Chapter Two:
Various patients of the Southstairs Asylum were sitting in a circle that was surrounded by nurses and doctors who were all observing them as they sat in their weekly discussion group.
"Now is there anything else that anyone would like to talk about?" asked Allaska who was deemed the head nurse for this particular discussion group. She looked around at the sea of patient's faces for a volunteer, "Anyone?"
Her eyes landed on Glinda who sat on her chair twisting fistfuls of her own uniform in her hands deep in thought.
"What about you, Galinda? Is there anything that you would like to share with the group?" Allaska knew what kind of water she was dangerously treading on by asking such a question but it had already been said and done.
"Yes," said the blonde faintly as she crossed one dainty leg over the other, "I would like to talk about… Elphaba Thropp."
No sooner afterwards did she say that there was a chorus of shrieks heard from the other patients.
"Not again!" cried one.
"Every week!" complained another.
The once weekly quiet discussion group was immediately turned into a shrieking animalistic frenzy with the other nurses trying to calm down the patients like they had to do every week whenever Glinda brought up the subject of Elphaba Thropp.
Allaska tried hard not to glare at the blonde woman for causing distress and weekly irritation among the other patients as she walked over to her, grabbed her by the arm, and dragged her back into her room.
Once the door was shut, Allaska turned to the woman who was sitting on the cot absentmindedly playing with her hair.
"Ten years, Glinda!" she exclaimed finally at her breaking point, "Ten years and all you do is talk about this Elphaba Thropp person!"
Allaska sighed and rubbed her temples with her fingers in irritation.
"Elphaba this and Elphaba that, Elphie is still alive, and Elphaba comes to visit me at night! Do you hear how ridiculous you sound?" yelled Allaska. The nurse had never yelled at a patient before like this. She had always tried to sympathize with them and try to understand where the root of their mental instability was but with Glinda that seemed nearly impossible.
"Do you have any idea what they're planning to do with you if you don't change? If you don't see that this person you keep talking about is probably dead then do you know what your husband is allowing us to do to you?"
Allaska was actually near tears when she said this. In all her years working at Southstairs Asylum she had always managed to cure and treat a patient without having to perform a lobotomy. She had always managed to help them without having their brains picked out. But now it seemed like she couldn't even help or later save Glinda.
In the silence that filled the room now the nurse looked at her patient. She had known exactly who the woman really was upon first seeing her when she arrived at the asylum. She had always looked up to Glinda the Good ever since she had rose up in the social world. She had seemed at first like a blonde airhead to the rest of Oz but Allaska had always seen the intellect that Glinda possessed and rarely ever used. Then when she had heard about her death shortly after the Wicked Witch Of The West's death she felt horribly sad for the woman's short life. So it was a big surprise for Allaska when Glinda had turned up at the asylum and that Allaska was her primary nurse.
But now as Allaska stared at the face of the once adored public figure she realized that the woman that she looked up to was gone. Glinda the Good was no longer here; she was simply Glinda now if even that. To Allaska she looked a distraught, helpless woman who was lost and who had been seriously disturbed by whatever had happened to her in her life.
"If… if you just admit it," pleaded Allaska to Glinda softly, "Admit it that Elphaba is dead then you'll be able to get out of here alive and be safe."
"No," said Glinda firmly, "I won't do it. It's not true, I won't say it!"
Only the blonde herself knew what horrors awaited her if she ever did return home with Chuffrey. She knew that he would lock her up in that big house of his and make her 'his' again for all eternity. At least while Glinda was in here she was safe from the sexual and mental attacks Chuffrey always gave her.
"I cannot tell a lie. I cannot tell everyone that she's dead when I know it's not true!" said Glinda softly as she lowered her head and blonde curls covered her face.
Allaska was furious and frustrated with the blonde woman. She stood up straight with her hands on her hips and thought for a moment about what to do.
"What if they found her body and showed it to you, would you believe that she's dead then?" suggested Allaska after much thought.
"They won't find a body even if they went looking for one," said Glinda with a small smile, "because she's still alive."
The nurse in the room repressed a grimace as she tried to think of a new plan.
"How did she die?" asked Allaska. Even though she had read the files on Glinda or "Galinda" as she was known around the asylum as, Allaska had come to realize that no one had ever asked the woman how her friend had died for reasons that they probably figured that it was pointless in asking.
"What?" asked Glinda as her face suddenly paled.
"How did your friend Elphaba die?"
"I already told you she didn't!" shot back Glinda defensively though Allaska could tell that the woman was shaken by the question.
Allaska felt slightly bad for rattling the woman but she felt like this was the key into curing Glinda so she was determined to keep asking until she got an answer.
"Glinda I need you to tell me how Elphaba died, whether she is dead now or not. I need you to tell me exactly why everyone besides you thinks she's dead. What happened to her?" pressed Allaska as she stared straight into Glinda's ashen face.
The blonde was paler than the nurse had ever seen her and her hands twitched in her lap like she was having a nervous fit of some sorts. It was as if all the unseen memories of her past were coming back to her mind with that one single question.
"I-I don't remember…" stuttered the blonde, her voice quivering as she fought back the horrid memories of that night that she was trying to hard to forget in her mind.
"You don't remember or you don't want to remember?" pressed Allaska.
It was now more of an interrogation than a helpful discussion but Allaska didn't care. She was so close on getting to the truth, to the root of Glinda's problem that she didn't want to stop until she had the answer.
"I don't want to remember," muttered the woman almost mutely as she stared away from Allaska's gaze.
"Why?" the word resonated off the padded walls of the room and echoed in both women's ears until it became a ringing sound and nothing more.
"Because it was all my fault and because I was there and I didn't try and stop it!" suddenly the mentally insane patient broke and spilled out her secret.
Allaska was on a roll and wasn't about to stop there.
"Glinda, you still haven't told me how she died…" she prompted for the blonde woman to finish.
"She melted, the skin was melting off of her face while I was hiding in the closet and I couldn't save her from the water!" suddenly cried out Glinda with tears now streaming down her face as she told the secret, "She told me long ago that she was allergic to water but- but I never thought that it would kill her! And it's all because I gave those stupid shoes to that bratty little girl and then she-"
"And then she what?" asked Allaska as she waited for the woman to finish.
But Glinda kept her lips shut tight after that and with tears in her eyes she turned away from the nurse and curled her legs closer to her chest as she lay down on the cot.
"None of that matters anymore though because she's not dead, and nothing you say will ever try to convince me otherwise because I know the truth," mumbled Glinda softly after a few tense moments of silence.
With one last stern look casted towards the blonde woman Allaska left the room without another word and decided that if she really wanted to help Glinda before her brains got picked out by these doctors she was going to have to do some investigating herself.
Though Allaska only knew of one killing in Oz that had been committed because of water and that was the death of the Wicked Witch of The West. It was impossible but Allaska couldn't help but wonder if this Elphaba Thropp character that Glinda was always going on about was actually The Wicked Witch of The West.
It was a hunch but a place to start no less.
The beginning scene is a playoff of one of the scenes in the movie, Death Becomes Her with Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn. It's one of my favorite movies and that scene always makes me laugh. Anyways hoped you liked this chapter and sorry it took so long to upload!
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