A/N: My first Hotgomery! Mostly fluff, 'cause who doesn't need that.
For a long time, Billie Dean Howard thought her life was cursed by a devil. Being able to see and talk to the dead, it wasn't exactly what she bargained for when she got out of her mother's womb.
When she was little, she couldn't distinguish between the living and the dead, couldn't understand why a strange Mexican lady, whose body was covered in dark crimson blood, was standing in the bathtub of her house. Every corner of the street she looked, there was a person with indefinable angst and fury. It was nothing but a series of nightmares that she didn't know how to wake up from.
In the course of her life, she had found people similar to her, and learned to be a psychic herself.
If people could communicate with the dead, there also should be people who could travel time. Anything is possible. If so, Billie hoped they'd tell her little self, the girl who was scared of the wretched monsters, that she would be making a living from talking to them. Billie smiled slightly as she pictured her little self crying in protest.
It was a life of adventures that she lived in. She had fame, her own shows…Perhaps that's why she'd felt bold enough to step into the infamous Hotel Cortez, in search of the equally notorious serial killer John Lowe. And look what she got.
It wasn't exactly what the saying "He who is in hell knows not what heaven is" describes. Rather, she had been interacting with weak, good-natured spirits for such a long time it'd slipped out of her mind how dangerous some ghosts could be. For Christ's sake, she almost got killed. Feeling the breeze of heaven had caused her to forget about the flames in hell.
It might have been easier, if she could have nothing but hatred toward the dead. Only if they were all evil and pathetic. But didn't she know it was furthest from the truth? Most of the ghosts were harmless, some actually quite amiable. And there was a very small proportion of them that were, well, lovable.
Pulling over her beloved car, as polished as her trimmed nails, the psychic looked at the house in front of her.
Even after what had happened to the Harmons a few years ago, the blonde always found herself coming back to this place. It wasn't a request from Constance that got her heart. There wasn't particular ambition or pity for the ghosts in the house, either.
Yes, she had everything she'd wished for as a young determined woman. But now that she had grown up, there was one more thing added to the list.
The freezing air of the empty kitchen caressed her legs underneath her skirt. Placing herself in one of the chairs, the blonde medium lit a cigarette.
The house always made her feel oddly calm, even with the presences of evil spirits. It was like time didn't exist in there, while the world outside moved so fast and tirelessly.
"Those things will kill you one day."
The voice came from behind and Billie Dean smiled. With the poisonous drug between her lips, she turned her head, flipping her pretty hair graciously. Her eyes crinkled up at the sight of Nora Montgomery, the original owner of the house, standing there in a gorgeous black dress.
"I think it's too late to quit now," the woman in chair responded. "Don't you know how many years you've been saying that to me?
"I couldn't care less, Miss. Howard. I'll keep saying until you let go of that disgusting habit of yours." The mistress of the notorious Murder House fidgeted with her handkerchief as she walked over to the other.
Her wary eyes nervously looked around the kitchen. It was hideous. Everything from the wallpaper to the ugly appliance above the sink set Nora's teeth on edge. The only thing that kept her from screaming in rage was the medium sitting in the center of the room, like the queen that she was.
This Billie woman was truly unique, Nora thought to herself. She walked around this world like a cat in the dark. Elegant and elusive, and dare she say, magical. The taller woman remembered the day they'd first met. The long manicured nails had absolutely appalled Nora at first (to be fair, she found anything modern appalling). But those chocolate brown eyes had pieces of tenderness, and left the woman breathless for a split second. Nora couldn't deny she liked what she'd seen that day.
Since then, she had established this friendship with a question mark at the end with the shorter woman.
Question mark, because Nora wasn't sure what the other was thinking about. The psychic's confident demeanor could sometimes make her appear rather condescending and bitchy. But the moment the older woman thought she didn't care about her, Billie would show the most loving part of her.
It confused Nora. It did, and she gritted her teeth every time her non-existent pulse picked up speed.
"Loosen up a little," the younger blonde laughed at her uptight companion. Her hand rose up to Nora's tense shoulder, giving it a light squeeze, enjoying the feeling of the silky dress under her palm. "What are you worried about? Secondhand smoke?"
"I'd like it if you didn't die of lung cancer, that is all."
"Don't worry. When I die, it'll be me killing myself here in this hellhole so I could spend the eternity with you."
The housemistress jaw tightened as she removed the hand off her shoulder, though she didn't let go of Billie's hand. "Don't make such a joke, Miss. Howard. It isn't funny at all."
She was angry. Such a joke should have upset her, but it didn't. Instead, her heart skipped a beat at the thought of them spending their eternal lives together. The medium's playful wink at the end of the sentence only exacerbated her frustrations. Nora was angry, with herself, with her own dead heart that seemed to beat only in the presence of the woman beside her.
