The next day Gustave woke up rested but worried that he was losing his mind. Without doubt, he had been dreaming last night. What he had experiences, but mostly what thought he had seen, had been the product of his imagination and the consequence of his exhausted body and mind.

The day went on with nothing out of the ordinary. By the end of his rehearsals, Gustave had convinced himself that the events of last night had never occurred. He came into his room a rational man once again. His daughter was asleep already. Gustave poured himself a glass of tonic from his personal drawer.

"Good evening." A voice inside his own ear spoke.

Gustave almost dropped the glass to the floor. It was Erik. He had not dreamed their previous conversation. Erik had walked into the wall and now he was inside his head. There must be an explanation, Gustave thought to himself madly.

"Erik!" Gustave exclaimed

The voice now came from Erik's throat; he was standing in the corner of the room.

"You like to have big entrances and exits, do you not?" Gustave asked a little calmer.

"I try, yes."

"How did you…" Gustave started.

"I know a little magic." Erik answered knowing exactly what the question was.

"That wasn't a little magic. That was frightening." Gustave confessed.

"I have had a lot of practice over the years; there is not much to do when you spend your days alone."

Gustave understood what Erik meant; his had spent his own childhood practicing the violin while his parents worked the fields. They wanted him to become a great musician so that he could have a better future, but they did not notice that the boy felt lonely with them working all day.

"Is walking through walls another one of your tricks?" Gustave asked stirring his thought back to the present.

"No." Erik laughed. "There is a secret passage."

"Where?" Gustave asked walking over to the wall in question.

"Somewhere."

"You will not tell me where?"

"Not now."

Gustave was not happy with Erik's answer but he decided to accept it, for now.

"You asked me to wait for you, what for?" Erik wondered.

"I thought we could continue our conversation."

"Why?"

"You ask too many questions." Gustave mocked him.

Erik giggled and walked to one of the chairs next to the table. Gustave followed his action and did the same.

"Is the secret passage to this room the reason why you sing to Christine?"

"No. There are secret passages to all the rooms, to all the corners of this Opera house. My grandfather must have had a dark mind, he build an opera for his daughter but a labyrinth for himself." Erik joked

Gustave smiled.

"My grandfather was an architect." Erik informed Gustave.

"Maybe he wanted to have a way to get from one place to another without been noticed, to check on his work perhaps." He suggested.

Erik didn't answer and Gustave instantly knew they had reached the end of that topic.

"What did your father do?"

Gustave was met with dead silence for a while.

"My father was once a great architect himself. He met my mother through her father. They worked together, my grandfather and father."

Gustave said nothing, expecting Erik to continue his tale.

"When my mother died my father became another man. He drank and gambled until he had nothing else to lose. All the servants left our home. My tutors disappeared. He left for days in a row and locked me up in the library. That is how I learned about magic. There were books about everything in there. I learned many a things from that place."

The irony in his voice struck Gustave hard. Erik's childhood was not a happy one.

"Sometimes when he came back he brought friends with him." Erik continued. "My father displayed me as he would an animal. He used me for their entertainment. He showed my face for his friend's amusement, charging them to strike me with a stick." Erik's voice was cut, Gustave could her him sobbing.

Still the young man persisted.

"My father himself took pleasure in punishing me for being his son. I was his shame."

Gustave was sick to hear him say that. How can a man strike his own son?

"Your father has no excuse." He told Erik

"He is dead now. He was killed after they caught him trying to cheat in a hand of poker. I never really knew where he was buried. He had lost everything he had under his name. His money, the house, everything." Erik took a deep breath. "Because my mother had been an only child and my grandparents had died by then, I had no one to go to. I was sent to a distant relative of my father, and was treated no different from how my father had treated me. The only thing that kept me alive was their hope for keeping what my mother's father had left me."

"This Opera house?" Gustave wondered.

"Along with other things." Erik said. "Finally I offered to give them all the money in my grandfather's will, and his house, if they agreed to donate the opera house to the city of Paris, and arranging it so that I could live within it."

"I am guessing those bastards agreed." Gustave said angrily.

"Yes, they did." Erik said. "I have been here ever since."

"How long ago was this?"

"Four years ago."

"Don't mind me asking you Erik but, how old are you?"

Erik answered the harmless question.

"Nineteen."

Gustave breathed loudly and threw his head back. At such a young age Erik already knew the meaning of pain.

"You are so brave Erik. You experienced such pain and…" Gustave touched Erik's arm lightly.

Erik drew back sharply and turned his face away from Gustave. He seemed angry at Gustave's touch.

"Do not pity me." He said. "I did not ask for your pity."

Gustave grew angry himself at Erik's reaction.

"I do not pity you. I was attempting to on your courage to face life alone, but it seems that you are deaf to compliments. Therefore I must ask you to retire for the night; I need to go to sleep."

Erik was astounded by Gustave's answer.

"I thought…" he started, but he changed his mind. " I stayed only because you asked me to wait for you. You promised to tell me all about your life, and instead you tricked me into telling you mine."

"I am not the one who knows magic." Gustave said. "I did not trick you into anything. You told what you wanted me to hear."

Erik contemplated a few comebacks he could throw at Gustave but none appeared strong enough to sustain the man's truth. Erik had told him everything out of his own will.

"Besides," Gustave said." There is nothing else about me that you need to know. I told you everything last night."

"You told me nothing."

"That's because there is nothing to tell." Gustave finished.

"Still, you owe me. I told you my secrets, and I have nothing from you."

Gustave realized he had nothing to offer. All he possessed in this world were Christine and his music. His music…

"Perhaps I can repay your trust by teaching you to play the violin."

Erik smiled. Gustave was an honest man.

"We will be without debt after that … but this does not make us friends." Erik informed Gustave.

"Of course it doesn't." Gustave assured him smiling.

Later that night Erik stood awake wondering why he had opened up to Gustave. Why had he told Gustave everything, why? Now he knew his weakness, he would surely use it against him. Gustave would harm him just as everyone else had, Erik was sure of that.