It always comes as a shock to learn that Hollywood, Tinsel Town, City of Glamour and the stuff that dreams are made of is just a portion of the otherwise utterly prosaic Las Angeles, city of freeways, traffic jams and smog. Luann was driving, hands frozen to the wheel as she crept along the freeway at 70 per with cars blasting past her left and right. Gunther was navigating from the seat beside her, with maps spread all about him, his cell phone propped on the dashboard, its GPS app running. He had so many maps spread out that the other four were squeezed into the back seat. Fortunately the old pink Cadillac had been designed to seat three fullbacks abreast and teenagers were a slender lot. Knute had offered to let Crystal sit on his lap but the spike-haired girl thought he might enjoy that too much.

The two in the front seat had been bickering since they crossed the city line, arguing over the best route, which exit to take and so on. Tiffany was one the verge of screaming; it reminded her too strongly of her parents driving, especially when her mother drove and her father correcting her driving.

"There! That exit!" Gunther shouted, pointing to an off-ramp they were nearly past. Luann swung the wheel over hard, bulling her way through traffic to the exit. In her wake was a swarm of squealing tires, honking horns and flipped birds but Luann had one thing no one wanted to argue with - 4500 pounds of Detroit Iron. Even giant SUVs gave way.

The Freeway dumped them in a less fashionable part of the city, somewhere between Mad Max and Robocop. The surface street immediate split in five different directions. A sign at the top of the exit ramp warned: "GPS in error / Follow street signs." With a cry of panic Gunther shuffled through his maps. Behind her Luann could hear Tiffany pulling down the door lock (the Caddy predated electric door locks) and kind of wished she had a free hand to do the same.

Gunther started giving Luann a flurry of directions, turning down one street then back up another. She began to suspect that Gunth had gotten them lost and was trying to get back on the right track. Finally one last put them on a five-lane street driving past a lot of slummy houses. Then, a half mile later, as if they had crossed an invisible line into another dimension, the houses started looking clean, maintained and rather more better built. This went on for a mile before crossing another invisible line the houses changed over into small factories, warehouses and office complexes. The area looked desolate, which was oddly reassuring. No people meaning no carjackings.

Gunther was scanning now for the addresses marked on the building. Finally he pointed to one building indistinguishable from all the others and said, "That's the one."

Luann pulled into the parking lot that ran adjacent to the building. It was crumbling blacktop and grass. A loading dock at the far end of the building suggested a prior occupation. Windows along the side had been bricked up at some date and painted white like the rest of the building.

The others piled out of the car talking excitedly, their long journey coming to an end. Luann turned off the motor and sat there, feeling her heart pounding in her chest. Unlike the others she was dreading this moment. It had sounded so easy back in Pittsville, walking up to Quill and shouting, "What the hell?" but now she was filled a dozen conflicting emotions. What if Quill wasn't really here? What if he had a perfectly good reason for leaving? What if that Elizabeth Porter woman was there? How do you talk to someone old enough to be your father? (OK, 26 year-olds aren't old enough to be her father but there was still the sense that instead of yelling at one of your peers she would be yelling at an adult...)

"You coming?" Tiffany yelled through the glass. Luann took a deep breathe, let out slowly. Repeated the process because the first time hadn't help, then got out of the car. She lead the way to the front of the building and through the glass double doors inside.

And stopped in dismay because there was no one inside.

The front office extended the width of the building but was only twenty-five feet or so deep. On one side was a large receptionist's desk and a credenza with a coffee maker perched on it. A hallway pierced the center of the room, running back about half the length of the building. Door could be seen opening off from either side of the hall. And on the other side of the room were a couple clusters of couches and armchairs surrounding coffee tables covered with a scattering of beat-up magazines. Belatedly she noticed a well dressed, thin man sitting on one of the couches. He had been glancing through one of the magazines but had looked up when the kids had trooped into the building.

"Excuse me, do you work here?" Luann asked.

"Sadly, no. Well, happily, no." he said, standing up. "Andre Clearey, fashion designer for the stars, at your service," he said it with a pronounced French accent. "Judith, the person you're looking for, stepped out to get some lunch. She should be back momentarily."

At the words 'fashion consultant' two things happened. Tiffany straightened up, pulling her shoulders back, thrusting out her chest and crossing her legs in the way models do to emphasis their shape. Gunther also brightened up, gripped his sketchbook more firmly and crossed over to the nattily dressed man.

"Is Quill here?" Luann asked the man.