Her apprehensive blue-grey eyes landed on their still connected hands, and she blushed lightly at the warmth.
"What if I said it wasn't a joke?" Billie Dean tilted her head, with the charming smirk that only she could master.
It was daring, more than Billie usually allowed herself to be. Beneath the effortlessly self-assured façade, she wondered to herself if this was a byproduct of what had happened at Hotel Cortez.
She had missed the ghost, extremely so, to the point her heart had ached to be back to the house. She almost had gotten murdered, by killer ghosts that were no less evil than Tate. The moment their blades had stroked her skin, she had realized that not being able to see Nora's nervous face ever again was the scariest thing on earth.
The medium let out a chuckle at the other, who had been left speechless by the audacious quip. She took a deep drag on a cigarette.
"What did I just tell you, darling? You are too uptight. You can't take everything I say so seriously." Her speech flowed smoothly like the string of pearls around the older blonde's delicate neck. "You should know that by now."
'Stop lying to yourself. That's pathetic.' Something in the back of her head screamed, but went ignored. She was a TV personality after all. Pretending was part of her job.
The blonde ghost stared back at her for a few seconds. When she opened her mouth, her words were filled with stiffness. Too impersonal, as if she was building a wall between them. That was when Billie realized she had crossed the line.
"You are right, Miss. Howard. I am uptight. Unlike you, I don't know how to make people laugh with inappropriate jokes. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to a baby to attend to." The mistress stood up and begun to walk away, but her wrist was caught by the younger blonde.
"Wait," Billie pleaded. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you."
"Then what did you mean, Miss. Howard?"
It was the shorter woman's turn to be at loss for words. She often forgot, but Nora Montgomery with flames of fury was one of the most terrifying things she'd ever known (hell, the woman actually killed her husband). The eyes that often reminded Billie of the autumn sky now looked like icicles, piercing her with no remorse. The sight sent chills down her spine.
But before the medium could utter a word, the same cold eyes shifted to their hands. Billie immediately pulled her hand back in. She knew exactly what had caught the woman's attention.
"What is that?" the older blonde probed. Her heart sped up, but for a different reason this time.
The rage had been replaced by concern and minor panic. Just like that, the woman could be ice-cold to Mother-Teresa-compassionate in a fraction of a second. Although it had been charming on any other day, it only made Billie even more rigid. When the medium avoided eye contact, Nora felt heat between her eyes.
"What happened?"
"It was bad luck, but I might as well have asked for it." The shorter shook her head, brown eyes hidden behind the golden strands.
"Miss. Howard, what happened at the hotel?" Nora asked again, grabbing the woman's hand to examine the bruise on her wrist.
There were traces of struggle. It wasn't just a bruise. Her flawless skin had been scraped by something, showing the pinker flesh one layer beneath it. Nora's fingers hovered over the scars with hesitation and revulsion.
When the younger blonde finally looked up, her coffee eyes were filled with tears. She wanted to tell Nora, tell her everything that had happened at the awful place. But her words died in her throat, before they could become actual sounds to hear.
"Oh, Billie." The medium's first name spilled out, and danced on her tongue. She pulled the crying woman into an embrace.
Nora led the other to a couch, and Billie Dean rested her head on her shoulder.
The mistresses didn't push her. She waited until the younger blonde felt like talking. Then Billie started to calm down after ten minutes or so, though her cheeks still wet. Even with her puffy nose and swollen eyes, the medium never failed to mesmerize Nora with her magnificence.
The psychic slowly begun to tell her about the horrendous event she had been involved in. Her voice trembled at the recollection every once in a while, and Nora tightened her embrace each time.
Feeling the strong arms around her, Billie felt like nobody could ever hurt her. Her cheeks started to dry. But she didn't tell anything to the older woman, as much as she wanted to assure her that she was alright. She wanted to stay in the embrace as long as Nora would allow.
"…and they said if I ever told somebody about this, they would haunt me down. They would. And I couldn't sleep at night, because what if–"
"Shhh, it's ok," the older blonde comforted her. Her ringed fingers combed the golden mane, shining as brightly as the twilight sky outside the windows. "I won't let anyone or anything hurt you."
Nora didn't know what came over her. It was such a pathetic promise that had no weight whatsoever. Billie knew how powerless the ghost was. But the brown eyes stared into her blue-grey ones, and the older woman thought that maybe, she'd said the right thing.
A few content hums escaped the younger woman's lips. She pressed her ear onto the ghost's chest and listened to the heartbeat that she didn't know was Nora's or hers. They stayed like that, until the sun set and either of them couldn't see their faces in the dark any longer.
ooooo
"You don't happen to know who Aileen Wuornos is, do you?" Billie asked all of a sudden, while the other woman examined the electric kettle with a horrified expression.
They had moved back to the kitchen when the medium's stomach wouldn't stop protesting. It would have caused her to blush madly, but Nora's giggles had stopped her from doing so.
