It happened so gradually that Erik might have missed it if he were any other man, but as he has nothing to preoccupy his days with other than Christine he was all too aware that something had gone wrong.
At first it had been a wonderful thing, her newfound interest in studying. Her eyes would light up whenever she figured something out, whether it was some wires or gears or diagrams she'd been poring over, and he loved to make her happy so he'd indulged her. There was only a minimal amount of worried hovering as she learned to make batteries, to mix chemicals, to investigate flammable materials, but fortunately she was proving to be an excellent student in this area as well and she had yet to suffer an injury.
He'd begun to buy her pamphlets and literature, or leave some of his own collection out on coffee tables so she might find and read them. Books on the latest advances in engineering, in architecture, in natural sciences. He only kept books of a medical nature from her, both from an awareness that surely a young lady would not have the stomach for such topics, and from a worry that such materials might prompt her to turn her curious gaze towards him. He had already spent years attempting to find a reason for his deformity, and science had at best disappointed him; there was nothing good that could come out of that train of questioning for either of them. Thankfully she appeared to be satisfied with his offerings and didn't ask for a wider selection.
Erik had foolishly thought this was a good thing. She was gaining more trust in him, asking him questions and listening to his instructions. She was interested in their little underground home, in the new electric lights and hot water pipes and little trinkets he'd gather from abroad. They had wonderful evenings where he'd tell her stories or explain different concepts to her, filled with her lovely questions and precious smile. But gradually those evenings had grown shorter and shorter as she'd excused herself into her room, claiming a headache or exhaustion.
"Would you like a medication?" he offered desperately the fifth night she did it. "We could discuss different migraine cures." But she shook her head and refused, and shut herself in her room again.
The next morning he left a couple of books for her on the kitchen table. She barely glanced at them when she came to breakfast, and he tried to engage her in a conversation about some of the books she currently had hidden away in her room, but she gave one word answers and excused herself. She spent more and more of her days in her room, and he missed the days when she'd read on the sofa and he'd be blessed with the sight of her brow furrowing or her teeth biting her lip as she made her way through a particularly difficult concept. Now it felt a little like those first days she'd spent here, hiding in her room and crying, only emerging when he announced it was a meal.
"Would you like some assistance?" he asked when she emerged for lunch, and she frowned at him and shook her head.
"I can understand it," she said, putting a stack of books on the table. "I'm done with these." He nodded and served her food, quickly glancing through the books to see if any of them could sustain a conversation. He quickly discovered that none of them could and she vanished into her room, leaving him alone.
Perhaps it was just a phase, but perhaps not. Maybe she's using him like some librarian but no longer desired to speak with him. He wracked his mind for anything he might have said that disturbed her and came up with too many things. Or maybe it was not one thing but the culmination of many. Perhaps his clever Christine had begun to ask herself why Erik knew so much about engineering designs for trap doors, or so many different chemical combinations for explosions, or so much information about electrical wires and contraptions. Perhaps she had figured out that Erik's mind had turned every discovery towards pain and death, depraved thing that he was, and she feared him.
He knew what fear looked like in people, and worst of all he knew what Christine acted like when afraid, so he put his cursed knowledge to the test and closely observed Christine over the next few days. There were no stammered words and shuddering, no pale face and averted eyes. Her hands didn't shake, and she didn't edge away from him and look for doorways to escape. She was not afraid. Yet, his mind whispered, and he ignored it in favor of wondering what has gone wrong if it is not fear. He concluded that she must be bored of him, tired of his company. He didn't know how to fix this, and so only grew more desperate.
The one saving grace, the one thing that kept him sane, was their music. They continued lessons as always, and he believed that they were the closest thing to heaven he'd ever know. He played beautiful songs, magnificent operas and stunning arias, and reveled in the beautiful and pristine voice she accompanied him in. There were minimal corrections, her tone a polished jewel that could now be admired. They could spend hours lost in music together; he would sing to her and switch to the violin, serenade her and write a thousand songs in her praise, and it was enough.
Christine had been growing slightly more distracted over the last few days, but it was fine. Their music was still beautiful, and music would be what bound them together. Even if she no longer wanted to talk to him or read with him or ask him questions, as long as they had their music everything would be perfect.
