Every year, the Press Association of the Emerald City hired out the Crystal Plaza and threw everything it had into giving the Fourth Estate a wild fine time. The Fourth Estate repaid the favour by turning up in its party clothes to congratulate itself on existing, listen to a few speeches, empty the free bar, cut loose, and generally tear it up. Everyone got a ticket. For one night only, professional hierarchy was abolished. Typesetters drank Brandy Alexanders with radio station owners. Print and television got along famously until dawn, when the Plaza finally kicked them out.
Glinda had always loved going out principally because it gave her an excuse to do what she loved most of all: getting ready to go out. What should she wear? Who would be there? What might happen? Up until the second she left her apartment for the evening, there was no reason to believe it might not turn out to be the greatest night of her life so far. So when she woke up that Saturday morning, it was with a song in her heart. The Press Association dinner lay ahead, and she had the luxury of a whole day to spend getting ready.
Throwing a robe on over her pyjamas, she went through to the little kitchen area of her apartment to make breakfast. The kitchenette opened into the living room, which was furnished in the minimalist style. After a brief and intense flirtation with chintz, Glinda had decided she was against excess in interior design. She had made an exception for the living room sofa, however. While the rest of the room was decorated in neutral hues, the sofa was a bold shade of fuchsia. It was rather high-concept, and not that comfortable to sit on, but it looked great with the steel-framed coffee table topped with smoked glass, and the deconstructed anglepoise lamps she had just got on sale at Zoro's. Glinda felt it really made a statement. Just looking at it gave her a sense of pride in her own eye for design and her command of aesthetic juxtaposition.
After her toast and coffee, she threw on some old clothes, tied her hair up in a scarf, and spent an hour tidying the apartment and taking care of all the stuff she never seemed to find time to do during the week. She had an appointment at the salon down the street that afternoon, so she was keeping an eye on the clock, but still somehow she ended up running late. By the time she finished her chores, washed and dressed properly, and put on a touch of lipstick, she already should have been out the door. She had her coat on and was frantically trying to find her keys (what did they do – get up and walk when she wasn't looking?) when the telephone rang.
Bother. She was ten minutes late already. If she didn't leave right now, she might miss her appointment. It was probably just a sales call. Or her mother. But the second possibility made Glinda feel guilty – the night before, she hadn't called her parents after all. She had stayed late at EBC1 and then fallen asleep on the sofa after watching Dixxi. The loud brrring brrring from the living room took on an accusatory sound. She ran back through and caught up the receiver.
"Hello?"she said, out of breath.
"Glinda? It's me, Milla."
Milla, her husband Boq, and Glinda had all been at university together. Milla and Boq had gotten married straight after graduating and had settled down in rural Munchkinland, where Boq was an agricultural engineer. Although Milla and Glinda tried to keep in touch, their lives had diverged to such an extent in the past few years that their friendship persisted only via cards at Lurlinemas and the odd phone call. Each time they spoke, they would vaguely agree to try and meet up sometime, but Glinda was too busy with work to travel out to the country. Milla and Boq had three small children to look after, a house that needed a lot of work, and not much money; there was no way they could come to the city.
"Is this a bad time?" Milla said.
Glinda looked at her watch. "Well, I was just about to – "
"Oh, it is a bad time," said Milla, apologetically. "I've been meaning to call you for weeks, but things have been so hectic I've hardly had time to think. Don't let me keep you. We can catch up another time."
Glinda was tempted to take the out. But she couldn't ditch Milla – it would be too rude. And it had been months since they had last spoken.
"Not at all," she said, as cheerfully as she could. "I was just about to go out, but it can wait. It's nothing important. How are you all?"
"Oh, everyone's fine. Boq took the kids to his parents' this morning, just to get them out of my hair for a while. It's all very well when they're crawling, but when they start running around…I can barely keep up. I turned my back for a second the other day – literally, one second, and Clarinda got into the laundry room. Oz knows how she managed it, but she got hold of the powder and emptied the box everywhere."
"It must be difficult trying to keep track of them all."
"That's an understatement," sighed Milla. Then her tone lifted. "They're a delight, really. It's not all sun and rainbows, but I wouldn't swap them for anything."
"Of course you wouldn't," said Glinda. "They're just gorgeous. They must be getting so grown up! You'll have to send me some pictures. I haven't the faintest idea what their angel faces look like these days."
Milla laughed. "Angel faces? Angels with dirty faces, more like. You know how I felt about moving out here. I really wasn't that happy. But I can't say it's not good for the children. There's so much space for them to play. They just roll around in the grass and the mud all day long, happy as anything."
"What about you?" Glinda asked. "Do you feel any more at ease there?"
"It hardly troubles me now. I don't mind staying here at least until the children are ready to start school. Then maybe we'll think about moving closer to civilization. But enough about my domestic life – I want to hear about you! Tell me what's been happening in the Emerald City."
