Sometimes Erik could scarcely believe that this life was his. It might not have seemed so terribly far fetched, way back when, to imagine that he might occupy a steady job, a law abiding career, if he so chose. A upright career and a house. Believable, achievable. But-
A wife who loved him, and a healthy child? In addition to everything else? It felt surreal sometimes.
He'd never considered the idea of himself as a father with anything other than disdain and disgust. But to find that maybe he wasn't so bad at it after all, that maybe he could actually be a good influence in this little life and have value and purpose? It was a surprise, every time.
As Gustave got older and explored the world more and needed his mother less, Erik found him an ideal companion and distraction from work. He had a short attention span, but he liked to draw things with Erik (his drawings weren't very recognizable yet, but they would work on that, though he'd leave handwriting as something for Christine to teach him), and build together with blocks (Erik have ever helpful advice on how to build taller and stronger structures, though Gustave seldom took it), and most of all, play music.
Gustave was entranced by the music his father could play, and eventually he even tried his own hand at the piano.
"Christine!"
Christine flinched at the sudden loud noise. She dropped her book and ran to the music room, hoping everything was okay.
"What is it? What's wrong?" she asked when she got there.
Erik a bright shine to his eyes as he held up Gustave.
"Christine," he declared. "Our baby is a genius!"
Christine blinked.
"What do you mean?"
"Look, look-" Erik held him up to the piano. "Play middle C, Gustave."
Gustave reached out a chubby hand and banged his fist on the nearest piano key, which happed to be E flat, nowhere near middle C.
Erik bit his lip and maneuvered his hold on Gustave until his hand finally hit the correct key.
"Look he's doing it!" Erik almost shouted.
"He certainly is," she agreed, not convinced.
"Our son is a musical genius, Christine. Can you believe it?"
He sat Gustave on the floor, who then wandered off. Erik was beaming at Christine, and she mustered a smile back at him. He was awfully proud of that boy, and though she loved her child very much, she was under no illusions that he was anything other than what he was, and he simply was not a musical - or any kind of - genius. If Erik wanted to think he was a genius, well- there were worse things in the world.
What bothered her more than any unrealistic opinions of their child was a new job Erik had taken on that seemed to be peeving him every time it was brought up.
He'd just gotten another letter from America, and he didn't look happy.
"What's the matter?" Christine asked kindly as she came to stand next to him in his office.
He threw the letter he was holding down on the table, wiping a hand over his face.
"It's this damn contract in America," he grumbled. "They refuse to use any of my ideas yet they refuse to go work with someone else."
"What are they building?" She placed a squirming Gustave up on the table, and he quickly grabbed the pencil he had been reaching for, beginning to chew on it.
"An amusement park. These are the last people in the world who should be building one. They're going to bankrupt themselves! Christine, it's so embarrassing. They're terrible at planning this out. If not for Bernard's insistence that I stay civil- well. If I were in charge of the damn park-"
"Why don't you be?"
"What?"
"Why not be in charge?"
"Because they're buying the property."
"Why don't you buy it out from under them?"
Erik opened and closed his mouth, considering her plan. He turned to face her, placing his hands on either side of her face.
"Christine Travers," he said, looking into her eyes, "you are a genius."
He kissed her hard and then scooped her up into his arms. She shrieked with laughter.
"Erik, where are you taking me?" she giggled as he made to carry her out of the room.
"To bed," he said matter-of-factly.
"Erik wait! The baby!"
He paused in the doorway.
"He's going to fall off the table if we leave him there!" she said.
He looked back to see Gustave on the table, watching them.
"Ah."
He set Christine down, who went to retrieve him before he could fall.
"You really think we should buy it?" he asked her, his mind starting to clear just a little. "Build an amusement park?"
"Why not, Erik? You already have ideas, don't you? No one can tell you what you can't do if you owned the thing. It would be less stress, wouldn't it?"
Erik scratched his head. He had been rather stressed and annoyed over this particular job. Bernard didn't want him to break the contract, but if the land that the amusement park was going on was suddenly sold to a different buyer, well-
He couldn't be faulted for that, could he? The contract would have to be dissolved in that case.
"A pseudonym," he muttered to himself, beginning to scratch out notes on a piece of paper. "I'll need a pseudonym to buy the land so no one will suspect."
Christine watched him with a smile. Her suggestion had only been half thought out, something that came to her in the spur of the moment. But she'd been tired of seeing these letters from America that so clearly put him in a bad mood when they arrived. Apparently they really were to become managers of a theme park on a different continent now. It seemed like it might work out. She only hoped she wouldn't come to regret her idea.
She was not finding much of anything hard to regret lately, though there was one thing.
She loved her little life more now than at any other time. She had her husband, her beloved Erik who was healthy and slightly more sane than in previous times. She had her son - their son - who was also healthy and happy and doing so well. She had very little real worries in the world - Erik provided for them and then some. Her childhood worries had disappeared, her financial future was secure.
But in the midst of all that security and safety and peace, one thing was missing.
Music.
It was something her mind had been turning to more and more lately. She hadn't said anything to Erik yet. Her contract at the opera house was still on hold after some negotiation, realizing that having a baby had been more work than she'd originally imagined. Carlotta was the only prima donna there now, though the managers had been quite clear that should she like to return, they would find a place for her.
She didn't have regrets about not returning to the stage as soon as she would have thought she'd return, but she was starting to feel that wistful pull, that longing to live a life that was just a little more than regular life. She wanted to be on stage again one day, she thought. She wanted the glamour, the spotlight back in her life. But most of all, she wanted the music back.
