A/N: For those of you who are familiar with this submission from the PFN Morbidity Writing Contest, I edited this version a bit. This time, there's more emphasis on the water imagery, an expanded first paragraph, and a bit more detail towards the end.
Otherwise… Enjoy this yummy cup of tea. ;) :D It ranked in the Top 10 of the contest, (8th place), and I am very pleased and extremely surprised that it did so well.
Oh, and if after reading this you're confused…Feel free to email me or IM me and I would be happy to explain it to you. :) There's more going on in this phic than just... horror. Haha.
I remember that day just as clearly as if it were a dream, an imaginary story, a fading, illusive memory, a legend, a fairy tale. Something that may or may not have happened, something with a grain of truth or none, something that exists only within the mind or within the multiple annals that abound. The results thereafter are retained in my memory as vivid as an evaporating, illusory dream. That is the truth.
I remember I chose Erik. He told me to go, to flee, to marry my lover and be happy – he loved me, yes, he did, enough to want my happiness over his. But I, I was so moved by the depth of his selflessness, by our mingled, interwoven tears, so much innocence shed and lost and shared, that something within me told him no, no, I would stay…
Erik released Raoul and the Persian. To where, I do not know. Erik led them through the lake and they disappeared forever.
I remember my own journey across the lake as well. Many times have I made that journey through the deep, impenetrable mist rising from the black surface. Such a naïve thing I had been the first time – and, indeed, the second and third and many times after too. A quiet, simple child leaning out over the dark expanse, hovering over the edge of innocence, wondering of things incomprehensible to her inexperienced mind. Am I still so naïve?
Erik thinks so. Erik still will not let me listen to his final score – Don Juan Triumphant.
"No, no, Christine, absolutely not!" was the answer when I implored him to hear the score. "It is not fit for innocent ears to hear, and it would damage your soul! There is also our little one to think of," he added, nodding to Isaac, who slept serenely in my arms.
Isaac. An unsullied being, so innocent, so pure, so angelic. He sleeps peacefully, untainted by evil or sin or distress.
Ironic, is it not, that he was born in my distress? My frustration, my pain, my agony? A burst of water and into this dark, wearisome, wretched world he arrived, already marked for the same loss that follows any encounter with the lake.
I did not feel well after giving birth. I did not feel well long afterwards. I still do not feel well. I feel uneasy. Unsettled. Troubled. As if all in the world is wrong and will never be right. And an increasingly obsessive desire to resolve the child, to make it right.
I confessed to Erik my ambivalent feelings. On examination, he could find nothing physically wrong with me, and declared I was completely healthy.
He is right. There is nothing wrong with my body.
I wander out to the lake, sometimes, and peer into its muddled surface. Inside there is a poor, unhappy girl. She is troubled. She has suffered. Her emotions are confused and irrational. And this haunting, obsessive dark love, this new, distressing child, none of it makes her better or well.
"Is this what you wanted?" she demands. "To live like this? You wanted to cast off your innocence? This is it!"
Erik frequently likens me to Isaac.
Today he played a song for me, and we sang. He turned from the piano, and I saw the amusement in his eyes. Isaac sat nearby, staring curiously. Erik noticed. "Christine, he looks just like you!" (Who else would he look like? Is it possible that he could even resemble a death's head?) "A caricature of your innocence!" He sighed. "But look at you!" he said, returning to his gaze to my face. His eyes were warm, loving. "You love the music so much, you have practically consumed it. Oh, if only I could consume innocence as you do the music! Then perhaps we would both be happy, we would be balanced!"
Today Erik has left to go shopping. It is Sunday, and he says that when he returns, we shall go out! I live for these days that I am not alone in my room, dreaming and drowning away my sorrows. Though Erik takes all precautions so as not to exert my mind, to exhaust me, he still allows me this one freedom, to go out on Sundays.
Isaac cries. I feed him wearily.
Oh, if only I could consume innocence as you do the music! Then perhaps we would both be happy, we would be balanced!
I want nothing more to hear Don Juan Triumphant! I want nothing more than to prove that I am ready, that I can be his equal. I love him, I truly do. He is my world, ever since his voice came through the glass, ever since he led me across the lake, he has been my world. How much had I given up for him?
John 3:16. One third. The first third.
Oh, if only I were not so innocent! I wish we could transfer our innocence, if that were possible!
A caricature of your innocence!
