Chapter 10

Roxanne

"Alexander!" I called down the street of Phantasma. Meg was too far away for her to hear what I was trying to yell to the world and the rain that hit the pavement was muffling my desperate cries. "Alexander!"

The rain soaked me to the bone. My dress felt like I was carrying twenty pounds more on my back which weighted me down and it clung to my body making me drag it along. I had to walk quickly instead of run because it was too heavy for me to run. Each step I took seemed like I was dragging heavy chains or swimming through syrup or trying to run in a dream: I just couldn't do it. But I pressed on as best as I could. My muscles were sore and my heart was nearly leaping out of my chest as I gasped for cool air for my lungs. I was in so much pain from attempting to run in the rain in a heavy drenched dress that I thought my body would give out before I could find Alexander. I was so cold and so miserable.

Desperate tears burned and blurred my eyes and vision so that I was unable to see properly. The throbbing in my feet felt like they were being beaten with rocks which made it harder to keep going on. But I had to find my baby. He could have been kidnapped or lost or dead and I might have been too late to save him. I was panicking. I could barely stand properly because my knees are shaking. I was so mad at myself for not looking after him better.

Alexander where are you? I should have been paying more attention to him than trying to keep the Christine façade up. "Alexander! Alexander, where are you?"

He was nowhere to be seen. The streets were packed with people who looked at me funny as I ran past them in my party gown.

"Excuse me have you seen my son?" I asked a man who towered over me.

He brushed by me like I was air.

Thinking that it was strange for only a moment I went to a woman and asked her. "Have you seen a little boy about this tall?"

She ignored me also, walking past me like she didn't hear a thing.

"Please can you help me?" I asked a stout grumpy man who wobbled towards me. "My son, he's—"

But he acted the same as the first.

"Can anyone help me?!" I cried.

Desperately I ran to many people asking the same questions but not getting any answers. They ran past me, completely unaware of me or ran faster away. But no one answered me. They looked like they were in a daze that rendered them useless to hear me.

Then a cold wind blew in my ear. I stopped dead in my tracks and turned to find a brick building looming over that was hidden from any unnoticing passerby because the bright lights that should have been lighting the sign had gone dark. It looked like it was closed off to the public for that night. But there was blue lights peeking out from the black curtains that covered the widows. Picking up my skirt I walked slowly towards it. Carefully I walked up the cold hard stairs up to the door. When I placed my hand on the door knob I heard a scream.

I opened the door so fast that it slammed against the wall as I ran inside the dark rooms. As I stood in the door way only silence of the darkness greeted me. With each step I took the floor creaked with a terrible racket. It seemed like there was no one in there like it had been abandoned for some time now. But I heard a scream. I continued to call out to Alexander but I couldn't find him. I was praying that this wasn't some sort of haunted house attraction and the scream I heard wasn't my son. Maneuvering my way through the rooms someone ran head on into me. My eyes adjusted and I saw a small child crying into my stomach as his arms wrapped around my waist. It took me a minute to realize that that small frightened child was my little boy.

"It's alright darling. Oh shh... Don't be afraid." I cooed while I smoothed his hair. He whimpered and hugged me tighter. "It's me."

"It's horrible! Horrible!" He cried. "Please don't let him get me!"

"Who?"

"Save me!"

"Christine?" I turned around to find Meg in the doorway, out of breath and drenched in rain.

She only looked at me for a split second then turned her attention to the opposite end of the room. Out of the corner of my eye a dark figure was walking slowly towards us but stopped. I looked down at Alexander then to back up to one of the people who I could entrust my life to. "Can you please take Gustave back to the hotel for me?"

"But—" She looked at me then at Erik with a confused expression.

"Meg, please." I begged.

Meg nodded and she walked up to me to take Alexander's hand. "Come along Gustave."

"No." He resisted.

"Gustave." Erik whispered our son's name.

"Stay away." He came closer to us but Alexander screamed "Don't come near me."

"Please go with Miss Giry." I instructed Alexander.

"No! No! No!" He screamed. "I won't let that monster hurt you."

Erik shrank back in the darkness as he held his hand to his face.

My heart hurt at the sight of my son rejecting his father. For Erik it must have been like someone was slicing off his arm; that was probably the equivalent of what he felt. What could be more painful than to hear your child call you a monster and reject you with so much fear and anger? It must be unbearable.

And for Alexander to call him a monster felt like he was swearing. In my house hold we never used those words to insult other people that so when I heard him say it I went into Mama-disciplining-her-child mode. I stooped down and whispered in his ear "Alexander Gustave Destler, you leave with Miss Giry right now. Do you understand me?"

He glanced up at me and held the skirts of my dress tightly which turned his knuckles pale. He was petrified. He was so scared that his hands were shaking. He looked up at me one last time. His pupils almost filled the dark colored brown of his iris, tears were brimming his eyes making them turn red. I only wanted to hold him and shield him from all that is evil in the world but that wasn't what I did. I should have for his sake but I wasn't thinking about him; I was thinking about Erik.

