This is me coping with the finale. Title from "My Songs Know What You Did In the Dark (Light Em Up)" by Fall Out boy.
[breathe]
.
The first thing she realizes upon waking up is that she's coughing. She also notices that her head is in Delphine's lap and a blanket's been draped over her, but then her brain goes back to the coughing thing because it's the not-normal kind of coughing, the Delphine-I'm-sick kind of coughing she's been doing all day.
She tries to take a deep breath but all that happens is this awful wheezing sound.
"Cosima?"
She registers the soft, worried French accent in her ear but opts out of responding and instead sits up. The blanket hangs loosely from her shoulders as they shake with each cough, and then there's a hand gently rubbing her back.
"Some water?"
Cosima nods even though she knows water is just a temporary fix, because she also knows—firsthand—that when you're a scientist, one of the worst feelings is when you don't know how to solve a problem. She hangs her head and closes her eyes and focuses on breathing in and out; when she opens them again, Delphine is back with a glass of water and a damp washcloth.
She hands the glass to Cosima and then gestures to her other hand, where there's a constellation of blood speckles on her palm. "May I?" she asks softly, and Cosima nods again as she gulps down the water. Delphine takes her hand and carefully wipes away the red; when she's finished, she sets aside the washcloth and holds Cosima's hand in both of hers.
Cosima drinks the last of the water and slowly sets the glass on the coffee table. "Please don't look at me like that," she says quietly, picking at a thread in the blanket.
"Like what?"
She swallows thickly and brings their joined hands to her lips, kissing the back of Delphine's palm before curling up against her. Delphine pulls the blanket over both of them and kisses the top of her head, and when Cosima coughs again, her hold on Cosima's hand tightens.
.
[sleep]
.
She can barely see where she's driving, but it doesn't even really matter because at this point she knows the route by heart.
(Plus, if she can manage it in the middle of an adrenaline rush, she should be able to when she's crying.)
It isn't the place she ever thought she'd go after something like this, but she couldn't bear trying Felix's flat. She hates showing weakness around Alison and Cosima, can't show weakness, and Felix would only freak out, and none of that would do her any good at this point.
She lets herself in and locks the door behind her, then leans back and slides down until she hits the floor. Her cheeks are wet and the lump in her throat is enormous and she folds her arms over her chest as tight as she can, trying to gauge how long she can go before everything inside her gives out.
"Sarah?"
Paul is blurry when she looks up but she can still see the concern on his face. "She's gone," Sarah chokes out. "Kira's gone." She lets out a sob and her hand trembles as she pushes her hair out of her face. "And it's all my fault."
Suddenly there are strong arms sliding beneath her knees and behind her shoulders and they scoop her up; she's being carried through the living room and kitchen, and after a few more paces she's lying on a soft mattress.
Paul vanishes and Sarah curls up into a ball, and she can feel her entire body shaking but she doesn't know how to make it stop. All she knows is Kira's empty, ransacked bedroom, and the most haunting silence she's ever heard in her life.
A heavy bottle clunks against the bedside table and when she opens her eyes there's a bottle of whiskey staring at her. She glances at Paul, who's crouching next to the bed. "Want to talk about it?" he asks quietly, and his tone is different than usual as he cups her cheek. This is about comfort, not interrogation.
She props herself up on her elbow and grabs the bottle and downs a few gulps, grimacing at the burn, but then her throat closes up again and she all but slams the bottle back down. She collapses onto the mattress, elbows in the air as she presses the heels of her palms over her eyes.
"Helena killed our biological mother, so I killed her." Her bottom lip is trembling. "They're both dead, and Kira and Mrs. S. are gone, and everything's gone to shit," she croaks, barely managing to finish the sentence.
Paul doesn't ask her to elaborate or explain, and she might've kissed him for that if she wasn't on the verge of a panic attack. "You've been doing the best you can," he says, taking a seat on the edge of the bed and brushing his fingers through her hair. "A lot of this is beyond your control, and that's not your fault."
She shakes her head. "Kira trusted me… I swore I'd protect her. That's supposed to be the most important thing. What if he hurts her? What if…?" A wave of dizziness hits her, and she tries to put her palm to her forehead but her arms are heavy. Everything is. "Paul," she mumbles, trying to sit up, but he holds her down by her shoulder.
"Just rest, okay? You deserve a break."
Her eyes are fighting to stay open. "What did you…?" she begins, but she's out of breath before she can get all the words out, and then everything fades away.
(They're only sleeping pills, and he doesn't do it so he can tie her up or bring her to Leekie or anything. When her eyes close, he puts the cap back on the bottle, walks around to the other side of the bed, and lies down next to her. He wraps her in his arms, pulling her close and thinking about the loaded gun in the drawer a foot and a half away.
He's not going to let anything happen to Sarah Manning, at least for a few hours.
She deserves that much.)
.
[think]
.
When she jerks awake she's covered in sweat and her heart is racing, like she's just finished one of her ab workouts. She slides her eye mask up to her forehead and rolls onto her back, taking deep breaths in and out. She listens to the ticking clock on her dresser, to the breeze rattling her designer window shades against the glass, to the dog barking next door; anything to distract her from the violent, grating hum, the screams, that have been in the back of her head ever since she left Aynesley's house this afternoon.
She's always had this really bad habit of letting things happen. She lets Donnie be a lazy hypocrite, lets her neighbors be nosey and rude, and now she's let her monitor be strangled to death by a garbage disposal and a scarf from the GAP.
But Aynesley totally deserved it, right? It's basically a fact that she's Alison's monitor, what with her always managing to show up at the worst possible moments; that, and Leekie said himself that he'd remove her monitor as a sign of trust, to convince her to sign the paper. He says that, and suddenly Aynesley's leaving the neighborhood? Two plus two equals four—it always equals four.
She shouldn't feel guilty about it, because it's not like her own life isn't in jeopardy. It was proactive self-defense; who's to say Aynesley wouldn't have come after her in the future? She just disposed of the problem before it could become too much of a problem, before there was a gun in her face or a knife in her gut. She was protecting her kids and Donnie, just like any decent mother would do.
Speaking of which.
Alison rolls over so she can snuggle into Donnie's side, but all she's met with is empty bed. She reaches out and pats the sheets: they're cold.
She returns to her other side and curls up again, sniffing a few times to keep an oncoming wave of tears at bay. She's not upset about what happened to Aynesley; she just misses her husband, is all. They have a lot of work ahead of them if they're truly committed to repairing their marriage. It's a very stressful and emotionally-trying process, like it would be for any other couple, and at least it won't get her killed… not like all that C-word business she's going to stay far away from, as of today.
She slips her eye mask back into place. Donnie's probably just watching cricket.