N/A: I hope you all liked Chapter One. I still intend to spread the rest of the chapters out quite a bit. But considering I got no reviews yet for Chapter One, I was wondering if it was because my lovely readers might need more stuff to give feedback on? I thrive on reviews guys, you all know this. LOL. Here's hoping that even if this isn't an incentive to give some, you at least find it a nice read to stave off quarantine boredom!
Chapter Two: Disharmony
Erik was trembling violently as the sounds of applause slowly faded and the massive crowd in front of him began to disperse. People were still offering money; throwing it onto the stage at his feet. The sun overhead was small and white, and although it was very hot out for that time of year, Erik felt cold right down into the very center of his bones.
He hated this. Hated the feeling that he had absolutely no choice but to remove his mask at the end of every performance. He wished he could truly rip every single person that gawked at his corpse-like visage into tiny little pieces of viscera. But how was he ever supposed to refuse such a massive crowd? They would surely mob him! He had found out the hard way – while still in his cage, and then before he'd become such a popular attraction in their little camp – that refusing to give the audience what they wanted could end in nothing but pain and further degradation.
Bella did not like him unmasking himself, either. Only the previous night, she had admitted wishing that his face was a secret only she knew. She liked the idea of being the only one privy to such a very special trust and secret. Having to share him with the crowd in that way made her feel a little nauseous. She had kept trying to insist that if Erik did not want to take off his mask, there was no longer a single member of the tribe who would force him to do so. He was a married man, a free man of the tribe. He owed no one anything anymore - except to help pitch into the fortune of the tribe as a whole the way they all did.
"I will be performing again in one half hour!" he announced, hoping some would come back or spread this news to other potential paying customers. It was only as he slipped the mask back over his face that he realized Arabella was standing nearby. She'd been towards the front of the crowd the entire time, no doubt, but he simply hadn't been paying a great deal of attention. A juvenile tree – certainly ten or thirteen years old but neither enormous nor a sapling - had blocked her mostly from view. Now he saw her there; wearing some very familiar canary yellow fabric from head to ankle. As was the case with many gypsies, Bella was barefoot in fair weather because shoes were so expensive. But, unlike how she dressed when not performing, her yellow vest was cut low and made a little too tight. It allowed her body to be shown off just a little more than usual without being scandalous or too inviting. A dicklo covered the top of her head and was tied beneath her hair in back.
She was wearing a performance dress embroidered in bright red flowers and dark green vines. She had been working on it since the fever had broken – from time to time, at least. It was quite good, and Erik realized now that she could easily have been a seamstress in a city. Perhaps not a highly paid one, but she was skilled just enough to show promise. For the briefest of seconds he imagined her sitting in the back of a shop working on some fine ladies' ballgown for the first party of the social season, and almost smiled.
Instead he scowled. In the days since Arabella had started helping her grandmother for part of every day, they had not once spoken of her returning to her usual work.
"What are you doing?" he asked her, his voice low and half-furious. He reminded himself not to snap at her. He was still riled up from having to show his face to that hateful crowd. Bella had no doubt been there to witness his terrible humiliation, and as upset as that made him he could not take out his frustration on her because of a more mundane annoyance. Color suffused his face, and he was glad he again wore the mask.
Bella stepped up to the edge of the stage, her fingertips tracing the veins in the wood.
"I want to dance." she told him simply, keeping her eyes demurely lowered.
He did not want her to dance. It felt much too soon after her injury and infection. He wanted her to remain unoccupied with such strain for the rest of her life! He didn't want her to perform anymore as he was forced to do. For her to … whore herself out in the way that she'd had to since childhood.
He would never think of Bella as such a horrible wretched creature. But the way men looked at her when she danced... he'd often felt as if they were assaulting her with their eyes. It seemed like too much of a temptation, as if her beauty and exotic skills were drawing men in and offering more than they should ever be allowed to have. It was not her fault for being so beautiful. Not her fault that even her husband had to force himself to look away just to keep himself under control.
