When She Loved Me
By: Anni Re
The sounds of music ran over the teal colored water, an endless cascade of discordant sounds bouncing off the wet black rocks and into the darkness of the earth. At its epicenter, Erik continued to push out his music through his organ with his long, lanky fingers. His digits ached and his knuckles were red and swollen from the strain. Erik continued despite their protest, cursing them for having a mortal man's strength and stamina, and not the power of the Angel of Music, a title he had, until recently, for the past ten years. Erik violently pressed down on the keys with all ten fingers, leaning into it while his organ groaned melodically beneath him. After a long, pregnant moment Erik released, collapsing back onto his bench, feeling his heartbeat in his hands. The sound of silence reverberated around Erik in palpable waves. Slowly, he turned his head, deliberately blinking, as if this was the first time he had seen in weeks; firelight from his massive candelabras flickering on wilting columns of wax, broken bits of furniture, and hundreds of cream colored music sheets written in red ink.
It had been three months, ninety dark days since Erik had ventured to the surface five stories above his head; ninety days since he had hidden in the shadow of Apollo's Lyre, snow biting the nape of his neck, and watched the only woman he ever loved pledge herself to another. Don Juan Triumphant was conceived on the night Erik descended from the roof of the Opera House and into its underbelly to mend his broken heart with music and his own company. He did not send Madame Giry, or Firmin and Andre any messages regarding his wishes or his threats. Part of his mind was completely unaware that he had been negligent; another part didn't care at all.
Erik glanced up at the ceiling. The Opera House must be in an uproarious state of celebration without him, he thought. However, he wondered what kind of carnage had been set on his stage and, for once, he was more than glad not to have witnessed it. He wondered if Carlotta had successfully usurped Christine from her spot as leading soprano. Erik winced slightly. The ached in his body that was his protégée was still tender. Erik massaged the pain out of his body, reaching towards the sheets of music on his organ's stand, the only drug powerful enough to satiate him.
During the many weeks of the Opera Ghost's absence Erik had composed a good portion of his magnum opus, creating the skeletal form of his story, several characters, and pages upon pages of bombastic and tragic musical scores to use as he wished. Now that this initial tidal wave of anger and heartbreak that had fuelled his creating receded, Erik looked at his work with an ever-critical eye. He picked up a leaflet and held it closer to him, so that the candlelight at his shoulder could illuminate the red ink. The score, sprinkled with the scratchings of sung dialogue was the opera's opening number Past the Point of No Return, in which Don Juan and the character played by Christine would share a conjugal embrace that would set the stage of their relationship throughout the opera. Erik had yet to name the role that Christine would play, for it was so transparently her, Erik had yet to disassociate himself and fully form a fictional character. Past the Point of No Return was the first thing that Erik had written for Don Juan Triumphant and everything else had been built off that moment. That is where everything began to diverge, for Erik had in fact written two operas, both partially completed, stemming from the same point. Both stories had also been written when Erik was in a particular state of mind, one fueled by the fire of its composer's anger, the other put to paper when Erik was swallowed by his despair.
The story written by Erik in anger had Don Juan sleep with Christine, who had be infatuated by him, and throughout the course of the opera overcoming his wickedness and loving him despite his flaws. Christine's kindness would break down Don Juan's barriers and he would learn to love her as well, realizing that his true triumph was not his physical conquests but the love of a woman. While the first plot portrayed Don Juan as a redeemable villain and Christine as a saint among women, the second plot painted Don Juan as a victim and Christine as a woman from his past with a grudge. Christine had left Don Juan and his lifestyle, losing all love for him. Upon realizing who she was, Don Juan decides not to sleep with her and tries to win back her love honorably. Christine eventually realizes he is a changed man and learns to love him again, consenting to sleep with Don Juan at the end of the opera.
Erik's mind wandered down that path, idly flipping through the reams of paper, his golden eyes, scanning the climax of the opening duet and the following dialogue in which both Christine and Don Juan discover who the other is. Distraught and angry, Christine's character departs, leaving Don Juan on the stage to sing of his lost love remembered, and committing himself to winning her back. The song had not yet been written. Erik gathered to score together and bounced the papers on his knee to get them even and organized. Gently, he set them off on the left side of the music stand as a reference. Erik bent down and picked up a fistful of blank staff paper that was stacked by his feet, setting them in front of him.
Erik's fingers experimented with introductory chords, softly pressing down on the keys to tease out of the organ's belly tender notes; pausing every so often to pen a few notes of the developing score. As Erik played, his inner eye became lost in the memories that inspired him. Christine, garbed in the pale pinks and lacy frills of the Countess from Il Muto, a cloak spread over her shoulders, covering her chocolate colored curls. Christine, professing her love to the dashing young Viconte whilst he spun her around in a small explosion of white powder. The scene was something out of a fairy tale that ended with, "and they all lived happily ever after." All but one. The lyrics practically wrote themselves, drawing themselves out of Erik's voice box, and the base of his soul.
