Archive of Our Own ^beta

The last time Glinda had seen Elphaba Thropp had been in the skies above the Emerald City ten years ago, voice sharp and echoing before she flew off into the horizon. Glinda remembers looking at her and thinking of fireworks bursting and cracking against the nighttime sky at festivals and celebrations. Bright, brilliant, colorful, wonderful, but always fading so fast. 

She remembers being a little girl, holding her mother’s hand and always wishing the pretty lights and colors would stay just a little longer. But they never did. They always vanished into the night, soft and silent as they had been brilliant and bombastic only moments before. 

That’s what she thinks of when she looks at Elphaba now. Still beautiful, but fading fast. There’s lines around her eyes now, exhaustion in her eyes where there used to be a brilliant spark that made Glinda go weak. She looks at her and thinks, no, not yet, please just a little longer. 

“The monkeys will see you,” she whispers, dropping her voice to a whisper despite no one else being in sight. “Come in now.”

For a moment Elphaba hesitates—and something flickers across her face like distrust, or regret, or—oh, something Glinda can’t think to name right now—before quickly sweeping into the vaulting apartment. Her cloak billows behind her. No, not a cloak, Glinda realizes with a pang in her chest—the blanket. 

She’s married. Married next to the prince of her dreams, dashing and charming and spiraling further and further away every single day. Adored, respect, famous glorious Good. She has everything she could ever want, and yet there have been so many nights—so many nights—where she would sit awake and think. 

The hat, the blanket. Trinkets and trifles, but when it came to making an actual sacrifice—come with me, Elphaba breathes, gripping her hand on a precipice Glinda had been so terrified of jumping off of—

She wonders, sometimes, how it must feel. To be surrounded by so many memories of her. To wear the things given to you by a person that, when it came down to it, hadn’t been ready to give enough. She wonders if it feels any better than how she does, with nothing of the beautiful, impossible, incomparable girl who had wedged her way into her life but the memories and the ugly faces painted on murals. 

She slams the door behind her, checking three times—her grandmother used to say three was a lucky number—for any winged silhouettes amongst the skyscrapers. Only when she’s certain they’re in the clear does she finally turn back to the shadows of her apartment. Specifically, the broom-wielding, pointy-hatted shadow that looks so, so perfect and so, so tired. 

“Glinda,” Elphaba begins. Her voice is just the same, low and soft, even if the sparking vibrancy has burnt down to a grim smolder. “I—“

And oh, Oz damn it all. 

Glinda rushes up to Elphaba, throwing her arms around shoulders that are a bit broader than she remembers, solid and strong, and kissing the Witch of the West like the Wizard and Madame Morrible and the last decade don’t matter in the slightest. 

“Elphie,” she gasps in between kisses, “Oh, Elphie. My sweet, my sweet. I missed you so much.”

Distantly, she thinks of Fiyero and feels a pang in her gut. But then hands find her waist and hair, and Elphaba kisses her with all the force and ferocity of a hurricane, and Glinda thinks, I can live with one more regret. 

They stumble their way to the bed, Glinda fumbling with the buttons of Elphaba’s coat before all but tearing the blasted thing off of her. The clothes she wears underneath are simple, but structured—Glinda can’t help but think of armor as she scrambles to undo Elphaba’s blouse. Underneath it, though, she looks just about the same. Green like leaves in the summer, freckles down her neck and shoulders and arms. Visibly stronger, though, Glinda notices, the thought making her simultaneously ache (Oh, Elphie, what have you been up to?) and drool. 

There are scars. Puckered and round, the color of copper coins left to oxidize. Glinda firmly banishes the thought of musket fire and little round bullets as she looks up to find Elphaba flushed, already gasping. 

“Glinda, I’m serious,” she insists. A few braids have fallen into her face, and she sweeps them behind her ears as she tries to recompose herself. “I—I’m glad to see you too, but—“

”Hush,” Glinda whispers fiercely, “Hush.” And then, she’s catching herself—no, no, no, she can’t go ahead and do whatever she likes, what is she thinking? Elphie doesn’t deserve that. She swallows, clears her throat, awkwardly trying to pull Elphaba’s undone blouse back over her shoulders. 

“I’m, um—“ sorry hangs in the air, made heavy by the years, unable to be said unless Glinda wants to cry her eyes out. “I shouldn’t have—“

”No.”

Elphaba goes quiet for a moment, eyes flicking down as expressions ranging from sadness to shame to grief pass over her face. Something going on in that brilliant mind of hers, that Glinda both wishes she were a part of and doubts she wants to know.

It’s all over in a second, though. Elphaba seemingly makes up her mind in a heartbeat, contemplation vanishing as she looks up at Glinda with a bittersweet, slightly lopsided smile. She’s blushing from the tips of her ears to the tip of her nose, eyes crinkling and bright even in the darkness. 

“No, actually. It’s alright. It can wait.” She reaches out, brushing a lock of hair Glinda hadn’t noticed out of her face. “I’ve missed you too, my sweet.”

Glinda smiles her widest, brightest, most winning smile. She refuses to cry tonight.

”You don’t mind, do you?” she asks, fiddling awkwardly with the collar of Glinda’s collar. Sweet Oz, only Elphaba Thropp could ever make her feel awkward. 

