Bittersweet Chapter 21

Erik's PoV

After Christine has left, I take a deep sigh and close my eyes. I feel numb. After a life of rejection and pain, after all the endless longing for my ex-student, I had yearned for the bliss of numbness.

Now, I miss the pain. I've known pain for all my life and I'm used to it like a cripple is used to not being able to walk. This numbness, not feeling anything anymore, scares me.

Suddenly I grow angry.

I've had enough of the pain.

I've had enough of the rejection.

I've had enough of still loving Christine until my dying day even though even she couldn't look past my poor excuse for a face.

After all these years I've been there for her…

I've had enough of my broken heart.

I walk to the mirror I once stole from the prop room, rip my mask off and stare at my own, monstrous reflection.

I may have had enough the pain and heartbreak but that's all I deserve isn't it? All I can ever wish for is this! It would be foolish to hope for more!

My scream, echoes though my lair and sounds foreign, even to me.

"CHRISTINE!"

Celia's PoV

I follow Meg as she runs to my room. However, before we reach it, we bump into Christine and I feel guilty for immediately assuming the worst about Erik and him kidnapping the young ex-soprano again.

That's not exactly how you should think about a friend, isn't it?

That's when we look at her and see she's trying not to cry.

"Oh my goodness, Christine, what happened?" Meg asks frantically.

Christine shakes her head.

"Nothing has happened, Meg. It's just….No one feels good about themselves when you realize you've treated someone more cruelly than you ever though you could."

She walks past us to Antoinette and hugs her. Meg, Antoinette and I look at each other, our worry prominent in our features.

After Antoinette has dragged Christine away, I run to my room. As I stand in front of the mirror that hides the pathway to Erik's lair, I realize I hesitate. After all, Erik's temper is legendary and thanks to Christine, his reaction to seeing me in his lair, is quite unpredictable. Plus, if he's really upset (and he probably is), he might take off his mask to wipe his tears away. If I accidently spot him with his deformity bared, I know he'll never forgive me, no matter what my reaction to his face is.

Then again, he needs someone to be there for him, now more than ever.

I push my doubts aside and walk to his lair.

I'm nearly there when I hear him.

"CHRISTINE!"

His voice sounds so distorted it almost sounds inhuman and I back away. I've never truly have been frightened of him, or at least, he could never frighten me as much as he could frighten the rest of the world, until now.

Alright, what should I do? I can't just leave him alone when he's like this but I'm not sure if he would appreciate some company now.

I decide to write him a note and deliver it to him by folding it into a paper plane and throwing it in the general direction of his lair. That way I can still let him know that if he want a shoulder to cry on, he can come to me, without disturbing his privacy.

Two hours later, there's still no sign of Erik. I walk through the stone tunnel to his lair again and listen.

It's silent. Too silent.

He's not even playing his organ.

Worried, I walk back to my room, not really knowing what to do. I grab a book and try to read but after realizing I've been staring at the same sentence for ten minutes, I give up.

I've had enough of doing nothing but waiting.

I stand up and walk to his underground home for the third time in 2 hours.

That's when I see him standing in the pathway, the note I wrote to him crumpled in his hand. He looks hesitant, indecisive, part of him wanting to run back to the safety of his lair.

He freezes when he sees me. He looks haggard, his black hair messy instead of neatly combed back, his white shirt wrinkled. I know Erik always makes sure he's dressed to perfection, so to see him like this, shocks me. That, combined with the fact that he hasn't even played his music, makes me grab his hand and drag him along with me.

He needs someone now.

Back in his lair, I wait patiently until he speaks. His silence unnerves me.

"What do you want?"

"Just to make sure you're alright."

Silence.

"Why do you care?" he asks me softly, his voice bitter.

Then, louder…."I could kill you in a heartbeat! I'm a monster!"

"I know you won't kill me, Erik, or do other unspeakable things to me. After all, if you truly were a monster, you would have attacked me the moment we first met.

