There was a fine line between music tutor and husband and it was a difficult one for both them to find the balance of. She hadn't had a music lesson in weeks, being far too consumed with other things. At last Erik felt the press of guilt and finally called her in to go over the new music she'd be performing for the new opera.

She approached the lesson as she always had, trying to remain professional about it. She nodded seriously when he corrected her, her hands folded in front of her.

"Posture, Christine," he said distractedly, his eyes raking over her.

She adjusted her posture and began singing again as Erik played on the piano of their new home. He kept glancing up her, eyes full of an emotion she was all too familiar with. She looked away, trying to focus on her work. She mustn't let him distract her!

He stopped halfway through the song, rising dramatically from the piano bench to come and circle around her.

"We have neglected your lessons for far too long," he said ominously.

She flinched a little as he stalked around her. She'd known she wasn't at her best, but really, she hadn't thought it that bad-

"Your posture is atrocious, sweet," he practically growled.

"Erik, I-" she tried to defend herself as he stood behind her and squeezed her shoulders, trying to straighten her out, but was cut off when he suddenly pulled her flush against his body.

"I'm afraid we're just going to have to practice continually until you are in proper form," he murmured into her ear, pushing his hips forwards into hers and pulling her upper body back towards his chest.

Oh.

"Whatever you say, Maestro," she breathed, and she could practically feel the smirk forming on his lips st her words.

At her spoken consent, he removed one hand from its place on her waist and dove it into the fabric on the back of her bodice, searching for the little buttons to remove it.

Christine bit her lip, trying not to laugh. His fingers quested up and down, side to side, then pressing harder as they tried to find what they were looking for but failed. He huffed in impatience, redoubling his efforts as he dug here and there, trying to find the damned buttons that continued to evade him.

At last Christine reached back and grabbed his hand, guiding it around to the front of her dress, showing his fingers how to slip under the lace edging to find the hidden closures.

"This one opens in the front, Angel," she told him lightly.

"Oh, I see-"

She giggled a little at his frustration and confusion, then shrieked with laughter as he both divested her of her clothing and picked her up at the same time.

It was nearly an hour later that she found herself half nude and sprawled over her similarly half undressed husband on the couch, both them too tired to continue the singing portion of her lesson. It finally struck her that they'd stopped halfway through a song.

"Do we need to go over the rest of the song?" her voice was muffled against his chest.

"Hmm. No."

She was quiet for a moment.

"Did I actually need to improve my posture?"

He let a single finger lazily trace over the lace floral design on the tops of her long stockings which went up to her thighs.

"No."

She huffed.

"Erik, you are a lecher."

"I know," he replied easily enough.

"I'm not really that far behind in my practice, am I?"

He brought her hand up to his face and tenderly kissed the top of it.

"You are just as perfect as ever," he assured her.

It soon became their first argument as newlyweds - her lessons.

He often found himself distracted about halfway through, and she often found herself too caught up in the distraction to put a stop to it, only to be annoyed later on that they hadn't gotten any real singing done.

"Erik, for goodness sake - I need you to focus!"

"It's difficult, Christine," he whined. "You've no idea how appealing you are."

She huffed.

"Do you need me to stand behind a partition, so that you do not lose your focus?"

He paused.

"Do we have a partition?"

"Erik! I'm not standing behind a partition just because you have no self control!"

"Alright, alright - never mind!" he grumbled. "It would never work anyway, I can still hear you."

She wrinkled her nose. He was impossible. She supposed she should be flattered, but she remained vaguely annoyed and slightly guilty because she herself never told him no in the midst of it.

At last they hit upon the problem - they were both far too used to being alone together. To remedy this, they began to invite various friends and acquaintances to be in the same room during her instruction - Meg or Nadir or even a housekeeper who would dust the music room as Christine sang. Nothing kept them focused on not giving into the joys of the flesh like another pair of eyes on them. Eventually they both were able to fall into the routine of music - and only music - during her lessons once more, and the habit of focusing on that alone stuck even when they no longer had company watching.

