Chapter Text
Glinda has tried it all.
She has tried every spell she’s managed to decipher after studying the Grimmerie day and night. Now that she’s not the Wizard and Morrible’s toy and mouthpiece anymore, she’s had plenty of time and more liberty to do what she wants, not to mention she's finally found her magic. Though she’s improved the Ozian laws for the Animals, no amount of work has made a difference when it comes to what her heart desires the most. She’s unable to summon Elphaba back to her.
Crying while chanting, again and again, she hugs Elpahaba’s hat in her arms. The hat, alongside the small green vial, is all that she has left of Elphaba. She always sleeps with them next to her, hoping they could be replaced by her Elphie.
At some point in her chants, she feels a jolt on her stomach and feels herself lifted from the floor. Wind blows in her face from various directions, which is odd since she’s inside her living quarters on a perfectly serene day. A scream leaves her mouth, and she doesn’t see anything for a moment, clutching onto Elphaba’s hat in a whirl of colors.
Air is expelled from her lungs when she hits a wooden floor, the wind around her finally subsiding. She blinks a few times, able to see again, though she can hardly believe her eyes. The Grimmerie is still on the floor in front of her, but her room in the palace has been replaced by her – and Elpahaba’s – dorm room at Shiz. The quarters are identical right down to her pink trunks and vanity table items, indistinguishable from the way the room used to look.
“What…”
She places the hat on top of the Grimmerie and she stands up, looking around. Then, she sees her. Elphaba – Elphaba! – is asleep in her narrow, old bed. Gasping once, Glinda walks toward the bed as if enchanted by it, unable to stop her feet from moving. Studying the sleeping form closer, she sees that the person in the bed truly must be Elphaba, but from years ago, when they first met. Her face looks so young, her cheeks full and a healthy glow on her green skin, unlike when Glinda last saw her.
“Elphie,” leaves her mouth, and she brings her hand to Elphaba’s cheek, needing to check if she’s really there.
Elphaba’s skin is warm and firm to her touch, which causes Glinda to gasp in surprise again. Under her palm, she feels Elphaba stir before her eyes open and Glinda’s own eyes meet endless pools of emerald. She looks at Elphaba in wonder as she blinks and scrunches her dark brow before pulling away with a start.
“What are you doing?” Elphaba asks, defensive, and it breaks Glinda’s heart. She never expected to see Elphaba again, to hear her talk; now that she has, she’s upset that Glinda is there. “Galinda, what’s going on? Is this another prank?”
Oh. Lurline above. She couldn’t have possibly…? But there’s no other way. She must have somehow brought herself to the past Elphie.
Yes, because your Elphie is dead, a cold, monotonous voice she’s all too used to by now says in the back of her mind.
“Seriously. Why do you… how come you look so different?”
“Elphie…” she says quietly, her heart breaking at the hostility.
“I’m sorry. Elphie?”
Fuck. What can she say? Surely, she shouldn’t tell the past Elphaba about the future, at least other than to avoid little girls with buckets of water. Then again, she doesn’t know if she’s actually brought herself to the past. What if this Elphaba is just a generation of her magic and not real at all? “I’m sorry.”
Elphaba’s brows shoot up at her words, which doesn’t exactly surprise Glinda. She probably hasn’t done a whole lot of apologizing to this Elphaba yet. “You are apologizing? You?”
“I guess, um, Elphie, look,” she continues as Elphaba’s brows rise again. Honesty might actually be her only way out of this mess unless she wants to run out of the room, which doesn’t seem like a smart decision. “I’m probably from your future. Or you’re from my past. Lurline, look at me. And you! You’re so young!”
“Okay,” Elphaba responds, cautious as she measures Glinda up and down. “I can see that.”
“Excuse me?” she says, the reaction so automatic she can’t stop it. She knows the years and countless sleepless nights have aged her, but, “That’s just rude.”
“You really don’t want to start a debate about what’s rude with me,” Elphaba points out before adding, “I didn’t say you look bad.”
An involuntary smile tugs at the corners of Glinda’s lips, which is ridiculous, she knows. But this is definitely Elphaba from once upon a time, before everything was difficult and they were just two best friends. Or probably not, although it’s best to make sure… “Are we friends yet?”
