Chapter 53

The wounds beneath my mask became increasingly raw and uncomfortable as the heat and humidity continued for another two weeks in Paris. The house stayed sweltering hot late into the night despite every window and the back door staying open late into the evening. With no breeze and little relief, I resorted to staying on the main level to compose and play the violin rather than stay locked in my room.

"Why don't you have Alex stay with Meg until the heat passes?" Madeline suggested as she fanned herself in the doorway between the kitchen and dining room. "Her room is much cooler than the rest of the house."

I was in the middle of composing when she decided to interrupt me. Pen in hand hovering over a crumpled paper Alex had grabbed from the table earlier in the night, I sucked on the inside of my cheek and looked at her from over my shoulder.

"You have impeccable timing. Truly," I muttered.

"Mother," Meg warned.

Meg stood behind her mother, timid and almost out of sight as always. I imagined she had come up with the idea for Alex to stay with her for his comfort, but naturally she would not ask me directly.

"I did not realize I interrupted your work. I apologize," Madeline replied blandly.

I sighed and looked at Alex, who was seated on my lap in nothing but a diaper and a damp kitchen rag draped over his legs, which he sucked on. He was as miserable as the rest of us, and despite his limited vocabulary, he made certain to voice his displeasure by refusing his toys, his food, being held and being placed on the floor.

Exhausted from his protests, he had finally decided to sit on my lap and chew on the towel as it seemed he was teething yet again.

"Where will he sleep? The floor?" I asked.

In all truth I had never stepped foot in Meg's room, so I had no idea what it contained.

"His bassinet," Madeline replied as if this were common knowledge. "We have already set it up for him."

Why they bothered asking me anything at all I had no idea seeing as how the two of them had already made plans.

Meg stepped forward, and the moment she came into Alexandre's line of sight, he lifted his head, dropped the towel, and reached for her. They both smiled at one another, and I looked on as Meg took him from me. Alex immediately put his arms around her neck and kissed her on the cheek.

"Mwah!" he said.

Meg kissed him back and repeated what he said, which made him wave his arms in delight.

"You are so warm," Meg commented as she pulled him away from her body and held him out.

"Chaaaaaaaud," he groaned. He had learned to say hot from Madeline and had made certain to say it repeatedly for the last three days in such frequency that I had almost considered writing it into my opera.

"Yes, yes," Meg said with a laugh. "Very hot these last few days. You are the smartest little boy I know."

I highly doubted she knew any others, but I held my tongue. As if she knew my thoughts, Madeline lifted a brow and glared at me.

"How about a bath and a story before bedtime?" Meg asked as Alex pinched her lips shut while she spoke and giggled to himself. "You will feel much cooler after a bath, don't you think?"

Alexandre gave an exaggerated nod in agreement and nearly headbutted Meg, but she didn't seem to notice and kissed him on the lips. He grabbed hold of her ears and rubbed his face against hers, which made the two of them laugh. Their brief time together was truly the most animated I had seen Alex since the start of the day. I assumed he grew tired of listening to the same melodies repeatedly for hours on end as I worked on finishing new symphonies and an opera.

The work of a composer was not entertaining for a nine month old boy, and as much as I needed to finish my work, I had no desire to neglect my son. Music went ignored while my focus remained on his needs.

Meg turned to me briefly, her eyes meeting mine for a half a second before her gaze was drawn to my neck. Without a word, she turned and left with Alex, telling him what story they would read and how they were going to have a wonderful time together.

Despite our limited interactions, I was glad Alex had Meg to entertain him for part of the day. It became somewhat of a routine for Meg to bring lunch up to my room in the afternoon, leave a tray of food in exchange for my son. While I focused on composing, she kept him downstairs and out of trouble, then returned him two hours later when he fell asleep, thereby giving me another hour to write music.

Meg rarely spoke to me directly, but she made certain to tell Alex precisely what she had planned for him and said it loud enough for me to hear.

"You are bleeding," Madeline said under her breath once we were alone in the dining room. She had filled a pitcher of water in the kitchen, which she brought to the table and placed between us.

I made no reply, but realized that was probably what Meg had noticed on my neck before she left with Alex. Instinctively I brought my hand to my neck and examined the bloodstains on my fingertips.

The wounds had bled for days, and when I had removed my mask the previous evening to evaluate the extent of the injuries, blood and sweat had created a painful suction against my flesh. I had almost regretted removing the damned thing given how my flesh burned.

"Here," Madeline said as she placed a damp rag in front of me.

I looked from the rag to her. "I will take care of it later."

"No, you will not."

The audacity of that woman never ceased to amaze me. "I do beg your pardon, Madame Giry?"

She stared back at me unblinking. The heat fueled my already surly nature and I knew Madeline was not about to back down now that I had addressed her by her married name. She had never liked when I spoke formally to her, which I was well aware. However, if she wished to continue hounding me while I attempted to finish my compositions, then so be it.

