Title: Ribbon (I/V)
Author: Angel Leviathan
Disclaimer: Wicked, characters, concept, etc, aren't mine.
Rating: PG/PG-13
Summary: As Elphaba vanishes into the
Underground life of the
Notes: Set directly after Glinda and Elphaba's parting. The last section uses pieces from a
previous fic, mainly for the reason that it's the
same scene.
-
Glinda sat frozen in place, tears
streaming down her face and muscles protesting abuse. Eyes glazed over, she
stared, unseeing, at the passenger opposite, and barely registered that such
behaviour was making the person uncomfortable. It didn’t matter. She didn’t
care.
Just what was going on? How had her safe, perfect little life been reduced to
this? How had she learned so much only to have it destroyed in a few short
moments, a brush of lips against her own, and a retreating figure swathed from
head to toe in black vanishing into a rush of emerald?
Oh Unnamed God. Oh Lurline, Ozma,
whatever gods or goddesses existed. What was happening? She was just a pampered
little girl from the Pertha Hills. Born
to money and not to thinking, not to this. Not to such disasters. She
was supposed to be able to fix anything with a smile and a laugh. Living was
supposed to be effortless to her.
Glinda dragged air into her lungs and heard a choking
sob escape from somewhere. She knew she had made the sound, but it didn’t
register as she finally broke from her awkward posture and sagged against the back
of the carriage. All eyes were on her. Something she would have liked just
short of two years ago. These eyes weren’t admiring her. Some were pitying, some condemning. Others declaring that such
behaviour wasn’t appropriate between two women and
that the green one couldn’t have been the blonde’s sister.
She was being sent back to Shiz. Sent
back. She hadn’t chosen, she hadn’t asked to go. When had Elphaba decided she was sending her alone and they weren’t
returning, by choice, together? She had no way of knowing. Glinda
contemplated demanding to be let from the carriage. Galinda
would never have stood for being abandoned in a carriage and sent on her way.
But then, Galinda wouldn’t have contemplated chasing
after Elphaba either. Glinda
was too afraid. She would never find Elphaba, not
knowing her way round the
She didn’t have the courage to jump from the carriage. At least Glinda was honest with herself. She didn’t like
uncertainties. No money and no connections would bring nothing of worth in the
Elphaba knew this. That was why she was sending her
back. Giving her no choice. Making
the decision for her, like Glinda would have wanted.
She could never have made the choice on her own. Money and social status gave
her her freedom, but she, just like the rest of her
class, still needed to be told what to do by somebody. How to
behave, how to be seen…how to live.
Glinda just wasn’t strong enough. She hadn’t been
brought up to know where she could pull strength from.
Not one of her companions offered comfort. When her eyes flickered back into
focus, they all looked away from her. She supposed she would have done the
same, if she had seen a dishevelled blonde in a dirty dress, gulping back tears
and grieving the loss of such an extraordinary looking girl.
She didn’t straighten or rearrange her skirts, stop her tears or try to draw
her hair back into some orderly arrangement. She would see none of these people
again, and so revelled in her grief, sniffing and sobbing for the whole journey,
until she fell into an exhausted sleep and almost missed her stop for the
train.
-
Wasn’t she such a sight trying to creep back to Shiz
as inconspicuously as she could, looking completely haggard, dishevelled, and
clutching the small parcel she had managed to pack (also full of dirty skirts
and blouses) before leaving? Students in town who knew her (only by sight, not
by association) stopped to stare as she traipsed slowly through, eyes on the
ground. Glinda tried to ignore them. The stares she
could, the whispers were harder to shut out. On reaching the gates of Crage Hall, she paused, wondering if she should take that
final step. She could beg for passage to Frottica,
say her family would pay, and cry and cry when she got home until her parents
let her leave Shiz. That would be childish, she
thought, however appealing the idea seemed. Yet if she just-
“Miss Glinda of the Arduennas!”
She jumped and nearly dropped her parcel. Taking a step back in fright, the
heel of her right shoe snapped and sent her crashing to the floor. The whispers
of a couple of nearby students became laughter as she yanked her skirts down to
protect her modesty.
“Miss Glinda!”
Glinda cringed. There was no escaping now. The voice
of the Headmistress reached her again; there was no way she could ignore the
summons a second time. No time to run, no time to pretend she never returned.
At least her current state and her washed out features
would work in her favour. She would recite what Elphaba
had told her to say; that she had been kidnapped and taken against her will.
She would not say that she had been sent back against her will.
She snapped the heel of the shoe off completely so she could clamber back to
her feet, Madame Morrible now before her, yet
offering no assistance. She clutched her parcel to her chest, “Madame
Headmistress,” she bobbed her head.
