Glinda's Musings

Good and Wicked and Wicked and Good

Glinda hid up in her new master bedroom in the Ozian palace. The normal person would be delighted to call such a magnificent room their own, but all of its splendor was lost on Glinda who would've gladly traded every little last emerald here for one she left behind in the west: Elphaba Thropp, her very best friend in the whole wide world. This bedroom, like all of the other ones since Shiz when she and Elphaba shared a room, seemed so big, empty and cold, and Glinda despised this one just as much as she did all of the other ones she'd ever slept in, despite its outward opulence. Glinda could only sit there on her satin bed and cry, mourning that wonderful woman she so adored...

"No one mourns the wicked!" someone standing in the courtyard just below Glinda's window was sending out that stupid, horrible rallying cry again. Ever since Elphaba had been slain, the Emerald City had been in a tumultuous and happy uproar, celebrating the downfall of that "wicked" witch. Glinda heard the voice repeat that stupid little saying and she suddenly felt a very strong urge to hop right out of her bedroom window and down onto that courtyard below (despite the massive and most likely fatal distance between the two) and slap the fool before telling him to kindly shut his dirty rotten pie hole. But of course, not only was such a thing implausible, but it was also very unbefitting of a new queen of Oz. Glinda didn't want to force this country into losing another big political leader just yet.

"No one mourns the wicked!" now everyone was singing it and Glinda couldn't help but spit at her window.

"Yes, someone mourns the wicked! Me! I do!" she fumed, but then she couldn't help but go into philosophical mode again. That seemed to happen whenever she was in one of her more depressed states. She was claiming that she "mourned the wicked". On the surface level, this meant Elphaba, that green-skinned witch of the west. But Glinda had already established that she did not think that Elphaba was wicked. So was it incorrect to say that Glinda mourned the wicked if Elphaba was not wicked? Unless, of course, on a more subconscious level, she meant that she was mourning herself, because goodness knew Glinda could be very wicked indeed.

So perhaps Glinda could still say she mourned the wicked if she was referring to herself. Wicked thought she was, it was not hard to pity her, having lost some of her nearest and dearest friends all in short order only to be left behind in a castle full of corrupt and deceitful politicians with the task of repairing a very broken and miserable country all on her own. Oh yes, Glinda had every right to mourn herself, and her bitter fate. Or maybe she meant the Ozians down below who were singing so merrily about Elphaba's despise right now. What good person celebrated the death of another? Maybe it was them, those arrogant and ignorant fools, that were wicked. In that case, the theory still held. Glinda knew she mourned them, only in a different way. She pitied their blindness that made them so full of fear and hatred. It was a mindset no one deserved to suffer, yet the entire world seemed to be poisoned by it anyway.

"Oz knows I do mourn them," Glinda sighed sadly, staring towards her window. The singing was still going on below. "Oh yes, someone can indeed mourn the wicked, for I do. I mourn myself, the Ozians below, and all that I have ever lost. I do indeed mourn the wicked."

"Goodness knows the wicked's lives are lonely!" someone else added a new line to the chorus and Glinda felt a sob shake her body as she began to wonder if the Ozians weren't singing about her after all. Goodness knew her life had been lonely. Even before Elphaba ever stepped into the picture, Glinda had been lonely. Though it seemed hard to believe, even during childhood, Glinda was quite lonely. That was because, as pretty and spoiled as she was, there was always a very inquisitive mind that lay past the golden curls. It was a mind no one else had or understood. For that, even in her "rich brat" days, she was alone. No one ever truly understood her, though they pretended to just because she was rich. That was why she had come to like Elphaba so much. Elphaba was the only one to love Glinda for who she really was and she was the only other person to understand what went on inside of her mind. Now Elphaba was gone and Glinda was alone with her thoughts again, a terrifying place to be.

"Goodness knows, the wicked cry alone. It just shows when you're wicked, you're left only on your own..." the song continued and Glinda really couldn't help but wonder if fate itself hadn't crafted such a taunting piece just for her. This was worse than salt in the wound! But their song said that goodness knew that the wicked would die alone, and Glinda knew this, so was she good, by that measure? But if the wicked's lives were lonely and hers was lonely, did that make her wicked? And hadn't Elphaba's own life been full of loneliness? But Elphaba wasn't wicked! Maybe she was mean and surly, but she was never ever wicked. Not her, not Elphaba. And besides, Elphaba knew that the wicked would cry alone, so did that make her good? Could Elphaba, and Glinda, have been good and bad both at the same time?

As these nonsensical thoughts continued to swirl through Glinda's grief-filled mind, a new and more disturbing thought came to her. She was alone. That realization became a burning pain in her chest until she found herself shaking with sobs. Another painful thought struck her, that the wicked alone too. Well, Glinda was certainly alone in life now and, after the trauma she'd endured, she'd always sort of be that way. She would die alone. No Elphie to comfort her in possible final moments...

"Oh Elphie! Why did you leave me? Why did you have to go? Please come back! I miss you, I need you! I know I'm a selfish coward and this is my fault but please! I'm so lost! Especially without you! I'm sorry!" Glinda wailed, but nothing paid heed to her pain. "You mean, green thing! Sweet Oz, is this my punishment for being a dumb, heartless, cowardly traitor? To have all I love taken from me, leaving me here alone?"

A new thought dawned on her then.

"I'm being punished... Wickedness must be punished," she said as she remembered what the Ozians had said earlier. "Am I wicked? Then why am I called 'good' why do I strive to be good?" she paused. The lines between good and wicked and wicked and good were very blurry, to say the least. So was she good or wicked? "What about Elphaba? She was punished. Was she wicked? But how could somebody wicked be so kind? Maybe if she had been born normal... What am I saying? Elphaba was normal. It's our fault for not seeing it!" Glinda cried in frustration.

And then another new thought hit Glinda.

"Maybe that's it. Maybe that was Elphaba's goodness. To show the world goodness could come from anywhere. And maybe it's my turn now. To tell the Ozians that. To make them see the error of their ways and to see them. To see that goodness has no set expression..." Glinda trailed off and gazed to the west. Glinda smiled proudly then, and she quickly conjured up a travel bubble to take her to the Ozians below. Once there, she began to tell the untold story of the witches of Oz.

AN: I apologize for this almost feverish over-analysis, but after seeing a post that said that "No One Mourns the Wicked" could easily refer to Glinda and how no one really cries for her (audience included), I had to write this. If anything, just look at the scatter-brained and chaotic, nonsensical nature of the writing as a meta reflection of Glinda's current mental stability.