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Elphaba is so beautiful. She’s so beautiful. Just the sight of her makes Glinda want to cry. And so she does.
“Oh, Elphie,” she says, and falls into her arms. Elphaba, still slightly out of breath from bursting through her balcony door, scrambles to catch her. The broom clatters to the floor as she nestles in. She tucks her head into Elphaba’s neck. Her skin is cool, and smells of the woods.
“Two years,” she says, still so close that her lips brush against the skin of Elphaba’s neck. When she shivers, Glinda feels it all through her body. She tucks herself closer, squeezes her tighter. “It’s been two years.”
“Two long years,” Elphaba mutters. Her hands wrap tightly around Glinda’s waist. “I didn’t come here for—I’m very upset with you.” One of her hands strokes Glinda’s back, slowly, and she melts even further into Elphaba’s hold, remembering how they had fit together. It takes longer—Elphie is a little more muscular now, and she holds Glinda tentatively, like she’s started to forget how, and it’s up to Glinda to shift until they are pressed together all the way down to their thighs, so that she is warm all over.
She sniffles. Elphaba sighs, and strokes her hair.
“That speech today—” Elphaba starts. She cringes away. Elphaba lets her, but catches her gaze.
“You heard it?”
“I was close.” Her deep green eyes. Glinda had been fascinated by them, even when she’d hated her.
“You know I don’t believe any of it,” she says.
“That doesn’t make me feel very much better,” Elphaba says.
She and Madame Morrible had taken her new train out to a town in Quadling Country, where Elphaba had been hard at work dismantling the Wizard’s paper mills. When they’d gotten there the mill was still quiet, the large waterwheels that powered the machines shattered into pieces bigger than she was.
She’d had to go straight to work calming the people down. They were terrified and angry and scared, and she was at her best with people like this. The ballgowns helped, but it was her. She’d always had a way of helping people see things the way she did. It was why her place here was secure, even as Morrible continued to curl her lip if they had to interact for any length of time.
What she wanted them to see was it wasn’t so bad, really. The Good and Brave people of the Town of Utensia would not be deterred by a broken waterwheel, surely! The important thing was that they helped each other and were kind as only Quadlings could be! When the lines of their faces started to ease, and the occasional smile began to appear in the crowd, she had begun to sing a song that was popular back in Frottica, a call and response song that the working men in Frottica would sing as they walked home. It was simple enough to follow, and soon the crowd was singing along, and they did sing quite prettily, these Quadlings—
“The Witch will kill you all,” Madame Morrible had said into the microphone. Her voice had carried the cool finality of a winter frost. The rest of her speech had Glinda shivering in her tulle ballgown.
“Did you tell her all of that? The things about me.” Elphaba swallows. “About my mother. Those things she said. Did you tell her?” Glinda stiffens in shock.
“Elphie. My goodness. Never. I would never do that.” Elphaba’s eyes flick away from her, take in the splendour of her apartment and skewer her with it, all in the space of a breath.
“I would never,” she insists.
Her mother’s heart had broken when the wicked witch was born, Morrible had said. Her body failed her before she could see the face of her second child, lest she see the same wickedness upon her.
“I couldn’t have,” Glinda says. “Because it wasn’t true. I know that’s not what happened.”
Elphaba breaks away from her, takes a few steps, and turns her back. Glinda can see from the set of her shoulders that she is trying not to cry, and she twists her hands together to stop from following after her.
When she turns back, her eyes are red, but her face is set. She takes a deep, shaky breath. Her eyes flick to Glinda’s hands, fingers still pulling, and comes back to hold them in hers.
“I missed you,” Elphaba says. Her head is down, fixed on their entangled hands.
“I did, too,” Glinda says. “So, so much.” Elphie’s hands are rougher than she remembers, but still fit in hers. She twines their hands together more firmly.
Elphaba looks away to scan her apartment again, and Glinda does too. She stands out so starkly, Elphie does, with her dark colours and her face still so serious, carefully studying Glinda’s apartment. She scans every piece of careful frippery like she will be asked to draw it from memory later. When she turns back, she has one of her secret smiles tucked into the corner of her mouth.
“It’s all so wonderfully you,” she says. “No need to share at all anymore.” She fidgets, her hands still clasped in Elphaba’s.
“I wouldn’t mind it,” she says.
