AN: First off, for any who have been reading my other story, "The Light's Gone Out," and might be concerned, I have not and will not quit working on that. I've been playing with a new scene-the writing style I use with that particular piece takes a lot of care, but rest assured I'll update as soon as I can.
On the more immediate subject of this story-I want to say that it isn't typically within my range or style as an author to write a story of this sort, that deals with any conceivable sort of AU or for that matter anything out of canon. This piece is actually the bastard child of a real-world experience and an inspired moment. I got a very clear image in my head and, well, had to write it-those of you who are writers will likely understand.^_^ So why not share, I guess?
That said, I hope it's not a complete blasphemous atrocity. Reviews, as always, are greatly appreciated. They let me know where the hell I stand.^_^; So without further ado (about nothing or anything)... here:
Chapter 1 – Deviance
The car door shut decisively, muting out the sounds of gossiping teenagers as they made their end-of-day mass exodus. Glinda's right hand immediately flipped open her phone, turning it on and dialing her voicemail, as her left deftly unbuttoned her Catholic school sweater.
"Charles, does Father own a watch?"
Her chauffer spared a glance over his shoulder as he battled with the outgoing traffic. "Miss Glinda, you bought him one for his last birthday."
"Then why should it be so difficult for him not to call me during the hours I'm in school?" She did not listen for his answer, nor did he offer one, as she lifted the cell to her ear.
Moments passed. The girl's expression remained as stone. However, she sighed as she put away her phone. "Something wrong, Miss Glinda?"
"Nothing at all. It's just as it always is." With a toss of her hair, she screwed her features into a farcical impression of her father. "'Darling, your mother and I will be out for a dinner party and will be home late. We've asked Ana-Marie to make your favorite. Good luck on your history exam tomorrow—be sure to study. We love you.'" She laughed. "Brilliant. He hasn't even remembered that I'm taking economics this term."
"Just as well—you've always hated history, as I recall." Charles smiled into the rearview mirror, and Glinda could not help a smirk in return.
"Nor economics, if you must know. I had thought the science of money would be far more interesting. At least one good thing has come of it—I have the word of very well-paid educators that shopping is a sign of my patriotism."
"I'm certain you could singlehandedly stop the waning of our economy, if given free reign."
"Undoubtedly," Glinda replied, turning her attention toward the silently passing scenery. Her bored tone indicated to Charles that she no longer wished to converse, and he honored her wishes.
As the car circled to a stop, Charles promptly let himself out to hold the door for Glinda. As she stepped from the vehicle, she rose onto her toes to kiss his cheek with a smile. "You're a good man, Charles Brown."
The chauffer sighed. "I never will forgive your father for taking you to that damnable show." Yet his eyes smiled back at her.
The girl laughed. "You'll see. Someday I'll play Sally Brown on Broadway, and then you'll take it all back."
Glinda breezed through the foyer with a graceful stride. With some maneuvering through ornately furnished rooms and halls, she arrived in the family kitchen, designed specifically for such an occasion as any family member wished to behave as average Americans and cook or otherwise provide their own food. It was spacious and designed with sort of look that hinted at the traditional yet flaunted its modern capabilities. Through a single swinging door lay the main kitchen, where servants might prepare food as required by family, guests, or themselves. It appeared as Glinda might have imagined a restaurant kitchen, all stainless steel and white tiled floor—it offered one the impression of perfect sterility, and Glinda avoided it.
She set down her bag on a counter and called for the mail to be brought. Sifting through envelopes, she set aside bills for her father's secretary, opening and reading invitations to one dinner party or another—occasionally a ball of some sort would occur to add variability to the atmosphere. Packages addressed to her mother she left alone—no predicting what sort of nonsense trinkets had been shipped from the shopping channel or obscure internet sites. She did not care.
"Ana-Marie," Glinda called, and a head popped through the swinging door. She set down the mail she'd been sorting so that she might address the woman directly. "What did he tell you to cook for tonight?"
"Why, fettuccini alfredo with mushrooms and extra garlic."
The girl turned back to her task. "Hold off on the garlic. Best to not overdo it."
"Yes, miss." Ana-Marie's head disappeared. The door flapped once or twice behind her.
A moment of silence passed, relished for its simplicity, despised for its void. The blonde tapped a fingernail against the countertop. The house phone rang with a biting clarity of sound. Glinda moved swiftly to retrieve it before any of the servants could.