He knew he was doomed when Christine began to end their lessons early. She'd avoid picking new arias, or insist that she would strain her voice by practicing more, or ask him to stop playing for the sake of her fictional headache. Or perhaps her headache was real, and his name was Erik. He felt like there was a great black hole tearing apart his heart when he watched her return to her room and close her door, ending their singing lesson after only an hour. It had been the shortest one this week, but he knew she wanted them to be shorter. She no longer loved his music, and if she no longer loved his music then there was nothing left of him that she could love.
He started a new opera for her, but could not write a single note on the page. His muse was behind a locked door and he would never see her smile again, and she would want to leave. He considered using his wealth to buy her affections for however long they'd last, perhaps supplying her with more lab equipment, but knew it would only drive her away from him faster. She was going through the piles of books so quickly, and he dreaded the day when she'd leave to go find an institute that taught young women or become an apprentice at an apothecary. His mind tormented him with visions of Christine surrounded by handsome young scholars, happy and laughing and never sparing even a passing thought for her old ugly teacher trapped under the earth.
He could stop her, though! He leapt to his feet and paced about the room, mentally cataloguing all the traps he had set. She would not leave his house without his permission, and even if she learned how to dismantle all his traps there were still other ways to keep her here. Her education had neglected lock picking and escape artistry, it would not be difficult.
Only such a course of action would make her fear him again. He did not want that. And his lovely Christine needed the sun, she would grow pale and wilt without it. He wanted her to be happy, and trapping her here would not do that. So was he to become a ghost in her life, a shadowy thing that lurked behind her every step and watched as she went on to live a life in the sun?
Suddenly Erik realized that all the fictional young suitors who would surely court Christine might be chemists themselves, and as ridiculous young men they were surely not as safe as Erik was with precious Christine. Why, any one of them could knock over a beaker or vial during one of her experiments and ruin it! But worst of all, such an incident could become dangerous for Christine. There were many deadly fumes that could be accidently created, and explosions were common. Were not his own hands and arms covered with burn scars from his own experiments? Such a thing must never happen to Christine, it was not safe for her to pursue her new life away from him!
It was with the intention to explain this to her that he knocked on the door of her room. She would surely be amenable to staying here with him in the interests of her safety. Yet there was no response. Erik waited, his ear to the door, and knocked again. Nothing. His heartbeat picked up as he considered all the dreadful calamities that might have befallen Christine behind that door - a deadly splinter, for example, or a horrid spider that caused her to faint, or perhaps she had dropped one of those heavy books on her head somehow - and it was with nothing but this worry that made him resolve to take the unthinkable step of entering her private room to check on her.
He only entered her room when she was not staying here, and even then only to clean it. She had been staying with him for several weeks now, so it had been some time since he'd seen her room, and he inwardly cringed at the thought of invading her privacy. He prepared to duck away from a thrown projectile if she happened to be fine and merely engaged in some womanly pursuit he was invading, but that would be the best thing, would it not? For no attack meant that Christine was not aware of his intrusion, which meant that Christine could be hurt or in trouble.
He carefully stepped forward and scanned the room, and immediately spotted his beautiful angel seated at the vanity desk. It appeared that she had repurposed it to a study desk, with stacks of books and a sheaf of paper along with an ink bottle and a set of pens. The love of his life was currently seated there, her head pillowed on one of the many books he'd brought her, blissfully asleep.
"Christine," Erik softly called, but she didn't stir. He stepped forward again, now fully in her room, and had to creep over a half built apparatus with wires and what looked like a cannibalized lamp to reach her desk. There was a sheet of paper next to her, and it appeared she'd fallen asleep writing it for there was a long inkblot stretching across the page and ending at the pen abandoned near her hand. He picked up the pen to ensure that no more ink ruined Christine's notes, and being so close to them it was only natural to read them. But he couldn't, or at least, he could only read very little of them.
His Christine had beautiful handwriting, and there written upon the page were familiar words - all scientific terms in French or Latin - interspersed with Swedish. He could not read Swedish, but admired the loops and curves of her native language and thought it was likely the most beautiful language in the world. But what was the purpose of this document?