She woke from dreams where she was back at the Populaire, dreams where she was singing the most beautiful music, dreams where she was even back in the ballet corps again. She awoke with a smile each time, a sense of beautiful nostalgia aching in her chest.
It was time to tell him.
She leaned on the doorframe of his home office late one night, watching him tidy up his work at the end of the day. She felt a rush of love for this man.
"Erik," she said softly.
"Hmm?"
"I'd- I'd like to sing again."
He froze, looking up at her, eyes wide.
"Do you mean it?" he breathed.
"Yes." She smiled at him.
A change came over him. He straightened up a little, his demeanor becoming serious.
"Very well, my dear. We shall start tomorrow, is that agreeable?"
"Yes!"
There was a sense of expectation hanging in the air as they met the next afternoon in the music room. She hadn't sung for Erik in nearly a year, or even more. She couldn't quite remember when that last lesson was, when they stepped away from the piano for the last time thinking that they would do this again soon only to leave off and not come back to it.
But they were back now. Erik, and Christine, and the music.
He began to play, and she began to warm up, her voice rusty from lack of use, but Erik still thought she was exquisite. He had been so worried, sometimes, that they'd never sing together again, but he hadn't wanted to push her to sing if she didn't want to. Music, however, seemed like it was something too integral to both of them to leave for very long.
She closed her eyes, lost in the music, and she was seventeen again, a girl full of hopes and dreams who still believed in her Angel, knowing he would watch over her. She was nineteen, getting to know the mysterious man who taught her and inspired mysterious feelings in her. She was twenty-three again, contemplating a future with the man she loved, willing to fight for that future. In the music she could hear the story of her life, their love story. It was beautiful and overwhelming.
She opened her eyes, a young woman who was raising her first child with her darling husband, and saw that he was watching her with a tender look in his eyes. She knew that he could hear it, too. So much in their lives had changed, yet so much had stayed the very same.
After her lesson was over, he took her in his arms and held her close, placing a tender kiss to her forehead.
"You were marvelous as always, sweet," he murmured to her.
They continued her lessons, and time went on. She sang; he cut back his hours working for Bernard in favor of his amusement park project; Gustave grew up a little more.
Soon enough they found themselves back in her dressing room at the Populaire, only this time with one more in tow.
"Mama gonna sing?" Gustave asked, staring up at her with wide eyes.
"Yes, Gustave - very soon now, you'll see."
She leaned down to hug him one last time. She thought Erik looked more nervous than she was.
It was her debut since becoming a mother. The managers had been pleased to have her return, though Carlotta remained firmly a major fixture in each production.
She looked at herself in her old mirror one last time before before leaving. Erik was standing there behind her, golden eyes nervous in the reflection. She smiled.
"I'll see you both soon," she told them, preparing to leave.
They said their goodbyes, and Erik took Gustave by the hand as they disappeared behind her mirror.
She gave her wig one last pat before the curtain went up and the show began. Being back to the first love of her life was marvelous and exhilarating, but nothing could beat the feeling at the very end as she took her bows and looked up to see the vague outline of a ghost in the dark red velvet of Box Five with a smaller figure on his knee - they were both clapping for her.
Erik never knew such a pride was possible, to watch his wife on stage and point out which one she was to their son as the little boy watched, entranced.
There was a clamor of fans and admirers at her dressing room door after the show, but La Daaé was curiously nowhere to be found despite no one knowing of any alternative exit from the little room.
She walked down the dark tunnel behind the wall, grinning widely, hand in hand with her husband and their son as they made their way to a secret exit for their waiting carriage. The evening had been a wild success.
She finished out a season at the Opera House, and her mind began to turn to other possibilities.
"I know it wouldn't be the easiest thing in the world," she said. "But I was his age when Papa and I started traveling."
"You really wish to go on tour?" Erik asked, curious.
"I would love it, Erik. When I traveled so much as a little girl, I always thought about what it must be like to be able to sing at all the big opera houses. I've been considering it for some time now, really."
He twisted a curl of her hair around his finger as he leaned in just a closer to her on the sofa in the reading room.
"I could arrange it," he offered. "If you don't mind me being your manager."
"You are already my teacher and my husband," she laughed. "What's one more title?"
Erik set about contacting various venues in different places, and they began to form an itinerary based on who accepted the chance to have La Daaé sing for a special engagement.
"Erik, you are wonderful," Christine said, eyes shining, as she looked over the plan he'd written out on a map.
"You inspire it in me, sweet."
Gustave, too, was excited about the idea of travel - or least about what he could understand of travel.
Before they knew it, it was time to depart. Arrangements had been made in advance, bags were packed, and the three of them were standing on the platform for the train, waiting for it to arrive.
Christine blinked under her hat, the sun bright and garish as the train pulled into the station with a great puff of steam and loud noise. This would be the last time they'd be in France for a long while. She'd been there so long, and she knew she was going to miss it, but she was ready to move into this next chapter of life and see what it held. She was ready to step out of the land that held so much of her past, and step into new places that held her future.
"Christine, are you ready?" Erik asked as he handed her her train ticket.
She beamed up at him.
"I'm ready."
And she was.
A/N: That concludes (this part) of the story! :) thank you so much to everyone who read it, I know it's been a long time coming haha. I really appreciate the support this story has gotten!
Not certain how soon it'll be up, but there are two more stories planned for this series - either a short chapter story or a oneshot, and then another multi chapter story after that. So happy to hear from everyone who commented on this over the years (!), and thank you again!