The concussive energy which had weaved itself throughout the small mountain town stalled with the coming of an early spring blizzard. And though every inch of snow brought the ability to strike meaningfully further and further away, it did nothing to cool the flood of letters and stories traveling to Erik's door.
After her refusal to leave and his surrender, she installed herself in his home, quickly becoming accustomed to daily life with her Phantom. The mundaneness of life charmed Christine. In every way it was what she expected and so much more than she ever hoped for.
The days passed with relative ease until weeks had piled together and the snow drifts were high and wide. While the weather did not stop the world of Mauch Chunk from running, it did immobilize Phantasma, and the stillness of the place seeped into Christine's bones, causing a strange sense of contentedness to war against worry within her.
Erik, it seemed, constantly lived within this war, for he was unperturbed by the forces of nature and their implications. Each morning when she would find him, lost in his letters or thoughts; she would return him to the present by running her fingers softly through his hair, caressing the already pristinely placed locks. In response, he would raise his head with the sweetest look of admiration in his eyes and seek her lips for a kiss.
Under her care, his injuries healed quickly, until the cane at his side and a heavy bandage around his broken tibia were the only indications of his encounter. For anyone else, his recovery would have been considered unnatural, so fast was its speed. But Erik was a different sort of man all together and was used to pain.
It had been natural, in a sense, to pack her bags and ensconce herself in Erik's house again. It was not safe for her in town, and she found she had little argument against the proposed situation. The only other option came from a kind note signed by Mrs. Cummings stating it would be ungodly and unseemly to stay anywhere other than their fine home. She wasn't wrong, but Christine had run away from the life of European nobility, there was no way she would willing choose the American version. Especially with the Cummings. No, isolation with Erik would do.
And what a wonder Erik in isolation was. With the absence of others came the release of his tightly controlled demeanor. Christine found he could be thoughtful and calm, excitable and downright playful when he wanted to be. At first, she assumed it was her presence. Yet as the days continued and the snow remained falling and he began to forget to wear his mask while he was composing, she realized he was being more himself without the expectations of the world.
When he would realize she was near, he would stop, look to her, and ask if he should replace his mask. "No," was always her answer.
Christine's hands pulled tightly against the morning chill and she burrowed deeper into the warmth of the blankets. She let her mind linger over the last few weeks of the storm with all its sweetness.
It was then she realized that she was not the cure of his life, but the balm for his loneliness. And a small part of her broke.
Truly, she'd wanted to be his savior, his utter reason for reformation. It was a selfish, bitter thing to breed within herself. She tried to let the feeling pass, to acknowledge that holding him captive in that way was cruel and far too similar to how Raoul had treated her for so long. Yet, melancholy crept into her and faded the brightness in her eyes.
She rose from bed, pulling a shawl tightly around her shoulders to stoke the fire. Though she slept next to Erik each night, wrapped tightly to his side, he had not taken her since that night in the practice rooms.
And yet the nights were long. She would to bed early before him but would not close the door between the room and the study. It was in those late hours – when he thought her fast asleep and dreaming – he would let the madness of his mind run free. He would pace and speak to himself in English and French and Italian and German. Plotting. Paper would shuffle and crumple and shuffle again. A note would play here, a tinkering with a twist of metal there. Maps became an obsession.
Other nights he would stand at the door, looking a dark specter against the illumination of the fire behind him, and stare inside. On these nights he kept his thoughts tightly in his mind.
Yet they all ended the same. He would finally fall into bed beside her, fully clothed atop the blankets, and wrap his arms around her, burrowing his head into the mess of her hair. He would fall asleep playing cords against her arm.
She had not even once woken beside him in the morning light. It soured her mood further. Years of her own loneliness had become a poison within her, and Erik's intimacy was an easy antidote. At least he kissed her freely.
.
Christine found Erik where she'd expected: lost at his desk, his long fingers pressed against the temple of his black mask. Someone must be coming today. She walked past the warming pot of coffee by the fire and stood at his side, lightly running her fingers along the nape of his neck. She was careful not to rumple his perfect hair or linger too long once his eyes rose from his letter.
"It seems the snow is no longer a deterrent." So there would be no kiss today. No good morning. No sweet smile. People must be coming.
"What does that mean?"