Meg was delighted with Christine's secret house, proud that she was the only ballerina to know its location. She came over fairly often for lunch which she ate only with Christine - Erik, though polite to her, kept his distance beyond a brief greeting. Christine told Meg that he was terribly shy and didn't like being around strangers, but she knew deep down that he was also feeling awkward because Meg's mother was convinced he was a spirit. Meg accepted her explanation and never tried to push the matter, but she found her friend's husband endlessly fascinating and rather alluring.

Nadir, too, became a rather frequent visitor. When he wasn't there to listen to Christine's lessons, he and Erik would hole up in the sitting room with cups of tea and deep discussion.

Christine was always highly curious about his visits and what they talked about, but each time the door to the sitting room would be closed.

One day her curiosity got the better of her. What did they talk about for hours in there?

She stooped down to try to glance through the keyhole, but couldn't see much. She kneeled down to try to get a better angle to view it from, and when that failed she placed a drinking glass up against the door and leaned her ear against it, trying to amplify the sound. From inside, the muffled voices became a little clearer.

Her stomach did a flip to hear Erik's smooth voice speaking in a foreign language. She couldn't make heads or tails of what he was saying, but the words flowed out of him like rich, dark water. Nadir replied in the same language, and they laughed over something. But what?

She pressed her ear harder against the glass, furrowing her brow, though she knew it was useless since she couldn't understand either of them.

There was a lull in the conversation, and she bit her lip, concentrating. Why had they stopped talking?

Suddenly the door opened and Erik looked down at her, raising an eyebrow. The corners of his lips twisted into a small smile.

"Do you need something, sweet?" he asked her.

She gaped up at him, glass in hand, no real excuse for what she was doing on the floor by their closed door with it. She shook her head vigorously.

"No, not at all!" she squeaked.

He chuckled and offered an hand to pull her up to her feet, and once standing she brushed the dust out of her skirts, her face red.

"Let me know if you change your mind, my dear," he teased as he closed the door once more.

Far too embarrassed, she never tried to spy on his conversations again, though this was also helped by the fact that later that evening Erik, realizing her curiosity, began to recount the conversation to her in all its boring glory - architectural woes that the French insisted on committing that the people of Persia would never dream of blighting their buildings with, and the pros and cons of certain spices for roasting chickens - until at last Christine begged him to stop. If Erik and his friend wanted to bore each other, she supposed that was their own business.

On the whole, they were exceedingly happy with their new life. Soon the only real source of frustration was how Christine seemed to be struggling with her new opera role.

Erik rubbed at the bridge of his nose as he slouched on the piano bench, scrunching up his eyes and trying to not take his frustration out on Christine.

"That's not it at all," he sighed.

"I'm sorry, Erik," she fidgeted with the gems of her sleeves. "I don't know how to play this role very well, I'm afraid."

"Again," he waved his hand, frowning, and she started the song over again.

She was playing a trickster fairy, opposite Carlotta who was playing a young woman that Christine's character tricked. Eventually the young woman figured out a way around the fairy's trick, and this enraged the fairy. Christine was not too terrible at the sneaky parts of the role - she had fun with those, even if they didn't come naturally - but it was the fit of rage that causing the list problems for her.

She simply didn't have it in her.

"Stop, stop," Erik said.

He stood up and walked to the window, staring forlornly out of it. He was quiet a long time.

They'd tried every trick he could think of to bring out the right characterization in her - she'd imagined the thought of Carlotta getting her fired, she'd thought of the time her Papa wouldn't buy her a puppy, she'd thought of mean things other girls had said to her when she was younger, she even tried thinking of if a gendarme came and arrested Erik (a scenario that, instead of provoking anger, only made her teary-eyed), but so far nothing had managed to bring out the rage needed for this particular scene.

Christine looked away, disappointed in herself. What if she just couldn't cut it?

"Christine," he called her over. "Christine, sweet - do you trust me? Do you trust that I love you and only want what's best for your career?"

She came and stood next to him, frowning a little at his words. He had pulled her close, cupping his hands around her cheeks and looking deep into her eyes. She nodded and placed her hands over his wrists.

"Of course I do, Erik," she said seriously.

He kissed her forehead and hugged her tightly.

"I love you, Christine."

His serious demeanor almost worried her, but he ended the lesson and the day went on normally, so she soon forgot about it.