"Arduenna residence," she answered with all the polite enthusiasm of an underpaid receptionist.
"Is this my lovely heiress to a nigh uncountable fortune?" a male voice filtered through the receiver.
Glinda shifted the phone onto her shoulder, crossing her arms over her chest. "Is this the jackass hotline?"
"Available twenty-four hours to serve you better."
"What do you want, Avery?"
"A pilgrimage, if you will, of a highly religious sort."
"Oh really? I suppose I'll need my fake ID?"
"And quite probably some cash, if you can manage it, my queen?"
"I can cover my own admittance at least. I don't know that I have change to spare."
"You hurt me deeply."
"Get on with it; I think the signal is growing fuzzy," Glinda said with a due inflection of irritated boredom.
"We're all going to the Philosophy Club."
Glinda's brow furrowed. "Oh that—what did Father call it?—hive for deviants."
"It's just a bar. Anyway, how would your dear old Popsicle ever know?"
"Your proposition—what is the right term? Intrigues me?"
"Glinda…"
"No, no—bores me. That is the term I was looking for."
"I'll pick you up at nine, and dress nicely. No one wants to be thought a slob by deviants."
"I'm hanging up on you."
"Ciao, babe!"
The phone receiver beeped as she disconnected. Glinda sighed and returned it to its cradle. She had barely turned when it rang a second time. The teenager snatched the phone, turned it on, and brought it to her ear in one swift motion.
"Avery, I said—"
"Glinda, darling, is everything all right?"
The girl hesitated, startled. "Mother. No, it's fine here. Why, has something happened?"
"Nothing at all, dear."
"Oh." Glinda was unaccustomed to being called at home by either of her parents.
"Your father and I are just so sorry that we can't be home with you tonight."
"No, I understand," she said a bit too hastily.
"Your father asked Ana-Marie to make your favorite—"
"Of course."
"—even though we won't be able to share it with you."
The girl laughed. "Well perhaps Charles can eat dinner with me in your stead."
"Darling, I'm not sure that would be entirely appropriate—"
"It was a joke, Mommie Dearest."
A beat interrupted, almost like an audible blink. "Dear, I don't think that's very—"
"Also, just a joke."
"Ah, I see. You kids."
"Indeed. Everything's funny, isn't it?"
Glinda chewed her lip in the silence.
"Well, as long as you're all right. You worry us sometimes, there all alone."
The girl nodded mutely before she remembered her mother could not see the gesture. "Of course, I'm fine."
"We must be going then. Get to bed early. You have that—what is it, a math test tomorrow?"
"No, Mom, I have no test tomorrow."
"Oh well, you need your rest. Good evening, darling."
Glinda heard the call disconnect and returned the phone once again to its resting place. Retrieving her bag from the counter, she trod upstairs to her bedroom. Setting her things down on the bed and stopping to open the window, she changed out of her school uniform to the tranquil sounds of birds in the trees just outside her room or an occasional passing car beyond the gated grounds.
With a glance in the mirror, tilting her head in the angle of light, Glinda unfastened her bra and dropped her undergarments at her feet, stepping over them. Draping a robe across her shoulders, she entered her bathroom and began running hot water into the Jacuzzi tub, allowing the current to spill over her palm until it reached her preferred temperature. She prepared salts and bubbles as it filled. Lighting a candle—she tested new scents periodically, whimsically selecting Cherry Blossom, and always used a wooden match—she turned last to her selection of music, browsing through CDs with an air of one possessing infinite time at a philosophical crossroad. She settled upon her 1982 motion picture soundtrack of Annie, her childhood love for musical films lending to her relaxation. With all done, she drew back her hair and allowed the robe to drop away, lowering herself into the heated water. Music soaked into her muscles as she felt them release, and Glinda sang.
With no one to hear through soundproofed walls, she sang.
OZ
Avery's Mustang convertible screeched to a brake before Glinda's door fifty minutes late. As was his custom, he forewent doorbell or cell phone in favor of laying on his horn to announce his arrival.
Glinda hastily descended the front steps and threw her purse irately into the front seat. "Very discreet," she snapped.
"So what?" He cranked his radio for show. "Your parents aren't home, princess."
"Our servants are. Any one of them could—"
"Snitch on you?" He laughed.
"So scary!" A thickly curled head leaned over Avery's shoulder and cackled.
Glinda plastered a tight smile. "Miss Phyllis."
The girl turned red. "Must you insist—!"
