Greetings Phantom fandom!
I gather that there are a lot of you, so I was a little nervous posting this - I mostly stick to writing for smaller groups like Newsies or Bonnie & Clyde. But the response to my first chapter was overwhelmingly positive - for which I thank all of you that reviewed - and I figured I might as well go ahead and post the second.
Standard disclaimers apply. Unfortunately, I own only a playbill from when I saw the show on tour last week, not the idea or the characters. :)
The sound of his voice is all the motivation she needs to jerk free of the debris crushing her leg, and any pain that this causes is swept aside by her immediate panic. She leaps to her feet and spins around, trying to pinpoint where he's standing. She needs an escape route. Where is the boat?
He speaks again, although that doesn't help her locate his form in the dark. His voice is barely a whisper, dark and cold, but she picks out every word with perfect clarity. "I'd ask where you picked up words like that, but I'm not sure I want to know."
She scoffs at that, temporarily amused before the fear returns. As if he doesn't. He's heard the ballet girls chattering late into the night just as she has, listened to Buquet's stories just offstage after a performance. None of them were ever exactly polite. He's probably even heard her bellowing profanities herself after stubbing her toe on her dresser or pricking her thumb with a needle as she tried (and inevitably failed) to quickly mend a costume. In fact, she's sure he has.
After all, he is always there. Even, evidently, when he is supposed to be dead.
"I'm not a child," she hisses instead of answering, and though her voice trembles, she thinks she sounds rather intimidating.
"No," he murmurs after a long pause. "You're not. And I believe congratulations are in order, Vicomtesse?" He spits the word as if it's worse than anything she could have said moments before.
For some reason, that stings. But it shouldn't, and it shouldn't matter either way — she should thank him, turn to leave. He still hasn't appeared — maybe he's trapped by the debris himself. Maybe she can slip away before he can stop her, or maybe he won't even try. She should run. She can make it.
"Not yet," she hears herself say instead. "The marriage is tomorrow. I'm still just Christine."
"I know," he whispers. She doesn't doubt it. For if he is still alive, then he must have retained his uncanny insight into the outside world as well. The Phantom of the Opera knows everything. Like how to keep her here, if he wants.
She has to leave. Before it's too late.
Turning on her heel, cloak whirling behind her, she takes a step toward the water. And stops.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, he's standing in her way.
She can just barely make out his shadow, tall and proud as it was the day his opera debuted — the day, she knows, his world fell apart, too. He found his mask somewhere — there's a pale glow across one of his cheeks. The rest of him is pure darkness, only slight differences in the depth of the shadows revealing that he has features at all.
She turns the other way instead, and crashes into a second pile of wood, sending it toppling to the ground.
Before she can blink or flinch away he's there, grasping her by the arm and pulling her to safety. Just as quickly she jerks back from his grasp, breath catching in her throat, though she's careful not to hit anything this time. "Don't touch me," she says hoarsely, though he may have just saved her life. On the ground where the debris fell, inches away from where her own body had been seconds earlier, another candleholder is in pieces. It was shattered by the weight.
Maybe it's her imagination, but she thinks he's smirking in the darkness.
Suddenly, she's enraged. Maybe she has no right to be — after all, she just invaded his home, if he even still lives here, and knocked in half the remaining ceiling. But after everything she's been through — everything he's put her through — she simply can't take anything else. She never asked for him to fall in love with her. It's not her fault he's incapable of behaving like a civilized human being, and he has no right to leer at her in that manner.
She raises her hand as if to slap him, to beat the horrible grin away from his face until he realizes she's a strong person and not a child to be laughed at and pushed around. He grabs her arm again, this time to protect himself — he must be able to see better in this infernal darkness than she can — but she doesn't struggle. Suddenly struck with a much better idea — albeit a dangerous one — she uses her other hand to snatch the mask off his face instead.
The effect of this strategy is immediate and terrifying. He drops her arm roughly, one hand coming up to cover his face and the other stretching fruitlessly to snatch it back. But she keeps it just out of his grasp, twirling away and standing beside the water as he watches her.
"Christine," he says softly, pleadingly. Just her name. But she shakes her head. Now it is she who almost smiles.
"This is my insurance," she says. "If anything happens to me, you can be sure I'll throw it somewhere you will never find it. Maybe you can have a new one made. But you'd have to go out in the open without a mask to purchase it."