Erik almost regretted the course of action he was about to take, and had it been anyone other than Christine he likely would not have undertaken it. But Christine - sweet, forgiving, understanding Christine - she would understand in the end. This was for the best.

She didn't notice anything at first. Life went on as normal. They did her lessons, and she made incremental yet steady progress, even though they never worked on the scene where she needed to be angry. But after a while, she began to... notice.

She had always heard that once a couple was married for a little while, the feeling that your spouse could do no wrong quickly wore off. It was probably directly related to another thing she'd heard said, which was that after a while someone who previously had been on their best behavior to impress their mate would eventually stop trying to impress and fall into less than stellar habits.

Christine began to notice both of these things.

It started with Erik leaving his dirty laundry on the floor. She didn't mind so terribly when it was the floor of his own private bedroom, but he also left piles of it on the floor - and the dresser, and the bed, and in the bathroom - of their shared room, and it peeved her to see it all. She'd never known a man could own so many clothes.

But she took it in stride. She could cope with a few annoying habits, surely she had some of her own he had to contend with.

She tried to take the sudden excess of dishes in the sink in stride, too. Erik used to always wash his own dishes, and hers too. She supposed she couldn't complain too much. He'd done her dishes for years, though of course she hadn't been cooking elaborate meals that required numerous pans and plates every single day. But she was a good wife, so she did what she must.

Truth be told, it was the little things that he himself did that bothered her more than any extra household tasks.

The night he made a traditional Swedish dish without telling her bothered her, she had to admit. She'd been drawn to the kitchen by smells of her childhood, wondering with a smile if Erik had made a surprise meal for her. When she got to the kitchen, all she found were a bunch of dirty dishes.

"Oh," she said, a little surprised. "I thought I smelled herring."

"You did," he said nonchalantly.

"Is it for dinner?"

"My dinner," he shrugged. "I already ate it. I didn't know if you wanted any. Besides, I only cooked enough for one."

"Oh," she glanced around the kitchen, embarrassed.

She isn't know why she was embarrassed - he was the one who'd done something awkward, not her - but she felt it all the same.

"There's some leftover salad from yesterday, if you want that," he said, turning away from her.

"Um, okay," she ducked her head and picked at her hands. "Maybe later."

And with that she turned and quickly left.

Erik felt a pang of remorse in his chest. He'd felt so guilty buying the single serving of herring fish at the market, knowing it was her favorite, knowing how it would hurt her. But he soldiered on, trying to remind himself that he was doing the right thing.

She tried very hard to tell herself that she didn't mind, but it sat at the back of her mind and ate at her.

The whole time she'd known him, she would have said he was gentleman of the highest caliber. He was always polite and solicitous, and had been for all the years she'd stayed in his house and spent extended amounts of time together.

That's why it surprised her when he sat down in the chair across from her one day as she was reading and loudly ate a muffin, washing it quickly down with a large glass of water. She squinted at the page in front of her, trying to ignore the smacking noise his lips were making. He normally ate with his mouth closed, but that seemed to be a skill he'd forgotten about in the past few days. When at last the food and drink were gone, she thought she'd have a respite at last. He belched. She closed her eyes and tried to pretend that noise hadn't come from her Angel. She let out a long exhale through her noise. He was staring at her, she could tell, as though he expected her comment on what had just happened. She merely pressed her lips tightly together and turned the page in her book.

It pained Erik to the very core of his being to behave this way around her, but he truly had no other choice.

She couldn't help but notice he'd taken to... not bathing. She didn't mind the smell of him, normally - he frequently got sweaty during certain activities, and she'd never complain about that - but normally he didn't let said sweat simply fester on his body for days at a time. She lay awake at night, staring at the wall across from her in the darkness, Erik's arms wrapped around her as she tried to not breathe too deeply. She felt bad about saying anything to him - he'd been composing lately, and she knew he often let everything fall by the wayside when that happened. She took even, steady breaths through her mouth, telling herself that he didn't mean it. He didn't mean to stink. Sooner or later he would remember to bathe. No sense in shaming him over it.

She only wished the period of composing would end - he'd jump out of bed at all hours, rushing to scribble something on a piece of paper before getting back in bed and pulling her this way and that to cuddle with her before repeating the same process two hours later. After three nights of this, she politely declined to sleep in the shared bed, instead going to her private room where she hoped to get some sleep. While she no longer had to smell him or feel him moving about, she did end up having to hear him as paced up and down the halls, furiously sawing on his violin. It kept her from getting more than a half hour of sleep at a time.