"You are not ready for that." Erik managed quietly, forcing his voice into tranquility and confidence without sounding overbearing or forbidding. He tried to sound caring and concerned.
"We can dance something simple." Bella offered. "I will not Flamenco at all … just a traditional gypsy dance. Some footwork and skirt waving. Please?"
Bella finally looked up at him and Erik felt gut-punched. She had such stunningly beautiful eyes. So innocent but so alluring and guileless ... Those eyes were absolutely pleading. His wife was bored senseless; restless because she did not use up half the energy she was used to expelling every day before.
Why did he feel he had to always give into her? He always had to give Arabella everything she wanted in spite of his own feelings. He could never ask for anything; could never get what he wanted. He would never even dare try! But every day he offered Bella more and more concessions. Why?
"A slow dance..." he echoed carefully. "Just one dance today?"
The way her eyes lit up with hope put pressure on the tightness already in his gut.
"I'll accept just one slower dance." she acknowledged. "Please, Erik? You have been calling to me with your music every single day! I can't ignore it anymore!"
Erik scoffed scornfully. Why did she act as if he were a siren with his music? People sometimes reacted strongly to his singing or playing. Bella very strongly, like his mother. But he was not attempting to do anything when he performed – unless he wanted to vent his rage to the audience after unmasking himself. That was just venting, though. It had nothing at all to do with what he was trying to make the audience feel. He just … let his rage show. He did not understand her overactive imagination insisting that he regularly drew her closer and closer with his compositions - not even just his own compositions. Sometimes she said his performance of other people's more popular music drew her in or made her feel a certain way.
"All right." he conceded. As long as she kept to her word and danced carefully without harming herself, he would give in. Especially since part of him missed watching her dance just as much as she missed it. "One dance."
As he prepared for the performance – changing from magicians robes and full head mask into something that would make playing his violin a bit easier – he considered the simply vicious option of punishing her for pushing so hard. If she wanted to dance, he could easily play music that would make her move too much. He could play until her body ached and begged for surcease. But that truly would be cruel. Instead he would watch very carefully to make certain that she didn't strain herself. At the first sign of pain, he would end the performance whether the audience liked it or not!
She was out of practice. But even stiff and mechanical, Bella still managed to dance beautifully for such a simple song. For such simple movements. Her feet played across the stage as lightly as a feather, and made up for any other shortcomings. She showed no signs of pain until it was over, and then she just pressed the tips of her fingers into a spot under her right breast as if she'd gotten an annoying cramp. It was slight discomfort on her face – not pain. It was not too worrisome.
Afterwards, when the coins were still flying through the air at their feet, Arabella smiled and flung her arms about Erik. He was so stunned she would do this in public that he nearly stumbled with the violin and bow held out to the side in one hand. He did not embrace her back, but withstood the happiness she exuded until it was over. He did not know how to handle public displays of affection. He barely knew how to handle private ones.
"Let's stop for the day." she encouraged as he stared down at her in a stunned silence that made him feel as if his vocal chords had become paralyzed. When Bella hugged, she did not just put an arm around his shoulder and give a brief harmless squeeze. She tended to hug with nearly her entire body, and the way he reacted never made him feel comfortable. Especially in public. "I feel like I haven't bathed at all since the wedding. Let's go into the woods. We'll find the river and bathe. I'll get a little laundry done."
Of course Bella wouldn't want to go in the dark. She could withstand the dark bravely, but was always afraid of it. This had only gotten worse after Adnah had attacked her in spite of the attack occurring during the day. Now she was even leery of the forest, and never wanted to go out there on her own. Her injury wouldn't have let her travel long distances recently; but before the Spanish festival when she'd found out about the baby, she had often gone into the woods with a group of other women to bathe and wash laundry.
