WOW!
O.o
Now how many reviews is THAT, hm?
A LOT!
Knew I said I would update TWO DAYS AGO, alas, school and piano got in the way!
BUT….
I think you'll like this chapter….FINALLY, ERIK! Almost THIS ENTIRE CHAPTER IS!
Might be a little serious, though…
Don't worry; the next one will be absolutely hee-larious! Me 'n EriannaAbyss have made sure of that!
BE SURE TO CHECK OUT EriannaAbyss's PHANTASTIQUE STORY "BLIND EXTENTIALISM", IT IS TOO AWESOME!
WoOt!
You know; after I finish school and everything, go on a Phantom of the Opera/Labyrinth/InuYasha/PoTO/Labyrinth/Inuyasha/PHANTOM OF THE OPERA frenzy.
I'm entitled to one of those, am I not?
Oh, and I'm using ALWs 2004 movie Christine, because I just want it to be that way! I know in Leroux she was BLONDE…
Oh my gosh, I think that's where the term 'dumb blonde' came from!
Now, without further ado, Chapter Ten! It's a very long one, only because I couldn't find a good place to stop! But don't worry, there's an awesome cliffhanger to keep you guys on your toes! I am so evil. :maniacal laughter played on gramophone:
The Haunted Mansion Part Two!
All of a sudden, the cat shot from the redhead's gentle hold, speeding along the path. She turned around and fixed her gaze on the freshman, her tail thumping lazily on the gravel.
Christine's eyebrows furrowed. "You want me to follow you?" she asked, getting up from the black bench.
She could have sworn the cat nodded at her.
Erik didn't wake until after noon, feeling refreshed and ready to face his betrayer's progeny. All signs of self-pity had vanished, leaving in their wake a man with a craving for a good baguette or two. A bit stiff after a night in the hard, merciless casket, he made his way down a flight of stairs leading to the second floor kitchen. He placed a hand on one of the brass candlelit sconces lining the dark and shadowy staircase, causing a hidden door to appear, which led to the second floor breakfast area. His main bedroom was on the fifth level above the house, but he had numerous ones in the basement levels.
It turns out that the 'haunted' Lavonne mansion had much more than met the eye. It had twelve stories, seven above ground and five below, unusual for a house, even one in New Orleans, stone gargoyles and angels guarding it, more rooms than he could count, and one of his personal favorites, the thousands of secret passageways found all over the house. There was a kitchen on almost every floor, elaborately decorated rooms with seemingly no purpose. Now, they were overfilled with the contents of his past travels, his old lairs. A collection of Punjab lassos hung upon the walls of one room on the fourth floor above ground, numerous trap doors littered the house, just in case. Somehow, he had managed to fill almost every room of the house with music scores, small libraries, some were full of costumes from previous Operas, mask collections, and at least seventy different bedrooms, of which he had no use for, but they were nice, so Erik decided not to mess with them.
You never know when you could have surprise guests, Don Juan had said once.
Although I doubt we will have a whole army of them, the rational Erik had replied.
But, his preferred part of the mansion would always be the roof. Like the rest of the house, it was majestic, monolithic deities and demons forever trapped in their stone prisons as they looked out coldly over the garden and the rest of New Orleans. He could see the newly built high school in the distance, the roofs of the Victorian neighborhood, and the hazy skyscrapers in the distance.
He found himself remembering exactly how he had come to this place in America, how he had met the young girl Christine, how she had danced with him just the night before. She was strange; intriguing….but she already had someone. She already had a lover, he thought with undisguised disgust as he thought about the night before…
(Long flashback here, sorry! But it had to be done!)
Night of the parade:
The man who once signed his letters 'O.G.' stood for a long moment staring after the enigmatic redhead as she raced off, hiking her maroon skirts up as she ran and disappeared into the crowd of spectators still clicking away furiously on their cameras. He saw her head of copper curls bob up and down, a beacon of light in the swirls of blacks, oranges, greens, golds and purples.
Don Juan set off after his Aminta; following her all the way back to her house in the quaint neighborhood of restored Victorian houses. He watched as the descendant of his lost love and betrayer scurried up the great magnolia tree onto her balcony with ease, the full skirts of her costume hardly being a hindrance as she climbed. The girl Christine slipped into her room, the lightweight curtains billowing in the breeze as she disappeared into the bowels of her bedroom.
