A/N
This is a little of the darker side of Christine. You'll note that my Christine is rather unique--well, unique, in that she is very unlike LeRoux's, Lloyd Webber's, or Kay's. She has a bit of a twist to her soul, a little like Erik's.

I don't know whether you like that idea or not, but somehow, that's how she's coming out, so that's how I'll let her come out.

I'm very big on allowing my characters to do what they want, and she definitely wants to do things this way.

Erik did not tell me who our visitor was. He spoke with the man for many hours, and was in a foul mood upon returning to me. He found me asleep, of course, and did not even consider awaking me. I imagine this was due more to his fear of my anger at being disturbed, than any true selfless sacrifice. His presence in the bed tugged me out of my dreaming, however, and I opened my eyes to find him sitting beside me, staring down in deathly stillness.

I reached up to take his mask off—it still was somewhat disturbing, to be placed under such intense study by such a lifeless object—but his head moved slightly to one side to escape my fingers' grasp. With a slight frown, my hand fell back to the bed, to aid in pushing me up into a sitting position. I leaned back against the pillows and the headboard, and watched him for a while in silence, before gently inquiring after his temper.

He responded with a head-shake, and edged closer to me. His hands migrated to place themselves on the small of my back, and he used that vantage-point to coax me into sitting forwards. I obeyed those hands as fully as any instrument would; those hands held as authoritative a position over me as did his voice. My arms raised to loop around his neck, and I schooled my features into an expression of tender curiosity.

It was a lengthy bout of silent staring that followed, before finally he gave me a curt nod. Words were not required to communicate that message; with sure fingers, I removed the mask, and tossed it onto the bed. I watched his eyes carefully as I did so, and was shocked to see what I had never seen before: He still expected rejection. His eyes shut in a solitary moment of pained acceptance, before opening and registering a glimmer of shock upon finding me smiling softly. I tried to keep my concern from showing as my hands moved to rest on the corners of his jaw, just below his ears. "My angel..."

Those eyes shut again, this time accompanied by a groan of longing. His forehead pressed against mine, before he opened his eyes again and fastened their gaze onto mine. "I need you," he whispered, hands shifting from my back to my hips, and stroking, caressing, in ways that were impossible to ignore. I whimpered, as his face retreated from mine, moving instead to allow his lips to trace their way down my neck. "Please," he breathed against my skin. "I must have you..."

This was quite definitely not fair. He knew I could not turn down that voice, especially when he begged...

He saved me the pain, by retreating to such a distance as to be off the bed. He was already walking across the room, to the door that led not into the hall, but into the adjacent study. I pushed myself off of the bed to follow him. He went into his study, crossed it without hesitation, and lifted his violin. The bow was set to the strings, and with only a moment's pause, he launched into a transcription of Chopin's Nocturne in C-Sharp Minor. I sagged into an armchair, wishing I could curl my legs to my chest as I so wished to do.

The purr of bow on string wrapped around me, and my eyes shut of their own design. I could not help but rock to that music, to allow my head to sway with the motion that the notes took. Erik swayed, as well; with every note he moved, back and forth, like the total embodiment of the music that drifted from his lonely corner.

By the end of that song, I was weeping uncontrollably. I did not even hear him set the instrument aside, did not see him come to my side, was barely even cognizant of being carried back into our bedroom. He laid me down, and kissed away my tears. I tried to draw him down onto the bed beside me; he merely reached over me to lift his mask, and then straightened.

"I cannot sleep with you, until after the child is born." That voice.. so cold, so dispassionate. I tried to ask if I had done something wrong, but he pressed a pair of fingers to my lips. "Sleep..."

And I could not find it in me to disobey.

My hands, once tiny and now swollen like a fat woman's—no, not like, they were a fat woman's hands. I was a fat woman.

Wait, where was my point?

My hands. My hands were resting lightly on the white railing that enclosed our back porch, my fat fingers rubbing idly into the thin layer of pollen that rested on its surface. I have no idea why that mischievous little finger was rubbing the pollen—I certainly was not telling it to. When I discovered its sneaky act, I immediately put an end to it, but the damage was already done. My fingertip—my fat fingertip—my huge, obnoxious, clumsy, fat fingertip—was stained a sickly yellow color.

"You fat beast, you deserve it," I growled—not to myself, but to the fingertip.

I had found a new word to describe my movement, and I rather liked it better than trundle. Trundle sounded cute. Trundle sounded like something an overweight penguin would do. I was not an overweight penguin. I did not have the adorable factor that an overweight penguin would have.

I waddled. I did not trundle, I waddled, like an overweight duck. Like a walrus. Like a big, fat, disgusting creature on legs that were not at all meant to support this stupid sack of life on my abdomen.

I have heard that women often become depressed shortly after having their child; the sudden separation, I'm told, upsets them. I could not imagine ever feeling that way. I could not imagine a moment when I would not be thankful that I had lost contact with this clumsy burden.