Despite everything, you're not an evil man, Erik. Do you honestly think I would have offered you my friendship if I had truly believed everything ignorant men and women have said about you? Ever since you were an infant? As for your crimes, as long you don't commit them again, I will not judge for it. After the kind of life you've had, I feel like judging you isn't a woman's, nor a man's, task. I've told you this be…''

That's when I see the hand that isn't holding my crumpled note. It's wounded, covered with deep , bloody gashes. He's been physically hurt all this time, leaving a bloody trail all over his lair and I didn't even see it! His lair is incredibly messy too, like a whirlwind has passed through it and I doubt I truly want to know what caused it.

"Oh Erik, what happened? Let me bind it for you! Where do you keep the first aid box?"

My obvious worry and care for his wellbeing, seems to trigger something in Erik and even though he turns himself away from me, probably for dignity's sake, I know he is breaking down and crying. The sight of the lonely, misunderstood man in front of me, tugs on my heartstrings and before I know it, I'm holding him while he cries on my shoulder.

He reminds me now more of a rejected child, wondering why his own mother won't hug him, than the strong, aloof, intimidating man he grew up to be. It's suddenly very hard to remember that this man is wanted by the gendarmerie for murder. I wonder what caused him to commit the crime. Fear of chased at, get caught and being locked up because of his face again? Anger of being mentioned as a monster, his shameful disfigurement even more exaggerated to scare the ballet rats? Did they bother Christine, stare at her chest, like they do at mine? Probably a combination of all three.

One might say it's taking an easy way out to not judge him for his past crimes but if they saw Erik now, crying because someone cared whether he was alive or dead, I'm sure even the best human judge on the earth would leave this task up to God. And I'm not even religious.

Plus, the world's judgment is one of the main reasons Erik ended up the way he is, so look where judging brings you.

I look at him as I stroke his back as a way a mother would calm her son. Goodness knows his own mother never did this.

That's when Erik suddenly realizes what he's doing and looks at me. He's blushing. After all, it's highly inappropriate to sob into a lady's shoulder while holding her close. On the other hand, I don't care. It's not like society had ever been appropriate to him and it's not like he's currently holding me as a way of seduction, anyway. He just needs someone to care.

He opens his mouth to apologies but I shake my head with a small smile.

We let go of each other and he sits down on his couch with a sigh.

"You were right. You were right about…about her." It's obvious this admission causes him great pain and I wait for him to continue."

"She said she still misses me. I wonder if she'll ever truly choose. If she ever has the strength to say no to either one of us. If I hadn't forced her, she'd still be happy giving both me and him false hope, to naïve to realize how much it hurts both of us. "

He pauses.

"She only made a choice because we told her too and because he voiced his words more carefully, less intimidating, she choose him. The only thing she truly wants is to have both of us in her life and even if we would have agreed to that, she wouldn't have had the strength to make sure both of us ARE in her life. "

"What did she say to you?" I ask softly.

"She asked if we could be friends. Don't get me wrong, I would go to the depths of hell if she told me too but us having tea in the Chagney mansion, her foolish boy watching us like a hawk?"

He sighs. "She's naïve and I fear I'm partially to blame, just like her father, Antoinette and the vicompte. After all, we all tried keep the whole fantasy world Gustave Daae created for her alive after the man himself died. It's time for her to wake up now and that's something she has to do alone."

He shakes his head sadly.

"I love her Celia, more than I can even express in words but….

It's hopeless isn't it? You tried to warm me but I was foolish and I'm sorry for the way I behaved."

"It's alright Erik. You weren't foolish, you're in love. I know our situations aren't completely similar but I reacted the same way when my friends Victoria, Rosalinde, Angelique and even Berenger tried to convince me I had to stop hoping Stefano would leave Dominique and marry me."

"What are your feelings for Stefano now?"

I shrug. "I know I'll never be completely indifferent to him because I did love him deeply and he's still a good friend of mine but I know now, we would never be truly happy. But believe me, it took me a lot of time and tears to get to this point."

Erik nods before standing up.

"Do you want some wine? I wanted to open a bottle anyway."

"Yes, thank you."

He hesitates.

"How about making some music together? I think we could both use it to make ourselves feel better."

I smile, feeling flattered. After all, except for Christine, I'm the only one who'll ever make music with the infamous 'angel'.

"I love too, I'll go fetch my violin."