She felt groggy and gross the next morning, not even bothering to bathe herself. She glared across the breakfast table at him, at his annoyingly askew wig and the same shirt he'd been wearing for the past two days straight. It was time she faced the truth of the matter - she'd married a boor. He'd only been hiding it all this time. The events of this past week had made it all perfectly clear.

His hot cereal finished, he began to pick in between his teeth with his fingernail, and she felt her eye begin to twitch.

She cleared the table, dumping the dishes into the sink to deal with later, and went to sit on the back porch, hoping for some fresh air to clear her sleep-deprived head.

He followed her.

Neither one said anything as they sat in the weak sunlight that filtered through the leaves of the trees. At least, she thought wryly, she couldn't smell him out here.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, bringing it up to his unmasked face. He blew his nose into it noisily, but she knew she couldn't fault him that. It was just how his half-formed nose was. She glanced across at him, about to try to start some small talk about the weather or the garden, but stopped short when she noticed what he was doing.

After loudly blowing his nose into the handkerchief, instead of folding it used side in, he folded it so that the used side was facing out... And he he then proceeded to pat the handkerchief over his face, leaving a faint glisten here and there.

She stared straight ahead, not willing to look at him doing this any longer. Good heavens - what was wrong with him?

He sniffled his nose and smiled widely, tucking the now disgusting handkerchief into his pocket. He turned to her, still smiling. She looked at him sidelong, her eyes wide.

"How about a kiss?" he said, holding his arms out to her and leaning in.

"No!" she shrieked, trying to slap his hands away. "Erik stop! You're being disgusting!"

He stared at her as she jumped up from her chair and tried to dart away from him. He decided the best thing in that moment was to chase her. He considered, briefly, pulling the handkerchief from his pocket and taunting her with it as he jogged towards her, but did not - she'd reached her breaking point, finally, and that was all he wanted - if he pushed too much, it might permanently damage the relationship.

"Erik!" she squealed as she wheeled about to face him, her hands clenching into fists. "What has come over you this past week? You've been insufferable! This isn't you! You don't try to kiss me with a face full of snot! You bathe! You clean up after yourself! It's- it's like you've reverted to a two year old! You've kept me up for four whole nights and I've had it! What is the matter with you? Have you lost all sense of decency and courtesy?! Has your brain turned to mush?!"

He dropped to his knees before her, placing his hands on her hips and shaking her just slightly.

"Feel the anger, Christine! Feel the fire, how it rages in your veins! Use it, Christine - this is what Alisha feels towards Maria in Act Three! This is what you need to put into your performance!"

Her jaw dropped and the blood drained from her face. Her performance? Alisha was her character in the upcoming opera... Had purposely been trying to goad her-?

"Erik," she said quietly, her voice even. "Did you do all this to get me mad enough to yell at you so I could feel what you thought I needed to feel on stage?"

He stood up.

"I take your career very seriously, Christine."

She pressed her lips together and went inside. He hesitated, then followed her. She had gone inside her private room, the door closed.

She didn't come out for five hours, and when she did she found a freshly washed and groomed Erik and a house devoid of both laundry and dishes. He seemed eager to please her, but she refused to talk to him for the rest of night.

She slept in her own room again, and the next morning she acted as though nothing had happened, though she seemed slightly cold to him.

He began to worry that perhaps he really had pushed it too far, but she had her first stage rehearsal for the new production that afternoon, and she was spectacular in every scene - especially the scene were she was angry. The managers and director all commended her.

She met Erik in her dressing room afterwards. He stood there uncertainly for a moment as she closed and locked the door in silence, but then she came up and hugged him, and his tension melted away.

"You are an infuriating man," she murmured lovingly as she kissed cheek. "But I love you."

"I love you too," he smoothed a hand over her hair. "I hope you aren't too upset..."

"You're forgiven," she smiled at him as she pulled away, then raised an eyebrow. "Just so long as you continue to bathe and let me sleep the whole night through."

He laughed.

"That can be arranged, my dear," he said warmly.