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matttgirlies · 7 months ago

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Matt & Me🎀

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a story heavily based on Priscilla Presley’s Book “Elvis & Me” based in the 1950’s - 1970’s.

fem! reader x singer! matt

disclaimer!! - in no way am i saying matt would ever support or do these kind of things, for the sake of the book certain unethical things do happen at times.

warnings - none

y/nn = your nickname for any confusion🩷

Chapter 16

Matt was not one for moderation. Whether it was motorcycles, slot cars, horses, amusement parks, roller skating, sex, or even eating the same dinner day after day, if he enjoyed it, he’d overindulge.

One evening I gave him a little racetrack with remote-control cars. A few weeks later he had an entire room added onto the house with a professional game track. There he played night after night until he had his fill and then he never went back to the room until much later, when the annex was converted into a trophy room filled with his gold records and awards.

As Matt’s fascination with occult and metaphysical phenomena intensified, Larry introduced him to the Self-Realization Fellowship Center on Mount Washington, where he met Daya Mata, the head of the center. She was an attractive woman who looked remarkably like Mary Lou Sturniolo, and he was captivated by her serenity and spiritual presence. She epitomized everything he was striving to be.

He made several trips to Mount Washington, high in the Hollywood Hills, for sessions with Daya Mata in the hope of attaining kriya, which is the highest form of meditation in the self-realization fellowship.

As relaxed and peaceful as he was upon leaving the center’s hushed grounds, one thing he couldn’t pass up was a good fight. We were on our way home from Mount Washington one afternoon when our limousine passed a service station where two attendants were staging a fight.

“Pull over,” Matt ordered the driver. “Someone’s in trouble.”

He jumped out of the car, Jerry and Sonny following him. Going up to one of the men, he said, “Hey, you want to give somebody trouble, give it to me.”

“Hey man,” the guy answered, scarcely able to believe this was Matt. “I don’t have any problem with you. I’m not arguing with you.”

“I’ll show you something, if you want to get into an argument,” Matt said. He shot out a karate kick, and to his surprise—and everyone else’s—he knocked a pack of cigarettes out of the guy’s pocket. Among our group, Matt wasn’t known for his precision in karate.

Long after the service station fracas, we joked about it, saying, “Man, the Lord had to be on M’s side that day. That guy doesn’t know how lucky he was.”

Of course Matt had acted as if he could do this any time he felt like it. After executing that kick he’d walked away with a cocky smile, warning the guy to stay out of trouble or there’d be more where that had come from.

When we got home, the way Matt told it you’d think he’d just wiped out half a battalion. We all supported his fantasy.

He was eagerly looking forward to one particular film, Harum Scarum, seeing it as a chance to create a genuinely interesting character. He identified his role with Rudolph Valentino’s in The Sheik. At last, he thought, a part he could sink his teeth into. He saw a physical resemblance between himself and Valentino, especially in profile.

During preproduction, he came home darkened with makeup, dressed in white harem pants and a white turban. He looked extremely handsome, much more so than Valentino, I thought. Tilting his head down, with a piercing gaze and flared nostrils, he asked rhetorically, “Frightening, isn’t it, how much I look like him? How does this get to ya?” He took me in his arms Valentino-style and dipped me over à la the famous poster of the Sheik.

Night after night he kept his makeup and the turban on all through dinner and up until bedtime.

Although he was excited about the film when he first started shooting, as each day went by, his morale plummeted. Harum Scarum’s plot was a joke, the character he played, a fool, and the songs he sang, disasters. The film turned out to be yet another disappointment, an embarrassing one at that.

Still committed to the picture but demeaned by its mediocrity, he sought escape on his motorbikes—eleven Triumphs and a Harley—a Triumph for each assistant and a Harley for the boss. Decked out in leather from head to toe and feeling as tough as a pack of Hell’s Angels on a rampage, we roared through the gates of Bel Air, revving our engines at all hours of the night.

Weekends we took trips through the Santa Monica Mountains, stopping off for beer or cola along the way. It was fast, fun, and wild. I liked it so much I wanted my own bike. Despite his concern for my safety, Matt reluctantly bought me a Honda Dream 350.