Erik did not want to tell her to go alone, knowing how afraid she was even in daylight. He was so protective of her, he doubted he could have let her go alone even if she was absolutely confident in her own safety. But he wouldn't try to find another woman to go with her when she'd asked him in particular. Obviously Bella was seeking some kind of private time with him that he found unnecessary and questionable. Why him, after all she'd endured? How could she trust a man to be alone with her when she was undressed and bathing? She would be so vulnerable!
As if her hug hadn't been enough, the thought of standing close by and acting as guard while she bathed naked in the deep river he knew to be nearby put his entire body into near paroxysms of frustrated agony. How could he deal with being so close to the wife he absolutely adored in such a state without giving into the demon inside him? How could he tame it before she noticed?
"I owe the audience at least two more performances. They were already announced." Erik hedged slowly. "But I will perform them early enough that we can go to the river and return by twilight's end. All right?"
Like the dutiful wife who tried desperately not to push him for fear of finding out the monster he really could be, Bella agreed. Erik was plagued with frustration and guilt all day, and things were only made worse by their time at the river. On the walk she asked him about what he'd wanted to be in the gaje world, before choosing the Romany way of existence. He didn't point out how he hadn't exactly chosen the gypsy way. That it had chosen him and taken him by force; and he'd only gone along because of her. Instead he explained how he had once dreamed of being an architect.
"Foolish, really." he'd muttered angrily. "I was a stupid little boy who thought the world would actually let him build beautiful things."
"Why can't you be an architect?" Bella demanded, a line forming between her brows in defiant consternation. "If you want to make buildings, Erik, there is nothing to stop you!"
"God, I love your naive optimism." he shook his head with a heavy sigh. "There isn't a man alive on this Earth who would accept a masked man on his building site, Bella. No contracts, no jobs. Not for a freak like me."
"But that's ridiculous! I bet you would be brilliant, just like you are at everything else!"
Erik chose not to argue. Thinking about his spoiled dreams and his misled youth only enraged him further. Instead he turned his back to the river as she began to undress, touching the knife at his hip, only one of the weapons he'd brought for protection. He also held a small hatchet loosely down at his other side. Although he doubted it would be terribly practical, it was a weapon. Besides, he could use it to chop firewood while she bathed.
When Arabella was done and stood drenched in a simple dress that was soaking in the river water – for she'd brought nothing to dry off in – Erik quickly excused himself to go bathe and wash clothes that hadn't been laundered in over a month. The brief sight of her dress clinging to her had added fuel to an inner fire he wished would just remain extinguished.
They'd returned to camp afterwards, both of them keeping their eyes straight ahead to avoid admitting their clothes had gotten quite clingy or transparent. Arabella went to Tsifia's tent to see how the stew the two women had made together that morning was coming along. It was made out of the leftover meat from a deer one of the Rom men had killed two days before.
Erik spent a few precious minutes alone in the tsera, fighting the urge to take care of his disgusting body's demands, and instead looked over the score to an operetta he'd begun composing since his wedding day that hadn't gotten much added to it since Bella's miscarriage. Then he went, as he did every night as of late, to join the women.
"... arrogant." Tsifia was telling Bella. "I know you're both young, Bella, but he can be just a bit insufferable. He's forgetting respect for his elders, ignoring those around him – including you – if they do not fit into what he wants to see, know, or do! Remind that boy that you are his wife.. Not his child. Not his sister-"
"Bunica!" Bella hissed, seeing Erik arrive over her grandmothers' shoulder. Tsifia paused, looking over at Erik and nodding to invite him closer.
"Come and eat, Erik." she invited, as if she had not just been absolutely insulting him.
I am the one bringing all the customers to the camp! Erik thought with the typical umbrage of all adolescent boys. Without me they would be where they were before! Practically starving to death with a scoundrel – two scoundrels! - in their midst! I have helped patch tsera's, fixed wagons, brought back food that no one else could have acquired without getting caught... And she calls me ungrateful and arrogant!?