I believe Erik had similar sentiments. Not only did he suffer from the same frustration that any man would, when denied access to his rights as a husband, but also my own temperament was beginning to wear on his nerves. I had no patience for anything these days. Any word, no matter how much good will was intended, could be twisted into an insult or a complaint, and as soon as he even breathed a complaint—or, what was perceived as a complaint—I could not hold myself back from flaunting all the things that were wrong with me. How could he complain, when he was free to do whatever he wished, and I was shackled by this blob that had taken up residence in my stomach?

Luckily, Henri was able to talk to him often enough that Erik was confident in my desire to have his child, and no longer plagued me with incessant accusations of secret lovers and despised mutant-children.

This was not luck for me, mind you, but luck for him.

The baby was due any day now. I could hardly wait. I missed sleeping with my husband. It had been nearly two months since his announcement that he could no longer sleep in our bed—and in addition, he had decided he could barely stand to see me, aside from taking meals with me. I did not want to go out, and he did not want to sit alone in my presence for more than a few moments, if he could not touch me, and he could not touch me without wanting to have me, and he could not have me.

Therefore, he could not sit with me.

Not only that, but he had been strangely busy, since the anonymous man's visit to our home. He barely had a spare moment. I had confirmation from Henri that I was not merely being avoided. Erik stayed up late nights, pouring over documents and bills, and making long calls to lawyers and accountants. It concerned me that he was doing this to himself. Henri tried to assure me that he was merely nervous about the baby, and wanted to distract himself, but... somehow, that excuse did not quite convince me.

What worried me far more than the reports of late nights, was the heart-rending music I could hear coming from his study near the obscene hours of the morning. At first, he had played pieces on his violin. Then, he had progressed to pieces on the piano. Not long after that, he had begun playing music I had never heard before, music of an intensity that I had only encountered once: in the opera's cellars. He was composing. Why was he composing? What had driven him to make this music that ripped open souls and left them dangling helplessly in the air?

I had thought he was happy.

Could I not make him happy?

My hands clenched on the pollen-ridden railing, my eyes staring, unseeing, into the distance. Lush green lawn, bordered by immaculately-cared-for gardens, stretched for several acres, before giving way to fields. I could not see the fields, but I knew they were there; Erik and I had ridden them together often enough.

Before I was fat, that is.

I did not much like the idea of a child, though I adored the idea of Erik's child. Having something to fully display the unity between he and I was not at all to my dislike. I wanted to have a family, to be a member of a delightful company of love and adoration. Erik, the child, and I. It was the ultimate perfection. And yet, having a tiny monster to run around and shatter the peace between he and I, to tug my hair and my skirts and to require constant attention when all I wanted was to sink into bed in my husband's arms...

They say your marriage is never the same after a child.

I did not want anything to be different.

I was shocked to discover that I was jealous of there being a thing to draw Erik's attention away from mine. He would love this child more than life itself.

...More than me?

I shivered, and raised my pollen-coated hands to rub my upper arms. I found myself hoping it was not a daughter that lay curled within my abdomen. For Erik to love a son more than me would be devastating, yes, but for him to love a daughter...

Another woman.

A female to challenge my place in his life—in his thoughts—in his heart...

My hands tightened on my arms with silent rage. Would he play his music for her? Would she fall asleep in bed to the sound of his violin? His piano? His voice? That voice was mine, and mine alone. It had been mine since first it sang to me in my dressing-room, and I had been fiercely protective of that possession from that self-same moment. I did not want to share him with anyone. Even Henri, at times, had seemed like a rival, and Henri was only a friend. Erik had never played for Henri, never sung for Henri. I could not even imagine what kind of world it would be, if I were forced to share Erik with another. I wanted to share a life with him, have a family with him.. but I did not want to share him with a family.

Such a thing was not even possible, and I knew it, at the same time that I knew I would never fully accept it.

And even now, I had to marvel over the power that this man had over me. I would never have dreamed of being jealous of anyone; I was a sweet, demure little angel, always willing to allow others to walk on top of me, for the sake of avoiding a conflict—and Erik had made me into a woman who had turned murderous thoughts of envy on a child that had not even been born yet.

A sudden thought struck me with dreadful honesty. If I was jealous of the child, would I be able to love it? If I viewed it as a roadblock to Erik's love, how would I be able to care for it?

Would it, in the end, share the same relationship with its mother that Erik had? Would I grow to hate it, as Madeleine had hated her son?

I recall thinking that no spring day is a good spring day, and turning away from the sight with contempt. As if in rebuke of my irritability, the baby stirred with shocking force. I clutched my stomach... and that was when my water broke.

I will not, of course, regale you with all of the disgusting details of my labor. That is what home videos of the birthing room are for—and I will happily assure you that none exist of my labor. My husband was, lucky for me, not a fool of a man. He did not care to see that nerve-wracking occurrence more than once, no more than I desired to experience it more than once.

Needless to say, I only ever had one child.