While he was at the studio I sometimes rode alone, fleeing Bel Air, Beverly Hills, Hollywood, MGM, and all my worries.

During this period when he was still seeking “a higher state of consciousness,” we experimented with mind-expanding drugs. We tried marijuana a few times and neither of us especially liked it. We felt tired and groggy and we’d become ravenously hungry. After a few raids on the refrigerator—and carrying the resulting extra poundage—we decided to stay away from the stuff.

Although he abhorred street drugs he was curious enough to try LSD once. When he initiated our experiment, he made sure Sonny West was on hand at all times to supervise. The night we tried it Steven, Jerry, Larry, Matt, and I took seats around the conference table in Matt’s office upstairs at Graceland.

Matt and I took half a tab. At first, nothing happened. Then we started staring at each other and laughing—our faces were becoming distorted.

I became engrossed in Matt’s multicolored shirt. It started to grow, getting larger and larger until I thought he was going to burst. It was captivating, but I did not like the feeling. I thought: This isn’t real, be careful, you’re losing it. I tried to hang on to sanity.

We all gathered around the large aquarium outside the master bedroom, fascinated by the tropical fish. Funny—there were only two or three, but suddenly I saw an ocean of brightly colored fish. I strolled off and found myself in Matt’s huge walk-in closet, purring like a kitten.

It was early morning when Matt and I went downstairs and walked outside. Dew came down, creating rainbows in the mist, glistening on the trees and the lawn. We studied the leaves, trying to count each dewdrop. The veins in the grass became visible, breathing slowly, rhythmically. We went from tree to tree, observing nature in detail.

It was an extraordinary experience. However, realizing it was too dangerous a drug to fool around with, we never tried LSD again.

By 1966, Matt’s long search for answers to the mystery of life involved us all in the strange games he loved to devise.

In the backyard of our Bel Air home we found him staring up at “planets moving across the sky” for long periods in the darkness of the early-morning hours. He was convinced, and nearly had us convinced, that there were energy waves so powerful they caused the stars to glide through the universe. For hours we all gazed up in wonderment, questioning each other about what we were seeing, afraid to ask ourselves anything but “Could it be possible?”

His imagination peaked later on when we were all standing in the yard, looking over at the Bel Air Country Club, which was being watered by a fanlike automatic sprinkler system.

“Do you see them?” said Matt, looking intently at the course.

“See what?” I asked, ready to hear anything.

“The angels, out there.”

“Angels?” I asked, looking down at the sprinklers. I wanted to believe him, we all did and we went along with it.

As if in a trance, he continued staring at the water for a few minutes. Then he began moving toward them. “I have to go,” he said. “You stay here. They’re trying to tell me something.” He wandered off toward the golf course in pursuit of his vision. Sonny followed, insuring Matt’s safety, and the rest of us were left dumbfounded.

Other times he’d have us stare for hours at the off-white, nubby-textured ceilings, trying to make out delicately lined faces that he said he was causing to appear.

More likely it was just a game he’d made up out of boredom and depression because he was experiencing such a low point in his career. He took sleeping pills to escape, and while fighting off their effect, he created his “images”—his mystical exercises.

The happiest I ever saw him was when he developed a passion for horses. It all began when I said I wished I had my own horse. I’d loved them since childhood, and Graceland had a beautiful old stable in back, where James used to store old furniture. It was equipped with a tack room, hayloft, and several stalls.

About two weeks later, I was in my dressing room when Matt, who had been out for a few hours, returned and knocked on my door. “Sattnin, I want you to come downstairs for a minute, got something I want to show you.”

He led me down the stairway, his eyes shining. Then he guided me out the back door, his hands over my eyes. When he took them away I saw the most beautiful sight I’d ever laid eyes on—a black quarterhorse with one white stocking.

“His name must be Domino,” I said, petting the spirited four-year-old. “Whose is he?”

“He’s yours.” Matt was grinning. “I saw this kid riding him, asked if he wanted to sell. I could just picture you on him.”

