Like Her Mother- Frex's POV
He watched his older daughter slowly approach him. He saw her mother in her- if not for the green skin, she was a carbon copy. "Papa, it's me," she said kindly. She knew he had gone mostly blind.
The two of them sat on a bench together. He called her Fabala and saw her perk up. Was she that desperate for love? Had he scarred her that badly as a child? He hoped he hadn't but knew he had. He had so much to tell her, so much to confess to, but didn't know where to begin.
He loved her, he did. He knew he never showed it enough. But with Nessarose so sickly and dependent... and then Melena died, and Elphaba had her eyes. He couldn't look at those eyes in that face. He knew he should have loved her the more for it, but pushed her away.
He threw himself into his job. The Quadlings, his mission. He had thrown himself whole-heartedly into his mission. She was like him in that- loving hopeless missions. His had been giving Unionism-religon- to the Quadlings. Hers had been the Animals. He decided neither had been very sucessful.
She had grown into a quiet, reclusive girl. He had sent her off to school at seventeen, and never gone to visit her. During the spring of her second year, he had recieved a letter claiming she had run away. His grandfather-in-law had sent out Munchkinlander soliders to look for her, but she was never found, and they had all presumed she was dead. Eventually, Nanny- the batty old hag, older than he was- had found her, living out in the Vinkus. How she got their, he didn't know.
All he knew was that his little Fabala had grown into a broken woman. There was a child, he had learned, but she would neither claim him or turn him away. He didn't even care that the child had obviously been concieved out of wedlock, not anymore.
She looked at him then. He couldn't see the Wicked Witch of the West. He couldn't believe the rumers. All he saw was his oldest-now, only daughter. She was thirty-eight years old, still relativly young. She was broken and battered and he could see he had never shown her enough love.
He wanted to start over, to go back to the day she was born. He wanted to tell his young self to protect the child, to love her and show her love. But that was impossible, and she was too bad off to be fixed now.
He looked at her and saw Elphaba's spirit through Melena's eyes. He didn't know she would be dead within the month.