The two girls stood there for a minute, needing no explanation of why the two were positioned that way. Each girl was troubled in her way by the fact that, though Fiyero and Elphaba were lying with everything exposed, with vulgar acts in open air and sexual fluids dried on their bodies, there was something oddly beautiful about them, something strangely romantic and… dare they call it… pure?
Neither of them knew what to make of the nightmarish display the night before, either. Had that been just some sort of folly to fool the two into thinking it was perfectly fine for Fiyero to get into bed with Elphaba, or had they truly meant to lie in each other's arms innocently, but some fire had started and needed to explode and fade? Nessa, obviously unsettled by the sight of her sister and Fiyero in a sexual situation, much less them actually still, in a way, having sex, left the room immediately, while Glinda stood for a moment longer, straining to understand.
What had changed in Elphie? How had Fiyero weaseled his way so far into her life, her trust, that she would lose herself to him and lie vulnerable beneath or beside him? Nothing broke Elphaba's defenses, Glinda thought, nothing. Why had Fiyero gotten into her mind (and her body) so easily? Were they really in love or were they just hormonal college students consumed by desire? She didn't know. Shaking her head, Glinda left the room and began to dress and head down for breakfast.
There were two more nights left of the trip, each of them including hotel stays. During the carriage ride, Nessa and Glinda discussed in brief, unimaginative words whether or not to say anything about their findings that morning, and if it was right to leave the couple to repeat these activities for two more nights. In the other carriage, Fiyero and Elphaba slept often and cuddled chastely. They assumed that no one had any inkling what they'd really done for the majority of last night.
However, when they entered the lobby, Glinda and Nessa's faces were grim, though Elphaba and Fiyero seemed a bit refreshed after their naps. Nessa, being more adamant about almost everything, said, before reaching the clerk's desk, "I think maybe you two should be in separate rooms."
Fiyero looked at Elphaba, who had a telling look of dread and guilt on her face. "Why? We haven't had a problem."
"This morning…" Glinda said timidly.
"When we found you two, you were still in the act of sex, sleeping, but still in the act. Apparently you'd been in that arrangement all night. I don't think having sex all night is not having a problem," Nessa stated bluntly.
"What's the point?" Elphaba huffed. "What's done is done! Isn't it the same thing, doing it once and doing it several times? It's not as if we'll be able to have that sort of time together when we return to Shiz."
"It's the same thing, once or a hundred times? Could you say the same thing for a murderer?" Nessa retorted
"Well… no. This is different."
"It's a sin, all the same."
"Forget it. You can't force us to sleep in separate rooms," Elphaba pointed out hastily. "We're of age, and most of this is his parents' money, so I don't think you can really do anything about it."
"I can write to father." Nessa threatened as Glinda wheeled her after Elphaba and Fiyero towards the desk.
Elphaba got the keys and looked at her sister. "Go ahead." She tossed Glinda the other keys and took Fiyero's hand, heading into the maze of rooms.
Glinda and Nessa followed after, somewhat speechless. After a long time, Nessa said, "Fine. I believe I will write to father."
"Good for you," Elphaba snapped. Reading numbers off the doors, she slowed to a halt at the room she would share with Fiyero, noting that Nessa and Glinda's was, again, just next door. In fact, there was a door in between them, in the case that the occupants of the two rooms were a family wishing to be able to check on each other. But the door could only be opened if both sides of it were unlocked, and Elphaba had no plans of doing such a thing.
"I can't believe you don't care if Father loses respect for you! I was only trying to scare you, Elphaba, but seeing that you won't care, I think I'll actually tell him."
"As I said, do what you will," Elphaba yanked open the door and shoved Fiyero into the room, "I'll just go enjoy a good hour or so fornicating, then."
Once she'd put her bag down, Fiyero kissed her and gazed down at her. "You don't have to do that. I can't imagine what your father would do if he knew that you'd…"
"I do have to." Elphaba argued, arms wrapped around him. "I'm not going to let his or Nessa's beliefs control my life anymore. I'm done."
"But what if he takes you out of Shiz?"
"I'm halfway through; it would be a waste of money. If he did, though, I wouldn't come home."
"You'd run away to the city." He said knowingly.
"Probably."
"Without me?"
She closed her eyes. "What else could I do, Fiyero?"
"I don't know. See if I can talk my parents into giving me enough money for a small apartment near Shiz where you could stay?"
"And how would your parents feel about that? I don't think they'd approve of you renting a place for your girlfriend who can't attend college because her father found out she was having sex with you." Elphaba reminded him.
"I said I'd talk them into giving me enough money. I never said I'd tell them exactly what I was using it for." He grinned.
"Look, let's not worry about it. I doubt it'll happen anyway, all right? I just can't believe Nessa's being such a brat right now." Elphaba sat down at the edge of the bed that Fiyero had already placed his things near.
"I know how we could scare her a bit."
"How?"
"We could go really close to the wall between the rooms and shout dirty things like we're having sex." He suggested.
"Oh, like what?" Elphaba wasn't so sure she'd agree to this idea, but she was amused at the prospect.
"Obscene sort of things. Things you wouldn't consider even whispering during sex. Vulgar terms, you know, that sort of thing. Like, I'd start with something like," he lowered his voice, "'Oh, Elphaba, baby, please let me,' and you'd be like 'Fiyero, oh, please, harder,' or something." He shrugged.
