Disclaimer: I don't own Wicked.
Ellie woke up the next morning in one of the very uncomfortable cots. She had a hard time sleeping and woke up quite frequently due to her back aching and thunderstorms. She got up out of bed and stretched, wondering how people slept in these old things that looked to be right out of the eighteen hundreds. Ellie wandered around the second floor to try and find the bathroom, and luckily, she did. She used the toilet and took a bath, and was surprised this place had running water.
After cleaning herself and toweling off, she went back to the room she had been given to stay in and began to get dressed, pulling her blue dress over her head and putting on the ruby slippers. Ellie looked down at them and felt somewhat guilty. These shoes had belonged to the witch's deceased sister, they never really belonged to her mother.
Thinking about the dead reminded her of what Dorothy had looked like when she died. Her mouth had been slightly parted, as if she was trying to breathe. Her eyes had become distant and her skin had paled and cooled very quickly, probably due to the fact her heart stopped pumping blood through her. Ellie shook the image out of her head. It was odd that her mother's death wasn't affecting her as much as it should. Sure, she cried the night she passed away, but other than that, she didn't shed a tear.
It's not that she wasn't upset that Dorothy died; okay, maybe it was. She thought losing her mother would have been worse than what she was feeling now. It was odd because she knew her mother was dead, she witnessed it herself. However, it didn't feel as if she was really gone, when she really was. Ellie didn't like this feeling because she knew it would only come to haunt her in the future and she'd bawl her eyes out. "Come get breakfast before you leave," the witch said as she peered her head in the door. Ellie nodded and followed her out.
"What's for breakfast?" Ellie asked her when she sat down at the counter.
"Whatever you can find," the witch shrugged. Ellie got up from her seat and looked around. She couldn't really cook, so she settled for something she usually ate since her mother got sick. She chose an apple. The witch seemed to have gotten her own apple and was eating it as she read a book. Ellie didn't think it would be a good idea to have regular conversations with her, or speak to her. Since Glinda was good, she probably didn't like her too much.
Ellie looked out the window and saw it was raining quite heavily when she went to leave through the castle doors. She looked at the ruby slippers and hoped they wouldn't get ruined on her long journey walking to the Emerald City. She had no money, so she knew she was going to have to walk all the way there. She assumed it would take four weeks instead of two simply because she was going to walk, and she was only ten. She wasn't great at thinking how long it would take to get there.
But the thing was, it was raining. She hated the rain. She hesitated before putting one foot out the door before she saw the witch standing there, making sure the brown haired girl left. "What are you waiting for?" the witch snapped at her. "You better start walking now or you'll never get to the Emerald City." Ellie could only nod.
She looked up at the witch glaring at her, making her feel smaller than she really was. "Well?" Ellie sat down on the floor, much to the witch's dislike. "I have no time for this," she snapped. Ellie took the ruby slippers off, stood up, and handed them to the witch.
"These are really yours," Ellie whispered. The witch's face softened a bit, but hardened once she made eye contact with the girl.
"Get out," she yelled. "I said get out and never come back!"
"How come you're being so mean?" Ellie whispered, but was loud enough for the witch to hear. She didn't mean for her to, but luck was never on Ellie's side.
"You're mother made my life miserable. How am I supposed to know if you'll dump water all over me, too? Or actually kill me?"
"Because I gave you what's rightfully yours." Ellie tried. She wished that the witch was somewhat nice to her, unlike everyone else. She was beginning to wish she never listened to that stupid tiger cub, Brac, and just went towards Emerald City and just walked through the night.
"I think it's time you left," the witch said, sending Ellie out into the pouring rain without any shoes. The castle doors shut in her face, and she stood out in the rain. Keeping her tears at bay, she marched through the thick mud in the forest in bare feet. She was smart enough to take her socks off so that her feet wouldn't get some weird fungus.
Ellie was grateful when the mud ended and the Yellow Brick Road began. She sat down on it to check out her feet, which were all scuffed up and caked with mud. She let the rain wash them off before she got up to continue down the Yellow Brick Road. "Mama was right, she is wicked," Ellie mumbled to herself. "I thought that she was nice at first, and maybe she wasn't wicked. Oh, why couldn't have I found Glinda first?" she cried, finally letting the tears spill over her eyes. It was sinking in that Dorothy was dead and she'd never see her again. She wouldn't even be able to attend her own mother's funeral! Who was going to go to it now? Ellie was beginning to wish she kept the ruby slippers. The wicked witch did not deserve them.