"No." Erik decided coolly. "I'm actually quite tired. I think I will go to bed early."
He nodded briefly to Tsifia, then bowed more deeply to poor Bella. She was so flustered. He wondered if she were embarrassed, frightened, or both.
She can't be afraid of me! What have Iever done to her?
He turned and stalked back to their tent, fully aware that Bella was following close behind. She did not speak, however, until they were alone in the relative privacy of their own canvas walls.
"Erik!" she pleaded quietly. "Erik, don't be angry!"
He could not take it. He rounded on her so quickly that in spite of the feet separating them, she back-pedaled and almost lost her balance. She caught herself before falling back out through the door flap rippling behind her. Erik made no violent move towards her. He let her catch herself and talked right over her fear.
"Don't be angry at what, Bella?" he demanded. "That we live in this squalid little tent? That I am a homeless beggar? That I do everything – everything – I can to make you happy and make peace with your people … and yet everyone still hates me?"
"That is not true!" Bella objected. "We don't hate you!"
Erik took in a slow deep breath in order to gain some semblance of control over himself.
"No, Bella, you do not hate me." he acknowledged. "God knows why, but you love me. As for the rest of them, I am always going to be the unwanted outsider! It doesn't matter where I go or what I try to do! I am still stuck in this … this ..."
He could not find the right words to express his desperate hatred of his living situation.
"I cannot provide properly for you!" he finally managed to shift his focus slightly. "I should have a proper job and a proper house. Some place with real walls and locks, glass windows and just a bit of privacy! Instead I am watched day and night. By the others, by you... I am never alone except when I go into the woods to relieve myself! I piss and shit in the woods like an animal; and I lie in my cot at night while just outside other people rut like animals out in the open!"
"What are you talking about?" Bella demanded. "Yasmina and Benjamin? I … all right. I agree. Perhaps they should show a little more restraint for a couple that has been married for eight years. But what else are they to do, Erik? They do their best to find shadows! They live with three children! They just want a little privacy, too!"
"They can hardly expect to have privacy just outside of our home!" Erik burst out."As you said, they already have three children! How many children can they possibly want in this poverty? What they do is pure animal lust and nothing a dutiful wife and husband ought to be doing!"
Erik was breathing heavily now, feeling on the verge of tears. The only reason that he berated the absent Benjamin and Yasmina was because they shared something he knew he could never really have. He never expected Bella to lie with him in bed. To share passion or make children. Honestly the thought of having children that would depend on him was utterly terrifying! It was not that his wife would deny him … she would no doubt be a very dutiful and accepting wife.
But how could he put her through his perversions? After all she'd been through!?
These were thoughts he could not get out of his mind. No matter how hard he tried.
As he fought to catch his breath, he realized that Arabella was staring at him blankly in shock. Somehow, his ranting had lost her. She did not understand what he'd just said.
"Erik..." she finally began, trying to put her thoughts in order. "Whether they are being rude by bringing us into their excursions by choosing our tsera to make love behind … they are only expressing love for each other."
"There are other ways to express love." Erik waved vaguely to where he kept all his music. "The music I have written for you when we perform, that is one way. How you dance for me sometimes... Perhaps not everyone can be a musician, but everyone has talents that could lend to that. Even taking special care when laundering a favorite shirt! They don't need to be such beasts and … and fornicate outside of a marriage's proper duty!"
Bella shook her head, again looking confused, and wounded.
Oh, what have I said now?
"You think love making is only for the creation of children?" she whispered. "Erik … you … you don't want children."
Erik froze for a moment, stumbling over the fact that this was what stung her so badly. He'd known Arabella had not wanted to lose her daughter, but he had thought she was willing to accept his fear of having a child of his own. Willing to live with just the two of them. Why had she said nothing before now?
