Another chapter for you all! A little bit of heart ache but it must be done. As usual I do not own any of the characters and all rights go Gaston Leroux etc. Reviews are welcome as always, and thank you to those who take the time out of their day to read my story. It is most appreciated. With love, M.

Like the stone faced workers whose ashen faces matched that of the sky, Darius stood in the fine rain, ignoring the steady trickle that was quickly making its way down his back. The sky was like a slate, motionless with only the huge black hulls of cruise ships piercing the gloominess. Even the sun had hidden its face, choosing instead to shy behind the heavy blanket of sky and suck the warmth away as if for once it had chosen to warm itself up. He was uncomfortable, that was for certain. His black hair was slick to his forehead, his brow scrunched as he made some effort to keep the rain out of his dark eyes. One covered arm stuck out, an umbrella attached at the end as the other remained bent behind his back, observing his master haggle for tickets for the next journey to America. The thought of this adventure, which had once been consoling and exciting to him, now instead caused him to fret for the thought of not knowing to expect. Darius had always had a plan and was so efficiently organised that Nadir needn't worry much about missing a meeting, for Darius was there to remind him. He was a man who needed to know what was going to happen so he could make sure his master would be prepared. But what use would that be in America when they had no clue as to what to do? He shuddered suddenly and he was not sure if it was from the biting cold or the notion that America would ruin him. His concentration was broken by a huff of annoyance from his master as he pocketed five tickets, two for the 17th of February which were for Erik and himself. The other three were for two weeks after, for the Giry's and Darius who agreed to accompany them should they decide to come. Darius had begrudgingly agreed to assist them though he'd much rather be at his masters side and thought this over and over as Nadir steered them through the dock workers towards the cab they had hired for the day.

"I hope Erik appreciates all this trouble I go through for him. That ticket lackey was as useful as a grave robber in a crematorium." He grunted, thrusting open the cab door as Darius fussed with the umbrella.

"Sir?" Darius questioned, not quite understanding but Nadir merely shook his head.

"Never mind. At least we have the tickets." He said as he patted his pocket in triumph. The lackey had been extremely resistant to sell tickets for the seemingly booked out ferries until Nadir had dumped a sack of money right in front of his eyes. Apparently, obtaining tickets wasn't so hard after that. Nadir thumped the roof of the cab, settling back in to the lush seats as the coach lurched forward, earning several surprised shouts from pedestrians who had stepped into the street without much thought.

"Sir... What awaits us in America?" Darius dared to ask, fiddling with the handle of the now soaked umbrella in his hand. Nadir spread out his hands in a gesture that Darius was so used to that it seemed odd his master hadn't done so in a while. It was one of uncertainty.

"I am not sure, my boy. Perhaps glory, perhaps something else. We shall have to wait and see."

"But Master Erik is adamant we go?"

"Yes. Of course, you don't have to go, Darius, if you do not want to. I have told you time and again you are your own man and the world is yours if you wish to grasp it." Darius scoffed at the thought of a life other than the one he had and curled his lip in disgust.

"There is nothing of interest for me out there at all. You are my master. I go where you go." Nadir smirked at the comment.

"Whatever you say, dear boy."

Tuesday arrived and the weather hadn't improved much at all. Winter still lingered in every corner of Paris, no one could quite escape it, especially when tendrils of ice started to decorate the very sidewalks they walked on. Madame Giry paced up and down the parlour in an agitated manor as Christine observed from her seat, chewing on her thumb nail in nervousness.

"Perhaps this is not such a good idea." She finally murmured, stopping Anna in her tracks.

"This is the only way to clear your head of yours. No, we will go through with this. Just remember, we have not planned this meeting, it must seem accidental."

"Yes well, Erik is always early so it shouldn't seem so incomprehensible that we should meet unexpectedly."

"You are quite right." Anna glanced at the clock, gasping that it was already quarter to seven and grasped Christine's face in her soft hands. "Now my dear, would you prefer me to be in the room or leave you be?"

"I'll be fine on my own mama, thank you." She seemed to tremble, so Anna drew her close to her breast, caressing her hair as if consoling a young child frightened from a nightmare.

"I'll be near by dear one, don't hesitate to call for me." And then, as if on cue, a knock on the door sounded.

