Collecting You
By gypsylemon
Rating: R
Author's Note: Yes, I know there's also a book, which I read, but this fic takes place at the end of the Broadway play. Even so, it adopts many aspects from the book, so in a way it's a crossover/AU.
Disclaimer: None of this belongs to me except the ideas.
Chapter 7: New Ends and Old Friends
Glinda woke with a yelp, not realizing she had fallen asleep until she remembered the nightmares that had plagued her and chased away the peace that was always just out of reach. Her eyes were puffy and blurry and stung as new tears spilled out. The room was dark, it was still late; she was tangled up in dirty sheets that smelled, to her, like…like sex. This caused her to cry harder, letting out a wail as pain from what had happened rose to the surface in full force.
She wrapper her arms around herself and bit her lower lip as it trembled so, but naught could calm her raging nerves. Her breathing came in short hiccups between sniffles and sobs.
Elphaba had hurt her. Her best and truest friend had come seeking salvation and had only betrayed Glinda in the end. She felt a fool to let the green woman in, the night she showed up at her door. All Glinda had thought of her was that she had been troubled, tormented, haunted, but never insane.
"Crazy…bitch…" Glinda sobbed into her hands, not caring if Elphaba heard anything. She was going to get out of bed and make her leave. Give her nothing but what she came with and make her leave. Elphaba had hurt her, and more then just once. Leaving everyone to think her dead after that cursed Dorothy came around was hard enough. The first time was to save her life; The second time was intentional.
Glinda had never felt more pain then what Elphaba had done, and she couldn't have any more. Elphaba had to be gone, and she would never be allowed back. Glinda knew she would surely go mad herself if she ever saw that green woman again.
With a suppressed cry as pain flared below her waist, she pulled herself out of bed, sought her nightgown and pulled it on over her head. Terrified of having to face Elphaba again, she slowly made her way out of the bedroom. The main hallway was empty, as was the kitchen, dining room, bathroom and living room; Elphaba was gone.
She sank down into a couch, unsure whether to laugh with relief that her horrible green plague had finally ceased or cry because she was alone again.
It ended up that Glinda did neither of the two; She was still a major public figure. She never needed to be lonely if she didn't want to be. She would go out for the first time in too long, and she would meet people and talk and enjoy herself. She would not keep herself locked up like a ghost any longer.
Blood rose in the back of Elphaba's throat, choking her. The stone floor beneath her sparkled with it after each hacking cough that stretched her injured body further and caused even more pain. She clutched her chest and struggled to keep from vomiting.
She didn't know where she was; the suspecting guard knew who she was, so there was nothing more to do but let time pass. At least they had stopped hitting her now. At least they still had some humanity left in them to give her a break, let her catch her breath, before they came back to do it again.
Breathing and thinking were growing difficult with the wound on her head throbbing and aching and blinding her with the most terrible pain she had felt. Blood coursed over her lips and down her chin, dripping onto the stones below. Seeing was also a losing battle. There was blood in her eyes and each time she tried to wipe it away, it would always leak back, as if from a broken pipe.
Once Elphaba had realized she was in captivity, she tried to fight. She managed to get a few good hits in before the pain had become unbearable and she sagged against a wall, leaving herself wide open for the beating. And beat her they did. Nobody knew what to do with her just yet, but the guards beat her like she was a wild Animal, screaming curses at her, knocking her down and laughing as she struggled.
The insults stopped and the fists, boots and hard, yet unrecognizable objects withdrew from Elphaba's broken form. She had collapsed on the hard floor; finding no strength to move. There she remained, enveloped in pain, listening to the two soldier's voices echo down the hall.
"I told you it helps relax the nerves." The scrape of metal on metal; a key locking a door.
"My nerves, at least. Can't say the same thing for her, eh?."
Laughter.
"What'll we do with her?"
"This is history, man. The Wicked Witch of the West…and you found her in the middle 'o nowhere. Unbelievable."
"Meant to be." A chuckle. "But what's gonna happen?"
"We can just keep beatin' her till she dies. Relaxing, you say."
"But that's no fun after a while. Won't turn her in to no heads or bosses, not yet."
"They'll be all over her like flies."
"From the looks of it, greenie seems used to that." He laughs at his own joke. "We could make money off this. The whole country was after this devil at one point. No use ruinin' it all now."
"Sell 'er blood. She's wicked and all, everyone would want some."
"Are you mad? Her blood!"
"Hold a stupendiferous presentation, like a celebration, a holiday. Bring in tourists, kill 'er and sell 'er blood."
A pause.
"How much is it gonna bring in?"
"Who knows? Slit her throat, then sell it by the quart."
"By the quart, are you daft? We'd make a whole bit of nothing out of that. Pints, then."
"I drink a pint of ale each night at the tavern; no, pints are too big."
"Ounces then?" A pause. "We'll bleed it into little jars."
"Like a lady's perfume." Laughter.
"Best not let her bleed so much now. You're letting our profit go to waste, you pinhead!"
"She'll make more of it."
"She's bleedin' all over the place, there it goes."
"Oh, sod off."