"We are too young to worry about such things." he offered, trying to hedge around the issue; as he always did. "I realize that to your people we are adults and-"
"-Erik, to my people we can't even call one another husband and wife yet!" Bella interrupted. "Not officially! We would live in your parents tsera until our first child was born if you were Romany. I know you are not, and I understand you don't want children just now... but … but we..."
Erik balled his hands into fists at his sides until he realized Arabella had noticed and was tense with fear. He forced his fingers to uncurl, and shook his wrists to loosen them further. But the wound she'd dealt him still brought more anger than he'd ever felt towards her before.
"I am sorry I am not the Rom you want." he spat.
Bella shook her head wildly, holding her hands out in an attempt to bring peace.
"No, Erik, I don't mean that!" she pleaded. "I just … I … I didn't realize you felt that way about... about that. Even with what dadrus did to me... I don't think that making love is wrong. It's not just for … for procreation."
It was such a fancy word for her, but it was one he'd had to use in their recent lessons. It still made them both blush and shift uncomfortably.
"I do not know what you expect from me!" Bella insisted.
Erik felt as if the air had been sucked out of his lungs. His entire body sagged, and slowly, helplessly, he finally removed his silk mask and put it gently aside. According to their agreement upon the first day of their marriage, he should have taken it off instantly upon entering the tent.
"Bella... I do not expect anything of you." he told her quietly, as tenderly as he could. "That I can call you my wife is more than I ever expected to have. All I ask is that you are faithful. Or at least … at least tell me beforehand if you ever want to betray me."
Her entire body jerked, and again Erik knew he'd said the entirely wrong thing. He was always saying the wrong thing. How? He was only being honest! Not accusing her of anything, or insinuating her to be any particular way!
"What about my expectations?" she finally asked him heatedly, her voice low and urgent.
Automatically, Erik stepped closer to her; but his steps felt heavy. Like he was moving up river against a white-water current.
"What is it you want?" he asked, always feeling obliged to give her anything she wanted to the best of his ability. He had promised to be a good husband for her, and he always tried to be. But every day it felt like more and more of a burden. How was he ever going to make her happy?
Arabella was quiet for so long that he felt his agitation rise again. He felt like shouting at her. Like threatening to withhold whatever she requested if she didn't hurry up and tell him. But when he thought that, his own mothers' voice doing exactly that rang in his head, and he knew he could not do that to Bella.
"Tell me, ma belle..." he encouraged in a much gentler voice than he'd managed since her performance that morning.
She bit on her lower lip. He'd noticed her doing that a great deal more often as of late. If she didn't stop, she would bite her lip clean off soon enough.
"Someday – not now but someday - I want a complete marriage." she whispered.
Erik flinched, and he found himself unable to look at her anymore. He turned his face, then his entire body, away. It was easier to think when he didn't look into her face... her beautiful eyes.
She wanted a real marriage. She wanted to consummate their marriage and produce children. But how could he do that? He was a homeless street performer. A child of theirs would have no country. No house to call home. They would live at greater risk than most dirt-poor gaje ever could. The road was very hard on little ones. She could miscarry a dozen times, lose more babies in childbirth or in infancy. How could he risk doing that to both of them? How could he have any pride raising a child that survived when he couldn't provide them with what they deserved?
Bella was waiting, and Erik forced himself to nod.
"Maybe later... when we are older. When you are completely better." he offered. A maybe was not a committed promise. A 'maybe' was safe.
Again, he knew he had said the wrong thing. Bella's body slumped, and she nodded. Not in agreement, but … surrender. He watched helplessly as she turned away and sat on the edge of their cot. Her head bent and she put her face miserably into her hands.
"Do you regret choosing me?" she asked through her fingers. He could see her shoulders were quivering, and instantly he was at her side on his knees. He would have reached out to comfort her, but was afraid touching her would only upset her more. Her voice was so frail and broken, he wondered if she was finally feeling the full extent of her injury for the first time since actually harming herself. But that wasn't a fair thought at all, and he knew it. This was not a physical exhaustion or pain. Not even remotely.
