A very loud gasp escaped the blonde as her head shot up at the sound of Elphaba barreling into the waiting room. Anna, the lady who was supposed to be tending the front desk was nowhere in sight. She had probably gone home for the night considering it was now after hours.

Glinda stared wide-eyed at the green woman and was frozen in place. In her clenched fist was a crumpled, yellowing piece of parchment about a quarter of the size of an average sheet of paper. The hand holding the parchment was clutched to her chest as the other covered her chapped-lipped mouth which held the form of an "O" since the moment she saw Elphaba. Elphaba felt tears pricking at her eyes but she refused to let them fall; more so out of pride than the fact that they would leave burns on her skin.

The sound of clicking heals on linoleum grabbed both of their attentions. Maureen walked up behind Elphaba with Lucas limping behind her. She placed a hand on her shoulder in a way that was meant to be comforting. Maureen wasn't sure what reason there was to comfort Elphaba, but she felt the need to anyway.

"Maureen, I don't mean to rush you out," Elphaba started slowly, planning her words carefully. "But Glinda and I have a lot to talk about."

The brunette nodded her head and scooted out the double doors with Lucas in tow. As soon as the door closed behind her, Elphaba ran to Glinda and took her in her arms.

"Sweet Oz, Glinda, how did you get here?" Elphaba gasped, clutching a reluctant and somewhat smelly Glinda close to her. It only lasted a few more seconds before the blonde shoved her away and put herself in a fighting stance.

"Who are you, artichoke?" She shouted. In the rush to get away from Elphaba, Glinda had dropped the parchment onto the ground. Elphaba chuckled and bent over to pick it up. As soon as she righted herself, Glinda darted forward and grabbed the parchment from her.

"Glinda, the vegetable jokes were humorous in university but, come on, we're adults now. This is honestly how you're going to greet me after five years?"

There was a hardness in Glinda's turquoise eyes that Elphaba had never seen before. "Glinda…" Elphaba's voice was soft now with pain ringing through it. "Glinda, it's me, Elphaba. Remember? We were best friends."

Glinda's stance loosened a little but she was still in a position to fight if need be. Her eyes remained hard and cold as she handed the parchment to the Elphaba and quickly retreated her hand. "So then I suppose this is my letter and you're the 'Elphaba' I was writing to. I found that in my boot. I guess it's a memento or something."

The parchment showed signs of being folded numerous times. There was water stains making the ink run that Elphaba could only assume were Glinda's tears all over it. The writing was distinctly Glinda's, small and loopy. The only difference from the blonde's handwriting from their Shiz days and this was that there were no hearts dotting the "I"s.

Elphaba finally got to reading the letter.

Dearest Elphaba,

It's been one year exactly since the melting. It's barbaric how people in the EC are celebrating it. If only they knew, Elphaba… If only they knew.

Hah. Do you remember the discussion we had in our dorm room before we were friends? The one about the existence of souls and how you said you doubted the fact that you even had one? Well I want you to know that you in fact did— do— have a soul and I've learned recently that it's the only truly good soul in this world. I intend on letting everyone know that.

Soon.

I know it's not what you wanted, but it's what needs to be done. I can't bear to see these festivities go on any longer. It hurts to see the demise of such a great woman being celebrated so maliciously.

Wherever you are, Elphie, dead or alive, I hope you're happy.

You know, I've always had the sneaking suspicion that you were still alive somewhere. That this was all just a trick. I guess that's why I'm writing this letter, in hopes that it will one day find you. I hope it will. I hope I will.

With all my heart,

Glinda

"What's 'the melting?'" Glinda asked when she suspected Elphaba was done reading the letter. Her body was now fully relaxed as if Elphaba reading the last words was some sort of test to see if she was to be trusted by the blonde.

Elphaba didn't know how to comprehend anything that was going on. Everything stopped making sense to her as soon as Glinda let out that first gasp when she initially saw her. "You don't remember me, do you?" Elphaba winced at the sound of her voice cracking. For years, she fantasized about her reunion with Glinda and not in a single one of her daydreams did she consider this a possibility.

Glinda inched closer to Elphaba. Was it dirt or ash that blackened parts of Glinda's face? Was it a sword or a hand that tore the Munchkinland military garb she was donning? Where did she even get Munchkinland military uniform?

"I don't remember anything." Glinda's eyes were downcast. Her hands were folded in front of her; she stood like a child waiting to get yelled at by her parents for breaking the antique vase.

Elphaba let out a shaky breath. She brought her hand to her mouth and began chewing on her nails, her opposite arm covering her stomach as if she were nauseous. The memory of the man in the trench coat chose that moment to come back to her.

"Are you missing something, ma'am?"

The memory of that morning's occurrence along with the current events brought a chill to Elphaba's spine. Her breathing started getting labored and her hands start shaking violently. She leaned against the front desk to support herself for she would have surely fallen over if she hadn't.

"You're very green."

"Thank you, I realize that!" Elphaba shouted, startling the blonde, still hunched over the desk.

"I'm sorry!" Glinda shouted back, looking more like a scared little girl than the fighter who was fully prepared to knock Elphaba out just minutes prior. Elphaba felt a hand on her back that began to rub soothing circles as Glinda spoke on. "It's just that you're the only person that I seem to know and I've been looking for you for four days now and I just didn't expect you to be so… verdant."

"Glinda, how did you even know where to find me?"

Glinda began to recount the tale of how she knew where Elphaba would be. There was a man, an old man, in a trench coat who asked her if she was missing something. She told the man that she wasn't sure if she was missing anything, but she was looking for something, someone, if he could help her with it. She wasn't sure, though, if she was looking for a Glinda or an Elphaba. Glinda told the man the two possible names of the woman she was looking for and he pointed her in the direction of the local animal hospital.

