Waking Up
His hand was warm. That snapped his consciousness into focus. Bright light reddened his eyelids, and his hand was warm. Erik opened his eyes to see her hand still covering his. The angel herself was curled on the blankets facing him, only inches away and sound asleep. He lay still, breathing in her nearness. He would not be the one to break this dream.
Soon she would be all he had in the world. From his prone position he could only survey parts of the basement. His refuge for so many years, he tried to imagine it empty of his meager belongings and full of rough construction workers, doing who knew what. They would drain his pond, find the source of moisture, and wall it off. They would upgrade the plumbing. Rip out old walls and floors and make everything new.
Erik tried to block that line of thought. It was foolish, even naïve, to have thought he would be here forever. The Khan would die someday; if this turn of events had never happened, he would still have found himself harborless (and without a human contact) then. But still. Still, he'd loved this place. Cared for it. Repaired it. Guarded it from harm. In return it had sheltered him and given him room for his music. And he could never have saved it. It would have been lost to him no matter what he had done. Now, at least it would be reinstated to its former glory and all he had to do was give it up and leave it in peace.
He pressed his face into the blankets, hiding from these ugly truths. The basement air was chill on his naked back, reminding him of all that had just passed. The compulsion to hide that repulsiveness before she woke rose and he beat it down. She had pushed him to reveal it, had she not? Over and over again, she stripped away his hiding places: gloves, mask, bedroom, costume. Now he must leave the last one behind. He was raw, vulnerable, like an insect hidden under a rock finding itself suddenly exposed to sunlight.
And yet.
It was not until she had blown through his cover that he had truly begun to change. It was not until she spread her wings between him and the world that he felt safe enough to be a man. To be at all, really. The shells he built had done nothing for him, by comparison. Hiding under that rock had gotten him nothing but barest survival. So, if she said he must leave, then he would leave.
As he waited for her to wake, he meditated on her career-to-come. She was more than ready for the audition. From this point on, he would put her through the paces of getting to the stage and up on it with grace, of answering the panelists, and how to behave during the flood of attention she would receive post-audition. She must not sign any contract he had not looked over. She must not promise anything to anyone, or be swayed by flattery. For many years he had skulked about theaters and arts schools. He knew the rigmarole of becoming a member of that world. If Christine could draw the man out of Erik, Erik would protect the Diva in Christine.
She moved a little, opened her eyes, saw that he was watching her and smiled.
'Mmm. 'S cold," she muttered, sitting up and rubbing her arms.
Before she could fully wake up, she was draped in a blanket and the kettle was on for tea. He quickly dressed; the air was quite cold, something he was noticing more often these days. When the tea was ready, he brought the tray and set it on the floor beside her. She patted the pallet.
"Sit with me?"
After his behavior, he felt almost too ashamed to speak to her, let alone sit with her. He had screamed and behaved like a madman. What she must think…
"You should be able to sit in peace. For my behavior… I apologize."
"Oh? What did you do while I was sleeping?" Christine asked as innocently as she could.
"What? No…" He lowered himself to sit with her, accepting the mug she passed him. "Before. It was wrong to…"
"Erik, stop." Christine smoothed his hair, leaned over and kissed his cheek. "It wasn't wrong. You should be angry. You should yell and throw a fit. I nearly screamed myself, when I saw what they'd done. It must be like having swallowed poison, having nothing but that for memories. All the time." She looked to him for confirmation.
Erik considered this thoughtfully, then shook his head. "Not until you…listened to me and touched me. Before then, it was like being poison. But the angel says, 'No.' And I have not sickened you. So, that must be true. I have begun to accept it: I am not poison. Now it is like having swallowed poison." He chuckled quietly, humorlessly. "That is better. Better to be poisoned than to be poison."
"I'm so sorry, Erik." She played with the hem of the blankets for a moment. "Maybe some of that will get better now that the secrets are out. Maybe if you can stand to talk about it. Maybe… Hey, I've just had a thought!"
