38

The nights do not bring on sleep, even when Erik's body is its weariest of all. He should have left hours ago, long after finishing with Raoul, and yet he remains resting here beside him, in quiet darkness. It was not awkward as the first time was; fumbling hands, unspoken protests and crushing discomfort written across the Vicomte's face. No, Erik was gentler with him than before, with his hands, with his mouth, taking his time and considering the one beneath him before rushing into release.

Raoul sleeps heavily beside him now, as they always lie, with the soft skin of Raoul's back to Erik's front, grazing and velvet comfort. Erik might have smiled another day. He wore the poor thing out. He should smile, but he should have left hours ago, and still he remains. Naked, arms curled around Raoul with his head bent and his cheek pressed into the nape of the younger man's neck. He is crying, and no one and nothing can hear the deep sobs, silent and only coming as dry gasps from a scoured throat.

Erik does not disturb Raoul, but he cries his soul out onto the other man.

This was not meant to last. Such things as these, glimpses of untainted felicity, colors he never noticed before, the feel of another soul wanting him for all he his, love. These are things he was born to always want and never have, and with each sob that wracks and shudders along the length of his body it becomes more and more real. He cries into Raoul, moans, but it is so quiet it will never wake the boy from sleep. What will he think if he sees the Phantom now?

He releases Raoul's body, and he stirs, shivers, but does not wake. Erik reaches for his trousers, and steps tentatively out of the bed, pulling them over shaking legs. Fine black material, contrasting his white undershirt that he pulls over his head to combat the draft of the night. Without his warmth in the sheets Raoul whimpers, and pulls the blankets higher over his naked skin. Erik does not look back to the bed. He is leaving now, as he said he would.

He wanders his chambers for the thousandth time, narrow hallways, further descent into this place as it seems he ever has. At the end he comes to the black wooden door, heavy and made of his own hands. It swings slowly open.

Unveiled is the mirror, wide and cold and lifeless as the night, even as he appears before it and becomes part of it. Even to his own eyes he is pale, ashen, and seemingly thinner than he has been in a long while. A final meeting between them, as he slides a bare palm over the distortion of his reflection. Another hand, both, and it still is there, staring back at him. Always staring, this misshapen flesh, only half of his face. So small, so insignificant and unaffecting, and yet it rules entirely and indiscriminately over his fate. It decides where he will go, and what he will be, it devours his mastery and his majesty. He hates it, and such hate brings him to the point of a tearing pain within himself that forces tears from his eyes.

His teeth clench, lips dry and trembling around them, tracks of tears and saliva shining in the half light.

Erik remembers, as always in despair, being a boy and facing the hideousness of his image for the first time, knowing nothing of it, only that it was not part of the world he knew to be right, and that it had to be destroyed. And yet as he smashed at the mirror he knew then, deep down, that it was himself that he was destroying. That although the thing staring back that he could not seem to destroy, it was what he would despise for the rest of his days, and fear, and it would never go away. As it will not leave him now.

He smashes, fists crushing through and splitting, first one crack, then entire craters of fine obliterated glass. There is nothing he can ever or will ever control but this.

Why can you not change!

The sound comes back, returning into his senses loud and blaring, and pain, crashing earsplitting shrieks among the flying shards. His white sleeves splatter and stain with blood, hot, thick with odor and heavy as it slides down the remaining mirror. Old scars reopen. Erik screams, wordless, deep, guttural, and with one last slam into the broken mirror he lowers down onto the floor. His body shudders as it falls to his knees, and he sobs, loud and horrible and wrenching. His own blood runs from the deep slices in his forearms, into his mouth, over his tongue and mingling with the tears in his eyes.

Perhaps it will not be long now. His sobs slow into sorrowful, heavy whimpers, moans of a name over and over, pain dulls but he did not feel it to begin with. Erik inhales shallowly, and closes his eyes, breathing to calm himself. Shaking, trembling, he pulls himself to his feet and journeys back to where Raoul sleeps. On his way out, feeling weaker with every step, he opens the doors of his prison for the boy to make his exit.

Erik returns to find him still asleep, and he has changed positions now. Raoul is wrapped in the sheets, dreaming perhaps, something wonderful and far away from where he is now, though his arm is reaching toward a body no longer beside his.

Erik ignores the pain, and the blood that still runs, the draining of his life force, and comes to rest quietly beside him. He does not wish to disturb his dreams, not even to part with him properly. Raoul will find his freedom come morning, the only fitting gift Erik may ever give another human being.

Perhaps he will leave Paris after all.