“Where have you been and to what do you owe the state in which you now appear?”
Morrible questioned, in clipped tones, torn between
outrage and curiosity.
Glinda blinked, “…I…she…” her vision blurred as tears
threatened to fall again.
“She?”
“But she…and I…”
Morrible removed the parcel from Glinda’s
grasp and wrapped a condescending arm around her shoulders, guiding her through
the open gates and towards the main entrance, “Now, now, Miss Glinda. You are an educated lady and such scenes will not
do. What would your parents think?”
Glinda thought that she cared not for what her
parents would think, nor what anyone else thought, the Headmistress included.
“I’ll have some tea prepared and then you must tell me every detail of your
disappearance. I must also know where Miss Elphaba
finds herself at this moment.”
She sniffed, “M-May I change first?”
“No dear, I believe a cup of tea is in order, then we
shall go from there.”
The large, quoxwood, door banged shut behind them
with a echoing clarity and finality that Glinda wasn’t sure she liked.
-
Glinda sat awkwardly on the very edge of a wooden
chair, parcel by her feet, hands in her lap. She hadn’t been permitted to sit
on one of the more expensive sofas, for fear of dirtying them, a choice she
would have made herself anyway. She stared down at her hands as Morrible busied herself with the tea tray, taking far
longer than she should have to place it down on the table.
“Now,” the Headmistress took one of the cups and motioned for Glinda to take the other. It seemed that the arm around the
shoulder had been more than enough contact between her and the mussed up
child-woman before her, “Start from the beginning. Miss Nessarose
was most concerned that neither yourself or her sister
could be found.”
Glinda did not reach for the tea, “She…she, that
is…Miss Elphaba…she wanted to see the Emerald
City…she wouldn’t go alone and she wouldn’t wait…she…she threatened that if I
didn’t go with her, she would…say that she had been writing my essays all along
and that I didn’t deserve to be here…” she wrung her hands in her lap and
finally reached for the ridiculously small cup to stop herself shaking.
“The
“Yes, Madame.”
“Continue.”
“I said…I said I wouldn’t go with her, but she bound my hands and forced me
along. She took my purse to make sure I had no means of getting anywhere
without her… She said she needed a person of my status, with connections, to
make enquiries in the City…”
“Yet you are here and she is…?” Morrible pressed.
“I don’t know.” Glinda replied, “She…Miss Elphaba didn’t know the way, she made us travel for days
and days and she wouldn’t let me go back. I escaped yesterday morning when she
was arguing with a carriage master.”
The Headmistress frowned and sipped her tea, “If you were taken by force, why,
my dear Miss Glinda, do you
have several changes of clothes with you?”
She stared, knowing she had been caught out. Glinda
lowered her gaze and sipped at her own tea, before setting it down on the table
and reaching for her parcel, “She made sure we were prepared, you see. She made
me pack and lug our things from place to place.” She was suddenly glad that one
of Elphaba’s shapeless dresses had worked its way in
with her belongings, which she dragged out, “She treated me no better than a
servant…” Glinda faked a second breakdown and threw
the dress on the floor.
“So…she is in the
She paused, “…I…I don’t know, perhaps…she found her way without me…maybe she
finally managed to make it to the City… Not many would offer her passage, you
see, with her…affliction. I can see I had my uses…”
“If she is in the City, then she is almost certainly lost by now…”
“Oh yes, Miss Elphaba has a terrible sense of
direction, as I told you…” Glinda agreed.
“No, I mean that the City is very large and there is a multitude of places that
she might hide away in,” the Headmistress narrowed her eyes, studying her
pupil.
“Madame, I am sure a person such as Miss Elphaba
would not have any great skill at hiding. Her colour, for one, makes her stand
out a great deal in a crowd,” the girl murmured, in a reassuring tone, just
about managing to hide her embarrassed blush.
“She has committed a great crime, you understand? Taking you against your will
and treating you in such a manner? She must be apprehended.”
“Oh yes…it was such an ordeal…so very terrible… I trusted her so very much, you
see, and now I understand she was only using me for my family name…” Glinda hung her head and wrung her hands some more.
Madame Morrible sighed, in no mood to cater to the
distress of a girl who thought she was society itself and actually only had
relatively good blood on one side of her lineage. She had to know where the
green Thropp daughter had vanished to, and exactly
why. It was too suspicious that she had chosen such a time to disappear. What
with the death of the old minder and the little discussion she herself had had
with the three roommates. There was no way to tell how each of the young women
had, and would, react to not only the suggestions planted, but also the binding
spell. She had, so far, seen no adverse affect on Nessarose.
