Sarah Paulson Character One-Shots

It's You I Welcome Death With (Billie)

You had switched the TV off instantly, dropping the remote from your grasp as if it burned your skin. The end had been declared. The apocalypse was coming.

Your body drowned in premature grief as your mind reeled at the reality you faced. The sound of the sirens rattled in your hollow chest, waves of torment rolling through your aching body as you scrambled to reach your phone, fingers trembling as you frantically scrolled for her name, so desperate to hear her voice.
"Billie" you choked out, swallowing a sob at the thought of her being anywhere but at your side.
"I know honey, I'm coming home. I'm on my way. I love you." Usually that confession would make your heart flutter, this time it sunk in your chest like lead, the insinuation hidden in the tone of her voice making tears burn at your eyes. Her voice wobbled with the same trauma laced in your own as she sat still in the traffic, an unsettling stillness in contrast with the frantic pulling of her heart and the dizzying noise of her thoughts.

You curled in on yourself, head buried in your knees as your body twitched with shallow sobs, your head pounding with the sickening loss of everything you were yet to have. Your gaze dropped to the test you had been holding in your hand, those two blue lines previously all you had ever hoped for, now a disgusting reminder of the life you were never meant to have. The life you never would have. The child you could never meet.

Bile rose in your throat at the thought of the form inside you, destined for a fate so cruel your skin crawled with disgust, self-loathing burning at your heart because it was you who brought it here. Strangled cries left your mouth, the shrill noise making you shiver in the deafening silence of your home. Your resting place.

You clawed at the flesh on your arms you had wrapped around your legs, rocking with the tremors of your heartache, clutching at yourself in an effort to soothe the terror that swarmed you. The silence of the hollow home shattered with each cry.

Keys turned in the lock, making the sobs pour out of you in a poisoned combination of both relief and despair, as heels rattled on the hardwood and Billie dropped to her knees, crawling towards you with her own tears staining her perfect porcelain cheeks. You met her gaze and even now, your heart fluttered at the sight of her, those elated butterflies quickly evolving to a swarm of moths, a bitter taste rising in your mouth when you watched her gaze drop to the floor between you, a blood curdling cry leaving her lipstick painted mouth.

There it lay between you, a sick twist of fate that after all this time, everything you had wanted, wished for, cried for, was within your reach. Your entire world, your whole future, your whole heart. And yet, the world caves in around you.

You moved quickly, jerking forward and kicking the white stick out of Billie's line of sight as you gathered her into her arms, her limp form escaping your grip like the ever flowing sand in the timer of your life. Your existence together.

Sobs and cries and screams swam around the room, you were unsure as to the source of each noise. You were unsure even of where you ended and she began.

You gripped her face tightly, nails digging at her skin so desperate to hold her in your grasp, and you pulled at her harshly, fusing your lips together angrily. The hot tears you both shed spilled into your shared mouths, the salty sting perfectly matching the bitterness that hung over the pair of you. Your lips moved together rapidly, making up the time, until she pulled away to release a sob, clinging to the fabric of your shirt as if she'd disappear at any moment. You rocked back and forth, cradling her and cooing like you would with an infant. A cruel irony that dawned on you as your body burned with the trauma of the violent sobs that erupted, the tensing and relaxing your body couldn't escape. You melted into one shared body, one shared heart, one shared life that could have been. A future that wouldn't be.

I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you.

You'll die loving her. Just as you had lived.

A silence envelopes your entangled bodies, a calmness littered with irony given the screaming of your heart and the shattering of the world around you. Even on this, the last day, Billie was all you ever needed. Every need, desire, instinct wrapped up in her delicate form as if she were just for you. She was all you ever had. Even as the world caved in.

Billie pulled away and you whimpered, body instantly cooling with the absence of her touch. Your eyes followed her to the record player and a bitter laugh escaped as the melody of your first dance wrapped its tender arms around your aching form.
She approached and you stood instantly meeting her height, the magnetic force of your ever-connected hearts drawing you into her. You stood together, movements slight, bodies weak with sorrow, leaning on each other as you always did.

Your last dance.

She tugs at your clammy hand and you move towards the bedroom, sprinting across the house you loved so dearly as if you could outrun the fate that lay ahead.

We can't outrun this, baby.

Flashes of what could have been tear through your mind, each leaving behind a burning sting. Pictures on the walls, your shoes at the door. The painting you chose together. Your wedding photo. The nursery.

Your mind fails you and your body gives in to her as she tugs you onto the bed, laying on the pillow in the position you had seen her in this morning.

The day you were going to tell her. The day your lives would begin.

The day your lives would end.

Her hair lay fanned out on the pillow, her feet curled behind her. Her arms wrapped around you, bringing your head to her chest and your lips to her heart.

A crack sounded, and you jumped, your bodies tensing on the bed the way you knew they would in just a few moments. Frozen in time.

Another hollow sob tore through the dense silence as Billie whispered into your hair, soothing you the way she always did when you woke from a nightmare.

Oh how you wished you could wake up now.

"I love you"

"I love you"

You inhaled her, desperate for her rich scent to drown the heady taste of burning that lined your mouth, staining it a bitter black.

Her lips pressed to your skin, brandishing you with her love.

What a heavenly way to die.

"Let's go to sleep, baby. It's okay. Good night my love. Sweet dreams my angel. I'll love you forever"

"Don't let me go"