Erik looked up at the sky and grimaced at the aching grey clouds that had started to roll over the city. The air had a bitterness to it that set him on edge, reminding him all too much of his now abandoned underground home. He shrank further into the comfort of his cloak as his feet pounded the frost bitten streets of Paris, passing an avenue of gnarled birches that twisted up to the forlorn sky, the white bark peeling off so that it looked like torn cotton had been wrapped around it's dark trunk. Another left, another right, down a slight incline (he was doing his best to avoid catching a glimpse of the Opera House) before he appeared at the end of Madame Giry's street. A vagabond, dressed in an outfit of beige, eyed him suspiciously as he went by, but that didn't stop him from rattling the tin can he held in his hand. Erik spared him a glance and was startled at the icy grey eyes that glared back at him, surrounded by whiskers of the same colour. The man wrinkled his nose and spat at the floor. Erik did not give him his change. Making sure he was some distance away from the tramp, he retrieved his pocket watch from the silk inline pocket of his jacket and observed that he was ten minutes early. He checked his appearance in the reflection of a nearby window, straightened his collar, then knocked on Anna's door. It was opened within seconds, as if she had been expecting him to arrive early and she smiled at him uncertainly.

"Erik, you're early." He noticed the discomfort in her smile but chose not to mention it.

"Of course. I have never been late in all my years, you should know that by now."

"Yes, I should." She grimaced, glancing over her should as a noise came from the room next to her.

"What's the matter? You look on edge." Erik frowned, peering over her shoulder before his face dropped and eyes widened. There, standing in the hallway with an oil lamp gripped in her hand, was Christine who looked back at him in equal surprise.

"Erik..." She murmured and how that voice roused so many quashed memories that they all threatened to bubble up violently to the surface.

"I... H-hello Christine." He said, hating how he stuttered before looking at Anna for an explanation.

"It's my fault really. I should've known you'd be early but Christine needed to go over a few last minute details with me. She was actually just about to leave..."

"Ah... Well. Perhaps I should come back another time?" He said, already starting to back away from the doorway.

"Actually Erik... Seeing as you're here I was wondering if we could talk?" Christine asked with such politeness it was impossible for him to refuse such a request. Then again, what was there to talk about? As far as he was concerned, they had made each other's choices clear in the lair and it was time to start afresh. Sparing a glance for Madame Giry, who looked at the ground sheepishly, Erik acquiesced to her request and stepped into the hallway. Her lavender scent attacked his senses but he did not respond to it. He would not fall into that abyss again. He removed his cloak and hung it up in the coat stand, looking at the two ladies expectantly.

"I'll give you two some privacy." Anna murmured, shutting the parlour room behind them. They listened to her pad down the hallway and up the stairs, knowing they were truly alone when they heard a door upstairs shut. Erik stood closest to the door, his hand inches from the handle should he wish to make a quick escape. She stood by the fireplace, the warm flames giving her an almost ethereal glow as her chestnut coloured hair hung like a heavy curtain of silk down her back. Her eyes, normally bright and full of light looked tired, the grey chalk like marks under her eyes emphasising her exhaustion.

"Are you well?" She started, threading a piece of ribbon she had picked up through her fingers. Erik watched her agitated fingers with a fascinated interest before remembering a question had been asked.

"As well as anyone can be. And you?" She shrugged and looked in the fire as if she could find a suitable response in the amber flames.

"Yes. I suppose." Erik raised his eyebrow though chose not to respond. He looked around the room in awkwardness until his gaze settled on a book of swatches, with pieces of fabric that had been taken out and laid almost too perfectly against the claret coloured sofa. Christine noticed his fixed attention and swallowed thickly. "For the wedding. I can't decide on what colour napkins to have... What would you say?" Erik swallowed the rise of bile that was quick to constrict his throat and could not keep the bitterness that was quick to add to his response.

"If you wanted to talk to me about what colour napkins to have at your wedding I'm afraid your talking to the wrong person entirely."

"I'm sorry that was cruel of me."

"Was it?" Erik said dryly, glowering at the thought of the De Chagny boy and his Christine tying the knot in a couple of days time. Then, with growing frustration, asked "what do you want to talk about, Christine? Because if I recall correctly, the last time we were together you never wanted to talk to me again." She looked away in discomfort.

