'Black Holiday

A Phantom of the Opera story

By Legendarypanda

Chapter one

Underneath An Angel

Paris- Christmas eve 1870

Icicles the color of her own eyes reflected the image of the Phantom back to him; cold, lonely and austere, he was truly an unapproachable creature. The moonlit mask so white it made the snow look filthy and unclean. The biting cold had little to no effect on him. He did not shiver; the snapping bite of the winter having no affect on him, the coldness of his home far worse than the one which currently smacked his body with his invisible hands. His blue eyes scanned the churchyard from where he knelt atop of the only building in the churchyard. The dark evening sky of the December Sunday was moonless behind the clouds so deeply blue that it was almost black, a midnight blue which only the natural dimness of the early morning hours could ever truly capture. His mother's eyes had been that shade of twilight blue, and he had both loved and hated those eyes. Beautiful and threatening all the same that shade of blue promised mystery and intrigue as well as the deadly cold blades of ice fell with ruthless, and reckless precision. Eyes like that could drive a man mad, his mother had said of herself. He knew she was right, for they had done the same for him, that blueness was something a man could drown in.

Many artists had tried but none could truly match the beauty of the entity the twilight hours where the music of the night itself slept lightly. The sort of slumber where the breathing and sighs where audibly gentle like a cooing of a song being sung by a lonesome child. The lament of a child who had grown to realize the cruelty of the world in all its horrid glory. If he listened closely, he, unlike others could hear the tears of the ghosts who had died before their time. Lamenting the loss of all that could have been, all that had come before and all that would never come to pass. Their mournful cries of resignation, resonated deep within his soul. Their voices sounded like that of a child he knew well, all too well that he cared to think of. A child who would be here soon to wish upon stars for the unattainable things that everyone wanted. He breathed out sharply through his nose; steam billowing and the place where he stood was high enough to see the single sliver of moonlight gleaming down at him like a spotlight.

She would be coming soon; he knew it, could sense it deep down in his bones crawling and creeping like so many scarab beetles crawling, in the torridness of the scabby skins of a Persian invalid. It was like a sixth-sense, something odd and ethereal which could not be explained. Like some sort of wicked, black magic. He inhaled the smell of the air, her feminine perfume caressing the holes which served as nostrils in his otherwise skeletal face. Erik groaned rubbing his mask, his male body reacting how any male body would when the object of his desire was so very close to him. Ironic really, that a walking corpse could feel so very much alive when the rest of him wasn't. He took his mask off and turned his face up to the cold night air in a rather useless attempt at calming himself as he inhaled again. This time catching the feint but still present scent of a gentleman's expensive cologne.

He narrowed his eyes at the falling snowflakes like so many jeweled insects falling endlessly on the tentative armor of his now-sopping winter clothes, soaking the silk and leather to the point of uselessness. Still the chill had no affect on him and he waited, crouched atop a mournful statue; the fallen angel's head lowered in mournful solitude as she shed her eternal tears for a man that she had never met but then again perhaps she had met the man in whatever life came after this one. He bent and reverently kissed the top of her marble head, her beauty forever immortal as she wept in sorrowful retribution for the people she never watched them as the sound of weeping, faint though it was reached his ears like the mournful yet once lovely tone of a broken cathedral bell. Soft and slightly melodic in its torture but terrible in its pain all the same as he gazed upon the pristine surface with angry eyes. The snow was white, so white it appeared to blue, a magnificent shade of ice-crystal blue so cold that it became translucent, glowing an almost cobalt blue in the moonlight.

The the exact shade of blue as her eyes. Her lovely terrified eyes. Erik glared as he remembered the way those eyes had widened He growled as he watched her, dressed in the white domino. Her white dress clinging fetchingly to her curves and breasts. His silly little Christine had no idea what she did to a man. The way she innocently tucked her golden curls in her diamond hair-dress. She was running so fast that she slipped in the snow and landed hard on her little rump. Losing her glove in the powder while her tortured angel watched her in some sort of bizarre amusement while she scrounged around for her now missing garment. If he'd had eyebrows beneath his mask, Erik surely would have raised them, a rare cynical smirk twisting his...well teeth.