She had yet to witness Elphaba and Glinda’s behaviour, only their excursion spoke volumes. So
did the fact that only one had returned. Circumstances aside, Morrible was glad that she had another of the girls back
under power. One renegade she could deal with. Two would have been much more
difficult. She could wait. She would see exactly what Elphaba
was up to, in time.
Which was why it was much easier to let Glinda
think she believed every word of her story and had no doubts whatsoever.
With one gone, there was a greater chance of the others taking flight. Weak as
she was, Morrible didn’t put an escape attempt past Glinda of the Arduennas. She had
returned once…there was no guarantee she would do so again.
“If you don’t mind…Madame Head, I would very much like to go and change my
clothes…I have been in this same dress for a good two days or more…” Glinda snatched up the bundle of clothes tumbling from her
parcel out onto the floor, including Elphaba’s dress.
“Yes…of course,” Morrible mumbled, a little absently,
with a wave of her hand.
Glinda jumped up from the chair and tried to flee.
“You will be in classes tomorrow morning?”
She halted by the door, “…Yes, Madame Morrible,” she
promised.
“Very well.”
The door banged shut behind Glinda as she ran all the
way back to her room, ignoring the startled cries and questions of Nessarose and Nanny as she entered, and simply locked
herself in the bathroom without another word.
-
She was thankful that, due to her bathing at an unusual time of the day, there
was enough hot water to fill the small tub in the bathroom. Glinda
forced herself to relax and sank down in the water, now that Nanny had finally
stopped banging her fists on the door and demanding answers, and that Nessa had ceased to scream bloody murder.
Her dress lay in a heap on the floor, next to her just as ruined shoes and
stockings. Glinda remembered a time when her main
concern would have been getting the mud - or whatever stains she had inflicted
upon the material - out of such a beautiful day-dress, but she just couldn’t
bring herself to care. She had peered at the heap for a while, over the rim of
the bath, but all she saw was a bundle of material and shoes that certainly
hadn’t been suitable for the journey she had undertaken. The dress had cost a
fair amount, that much she knew, and now it was reduced to rags. There had been
a time when she would have cried over it, back when she hadn’t had anything
else to cry about.
How could she…? How could she!?
How could Elphaba leave her to deal with everything
on her own!? With what she knew and what she wasn’t supposed to know, with Morrible and Nessa and dear
devoted Nanny losing one of her beloved girls without even a letter of
explanation? She wasn’t a talker. She was perfectly content to be parked
somewhere to look pretty! She couldn’t do it! She couldn’t! She would be caught
in a lie, panic as to what to do, pull the whole world down around her! Glinda sat up before she inhaled too sharply and
accidentally choked on the bathwater and her own anger. What did she have now?
Pretty perfect life: gone! Drifting through university without a care, making
the best of social connections: gone! Fantasy world where the real troubles of
Oz couldn’t reach her: gone! Best…friend…gone…
Did she think it was brave? Did Elphaba think she was
being brave and noble and oh so grown up by running off like that? However
adult Elphaba liked to behave, Glinda
knew the green girl didn’t know the
Glinda knew anger was clouding her judgement, but
still. Maybe she was bitter. Just a little bit bitter that Elphaba hadn’t trusted her to stay with her. Perhaps
it was being aware that her friend didn’t have that much faith in her…and was right
not to…that stung.
She forced heavy limbs to co-operate as she repeatedly shampooed her hair in an
attempt to feel more human. She felt anything but human at that moment. Like a
shadow, a ghost. Maybe the real Glinda was waiting
somewhere to wake up again one day. Maybe she had run off with Elphaba and all that was left was a shell.
Stupid, stupid girl…how could she just abandon her, wake her up inside and
leave her? It wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t fair. It wasn’t her fault she was so
easily broken…was it? Why did Elphaba have to believe
in something so much? Couldn’t she just be content to muddle through life like
the rest of them? Why did she have to think she was better than-
Glinda froze. She sounded positively like Nessarose.
Elphaba had the right to choose. She never had the
right to anything else. She could be first class in her belief in her versions
of right and wrong because she had been made to be so second class all her
life.
How could she…? How? How in the hell could she start her on the path to being a
better person and not stick around to see it through? How could she leave her
with all this…in such a…mess?
Glinda stepped from the bath and towelled herself
dry, leaving her hair a tangled mess for once. It quite suited how she felt, she
decided. She reached for the dressing gown she always left hung on the bathroom
door and wrapped it round herself, tying the cord. She
had to be angry. She had to be as bitter and twisted as Nessa
or she was never going to survive. If she wasn’t angry, she would surely cry.
Now Elphaba was gone, she had to be the strong one.
She didn’t have a choice. Just like Elphaba didn’t
for all those years.
Glinda took a deep breath and unlocked the bathroom
door, ready to face the music.
