No One Mourns the Wicked - But What About the Good?
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Glinda sits at her small wooden desk. Her silvered blonde hair is tied at the back of her neck with a black ribbon. There is only a single sheet of paper sitting on the desk this evening, and the room seems to be in an unusual state of order, no crumpled notes strewn about. The room is dim, faint light filtering through the drapes from the lamps outside. Glinda's eyes glitter in the half-light, as she stares at the paper that appears to glow ghostly white, empty.
Thoughts chase each other across her eyes. Forgotten conversations play in her mind. She glances at the clock. Twenty minutes to midnight. The attendant would be coming around soon. She briefly ponders retiring to bed, if only to keep some of the curious gossip at bay, but she can't seem to find the energy to rise.
Yes, Glinda is aware of the gossip. She is aware of what people think of her. Painfully aware, as she still cares about the public's opinion. This... declination, though, seems to be beyond her control. The left corner of her mouth turns up slightly, a hint of a sardonic smile. If she could return to her carefree schooldays, she would.
But for now, she can only sit at her desk, remembering her friend Elphaba, and torturing herself with guilt. And the attendants wonder why she rarely sleeps... but no, the attendants could never know what happened then, in the castle. Only Glinda knew the real Elphie. Well, Glinda and Fiyero. And look what happened to him.
Glinda is interrupted from these thoughts by a sound at the door. She glances over, taking in the shadowy figure and the time on the clock. The attendant - he was early. She would have to speak to the supervisor about that. She likes routine, and dislikes interruptions.
The attendant speaks her name, in no more than a whisper. She tallies another strike against him in her mind. If she wanted anything, she would have spoken first. She doesn't look up.
The figure steps closer, into the dim light of the room, and speaks again. Glinda almost stops breathing. The voice is the one that speaks to her in her deepest nightmares. She refuses to believe it. It is her fatigue, it's a hallucination from her lack of sleep. It's not real. Safe in this belief, she attempts to retreat into her thoughts once more, but her head inexorably turns, and her red-rimmed eyes widen as they land on the skinny dark figure just inside the door.
As realization hits her, her breath does catch in her throat. She can feel heat rising to her face, and her heart speed up. She rises to her feet, trembling slightly, but her body no longer seems to be under her own control......
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AN: I do not own Wicked, Glinda or Elphaba. I do, however, love the story and the characters, and this creative outlet. :-) Just a reminder that this is based on the musical, since I mentioned a few things that definitely don't happen in the book. And there you go, I mentioned Fiyero. ;-)
Thank you for the reviews! I appreciate them. Sorry about the tense issues... I usually switch to past tense briefly when writing about something that already happened in the story. I think that from this point on I won't be able to alternate chapters between Elphaba and Glinda. I'll see what I can figure out.
Sorry also about the long period of inactivity. I have plans for this fic, but it's not writing as fast as I would like it to.
Thanks for reading!
Love,
B