His girl was such a prim and proper little thing. Even in her haste, she could not bear to lose a glove. It was endearing really. How childlike she was. He stood in silence as the golden angel once named Apollo when the opera had first been built shielded him with wide golden wings so bright that in the summertime they blinded him if he came up before nightfall; not that he ever did mind you. Preferring the company of shadows to the noise and drudgery of the human race, shadows were his friend. Silent, and mystical in their enveloping darkness, embracing him with their hideousness and utter solitude. For dark thoughts circulated around the twisted genius in his mind. Dark, murderous thoughts as his anger mounted and his lust built. Erik cursed the God which had formed him a mortal man, feeling the jealousy of a man and the black hatred of a monster as she appeared before him in angelic perfection.

Blonde hair and blue eyes. her poor pathetic love struck suitor trailing close behind her as if he were a sailor following some Erik did not hate the man so much he might've felt sorry for him. Not that he did. On some level, he was proud of that little vixen, wrapping her coils around that piss-ant little boy's manhood and making him do her bidding. She was more like him than she liked to admit to herself. His Christine was just as powerful and just as wicked as him, if only she might admit it to herself. But then he supposed, that she, like many women did not know the extent of her own power. Her innocence, was damn-near compelling to the point of Erik almost softening his anger. Note the almost, as he did not take kindly to the sight of that boy trailing so close to his Christine. Nor did he very much appreciate the way she was looking at him; with those wide, adoring, helpless blue eyes of over her, checking over her shoulder every so often to make sure he was still behind her.

He watched those eyes, the golden hair, twinkling beneath her white domino mask as she awaited that boy. Erik watched, waiting for him too but not for the same reason,no, he wanted a proper glimpse of the man who had the nerve to come anywhere near what was rightfully his. He stood there, flame-colored eyes boring down into the face of the object of his obsessive desires. Erik watched her intently, his dark heart growing blacker by the second as he thought of the little ingenue just hiding from him like the scared little girl that she was. But his little girl had been a very naughty child, first removing his mask and then running off to see this boy...yes naughty little girl needed to be punished and he would see to it that she was.

For while she rested under the watch of the angel she had no idea that another angel, a fallen angel also stood his silent and deadly vigil overhead. A dangerous and treacherous angel dressed all in black. He narrowed his eyes as he pondered the pretty little redhead beneath him, And his watch was certainly not a gentle one. For this guardian, was a vengeful one and he did not like what he saw, did not like the fact that she now waited for another man. Deceived him, betrayed him and -this made him laugh a little bit- thought she had outsmarted him, silly girl, she would find out the truth soon enough. Her Erik would certainly see to that! He watcher her from above, the angel of music watching over little Lotte as she navigated the perilous journey of adulthood.

A vigil which had been marked by the blood which ran through his fingers, ran through them as if he'd soaked them in it, and in some ways he supposed he had. Gazing intently, and darkly down at her a thin, crooked smile twisting his lip-less mouth. His thoughts darkly playful as the twisted wheels of his mind formulated the plan to punish the lovers. The boy in particular, for although hurting her was unthinkable, that little Vicomte was another matter entirely. How he would simply love to throttle the boy, watch him squirm and squeal at the end of the rope. He moistened the hole that was his mouth, golden eyes bright at the thought of that stuffed aristocrat, dangling, twitching, his eyes bulging out of that disgustingly handsome face of his. He stopped himself, no, he couldn't do that, to kill that boy would hurt his little girl and he never wanted that, never, but then desperate times called for desperate measures and if she pushed him far enough she would live to regret it.

He turned his face to the sky enjoying the coldness of the snow as he let his eyes drift up to the swirling cosmos above his head. Starlight was the only thing keeping this world from being completely black, and had she looked up she would have seen simply what appeared to be two menacing fireflies glowing in a sinister fashion as he pondered the shadows and mulled over the secrets of the night. Erik was no fool, he knew the wile nature of young women and his Christine was no exception but that was just the trouble, she was his and she seemed to have forgotten this fact. A rather egregious transgression if he said so himself. Erik peered down and noticed something twinkling in the near-pitch darkness of the Parisian night and his eyes narrowed as he noted a smiling gold band winking at him from the otherwise spotless slush. He glared down at it, feeling his blood boil as he watched her sight of it. Naughty, naughty girl that she was. She had broken her promise to Erik and he did not take kindly to that. She had done the exact opposite of what he had told her. It was so simple: his one commandment: to stay away from that boy and she had disobeyed him.