"Shut up, Philly." Avery pushed her back into her seat.
"Move over, Shelley," she snapped, and Glinda shook her head at the absurdity. How Avery had maneuvered both girls into a backseat space scarcely big enough for one she neglected to ask. Then again, she thought, Philly's anorexia offered some allowance for such crowding. "You know, Avery wouldn't even let one of us ride over here up front, because he didn't want to bother moving us to make room for you."
"Just be quiet, Philly," Shelley said, withdrawing as far as she could from the brunette in the limited space.
"Let's just go," Glinda said, slipping into the front seat and tossing her gold curls to observe their effect in the rearview mirror.
"So glad you decided to join us," Avery said playfully.
"Bite me." He obliged, and she slapped him across the arm with as much genuine strength as she could muster. He merely laughed.
The combination of wind and radio ruled out any possibility of conversation as Avery drove. He possessed a love, in addition, for showing off the capabilities of his engine primarily through the noise of it. Over the roar of the world, Glinda shouted, "You're an asshole!" Avery smiled, flashing his teeth. He had not heard her, and she suspected he did not care. In the wind and rush biting at her cheeks, Glinda laughed at all the foolishness she could imagine in the small universe.
Avery refused to park too near the bar—for fear of his car. As they walked through darkened streets, he gentlemanly draped an arm about Glinda, in protection against any potential harm. She shoved him away. Philly made a noise in her throat that clearly indicated disgust. Shelley, meanwhile, trailed closely behind Avery, in apparent terror.
The black door to the bar bore the words "The Philosophy Club" in neon-colored paint. In much larger letters along the building's wall a phrase had been scrawled—whether the work was graffiti or the club's own decoration Glinda could not tell. The words read: "The nature of man is not what he is born as, but what he is born for." She stopped to contemplate the spectacle. Before her mind could move on to their intended purpose, Avery was pulling her inside by an arm.
Inside, they met immediately with a man—or possibly a woman—who had a foot in height and likely a hundred pounds on Glinda. Without a blink, the teenager handed over her expertly crafted fake ID. A glance at the counterfeit license, then a glance at Glinda, and she paid all four three-dollar admissions with a fifty as Avery, Shelley, and Phyllis handed over their own IDs. Philly alone found herself stuck with an under-21 wristband.
"It's pre-show music!" Avery shouted into Glinda's ear over the din.
"Show?"
"Yeah! Shelley knows someone performing. Should be interesting." He laughed, and Glinda furrowed a brow at him.
They seated themselves at the bar with a clear view of the small stage. A dozen feet of cement dance floor—soon to be standing space, when the performance began—filled the gap.
"Charming, isn't it?" Glinda said to Philly as she flagged the bartender.
"Oh stop." Philly wrinkled her nose at the blonde. "You're here with the rest of us, princess. And you're not fooling anyone with that damn superiority complex."
Glinda raised an eyebrow and ordered her drink, leaving Philly to the choice of water or Coke.
"What a bitch," Avery whispered into her ear as she swiveled her chair away from the bar.
"Aren't we all?" Glinda said, sipping conservatively as Avery downed his first beer.
"The philosophical type," he replied with a belch. "See, you do belong here after all." She rolled her eyes at him.
An hour into waiting, a petite drag king emerged onto the stage with a microphone. While scattered applause hailed his arrival, he was forced into tapping the mic and clearing his throat in an amplified fashion to command the silent attention of the bar on whole. "Thank you all for coming tonight." Despite his stature, the king might have passed for a young man, but his voice betrayed him. "Our troupe is called the Androgynous Animals—also known as the AA—for those of you who don't already know us. Only some of us are alcoholics."
A few cheers went up, presumably regulars.
"Thank you. And for those of you who don't know me, I'm Chaz Breaker." Whistles answered. The standing space had mostly filled. "And I'd like to start us off with a toast." Someone handed him a bottle, which he lifted.
"Here's to those we fuck the best.
We fuck them best when they're undressed.
We fuck 'em standing, sitting, or lying.
If they had wings, we'd fuck 'em flying.
And when they're dead and long forgotten,
We'll dig their ass up and fuck 'em rotten."
Chaz took a swig of his bottle, accompanied by a collective tipping of glasses. Glinda did not drink.
"And now I'd like to introduce our first performer. The lovely, multitalented, the Queen of Broadway—behind the theatres, that is." Laughter and applause. "Please welcome Miss Betty Bloop."