Glinda tried to think. What could she tell Milla? When so much time went by between phone calls, it wasn't that she felt she had nothing to tell. It was more that there was so much to relate that Glinda couldn't even begin to summarise it. And she was always conscious of not wanting to sound as if she thought her life was better than Milla's – more exciting, more glamorous. Naturally, she did think so. She could not imagine herself stuck out in the sticks with nothing to do except raise children and sweep up laundry powder. She could imagine the children, one day. A little girl, maybe, with blonde hair like Glinda's own. But not the laundry powder. Not the countryside. Shudder.
That wasn't to say that she didn't respect Milla for what she did, or the path she had taken. And Glinda had always admired the way Milla and Boq had chosen to get married when they were both so young, with such certainty. Because how did you know? How did you really know? It had seemed to Glinda at the time – as it seemed to her now – an act of fearlessness.
"Glinda? Are you still there?"
"Yes! Yes, I'm still here," Glinda said hurriedly. "I just got distracted for a clock tick. What's been going on? Nothing much, really. Work. Dating. Mainly work. Things are really taking off."
"You don't have to tell me that! We do get EBC1 out here – although the picture is terrible when it rains. It's the aerial. But I dread asking Boq to go up on the roof in case he falls. I'm sure the slates are loose. Anyway, I have to say, you look great on the news. It's like you're just meant to be there."
"Thank you," Glinda said, with the simple graciousness that came with having been complimented on her appearance her entire life. She had heard the words you look great (or a variation of them) so many times that it was like being told: your eyes are blue. It no longer spurred any vanity in her, but she appreciated having it pointed out nonetheless. "In fact, I've been trying this new diet. It's for skin clarity. You have to drink a lot of hot water, with lemon. I wasn't sure if it was working – I mean, I haven't really noticed a difference myself. I do cheat quite a lot though," she said ruefully. "I sometimes add maple syrup instead of lemon. I never have been able to shake my sweet tooth."
"Do you remember when you were addicted to those sugar gems?"
"Lurline, I forgot all about those! I used to get my mother to send me packets from home. I couldn't even look at one now."
"I'm not surprised!"
"It was terrible. I must have had enough to last a lifetime. But I always seem to find something else to replace my existing obsession." The world of sweet, short-chain, soluble carbohydrates offered infinite temptations. Glinda silently consigned them all to damnation.
"Talking of existing obsessions," said Milla. "How are things going with Jones?"
This threw Glinda completely, until she recalled how long it had been since she last talked to Milla. "Well…" she hesitated, considering just saying fine to save the trouble of having to explain, but deciding this wasn't a mature course of action. "Actually, Jones and I aren't seeing each other anymore."
"Oh, I'm sorry! I shouldn't have asked."
"Honestly, it's perfectly fine. It was months ago. It's not like it was serious. We never really clicked, anyway." She decided, on balance, not to mention Steve. Steve was a dream, but Milla would only ask more questions, and Glinda didn't really feel like getting into a whole discussion about her personal life. Omitting a few details wasn't the same as lying – at least, unless you were in court.
Although she hated to admit it, Avaric's comments from the day before were still bothering her. It wasn't that she didn't want to settle down. She just didn't want to settle for anyone other than the right person. It was no different from wanting to do the best she could when it came to her career. Was that such a crime? Fine. Guilty as charged, and not sorry about it.
At the other end of the line, she heard a loud clattering and banging of doors, and the high, happy sound of children's voices.
"Looks like peace time is over," said Milla. "Hello, you little monsters." The last part sounded muffled, as if she had turned away from the phone. "Did you have a nice time with Granny? What's that you're treading all over the floor, Rikla? Take your outdoor boots off, please. Yes, you can have some cake, but only after you wash your hands and then come and tell me all about what fun you've had. Boq, did you let them go down by the riverbank? Their boots are filthy." Milla's voice abruptly came back into focus. "Sorry, Glinda. It's like the circus just rolled in." In the background, indistinct but familiar, Glinda heard Boq's voice. Milla answered him. "Yes, I'm talking to Glinda." A pause. More indistinction. "She's fine." Another pause. "Yes, I'll tell her. Could you go and make sure they're using soap as well as water?"
Glinda was beginning to find it difficult to keep track, and felt an absurd impulse to go and wash her own hands, check there was no river sludge on the carpet, and divest herself of her shoes, in reverse order.
"That was Boq," said Milla, stating the obvious. "He was asking how you were. He sends his love."
"He's so sweet," said Glinda. She said it reflexively, with little thought, although she did mean it; he's so sweet was probably the same to Boq as you look great was to her. "Tell him I send mine too. But listen, Milla, hadn't I better let you go?"