There was a stack of pages all similarly formatted, and a brief perusal allowed him to make his guess. They were formatted with the scientific terms on one side and the Swedish words on the other - his darling girl had set out upon the task of making herself a dictionary. Truly Christine was a very wise and learned scholar, and he felt proud for a brief moment before remembering that she wanted to leave him, and linguists were not nearly as dangerous as chemists. How could he persuade her to stay if she wished to travel and write her dictionary, encountering nothing more dangerous than a badly translated text? Erik would learn Swedish if that would please her, but he doubted he'd learn it quickly enough for her to wait for him. This was an endeavour he would be wholly useless to her in, instead of merely inconvenient or not ideal.
For a moment he felt an urge to take her notes and burn them but then hated himself for the thought. His Christine was doing work she loved, and he hardly had the right to touch it, much less destroy it. So he settled for putting the pages back and returning his attention to the slumbering woman herself. It could not be a comfortable position to sleep in, so he began to consider how to best relocate her to her bed without waking her.
He moved to the bed to pull back the covers only to realize that her bed had been turned into a workspace of sorts. There was a dress torn apart on it, and sewing needles and thread and scissors scattered about one end. On the other it appeared that Christine had begun to deconstruct a parasol, but the wooden pieces were left lying about with sad bits of fabric still clinging to them in disarray. He hated to move her project, but where would she sleep if not the only bed in the house? So he carefully began the process of gathering up the various supplies and relocating them to different corners of the room, promising himself that he would buy her a work table and proper space for her endeavors. Maybe he could get away with placing them in the main room, or repurposing another room to be her workroom, so he could see her come out of her room occasionally. So lost was he in these plans for her new laboratory that he carelessly picked up the torn parasol, and a piece of wood clattered to the ground. He froze, and there was the most beautiful murmur in the world as Christine stirred and woke, then twisted around and saw him there.
"I was only… I apologize," Erik said, dropping the dratted parasol and holding up his hands in surrender. "I was concerned for you."
"Oh," said Christine, blinking rapidly. She still appeared woozy, but she attempted to stand and steadied herself at the desk. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was supper."
"No," Erik said, and she frowned at him. "It is not supper, I mean. That is, I could make supper for you if you desire. Allow me," he said, sweeping past her and making for the door. He'd almost escaped when her voice stopped him.
"Then why were you in here?"
"To check on you," he said, his shoulders hunched, as he stared at the door instead of her. "I was… Erik was concerned. You have not been outside your room for very long, and he…" He trailed off, his fears about her future chemist suitors suddenly seeming ridiculous, and not just because he now realized it was the linguists he had to worry about.
"Well, I'm fine," Christine said, and he nodded, risking a glance back at her. Her brow was furrowed but she did not seem angry, merely like she was confused, so he risked turning towards her and gesturing at her room.
"My dear, would I be able to assist you with any of this?" he asked. "Your bed should be for sleeping, and I can't help but notice that it is otherwise occupied. Would you-"
"No thank you," Christine said crisply, her expression turning into a frown. "It's not very gentlemanly of you to pry into a lady's private matters," she said, and he flinched and took a step back from her.
"I was only-" he began but she cut him off.
"I don't need your help, Erik," she said, each word feeling like the sting of a whip. "Nor do I want it. Now if that is all, I'll see you at dinner." She moved towards him as if to chase him out, and he took a step back as his mind spun.
"And we will have our music lesson after, yes?" he asked, and Christine sighed and nodded.
"Yes, we will," she said. "After dinner." With that dismissal Erik finally found himself outside her door, which was then slammed in his face. He stared at it for a long moment before turning and forcing himself to move towards the kitchen. The sooner he made supper the sooner he could see Christine again, even though the thought of her angry eyes made him feel hollow.
Perhaps if he made her a dish from Sweden it would make her happier, but it might remind her of faraway places she would like to visit. She had not asked to leave, but she clearly did not want Erik around her. How long would it be until she demanded her freedom from his presence forever?
Erik was very good at pretending. He had years of experience pretending to be a magician, a qualified architect, a phantom, and finally an angel, but also years of pretending that he was not lonely, that he was not scared, that he was not hopelessly in love. So now, as he began to chop the vegetables and prepare a stew, he pretended he couldn't see the looming end of his happiest days, when Christine would finally give up on their music and leave him.