Chapter Two:

The meeting was taking forever to end. It was as if time had slowed down to a halt for just this time slot between one to four, just to further torment Elphaba. She couldn't tell if the sudden news of Glinda's death was altering her perspective of time passing or if it was the fact that this meeting was boring and dull and she wasn't really paying attention anyways. Either way Elphaba felt detached from the world. Tapping her pen against her stack of papers, she kept a hand propped under her chin and blinked her eyes, trying to stay awake. Her behavior today was seriously abnormal. She was usually the one to initiate questions from the clients, make sure protocol was being followed, the one to voice her opinion loudly in front of everyone. But today, not a peep was heard out of her. She had just sat down in the chair and stayed silent and her co-workers were beginning to take notice that something might be wrong or upsetting her. Her mind was occupied on Glinda, on her dead friend, on how she might have died not on work. It was starting to consume her, like a plague on her heart. This was going to haunt her for the rest of her life.

The power point presentation up front mixing with the droning voices of their clients were putting her to sleep and causing her to daydream of what could have happened to Glinda. Lost in her daydreams, she hadn't even taken down a single note. Luckily, Elphaba was not alone here at this meeting; she had another bank employee with her. Boq was sitting right next to her, taking dutiful notes after every slide like the rookie he was. Boq Tippin was a good worker, one from the bank's California base corporation. Elphaba had worked with him before and she liked him well enough. He was a good kid, obviously fresh out of college but he worked very, very hard. He had all the obvious signs of being a rookie though, showing up early and dressing nice to meetings, copying every single thing anyone ever said down into his notebook, willingly volunteering to do everything and anything to please everyone, and he just had that look about him. He was a fresh face in the crowd, one that was topped with cropped blonde hair and bright blue eyes. His dressing was impeccable; Elphaba at least could give him that. And even though she only saw him once a year, Elphaba considered Boq to be a friend, and it was obvious that he thought of Elphaba as a friend too.

When the meeting finally came to a close, Boq leaned over to her and whispered in her ear, "You alright?" He looked genuinely concerned for her as everyone else began to pack up and leave.

Elphaba blinked, she hadn't realized that she had momentarily dozed off. She struggled to appear normal, gathering her paper and folders up quickly in her arms.

"Fine, just fine," she lied as she hurried her legs and tried to just get out of the building unscathed and not bothered with questions about why she was acting so weird today.

"Is it Nessa?" Boq called after her and the dark-haired woman stopped in her tracks.

"No, it's not Nessa. She's fine," dismissed Elphaba and she quickly got back to her walking. Boq knew the tight bond Elphaba had with her younger sister and he knew that she would be acting off if anything ever happened to her but that was not the case this time.

"Then what is it?" pressed Boq as he finally caught up with her on the stairwell. Elphaba let out a long sigh as she stopped on the stairs, finally relenting to tell him the truth.

"It's just… it's just," she struggled to form the words to tell him what she saw at the airport.

"A very good friend of mine passed away today and I found out at the airport while I was waiting in line for the escalators. It was all over the news."

Elphaba could feel her voice breaking with emotion as she finished off her sentence and avoided Boq's eye contact in fear that she would start crying all over again. She felt as if she was going to cry, her throat was lumpy, her eyes were beginning to water…

"Elphie, you're shaking," pointed out Boq who was obviously astonished at how pained Elphaba was about all this and how much she was holding back, "Come on, I'll drive you back to your hotel."

Elphaba didn't even hesitate for a second; she just nodded and bolted to the front door with Boq trailing behind her, struggling to keep up with her fast-paced gait.

"I'm really sorry," was the first thing he said to her in the car. Elphaba just sat there in the passenger seat, looking rigidly out the window like a hawk as they flew by car after car. Boq could feel the tension, anger, and grief radiating off of her from just a few mere inches away.

"Do you wanna talk about it?" he offered as he put on the car's blinker as they got onto the highway. No, thought Elphaba, because if I do I feel as though I will never stop crying. But her mouth wasn't listening to her head and went ahead and began to talk anyways.

"I just don't understand why someone would kill her," whispered Elphaba in obvious mourning.

"You mean your friend was murdered?" exclaimed Boq in shock as he slammed on the breaks to avoid getting into a crash on the freeway, "Who was this friend anyways? Did she have Mafia ties or something?"

He was trying to make a joke but Elphaba was not in the mood.

"Her name was Glinda Upland," started the dark-haired woman as she loosened her posture, "but her married name was Glinda Tiggular."

Boq nearly ran the car off the road after hearing that.

"You were friends with Glinda Tiggular, the most ruthless yet most creative fashion designer in all of America and you didn't think about mentioning that at all to me?"

She shrugged, a bit amused though at his reaction, "I didn't think you knew who she was."

Boq's mouth was open wide, "Of course I do! I got all of my suits from her store! I adored her!"

"Yeah, well she's dead now," quipped Elphaba in a voice a bit too harsh for even her liking. She cringed as she saw Boq's face plummet; "I'm sorry Boq I didn't mean it like that… I'm just… I'm just having trouble processing this."

She hung her head low, her ponytail sticking up in the air as she did so.

"No, of course, I shouldn't have been so insensitive. I'm sorry she's dead," Boq was quick to apologize and come to her aid. He pulled over on the side of the road, and parked the car.

"Did it say how she died?" he asked, looking at her hair since Elphaba refused to lift her head from its hiding place in her arms.

"No, it just said that she was murdered at her studio," mumbled Elphaba nearly on the verge of collapsing into tears. She didn't want to talk about Glinda anymore. It hurt too much. It brought up memories that she could never replace, ones that only the blonde could have made with her. The thought of her being dead was affecting Elphaba more than she thought it would have. She didn't think she had grown this attached to Glinda, especially in recent years when they had only texted each other and emailed once a month if that.

She barely felt it when Boq put his arms around her but she was thankful for the comfort even though she was not one for physical contact type of comfort and healthy. Elphaba preferred to brave it alone but this time was an exception to say the least.

When she had finished crying she looked up at Boq and wiped her eyes tenderly, silently thanking him for being there for her.

"It's 6 o' clock and I still haven't been back to the hotel to unpack," she remarked glumly as she switched the subject on him as her eyes glanced at the clock that was illuminated on his dashboard.

"When do you leave?" asked Boq putting his seatbelt back on and signaling to get back on the road.

"In a week, my boss wants me to stay until our clients have made a decision and have all their questions answered and I'm the only one knows everything there is to know about our company so you're stuck with me for seven full days," she was teasing but it futile and weak. Boq laughed anyways, just to cheer her up.

"Well, then tonight I say we go out on the town, go get a couple of drinks…"

Elphaba raised her eyebrows at Boq's suggestion. She watched with grim regret for her words as he turned the car around and sped in the other direction, obviously heading to a club or bar.

"Boq, I don't drink," Elphaba started to say but Boq cut her off.

"Tonight you do. You owe it to yourself… you owe it to Glinda. Have a few drinks and relax a bit. Besides… who knows maybe we'll find dates for each other."

"Oh, I see… you just want to go out and find yourself a hot date," Elphaba couldn't help the smile that was forming on her face.

"We can share him," was Boq's last retort as he sped off down the road to God's knows where in search of a decent bar to take Elphaba to.

AN: On a roll here.

And yes I do realize that I wrote Boq as a gay character but that will come into effect later, don't you worry. :)

Will write the next chapter tonight and tomorrow. Should be posting by this weekend! :)

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