Chapter 3: Once Again We Meet

The play ended with the thunder of applause and cheers. The actors came and bowed them the manager came out on stage.

"May I present the marvelous playwright of this play, Mademoiselle Christine Amouré-Louver!" She stood up in her box and curtsied. She bowed again then sat down. The manager smiled.

"May you all have a restful evening and come back again." The people began exiting. Christine sat and watched everything around her. She looked across the way to box five of the theater. She thought of Erik and wondered if he was watching her even now from the shadows. Her thoughts were stopped when someone knocked on her door. Rumen looked to her and she nodded. It was the manager with another man. Christine kept looking at the theater.

"Mademoiselle, this is Monsieur Lavonné from the Paris Opera House and he--." She cut him off.

"I don't write opera. You know this." The manager stammered forward.

"I know but he seems very interested in--."

"I don't write opera. Now please stop wasting my time." The man next to the manager took a step forward.

"I came to speak about how your plays seem to diverge people from my operas." Christine stiffened and took in a deep breath. That voice… It couldn't be! He kept moving forward until he was fully in the room. Slowly she turned in her chair and looked into the white leather mask that she only dreamed of the last three years.

"Erik…"