Finally, she just broke down right in the middle of the Yellow Brick Road in the rain. Ellie cried her heart out, wishing for Dorothy to come and save her, although she knew it was impossible. Dorothy, her mother, was dead, and even if she was alive, she never comforted her daughter anyway. All she did was tell her stories of Oz and how great it was. Ellie began to think the doctors were right; Dorothy had gone insane. Oz seemed to be a terrible place. But so was South Carolina, where she had come from. She just didn't fit in there. She'd rather be an outcast in an unknown land where no one knew of her.
Ellie got up and tried to keep walking. The more she walked during the day, the closer she'd get to her new life. Eventually, she got to that little town she had stopped in where she met Brac. Nobody was in sight, except for the occasional person running through the rain for shelter. Ellie found a little market place and took a deep breath before she shoved a couple of apples into her pockets. "Stealing isn't vey becoming of a young girl." Ellie jumped up at the voice and turned around. She looked up and saw the witch staring vacantly ahead of her, not meeting her eyes. She held an umbrella in her hand and made a gesture with the other, wanting Ellie to follow her.
"I will not come with someone as wicked as you," Ellie cried out.
"Shush, you want me to get caught?" the witch said, yanking the girl to the side of the Yellow Brick Road. "The fact that you can even recognize me without the shoes is remarkable. Perhaps it is because you are from another world." She wasn't really even speaking to Ellie, but more so to herself.
"I thought you wanted me gone," Ellie said. "So, I left. And then you follow me?"
"Come with me," the witch said, not even giving Ellie a choice. She yanked on the girl's sleeve and forced her into some bar or coffee house, Ellie didn't know. They sat in the farthest booth, away from practically everyone. Ellie felt trapped in the large red seat she sat in across from the witch. "Here, dry your feet off with these." She handed her some napkins, and Ellie listened, wiping the water from her feet, and a small amount of blood. She put her socks on them and realized just how cold they were. She was surprised when the witch grabbed them and started warming them up with her own hands, but at the same time, she had this scowl on her face. "Put these on." She shoved the ruby slippers towards Ellie. She didn't put them on quite yet. She let them stay on the table and she stared at them.
"So now you're being nice to me?" she said in a hushed voice, although, nice wasn't really the best word to describe her.
"You were pitiful walking away in the mud with bare feet. It was embarrassing," the witch reasoned.
"Why are you being so wicked?"
"I guess my name suits me then," the witch said.
"Mama was right. You are a mean, nasty old thing," Ellie spat.
"Watch your tongue."
"No!" Ellie yelled, but then kept her voice down so that she didn't bring attention to herself. "I'm tired of people treating me bad. I just want people to be nice to me. I just want to be a kid. I don't want to have to worry about the kids picking on me, or the adults," she rambled. "If I have to be mean to get respect, then I guess I will have to. I'm in a new land, so I can be anyone I want. I can be exactly what they want me to be."
"You sure like to ramble, my pretty," the witch rolled her eyes.
"Do I? Or maybe I just described you," Ellie whispered.
"Come again?"
"You heard me. You were like me. And you became someone everyone wanted you to be. I don't want that to happen to me."
"Put the damn shoes on," the witch commanded and Ellie listened, knowing that she was already pushing it with this dangerous woman.
"Why are you giving me these?"
"Just don't ask any questions," the green woman replied. Ellie got up from the table and began to walk away, but was stopped again, the witch's nails digging into her skin. Tears sprung to her eyes. It was all too much. She should have never went into that castle.
"Just let me go, please. I just want to find Glinda."
"Why are you so desperate to find her?"
"Because I don't want to be alone anymore," Ellie cried. "Please, just let me go. I promise I'll never bother you again." Ellie noticed that the grip on her arm softened a bit.
"I'll bring you to the Emerald City."
"Why would you want to do that? You hate me."
"You're just a child, my pretty. I can't just let you walk all the way to Emerald City. You'd probably die."
"Why do you even care?" Ellie sniffed.
"Never said I did," the witch remarked. "I just want to make sure Dorothy's little angel will not go on some strange quest to attempt to kill me." With that said, the wicked witch forcefully led Ellie into a room on the second floor of the joint to spend the night in. Ellie had never slept worse in her life.