The indelibility and solidity of Elphaba’s musty old books and inkstained desk at Shiz, her lone white pillow on her neatly made bed. The companionship of a coat next to hers on the rack, so that in the mornings they could stand with their shoulders touching as they put them on, and Glinda could help Elphaba with her collar and make sure that her hair was arranged just so around her shoulders. Wanting for all of that rises in her like a wave, and she has to take several deep breaths herself to keep it from spilling over.
Elphaba’s keen gaze settles on her again, and she can see she is thinking the same thing.
“Where do you sleep now, Elphie?” she asks, timidly. Elphaba’s smile is melancholy.
“I’m comfortable enough,” she says.
“But are you—”
“I’m safe.” Her tone is final, but not chastising.
Her clothes are patched and worn in places, but clean. Her grip is strong and sure. She seems healthy.
And still so beautiful.
Glinda knows what’s happening. She’s not, despite what Morrible thinks, a fool. Which is why she knows life isn’t necessarily about what one wants. But if it were—
Something in the way that she is looking at Elphaba makes her turn away uneasily, though she doesn’t let go of Glinda’s hands.
“I really didn’t mean to stay,” she says. “I shouldn’t even really have come here.”
“I’m glad you did,” Glinda says, and holds on tight when Elphaba tries to pull her hands away. “It’s a wonderful way to end a not-very-nice day. Stuck in a carriage with Madame for hours, and she likes me even less now than she did at Shiz, if you can believe that’s possible.”
“One advantage of broom-flight,” Elphaba says. “It’s fast.”
“But uncomfortable, probably,” Glinda sniffs. “Not to mention, the damage it would do to one’s hairstyle.” She glances at the broom, still laying on her floor. So odd, to still be using that. So Elphaba. And yet a part of her is intrigued. Elphaba sees it, of course.
“I can show you,” Elphaba says. “If you would like to see. I think you would like it.” Despite her own reluctant curiosity, there is a faint tremor in Elphaba’s voice that tells her this is something she would like very much. Still…
“I’ve never flown before,” Glinda says. “On anything.”
“It’s easy,” Elphaba says, and her smile is bright and beautiful. In the face of that smile, Glinda can do nothing but smile back, and capitulate.
“Should I change? I have some riding gowns.” Elphaba smiles that tucked-in smile again, and her face warms again.
“Less fabric is probably better,” Elphaba says. Glinda raises her eyebrows.
“Miss Elphaba,” she starts, and Elphie blushes a deep green.
“No, not like that.” She raises her eyebrows higher, to her hairline. “You’re impossible,” Elphaba mutters. “I just mean, with the wind,” she starts, before she gives up and takes a deep breath.
“The way you’re dressed is fine,” Elphaba says, finally.
“Elphie,” she says, mock scolding, “you cannot say fine to a lady. This is my second best nightgown!”
“I can see why,” Elphaba says, and despite herself, Glinda blushes. “Glinda,” she says. “You look wonderful.”
“Thank you,” she says, cheeks hot, and finally releases her hands to fiddle with the sash of her nightgown. “I don’t want to be caught outdoors in an outfit that’s only second-best, you understand, so if something were to go wrong—”
“Don’t worry,” Elphaba says, quiet and a little sad, though she smiles for Glinda. “I’ll bring you back.”
*
She changes her mind as soon as they step onto the balcony.
“We’ll have to leave quickly,” Elphaba says. “I don’t want the Monkeys to spot us.” She tugs on Glinda’s hand, but.
They are so high up. So high! She doesn’t even like to look over the edge for too long, because it makes her so woozified. How in Oz will she balance on a stick? What if it rolls, as round things are wont to do, and sends her straight over the edge in her second best nightgown? Oh, poor Elphie will simply be beside herself if she causes Glinda’s demise.
“Elphie, I—” when she tugs back, Elphaba goes with her, frowning.
“Elphaba,” she says. “I’m not like you.” She glances again at the broom, rotating lazily in the air, the vast and empty sky beyond her balcony, and Elphaba, last. She doesn’t think she can bear to see disappointment on Elphaba’s face, but there isn’t any, only a patient tenderness that makes her chest ache.
“I don’t want you to be,” she says. “Do you trust me?”
She’s given Elphaba so little of what she’s asked of her. Maybe she can give her this.
“Yes,” she whispers.