He shakes his head, turning away from her and switching his hands so the other conceals his face. She wants to tell him it doesn't matter — she can't see anything more than his vague shape anyway. And really, would it matter even if she could? But she remains silent, her last statement hovering in the air between them.
"Then go," he says sharply. "Take it with you for all I care. I have no use for it now — they'd recognize me up there anyway. With or without the mask."
"You should have thought of that before you killed those people," she hisses back, but she doesn't move. Regardless of what she says, they both know she could never do that to him. She could never leave him like this, alone and cold and without protection from the hatred of the world.
"Perhaps," is his only retort.
She knows she shouldn't ask, shouldn't risk angering him again, but she can't resist. She needs to know. "How could you? Buquet? Piangi?"
"Is that why you're here?" he says bitterly, a hint of dark laughter in his voice. "To torture me for that? Trust me, I regret it. It got me nowhere."
"Even if it had, it would have still been wrong!" she exclaims, and he makes a sound somewhat like a growl. She glares at him. "I'm sorry, but that is the truth. They were people. And now they're not, because they're dead."
"Then what am I?" he whispers, and she sees his head turn a fraction, as if he truly cares to hear her response. She studies his outline for a moment, eyebrow raised critically.
"I honestly don't know," she admits finally.
He's facing her completely now, hand still clapped protectively across his cheek. "Well, I suppose that's better than I had any right to expect."
"You didn't kill Raoul," she explains, trying to articulate her suddenly generous description of his character. "You didn't kill me."
Besides another dark laugh, that gets no response. She supposes she knew he would never harm her, at least not then. Has she angered him enough to change that now? Has he grown less fond of her in her absence? She'd like to think not. Only because she has no desire to die today, of course.
"You never answered me," he says finally, taking a single step closer. She retreats several, almost careening into the water before regaining her balance. "Why are you here? Not to invite me to the wedding, I'm sure. Are you experiencing difficulties in your life with the wonderful vicomte?"
"Everything is fine," she says quickly, though he scoffs at her words as though he can detect the thinly-veiled half-truth. "I merely took a walk to clear my head."
"A walk to Paris?" he asks mockingly. She silently curses herself. Of course he would know she hadn't stayed in the city.
"More of a ride, rather," she sniffs. "I wanted to retrieve a few of my things."
"From your dressing room, no doubt," he notes, and she feels a strong desire to slap him all over again. Because he's right, of course. Like always. "Not from the bottom of a lake beyond a ruined secret passageway. Not under the eyes of the Angel of Hell."
"Damn you," she whispers, suddenly letting the mask slip from her fingers to the ground. Before she quite realizes what's happening she's in his arms, pulling him into a tight hug she's not sure she ever wants to let go of. "I thought you were dead, I thought you'd been killed down here all alone by the mob, or been crushed in the aftermath of the fire–" Her fingers clutch at the back of his shirt, and she's suddenly desperate to reassure herself that he is really alive.
"Wouldn't it have been better that way?" he asks, a catch in his voice. Almost unconsciously, his hand drops from his face to cradle her waist before he forces it to his side. Still she doesn't let go.
"Don't say that," she says, her voice muffled as she buries her face in his chest. "Don't even think it."
It's strange, this familiarity they've gained of each other without either realizing it. His arms may hang stiffly at his sides, but he's not upset with her for her sudden gesture of friendship — she can tell by the way he subtly leans into her, almost as if she's supporting him. She can feel his heart racing beneath her cheek, hear the rasp of his breathing in her ear. He still smells of smoke from the fire and sweat, but as she probably smells of horse and dirty lake water, she can't exactly complain. She lets her eyes fall closed, feeling inexplicably calmer than she has in weeks.
The thought strikes her that she's not really frightened of him anymore. She's afraid of something else now.
They are too close, far closer than she should have ever allowed them to become. And that isn't safe for either of them, especially not now.
Reviews are confidence boosters, and I'd especially love to hear what you'd like to see from this in the future. If you have any familiarity with Love Never Dies you probably know where it's heading . . . but I'm not sure I'm capable of writing hardcore romance, and I'm also not sure I want to bump up the rating like that. If you feel strongly either way, shoot me a review and let me know what you think.
Thanks to everybody who reads, and a super special thank you to my reviewers! You all inspire me to continue writing!
Much love,
KnightNight