What holds me back? What stops me from being his equivalent? Who is it? Is it my innocence? Yes, my innocence! But how can I destroy it? How can I eliminate what stops me from hearing Don Juan, the music?
There is also our little one to think of.
It is the being that stops every mother from living her own true life, an independent, free life.
I scoop Isaac into my arms.
"Come along, dear Isaac," I croon. "We're going for a walk around the lake today! Perhaps even through the lake! Would you like that? Wouldn't you?"
I smile benignly at my little boy, and he, observing his loving mother, not understanding her meaningless words, smiles back, so trusting, so innocent. He understands a reassuring smile. He believes it. He even giggles, a pure, bell-like tone.
I open the door to leave the house. I remember the first few times I had been lost in Erik's home. Frightened, unable to understand how to open the door. Now it is no problem. Has the house changed? Is this the same house? Am I still living beneath the Opera House? Or is it me who has changed?
Outside of the house, the air is clear and crisp. Outside, the world is illuminated. A cold pastoral scene. And a vast lake stretches out before me.
I kneel beside the fringes of the dark, watery void, the shores that will wash away all simplicity. Little Isaac still rests in my arms. He looks around, curious. What strange, dark, bright world is this?
There is the girl again, the poor, unhappy girl.
"Throw him to me!" she says hopefully. "Please, throw him!"
"No!" I argue back. "He shall fall."
"He won't fall. I'll catch him."
"Can you make him understand? Can you transfer his being?"
"Of course. The water is life, death, innocence, compassion, knowledge… He will be safe with me."
I smile, relieved, and gently, so carefully, so tenderly, transfer Isaac into my waiting arms at the bottom of the lake.
Did you know that babies can swim naturally? They don't even need to be taught! In the depths of the lake, Issac paddles his arms and legs, flails them, splashes, gurgles in the water. I hold onto him. He tries to let go, to force me to release him, but I know what is best. What is in all of our best interests. He is so young, so innocent, but I know what shall happen if I let go!
"Pure and simple innocence," I comment, my voice echoing off the walls.
I carry Isaac back to the house. He is still, unmoving. Of course. He is exhausted. A journey through the lake can sap the life out of anyone!
Back to the house. To the kitchen. I rest Isaac on the counter. Today, I shall cook for Erik! He is the one who usually provides us our meals. He takes great pleasure in feeding me. He rarely eats. But today, I shall be the one to feed him! What have I to provide?
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son…
I pull out the little animal – what is it? I cannot recall! No, I shan't recall! – and slide it onto the board. I shudder. Can I cut this creature? Can I really slice it and cook it and feed it to Erik? I am so squeamish, but I do love Erik, and I want to provide him a meal for once!
Chop! Slash!
A leg pops off.
One leg should do it! The creature wasn't even full-grown, I think, but it shall do!
Into the oven you go! And in the meantime, how can I forget to prepare some of Erik's favorite tea? Russian tea!
While I wait for the meal to cook, I drift outside of the kitchen, and into the music room. There, on the piano, rests that mysterious, destructive manuscript. With trembling fingers, I pick it up, and turn the pages, imbibing the words, the notes, the melody, the message…
Erik is overprotective, sometimes! These words are far from damaging for a changed soul.
"Christine!" a voice calls wonderingly from afar off. "Where are you?"
Erik has returned!
"I'm here, Erik!" I sing out as I drop the script and rush to the kitchen. Hastily, I stuff the rest of the animal into a cupboard. Never mind the leaking blood. I pull out the leg from the oven. Tea and… meat?
"Christine!" Erik enters the kitchen. His eyes widen in surprise. "What are you doing?"
"I wanted to prepare a meal for you!"
His eyes are now bemused. "But of course, my angel, anything you want…"
Beaming, I place the meal on a tray, and together, we exit the kitchen, and sit down at the table, he on one end with the tray and I on the other.
He eats a portion of the leg. Consumes the innocence. Will this work? Can he truly consume innocence?
"Christine?" I hear him ask, his voice puzzled. "What is this? What have you prepared?"
All afternoon I had studied Don Juan Triumphant. And now I hum the tune.
"Christine! What have you done? Have you read my score?" He is furious.
I continue humming. Such a dark tune, really, but now, now it does not affect me.
"Where is Isaac? Where is he? Is he asleep? Why haven't I heard him since I came home?"
I continue humming.
"What is this that you have fed me?"
We are silent for a long time.
"Pure and simple innocence," I say at last.