High above the stage, upon the narrow catwalks, Erik walked lines back and forth, looking down upon all that would materialize to make up the newest opera production. It was here, above everyone as they rehearsed, quarreled and compiled new ideas and direction for the performance that he could conduct his own assessment of how things should be run. He was quick to write his letters to the management, not suggesting but rather demanding that certain changes be made less he cause a most unfortunate befalling of the actors and actresses. Becoming the only residing opera ghost the Palais Garnier had unknowingly adopted, he had adapted quite contently to getting what he wanted by causing fear and alarm. With the opera cast and the administration all fumbling over his magic tricks and frightful illusions he found it amusing,that after all his life of hating to be feared and loathed, now becoming such a permanent fear in people's lives had gained him more than ever. Money, a home...and all the glorious music the city of Paris could offer.
It was with great reluctance that each night after a performance he would have to stagger back down below where he belonged. To be enthralled in the drama of an opera was like having a window into normalcy. A life he would never, could never hope to ever live. And so, with only the opera to do his bidding, he forced them to abide by his rules. Any triumph, any solid increase in ticket sales and Erik would attribute it to his own doing; the opera's success...his success. Music was always an outlet for him. Even as a child he was musically inclined, gifted some might have said...though such talents were wasted and not challenged. Everyone was afraid of him, afraid of the monstrous face that was hidden beneath an ebony mask.
Still high in the rafters, such thoughts brought his own hand to come up and touch the mask. No one could love him with a monster's face...and certainly no one would even want to appeal to anything a man in a mask had to offer. And so was his life. Condemned to a life of solitude...but also to one of pure, interrupted musical composition and the bliss from hearing it played. Even if he was the only one to hear it.
He cut his eyes down stage left to a commotion...to the hoard of fluttering tutus and hair ribbons. He sighed his annoyance. How he hated the ballet! Music and voice was the ultimate expression of feeling and passion. Dance...well, dance had yet to grow on him. As well as the irritating, high pitched squeals of the ballerinas and their dramatic, over exaggerated take on everything in life. Sometimes his ghost persona worked to his advantage in the way of frightening little girls, keeping them out of areas of the underground that they did not belong. He would watch as they would dare each other to take further and farther step into his cellar, then he would create the slightest noise, driving them out on a single pitch, amused that such simple tricks could scare them so much.
Without the orchestra tuning before their entrance, he could hear the shuffling of their slippers as they stepped into place. The harsh sound of the Giry woman screeching in French led to more gasps from her little troupe, her own daughters' giggles being heard throughout the auditorium. Erik's eyes tore to the interruption the shrill little voice had caused, almost prepared to cast down a voice to them all to concentrate lest he kill them in their sleep! He stifled the urge, making his way down off the walkways in silence, stealth becoming another attribute he had perfected in the few years he had been there.
He could see the younger dancers in the wings, such little things watching with awestruck eyes as the more experienced girls skipped and leaped about, knowing that in a few years they would be on the stage as well. He wanted to laugh. A dancer's life, indeed. What a short lived, overrated achievement to attain and aspire to!
Coming down from the rafters, keeping to the shadows, he took note of the clumsy formations and unprofessional banter the older girls seemed to always revert back to if they were not being watched by Giry. That was certainly going to be a major note in his next letter to the managers. He knew, however, if he took the problem upon himself and frightened them all into standing straighter and focusing on their choreography that it would resolve itself much sooner.
With a final perturbed, irritated shake of his head he prepared to move out of the darkness and slip down to the cellars, back to his home where he could live out the rest of the day in peace, composing and thriving in a more artistic domain. He crept down a short staircase out of sight, leading to a narrow darkened hallway that housed the costumes and led to the dormitories. Sighing his relief that he no longer had to be so tense and stealth-like, he resumed the time consuming journey down into his world, down into hell.
A whimper, faint and distant...it burned his ears, making him turn around. What was that? It was...beautiful. It was full of pain, anguish...torment even, but it was beautiful just the same.
He looked behind him, finding nothing but dark. Had he heard a ghost? Perhaps he wasn't the only specter meandering about during the rehearsal's attendance! He had to satisfy his curiosity and find who, or what, had possessed such a sound. Quietly he retreated several steps back, hearing the muffled sobs again all filtering out from the dormitories. He huffed a breath in his defeat. Not a ghost, just another child crying over her hair or the way her toe shoes bit into her feet as she stepped into them. Sighing, he inhaled deeply, oddly disappointed that it wasn't another ghost.