Erik quickly scaled the tree, but paused at the branch leading to the balcony, his eye catching on a flash of white. He heard water rushing somewhere in the background coming from the girl's room, presumably from the shower, as he stared at the magnolia blossom, marveling at its beautiful perfection.
And Erik seemed to have a habit of loving beautiful things…even when they did not love him back.
The former Phantom gently plucked the bloom from its place, handling it delicately as not to tear its soft, velvety petals. He slid off the branch and stepped silently onto the balcony just as the young girl burst out of her bathroom and plopped down in her computer chair, using a dark blue fluffy towel to dry her hair as she waited for the sign on screen to come on. He heard her mutter not so quietly about someone not being online again, and that she'd call him tomorrow.
A small pang of jealousy hit him, and he wondered why he had the almost uncontrollable urge to strangle whoever she was talking about. Then he realized that he was starting to crush the magnolia in his hands and all the bloodlust immediately froze in his veins.
Why am I acting this way? I have no reason to! Whoever she decides to be with should not be my problem, a part of him said.
But you know no one can ever be good enough for her, another voice, his inner passionate Don Juan replied in a heated voice. Not even you.
Just shut it, Donny boy! The first voice snapped.
I'm just saying that no boy deserves her, she's just too special, too amazing, even at her age… just like no one deserved my Christine…Don Juan said.
She wasn't your Christine to begin with! His newer, rational part of his mind cried; the part that showed up after the whole affair that got him into this whole eternal life business. It was Don Juan who got him into this mess, the perfect lover, the perfect man residing in the depths of Erik's mind, the one who fell in love and lived happily ever after. Everything Erik could not be; everything he wasn't.
He saw the girl get up from the laptop on her desk and come towards the balcony window. Erik pushed himself deeper into the shadows outside she gazed for a long moment at the quarter moon shining high above the houses, standing at the point where balcony met room, hands on the brass door handles. Her face was mixed with emotion as the pale light washed over her delicate features; bliss, suppressed anxiety, and wonder were the most prominent, even on just the left side of her profile. Christine sighed deeply and closed the in swinging glass balcony doors quietly before slipping under the purple covers of her bed.
Erik stayed outside until he was sure the girl was fast asleep and still clasping the magnolia blossom in one hand noiselessly opened the French doors, which swung into the room quietly, the sudden breeze making the white gauzy curtains ruffle. He padded over to where the girl slept peacefully, a soft smile gracing her claret lips. Erik took the time now to truly look at the girl, something he had done earlier, but now it was a whole different story. Now she wasn't talking, her eyes weren't lit with the seemingly eternal blaze as they were when she was awake, now her face wasn't nearly as expressive.
And why can't I bring myself to hurt her? She deserves it! No, no! It's not her fault I was cursed! The two voices battled against each other, but the man just shook them both off and peered closer behind his black half mask, taking in every bit of the girl, then suddenly staggered back, unable to breathe.
Did she know how much she looked like her?
It was true; he could have almost mistaken this Christine for the one who had betrayed him. If only her hair were the luxurious chestnut he had always wanted to entangle his hands in…
He set the magnolia blossom gently down onto the sleeping girl's bedside table and fled, taking care to close the balcony doors before swiftly descending the tree and making his way back to his mansion less than fifteen blocks away.
He couldn't sleep that night; no matter how hard he tried, the blissful darkness wouldn't overtake him. Instead, he settled for a night of furiously pounding away on his pipe organ until his fingers were raw and bleeding. All the pain and anguish and anger he had kept inside for so long came out in his playing, but each time he started one of his newer compositions, he kept unconsciously reverting back to pieces from Don Juan Triumphant, frustrating him even more, until he finally slumped over, then jumped right up again as he remembered the young Chagny girl's invitation to see his musical, or rather, the one based on his life.
Would he go? Why wouldn't he? He planned on going sometime anyway, why not now?
Are you sure it's not just a pathetic excuse to be close to Christine again? The wicked rational voice whispered.
Of course not! Don Juan denied vehemently.
