Chapter Five: Sympathy, Tenderness

Erik's Point of View

I was trapped in my music, playing it with all the regret and rage in the world, unaware of anything. Why should I have been? I had lived in solitude forever with no one to gaze at me or marvel while I played. That is, until Leonora…

I first noticed her beauty. Her long, straight dark hair that fell around her face like a raven picture frame, capturing her pale skin and grey pools of eyes. Her eyes had a hurt and pleading look that captivated me as I suddenly realized who she was…

In my days of gazing at rehearsals, I noticed she was a chorus girl in the opera. Always alone or talking with a younger member of the company, she was very quiet and humble, yet was always continuously picked at for some reason which was not known to me then. For that reason, I knew that it was her whom I heard weeping earlier that day.

I took into the darkness like a mole as she tried to coax me out as if I were a young child. At that moment, I certainly had the mentality of one! I had covered my hideous face, afraid that I would frighten her, and was staring at her with fear as I closed myself up. I remembered how I had opened up my feelings to Christine and how it had turned out. I wanted nothing to do with anymore chorus girls.

Yet, in spite of my feelings, I heard her voice…So full of kindness as she complimented me on my music. I thanked her softly like an obedient child as she told me her name…Leonora.

It seemed the most sound in the world, as if all the beauty on Earth was wrapped into a name suitable for the girl who was branded with it. I felt ashamed to tell her my name, for some reason I could not describe. Erik, a name I never paid much attention to, suddenly sounded harsh and ugly…

But then again, I had known beauty. Who was to say that she was not the same as all the others? Those who had rejected me, laughed at me…

But, she had, too, been rejected. She told me of a ballerina who had made fun of her because of her leg and I automatically felt anger for that unknown person. My mind raced back to the fairground as I watched, helplessly as the people around me jeered at me…

Suddenly, she asked about my face. She knew it was deformed, the way I hid it from her like a silly childish game. But, she surely knew of deformities…I opened the gate to allow her in and watched as she gazed around like she was in a sort of mystical new world. She noticed the miniature model of the opera house and picked up the figure that represented her. From far away, she had been a lonely, boring girl, and that was how I made the figure. I was afraid she'd be offended but, to my surprise, she just gaped at it in amazement, looking thankful that I had taken the time to even think of her…

She told me of her life. Her disapproving parents who had abandoned her on the steps of the opera…her loneliness and the extreme dislike for the new patron who "loved her." I had been around enough to know his name-Robert Gounod. He reminded me of a certain other patron…

Then, she asked to see my face. I thought I would lose any hope of a friendship forever, but I obeyed. As I stepped into the light, I was a little surprised to not see her flinch or even utter a small gasp as she studied my face.

Suddenly, before I could move away in fear, she flung her arms around me and embraced me. It was as if my face was so deformed, she summoned up all of her courage to show me a gesture of compassion.

She lingered there, listening as I played. She was so quiet and concentrated; I had to look up at her every so often to make sure she wasn't asleep. She asked me about a sheet of music that she held; the piece Christine and I sang together before she unmasked me before the entire society. I tried to avoid the fact that I had murdered numerous people to try and win her heart, knowing that Leonora would probably start to wander towards the gate, nervously.

Then I saw her leg.

It was deformed, no doubt, as if melted like candle wax. Beneath the thin layer of skin stretched to cover it, I could see her blood and tiny veins. Or was it just the skin? The skin was also that same scarred red as my face, with little cuts and scabs upon it like someone had been kicking her. She noticed me staring and I stopped, remembering how bad I felt when people stared at me.

Eventually, she left, leaving me alone with my thoughts and my impression of her. She was kind to me, looking upon me as if I were a normal human being. Her compassion told me that there was hope for friendship. Her leg told me that I was not the only person in the world who was deformed. It was so strange to me, seeing another with a deformity, because I had really never seen one before. I always felt like I was another creature entirely due to the distortion of my face. It was nice to know that there was a person I could relate to, with each of us knowing the pain.

She would visit every night and, while the rest of the company wandered in their dreams, we would talk. She usually just sat in a small chair and listened to me play the organ. She was quiet and would often wander into a deep trance as the music flowed into her ears and I would catch myself staring at her in a strange curiosity.

"Robert is harmless," she told me one night when I asked about him. Her tone had me convinced but her face showed a strange expression that kept me wondering. "He's just a silly boy that likes me." She laughed softly and looked away towards a candle, studying its dancing flame.

"Why wouldn't he?" I felt myself say. I meant it, but I couldn't handle her reaction as she looked up at me with blush entering her cheeks. I wanted to smile but my eyes retreated to the score like an embarrassed child and when I tried to play, my hands became unreasonable and began to play wrong chords and notes, causing her to laugh as I cringed at the sound.

I found myself in the deserted Box Five during rehearsals. I would have watched from the rafters but they had hired many stagehands in fear of my return and I surely would have been caught.

My gaze would continuously fall upon her as I watched her sing and dance across the stage, her dark hair flowing majestically behind her. I had noticed something since our first meeting; her once gloomy grey eyes now sparkled with enthusiasm and seemed carefree to what the others might have said about her deformity. If a company member would mock her distortion, she just stood there and took the verbal beating as if it were a compliment instead of sobbing offstage and locking herself in her dressing room.

The patron would also watch form an isle way, crossing his arms in thought. He had left her alone since my first meeting with Leonora and merely studied her from onstage. I felt an emotion that I had long since deserted descend upon me as the female dancers would perform sensual numbers with shorter skirts and bare shoulders. I knew he was watching her and as much as I thought, I knew that there was nothing that I could do about it. I had finally unmasked that emotion.

Jealousy.

I clutched the box's curtain for support and huddled into the shadows, closing my eyes. All I saw was her. I ran my hands down my face and sank to the floor with my legs pressed to my chest like a type of armor that would protect me from my feelings that I could not escape from.

We had both found a friend. Yet I was found confessing to myself that felt much more for her.

I was in love. Again. Yet, this time it was pure and innocent. But, I remind myself, who would ever love a man once called the living corpse, with a deformity or not. Surely, not Leonora...could she?...

A/N- Next chapter-Leonora's feelings point of view on Erik and the patron…Jerry! Jerry!

R&R!