"I should hope so. I'm scheduled for a meeting with Quill in ... oh ... half an hour ago. If he makes me wait much longer I'm going to have to charge him by the hour!"

"We'll wait," Luann announced, crossing her arms. No one seemed impressed with her sound of defiance.

"You say you're a fashion designer?" Gunther asked Clearey.

"That's what it says on my card," the man said. "Who are you?"

"Gunther, Gunther Berger. I've been working on some dress designs and I wondered if you'd look at them and tell me what you think."

Gunther was too starry-eyed to notice the momentary grimace. Clearey had been asked to look at sketches from hundreds of would-be designers, none of whom were any good. But ever the professional, he smoothed his face into a smile and held out his hand for Gunther's book. He had gone through several pages before cocking an eyebrow in Gunther. "You got a bit of crush on that big blonde."

Gunther blushed and stuttered. "She's all stuck on Quill. We came all across the country just so she can ask him why he left. She wanted me along to lift heavy object. That's all I am to her."

""I've been there," the nattily dressed man said. "You just have to keep looking for the right person. You're a big fan of Bob Mackie, I see."

"Is that bad?"

"It's never bad to start with the mast- Wait! Where did you say you were from?"

"Pittsville."

"Never heard of it. But you're all high school students, and blondie has been dating Quill?"

"Yeah, then he just up and disappeared. We tracked him to here."

"Oh, My God!" Clearey whispered. And started giggling.

Gunther was about to ask what was so funny when a blonde woman in her mid thirties walked through the door. She was dressed in a grey pantsuit with a large purple scarf tied around her neck. She was holding a cloth sack with the logo for a deli printed on the side. She looked at Luann and the others in surprise. "Can I help you?" she asked, moving around behind the receptionist's desk, placing her bag on a table behind her.

"We're here to see Quill Masterson." Luann said.

"Do you have an appointment?" the woman asked. She was really quite pretty, like a starlet just past her prime.

"No."

"Who should I say is calling?" she asked, picking up a phone."

"Don't!" interrupted the fashion designer before Luann could answer. He hurried over to the receptionist's desk and leaned in confidentially.

"What is it, Andy?" she said, not bothering with the French pronunciation of Andre.

"You see that girl," he whispered, but apparently not low enough because Luann could still hear him. "Season Seven."

The receptionist looked at Luann for a long moment before turning back to the designer. "You're kidding me?"

"Heard it from her little friend over there. She's been dating Quill all this year. When he disappeared she followed him all the way out here."

"I had better warn Quill," the receptionist said.

"No, No! Don't warn him. Judith, love, this is going to be the best joke either of us will ever see in our lives. Let Quill find out for himself. I can't wait to see the look on his face when he finds his girlfriend is out here waiting for him."

"I could lose my job..."

"You call working for this shitty company a 'job?"

Judith hesitated.

"Just tell him that I'm getting tired of waiting and am going to start charging by the minute."

She picked up the phone and punched a button, after a moment she said, "Andy's out here waiting. He's threatening to start charging by the minute." Turning to the fashion designer, "He's coming. If I get fired for doing this you are so going to pay for it!"

"You won't," Andre or Andy assured her. He rushed back to Gunther. "Get your phone and go over to the other side of the room and start recording. Make sure you get Quill's expression when he sees blondie." He gave Gunther a push in the direction he wanted. Meanwhile he got out his own phone and started the video camera app.

A door down a hall opened and flock of men came out. they were all dressed in expensive suits and laughing over some joke. Leading the pack was shorter man with a carefully cultivated three-days old growth of whiskers. Bringing up the rear was an older man, taller than the others, and a hundred pounds heavier. He was the only one not laughing. He didn't look like a man who laughed much. The short man in front, it took a moment to realize, was Quill, looking more his age with the scrubby beard and suit.

"Hey, Andy, you ol' buggerer, sorry to keep you..."

"Quill?" Luann began hesitantly.

Quill looked up at the voice. "Crikey!" His face, what could be seen under his beard blanched and he turned around and started back the way he came.

"Don't you walk away from me, Quill Masterson!" she hollered, in the same tone of voice her mother always used when she was in trouble. "I've got a lot of things to ask and you're going to answer every one!"

"G'day, Yank, what a surprise." Quill turned and tried to assume a confident grin.

"Don't you 'G'day Yank' me. What the hell are you doing here when you said you had to go back to Australia immediately. There are no planes to Australia from Pittsville!"

"Right, that's why I'm here. I had to catch - uh - uh - connecting flight home."