Erik ignored the pesky voices that were now quarreling yet again, and crept upstairs to his coffin after taking his black half mask off. Of course he had a bed in his room, but the moment called for some self-depreciation and morbidness. Wasn't he entitled to that every few decades?
He slipped inside its cold, unforgiving depths and wallowed in self pity.
How he loathed time, hated watching the people around him live their lives happily from infancy to old age in peace; while he was always on the outside looking in. He had tried killing himself after she left, but even when he thought it was all over, his wounds healed, and he got up and walked once more. The shell of a man stayed beneath the Opera house even after the mob came and destroyed his lair, he still had his secrets, after all.
But why couldn't he kill himself?
The question had rung in his head for years, until one day, while he was deep beneath the Opera because he dared not venture out into the building now, the answer struck him like a bolt of lightning.
Gypsies.
The imbecilic gypsy man who had imprisoned him, they had somehow found out about the cause of his death, then used their Seer to curse him with eternal life!
Now it was all so simple, so very, very simple. There was nothing he could do about it, either. He had come out of his slump and risen from the depths of hell to enter his eternal purgatory. The world had changed so much in the fifty years he had still been beneath the Opera Garnier; a World War had come and gone, and a novel and a motion picture made about him, of all things!
Monsieur Gaston Leroux had come down into the cellars of the Opera house, searching for the "Opera Ghost", and found Erik huddled in a small cave littered with scores of music librettos, shards from broken mirrors spread across the slippery surface of the Phantom's new lair. Leroux had been a jovial man and Erik couldn't help but like him right away. Gaston had also been the only one not to flinch or blanch or cry out in horror when he saw the other man's face. He once said that the other man's deformity resembled a nasty sunburn and that it wasn't all that bad…well, that episode wasn't all that great, to say the least. But Erik's respect for him grew even during that one fitful tirade, and Leroux began visiting every once in a while when he could get away from his publishers, and it was M. Leroux came up with the brilliant idea one day to write a book about his dear friend.
He had agreed to tell the man all that he wanted, under the condition that a select few details would be altered, like the mask on his face. Erik had obviously been in a very good mood as he described the events taken place twenty years ago. Raoul sounded much foppier than usual, Christine was a silly little girl, and the managers were even more hilarious than they had been in real life. They both agreed on making it gruesome, terrible and dramatic, but they didn't expect it to do all that well with the public. After all, who would want to read about a hideously deformed murderer and his lusting after an innocent dim-witted girl?
And it didn't do all that well, at first. Then the silent motion picture came out in the 1920s, and his story became known worldwide. Erik decided to leave Paris, permanently, and he traveled all around the world, day after day watching the world change before his very eyes.
The man gifted with the curse of eternal life closed his eyes and had a nightmare about the haunting golden eyes with silver rims that seemed to follow him wherever he went…
He blinked, coming out of his trance, but thought he was being delusional again, because he saw a flash of copper in his oh-so-secret garden hidden behind the mansion.
Erik focused his eyes on the young girl and put one palm on a stony gargoyle, but belatedly noticed the presence of six other scrawny teenagers. All of them seemed fascinated with his temporary home, but then, who wouldn't be?
Christine looked up suddenly, and he hid himself behind the statue. Curses! She almost saw me…Me and my damned curiosity…
What curiosity? Don Juan asked innocently.
Erik rolled his eyes. I thought I had finally gotten rid of you two after all these years, he drawled in his mind.
Like you ever could, the rational Erik replied haughtily. The physical Erik ignored this, cautiously creeping out from behind the statue, but he saw none of the brats anymore. He peered out over the garden and saw the redhead wandering along one of its many paths, but those other blasted children were nowhere to be seen!
His lips twisted into a devious smirk as he realized that the rest of the little group had found one of the ways into his house. How entertaining…
A white blur caught his eye as it rushed out of its hiding place in the rosebush hedges—Ayesha. His old Siamese cat had died centuries ago, the pretentious beast. He had liked her nonetheless, and he still felt a twinge of remorse at the memory of her death. Erik had found this new Ayesha rummaging in the garbage bins in an alley in Prague; she looked so pitiful with the apple core dangling from one white ear and the dirt and grime caked all over her pure white coat that the man couldn't help but take her in.