"It means our lovely seclusion is at an end."
"How will they strike in the snow?" Christine asked, leaving his side and setting herself in the chair opposite him.
"Much more easily than how they've been going to work." At her quizzical expression Erik clarified, "The snow may mean we have no work here, but the people of Mauch Chunk still do. Men have been working though the drifts. A small child caught sick and died yesterday. The women are demanding justice. There will be no more delays. With the storm finally passing, the fight will return. In force."
"I just thought –" she was unable to finish her sentence. What had she thought? That life would still forever? That somehow everything would sink away into the snow? That her happy world meant the whole world was happy? "Will Hanna need help at the school?"
"I'm sure she would always welcome your help. But you've never aspired to be a teacher, Christine."
Her arrival in Mauch Chunk had been a declaration of her intent to live her own life, to carve out something in the world that would be her own, on her own terms. How quickly she'd returned to the petulant Opera Diva – how easily her Phantom facilitated her selfishness.
"I would like to help."
"What is wrong, my dear?"
The endearment and Erik's piercing eyes twisted something dark within Christine. "I fear I've not been myself. I—"
Though Erik's eyes flited from his papers to the clock behind her, he did not speak or move. He waited as still as marble, a hint of fear creeping into his eyes. When she could not find her words, he asked, "In what way, Christine?" Still she could not answer him. The shame of her childishness choked her. "If this is because of the night we shared, if you regret it –"
"No." She answered firmly, reaching for his hand across the desk, "No. That is not what I mean." It felt impossible to tell him how painfully disappointed she was in herself. So instead she focused on the implications of his statement. "I don't regret that night. I thought perhaps you did."
"How on Earth would it be possible that I would regret it?"
"It's just,"
"The only reason." His attention was fully hers now, "Truly the only reason has been my vow to not force my will upon you. My dear, surely you know that any touch from you is a gift from God to an unworthy sinner." Christine's face flushed a deep crimson. "You have no idea the utter pleasure and torture it has been to lie beside you every night and not, not –"
"Consummate our desires?" She offered. It was now his turn to blush.
"Our?" His elegant eyebrow peaking.
"Yes. Our." She wanted desperately to tell him she'd loved him since the first moment he'd sang to her; that she'd lusted after him since that first kiss under the Opera House. While old memories and dead bodies lay between those desires, it was much easier to forget their darkening shadow so far away removed from them.
"You deserved so much more than a cold floor. You deserve a warm bed and a proper wooing. You deserve a marriage proposal."
"Are you proposing to me?"
His body froze before her, while his eyes became molten fire. "Would I think you accept, I would ask."
She couldn't help her response, not after all these years, "I did accept your proposal once before and you sent me away."
"You had no choice in that proposal."
She blinked at his response, her mind unsure she'd heard him correctly.
He was not wrong.
The surety in his statement mollified years of frustration in her. A broken part within her fused back together.
"I'm glad you see that now. But you should know I had chosen. I was willing. You were the one that deemed my answer insincere and not enough." He stood and began to pace about the room. She'd struck a nerve.
"We were both very cruel to you, weren't we?"
"Not cruel," she paused, thinking for the right word, "selfish. You were both very selfish." He nodded at her statement. His mind worked before her, reshaping his memories with her new word though he did not seem to totally agree. "I don't need a proposal to be with you Erik. I don't even need a proper wooing. Being in your presence makes me long for you. You need only roll to me in bed and I would be yours."
"And if I was proposing to you?"
"Would you believe I was sincere in my reply?" He did not speak and the air hung heavy. Christine rose from her chair to leave. "What would you need from me, Erik? Would you ever be convinced that I would willingly be your wife?"
"To believe you love me, Christine – it is easier to believe in the existence of God."
"That is unfair, unkind, and blasphemous. And I know you believe in God."
He answered her questions with one of his own, "What happened with the Vicomte?" When she would give no reply and the silence in the room had become deafening, he changed the subject, "Today there will be visitors from both the company and the strikers. Both sides will expect a diversion at Phantasma. It's best you stay away from everyone today, but we will begin your practice for the Spectacular tonight. You must be ready."
"I will be in the Spectacular?"
"Strikes in America rarely end at the bargaining table. If you will not leave, it is best we put your gift to use."