That did sound dreadfully tempting and quite funny, but she could barely talk about such things with him. Making any sort of talk about it, especially something so very…coarse, wasn't something she was comfortable with, even if she was supposed to be joking. "I don't think so. She probably already thinks we are." Elphaba couldn't help but smile at that; she could only imagine the horror in her sister's eyes.
Fiyero playfully shook the bed nearest the wall, just for effect. Elphaba glared at him, but burst into helpless giggles.
They collapsed in each other's arms, muffling laughter. They were then silent, listening for anything from the other room. Nessa was crying.
Elphaba sat up in alarm. "I didn't mean to make her cry." She scrambled out of bed and to the door.
"Elphaba, don't." Fiyero stopped her.
She looked despairingly towards the room her sister and Glinda were sharing. "I know, but I can't leave her like that! We only meant to freak her out. Now she probably thinks I'm some whore who has rough sex with anyone who asks, Fiyero."
He dropped her arm. "True. Then go and talk to her."
Elphaba trudged into Nessa and Glinda's room, Fiyero in tow behind her. "Nessie, what's wrong?"
"Glinda, let me look at her," Nessa demanded, trying to maneuver herself so she could see past the tissues that Glinda had been pressing to her eyes. When she was able to glare at her sister, she said, "Oh, I believe you very well know what's wrong. I'm disgusted with you. I never thought you were like that, even when I found out what you'd done."
Elphaba sat on the edge of her sister's bed, Fiyero sitting beside her, still not letting his arms slip from her waist. "I'm not."
"Nessa," Fiyero began, "we weren't really having sex just now. It was my idea and I'm sorry. I thought it would be funny to scare you, but Elphaba heard you crying when we stopped pretending and she felt bad, as she should, though I should feel worse. I apologize."
"We apologize," Elphaba amended.
Nessa studied her sister and Fiyero, coming to the conclusion that they were too appropriately dressed for such a small amount of time to have passed between what she'd heard and that moment. "That was a awfully rude trick, you know."
"I know." Elphaba hung her head.
"It's my fault. I came up with it." Fiyero said. "It was rude of me. I talked Elphaba into it; it's not her fault."
Elphaba said, "Look, we're sorry. I'm really sorry. We were just being stupid. It's really nothing like that. I won't tell you what it is like, but it's nothing so crude. The way you look at it, though, we figured you probably think it's just as bad as we made it sound."
"It is, even if you aren't shoving a bed against the wall. Fornication is wrong, dear sister. To go so far as to joke or talk about it in even the small comment you made is very uncouth," Nessa scolded.
As guilty as Elphaba felt for what she and Fiyero had done, she couldn't help but feel a bit angry with her sister. "I am not your daughter; I can make my own decisions about what's wrong and what's not."
Fiyero didn't say anything. He and Glinda looked at each other, Glinda almost laughing, too. Tension spread between the two sisters, but Fiyero and Glinda still believed that the joke had been just the least bit funny. Glinda had been utterly appalled by what she'd heard, but knowing it wasn't real (it did sound like the sort of thing you'd find a teenage boy reading in some erotic novel, after all), comforted her and enlightened her to the hilarity of it.
Nessa noted Glinda's shaking with silent chuckles beside her and turned to glare at her. "I can't believe any of you!"
Fiyero and Elphaba decided it was best for them just to go back to their room. Nessa would probably never come close to accepting it. To their credit, Elphaba and Fiyero did little more than hold one another that night, whispering lazy conversation.
But in the middle of a discussion about how awkward it could get if, in addition to writing to their father, Nessa informed Nanny of the "sin" Elphaba had committed, Elphaba cut herself off and said, "Will it still be the same as it was before?"
"Of course not. We've… things have changed between us. You know that." He looked at her closely, slightly bewildered.
"I know that," she clarified, "that's not what I meant. Now that we, well, you know, and back at Shiz we won't be able to, um, do certain things that often, will you still want to be around me so much? Will we still spend as much time together not, uh, doing it, the way we used to?" She gazed up at him, feeling a bit vulnerable.
"Why wouldn't we? I haven't lost interest in your company, Elphaba. It's not as if that's the only thing that I love about you."
"It isn't? Then how come you only told me that you loved me after we'd had sex?" She challenged.
"You didn't say it any earlier," he pointed out swiftly. "Hell, you might never have said it at all if I hadn't pushed you to. I didn't say it before because I thought you'd react badly. I was waiting for some sign that you wouldn't just close yourself off if I did say it. I only actually told you when I did out of desperation. You were running away from me no matter what; it couldn't hurt if I admitted it. Elphaba, I'd felt that way for a long time; I was too scared to tell you, that's all. What are you trying to accuse me of, using you for sex?" A little peeved and quite hurt, Fiyero tore his arm from around her and crossed his arms over his chest.
"No!" She protested, placing a hand on his forearm. "I just didn't understand, and that was the only solution that came to mind. I didn't truly think that you would do that, but I had to bring it up. I'm sorry." Elphaba kissed him on the cheek and placed a hand there, too. "You know that I trust what you say."
He unfolded his arms warily, but took her into them again nonetheless. "I didn't behave like that was all I wanted from you, did I?"
"Not at all." She said solemnly. Almost shyly, she then asked, "Fiyero, could we maybe, like, when we get back, almost act as if none of this trip – including the journey there – happened, at least not the sexual stuff?"
"Sure," he promised her, kissing her sweetly. "Whatever you want."