"But you're still here. It's been almost two weeks and you're still here, and you don't look like you're planning to leave ... ever!"

"Some things came up. I had to deal with them but tomorrow, I really am heading down under."

"Some things? Like Elizabeth Porter? You said you were my boyfriend but you had someone else all along."

"Now technically I never said..."

"Oh shut up. And what's this about you being twenty-six? What else have you lied to me about? You're just a lying, cheating sack of sh... Oh, you're not worth it. I've been a complete fool to think you ever cared. Come on we're going!" She turned and started marching towards the door.

At the door she paused. "I'll never live with myself if I don't," she grumbled and swung around, marched up to Quill and punched him with all her might. Pain exploded unexpectedly in her hand and she was too busy nursing that to see Quill flop back and laid quiet on the floor, his 'best buds' scattering to avoid getting any blood on their expensive clothes.

The big man at the back of the group pushed forward and knelt beside Quill then stood up and pointed to two of the men, "Bert, Blue, take Quill to the hospital. Judith, call that quack we have on retainer ... ah, Dr. Hackenbush, and told him to meet then at the hospital. It's time for him to earn those big bucks we've been paying him. And you," he clamped a meaty hand on Luann's arm, " we need to talk."

He half-lead, half-dragged Luann down the hall and into a large office. He pointed to a chair in front of the desk for her to sit in.

"I'm in trouble, aren't I," Luann said meekly.

"We'll talk about that in a moment. Let's see your hand."

Holding it by her forearm, the beefy man turned her hand over, looking at it critically. Blood was oozing from skinned knuckles. "Can you move your fingers?" he asked. "Can you make a fist? Good. Now straighten then out. Any sudden or sharp pain?" Luann shook her head.

"Good, good," the man murmured. "Doesn't look to be any broken bones but we'll have to X-rayed to be safe." He picked up his phone, "Judith?" There was a knock on the door. He put the phone down and went to the door. The receptionist was there with a bowl of ice and several neatly pressed tea towels. "Oh," he said with surprise, "you read my mind. How do you do that." He took the ice and towels, started to turn away, the turned back towards the door. "Judith, love, in a few minutes I'll be taking Miss ... Miss ..."

"DeGroot" Luann furnished.

"Of course, how could I forget. I'll be taking Miss DeGroot to the hospital to have her hand X-rayed. Would you be a dear and tell her friends that and draw them a map so they can find the place. Thanks, you're a peach."

He laid the bowl of ice on a corner of his desk, then pushed papers out of the way in front of Luann, spread out a couple of the towels. He piled a handful of ice on the top sheet and folded it into a square. Then he folded the other towel lengthwise over the ice. "Put the back of your hand there," he pointed and after positioning it the way he wanted, knotted the ends of the second towel over her hand, tying the ice to the skinned knuckles. "Let me know if that gets too cold or starts to hurt, OK?"

The ice had stung at first but after a couple seconds had soothed her nerves enough that she began to feel a but more normal.

The big man had seated himself behind the desk, leaned towards her, "perhaps we should introduce ourselves. - But before we do that I want to say, and this is strictly off the record. I put myself through law school working as a bouncer at various night clubs. In all my years as a professional bouncer I have never seen such a classic punch. You swing from the waist, you put your whole body into, you carried through and past the point of impact... I have seen guys, easily twice your size, who couldn't throw a punch like that; couldn't knock a guy down. Not that I was eager to see any punches being thrown and not that I'm happy you decided to smack Quill, but as an ex-bouncer I have to admire a well placed punch."

He paused. "And now to introductions. I am Butch Wrangler, legal counsel for Chunder Productions, although if you look at the diplomas on the wall you'll see a different name there. You're not going to get far in life with a name like Wilberforce, so when I started bouncing I called myself Butch. And - well - I like it a lot better than Wilberforce."

"Luann DeGroot, ah, student," Luann replied

"Quite right. Just about every paper on this desk concerns you. Quill never got around to explaining what 'G'day Yank' was all about. So let's start there. Quill, as you may have noticed can easily pass for a teenager. Or at least he could until you rearranged his face..."

"Sorry," Luann whispered.

"He decided to monetarized on that by creating a reality show in which he enrolls in various high schools and secretly records the students there in their daily activities with an emphasis on them doing embarrassing or humiliating them. Typically he picks one girl to be his 'girlfriend' although it is my job to make sure that he never actually commits to being their boyfriend or doing anything of a compromising behavior."

"So you're the reason he never touched me the whole year?"