"Since you failed to hear me the first time I spoke, I will repeat myself for your sake." She made certain to enunciate each word with razor sharp precision, her cadence slow and tone tight. "I said no, you will not take care of it later. You will wait for days on end and allow the wounds to fester until it poisons your blood and kills you, leaving Alexandre an orphan."

Her words left me speechless as I realized how much thought she had put into the scenario she had created in her mind. For as long as I had known her, she had been one to exaggerate and make situations more dire than necessary.

"Your son is not in the room," she added.

I swallowed and looked away from her. "And yet I am not alone."

Her breathing turned more harsh as frustration set in. She grabbed the rag and threw it onto the table with enough force for me to feel the splatter of water against the back of my hand.

Our eyes met, hers filled with rage that slowly turned apologetic as I looked back at her in astonishment. "Erik," she pleaded.

I stood abruptly, snatched the rag from the table, and stormed out of the dining room, away from the one person who had meant more to me than anyone else for years. My pace slowed, my footsteps weighed down by remorse, and before I reached the end of the hall I turned and saw Madeline trailing behind me. I paused, staring at her from over my shoulder before I opened the pocket door and walked into the water closet. The door I left open as an unspoken invite.

For a long moment I stood in front of the oval mirror, a mixture of blood and sweat staining my jaw, neck, and partially unbuttoned lawn shirt. As expected, Madeline followed me and stood in the doorway with her hands in fists and a troubled look on her face.

"You do know for many years people of all ages paid an admission to see what is beneath this mask?" I asked without turning to acknowledge her.

"It was a hood," Madeline replied. "A filthy, tattered sack with eye holes gauged out a slit in the fabric for a mouth. It was covered in so much blood and dirt I had no idea how you could possibly ever want to wear such a thing, but you asked for me to return it several times. And do you know what? The moment I took it from you, I had no intention of ever giving it back."

Her words elicited a spike of anger hotter than the damned house. My nostrils flared, my jaw clenched. I glared at her reflection as she remained in the doorway, defiant and stern and exactly as I remembered her from long ago, when I had stopped being a fearful child and turned hot-headed and arrogant. The longer she dared to look at me, the more my anger turned to shame.

While Madeline looked on, I turned my face for a better look in the mirror and dabbed at my neck and jaw. The damp, cool cloth allowed me a small sense of relief from the heat. I took my time and cleared away the blood and perspiration on my flesh slowly, the mask still intact as I waited for Madeline to finally turn away and walk out.

I knew the wounds were much worse than she could have ever remembered given how many days on end I had kept my mask in place.

Beneath my right eye the injury had started to weep and my skin was bright red in spots and oozed yellow with the start of an infection. With the passing of another day I suspected it now looked considerably worse.

"How much did you pay to enter the fair?" I asked, my tone acidic.

Madeline came up beside me, her eyes hardened and lips taut. "In all honesty I do not recall the price of admission into the fair, but I do know we were promised the most evil of creatures at the very end of the exhibit."

I suppressed a shiver at her words. At the age of thirteen, I had been called many names, each one like a heavy lock on an invisible chain wrapped around me. Bruises, cuts, and broken fingers and ribs healed, but the weight of cruel words and humiliating acts weighed heavily upon me, never far from my thoughts.

"Garrot was going to beat the evil out of you."

"Garouche," I corrected. His image still haunted me from his small, cruel eyes to his wild beard and the thick carpet of hair covering his exposed arms, chest, and the back of his neck. He looked like a man who could turn into a werewolf at the full moon and who acted more like a savage beast than a gentleman every night of the month.

"But there was no evil to beat out. There was sadness and fear, but there was no evil in that boy I saw in the cage."

There had been evil in the man standing before her, I wanted to say, but the words refused to form on my tongue purely out of shame and regret. There was frustration and anger as well-there had always been anger-and hopelessness from being treated as more of a thing than a human being. The evilness I felt in my thoughts, the hopelessness and the anger were all laced together with the understanding that no matter what I did, I was tethered to the same fate.

"I will clean the wounds," Madeline said firmly. She spoke as though this had already been decided.

"You will do no such thing," I said beneath my trembling breath.

"Then I will make certain you do not miss a spot while you do it yourself."

"Why such macabre interest, Madame?"

She turned her head to the side. "Do you honestly think that is why I am standing here? Out of some perverse enjoyment?"

I looked away first, blinking away the sweat dripping into my eyes. The right side of my face throbbed, my jaw clenched as though somehow pain would combat pain. The heat made me lightheaded throughout the day and now my stomach had started to churn.

Without a word I unbuttoned my stained shirt nearly halfway down and rolled up my sleeves, revealing forearms slick with the sheen of sweat. My actions were little more than stalling as I waited for Madeline to curse me under her breath and stalk away.