"I feel like we need closure." At this Erik snorted, raking his hand through his black hair before letting it fall to his side again.

"Really?" He asked in disbelief, "you want closure?" When she didn't reply he took a few steps forward until he was a mere few steps away, "No, you want an apology, am I right? Well I am sorry, Christine. I am sorry for making your life a living hell, I am sorry for all the lies, the deceit. I know what I did was wrong and if I could go back in time and change everything I would. I would make sure that I didn't take you on as a student so that my presence from your life would be spared. Maybe then you would he happy."

"Erik-"

"Though you should be happy now, getting to marry the man of your dreams. I let you go so you could be happy. Why aren't you happy, Christine?" He interrupted, studying her tired face in more detail, how her hair up close was drab and lank, her fingernails chewed to the wick. She took a while to reply.

"I wish we could have changed the way things were as well. You were cruel but so was I, especially when I tore your mask off. Perhaps, if I hadn't of done that, you wouldn't have hated me so much. We could've learn to trust each other, to live with each other. I just don't understand, why did you have to be so abhorrently cruel?"

"It is all I know. I take things in spite because I haven't been shown how to do it in kindness." She did not know how to respond and so she fell silent, letting the ribbon fall from her fingers.

"You think that by never talking to me, I'd be happy? You are foolish to think that. You were the only one to bring happiness to those dark times. The only one talk of my father as if he were a living being. As much as you will choose to disbelieve it, you were the one who brought a lightness to my darkness. Why did you think I followed you so willingly that night to your lair? I wanted to understand the man who was my saviour."

"I see your naivety still clings to you like a child to its mother." He said, a little too meanly so that he sighed and apologised softly, his hand reaching up to brush her cheek before he decided against it and let it fall back to his side. "I wasn't your saviour, Christine. I was a greedy man who suffered from your beauty and voice and needed to have it to myself. I was selfish."

"I thrived off that greed. It made me feel like I was worth something." And then, she started to cry so suddenly that Erik grew alarmed at the fat tears that started trailing down her cheeks, "you were the only one who was ever there for me and I threw that kindness back in your face. I am sorry, Erik. You did not deserve that."

"Hush now... Please, don't cry. You know I hate to see you cry." It was then that Christine closed the distance and rested her forehead on his chest, listening to his heart throb at the contact. He brought his hands up and rested them on the small of her back, pressing her closer to his form so that he might get an imprint of her against him. In response, she wound her arms around his taught back, turning to rest her lips against his cotton covered thorax.

"You're right. I am not happy. I miss you too much. I miss our singing lessons, the hours spent reading and drinking tea. I miss the stories you used to tell me, the melodies you played on the piano. I made the wrong decision... Although you didn't exactly give me a choice." Erik peered down then, looking at where her hair whorled at the crown, at the cluster of freckles that lay spattered beneath her hairline.

"What do you mean?" He scarcely dared to breathe, as if this sweet embrace would be torn away from him forever. She sighed heavily, as if in distress.

"I wanted to choose you. You were just so horrible that I chose Raoul out of spite, like the child that I am. But he does not make me happy. I love him, I do. Just not as deeply as I ought to."

"These are not the feelings you ought to be having towards a man who you're about to marry." He said sagely, breathing in her lavender scent so that it grew imbedded in his mind.

"I don't want to marry him." She whispered timidly, before breaking away from the embrace.

"Don't be silly Christine. He is a wealthy man of a high borne position that can look after you well. It-" he was suddenly cut off by the quick, sweet pressure of lips against his, the heat they brought searing him to the bone. It was over before it began.

"I love you." She whispered vehemently, clutching at the lapels of his jacket. It was Erik who initiated the kiss this time, claiming her lips for his own as his hands roamed up her body to her hair which he grabbed gently in fistfuls. In response, she slid her hands under the folds of his jacket so that they snaked up his back to his nape where her touch burned the very spot it explored. The kiss was deepened, lips slick as their mouths opened and tongues explored crevices they hadn't done before. She withdrew her hands so she could unfasten the first few buttons of his shirt, she needed to touch him, to feel him. He responded by pressing her against wall next to the fireplace, his hand roaming down to the nape of neck before it drifted further and cupped her breast, her heartbeat thundering away under neath silk and the whalebone of her corset. At this contact, she gasped in his mouth, from the sudden pleasure that washed over her. It was this gasp that reminded Erik of why he was here in the first place and stumbled away in dismay.