“You mean he’s really mine?” I yelled, jumping up and down, throwing my arms around Matt. I wanted to ride Domino immediately and I mounted him.

“Now, wait a minute,” Matt cautioned. “Don’t go off gettin’ yourself hurt.”

He watched me with a concerned look as I rode out through the pasture and then up to the window of Grandma’s room.

“Dodger! Dodger!” I shouted. “Look what I got, my own horse! Isn’t he beautiful? Matt just bought him for me!”

“Good Lord,” Dodger cried. “Get off that thing, y/n. You’re gonna get yourself killed. I’m gonna whop that young’un for gettin’ you that. You got no business ridin’ that creature.”

“It’s okay, Dodger, I can handle him,” I called out, riding off happily.

He was wild and spirited. When I rode in the late afternoons, I was in my own world. It was a wonderful release. Often Matt would watch me from his upstairs window. I’d call out to him, “Come down and ride with me.

Matt didn’t ride very well at that time. About the only experience he’d had was in a few of his films, where he didn’t feel totally at ease. In fact, he was somewhat intimidated by large animals; nonetheless, he accepted my invitation and tried riding Domino.

He loved it, declaring, “I want a horse of my own, a golden palomino.”

Jerry Schilling found Rising Sun at a nearby stable. He was the handsomest palomino imaginable—big and powerful. He’d been trained for shows, and I’ve never seen an animal that demanded and thrived on as much attention as Rising Sun. There was no doubt that this was the horse for Matt.

He remained skeptical and had Jerry test Sun out. “Hey, it’s beautiful, man,” Matt said.

“A great-looking horse. Jerry, you get on it and ride.” Jerry had little, if any, riding experience and was horrified at the thought. Nonetheless, he gamely mounted Sun, looking as misplaced as Noël Coward on a Clydesdale.

Sun took off like a bullet with Jerry barely holding on, every bit of pride in his boots. The magnificent animal seemed to be studying Matt as much as Matt was studying him. He raced back, heading straight to where Matt was standing. “Hold ’em back,” Matt yelled. “I am, M, I am,” shouted Jerry. Matt was won over.

Now we all developed horse fever. We rode late afternoons and well into the evenings. But this wasn’t enough for Matt. As with anything he enjoyed, he wanted everyone else to join the fun. Thus began our quest for horses for the group, including their wives. We bought horses for Billy and Joe Smith, Nate Doe, Jerry and Sandy Schilling, Steven, Charlie, Red, Sonny, Richard—everyone. We bought the finest saddles, blankets, halters, bits, reins, feeding buckets. Anything that had to do with a horse, we bought.

Every afternoon we’d all mount up and ride, in full view of the two hundred or so local fans lined up along the fences. In western riding gear—chaps included—Matt would turn it into a show. He’d race down the long slope in front of Graceland and then strut back and forth before the fans, demonstrating how well he could ride. He’d have all-out races with the guys as the fans cheered them on.

They were in for even more of a spectacle when Matt bought his prize black Tennessee Walker, nicknamed Bear, which he rode attired in full show regalia. He and Bear put on a fancy high-stepping show that—if made available to paying customers—would probably have matched his Vegas take.

His other hobbies—go-carts and model cars—were only machines. This was the first hobby that involved a living creature. The horses responded to his love, and it was touching to witness his attachment to them.

It was a close time for all of us, we had something in common. However, after. Matt had delighted in lavishing horses on all of us, Graceland wasn’t quite big enough to handle the herds. We didn’t know it yet, but we were about to become ranchers.

Excerpt from: "Elvis and Me" by Priscilla Beaulieu Presley. Scribd. This material may be protected by copyright.

a/n - sweet chapter since the last few have been sad🎀

#matt stuniolo fanfic #matthew sturn #matthew sturniolo #matt sturniolo #chris sturniolo #christopher sturniolo #sturniolo edit #sturniolo fanfic #sturniolo imagine #sturniolo smut #sturniolo triplets #sturniolo x reader #nick sturniolo #Spotify

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