Erik would make her pay for it, for that he was certain. He let his mouth twist into a cold fanged smile, with a mouth that had no lips. That foolish young fop of hers, he had left her alone and undefended on the roof of the haunted opera. Where a ghost was supposedly lurking in the dark to steal her away; and oh how right he was. She was sitting, kneeling, knee-deep in the white snow, her rosary clutched tightly in her pale hands to the point of where her knuckles reflecting two sets of sickly pearls. Erik sneered in utter disgust. His girl was such an innocent child, so silly, so naive. Praying to a God who cared nothing for her. He was the only one who understood her. The only one who truly loved her. Why couldn't she see that? Why was she so very blind! Erik gathered the ring into his palm and slowly, ever-so-slowly, he approached her.

"Naughty girl, Christine," he hissed. "Kissing that insolent boy."

She whirled around and met his masked face, her hand coming up to cover her mouth as her rosary beads fell soundlessly to the ground. She bent to gather them but Erik was too fast for her. He picked them up, his skinless hands clicking as his skeletal fingers pinched together to hold the silly little relic up to the icy moonlight. It disgusted him, made him feel like throwing up even and as if he could not bear their touch he dropped them to the ground. Christine yelped and gathered them up from the ground, her hands trembling as she stuffed them back into the confines of her corset. Almost afraid that he might have tossed them off the roof just to spite her. Erik turned and walked toward his terrified songbird, stopping in front of her as the single red rose he had given her fell from the pocket of her cloak.

"Erik...have..." she whispered; he held up his hand to stop her.

"Pity on you?" he finished. "Oh Christine, your Erik does not pity you, your Erik LOVES YOU!"He roared at the top of his voice and then he fell to his knees.

Erik crawled toward her like the pathetic wretch he was, his hands trembling as he grasped the hem of her dress and he wept openly. The tears possibly the warmest thing to touch his face in so many years that for a moment he gasped in apparent pain. The burning sensation nearly too much for him as he moaned like the pathetic animal he was. Christine stood there, not moving as the man she had once thought to be an angel crawled on the ground like some mangy mutt starving for affection. Emotions warring in her eyes as she thought of a hundred different things at once. Her heart constricted with a mixture of sympathetic pity for this lonesome love starved creature writhing on the ground before her. But her pity was mixed with terror, for this being in front of her was not a normal man. This man was a monster, a murderer, a madman. He was inhuman, as black-hearted as the cloak which hung too loose on his nonexistent back. Words of love falling like acid-rain from his antarctic mouth.

Teeth clicking together when he spoke. So why did she feel this urge to hold him close? Erik got to his feet as the door creaked open and he smelled him again. The boy was coming, coming to take his Christine away from him forever. He rose to his feet, feeling for his lasso and drawing it from the inside of his cloak. Christine was his! And if he had to kill the boy she would understand that! But then he made a mistake, a terrible, awful and deadly mistake. He looked back at her, with her terrified blue eyes and saw the shine there, the shine that was never meant for him. His Christine did not love him. She would never love him. His heart which he had long felt dead and devoid of emotion seemed to crack right down the middle. The two halves of it landing on either side of his chest and he began to back up toward the edge of the rooftop.

Christine went white as she watched him,"What are you doing?" she whispered, beginning to panic.

"Goodbye my Christine..." he choked, swallowing the nauseous lump in his throat. "Erik will give his love anything she likes, his love, his life...his death."

She froze,"Oh Heaven!" she cried, tears pouring down her face, "Erik...no...please...please no!"

He may be a madman, a lunatic and a liar but she did not ask for this. She did not want this. Not from the man who had been her everything for so many years. Christine realized in that moment that was the first time she had thought of him as a man. A human man who had told her he loved her more than once, too many times in fact for her to count. Erik was just a lonesome, pathetic man who she had driven mad with the most painful unrequited love; all on account of her. She stepped forward slowly, carefully hearing Raoul getting closer, coming up the stairs. He would be here any moment now, and she was running out of time. Both to stop him from carrying her off as she had made him promise to do and to stop the other from ending his life. Her small feet crunched in the frigid ground, stinging with the intensity of the cold as she slipped out of her thin silk slippers; going forward as he went back.

"Erik," she pleaded again, "Not like this."

He looked at her, his mask dangling from his left ear, leaving half of his face exposed. "Christine does not love her Erik...Erik frightens her."

"Of course you do!" she said, "Erik your emotions are rather intense..."

Erik cried, hanging his head so that his black mask fell with a painful thud to the snow-covered brick, his face now fully exposed."Erik cannot help it!" he moaned, still backing up so that he was dangerously close to the edge, "Christine does not understand!" the poor monster cried.