Elphaba goes first, throws one leg over like she’s getting on a horse. Glinda is sure she wouldn’t look half so graceful if she tried to do the same thing, and spends a clock-tick standing by the broom, hoping she can somehow skip the getting on part and just be on it, when Elphaba rolls her eyes, grabs her by the hips, and pulls her back so she is sitting sideways. She tenses, but the broom remains steady, and she squirms until she’s comfortable, her side pressed against Elphaba’s front, her two ankles tangled around Elphaba’s one.
“Ready?” Elphaba’s voice is a little strangled, and Glinda stops fussing to look at her. Even in the dim light, she can see tension at the corners of her eyes, the dark green flush of her cheeks.
“You’ll need to hold on,” Elphaba says, and Glinda presses closer, winding her arm around Elphaba’s waist, tucking herself along her front, feeling an arm wrap around hers. “We’ll have to go fast to be out of sight of the scouts.” Her voice has steadied, now, but Glinda hears her breath catch when she runs a light, careful hand down her arm with her free hand.
“Glinda,” she says, half pleading, half warning, and Glinda stops.
“You’ll have to be quiet,” Elphaba says. “Do not scream.”
“I promise,” she says, and closes her eyes.
*
The flight is—
Well. It’s awful. Simply awful. Her stomach swoops just horrendibly when they take off. She keeps her eyes closed and tucked into Elphie’s neck so that she can keep her promise and not scream, but she can feel it building in her chest anyway, and she bites down hard on her tongue to keep it in. The wind whips through them and makes her teeth chatter so hard that the scream almost escapes anyway.
The broom pitches quite terribly from side to side, and Elphaba curses under her breath, and Glinda holds on as tight as she can and does not open her eyes and takes short, choppy breaths through her clenched teeth for what feels like an eternity.
When the broom slows down, Elphaba sighs in relief.
“We’re safe,” she says. Glinda bites down a scoff. This was the worst idea she’s ever had, and she’d tried to take Madame Morrible out to lunch with Momsie. She just knows that the moment she opens her eyes she will plummet like a beautiful, pink, falling star, and she will scream all the way down.
“You can open your eyes now.”
“They are open.”
“Are they really?” Elphaba’s chest rumbles as she laughs.
“Maybe you could describe it to me?”
Elphaba kisses her head. She has never done that before, and it shakes a significant amount of the dizzification off.
“Please, Glinda,” she says, and in a daze, Glinda raises her head, opens her eyes, and gasps.
They are so far up that she can’t see the ground at all. They hover just above a blanket of clouds, glowing softly from the reflected light of the full moon that hangs right over their heads. The sky is mostly a dark, rich blue with thin streaks of the loveliest purple. The stars feel so close that she could almost cup them in the palm of her hand. There’s no sound but their own breathing, no movement other than the lazy roll of the clouds below. It’s beautiful enough that her terror at being up so high melts away almost completely.
“Oh,” she says, and turns to Elphaba, and whatever she sees in Glinda’s face makes her smile too, the wide grin that lights up her whole face and re-dizzifies Glinda all over again. “You… you see this all the time?
“I don’t usually fly up this high,” Elphaba says. “It gets cold, and I have to keep track of where I am.” There is an ease in her voice now, a relaxing of her posture. It’s Elphaba in their room at Shiz, soft and sleepy, smiling lazily as Glinda fills her in on all the little things that happened that day that Elphaba didn’t notice.
She shivers, and Elphaba shifts so that her cloak more properly covers them both. The broom, being a broom, is not very comfortable to sit on, but she’s partly on Elphaba anyway, and she can be very forbearing when required. She cuddles into the little pocket of warmth, and squirms a little more so she can stay close.
Elphaba’s hand settles on her back again, and draws small circles. She plays with the hem of the cloak.
“I gave you this,” she says. She can’t quite look at Elphie, now, and focuses instead on the freckles on her cheek, a familiar pattern that she could draw from memory. She has, once or twice, to remind herself what Elphie really looks like, when the propaganda posters started going up. She’s burned them, though. The Wizard had people search her room regularly when she’d first moved in, and she doesn’t even want to think of what they would say to her if they found the pages of Elphaba’s eyes and freckles and gentle and graceful hands, of the precise way she held her head when she was trying very hard not to laugh at something Glinda was doing.
The arm around her tightens. “I missed you,” Elphaba says again, voice thick. “I can’t stop thinking about you.”
