I don't own Moulin Rouge, but my mom and I both like it, so I wrote this as her Mother's Day present.
No. She can't be gone. No.
Christian holds her lifeless body in his arms, still refusing to believe that this is actually happening. It can't be. He just got her back; she can't die. Come what may isn't supposed to come this soon.
"Christian," Toulouse begins, but the Argentinian quickly shushes him.
"Why? Oh, god, why?" Christian cries, staring at the ceiling and the still falling rose petals. One lands in his mouth and catches in the back of his throat. He sputters, trying to dislodge it. It works, and as he looks at the crumpled, wet petal lying on the ground he wonders... Could it be?
He has to try. Please, he begs the universe, please let me be right.
Quickly, Christian lowers Satine to the ground. He starts pressing repeatedly on her chest, groaning in frustration when her bodice doesn't budge. Damn corsets. He has to get it off of her. Searching the pockets of the costume he had taken off of the Argentinian, he finds a pocket knife and uses it to reach under Satine and slices the ribbon keeping her sewn into the ridiculous contraption.
"What are you doing?" Zidler demands, scandalized, ad Christian tears the corset from around Satine.
"A rose petal," he declares, pushing on her chest again in a technique his aunt, a nurse, had shown him. "A rose petal might have gotten stuck in her throat while we were singing! It could be keeping her from breathing!"
It's not working – why isn't it working?
"Please, Satine," he begs softly, "please wake up. Spectacular Spectacular still has a fifty year run ahead of it, remember? You don't want to miss that. And the Moulin Rouge needs you, Satine. I need you. Please come back. Please."
"Christian," the Argentinian says, putting a hand on his shoulder. "She's gone."
"No," Christian cries, shaking his head. But he stops pressing on her chest, stops pleading with her, and he just sits back and sobs. Well, the Green Fairy would be visiting him a lot more often now. He's so lost in grief that he doesn't hear the hacking cough, or the gasping for breath that comes after.
"Christian?"
That, he hears. It's soft and hoarse and breathless, and he can hardly believe it's real, but he opens his eyes and she's there, eyes open, trying to prop herself up on her elbows.
"Satine," he breathes, pulling her to his chest. "I though you were gone."
"I could never leave you, Christian," she murmurs. "I love you, remember? Until your dying day. Besides," she adds wryly, "I couldn't leave before the curtain call, now could I?"
He laughs. Ever the performer, Satine is.
"But, um, do you think I could have a shirt be fore we go out there?" she asks with a blush. He laughs again, and then Toulouse does, and then Zidler, and then everyone else does, the Argentinian sending one of the women to fetch a top for Satine.
The rose petals have to be cut, Christian decides, looking down at the beauty in his arms. He can't go through this again, not ever.
Because he loves her too much. Until his dying day.
Happy Mother's Day, Mom! I love you.
Everyone else, you should review, 'kay?
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Gryffindorable