I gestured to Meg. He shook his head to show that he didn't want to listen to me so I bent down t his level t talk to him. "It's alright. I'll be fine, I promise."

He looked still unsure but he did as I said. At last he scurried off toward her and out of the building as fast as he could.

Erik sighed as he slid down to sit against the wall, closed his eyes and covered them with his hands. Then there was a long silence that was left between Erik and I which made it awkward to do nothing. It was hard watching him in such a state. So I walked over to him, while looking down at him I saw how broken down he was. It was looking at a wounded soldier after he has been through hell and back after he had witnessed others dying in front of him. It looked like there was a black cloud of darkness that surrounded him. He was so beaten down that he couldn't hold his head up any longer. I have never seen him look so sad before.

Slowly I sat next to him and laid my head on his shoulders. "Penny for your thoughts."

"My son despises me."Erik said in despair. "He loathes me. He can't even look at me."

"Don't think like that."

"How can I not? He ran away from me when I showed him this." He gestured to his face.

"Erik for God's sake, he is a ten year old boy, a child. He doesn't know any better."

"But he should know. I thought that he could be able to handle it because he is my son but I was wrong."

"He doesn't know you're his father." I reasoned.

"I have done a lot of wrong in my life. There have been many mistakes through my years, ones that I regret. But Roxanne, being a father wasn't. In him, my wrongness is made right and yet he loathes me just the same." He confessed. "I thought that of all people he would accept me but that was only a foolish hope. No one can ever look at my face and love it."

"I have." I comforted. Sitting back up, I placed my hand on his arm.

"You grew to it over time." He shook his head and looked up at the ceiling. "My own flesh and blood and even he recoils in horror from me, just like his mother did."

I stayed silent. He was right. I had wanted to run away from him as far as I could s that I couldn't have to see that gruesome sight. It was true that back when I was young and foolish I wasn't able accept him. I couldn't respond to that or tell him that he was wrong or protest.

He looked at me and saw the sadness grow on my face which made him feel instantly guilty. "I'm sorry."

"No you are right. I did run and everyday it makes me sick to my stomach that I did. I wish I could have been able to show you the compassion that you needed but I didn't."

"But you have been the only one to accept me in my whole life."

"That's not true, Meg loves you."

"Meg has never seen my face." Erik admitted.

"What?! She has been in your care for how long and she has never seen your face?" I was stunned. I thought that after ten years in that time Erik would have revealed himself.

He chuckled. "I couldn't risk it. At the time she was all that I had in the world. I didn't want her to shun me in disgust or flee in fear. I always wanted her to see me as some sort of magical human being and not a monster."

It nearly brought tears to my eyes when his voice cracked when he called himself a monster. In my heart I knew that he was more than an ordinary man but in others' eyes they only saw his deformity. However I would have thought that Meg would be one of the few people who could be able to accept him but I had been recently proven wrong by my own son so I didn't know what t think anymore. "But for ten years, Erik."

"It wasn't that long of time to hide it from one person since I have had to hide it from the world all my life." Erik said in deep sorrow. He sat there for awhile looking out of the crack of the window. "Are we bad parents?"

"Speak for yourself, Mister I-have-never-showed-my-adoptive-daughter-my-face." I nudged him playfully but he didn't even blink. He only stared out into space with a painful expression. I sighed. "I don't think so."

"We couldn't teach him the values of what counts is one the inside or that beauty is skin deep. We couldn't even teach him 'don't judge a cove by the book'."

I stared at him confused then realized what he was saying and I shook my head. "You mean don't judge a book by its cover."

"You know what I mean."

"My mom always said that you always make mistakes with the first born." I offered. "She said that the second born usually where you learn from your previous mistakes that you had with the first."

"What if Ange will act the same?" Erik asked.

"She won't."

"I couldn't be able to live with myself if my daughter could never look at me again."

I shook my head. "You're her whole world; she would never do something like that."

"What if when we go back this time, and if we go back, I stay like this?" Erik snarled. "She will recoil in fear just like Alexander. My own children will look at me in disgust."

"Before we left to New York Alexander got into a fight at school." I looked at my hands as I told him. Erik stood up in a rage of anger and surprise.

"What?! When we get home he is in so much trouble."

"Don't worry I have already read him his rights." I joked.

"What happened?" Erik demanded.

"He got into a fight with two boys who were older than him because they were making fun of a girl who had a deformity." Standing up I touched his arm. "He didn't judge her instead he protected her from people who were hurting her. I think there is hope."

Erik sighed and shook his head as he held my hands. "I have learned to stop hoping a long time ago."

"But I haven't." I smiled. "He will be your saving grace."

Disclaimer: I don't own any Love Never Dies.

How could you think I wouldn't guess? How could you think I wouldn't know? Do you have something to confess? I want you to review right now if so!

I am glad that I finished this chapter. It has been a busy week for me and I sad t say this was not top priority. But I did manage to get this chapter up today so I am really happy. I tried to make this chapter less about Erik realizing about Alexander but more about reflecting on his parenting skills with Roxanne. I want to know what you thought of how I did this. Did it seem too short? Are Roxanne and Erik good parent?