-
“What do you mean she’s gone?” Nessarose repeated,
for what must have been the fifth time. She was glaring at the heap of a blonde
who sat hunched over on her bed, knees drawn to her chest, eyes downcast, “What
do you mean?” she continued, determined to get a better answer than the one she
had received.
“Nessie-“ Nanny began.
“No!” Nessa shouted, “She left with Elphaba and returns alone – she must have answers.”
“…She’s gone,” Glinda said, again, voice low and
controlled, “She sent me back here. She stayed… She didn’t like what she heard
and she stayed…”
“You chose to go-“
“She kidnapped me,” she said.
“She no more kidnapped you than she did me!” Nessarose
exclaimed.
“Miss Glinda has a mind of her own these days,” Nanny
agreed, “Our Elphie would not have led you astray had
you not wanted it.”
“Elphaba wouldn’t just abandon me…” Nessa uttered, expression tinged with a sudden fear.
She wanted to snap that she wasn’t the only one to have been abandoned. The
fact that she had been graced with a goodbye somehow made it all the more
painful. She was suddenly jealous of all the years Nanny and Nessarose had spent with Elphaba.
Glinda had seen all too often the way Nessa spoke to her sister. She had taken her for granted.
Well, no more.
“Well, she has…” Glinda answered, hoarsely.
“Glinda!”
“Now that’s not nice,” Nanny stepped in.
She got up from the bed, “She has!” she repeated, voice growing stronger, “She
has chosen her path and she has abandoned us,” she stressed. Glinda glared at Nessa, “You, me,
Nanny, everyone. Elphaba chose. She didn’t do it to
spite you, Nessa, but she is gone. She didn’t want to
return and she doesn’t want to be found.”
“How could she!? She’s always been so selfish-“
“Selfish!?” now Glinda did shout, “How can you say
that when she has taken care of you all her life!? She loves you! Maybe this is
her one selfish act, doing something for herself! I can’t explain it, and I
don’t know why she did it, but I’ll defend her right to have done it!”
“She abandoned you too!” Nessa shot back.
“I know!” she screamed, shaking. Glinda clamped a
hand over her mouth, taken aback by the force her of reaction, “I know…” her
voice hitched and her tears fell. Genuine anger just wasn’t her talent. Mock
surprise, fake disgust, theatrical displeasure she
could pull off. Not anger she really, truly, felt. Not when it was so closely
mixed with such despair. She exhaled slowly, trying to regain her composure,
“But Elphaba’s gone. It’s just us now. She’s said her
farewells. If anyone can take care of themselves, it’s her.”
Nanny wiped the tears from Nessarose’s eyes and took
her by the shoulders, “Elphie will make herself known
to you again at a time of her choosing. Not before. You know that as well as
any of us. Until then, you have Nanny…and,” she glanced across at the blonde,
“…you have Glinda.”
Glinda sank back down onto her bed, determined not to
look at the empty one across from her. When she looked back, she would look
upon this moment as one that defined the others, that led to what was to come.
If she had rejected Nessa, if she had asked to sleep
in the dorms…if she had refused there and then at the first hint of becoming a
surrogate sister…perhaps everything would have been easier. Maybe things would
have been different. Less difficult. She could have
conveniently forgotten everything she had learned from Elphaba
and become the young lady of society she had been. Oh, it would have been
easy…blissfully so…she could have returned to being a marginally intelligent
young woman more interested in what an ‘education’ could do for her rather than
knowing what that education was. She could have been Galinda
again. It would have been so, so easy…
But that didn’t make it right.
Glinda nodded, “I’m not going anywhere, Nessa,” she said softly.
And wasn’t that just the truth? Elphaba was beginning
a whole new stage of her life, standing up for whatever it was she believed in
(Glinda still wasn’t sure she quite understood any of
it) and she was stuck at Shiz. She had nowhere to go
but home. Back to a home full of the correct way to speak and what was
acceptable conversation and how she should walk in certain types of heel.
Nothing was going to change for her. She had lost the one person that had made
her life remotely interesting, if only because she was forced to think and find
other topics to speak about beyond the drawbacks of satin dresses and who was
now officially betrothed to who. Glinda was
terrified. It would certainly be easier to flee back to her old behaviour
patterns…but what if she did? What if she became that girl again and forgot
what it was like to actually have meaning in her life?
‘Hold out, if you can.’
Elphaba knew. Elphaba knew
just how difficult it was going to be. Elphaba had
her grand war to fight…and Glinda had her own, much
more personal…much more frightening…battle to wage against all she knew and all
she had ever wanted.
The silence was shattered by a wail of a sob from Nessarose.
Glinda stood up and crossed the room to embrace her,
sealing her fate there and then.