"Hmmm?" Erik responded distractedly. The idea had not occurred to him before. The pain was less – ever since he first told even some small part of his story, it had been less. But to talk more, to delve into details, felt dangerous. What knowledge would be the final straw? What detail would finally disgust her and push her from him?
"I'd like you to meet some people who aren't awful. You're my partner now, so they're going to want to know you. I'd like you to meet Meg, so she can squeal over us. And my mother." She paused at the sheer overwhelm spreading across his face. "Or just one of them. My mom, maybe?"
"That seems like a bad idea." His bluntness covered a growing wistfulness. "We have discussed before what could come of my involvement with your family and friends."
"Could, yeah. But probably won't. Erik, if you will give me permission, I'll explain about your 'peculiar condition' beforehand. No one will be surprised, and I can field all her questions, so you won't have to." Christine mentally hunkered down. This could be a long fight.
"Then this woman will despise me before she ever meets me. I suppose that at least gives her the chance to refuse." Christine saw his doors shutting, locking.
She put down her cup stared at him for a moment, as though weighing her options, then took his free hand and clasped it in hers.
"See this? Ever since this happened, the rest of the world has a whole new way of meeting you and getting to know you. Those…people…who tortured you do not represent all of us. I swear they don't. Probably, if you decide to show your face, there will be those who don't take well to it. But also, like I told you, anyone who refuses to see you for who you are won't be welcome. My mother is a sweet woman, Erik. She really is. She's everyone's mother. When I was a teenager, my friends sometimes came to my house just to spend time with her – not me. I think, if you let me prepare her and if you give her a chance, you will enjoy knowing her."
"Still, you say nothing of her enjoyment of me." Erik's stubbornness inserted itself. "It matters very little what I think of her, if she has left the building."
"She likes classical violin." This was Christine's ace in the hole. "If you played for her, I'm sure you'd win her over in no time."
"The hands…" but the lure of an audience hooked him neatly.
"She would already know, coming in."
"Dammit, Christine." Erik drew his knees to his chest and rested forehead on them.
Her arms encircled him and he leaned towards her.
"You're afraid. Instead of giving me all these reason why she will be afraid, you can just tell me you don't want to. 'No' is an acceptable answer, I promise." Christine held on to him, waiting.
"Where?" he asked his knees.
"Where what?"
"Will you bring her here, or shall I be brought to her?" The fear of being displayed warred with the desire to perform and the heady knowledge that he would have an appreciative audience if Christine could keep it there and…that wistfulness.
"We haven't decided whether this is happening at all, have we?" Christine kept her voice neutral.
A long quiet followed this question. Erik tried to tease apart the emotions battling within, tried to figure out what the real threat was and how he should face it. Christine insisted that he could say no, but what would that accomplish? Erik raised his head and tried imagine Christine's mother. An older version of Christine, maybe. …a sweet woman.
"Bring her here. I will face her on my own ground, while it is still mine."
"Erik, are you sure? Because once I invite her, I'm not backing out of this. She's coming." Christine continued to reach for that neutral voice, though her stomach was performing flips.
"Do you think," Erik's voice was small, his eyes far away, "she will be kind?"
"Yes, my love." Christine smiled sadly. "I am sure she will, if you allow her to be."
As she walked to the bus stop, Christine questioned the wisdom of bringing anyone else around Erik. The best-case scenario was that he did not feel his space was utterly violated and he did not react to the visitor with shame. Worst-case scenario, her mother responded poorly, and all progress would be lost. Christine found herself chewing her thumb as she fretted. Of course, best-case scenario, Erik would see that she was not the only person in the world who could be friendly with him. She pulled out her phone and almost called her mother before she saw the time. When had it become 2 o'clock in the morning? There would be no bus coming. She called a cab and rode home in an uneasy silence.
The next morning, the moment she was awake enough even to be coherent, Christine called her mother.
"Christine, honey! Have you tried on that shirt I sent you?"