He saw Christine gently take his cat into her arms and felt something stir deep within him. Damn it all, this can't be happening again…Erik shook his head violently and pushed all the ridiculous thoughts out of his head. She was what, fourteen years old for goodness sakes! Maybe fifteen…Much too young…The age gap was too big…
The rational Erik snickered. Well of course, you nit, you're a hundred and seventy one years old!
The voice continued to laugh as Ayesha darted out of the girl's arms and the real Erik continued to watch the scene unfold. He cursed in every language he knew when he realized he couldn't hear a word Christine was saying. Finally, the redhead followed the white feline down a different path, towards…
A door in the hedge.
A bell rang, and Erik vanished from his rooftop perch into the bowels of his mansion.
Christine's POV:
Christine couldn't believe what was happening. First, she meets a man claiming to be one of the greatest literary figures of all time, then comes across a mansion that looks like something out of a storybook, walks into a fairy tale-like secret garden like something out of Alice in Wonderland, follows a white cat that seems to know much more than it should, and know this.
She stared at the door in the rosebush hedge disbelievingly. The girl pinched herself hard, and she felt a sharp pain on her forearm—this was definitely no dream.
The cat looked up at the redhead and back at the wooden door again.
The girl sighed and reached out and twisted the doorknob. The door swung open noiselessly, revealing a void of darkness. The young cat disappeared into it, her tiny claws slicking on unseen stone steps. Christine groaned and descended into the black depths, behind her, going lower and lower beneath the hidden garden.
The journey was over far quicker than Christine had first imagined it would, as she stepped out into what seemed to be a dusty living room. She wrinkled her nose at the musty smell of the room- we must be underground still, she thought. It was quite dark, but her eyes were slowly getting used to the lack of light until she saw two golden orbs shining to her right. She saw a thin spiral staircase leading out of the place up to another level of the house behind the cat. The girl didn't pay too much attention to the rest of the house as she climbed what seemed like a hundred floors, yet there were only five of them, she realized, coming to a much better lit room—the foyer of the Lavonne mansion.
She heard a clattering from one of the nearby rooms and slowly crept into it and gasped. There were Constance, Larissa and Mikhail hunched over in front of a table holding shards of something, quite possibly a vase, but where were the others?
Her question was answered almost instantaneously as another crash resounded in the room, making everyone shriek in surprise. Anna and the two other guys not in the drama club burst out from behind a portrait of a horseman hung on the wall, gasping for breath and clutching their side-stitched abdomens.
"You guys, there's someone in here!" One of the guys rasped. His light brown hair was sweaty and disheveled, much like his other two companions appearances, even Anna's.
"What do you mean?" Christine asked, finally showing herself to the people in the room. Everyone jumped again, and Constance hissed, "Geez Chrissy, give us all heart attacks why don't you?"
"Sorry," the redhead muttered. The seven teens huddled close together near a dusty couch, jumping at the slightest little sounds of the settling house. The curtains were drawn, strangely, because it was still daylight outside, and electric sconces lined the walls, causing shadows to flicker eerily across the teen's faces.
"So, what were you saying about someone in here?" Larissa whispered, her bright blue eyes wide with apprehension.
"I dunno," Mark said, clutching his girlfriend's arm comfortingly. Larissa seemed a little less frightened at his touch and calmed down enough to listen. "We followed the rest of you guys in, but then the walls just kind of shifted, and we found ourselves in this room full of whips and stuff. We heard this one bell kinda sound, and it was really creepy, and then we saw this guy who came out from nowhere standing there in front of us, and it was effing scary, it wasn't evenfunny. Then we ran out of that freaky room and then Anna here fell into another wall, the klutz. Turns out, it was like a secret tunnel thing, and we found ourselves here, and that's it," he explained.
The six teenagers were standing across from Christine, who stood alone near one of the wing chairs of the parlor. They froze after hearing Mark's explanation, staring in horror at something beyond the redhead, who was lost in thought. She didn't see the man come up behind her and when he placed a hand on her shoulder she screamed in surprise.
Then the lights went out.
Hahahaha, hope you liked the cliffy! Oh, and Erianna Abyss, can you find where I put you in this chappy? It's kind of vague, but I promise, you'll be a big part in the chapters to come!
Now, PLEASE REVIEW! It's 11 PM, plus it totally makes my day! Night, whatever!
-Alianne