Elphaba sits up and laughs at that until she sees the distress on Glinda’s face and gets more serious. “Really?”
“Well, I wouldn’t be here if you didn’t mean the world to me!”
“Oz, okay…” Elphaba says before continuing, “No. We fought over the last seat in class yesterday.”
Glinda’s mouth turns upwards, the fondness of the memory overtaking her. “Ah.”
“You called me an artichoke,” Elphaba adds.
Why did she dig herself such a hole? The worst part of it is that their night at the Ozdust is only about to come for this Elphaba and she can’t – shouldn’t – stop any of it since that’s what made things turn around for them in the first place. “I am deeply sorry about that. Um, between you and me,” she says as she moves closer to Elphaba, sitting on the bed next to her. “Don’t take anything I say – past me says, I mean – too seriously.”
She wants to go into detail about how she was just deeply jealous of Elphaba, of her giftedness in sorcery and how she never followed the norms Glinda was expected to, but she really doesn’t want to affect their Shiz timeline. The less Elphaba knows, the better.
“Okay…” Elphaba says. “So, why are you here then?”
“I’m actually not sure,” she says, though she’s fairly certain that this was the closest spell to bringing Elphaba back to her. “However, now that I’m here; stay away from water.”
Elphaba tilts her head. “What do you mean?”
“I mean stay away from water. Especially little girls that could throw buckets of water at you.”
Elphaba snorts – snorts! – at her. “Galinda, that’s ridiculous. Water doesn’t do me any harm.”
“Wait, what?” Glinda says, the words hitting her like ice water (the cruel humor of the sentiment doesn’t escape her). “Seriously?”
“Seriously. I promise. I drink it all the time. Surely, you saw me go in the shower multiple times when we lived in the same room,” Elphaba continues. “I would probably smell really bad if I never showered or bathed.”
Lurline above. Maybe there was something else in the water Dorothy threw on Elphaba, too? But surely there was not – it was just plain, ordinary water. Yet, Elphaba had melted right in front of her, ceased to exist only moments after the bucket of water hit her. Unless…
What if she never really melted?
“Elphie, I have the most randomous question for you!” she tells Elphaba, unable to hold the thought in any longer. “You really should not think too much of it!”
“Okay…”
“Would you think faking your death is something you might do in order to get dangerous people off your back?” she asks, knowing that they have to work out how to perform some sort of memory loss magic by now.
Elphaba looks at her suspiciously. “I mean… If there was no other choice, then sure?”
“Oh, Elphie!” she cries and throws her arms around a very confused, very young Elphaba. “I cannot believe it! But maybe it is true after all. Or not true is more like it.”
Elphaba feels warm and real in her arms, her earthy smell reminding Glinda of simpler – wonderful – times. Though Elphaba isn’t hugging her back, she cannot bear to let her go, not when holding her is all she’s wanted for the longest time. For the first time in years, she feels a hint of happiness and belonging.
After a moment, Elphaba’s hand comes to pat her shoulder tentatively, which makes Glinda hold on to Elphie even harder. Even this version of Elphaba is so kind to her underneath it all, she thinks as tears fall down her cheeks. She loves Elphaba so much and will do anything to bring her back. Anything.
“Oh, Elphie,” she says as she pulls back a bit. “Thank you.”
Without thinking much, she presses a small kiss to Elphaba’s cheek, as part of the thank you. It’s definitely not something she’d do normally, but this day has been anything but normal; Glinda is stuck in the wrong timeline and Elphaba is back in her arms. She wants to give her Elphie all the gratitude and affection she possibly can.
What she doesn’t consider, however, is how Elphaba’s young brain might react to her lips against her cheek. Before Glinda knows what’s happening, Elphaba has brought her lips to Glinda’s, kissing her on the mouth. Glinda freezes, shocked by the turn of events, and Elphaba doesn’t move either, possibly due to shock or lack of experience. When Glinda comes back to her senses, she moves her lips once before pulling away and giving Elphaba a small smile.