"Christine, no. This isn't right. You are deluded, you cannot possibly love me."

"But-"

"No. I am moving to America, Christine, far away so that you and Raoul have a chance at a normal life. He is the man you deserve. You must stop this childish fantasy and grow up."

"Why won't you let me make my own decisions?!" She cried, balling her small hands into fists from frustration.

"Because they are that of a child!" He shouted fiercely. A silent tension cast the room as he fumbled with the buttons on his shirt. "I cannot let you go through with this delusion. Marry Raoul, for your sake or mine."

"You can't go!" She sobbed, reaching for him but he backed away and held up a placating hand.

"I can and I will. Christine, I am poison and am no good to anyone, especially you. You do not deserve someone as lowly as me. I only bring you pain."

"A pain I can suffer-"

"Stop. Just... Stop." He rested his hand on the door handle and sighed, casting his forlorn gaze to the floor so she would not see. "Marry Raoul. It is the best choice for you. Forget me. Let your wounds heal. Please... Just forget me." Her response was to cry swollen tears that seemed to thud against the parquet floor beneath her. She listened to the door click open but did not hear him step into the hallway.

"Christine...?" She glanced up in a hope that was too wretched to bear.

"Yes?" He looked over his shoulder, studying the coloured samples that lay like horrid reminders of the event soon to come.

"I'd chose red. It's the same colour of the roses I used to get you and it compliments your beauty. It always has done." Then the door clicked shut and she was left alone in the room staring at the samples in hatred. In her frustration, she picked the book up and hurled it against the wall opposite her, before her legs gave way and she crumpled against the sofa in a grief so suffocating that she cried like she had when her father passed away. Meanwhile, in the hallway, Erik gulped down great breaths as his mind screamed and his heart cried. Anna appeared, alarmed by the crying and looked at him in explanation he chose not to give. As he shouldered on his cloak, he told Anna of their travel plans.

"Nadir and I will be leaving on the 17th of February. He has purchased tickets for you and Meg, should you wish to come, for the 3rd of March. Darius will accompany you." She nodded but could not help glancing at the parlour room door where Christine's cries thickened the air they breathed with grief. "See to her. She is delusional." He croaked, raking back his hair in exasperation before making for the door.

"Erik... What if I choose not to come? What if I never see you again?"

"You will come. There is nothing left for you here in Paris. I will see you soon Annie." Before she could even utter her response, he had gone, vanished into the dark Parisian streets. Sighing, she closed the door behind him and attended to her ward.

Erik arrived at Nadir's apartment with a slam of the door and an anguished cry as he removed his cloak and let it fall at his feet. Nadir appeared concerned in the hallway, his half moon glasses slipping down his nose and he peered at Erik out of them.

"Goodness me, whatever is the matter? You look like you're going to be sick." Erik tightened his lips together before stringing out a half hearted comment.

"I am fine."

"You don't look it." Nadir scoffed, not used to this new bewildered fashion his friend had chosen to take on.

"The sooner we get to America, the better." Erik snapped, before pacing to his room and slammed the door shut. Nadir eyed after him, before glancing at the crumpled fabric that lay at his feet. Sighing, he picked it up, noticing a note had been left in the inner breast pocket of his cloak. He picked at the corner in interest, slipping it up to see that his name had been deftly written in fine black calligraphy, probably from Anna's hand. He pocketed the note into his own and hung the cloak up, looking back down the hallway before sighing and decided it was best to leave his friend alone. He was right to do so, as Erik was pacing the already worn floor beneath him, not sure if he wanted to lash out in anger or cry in despair. He needed darkness and so he went across to closet that was large enough for him to crouch in and sat in there. Truly alone, he grasped his head in his hands and that was when an awful trembling set over his body. It didn't take long to subside but when it did, he did something that he hadn't done since he was a child, and cried.