"Papa...oh, Papa why did you leave me?" The voice called out amidst it's sobbing, every syllable laced with agony. Someone so young shouldn't know such pain, he thought, reminding himself that as a child he too would cry and sob just as this voice! He couldn't leave now, not after perhaps hearing more of the beautiful little voice that cried out in dark.
He stepped towards an extended corridor that led to a small opening in the wall, a view into the small rooms used to house all the ballerinas and future ones too. He never looked through this spying hole... it was a delicate subject that he would not fall to...no not the desiring of young women. He had seen Buquet and other young stagehands use it to spy as the older girls would undress after a performance. What a monstrous thing to do! And yet, here he found himself peering through the crack in the wall to seek out the source of what he knew to be a child, wondering silently what had caused her so much pain.
He searched the room with his eyes; amidst the numerous beds and clothing trunks he found her, a trembling little body huddled next to a dressing mirror, her knees brought up to her chest as she faced her trembling reflection. She wore the mandatory dancing attire, a white leotard with white tights and tulle floating about a tiny waist. She was barefoot; her dancing slippers laying idle on the floor next to her.
Her hair was dark and long, curls adorned the ends of her strands, a large hair bow fixed to the top where half of the locks were pulled back. Her face was hidden in small hands, tears streaming over fingers to land in sploshes at the wooden floor around her.
"Oh, I don't want to be a ballerina! I want to sing, Papa...on the stage...that's the only way you will hear me up in heaven...oh, please don't give up on me now...you promised...you promised an angel..."
Erik couldn't help notice the child's fading Swedish accent. The child was obviously in pain, but...what did he care? He had no time, no interest in such things...and why should he? Most of these girls were orphaned, taken under Giry's wing and made into dancers. Why would this little creature be any different?
He watched for a moment as her sobs continued, her little body shaking violently from her incessant sobbing. His heart ached in his chest, tight and constricting. Never had he ever cared for anyone but himself! It was new and strange to him to feel the tug of heartstrings, knowing someone so innocent and young could know the violent, unyielding pain of grief.
His hands began to shake with the need to reach out to her and he fisted them at his sides. Inhaling deep and full, he left the little wall with a view and stepped back, lingering for a moment as the child's cries quieted. Poor girl, he thought. And without another thought he forced himself back on his way to the underground. He had only stepped a few paces back into the dark when the soft whimpers of a child blossomed into a full voice of a girl.
The words were not his native French, but he didn't have to know what the song meant. Her voice rang out throughout the dormitories, so beautiful that he thought he might have imagined it. Heaven...heaven...That was the only thought in his head as he was consumed by the resonating beauty of a such a small girl's voice.
She had spoken of angels...but all he could think in his addled mind was that she must be an angel herself. Rushing back to the little wall he was almost deaf from the blood rushing at his ears, pulses bounding painfully and limbs becoming weary. Peering through the mask into the crack, he saw that she stood now at the mirror, looking into herself as she sang.
She was very small, maybe about seven or eight, her skin pale and nearly matching her uniform. Dark eyes peered out from a tear-stained face reflected in the mirror, striking him and piercing down to his blackened soul. She was hauntingly beautiful, even for one so young. He hadn't realized that he had been holding his breath, watching intently as she stared at her reflection, no emotion and no expression, only glorious sound...
A scuffle of slippers echoed in the corridor causing Erik to shrink silently into the darkness. The angel stopped her singing. It was Giry's daughter, Megan...flouncing about and skipping into the dormitory.
"Christine? Christine Daae? Yes, that is your name. Why aren't you above watching rehearsal? You know my mama will be cross if she finds you down here alone...and even more so if you are not at practice!"
"Forgive me...I...I forgot my slippers." Christine whispered, sniffling and wiping a lone tear from her cheek.
Christine. The voice did have a name.
As the pair raced off to avoid penalty's from their strict instructor, Erik held still in the shadows, his mind turning steadily. She had asked for an angel...and Erik would be that for her. He called himself crazy, infatuated with a sound...a sound he had longed to possess for himself since he knew of the existence of music. He had to watch over her; he had to keep her safe. She was too precious to become victim to anything that could befall her as a ward of the opera. She was on the path to certain corruption and he had to see to it that something extraordinary would come of her and her voice. One day he would reveal himself as the angel who had watched over her for years...but for now, he would keep to his phantom persona; silent...only offering a guiding hand when needed. Someday she would call for him to come again...and only then would he be answer to her prayers.