"No, I don't think I do," the older blonde shook her head.
"She was a very famous serial killer in the 90's. The most notorious female killer in the U.S. history. There's a movie about her, too. The young ones must know her."
"Oh, and I assume she was there too? At the Devil's Night, I mean."
Billie nodded in reply as she made Nora's favorite tea. "She was, and she said that I had the prettiest hair." A string of chuckles escaped her plump lips. Although the whole experience at the hotel was traumatizing, the single encounter with the killer ghost was a one-of-a-kind anecdote. She'd gotten hit on by famous people, as much as by ghosts. Getting hit on by a famous killer ghost, it was certainly the first and hopefully the last time. "She said it reminded her of her ex-girlfriend."
This got Nora to shift her every thread of attention to the other woman. "Ex-girlfriend?" the ghost exclaimed.
Despite the time period she lived in, the idea of two people of the same gender loving each other in a romantic way never bothered her. Love is love. It shouldn't be such a huge problem.
What struck and bothered her was the idea of Billie Dean being with a woman.
"Oh, so she was...interested in you."
Billie smirked at her choice of words. "Can you believe that? She should've known, the odds of her actually having me were as little as an ant's head."
The older blonde's heart clenched at that. Why, she didn't want to dare know. "Of course. She's dead…and a woman, as you are."
Her own words stung her right in the chest. Dead, and a woman. Was she still talking about the killer ghost or herself?
"No, I meant," Billie said. "My heart belongs to someone else, though she doesn't know it." With a coy, reserved smile, she took a sip from her cup. Nora's eyes widened at the confession, making the medium's eyes crinkle up. "She has the most gorgeous smile, and pretty hair, too. Prettier than mine, I'd say. And her eyes," Billie moved to stare into the eyes that seemed to change their color every time she looked. The butterflies in her stomach fed off the sight. "They are indescribably beautiful. They are like…grey sapphire, billions of dust reflecting all the light from heaven."
At this point, the older woman was blushing furiously.
"I keep coming back to her house, but she still calls me Miss. Howard."
"Miss. Howard," Nora breathed out. She felt giddy, confused, panicky, and exhilarated all at the same time.
The psychic let out hums. She was drunk on the sight before her as much as her ghostly companion was. "I love it when she says my name. It makes me dizzy. Though, I wish she would call me by my first name."
"Miss. Howard," Nora repeated, not knowing why on earth she couldn't utter anything else. It only made the other chuckle.
"That's not my first name."
"I know it isn't." Flustered and embarrassed, the taller blonde desperately sought something to settle her gaze on, just so she wouldn't look the other woman in the eye and give away all of her secrets.
A strand of her neat golden curls fell into her face. She brought up her hand, but Billie was quicker; her slender fingers tucked the hair behind the ghost's scarlet ear. It caught Nora off guard and she instinctively wrapped her fingers around the medium's wrist, which caused herself to freeze in shock even more.
Her blue-grey eyes gazed at their hands, where the younger woman's skin radiated warmth in her grip. She looked at the bruise and scrape and looked at the sweet brown eyes.
Lord, have mercy on me, Nora Montgomery prayed silently.
"Your eyes…" the shorter woman murmured in reverie.
It was only two words, so simple, and so powerful. Nora swallowed and laughed at herself for how easily this woman could fluster her.
Billie's eyes kept boring into hers, and finally she said: "My grey sapphire."
And that was her last thread of self-control. The older blonde could hear it going down the drain as she lunged forward, capturing the woman's lips with her own. Her grip around Billie's wrist tightened without her notice. Her mind was too foggy to comprehend what her body was doing.
Too much noise, Nora thought. The wet sound of their kisses, their moans and whimpers, the rash of adrenaline in her brain, her heartbeat. Half of them didn't make sense.
But did it matter?
The only thing that mattered right in the moment was that she had Billie in her arms, the way she'd always dreamed of.
Still panting, the older woman pulled back, eliciting a protesting whimper from the other. It was the most gorgeous sound in the whole universe. She'd heard that sound before, in her sleepless dreams, in the midst of her eternal purgatory. And lord, there was nothing holier than Billie Dean Howard with her smudged lipstick.
The ghost traced her lover's bottom lip with her thumb, mesmerized by the way the different colors of their lipsticks glistened on the smooth palette of Billie's skin.
"Wow," the shorter woman panted out, a little taken aback by the roughness she hadn't thought the woman was capable of. Her lips were still tickling with excitement. "Aren't you full of surprises?"
The comment made Nora smirk. Her hands reached for the mediums hips, before bringing their bodies closer again.
"Believe me, you have yet to see the best part," she whispered in Billie's ear, her lips itching to have contact with the skin there. "Billie."
Her smirk grew when the woman beneath her shivered.