Christine had to grin. Her mother never said any version of "Hello" in phone calls. There were other things on her mind, and she skipped the formalities.
"Yes. It's very nice. Mom, I need to talk to you about something serious."
"What's wrong? Are you sick? Do I need to come over?" Motherly concern infused every word.
Christine wondered briefly what Erik would be like now if he'd grow up with his mother, but then refocused on the conversation. "Ummm, nothing, no, and yes. Kind of."
"But you're not sick?" Double checking was an old habit of her mother's.
"I'm never sick, Mom," Christine reassured her. "But I do have a partner."
"Oh! Well, it's about time. You know, I was telling Aunt Laura just yesterday that, now that you're into art, we might never see you settle down. And she said, 'Now Elaine, don't give up on her just yet.' And I said…"
"But there's something you need to understand about him, and you need to meet him," Christine gently cut across. "He's different from other men."
"We all think our sweetheart is different from others, honey." Her mother gently inserted.
Christine sighed. "Yeah, that's the cliché, but Erik really is different, so I need you to listen. He's an amazing artist -he's the one teaching me to sing. And he plays violin better than anything I've ever heard. And he's a total gentleman. All the time. Treats me like gold."
"Mmm-hmmm." Elaine could convey so much with a couple of nonsense syllables.
"Ok, but here's the thing: he's deformed. Like, a birth defect. Really bad."
"Oh, poor man! Is he disabled?" the swift change of tone was precisely what Christine had expected and hoped for.
Christine pondered. Was Erik disabled? Not the way her mother meant, she decided. "No, but he's also an abuse survivor. And I mean barely a survivor. So, he, uh… he kind of became a hermit. You'll be the first new person he's met, not including me, in a very long time. And he's really nervous about meeting you. He's sure you will be afraid of him."
"Why on earth would I be afraid of him? That's just ridiculous." But Christine heard pity in her mother's voice.
"It's actually not ridiculous. Everyone who sees him is afraid at first." Christine took a deep breath. She had never admitted this out loud; she'd barely admitted it to herself. "I was, too. But you won't even see his face, probably. He'll be wearing his mask and stuff. You'll just see his hands, if he thinks he can trust you."
"Well, of course he can trust me." She sounded affronted at the very idea.
"You and I know that, but he doesn't. When I say 'barely survived,' I mean it, okay? So you have to be really patient. Don't, you know, go hugging him or anything."
"If he's such a recluse, how did you manage to meet him?"
"Well, that's a funny story, really."
Christine launched into that story, emphasizing how accommodating and gentle Erik always was, but all her mother got out of it was,
"You sing now? You didn't tell me you sing. You'd think you'd tell your mother something like that."
"Well, I wasn't sure at first, and then it was kind of a secret, but I'm about to go audition at the big theater in Riverside…"
"You're what?!" Elaine's voice screeched through the phone.
Christine lightly knocked her head on the wall several times. She was never going to hear the end of this.
"Ummm…and we're pretty sure I'm a lock for the part, so you might be coming to see me in Lakme later in the year."
"And this man is your teacher."
"Yes."
"But he lives like a hermit in an abandoned theater."
"Yes."
"And he is deformed."
"Yes."
"And there's more to this story than you're telling me. Honey, are you sure about all this?" Elaine worried for her daughter, who seemed drawn to the fringes of life like a moth to flame.
"…yes, Mom. Will you come?"
"Of course, honey." She heaved a deep and long-suffering sigh. "You never were much of one for a nice quiet life. When should I come on out?"
"Is tomorrow good for you? I don't want to drag this out; he's going to be nervous enough as it is. Besides, with the audition and everything else, I think things are about to get all kinds of busy around here."
"Alright, I'll come down a little after lunch. I love you."
"Love you, too. You're the best Mom ever, you know that, right?"
"Bye, honey."
Christine hung up and proceeded to rehearse how she was going to break the news to Erik.