Instead she remained valiantly behind me, her eyes impatiently trained on my reflection as I stood with my knuckles against the wooden sink top and my head spinning. Years had passed since I had truly suffered physical pain, and the last of the brutality I had endured was the worst I had ever known. Thankfully this was not nearly to that level of pain, but blood stains always reminded me of the palace in the desert.

Madeline had seen the aftermath of such unimaginable suffering. I had very little recollection of how I made my way from Persia back to Paris save that I had laid very still in the false bottom of a boat. The space was barely big enough for my chest to rise and fall with each shallow breath keeping me alive. How many days passed without food or water I had no idea, but somehow I survived, returned to Paris, and used the last of my strength to crawl into her apartment after a three year absence from the Opera House.

Nothing would make her turn away from me, I realized. Teeth gritted, I met her eye in the mirror and pulled at the bottom corner of my mask.

I sucked in a breath past my teeth and felt my stomach churn as my flesh stuck to the leather. The sensation nauseated me, the stream of blood down my neck much more prominent now that wounds were being opened.

Madeline stepped to my side with the rag in hand and placed it against my jaw. Immediately the cool, damp sensation againstered fevered flesh made me shiver, and I grabbed hold of Madeline by her thin wrist in silent warning not to proceed.

Time lapsed, my hardened gaze trained on her softer, pleading eyes. My grasp on her wrist lacked any pressure and she could have easily pulled away from me, but she remained quite still.

She had never dared challenged me in this manner before, at least not in our adult lives, and as much as I wanted to unleash the beast everyone knew I possessed inside, I could not move. She knew full well I would not physically hurt her. After a lifetime of brutality I refused to raise a hand to any woman and certainly no child.

Madeline slowly reached for my arm with her free hand and pulled my loosely held fingers away from her wrist. She focused on my neck and jaw, swallowing hard as she pulled the rag across my skin and worked her way up to the bloodied edge of my mask. With her index finger beneath the rag, she slipped the damp cloth between my mask and damaged skin until I turned my head to the side and grimaced.

I noticed her breaths quickened, her features more taut as she weighed her options. My stomach knotted with dread; equal parts divided between her reaction if she dared to remove the mask and if she stopped and walked away from me, sickened by the notion of what was hidden beneath.

"It is worse than you could imagine," I warned. It was worse than I had imagined.

She nodded but remained undeterred by my words. "The skin needs to breathe,"she said as though reminding herself why she was beside me.

"Give me the rag," I demanded.

Madeline rinsed and wrung out the rag before doing as I requested. I draped it over my outstretched right hand, turned away from her, and proceeded to pull off my mask in one swift motion.

But it was not as swift as I desired and instead I peeled off the covering and felt every excruciating tug against angry flesh. My back straightened and I cursed louder than I intended.

Once I had the mask removed, I placed the cool rag against my face and shivered, hoping the pain would lessen at last.

Madeline dutifully took the mask from me and ran it under the water. She looked at me from the corner of her eye as she scrubbed the underside with soap but did not say a word until she patted the covering dry and set it on the sink top.

"The neighbors seem... nice," Madeline said suddenly.

Her words came so unexpectedly that at first I merely stared at her.

"They seem incessantly loud," I said at last.

I had heard the man for the last four days shouting for supper, his newspaper, and whatever else he desired. The woman, however, was silent and unseen. I only assumed she was within the house because her husband ordered her to silence their child any time the baby made the slightest noise.

The brackish pig of a man had no idea his voice carried or didn't care if anyone heard him cursing and yelling over every damned thing. If he so much as complained about Alexandre playing with his toys or squealing when Meg entered the room, he would regret his actions. I would not tolerate him telling my son to shut his mouth.

"The music you have been working on today is beautiful," Madeline said as she tried again to make conversation.

I know, I wanted to say to her. I had played it over and over both in my head and on the violin at the dining room table with Alex at my feet playing or asleep on the cool dining room floor.

"Thank you," I mumbled as I turned awkwardly away from her.

"I am glad you are composing," she continued.

I was not sure why she insisted on speaking, and given how my face throbbed even with the mask removed I had no desire to entertain her a moment longer.

"Alex certainly enjoys listening to you play," Madeline added. "I suppose it should be expected that he has music in his veins."

"Surely you feel the need to say another word," I snapped.

Madeline's gaze never made it to mine. Wide-eyed, she looked briefly at my outstretched hand holding the rag to my face before she stared at my chest. Rather than frustration or anger, she appeared more hurt and disappointed. Lips pursed, she turned away and busied herself by straightening the towels on the hooks.

"I apologize for my temper," I whispered. I took a shuddering breath as my flesh continued to throb and my skull felt as though a hammer repeatedly struck my temples.