"Knowing Quill as you do now would you really have wanted him to "touch" you? Hate me all you want, I was actually looking out for you."

"I spent a whole year waiting for something to happen that was never going to happen. I feel ... robbed!" Luann tapped her good hand on the desk. "How could you record everything when I never saw a camera?"

Butch pulled his phone out of his coat pocket. "Look how thin this is, and it still has a camera built in. Two actually, front and back. Cameras today are tiny. The biggest thing to them are the batteries."

"So you had cameras in my bedroom? You recorded me getting undressed?"

"Oh, God, no!" the lawyer said emphatically. "That was right out from Day One. We never bugged your room. Quill would bring a camera if he visited you there. And we never recorded anyone undressing. That would be child pornography because you're all minors. So that was rule number one.

"Isn't this whole recording people without their knowledge illegal?"

"That's why we're so strict that this show only appears in the Australian outback and never rebroadcast anywhere else in the world. It's kind of a loophole"

"Sounds pretty rotten." Luann concluded.

"Whatever. The point I want to make is this: I am legal counsel for Chunder Productions, and ever though Quill Masterson is the majority stockholder and principle asset for the corporation I do not work for Quill. I work for the corporation. What that means is that while Quill will be howling to sue your pants off - um, that didn't come out right. Quill will insist we sue, and he does have you dead-to-rights about that. He has his friends as witnesses, your friends as witnesses... My job will be to convince him that suing you will be the worst possible thing for the corporation."

"Aside from the fact that I have no money."

"Technically it would be your parents paying, but no one is going to be suing anyone if I can help it."

"Why?"

"Because if this case ever goes to trial, your lawyer, if you have a good one..." Butch paused, opened his desk drawer and rummaged inside. He pulled out a business card and handed it to Luann. "Legal Aid," he explained. "They'll recommend a good lawyer. They're good people. I worked there for a year before landing this gig.

"Anyway... Your lawyer will try to get Quill on the stand to ask him one question, 'How old are you?' I will fight to keep him off since he's the victim here. Your lawyer might try to introduce Quill's passport, which of course lists his true age, and I'll fight that, too. Eventually he'll have to put you on the stand and ask you what you think Quill's age is. I'll argue that what you think would be hearsay and therefore inadmissible. But then he'll ask if you know for a fact what Quill's age is, which you seem to know since you accused him of it before you slugged him, I won't be able to stop you from answering and once the press hear's about that, they'll tear Quill to shreds. A grown man pretending to be a teen-ager. And that will be the end of it. So we can't have a trial. I think, all things considered that Fifty thousands dollars would be about right."

"I don't have that kind of money," Luann protested.

"No. We give you $50,000 on the condition that you never speak of this ever again."

"M-me?"

"You."

"Fif - fif - fifty thousand dollars? Just for saying nothing?

"It's in consideration of a lot of things but in the end, yeah, we want to buy your silence."

"Fifty Thousand dollars!"

"Which is why," the big man explained, "you need to keep hold of this card. Once you're checked out of the hospital called legal Aid and tell them you need an expert on contract law. Met them tomorrow, talk it over, then call me." Butch dug in his desk again and brought another business card, this one with his name on it. "And we'll get together. Have your lawyer read over the confidentially agreement then sign it. I'll have your money waiting in the form of a check. Do we have a deal."

Luann nodded her head. "Ye - ye - sure." she husked.

"Good, then let's get that hand looked at."

][

The trip home took a lot longer than the trip out.

Luann spent several hours in the hospital waiting for the X-rays to be read, was pronounced fit and left with a brace over her hand to keep from bumping it while it healed. She met the next day with her lawyer, the only woman on the list Legal Aid gave her. The lawyer did not look happy about representing an unaccompanied minor in this case but arranged a bank account in Luann's name in a Pittsville bank, co-signing as the legal adult. They would wire the money when the contract was signed. Luann was torn about whether to tell them about Gunther's video of the whole event, which they had watched dozens of times overnight, then decided that since it was Gunther's phone, as long as they didn't ask about it she wasn't going to mention it. She did tell the others that she's signed a undisclosure agreement and asked them not to spread the story least she be blamed for breaking the agreement. She didn't tell them about the cash payment. She slept well that night, partially from the pain pills they'd given her for her hand, but also in relief that she's be able to pay off TJ's magic credit card and still have scads of money left over. Already she started thinking about what college to go to.