The first queen strutted out to the pulse of loud music and poor lighting. Before long, audience members of varying genders were offering up one-dollar-bills in their teeth. "Oh God—we're expected to tip these people?" Glinda wrinkled her nose. "They aren't going to start stripping, are they?"
"That would kind of defeat the point," Shelley said from two seats down. Avery ordered another beer.
A half dozen numbers in, Glinda was yawning and growing more inclined to become drunk herself. Chaz came back onstage encouraging applause as a king named Cain Griffith finished lip-syncing his Rammstein number. "It seems to me," Glinda said to Avery, "that community drag boils down to one thing. The queens think that if they're fat, it's sufficient merely to jiggle their man-boobs. The kings that that if they're fat, the blubber will hide their real boobs."
"Fat faggots," he grunted and shook his head.
No sooner has she spoken, however, than their host introduced the next number. "Our queens of the ancient world, that Dianic duo—"
"You bastard!" snapped a falsely high voice from offstage.
Another quickly chimed: "Diana is only the Roman derivative of Artemis!"
Chaz smiled innocently at the audience and shrugged. "Cressida and Thalia!"
Glinda recognized the opening of "Glitter and Be Gay." The pair who emerged certainly struck the impression of femininity. Bone skinny, with stiletto heels adding inches to their already notable stature—to one of a height with Glinda, at least—they moved with the grace and air of Hollywood divas in an age long passed. Their makeup and hair, while hardly tasteful, were expertly done, Glinda noticed with considerable surprise. And while possessing no apparent dance training, their energy and theatricality set them apart from the preceding performances.
"Hell yeah, bitches!" Avery leaped from his seat and bounded up to the stage to stuff singles into each padded bra.
"What a spectacle," Glinda sighed, though she would have conceded her relative respect for the two queens, had any the notion to inquire. "Enjoy yourself?" she asked Avery as he fell back into his bar chair—almost missing.
"Hey, if I didn't know any better, I'd hit it."
"I'm perfectly willing to place a wager on the 'knowing better' bit." Glinda raised her glass to her lips.
"You're such a bitch," Philly grumbled as audibly as she could. The blonde ignored her with a pleasurable ease.
"A regular Greek tragedy," Chaz quipped as he returned.
"Son of a bitch!" synchronized voices floated from backstage.
"And next up—"
"Galahad's gutter whore, I'm sure," Glinda said with a snort.
"Hot and spicy," Avery giggled.
"—our local king of camouflage, a spectacle in his own right to exist. So welcome our Lord of Lorien—"
"You're a dumbass, Chaz!" Thalia and Cressida shouted.
"Ignore those ditsy bitches, they're a few too many Zimas to the wind. Please welcome to the stage, our very own Elf!" With a brief heralding bout of applause, Chaz cleared the stage.
"Oh shit, Linkin Park." Avery groaned. "Another emo dyke." More than a few glares sliced in his direction. Glinda rolled her eyes. Indeed, though, the king who stepped into the light with mic in hand gave them all more than a moment's pause.
Glinda raised her head for a clearer view, but the image did not change. "Who is he?" "She." Avery took a gulp of beer. "They're all faggots, remember." But the blonde had ceased listening even as she asked the question. All her senses focused in one direction.
"Elf" did not lip-sync his lyrics—the first of the performers to actually attempt any singing—and his voice was not mediocre. Glinda might have closed her eyes to listen, but she could not look away for fascination.
The bewitching creature was thin and angular, the cut of muscle clear in bare arms, and had successfully managed to hide any hint of breasts, his T-shirt tucked seamlessly into the waist of his half-tattered jeans. Shaggy black hair—blacker than Glinda had seen on a human being—teased ears and jaw line. But the spectacle Chaz had mentioned lay not in vocal ability nor trim physique—as surely as though the cheap electric lighting were purest sunlight, the king called Elf possessed skin as green as sin.
The audience members who had never seen him stared speechlessly, some wondering at possibilities of theatrical illusion.
His singing, despite Avery's initial reaction to the choice of music, left no impression of anger or aggravation. He sounded earnest, his voice beautiful.
"'Cause I've drawn regret
From the truth
Of a thousand lies."
Glinda rose and did not notice confounded expressions from her friends. Stepping one foot in front of the other—there seemed to be no one in her way—she stood abruptly at the foot of the stage and, reaching up, offered her first tip. Elf's eyes met hers, brown and solid as earth. Their hands touched for only a moment before the contact was broken.