AN: I know the entire sexuality and concept of this chapter is going to seem a bit odd, but it's the one thing that would be affected immediately, with the way I look at it. And yes, I know all of you think Elphaba wouldn't hide this, but she wouldn't want to hurt him, either, would she?

Chapter Forty-Eight: All the Wrong Ways Not to Hurt Someone

Something was very wrong, and Glinda was well aware of it. Elphaba had persuaded her to stay and help out with the school for at least the first part of the year, and so Glinda had stayed. It was only days until the school year began and a month and a half since Fiyero had woken from his unconscious state, but something was terribly off kilter. She could see it in Elphaba's eyes every time Elphaba and Fiyero were around each other. Something wasn't working.

Fiyero didn't understand what was wrong. He loved Elphaba as he had before, but whenever he started getting close to her intimately, something drew him back, and he didn't know why. She knew it, too. Elphaba had tried to arouse him, to get him to make love to her, and though it had excited him and his body was all for it, something nagged in the back of his mind. It hurt Elphaba badly, especially when he'd insisted they start sleeping in nightclothes instead of sleeping nude.

That had been two weeks after he'd recovered, and she'd nuzzled against him as they were falling asleep, innocently pressing her body to his and smiling at him teasingly with her eyes. Instead of letting his body respond any more than it already had (he'd gotten quite uncomfortably aroused), he had just suggested that she put on a nightgown. They were no longer a young, reckless married couple, he'd reasoned, and they'd matured; there was no need for them to keep lying in bed to sleep naked.

Slowly, she'd made her way over to the closet, taking as much time as she could, trying to get him to think the better of his decision. And in the end, he hadn't been able to take it. He'd shoved her up against the wall and had her. But to Elphaba, it felt like he was almost purposely taking her at an angle that was so uncomfortable it almost hurt. It wasn't necessarily that they were standing; it was just that he knew how to please her, and that hadn't been how. Fiyero hadn't taken his time, like he'd used to, drawing out the pleasure and waiting until she'd been satisfied once, if not twice. It was as if he'd just wanted to get rid of the need to do it. He'd left her so quickly that some of his juices had splattered all over her. When it had been over, he'd looked at her coldly and told her to clean herself up and put on a nightgown. He'd left the room to use the bathroom, and she'd simply sank to the floor and cried.

He didn't want to "make love" to her, Elphaba figured, he just wanted to have her as quickly as possible and have his release. She didn't doubt that he could've done it properly if he'd wanted to; she simply knew he didn't want to and so he hadn't. It'd happened twice more since then, and neither time had been any good for either of them, because Fiyero hadn't wanted it to be. Both of the other times hadn't been in their bed, either. Once he'd had her on the floor next to the bed, pushing at her so hard she'd bruised her back from the roughness of the stone. She'd felt worthless afterwards, disgusting and used, and she'd cried again. The other time, she'd gotten out of bed early and had been in the middle of changing when she looked at him. He'd looked so peaceful sleeping, so she sat down in the chair near the dresser and watched him sleep for a little while. Fiyero had woken up, then, and then he'd had her in the chair, again being so forceful with her that she'd hurt herself. She hadn't been able to hold back her tears until it was over, either, but he'd ignored them.

In any other situation, they were no different then they had been before, though she had a feeling that those moments, too, would change if she didn't do something soon. At a different moment, he'd hold her hand, drape an arm around her shoulders, kiss her on the cheek or hug her close. But there was a distinct air of discomfort around them. Glinda noticed all of this and waited for Elphaba to come to her and explain, looking for help. Elphaba didn't like to admit to problems or talk about what was going on, so it took some time for her to knock on Glinda's door, but it was really no surprise when she did.

She'd come into Glinda's room with a half smile, unsuccessfully attempting to hold up her façade. But the moment she'd sat down on the bed next to her best friend, her face fell and she said, "I can't take this anymore."

Glinda scooted closer to her. "What are you talking about, Elphie?"

"Fiyero. I could deal with not having sex if he didn't have to act this way about it."

"You're not having sex?"

"Well, pretty much…" Elphaba took a deep breath and explained, in not so much detail, what had been going on. She simply explained that they'd only had sex three times (she refused to say "made love", because it certainly didn't feel like that's what it was), and that he'd purposely made it uncomfortable and rushed. She explained how, when she tried to initiate something, he'd reject her.

"He treats you like crap whenever you have sex and you just put up with it?" Glinda demanded.

"First of all, he's good to me almost any other time, Glinda. And I feel bad, after everything that's happened. I have to be a good wife, now, remember? Besides, I can't help but hope that it'll start to feel right, even though I know it won't, not with the way he does it. He's doing it intentionally. I know it. I just don't know why."

"Have you talked to Fiyero about it?"

She shrugged. "I've tried. Every time we try to talk about it, he gets all funny. He says he does want me, and that he'd like to make love to me, but something in the back of his mind won't let him. He doesn't know why that something won't let him, but it won't. And so he doesn't. I don't understand him at all."

After a long pause, Glinda said quietly, "Did you ever consider that something in the back of his mind remembers? Maybe something in the back of his mind is saying: 'don't touch her, she's had another man'."

"But I didn't!"

"He doesn't know that, Elphie, remember? You don't think he stayed long enough to see you turn Kalendrio away." Glinda reminded her. "This might be what you get for not telling Fiyero what happened."

Elphaba glared at Glinda, despising that she was right. "So what do I do? I can't very well just tell him now."

"Yes, you can. And you have to."

"Oh, and what am I supposed to say? 'I'm sorry I lied to you about not knowing why you tried to kill yourself, but I'm almost positive I know why.'"

"You'll have to figure that out for yourself, Elphaba. But if you want to fix this completely, you have to tell him. It wasn't fair not to tell him before, but you didn't then. Now you have no choice except to do so. If you'd have just told him in the first place, you wouldn't have this problem."

"I just can't imagine how I'm going to explain all of this without hurting him."

"Maybe it's not possible not to hurt him. But you have to tell him, or things are just going to get worse between you two." Glinda sighed. "I envied your marriage, Elphaba. I envied how much he cared for you and how he pleased you and loved you and did whatever you asked. I thought it was cute the way you two tried to keep your hands off of each other but really couldn't. Now there's nothing to envy. Don't you want all of that back, Elphie?"

She nodded. "Of course I do. But I don't want…"

"I know. But it's probably hurting him just as much that the two of you can't be the way you used to be. It's one or the other. He'll get over it, if you explain it right, Elphie. However, if you leave it like this, there will be no getting over anything, and it'll only get worse."

"I guess that's true," Elphaba admitted. She stood up and looked towards the doorway. "I'll talk to you later."

"What are you going to do, Elphaba?"

"I think I'm going to explain." She decided, and left the room, trudging solemnly down the hall to find Fiyero and tell him the story that, she felt, might as well break his heart