Gunther was incredibly pleased with the video he'd made but not half as pleased as the sales he made with Andre (or Andy) Clearey for a couple of his dress designs. He didn't want to admit that one was specifically for a crossdressing comedian who did a Carmen Miranda act, and the more outrageous the dress the better for the act. The other two dress designs were for small-time actresses who needed something nice, different, but couldn't afford a designer dress. Gunther and Andre promised to keep in touch.

Tiffany tended to burst out in giggles whenever she thought about Luann and Quill. She had come to a sudden realization that she'd dodged a major faux pas when Quill had picked Luann over her, and was about as mad as Luann about his lying about his age. "He was old enough to be my father," she would tell people, which would have made him ten when she was born but Tiffany never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

Bernice wanted to drive back to Yosemite National Park to see her Barry one more time but Tiffany put her foot down. It was her car and it was going where she wanted to go. And where she wanted to go was Las Vegas. This turned out to be less fun then expected because as under-aged kids they couldn't get into the casinos or the more interesting shows. But they did drive up and down the strip whopping and hollering. Then it was across Arizona and New Mexico, into Oklahoma and down to New Orleans. While the others were gorging on jambalaya and beignets, Crystal and Knute were prowling the above ground graveyards of the city looking for the notorious Voodoo Queen, Marie Laveau. There were several. This got them interested in visiting another grave - that of Elvis in Nashville. Then, instead of heading north, Tiffany turned the car south and made for Miami Beach. Her father would never let her go there for Spring Break but this wasn't spring, a break, and what he doesn't know wouldn't hurt her. The trip to Miami was cut short, though, because of the endless string of young men who keep coming around to hit on the girls. Neither the presence of Gunther or Knute seemed to slow them down any. So with a curse on all men, Tiffany left the golden coast and drove for dreary old Pittsville.

][

Coming up from the south it worked out that Gunther, Crystal and Knute and Bernice all got off before Luann. Climbing out of the car in front of her house Luann struggled to think of what to say. Most of the time she'd as like to strangle Tiffany, but she did owe her rival a big thanks for letting them use her car. Pulling her suitcase out of the trunk she stopped by the driver's window. "Next boyfriend I'm going to chain to his desk," she said.

Tiffany laughed. "Love 'em and leave 'em, like I do, boys aren't worth the effort."

"Yeah... boys!" Luann said, thinking "now men..."

Coming into the house Luann called out, "Mom, I'm home."

"About time. Take the garbage out. It's your chore and I'm tired of your putting it off. Oh, and clean up your room. I've been telling you to do that all summer and you still haven't."

"Sure, OK. I'll get right on it."

She flung her bags on her bed and looked around, the room looked just like she's left it a month ago. There was a layer of dust, though. She'd have to deal with that, but later. She took the garbage out then dropped down on the couch. Her father was reading the newspaper. He lowered it a bit, "Home early from the mall? Run out of things to shop for?" he said before raising the paper again. And that was that.

The next day Luann called around and all of them said the same thing: none of their parents had apparently noticed that they had been gone. As she said to Bernice later, "we should have stayed on the road longer."

I don't think I've ever felt so happy to write "fin" to a story before. Except maybe the last time I actually finished a story. There was a time when I had a policy that I would not begin posting a story until I had finished writing it. That never happened. So I compromised on starting to posting a story when I was nearly finished. That never happened either. In the time it's taken to write this story Quill has gone to Australia, returned to the States, moved in with Gunther and his mom, started college and appears to be Luann's steady. Meanwhile Luann has all but disappeared from her own strip. Delta has been exiled, Rosa has been written out of the strip and Gunther has become a dick with a mangy beard. I won't say I could have written a better year's continuity but the mess the strip has become is sad.

I'm tempted to start another Luann story, with her in college, with her friends, taking as it's starting point a strip from before their graduation where Luann asks Tiffany what's going to do after graduation. Tiffany's answer was go to college because that what he father expected. The expression on her face was one of infinite sadness. Where does one go when one is that sad? To drugs. So the story ends with an intervention and before that I'd introduce a new boyfriend for Luann, bring back Delta and maybe wrestle with what Knute and Crystal are doing now that they've left high school and not entered college. But I'm not sure I want to spend two years puttering on this story.

Once upon a time while looking at all the science fiction books out I was disturbed by all the books, like the Honor Harrington series, being written by men about woman. What do men know about women, I asked Nothing. Men should stick to what they know, men, and let women write about woman. And yet here I've written nearly a novel-length story about a bunch of woman. Ironic.

And speaking of writing about what you know. I don't knowo anything about LA, so I wrote about Detroit.