Milla protested, but she was soon confronted with a chorus of demands for the promised cake, and the process of hanging up commenced. First, Glinda and Milla both affirmed how much they had enjoyed catching up; secondly, they commented again on how well the other sounded; third, they agreed it had been far too long; fourth, they promised to try and "sort something out soon", although neither elaborated on what this might be; finally, they said goodbye, and Glinda felt the slight disorientation that comes from speaking to a friend from a very different time, in a distant place, connected only by wires. Also, she had comprehensively missed her manicure.
She called the salon to apologise, and ask if they had any other appointments, but they were fully booked that afternoon. No need to worry. She could do her own nails. She would have to take her current polish off first, though, and she had used the last of the remover, but there was nothing to stop her running out to the shops to buy some acetone.
It was only after she had spent a happy hour outside and quite an unexpected amount of money on the acetone, two new nail polishes (just in case), and several other purchases she had not intended to make (but which seemed quite essential) that Glinda returned to her apartment and realised her keys weren't in her handbag. They were still wherever they had hidden themselves, on the other side of the front door.
Luckily her next-door neighbour, a kindly old lady who always mispronounced Glinda's name, happened to be in, and Glinda was able to summon a locksmith. The locksmith took another hour to arrive, in which time Glinda ate too many of Mrs Clutch's home-baked cookies and listened to her gossiping about the rich families she had worked for during her time as a young Ama. By the time the locksmith let Glinda back into her apartment and charged her a flat-out extortionate fee, it was half-past four.
That was fine. That was perfectly fine. She still had over two hours to get into the groove.
Twenty minutes later, with her face covered in Visage Cleanse and Enhance lotion, she was contentedly applying the second coat of Coral Sunrise to her toenails and shoulder-dancing to one of her favourite going-out records. Once the polish was dry she would take a bath and wash her hair, and then she just had to get into her dress and do her make-up, and she would be ready.
Over the shimmering, supple synthesizers of the record revolving on the turntable, the telephone rang.
Glinda regarded it warily. Answering the phone had got her into enough trouble already. But its shrill ring was ruining the beat.
"Lurline dash it all to Ev," she muttered. Hurriedly she set the lid back on the nail polish and hopped over to the stereo to turn down the music before picking up the phone.
"Hello?" she said, with some suspicion, relaxing only when she heard the deep, square-jawed voice on the other end. It was the voice of silk pocket squares, weekends at Caprice, and offices lined with leather-bound copies of Oz Law Review. Listening to it, Glinda felt a renewed sense of optimism. It was a rich and attractive voice, and there was really no reason to believe that it might not turn out to belong to the Ideal Guy.
"Oh, it's you, Steve. Thank Oz. I've been having the most ridiculous day. You wouldn't believe – Hold on. I can't hear you properly. Are you in the office? Poor darling, having to work on a Saturday…Is it that class action lawsuit? At least you can relax at the dinner tonight. I promise you won't have to talk about litigation to anyone. It doesn't officially start until eight, so if you want to pick me up at seven thirty instead of seven – sorry, what was that? You don't think you can make it? Steve, you're a scream! You really know how to make a girl laugh." On cue, Glinda laughed flirtatiously, but her merriment was cut short as the deep voice explained that its owner was, in point of fact, not joking.
At seventeen, nineteen, or even twenty-one, Glinda would have lost her cool at this kind of thing. Being stood up wasn't something she had ever dealt with well – especially not for major social events. Younger Glinda would have berated the errant suitor scaldingly, then looked around for something to throw. But she was older now. She didn't break vases or fly into tantrums. She counted to ten, and kept it on the level.
"That is a shame," she said, composedly, with just the right amount of disappointment, and no trace of annoyance. It was a difficult tone to carry off. It said: I'm sorry, but not that sorry. Your decision to forgo my company grieves me, but only because you clearly haven't thought this through. "But you mustn't feel bad about it – we all have to work, don't we? I won't hear another word of apology. It's simply not necessary. You just get on and deal with those torts. Yes…yes, I will have a pleasant evening. Oh, that's too cute! You hang up first. No, you hang up! I'm not doing it. You hang up. No…"
Life was really too short for this, Glinda thought, and hung up executively as Steve was halfway through entreating her to do just that. As soon as she did so, however, the beastly phone rang again.
"What. What is it this time?! Hello?"
"Glinda, that isn't how a lady answers the telephone! A lady is always glad to receive calls."
"Momsie," Glinda said, slumping back against her uncomfortable sofa.
"Is everything all right? You sound on edge."
"I'm not on edge."
"Are you sure? Because you sound as if you are."
Glinda put a hand over her eyes, feeling a headache coming on. Like a cloud descending.
A/N: Thank you so much for your reviews - it's so kind of people to take the time, and it's really appreciated. Next on Emerald City Lies: Glinda finally makes it to the Press Association dinner...and maybe gets to listen to the whole of Blondie's Parallel Lines without someone calling to interrupt her pre-going out shoulder-dancing (Steve really messed up Heart of Glass).