Everywhere they’re touching feels warm, every shift she makes against Elphaba sends pinpricks skittering up and down her spine, raises a blush to her cheeks.
She knows what it is, of course. She’s always known, ever since the first time they held hands. There was just always so much more clutter, so much to do and consider. But right now there is only Elphaba.
“There isn’t anyone like you,” Glinda says. This close, she can see the night sky reflected in Elphaba’s eyes, stars twinkling inside the brilliant green of her irises. She leans closer, just a little, and Elphaba blinks, freezes.
“If I asked again,” Elphaba says. “If I asked you to come with me again, would you?”
“Please don’t ask me again,” she whispers.
Elphaba’s resignation is worse than the disappointment, somehow. Elphie has her measure exactly. But she is still here. Her arm is still holding Glinda securely to her. Glinda shifts closer, sees the impulse pass from her to Elphaba as if through a current, and she leans forward, too.
She has thought of kissing Elphaba before, an indecent amount. It's nothing is like the real thing. Elphaba’s mouth is soft and pliant under hers, and when their lips slide together just so, she lets a breathy little whimper into Glinda’s mouth that makes her press forward harder, clutch her closer.
She turns further into Elphaba’s body, curves a hand around her shoulder and anchors the other on a soft thigh, and only stops when she tastes salt. When she pulls back, tears streak down Elphaba’s face, glowing silver in the moonlight.
She strokes Elphaba’s face gently, runs her thumbs over the furrows at her brow.
“I had to go, Glinda. I had to.”
“I know.”
“I wish—” Glinda can see her bite her lip against the words.
There is nowhere to retreat to, no buffer made of rows of pink dresses or arrays of make up cases or beautification appointments, nothing but Glinda and Elphaba’s tears and the wide dark sky. She has nothing to fall back on but herself.
She leans in again, slowly, so that Elphaba’s features blur and meld together. She waits another clock-tick, to see if Elphaba will move away, but her lovely, lonely Elphaba only sniffles inelegantly and leans in.
Their mouths meet, and she whimpers into her mouth. It’s lighter than the first kiss, slower, but she can feel the muscle of Elphaba’s thigh jumping under her hand. They kiss again, slowly, until Elphaba sighs and pulls away.
Glinda chases her, unable to stop falling into her, and lands with her lips just under her ear, at the hinge of her jaw. The skin there is the softest thing she’s ever felt, and the gasp Elphaba lets out when she kisses her there winds its way down to the cradle of her hips and sits there, heavy.
A hand on her jaw tugs her away, and she goes, helplessly. She feels as if someone has knocked her askew. She wants that skin under her lips again, hands stroking at her skin.
“Elphie.” She can’t stand it. “I need you.”
Elphaba laughs, soft edged.
“You don’t.” Something is closing. Some part of her has turned away.
“I do,” she says.
“Not enough,” Elphaba says. “This isn’t about me, anyway,” she continues, as though she hasn’t left Glinda reeling. “I wouldn’t want you to come with me just to be with me.”
She’s had variations of this argument with Elphaba many times over the past few years, in her head. Usually she imagines that they are yelling, or angry. She’s never imagined it like this.
She knows her place in the world. She knows what people value her for. There is no room in it for someone like Elphaba. She thinks back to the awful day she had today, how she wouldn’t have known what to do if the Quadlings had been frightened of her the way they would have been of Elphaba.
She knows how the argument always ends, in her head, and knows as certain as if she’d said it out loud that Elphaba is having the same argument with her Glinda, and they are both tired of it already.
“I can’t,” she says, and shakes her head when Elphaba goes to speak. “I can’t. I’m not…” brave, maybe, or impulsive or self-sacrificing or maybe just bullishly hardheaded. “But, I’ll try. To be. I’ll try.”
“For me?” Elphaba asks. She shakes her head. At that paper mill amongst the rubble, she’d seen some of the original brick before the front was overlaid by the Wizard’s signature green marble. It was hard to tell, just looking at pieces, but she was almost certain she’d seen carvings of Rabbits at the mill.
Elphaba was wrong. It is about her. Everything significant in Glinda’s life seems to be, these days. But it’s not only about her.
“I can. I promise.”
She touches her face, feels the softness of it, the way Elphaba sighs, just a little, at her touch. She wants to do this every day for the rest of her life.
“I just need a little time.”