When somebody loved me
Everything was beautiful
Every hour we spent together
Lives with my heart
Christine had loved him once Erik liked to believe. He remembered finding her as a small, fatherless child in a foreign land, lighting a candle for her lost parent in the chapel of the Opera House. Her quiet sniffling caught his attention through the wall he walked within. Erik peered though a crack in the mortar and saw her small frame grabbed in a white shift curled up into herself, her wild curls sticking out every which way, her body shuddering from the cold and her crying. For the first time in the twenty years of Erik's life he felt pity and concern. Erik spoke through the fissure in the wall, his skill at ventriloquism making his voice echo around the room from seemingly no point. "Why are you crying, sweet child?"
Christine's head looked up, even with a blotchy, tear stained face and a running nose she was still the most precious cherub he had ever seen. "B-Because my father is dead," she stuttered through her sniffling. "Who are you?"
Erik paused. He had never seen this girl before, so he did not know how long she had resided here, and more importantly, how much she had heard about the opera' resident phantom. "Who do you think I am?" Erik countered.
Christine's glassy brown eyes were wide and hopeful. "Are you the Angel of Music?" she asked.
The title struck Erik. He had been called many things: Opera Ghost, Devil's Child, but never the angel of anything. He liked it. Erik had also played so many roles in his life, he didn't mind adding on another one when he saw in Christine's eyes how important this was to her. "I am," he said, his melodic voice reverberating around the small room.
Christine stood up quickly, her nightclothes falling around her small feet. "I knew it," she said, practically bouncing on the stone floor. "I knew my father would send you to me."
Erik felt a smile tug at his lips and quietly marveled at it, along with the young girl in front of him. "What is your name?" he asked softly.
Christine bent her knees in a small curtsy, her pudgy fingers fanning out her gown to either side. "Christine Daae."
Christine, Christine
"Christine…" Erik's voice breathed out in his pause, leaning forward to write notes and words along the staff paper. After a moment, he placed his fingers lightly on the keys and his digits continued to dance over them, his body serving as the vessel for Don Juan's voice.
And when she was sad
I was there to dry here tears
And when she was happy
So was I
When she loved me
Erik dropped his right hand into his lap and continued to play the simple stream of notes he was actively composing with his left hand. Erik's head tilted towards the entrance to his grotto, his gaze cast far over the lake. Ever since the moment he met Christine, she had had Erik inescapably wrapped around her finger, and the ten years that followed were the best in Erik's life. Christine sought out his companionship and his comfort more than anyone else's, especially during the first nights Christine lived in the opera, still so lost and alone, afraid her Angel of Music would not be there for her, as she had been promised. Erik watched her sleep in her narrow cot through the holes in the ceiling, watched the rhythm in her breathing and how she shifted in her sleep. Sometimes, she would jerk suddenly out of her slumber flustered and frightened, clutching at her covers. "Angel?" she asked the darkness.
Erik got more and more practice with his smiling muscles every night, a soft grin without hesitation developing on his mouth. Erik cast his voice down to rest on her shoulder, caressing her ear. "I'm here," he whispered.
Christine's body relaxed in palpable relief, and with some coaxing she tucked herself back into bed.
"Shall I sing you back to sleep?" Erik offered.
Christine nodded, her eyes already closed, head steadily sinking into her feather pillow. "Please," she said.
Erik sang to her though the rafters Swedish lullabies, or played on the violin snippets of her father's music he had found in the opera's musical archives, chasing away Christine's nightmares and in turn giving himself sound sleep.
Erik gave Christine anything and everything musical, as he believed her father and her Angel of Music would have wanted. He immediately took her under his wing and trained her to be the next leading soprano, if he had anything to say about it. During her tutelage Christine even more than before sought out Erik's guidance and reassurance.
"Angel," said Christine one day while she was practicing in the often-neglected pastel pink dressing room in front of the large gilded mirror that concealed both Erik and the entrance to his lair. "Do you think I'm pretty?"
Erik froze behind the glass, unsure of what to say to a fourteen year old on this subject, grateful that Christine continued to talk giving him time to formulate an answer.
"I'm just so tall and gangly," Christine continued, the huge mirror in front of her providing a visual aid, "and my hair is so…" Christine reached up and pressed down on her wild Scandinavian curls that Western Europe had yet to temper. "Meg Giry has pretty hair," said Christine, her hands dropping to her sides. "And her skin is so soft, and all the boys like her. No one likes me."
Erik for a long time had gone past simply 'liking' Christine, and it took all of his almost thirty years of restraint not to reveal his secret. Tentatively, he reached out and grasped at the ethereal image Christine had painted of him. "I have no concept of mortal beauty," he said, choosing his words carefully so as not to trap himself. "The beauty I see comes from music. Come; sing for me, from the middle of the aria. Let your voice fly up to me in the heavens."