"What don't I understand?" she shouted to him as the wind howled in her ears, "Please Erik talk to me!"

"Christine wants Erik gone, Christine is frightened of him... Christine does not love him..." he lamented.

"Erik..." she whispered, reaching for him helplessly.

He continued his retreat. If she did not love him then he no longer had a reason to live; and if he had no reason to live then he would no longer continue to do so. He looked behind him seeing the yule tide lights shining him. The great grandfather clock showing just five minutes to Christmas and he laughed at the cruel irony of his untimely death. The birth of the lord would be the end of his unwanted, bastard child. Named for the devil himself in his second and a prince of darkness in his first. He could hear the footsteps of the boy as he tripped on the opera house steps and fell flat on his aristocratic nose. If he were not in such a morbid form of mind he might have smiled but instead he reached into his pocket and pulled out his golden ring dropping it at her that he turned to make his jump when someone reached out and grabbed him yanking him back.

Erik hit the ground and landed flat on his back, looking up at Christine who was crying and holding onto his arm. She shook all over, as she continued to drag him back toward the angel. Christine was surprised at how light, how very thin Erik was as she forced him back down so that he sat still. Before she knew what else she could do for him, she rose to her feet and ran toward the door of the roof; slamming it shut and locking the deadbolt with a resounding crash just before Raoul reached the threshold. She did not know why she did what she did, only that the last person Erik needed to see at a time like this was Raoul. She crept back over to him, he was struggling to find his mask in the snow and she stopped him with a shake of her head. Taking his chin in her hand she made him meet her eyes. Reaching up to wipe the tears running down his face. Erik sighed, relishing the human contact he had been denied for so long.

"Erik..." she whispered, "please let me in, what is it you think I will not understand."

"Erik has..." he choked on a gasp, "never loved anyone before."

She blinked at the startling confession, "Surely you jest Erik, surely your mother...father...you must've loved them no?"

Erik let out a bitter laugh, "Erik never met the old drunk which his poor unhappy mother spoke of. All she said was that he raped her. That he raped her and Erik was part of that. She hated Erik; and Erik learned to hate her."

Christine shook her head, "Poor Erik," she whispered, stroking the balding head,

"Erik has never been loved by anyone, and has never loved anyone...except his Christine. But Christine doesn't love him, she even dropped his ring."

Christine shook her head, "Poor man..." she whispered and placed her lips on his head whispering, "You poor, poor man." against the thin lining of his skin.

Erik's body went rigid at the touch of her lips. An almost stunned sigh escaped him as she held his shoulders to keep him from heading back to the edge of the roof. She let her lips linger as long as she could, before needing air. He reached up as if to hold the kiss in place. The red from her lipstick stained the spot where she had kissed him and she took out her handkerchief and wiped his head clean. Christine handed him the handkerchief imagining he would wipe his tears away but instead he stared at it for a moment and folded it up. Placing it in the pocket of his dress coat as if to save her kiss forever. She reached up and wiped his face, reaching into his coat pocket she put his ring back on her hand, continuing to wipe his unmasked face. Feeling the fragile bones of his cheeks, the rigid hard lining of his jaw and the strong sculpted lines of his face.

As hideous as he was she had to admit he was handsome in his own oddly imperfect way. Not beautiful as Raoul was, but not so unpleasant that the sight of him was unbearable; but Christine assumed she was just biased because she loved him. She loved him. The realization hit her like a shot to the heart, the realization that she loved him so deeply that the thought of losing him was a genuinely terrifying prospect seemed to slap her across the face. She stroked his face again feeling him close his eyes and tentatively press her hand to his poor neglected cheek. Christine did not stop him, she couldn't stop him. Couldn't bear to take her hand away from his skin or ruin the one moment of compassion this poor man had ever been shown. Her hand's cold as they were made his own skin feel warm and Erik sighed looking at her with the most distressed affection she had ever seen.

"It's all right Erik...I'm here." she told him, feeling his shoulders slump as his head landed heavily on her shoulder.

"Christine does not want to be here," he groaned, "Christine will run away with her boy..." he sobbed. "Christine tortures Erik with one moment of affection and then she will walk out of his life forever."

"Erik," she sighed, exhausted."Look at me." Erik looked up at her, helpless to do anything other than her bidding, "I love you."