“Not at all,” Elphaba assures, as her hands reach behind Glinda to find the clasp of her dress. ”Do you?”

”Not in a million years.”

Elphaba chuckles—and once again something guilty flickers behind her eyes and Glinda thinks of asking what’s wrong? before she’s being kissed again, and they’re falling onto the bed in a tumble of worn leather and crunching tulle. Glinda feels her dress fall off her as she makes short work of Elphaba’s blouse, pressing kisses down her neck and over her chest, over her scars and the curves of her breasts. Lovely, she thinks, soft and lovestruck and mournful. My lovely, lovely girl. 

“Can I?” she asks, looking up at Elphaba as she taps a finger against the button of her pants, waiting for a nod before taking them off and throwing them over her shoulder. Above her head, she hears a quiet snicker. 

“Don’t laugh,” she mutters, looking up again to pout—and just for a moment, to savor the look on Elphaba’s face. Braids in disarray, hat knocked off her head, pupils blown wide and dark. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. 

“I’m not laughing,” Elphaba says, even as she’s grinning ear to ear like the liar she is. “You’re just, ah—very hasty, is all.”

”Well, of course I am,” Glinda huffs, flicking her hair off her shoulders in a dramatic flourish. “What, you’re telling me that if I swept up to your hideout in the dark of the night you wouldn’t be positively thrillified to ravish me?”

”Ravish?” Elphaba cocks an eyebrow. “A bit of a harsh word, if you ask me.”

”Oh, shush. You know what I mean,” Glinda waves vaguely as she crawls back to bury her face between Elphaba’s thighs. “What word would you use, anyway?”

”Lavish,” Elphaba begins—stably at first, though her breath begins to hitch the moment Glinda gets her mouth on her. “Revere. Pamper—o-oh. Oh, that’s nice. Uh…Please—“

”I like that one,” Glinda quips, popping her head up for a moment to smile teasingly. “It sounds very nice when you say it.”

Elphaba rolls her eyes, dropping her head back onto the bed. But Glinda catches the edge of a smile, the same one she’d wear when they were still at Shiz and Glinda had said or done something she just couldn’t stay mad at, and Glinda has to think of sunshine and bubbles and rainbows to keep from tearing up.

She quickly decides to distract herself. Elphie’s already all worked up, leaking and hot under her tongue, and from the looks of things she still likes all the tricks she used to—Glinda swirls her tongue around her head and makes her moan, sucks on her entrance and makes her whine, slips a finger inside and hooks it just right and makes her shiver.

 “Oh, Oz,” Elphaba gasps, her voice thick and heavy as she squirms in the sheets. “Oh, my—Glinda—“

“Shhhh,” Glinda soothes, pressing a kiss into Elphaba’s thick, dark curls as she rubs circles into the dip of Elphaba’s hip. “Shhh, shshshsh. Let me make you feel good.”

”You’re doing—“ Elphaba gasps, utterly breathless. Oh, Glinda loves to make her breathless. “—a wonderful job already—ahh!”

She cuts herself off with a short, sweet cry as Glinda decides to slip another finger inside, slowly thrusting and scissoring them as she seals her mouth around Elphaba’s tip. 

The last time they’d done this—no, she won’t think about it. Glinda won’t think about anything sad right now. Right now all she’ll let herself think about is Elphie, and her, back in each other’s arms. The way it always should have been.

“Close?” she asks—after a good while, after she’s made Elphaba writhe and  whimper and pull her hair so hard it has to be a mess by now. 

“What do you—“ Keening whimper, oh, she’s so sweet, “—th-think?”

Glinda cocks her head, putting on a show of consideration as she continues to work her fingers slow and steady, the way Elphaba likes. 

“Hmm. Well, I think you are,” she says decisively. “Are you?”

Elphaba sighs—groans? Sighgroans? Sighgroans—dragging her hands over her face and muttering something like, “You always want me to say it, don’t you” before looking up at Glinda and trying so very hard to look annoyed. “Yes, I’m close.”

Glinda beams, crawling up the length of Elphaba’s body to kiss her properly again. “Exactly what I wanted to hear, my sweet.”

”You’re horrible,” Elphaba grumbles, even as she’s grinning before leaning up into Glinda’s kisses. Because really, it is Glinda doing most of the kissing—Elphaba’s always caught up in another moan, or sigh, or whimper, as her hands brace themselves on Glinda’s shoulders, twist themselves in her hair, as her legs wrap around Glinda’s hips like even this isn’t close enough for her. 

Which, fair enough. It isn’t close enough for Glinda, either. Close enough would mean that Elphaba wouldn’t have to leave. 

Elphaba’s always quiet when she finishes. There’s a moment of tension, and gasping after, but the moment itself is always silent. Glinda makes sure to fill the silence, whispering gentle praises of you’re wonderful and my sweet Elphie and beautiful, you’re so beautiful as she gently works her fingers through the aftershocks, until Elphaba’s whining and squirming and mumbling, “too much.”

They fall on the bed together once they’re done, panting and sweaty. The fact of Elphaba having to leave goes unaddressed, along with the fact that sooner or later, Fiyero might come in through the door—no, no, no, Glinda won’t think about it right now. She refuses to. All the messiness and complicatedness and unpleasantness will have to wait. Right now, she just wants to focus on this. Her, and Elphie, together. 

The way it always should have been.