From down the hall I heard Meg singing to Alex as he splashed in the water and repeated the sounds she made. The two of them together sounded delighted by their antics, and from the corner of my eye I caught Madeline listening as well. She smiled to herself and crossed her arms, the fingers of her right hand tapping her left forearm along to the melody.

I doubted she would continue speaking and I was fairly surprised she remained near me at all given my belligerent tone.

"The mask is off," I said quietly. "You have no need to stay a moment longer."

Madeline pulled another rag and two small bottles from the cabinet where towels and soap were stored and placed them on the sink top. She paused beside me, her gaze searching my face as I stared at my reflection.

To my surprise, she opened one of the bottles and placed the rag over the opening before turning the bottle upside down and giving the bottle a hearty shake.

"Removing the mask is not enough," she said. "If the wounds are bleeding that badly then you most certainly need to keep them clean and allow your skin to thoroughly dry."

Her tone was quite firm despite the hesitation behind her eyes. She held out her hand, presumably for the towel I held against my face. Once I hesitated, she shifted her weight impatiently.

"Erik-"

"I do not need your assistance nor do I desire an audience."

I saw her swallow hard and clench her jaw. Her quiet, persistent demeanor changed and her shoulders dropped, the movement of her hands more choppy than graceful as she returned the cap to the bottle she had opened, folded the rag and placed it on the sink top, and wiped her hands on her skirts. She took several steps away from me, but paused as she reached the door and remained a moment longer.

She turned slowly toward me, flexing her hands in nervous fashion. The movement of her fingers closing and extending once more gave me pause and reminded me of how my father often walked down the cellar stairs, opening and closing his hand with each step in anticipation of doing me great harm.

I stood transfixed as Madeline came toward me again, my heart beating wildly as memories flooded my mind. She reached up as though she would snatch the towel from my grasp, but paused and shook her head when I bunched my shoulders and turned away. The tips of her fingers lightly brushed against my shoulder before she stepped back.

For a long moment she regarded me, and even with my face sufficiently hidden from her view, I felt exposed.

"You are not a sideshow attraction to me. You never were. One day, Erik, I do hope you forgive me for whatever I did that made you push me away." Her eyes filled with tears but she refused to lower her gaze. "I sincerely miss you and I remain hopeful I will know you again as I once did. If not for my sake, I hope you will be that person for Alexandre."

Well before her words fully registered in my mind, she linked her fingers together, inhaled sharply, and walked through the doorway without looking back.

"Mad…" I started to say, but my breath was wasted as she did not acknowledge me.

The rag I held against my face slipped from my grasp and landed at my feet. I looked from the rag to the doorway and heard Madeline's bedroom door open and quickly shut followed by the turn of the lock.

Frustrated with myself and still in a great deal of pain, I leaned against the wall, closed my eyes, and ran her words through my head. She did not need my forgiveness as she was not the one at fault. In the twenty-two years I had known her, there was not a single moment I could recall in which she had purposely harmed me. I, on the other hand, had stumbled time and again with the unfamiliarity of friendship.

In the two decades we had known one another, I still struggled to comprehend how she could tolerate my appearance. I suppose in her eyes, the ugliness was never on the surface.

Madeline had no idea how desperately I wanted to be a better person for my son, how I wished I could pull the nightmares and images out of my mind, place them into a bottle, and screw a lid on tight to keep them sealed forever.

She had always attempted to guide me away from my miserable thoughts, always bright and attentive when she paid me a visit and constantly praising my work even when I did not finish a composition.

I considered her words again and thought of how she had said she sincerely missed who I had been. Deep inside, I missed her as well. Whereas she was a dreamer, I was grounded by my cynicism. There would be no turning back, not after all the years that had passed.

Meg stopped singing for a moment and Alex no longer splashed or squealed. Silence stretched through the house and I held my breath as I pulled my gaze from the hallway to the mirror and briefly examined the wounds.

Faintly I heard a baby crying and the man who had moved into the house behind us yell, and his voice startled me.I realized the reason for the silence was most likely that boorish fool and not Madeline returning to her room.

"Julia, damn it! All your daughter ever does is cry! Take her away at once and give me a moment of peace in my own house," he grumbled.

As usual his wife made no reply. The sound of the crying infant grew louder, Meg began to sing-this time quietly-and Alex also seemed to keep his voice hushed after the neighbor's outburst.

I grabbed the fresh rag Madeline had taken from the cabinet and noticed the smell of clove and oregano before I pressed it to my cheek and cleansed the open wounds until the blood was washed away and the skin beneath it could dry.

"You will be just fine," I heard a woman say. She sounded nearby, and as I turned my head to the side I realized the mother of the infant had stepped into her back garden. Rag in hand, I turned toward the small window behind me and listened for a moment. "One day, Lissy, everything will be fine."