"No!" he assured. "Never, ma belle. Never!" He sighed heavily. "I just... I barely know who I am now. I was not raised in a gypsy camp. I did not ask to be taken captive by your people. I know many of them have tried very hard to get along with me and make me feel welcome. I know you love me. But I still feel lost here. I feel like a whore selling myself to the crowds every day. Exposing what I hate most about myself."
She flinched at the word 'whore', but he had known she would. For years her father had called her that horrible thing. It was a sensitive word. But he'd been unable to think of a better one to express his frustration.
"I fell into being a performer here. I love playing the violin and singing for you. But now I don't feel comfortable when you dance with me anymore. I'm too on edge about you re-injuring yourself. Or getting ill again. I am so frustrated all of the time, and barely know why. I barely know who I am, ma belle. Can you understand that? I … I feel like I need to spend time on my own. To discover who I am away from my mother. Away from this … this freak show I have been forced into being part of. If I could just find myself … maybe I could do better by you. I could give you all the things you want and need. I could make peace with everything."
Bella looked at him, and he recoiled slightly to find tears were smeared all over her cheeks.
"On your own?" she echoed in bewilderment. "What do you mean? Where would you go? For how long?"
Erik finally reached up and brushed his thumbs along her cheeks and under her eyes. When that failed to dry her skin, he reached for a discarded dicklo and mopped at her face as gently as he could.
"I don't know." he admitted. "I couldn't return to France. I can't stay in Spain or go with the tribe to Portugal. Too many people know of The Living Corpse there now. My reputation is too vast. I … I think I'd have to go to..." He thought seriously. "Maybe I would go to Italy. I could visit the great ancient buildings there. See the beauty of them for myself as I never thought I could. Maybe while I'm traveling I can figure this all out."
He could pick pockets to survive, and of course perform. There was no use wasting his talents as a performer. But without traveling as part of an entire group, he could save what money he earned instead of sharing it. That would help him get by much better.
"But I can't leave bunica, Erik." Bella was almost whining in despair. "I know she says she is strong and doesn't need me. I know that she would survive if I left. But we're the only blood family either of us has left!"
"I know." Erik assured gently. This time, he felt absolutely no anger towards her honesty in the least. He admired Tsifia greatly. He fully understood Bella's connection to her grandmother and was often jealous of it. "I do not ask you to join me. Truly, Bella... taking you with me would only hold me back."
She opened her mouth to object, more pain in her eyes, but he shook his head.
"Arabella..." he insisted gently. "I want you to stay with Tsifia while I am gone. I can leave in the morning so that no one else has to keep suffering. I tried to keep my stupid black moods from hurting anyone, but it's clear I've failed miserably. I'm failing you, Bella. And I can't keep doing that. Better to go now, alone, and find what I need to."
He could no longer keep up with the tears running down her cheeks, and he pulled her into his arms for the first time in weeks. It was the first real embrace he'd given her, and he did not flinch when she clung to him in return. He brushed his malformed lips across her hair, stroked the long dark tresses, and rocked her.
"Keep this tent for yourself." he whispered. "Or live with Tsifia, if that makes you happier. Be your own independent self, too. Find who you are. Without my influence or that of any other overbearing jackass of a man. Just give me time, Bella. Please... and know that I'm not leavingyou. You're my wife. I'm your husband. I will remain true to that. And I know how to find you when I'm ready."
"H-how long … do you think?" Bella whimpered.
She was weakening. He could feel her muscles shuddering and going limp. Erik quickly shifted them so he lie on the cot holding her against him. For once, his body was not tortured by having hers against it.
"I don't know." he breathed honestly. "I don't know, Bella... But I will come back to you. I swear on my life that I will come back to you. No matter what my answer about a complete marriage orchildren or anything else is. I'm coming back. Because I have you to come back to. ...If you will still have me by then."