If it hadn't been restricted to mere shades of green, the architecture of Emerald City might have been the most colorful in all of Oz. No doubt the colors would have reflected on the building's owners and purposes; Blue for offices, reds and purples for the theaters, yellow for schools, lazy shades of gray for community events and the usual emerald, or white, for residence. So it had been in the Pertha Hills, though Glinda's birthplace was much more expansive, with only little clusters of color spread out across the green and gold rolling hills.
But it was still stuck with green as the foremost color, grass in the hills instead of the buildings of the city. No, come to think of it, Pertha was more blue then anything else. In the Pertha Hills, the sky lay like a blanket over everything; no building was tall enough to block it out, and it spread eternally into the distance.
As a child, Galinda had been told the story of the sky's end countless times, so many times that she could still hear the voice of the old crone that had fascinated her with the tale long before. She often did this during the long days locked inside her luxurious apartment, alone.
But now, instead of trapped inside walls high above the streets, she had ventured outside once again. Dressing up in a stunning yet slightly casual dress that she did not even remember purchasing, Glinda always turned heads wherever she went. She pulled a light shawl around her shoulders to shield her from the wind that slipped through the maze of emerald buildings as if it's soul purpose was to make her life less comfortable.
She stopped in a little café that looked cozy enough; she ordered a tea from the menu, to warm her up, and relaxed in the cushioned booth that was meant to sit more then just one person. The streets became her main fixation now, with people of all different shapes and sizes, age and gender, clothing ranging from the dirtiest of rags to the latest couture.
The scent of Sourleaf filled her nostrils, the thin smoke snaking out from tips of the plant rolled up in leaves or paper that hung between the lips of a group of bleary-eyed, middle-aged men sitting in a corner booth. What Glinda picked up second hand made her feel strangely lightheaded and relaxed, so she shut her eyes and breathed deeply and welcomed this time to be free of any cares she ever carried.
Despite all her propriety and high class, Glinda yearned to approach the men smoking in the corner and ask to join them, but the company came to her first. It creaked and clanked over to her booth in the form of a man (or was it a tik tok?) made entirely out of slightly rusted, weather-worn tin.
Glinda kept her eyes trained at her mug, pretending the swirling brown liquid was more fascinating then the metallic man before her; staring was rude, after all.
Silver hands came down on the table, and Glinda's tea resembled a brown Lake Chorge during a storm; So she looked up and met equally silver eyes staring at her with an unreadable expression. "May I help you?" She asks politely.
Tin creaked as the man shook his head side to side. "No, thank you, but there's not much I need." His eyes glowed with an odd sort of warmth. "It's just been so long, if you'll excuse my asking; how have you been?"
"Well, I'm fine." Awkwardness took hold of the room like a glove. "Do I know you?"
"Yes, we were," he struggled to find the right wording, unless his jaw hinges were malfunctioning. "we knew each other back at school."
"Shiz?"
"Yes."
"Pardon me, but I think I would have clearly recognized you if we were indeed school friends. You don't seem at all familiar."
He sighed sadly through his metal jaw, his structured body all but deflated. "No, I think you do know me, Miss Galinda."
The name caught Glinda off guard; "How do you know that name? No one's called me that-"
"Since Shiz." The tin man finished the sentence for her, "Yes, I know."
"But, if you were, then what - who are you?" Glinda struggled for a memory but could find none. Just a haunting tin smile.
More creaking and groaning issued forth from his limbs as he pulled up a chair and sat down. "Please, tell me your name." Glinda continued, quickly adding, "I mean no offense to you, sir." at the thought of how strong that tin was.
"It's alright," The tin man said. "No one uses it anymore, and you'd never remember it anyways." He smirked.
Glinda's eyes widened at the aspect of this tin man's identity, but how could it be. She smiled warmly and abandoned her tea mug. "Boq." She announced, and he even laughed before considering the other people in the café.
"How are you faring after all these years?" Glinda reached a dainty, gloved hand across the table and rested it over Boq's; The tin was freezing, and she pulled back her hand in alarm. "Why, you're freezing!"
"No, I'm not. No circulation." Boq explained almost mournfully, afraid of what Glinda would expect out of his sudden…change in appearance. But the blonde woman's smile did not falter, nor did her eyes give up their shine that they had once held so many years ago.
"And I am faring, rather differently then anyone would have expected," He said. "At least I'm tall now."
A burst of laughter escaped Glinda's lips before she could clamp them shut and grin. "Oh, Boq, I'm afraid this is all so sudden," She apologized. "But I just can't…can't even remember how you looked."
This hurt Boq, but he had come prepared. He had no heart to love Glinda with, so it could not ever be broken. This sent him through any danger fully protected, although it still hurt to remember who he used to be. "Don't worry, I hardly can either."
At this, Glinda sat back against the cushioned booth, surveying her old friend with a look of delight and utter surprise. "I'm to have some difficulty getting used to this," She admitted finally. "But it is so good to see you."
"Likewise. You are quite difficult to track down."
"Oh, so now you stalked me?"
They both laughed; it sounded beautiful.