"Can you please help me, Elphaba? I have no idea who I am or who you are or anything! I don't know what's going on. Please…" Her voice was sincere.

"Come with me." Elphaba commanded, finally collecting herself. Her breath was still uneven but she was at least able to support herself now.

After locking up the office, Elphaba drove Glinda to her apartment building. There was barely any conversation as the two sat in the car. When they arrived at the apartment, Elphaba told the blonde to wait in the hallway while she talked to Fiyero; she would explain who he was later.

Mark and Roger frequented the gym Fiyero worked at. Roger more so than Mark. It was through hockey that the three became friends; Mark and Roger were sweaty and huddled up around a television that had been playing that days game when Fiyero came up behind them to join in. He startled them both when he began shouting at number 14 for not making the goal when he had the perfect chance to. Imbecile.

It didn't take very long after that for the two men to befriend Fiyero. After that, the three of them would meet up at sports bars and occasionally Elphaba would tag along if Fiyero had pouted enough that night. Mark and Roger were initially taken aback by the woman's verdigris but they soon grew used to it. Roger even went as far as to hitting on her before Fiyero got him to back off.

As expected, the three men sat in the living room yelling at the TV. Elphaba didn't bother to question and didn't even want to know how some of the furniture became overturned or how it seemed an entire bag of Cheetos managed to get ground up into the carpet.

She grabbed the remote off the coffee table and clicked the power button. Only then did the men acknowledge the woman's presence and began to shout at her to turn it back on.

"Mark, Roger, I need you both to leave. There's something very important I need to discuss with Fiyero."

"Come on, there's only fifteen minutes left!" Roger protested, trying to get the remote back from Elphaba who snatched it away as soon as he made a move.

"Fiyero, if you don't make them leave right now, you're sleeping in that Cheeto dust." She pointed to the orange stains all over the carpet.

"Come on guys, go home, we're losing anyway."

A glare from Elphaba prevented any further protests and the two men made their goodbyes and departed from the apartment. Elphaba heard Roger wolf whistle at, she assumed, Glinda as he closed the door behind him and rolled her eyes.

"Keep walking!" She shouted at the door. She turned to face Fiyero who had a look of concern etched across his face. Sitting him down, she went over the day's events with him as he stared at her in disbelief.

"That's not funny, Elphaba. I know you're not that great at making joke that are actually funny, but I know that you know that that's not funny." Fiyero sputtered.

Fiyero, you're so beautiful but so stupid, Elphaba thought with a sigh. "You don't believe me?"

"No, I don't believe you at all, actually."

Elphaba stood up and walked to the door. She placed one hand on the doorknob and the other flat on the wooden surface. She took a deep breath and looked over her shoulder at Fiyero who had stood up and crossed his arms over his chest, waiting for her to open the door. Maybe she was crazy and she had just imagined all of this. Maybe all the years she had spent in this world finally drove her to madness and she had been hallucinating the entire occurrence with the old man and Glinda.

She took another deep breath and twisted the doorknob, pulling the slab of wood open. Standing in front of the threshold was Glinda, arms crossed and foot tapping rapidly.

There was a moment of silence as Elphaba looked expectantly at Fiyero, who stood in shock. His arms slowly came out of their crossed position and went down to his sides. A goofy smile crossed his face before he shouted,

"Oh, Lurline!"

Glinda yelped as Fiyero ran towards her and squeezed her. He lifted her off the ground and spun her around once before putting her back down. Elphaba gestured for the two to come back into the apartment and she shut the door behind them. There were tears streaming freely from Fiyero's eyes as he chuckled, more in shock than in humor, at the sight of his old friend.

"Glinda! How did you get here from Oz? We're not even sure how we got here!" Fiyero had both of Glinda's forearms in his grip. The poor girl looked scared and confused.

"Wh-what's Oz?" Glinda looked between the two of them.

Elphaba gripped Glinda's shoulder, swatting Fiyero's hands away, and walked her to the couch. She picked up an empty chips bag and placed it on the coffee table in disgust. Sitting down, she patted the seat next to her which Glinda promptly took. Fiyero took a seat in the arm chair. It hadn't crossed Elphaba's mind that she wouldn't remember where she came from. It probably should have, though, she didn't even remember her own name.

"Glinda, Oz is where we're from." Fiyero began explaining. "It's this whole other world. We came here five years ago, Elphaba and I, after the Dorothy girl 'melted' Elphaba. Everyone in Oz thinks Elphaba is dead. Me as well."

"Why?" Glinda asked.

"Bec—"

"Wait," Elphaba intervened. "It's late. Maybe we should let Glinda wash up, she's filthy— don't look at me that way, it's true, you smell horrendous— and get some rest. I'm sure she's had it rough for the past few days."

They all agreed.

Glinda didn't sleep well that night. Elphaba and Fiyero insisted she take their bed for the night but she refused and resided to the couch. Fiyero did his best to clean up the living room while she was in the shower but the smell of alcohol still lingered in the room. It was because she could hear Elphaba and Fiyero arguing in their room. She sat quietly and tried to make her breathing as silent as possible as she listened to the conversation.

"How do we know that's even really Glinda?"

"What do you mean? It's obviously Glinda, just look at her!"

"But how do we know it's not just something Morrible or someone created to come and kill us!"

"Fae, you're just paranoid."

"Then how do you explain the fact that she doesn't remember anything?"

Glinda couldn't hear anything after that. Whether that was the end of the conversation or they began speaking in whispers, she couldn't tell. She decided to try and give herself to sleep. The couch was much more comfortable than the park benches she had been sleeping on for the past few nights.