This was how her childhood should have been.

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Chapter Ten:

Time went on, dragging Elphaba and Garivon with it. For a few days Garivon had feared that he would lose his green daughter – for he had come to think of her as his daughter – as an infection set in to her wound and fever overtook her body. She was racked with sweats and delusions and he could not bear to leave her in such a state so he sat by her side for the four days it took for the fever to break. At one point the infection had settled so deeply into the injury that he had had to lance it, letting the blood and fluid drain into a small bucket, before being forced to cauterize the wound again. Elphaba had flinched as the hot iron touched her skin but even such great a pain could not wake her from the unconsciousness that the fever had trapped her in.

When the fever finally broke Garivon had felt a wonderful sense of relief burst inside of him. It wasn't until a few hours later that Elphaba finally opened her eyes and returned to the world of the living. She looked at him and smiled, seeming to know already what had happened to her.

The world kept spinning and lives were carried on. Glinda had her child with Fiyero, a tiny baby girl, and when Elphaba had heard the news she had felt her heart squeeze into nothingness inside of her. There had been a gathering at the palace square where the tiny bundle of joy was introduced to Oz – Elphaba did not go. She tried her best to forget that they even existed because it was easier that way.

When she was not helping Garivon with the bar – she had learnt to be a waitress, to balance the trays of drinks on her stub where her hand should be – she spent much of her time teaching herself how to write again. She had always favoured her right hand and had always written with it and her usually neat and tidy writing was messy and scraggly and altogether ugly looking as she realized, for the first time, how little motor-control she really had in her left hand.

At the same time that she practiced writing she also did her best to teach Garivon, if he was up to it, how to write. The old man could read, to some extent, but he had never learnt to write and it was something that kept him busy for there was little else he could do in his aging life.

Elphaba celebrated her forty-third birthday with a tiny cake and a day off. Garivon celebrated his seventy-first birthday with an even smaller cake and over a week off. Glinda and Fiyero's child celebrated her first birthday with a lavish party and far more gifts than any one-year old could ever need.

Soon the bar became more of Elphaba's responsibility than Garivon's as he was becoming weaker and sicker as each day passed them by. The drunken men knew that Elphaba used to play the piano for them and they always begged her, in their stupid, drunken way, to play again but she refused. She had let the hems down on the sleeves to all her clothing and the extra fabric was enough to hide the fact that she was missing her right hand unless you knew to look. She kept it a carefully guarded secret because she was utterly ashamed of her amputated hand.

Elphaba awoke one day and trudged up the stairs to the bar to find that Garivon was not there to greet her as was usual. Concerned she quietly made her way up his set of stairs to his floor of the house above the bar. She knocked on the door but got no answer so she pulled out the hairpin that kept her hair in the knot at the base of her neck and used it to pick the lock.

"Garivon?" she called as she entered. No response. She walked down the small hallway and pushed opened the door to his room to find him lying on his bed. In a moment of utter terror she thought that he was dead until she saw his chest moving up and down beneath his thick blankets. "Are you well?" she asked.

He turned to look at her and smiled weakly. "My time is coming," he said, his voice hoarse and dry.

Elphaba shook her head and sat down on the edge of his bed; played with her hair with her remaining hand to try and distract herself. "No," she said, far harsher then she intended. She couldn't bear the thought of losing another person she loved. "Not yet, it's… it's too soon."

"I'm seventy-one Fae, I've had a good run." He reached for her hand and she slipped it into his hold. He squeezed it as best as his weak body could allow him to.

"I can't live without you." She stared at the ground so he wouldn't see the tears pooling in her eyes.

"You're stronger than you give yourself credit for."

She frowned. "You're not the first person to tell me that."

"Malky did too, didn't he?"

She looked up at him suddenly. "You knew Malky?" she asked, shocked.

"Of course, we were partners in the revolution before he left to help you."

"He… he left the revolution for… for me?"

Garivon smiled in amusement. "There was quite the uproar from the higher ups but he was determined to save you. Kept saying something about owing you his life or something of the such."

Her mouth opened in shock and she just stared at him disbelief. "Then the… the furniture in my home, above the corn exchange… that was you, wasn't it? You were the friend Malky said brought it, weren't you?"

"Me and a few others but yes, it was me. Malky asked for a favour and I remembered you from the nights you used to spend at my bar. I felt compelled to help."

"You only knew me as the strange green whore who sold her body to survive," she whispered. "You only knew me as a prostitute and yet you weren't disgusted… you still wanted to help me." She couldn't believe what she was hearing, it was too… impossible… to be true.

They fell into silence and Elphaba dropped her gaze to the ground. "I want you to close the bar," Garivon said. "I cannot keep it opened in my state and you should not be held back by the responsibility of it."

"Right now?"

"Open it tonight for the last time but when you close it you close forever, and make sure the men know that, okay?"

She nodded her understanding. "I don't want to watch you die," she whispered.

"There's still some fight in me left."

"Is there anything I can get for you?"

Garivon smiled and nodded. "As a matter of fact yes, yes there is."

And so it began. Elphaba did her best to help Garivon as his life slowly slipped from his grasp and Garivon did his best to help lessen the pain that his slow death was causing the green woman he cherished.