Fiyero laid sprawled on the floor next to their picnic basket while Galinda walked from one side to the other, frilly notepad in hand.
“So, we have the paper lanterns for decor, Popsicle is going to send the ice statues, we secured the alcohol from the Ozdust, the food is coming from Munchkinland, my new dress should be here tomorrow, and the shoes! They’re brilliant, Fiyero!”
“Are we set, then?” He asked, lifting his head to look at his girlfriend.
“Yes! Sweet Oz, I’m so excited. It’s gonna be a party that Shiz will never forget! Everything will be so perfect!” Galinda exclaimed, falling graciously to the floor onto Fiyero’s chest.
“What about Elphaba?” Fiyero asked. Glinda’s head shot up from his chest and she stared at him with the fury of a thousand suns.
“What about Elphaba? She’s perfect! There’s absolutely nothing wrong with her that I would change in a million years!”
Fiyero nodded enthusiastically at every word. “I know! But we’ll be together, Boq and Nessa will be together, so who… Who’s going to give her a New Year’s kiss?”
Galinda’s expression shifted from righteous fury to dread and she covered her mouth with her hands in horror.
“Shit, you’re so right. She can’t go without it!”
“ShenShen?”
“No.”
“Pfannee?”
“Even worse!”
“Could you maybe convince Madame Morrible?”
“Ewwwwwwwwww!”
They sat in stunned silence, eyes unfocused, pondering.
“Maybe I could?” Galinda said in a creaky voice.
“But then I’ll be alone!” Fiyero protested, far less concerned about his girlfriend kissing their friend than about being left out.
“You kiss her, then.”
“But then you’ll be alone!”
Galinda looked at Fiyero.
Fiyero looked at Galinda.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” She asked.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
Galinda pulled herself into a sitting position and he soon followed. She put her hand up in the air around the same height of their heads, as if the hand was a vortex of a triangle and the two were the other.
“So, let’s imagine this is Elphie. We’ll have to angle our heads so that both our lips touch hers at the same time,” said Galinda with the seriousness of a captain positioning their soldiers on a battlefield. Fiyero followed her instructions with deep determination in his eyes.
They tested different configurations of three-way kiss with her hand before realizing they needed human subjects to bring credibility to their experiment. While Elphaba was too busy studying for the end of year exams, Galinda and Fiyero set out to kiss as many people as they could - for science.
This is how the research went:
All thirteen subjects signed a confidentiality clause (which consisted of Fiyero threatening to punch them if they told anyone) and two different experiments were conducted for each subject, resulting in twenty-six data entries, three of which were considered invalid (one of the subjects sneezed as they were about to start timing the kiss and the other was Boq. Neither Fiyero nor Galinda wanted to take kissing Boq into consideration for their research - and both authors recognize this bias, ethics be damned). After each experiment, subjects would fill out a survey with impressions on the quality of the kiss based on three variables: angle, pressure and duration. Based on these surveys, they were able to determine optimal conditions for three-way kissing, systematized in a flowchart.
First, they investigated the optimal head height, which they found to be equal to Elphaba’s. This discovery led to the consideration that Fiyero, being taller, would be responsible for crouching slightly with his knees, keeping his back straight instead of leaning forward, since it inferred with the first parameter of evaluation: angle of lips. They found that to cover as much surface area as possible with minimal gaps between lips, their heads had to be tilted back, so leaning in made the process difficult. Their third conclusion was in regard to pressure: harder than a peck but lighter than a one-on-one kiss, lest it cause nose smushing. Their final discovery was that any and all head ornaments should be removed, which was particularly important, given that Elphaba had a tendency to wear her black hat. No conclusion could be reached in terms of duration, given conflicting data in the surveys, but they could observe a tendency of more positive responses towards shorter kisses.
“It is statistically insignificant, Doctor Upland.”
“I must disagree with you, Doctor Tigelaar. We are conducting quali-quantitative research, so our analysis must take the answers themselves into account and not just the numbers.”
“What the hell are you two talking about and why are you wearing glasses?” Came Elphaba’s voice from behind them, one cold afternoon, after they’d finished processing the data from the surveys in Galinda’s little pink notebook. Both Galinda and Fiyero jumped.
