Elphaba had grown very fond of Glinda over the past few months but she wasn't sure she was comfortable with the concern and worry that Glinda had expressed. But she wasn't really uncomfortable with it either, and it was inevitable. So she but on her bravest face, opened the bathroom door and walked with effort, out into the room.
Although she had tried her best to mask her injuries, she obviously didn't do it well. Glinda took one look at her and burst into tears.
"Oh Elphie" she sobbed. "Look at you" and she leapt up to help her friend over to her bed. As she took Elphaba's arm the battered girl flinched, Glinda shrank back "I'm sorry-did I hurt you?" she whimpered.
Elphaba tried to smile, for the sake of her friend, "No- don't worry". She made her way painfully to her bed and sat down with great difficulty- suppressing a moan.
When she was settled as comfortably as was possible, considering- she glanced up at her visibly shaken friend
"It's not as bad as it looks" she lied. The tears that were welling up in Glinda's eyes spilled down onto her already tear stained cheeks and her face was flushed with concern true concern. "Really, it's not"
Seeing the pain etched onto her friend's face and knowing that she was being less than truthful about her condition, just to spare her feelings- made Glinda snap out of her tearful, whimpering, and as she realized, useless state. Within moments her tears dried and she calmed." Miss Elphaba, it is not proper to fib to ones roommate" She smiled and Elphie let down her guard, just a tad. "Now, whatever happened to you?"
Elphaba was prepared for this- " I told you, I fell down" ignoring the skeptical look on her roomies determined face. "I was walking through the grassy field lost in my own thoughts, as usual" she saw Glinda smile and nod knowingly." I didn't notice when the grass ended and the concrete began, and I tripped and feel into some gravel. There must have been some broken glass or something as well. I twisted my ankle and got scrapped up a bit- I'll be fine"
Glinda got up, walked over to her friend's bed and ever so gently sat down beside her. "Honestly, Glinda" Elphaba huffed, "I'm not all that bad off" Glinda touched the red mark on her roomies face and tried to examine the cuts. Elphie pulled away, unused to this kind of physical attention. "Please, don't" she almost begged of Glinda. "Oh hush Elphie and let me look at you, some of these cuts look bad" Elphaba sighed and let the blonde continue her ministrations. She was a little surprised how readily she accepted the girl's gentle touch,
Let me go get something to tend to these. "Glinda you don't have to…" but she was cut off by a flurry of moving pink and a "Nonsense". "Well, at least she seemed to by the story" she murmured to herself. She heard Glinda running water in their metal bowl and shuttered- "No water" she yelled into the bathroom. "Oh, of course" Glinda chided herself for forgetting such an important fact. "Are any of your oils camphorated?" She yelled back. ""The blue bottle on the left, I think" Glinda thought she heard her roomie laugh, As she left the bathroom she said "Must you always be so…" She stopped dead in her tracks as she saw a bloodstain forming on Elphie's nightdress, near her leg. "Sweet Luriline" she breathed and raced to the bed. "Elphie, what aren't you telling me?" she asked kneeling by the bed. As she tried to lift the hem of the nightgown Elphaba tried to move away, unsuccessfully. Glinda saw the cut and gasped. "You need a doctor, Elphaba- this looks bad" she whispered. "No doctor" Elphie hissed. Glinda sighed and put some of the oil on the cloth and cleaned the cut on Elphie's leg, while Elphie gritted her teeth, and tried to hold onto her resolve, which was easier said than done, because it was rapidly slipping away.
Glinda knew she wasn't told the whole story. Something was really wrong with her friend-even she knew that you didn't get wounds like this from a tumble. She finished up and sat back down beside her friend. She had never seen her like this- she looked -dare she think it vulnerable, frightened- it was so uncharacteristic of her roomie that it scared her a little. She took a deep breath and put her arms carefully around Elphaba's neck and kissed her gently on the forehead.
"What really happened to you today Elphaba?" she whispered into the green ear. She steeled herself for whatever the real answer was- whatever caused that look of defeat and pain on her normally confident roommate's face. Glinda realized, at that moment that she loved Elphaba too much to let her go through whatever it was alone.