Blue Suede Dreams - An Elvis Presley Fanfiction

Chapter 6: The Cost Of Fame

As Elvis's fame continued to soar, the pressure mounted in ways neither he nor Sarah had anticipated. His life had become a blur of flashing cameras, sold-out arenas, and constant demands from everyone around him. Every waking moment was accounted for—interviews, recording sessions, photo shoots, meetings with producers, and of course, performances. There was no escaping it. The fame that had once been a dream was now a machine, a relentless force that consumed every part of his life.

For Sarah, watching it all unfold from the sidelines was painful. Elvis wasn't the carefree boy she had known anymore; he was now a man who seemed to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders. Whenever they did manage to see each other, the exhaustion etched across his face was impossible to ignore. His eyes, once full of spark and mischief, now seemed clouded with fatigue and something deeper—something she couldn't quite put her finger on but worried about constantly.

Their once-frequent meetings had become rare, and their phone calls, though cherished, were often cut short by the demands of his schedule. Elvis was being pulled in a thousand different directions, and Sarah found herself wondering more and more where she fit into the whirlwind his life had become.

One evening, after a particularly long week of travel and performances, Elvis called Sarah from his hotel room in Chicago. His voice sounded strained, and she could hear the exhaustion in every word he spoke.

"Sarah, I swear, sometimes I think I'm gonna lose my mind," he said, his voice heavy with weariness. "I don't know how much more of this I can take."

Sarah sat up in bed, clutching the phone tightly to her ear. "Elvis, what's going on? You don't sound like yourself."

"It's just...everything," he replied, his voice trailing off. "The fans, the shows, the press... It never stops, Sarah. It feels like I'm not even me anymore. I'm just this...thing they all want a piece of."

Her heart ached hearing the pain in his voice. She had always known that fame would come with a cost, but she hadn't realized just how high that price would be for Elvis. He had always been larger than life, but now it seemed like the life he had always wanted was suffocating him.

"I'm worried about you," Sarah said softly, her voice filled with concern. "You've been going non-stop for months. Maybe you need a break, just to catch your breath."

Elvis let out a bitter laugh. "A break? I don't even know what that is anymore. There's always somethin'—always someone needin' me to be somewhere, doin' somethin'. I can't even think straight half the time."

"I hate that this is happening to you," Sarah whispered, feeling helpless. "I wish there was something I could do."

"You bein' there for me is enough," Elvis said, though his tone carried a sadness that made her wonder if even that was slipping away. "I don't know how I'd do this without you, Sarah."

They talked for a while longer, but the conversation left Sarah with a deep sense of unease. She knew Elvis was struggling, but it seemed like the more his fame grew, the harder it became for him to hold on to who he was. The Elvis she had known—the boy who used to dream of stardom while strumming his guitar on the front porch—was disappearing, and in his place was a man who was constantly being shaped and molded by the pressures of fame.

A few weeks later, Elvis returned to Memphis for a short visit, though even that felt rushed and chaotic. He was in town for only a few days before he would have to head back to the road, and Sarah could tell that he was barely holding it together. His smile was there, but it didn't reach his eyes, and his usually boisterous laugh felt forced, like it took too much energy to truly enjoy anything anymore.

They sat together on the porch of Graceland, the sprawling mansion that Elvis had recently purchased for his family. It was a far cry from the small house they had both grown up in, and though it was beautiful, it felt more like a fortress than a home. Elvis leaned back in his chair, staring out at the vast lawn in front of them, his expression distant.

"This place is somethin' else, huh?" he said, his voice filled with a mix of pride and disbelief. "Never thought I'd be livin' in a place like this."

"It's amazing," Sarah agreed, though she couldn't help but feel that the grandeur of the estate only added to the isolation she saw in his eyes.

Elvis sighed, running a hand through his hair. "But sometimes... I don't know, it feels like the bigger my life gets, the smaller I feel inside. Does that make sense?"

Sarah turned to look at him, her heart breaking at the vulnerability in his words. "Yeah, it does," she said softly. "You've got so much going on, but it seems like it's all pulling you away from the things that really matter."

Elvis nodded, his gaze fixed on the horizon. "I don't even know who I'm doin' all this for anymore. It's like I'm just goin' through the motions, doin' what everyone expects me to do."

"But what do you want, Elvis?" Sarah asked, her voice gentle but firm. "What makes you happy?"

For a moment, Elvis didn't answer. He stared out into the distance, his brow furrowed as if he were searching for an answer that had long eluded him. "I don't know," he admitted finally, his voice barely above a whisper. "I thought this—everything I've worked for—would make me happy. But now that I've got it, it doesn't feel like enough. It doesn't feel like...me."

Sarah reached out and placed a hand on his arm, squeezing it gently. "You're still you, Elvis. You're just...lost right now. But that doesn't mean you can't find your way back."

Elvis turned to her, his eyes filled with a deep, unspoken sadness. "I don't know if I can, Sarah. I don't know if I'll ever be able to go back to the way things were."

Sarah swallowed hard, trying to push back the lump that had formed in her throat. "Maybe you don't have to go back. Maybe you just need to figure out a new way to be—one that makes sense for who you are now."

Elvis looked at her for a long moment, as if her words had struck something deep within him. "Maybe," he said softly. "Maybe you're right."

But even as he said the words, Sarah couldn't shake the feeling that Elvis was slipping further and further away, not just from her, but from himself. The demands of fame were relentless, and the longer he stayed in the spotlight, the more it seemed to consume him.

In the weeks that followed, Sarah saw less and less of Elvis. His schedule became even more grueling, with tours taking him to different parts of the country and offers pouring in from all directions. The phone calls, which had once been frequent, became sporadic, and the postcards he used to send her now arrived less often, their messages growing shorter with each passing week.

Sarah tried to stay busy, throwing herself into her own life, but the emptiness she felt without Elvis by her side was hard to ignore. She missed the simple days, the days before the world had discovered him, when it was just the two of them against the world. Now, it felt like the world had won, and she was left standing on the sidelines, watching as Elvis was swallowed whole by the fame he had once craved.

One evening, after another long stretch without hearing from him, Sarah sat by the window of her bedroom, staring out at the darkening sky. She wondered where Elvis was, what he was doing, and whether he still thought about her the way she thought about him.

The phone rang, startling her from her thoughts. She rushed to answer it, her heart pounding in her chest as she hoped it was Elvis on the other end. But when she picked up the receiver, the voice that greeted her wasn't his—it was one of his managers, calling to let her know that Elvis was on the road again and wouldn't be back in Memphis for another few months.

The disappointment hit her like a wave, and for the first time, she allowed herself to cry. She cried for the boy she had known, for the friendship they had shared, and for the man Elvis was becoming—a man she feared she might never truly know again.

As the tears fell, Sarah realized that she was grieving not just for Elvis, but for herself—for the part of her that had been left behind in the wake of his meteoric rise to fame. And as much as she wanted to hold on, to be there for him, she knew that there were some things she couldn't save him from.

Elvis was a world apart now, and no matter how much she loved him, she couldn't follow him into that world. It was a place where fame ruled, where the spotlight burned too bright, and where the people who loved him the most risked being left in the shadows.