“Research. We’re doing research.” They answered in tandem.
“Oooooh. Can I see?”
“No!” Galinda yelped.
“Hasn’t been peer-reviewed yet,” Fiyero butted in.
“Well, I’m your peer, I can review it.” Elphaba was seriously concerned about her friends’ behavior. Since when did Galinda Upland and Prince Fiyero Tigelaar do research?
“It contains sensitive information, Miss Elphaba. We’re waiting on the feedback from the journal before divulging,” Galinda said gravelly.
Elphaba frowned at them, absolutely dumbfounded. “Then people say that I’m the weird one. Have fun with your research, I guess.” And then she left.
Fiyero and Galinda fell back on their stools with a thud. “Well, that was a close call. But is it going to be Tigelaar & Upland or Upland & Tigelaar in the end?”
Galinda stared at him in disgust. “There’s no way in hell I’m letting you be the first author, Fiyero.”
New Year’s Eve was here. The students were gathered in the dining hall, eating, drinking, dancing and having fun, but both Fiyero and Galinda were nervously pacing around the hall. That was it, the culmination of their research. It had to be perfect. After what seemed like a million years, it was almost midnight. Time to put the plan in action. After reviewing their research notes one more time, they held each other’s hand and went on the hunt for Elphaba. Both their faces lit up when they saw her in her traditional black dress, wearing the pointy hat Galinda gave her.
“Elphie! Over here!” They waved at their friend and she smiled, making her way to them.
“Almost here! A New Year!” Elphaba said, accepting the outstretched hands of Galinda and Fiyero.
“Yes! And we’d finally like to show you the results of our research!” Galinda said excitedly.
“Oh, please do! I’m dying to know.”
The countdown started. Now or never.
Galinda and Fiyero took matching deep breaths. Galinda carefully removed Elphaba’s hat and they both leaned in, exactly as they had concluded. As they approached, Elphaba’s smile morphed into absolute confusion.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, what’s going on?” she said, taking a step back.
“Our research! It’s for this!” Galinda said like it was obvious.
“What?!”
“Yeah, we’ve been researching the best conditions for a three-way kiss so that we could kiss you on New Year’s Eve.”
“You’ve gotta be kidding me. You can’t be serious!”
“Of course we’re serious. Look, I even made a flowchart!” Fiyero said, showing the notes on Galinda’s notebook.
“He made a flowchart!”
Elphaba looked through the notes, absolutely incredulous. “So you two morons went through all this trouble but neglected to TALK TO ME ABOUT IT?” She was a little mad, truth be told.
“It would ruin the surprise.” Galinda said, looking at Elphaba like a sad, wet dog.
“Listen, you don’t have to do this. In fact, the last thing I want is to be your charity case, guys, I -”
“You’re not our charity case! Boq was! We had to put up with kissing him for science! For you!” Fiyero said indignantly.
“Not, absolutely not, Elphie! Believe me, we very much want to kiss you!” Galinda added, nodding enthusiastically at Fiyero. “You could never be our charity case, because that would mean you needed something from us, and you don’t! You’re so..”
“Amazing!”
“Incredible!”
“Intelligent!”
“Pretty!”
“Kind!”
“I love it when you finish my sentences, Fiyero.”
“Aren’t we so in tune?”
“Ok, ok, you guys are a lot weirder than I thought you were.” Elphaba said, in a mix of amazement and fear. “Aren’t you… dating each other?”
“Why, yes, we are.”
“Wouldn’t this kiss be… cheating?”
“Not when we both want to.” Galinda said simply.
“In fact, it wouldn't be cheating if we were all dating.” Fiyero added.
“Good Oz, babe, that’s the best idea you’ve had since the flowchart!”
Elphaba was still speechless. So speechless that she couldn’t say no. So speechless that the only thing she could reasonably do was pull them both down by their beautiful faces and see what this research of them was all about. So speechless that she could only smile afterwards when they kissed her cheeks and hugged her.
“Fiyero, I think we have a new first author.”
“Thropp, Upland & Tigelaar? Has a nice ring to it.”