The Music of the Night
Prologue
The Auction
Paris, 1920
The Opera Populaire is no longer the great opera house that it once was. The only glory that remains is in the echoes that still whisper to her from the distant past … has it truly been fifty years? It seems impossible. Impossible when she can stand here looking at that dirty, gray stage and remember it bright and colorful, full of music and dance and beauty as though it was only yesterday.
It seems completely absurd that time has gone by so fast. And now the only testament to the grandeur that was once the Opera Populaire lies in the pieces of junkbeing auctioned off to make a profit for the city.
She looks at her husband and wonders why she wanted to come in the first place. The sight of the opera house so tarnished and blackened should not corrupt the bright, happy memories that lie here. Her husband won't return her gaze. He is looking at their faded surroundings, assuredly just as hurt by the dust and cobwebs and rotted fabric as she is.
She turns her attention to the auctioneer. So far, all that has gone up for sale are old posters advertising operas of the past and ancient pieces of scenery. She wonders who would ever buy such things. Even she wouldn't stoop so low as to clutter her house with useless items and she had come here searching for some small slice of physical memory.
It is then that she hears a melody that makes her stand immediately to attention. She stares at the auctioneer in shock as he holds up a music box that is shaped like a monkey wearing robes from the far east and clapping together cymbals to the rhythm of the song.
This, this was why she had come. Until this instant, she hadn't known that this music box was what she had been looking for, but it was true. She remembered that melody.
Fifty years ago, the girl that she had thought of as a sister had vanished below the opera house. When she had returned, it had been with that song constantly on her lips. There had been other songs as well, of course. That remembered girl had come back to the surface full of music. She can barely remember the other songs, though, and this is the one that now tinkles through the opera house as though it were fifty years earlier. She tries to remember the lyrics, but it has been fifty years and all she can recall is the first line, "Masquerade …"
She meets her husband's eyes and she can tell that he remembers as well. He smiles at her lightly, and she is briefly amazed that she can find a 70-year-old man so unbelievably handsome.
Then the auctioneer calls for bids and she raises her number right away, not even bothering to listen to the amount that was asked for. It is a piece of junk to most people, not worth anything. But, to her, it is priceless. She is confident that she will get it without contest.
On this, however, she is wrong. As quickly as she bid first, a man on the other side of the opera house follows her bid. There aren't many people here, so she is able to see him if she stretches. She does so, trying to see who would bid on this forgotten music box with no meaning to anyone other than her. Meanwhile, she raises her number and the bid, still trying to get her piece of memory.
She realizes who is on the other side of the theater at the same time as her husband whispers her name. He has obviously realized it too. Oh. She thinks. Well, perhaps …
She meets his eyes from across the room. Recognition echoes between them and words and memories flow across, words unecessary.
Her husband mutters, "He needs the memory more, love. Let him have it." She nods absent-mindedly, still lost in the reminiscences of things that happened fifty years ago.
She shakes her head when the auctioneer looks at her for a conflicting bid to the man-across-the-room's. She is disappointed at the loss of the physical representation, but as she gazes around the theater and her eyes come to rest on her husband, she decides that she doesn't need it.
"Let's go home." She whispers in his ear. He nods and they are about to move towards the exit, when the auctioneer begins to talk again.
"And now, you're all in for a special treat. Some of you may recall the strange affair of the Phantom of the Opera." She stiffens and feels her husband do the same beside her. She spares a glance for the man across the room and he too appears uneasy and upset. "A mystery never fully explained."
She turns slowly to see a large object covered by fabric. It looks uncomfortably like a broken chandelier. She winces as the auctioneer continues to affirm her theory. "We are told, ladies and gentlemen, that this is the very chandelier which figures in the famous disaster. Our workshops have repaired it and wired parts of it for the new electric light. Perhaps we can frighten away the ghost of so many years ago with a little illumination."
Suddenly, the cloth covering the chandelier is thrown off and the room is dazzlingly, unbelievably bright. She remembers this chandelier so well, even though she had been just seventeen when she last saw it lit up. Then it had been flying far overhead, lighting the best opera house in France.
In the last moments before she completely succumbs to memory, she thinks she sees something. It is out of the corner of her eye and she is still squinting from the sudden light, but she could swear she sees six figures in the shadows, one that stands out especially. The person looks like … it looks like a seventeen-year-old Bella. Just exactly as she had been fifty years ago when all of this had started.
Impossible. It must just be a trick of the light and the memory that is about to envelope her.
A/N: Welcome to something I've been working on for a while now! This will be a Twilight fanfiction with songs and some plot taken from the Phantom of the Opera. Don't expect any Phantom characters to be showing up though, and I'm trying to make the characters as much like themselves in the Twilight books as possible. You don't need to know anything about the Phantom of the Opera to read this story, although I highly recommend the movie and musical anyway. Note that this is only the prologue, other chapters won't be as short, in present tense, or mysterious, so don't worry. ;-) Tell me what you think by pressing that button down below! Now go pop in your Phantom of the Opera soundtrack, sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride.
Next Time: We begin our actual story in 1870 with the introduction of two new managers.
Disclaimer: I do not claim the rights to anything from Twilight or The Phantom of the Opera those belong to their respective authors, directors, and companies. I'm merely using them for my own enjoyment and for no money. This disclaimer applies to the entire story.