"Christine-"
Christine.
"A good ballerina is one who is attentive." Madame Giry scolded, her cold eyes staring at Christine as she stared blindly off into the auditorium.
Christine's eyes shot wide as she turned to see who it was who had been talking to her. From the look on Madame Giry's face she figured she had done something wrong. "I'm, I'm sorry." She bowed her head apologetically. "I am not myself this morning."
"I have noticed. Come. We're practicing our balancé moves. If you would care to join us." Madame Giry clapped her hands together, beckoning the brunette girl back.
Christine shook her head. How could the Phantom be there inside her mind? When Madame Giry had spoken her name, she had heard his voice flood her mind and soul with a sweet melody that was her name sung by his seductive voice. He was always there inside her mind.
Even now, she knew he was there. Somewhere. Watching.
"Christine, must I send you back to the dormitories?" Madame Giry gritted, "You are being a very inattentive student today. I am not wasting my breath any longer. Pay attention or be punished."
"I'm sorry." Christine breathed, feeling her cheeks heat with a blush as the eyes of the ballet company fell on her. She didn't mind having the Phantom, Erik's concealed gaze on her but a stage full of people was unbearable. "I'm not meaning to disruptive."
"Once more and you will be removed from the stage." Madame Giry shouted, motioning for her to begin the waltz step.
Christine moved in accord with the rest of the girls, but her eyes never stopped searching the corners of the auditorium. She knew he was somewhere up there.
There! In Box Five. She knew she had seen the swish of his black cape. Perhaps, even the flicker of a flame against his stark white mask.
Christine.
"Christine!" Madame Giry was suddenly standing before her. "I am sorry, but you must go to the dormitories for the remainder of the morning. Perhaps by then you will learn to concentrate on the task at hand instead of letting yourself be caught in some sort of daydream. Go now and cease this waste of space."
Christine bit her lip, nodding shyly. "I'm sorry Madame Giry." What was wrong with her? Why could she not focus on dance? It wasn't that hard.
She didn't want to go back to the dormitories, they were empty and boring and unbearably stuffy. Instead, she felt that it was due time to visit the chapel. She needed time to talk to her father. Perhaps he would give her some divine answer to the thousands of questions buzzing around her mind. Why did she feel this way? It was an all consuming dizzying and mind numbing feeling that was overwhelming her. Her veins were coursing with the thought of the passion that swept through her at the touch of her lips to Erik's.
With the graceful steps of a ballerina Christine descended the stairs down towards the chapel, humming softly the song that she had spent a good portion of the morning trying to perfect with her tutor. Was her father proud of where she was now?
Christine lit a candle, moving towards the half melted candle in front of her father's image. She lit the candle, kneeling before the image and blowing out the other candle. "Father, forgive me for I have sinned." Christine sat quietly, mulling over the thoughts that swam around her mind. "I am engaged to that boy, you remember him I'm sure. Raoul de Chagny, a Vicomte. You taught him violin, but he was rather untrainable. I believe you said he didn't have the temper for music. It's not official. There's not even a ring yet. But he's made it well known already."
Christine sighed, stroking her finger along her lower lip. "But then, there's him. My angel of music. The angel you swore you'd send to me as you lay on your death bed. I know that in the Bible the angel of music was Lucifer, the devil himself. He was banished because of his desires to be above God. To a lake of fire. And father, my angel of music has a lake in his lair. Not of fire, but of crystalline water. But he's not like the Devil. His face." Christine covered her face at the thought of when she had uncovered it. "He wears a mask that conceals some sort of horrible scaring. Perhaps from fire, or acid-"
"Or birth."
Christine leapt to her feet, whirling around so fast that her skirts brushed against the candle and causing it to tumble to the ground, setting the edge of her skirt on fire. In a nervous haste she started to pat out the fire with her pale hands, hissing in pain as the fire licked her smooth skin.
"You were listening!" Christine shouted in a hushed voice, staring at the masked man she had just been speaking of.
"I am always listening." Erik laughed, "You do not think that I am the angel of music?"
"Not Lucifer at least."
"But perhaps a friend of his?"
Christine wilted slightly, nursing her burned skin by suckling it with her lips. "You say then, that you are an ally of Satan?"
"I was known as the Devil's Child for the longest part of my life."
Christine's eyes opened wide, "What sort of person would call you that?"
"More people than I'm sure you could imagine," Erik replied coldly. It had been nearly two decades since his last encounter with a gypsy man, a whip, and a vicious crowd – but the agony of it all still felt fresh.
"But why," Christine asked, stepping towards him as she looked at the red welt on her hand.
"Let me see it," Erik breathed tightly, reaching out for her petite hand and holding it gently in his black leather clad hand. "I am sure you remember the scars of my hands."
"Yes."
"There are many more that match those. A constant reminder, on nearly every inch of my body, of what I am."
"What are you?" Christine asked with a sigh as he brought her hand to his lips and kissed the angry sore. It did not take any pain away, or magically heal the wound, but his cool lips against it flooded her senses.
"I am a creature of how I was raised." Erik replied, letting the seductive tones of his voice envelop her. "I am nothing like your beautiful fop. This Phantom is as wicked inside as the wickedness of my 'horrible' face."
"I didn't mean it." Christine's eyes flew open. When had she got so close to him? His white mask was hardly a breath away from her own face. "It was the only way to explain it."
"I know I am horrible," He inched his face closer. "I know that my face, my body, my mind, everything that is mine is horrible. Except-" He jerked her closer, his hands finding their seats on the swell of her hips. "For you."
"I.. I am. Are you saying?" Christine gulped, resting her hands on his chest as he pulled her flush to him.
"Yes." Erik smiled cruelly, "You are mine."
Christine felt light headed as she stared into his mix matched eyes. He didn't feel like he was only in front of her, unbearably close to her. But he felt as though he was inside her mind. She could feel him possess every corner of her being. Her eyes fell close as she melted into his sturdy arms. He was like stone against her pliable body.
"I am yours?"
The inflection on the end, the question, tore a hole inside Erik's heart. Of course she was his. Wasn't he the one who taught her voice to sing, her heart to swore, her eyes to see?
Her eyes flew open as she stared into his eyes, "I can see it."
"See what?"
"The beauty underneath." Without a second to spare she ripped the mask away from his face in a blur of movement.