Christine began to sing, her voice ascending her ever-expanding range of octaves.
"Breath deeper, Christine." Erik coached from behind the mirror, watching her intently, though she couldn't see him. "Use your diaphragm or you'll never make it." Erik placed his hands on the glass on either side of Christine's figure as if to vicariously guide her to what he desired. Her budding breasts swelled beneath his hands and her voice soared to the highest parts of her range. Erik closed his eyes and lost himself in it. He leaned forward and through the glass pressed his forehead against her own. "There," he said almost reverently, "beautiful."
Through the summer and the fall
We had each other that was all
Just she and I together
Like it was meant to be
And when she was lonely
I was there to comfort her
Erik's voice faltered, his emotion chocking him, recalling all the smiles and looks of adoration he received from Christine, which he kept in a velvet lined box in the corner of his heart.
And I knew that she loved me
Erik rested both his quill and his hands while he struggled to compose himself unsuccessfully, looking at his work so far. Down Juan would turn the music here and sing about how Christine's character left him with his broken heart and how his ways with women now was an attempt to bind his wounds. In Erik's state of mind, he was both shocked and envious of Don Juan. Socked, because he would never do that to Christine, and envious because even if he wanted to, he never could. Erik's mid traveled back to only a few short months ago when Erik brought Christine to his underground kingdom. How Christine had seen his face and fled into the arms of another. Erik forcibly pushed the images of Christine and her fiancé kisses from his mind. With both hands he thundered across the ivory, both his and Don Juan's emotions poring out over the paper.
So the years went by
I stayed the same
But she began to drift away
I was left alone
Still I waited for the day
When she'd say
I will always love you
Erik's fingers and voice once again softened and slowed, his head turning and looking out over the lake for a second time. He jolted. Christie was standing here, ankle deep in the water, wearing the wedding dress that he had picked out for her. Erik's stumbled to a standing position and, with the staff paper in his hands, he simultaneously wrote and sang as he strode towards her, his accompaniment playing within him.
Lonely and forgotten
His eyes were wide and pleading as her approached her.
Never thought she'd look my way
And she smiled at me and held me
Just like she used to do
Christine smiled at Erik, stepping closer to him so that their bodies were flush against each other. She lifted her hands and gently placed them on the sides of his face, one on his cheek, and the other on his mask.
Like she loved me
With trembling hands, Erik reached up to cup Christine's hands, feeling only skin and cold, hard porcelain.
When she loved me
Erik blinked, and in that instant the vision of Christine had vanished, leaving him standing in the shallows. Numb, Erik turned and returned to his organ finishing out Don Juan's song as he walked, singing in a husky, watery voice.
When somebody loved me
Everything was beautiful
Every hour we spent together
Lives within my heart
Erik collapsed on his bench and put his face in his hands.
When she loved me
Erik's voice dissolved into quiet sobbing, his body shuddering as he curled up onto himself, similar to how Christine was when he had first found her. His body stiffened, his fingers forming claws digging into the paper. The pendulum within him swung from sadness to anger. "Christine," he muttered, "Christine, why? Ungrateful child, to take all I have given you and then leave me." Erik squeezed his eyes shut his mind returning back to the anger he felt as he screamed on the rooftop of the Opera House, hoping that his survival instincts would shatter and he would tumble off the building and end his onslaught of suffering.
Erik heard the sounds of paper tearing, and after a second stopped himself from ripping the sheets in half. Erik opened his eyes and stared at the crumpled music in his quivering hands. Erik resolved he would choose the story where the beauty's love would overcome the beast's terror. He found that even in the disguise of Don Juan and Christine's unnamed role, he could never paint himself as a pitiable creature or Christine as anything less than an angelic saint. A corner of his brain selfishly added that even if only in his fantasy, Christine would always love him.
An eerie calm settled over Erik's body, like a comforting embrace. Erik smoothed out the sheets of score and gently folded them into a small square, tucking it into his suit coat pocket over his heart. With this strange feeling settling within him, Erik composed a new scene, before Past the Point of No Return. Christine was wandering through the scenery, her eyes curious and delighted at what she saw, plucking at red roses in a basket hanging off her arm while Don Juan watched from within the shadows. Erik did not know what to name this emotion resting somewhere between his rage and despair. He felt like he had never experienced it before, like when he had first discovered happiness with Christine. The emotion guided him through the uplifting notes that fell from his hands onto his organ as the image of Christine walked around in the stage of his mind. Erik called it hope.
Erik idly played while in a high voice he hummed the words he wished for Christine to sing.
No thoughts were in her head
But thoughts of joy
No dreams within her heart
But dreams of love
Finis
If you really want to have a good cry, go and listen to Michael Crawford singing this. Bring tissues.