“Galinda, shit, I thought–”
“No, it’s– it’s okay, really–”
“You were being so nice and then – my cheek – and –”
“Elphie, really,” she says, bringing her hand to Elphaba’s arm to try to calm her down. “It’s okay. I do feel that way, but about your older self.” She sighs. “We truly have to figure out how to erase this from your memory.”
“Oh.” Elphaba looks at her. “What if I don’t want to?”
Not this. “Elphie, you of all people are smart enough to know that I shouldn’t have been here in the first place. You’re supposed to be fighting the Galinda of your own age about sorcery and her silly pink belongings that take up way too much space.” She brushes a tear off, wishing she could just live here all over again instead of going back to her awful timeline where Elphie is not by her side. “You can’t remember this either. It’ll just do damage. You know it.”
“Hm,” Elphaba says. “I prefer this you a bit.”
“No, you don’t,” Glinda responds and lets out a shallow laugh. “I’m incredibly depressed. Absolutely no fun to be around. You’re the only reason I’m smiling in ages.”
She walks back to the middle of the room, where the Grimmerie and the hat lie on the floor. She grabs both of them and walks back to Elphaba’s bed where she’s waiting with a curious expression on her face. “What’s that?”
“Okay, so…” she starts. “I think you can read this well enough to find yourself a memory loss spell or a potion or anything to get rid of the last few hours. And, as for me, it’s my ticket back to my timeline. I have an older you to find.”
“Promise I’ll meet this version of you again,” Elphaba says, her face stern.
“Oh, I’m counting on it, my dearest darlingest Elphie,” she admits. “Otherwise there’d be no reason for me to go back. And I’m sure I’ll be right back in here too, from breakfast or wherever the young me is. She’ll be back to annoy you in no time.”
“You know that’s not what I meant,” Elphaba points out.
“I know. But that’s how it should be.” She pauses. “Now, if you can please put your hands above this book and find two spells that would help us in our situation.”
Elphaba looks at her, incredulous, but does as she’s told anyway and brings her hands above the Grimmerie. Within a few clock-ticks, the pages are flipping and Elphaba looks at the book surprisedly as she searches the right spell. When the correct page opens in front of her, she takes a look at the book and nods.
“I need to write this memory spell down,” Elphaba points out and pulls a sheet of paper and a quill from next to her bed, where one of her notebooks is placed on top of a book. “Since I have to send you and this book back first. And what’s with the hat?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Glinda tells her and brings the hat closer to her chest. “It’s sort of a big thing.”
Elphaba nods as she finishes writing her notes. Bringing her hands back above the Grimmerie, she lets the pages flip until she reads through the page, muttering under her breath. “This should be it. Are you ready to go back?”
Glinda feels a tear fall on her cheek. One side of her is not ready at all – she wants to stay here, wants to get to know Elphaba all over again and spend time with her without a care in the world. The problem is it’s not her time to spend, and if she’s correct, there may be an Elphaba who’s way better suited for her back in her timeline. If she manages to find her.
“Elphie, actually,” she says as the thought crosses her mind. “Could you send me to you? In my timeline? The version of you from that time?”
If it takes her nowhere, so be it. Glinda doesn’t want to exist in a world without Elphaba anyway.
“Hmm,” Elphaba lets out, thoughtful as she reads through the page a few more times. “I think I can try that.”
“Thank you, Elphie,” she says, unable to stop from throwing her arms around her friend again. “I love you so much,” she admits into the hug. “I’ll see you soon. I promise.”
When Glinda pulls back, ready to go with the hat and the Grimmerie in her lap, Elphaba smiles at her. Her expression reminds Glinda so much of her when they first became friends, when nothing else than their laughs existed on the way back from Ozdust, that she wants to cry. Another tear falls on her cheek as Elphaba starts chanting and the room around her disappears, the same whirl of colors as before enveloping her completely.
When she hits solid ground, she opens her eyes again and finds herself in front of a dwelling against a horizon full of sand as far as her eyes can see. She’s holding the hat and the Grimmerie, breathing in and out as she takes in her incredibly quiet and depressing surroundings.
With a grunt, she gets up. Her eyes measure the door of the dwelling. Elphaba has to be in the house – she wouldn’t have ended up here otherwise. She takes a deep breath, feeling faint as she knocks on the door.