A/N: This chapter is totally and utterly unedited so excuse mistakes. I felt it needed to go up 'raw' so please forgive me! Review please…

Chapter 12- History

Christine held the rose in her hand all the way down the cobbled streets, barely feeling the wind, until she arrived at the Giry house. As she walked up she again admired the front door, as she always did, and then she took a deep breath and knocked hard. It was a couple of minutes before she heard the light but steady footsteps of Antoinette Giry on the other side but when she did it was quickly followed by the clanking of bolts opening and the key turning in the door. As it swung open Christine slotted the flower into her cape pocket and smiled at Madame Giry.

'Hello,' she said and stepped forward.

'Meg isn't home,' Madame Giry replied, beginning to close the door.

'It isn't Meg I wish to see,' Christine said, swallowing hard. 'I've come to speak with you.'

Madame Giry frowned for a brief moment before breaking into a knowing smile and stepping aside to clear a path for the wind swept Vicomtess. She took Christine's cape to hang it on the hat rail but as she did the rose dropped from the pocket and floated down, finally settling at the ballet mistress' feet. She glanced down at it and then retrained her eyes onto a very nervous Christine. In a moment Christine fell to her knees, fighting back tears and scooping the rose into her hands, holding it to her chest and looking up at Madame Giry.

'Come, sit,' Her friends mother said, simply stepping over her and walking into the sitting room. Christine wiped her eyes and stood slowly before following Madame Giry. She sat in the seat closest to the fire and placed her hands over the top of the flames, rubbing them together and finding the colour returning slowly to them.

'What do you wish to discuss?' Madame Giry said not taking her eyes away from her young visitor.

'I…' she began but faltered. This was a very, VERY bad idea. She stared at her hands growing a warm pink.

'Erik,' Giry said simply and Christine looked up at her, opening her mouth to speak but closing it quickly. 'Well?'

'Yes,' Christine croaked.

'I thought we had already dealt with this.' She said firmly, eyes still fixed on an immobile Christine. Christine cleared her throat and looked up at Madame Giry.

'I wanted to know… to ask…' she began, coughed again and started over. 'I wanted to know if you and Erik were… together.' Tactful, she thought.

Madame Giry laughed hard and sharp, holding her stomach in sheer amusement. Christine stared and she smiled at her.

'No,' she answered. Christine felt her cheeks burning as she sat there and she realised that the heat from the fire wasn't helping. She shuffled along the seat and focused her eyes to the floor. Was she so wrong? She bit her fear.

'But you were.' She said and Madame Giry laughed again but this time it was different, a slower laugh. Not as amused, not as surprised.

'No,'

'But…'

'We are friends,' she said looking at Christine's face. 'That is all.'

'There's more,' Christine said, shocked at her own fortitude. 'There is.'

'Child…' Madame Giry began but stopped when she saw the emotion on Christine's face. She looked at her chocolate brown eyes, so soft and smooth, so full of feeling and she found herself finally feeling sympathy for the girl. 'Christine, we are friends.'

'Then how do you know…' Christine swallowed. 'How do you know he has known other women?'

For a moment Madame Giry looked taken a back but she simply smiled and stood, walking closer to Christine. Christine glanced up at her, feeling the flames flicker along the side of her face. The pops and crackles of the fire were the only noises in the room for what seemed like an eternity, they seemed so loud.

'I met Erik when I was fifteen years old,' she began and Christine started to relax. 'He was part of a travelling carnival, part of their damned freak show.' She brushed the front of her dress, Christine almost thought that she looked nervous. 'I saw him… just… he was just lying there caked in mud, cowering like a beaten animal. How dare someone, anyone, treat another person that way?'

'I had no idea,' Christine said, choking. Madame Giry shook her head slowly, no longer focused on Christine's face but thinking back, focused on the pictures of her memory.

'He was filthy, the place stunk, lying in… oh, and they paraded him like a monster, like a criminal, calling him the Devil's child … as if they had that right.' She blinked and Christine thought for a second that she spotted a tear in the Madame's eye. 'I fed him… an orange, he ate it in seconds… poor boy… he was starving, they had starved him, Christine… do you know how that feels?'

'No,' Christine said, shaking her head but listening intently.

'I went back for him, you know?' she said. 'That night, I helped him to escape.'

Christine opened her mouth but nothing came out.

'I took him to the opera, it was me who put him in its cellar, me who helped him.' Madame Giry looked at Christine. 'We have been friends since and when I married I was mortified that I could never invite him to my happy day.'

Christine nodded.

'When my husband left I felt so alone, so terribly alone. Such a horrible feeling and suddenly Erik and I had something in common.' She smiled to herself. 'We were both lonely.'

'I'm so sorry…' Christine said. Madame Giry shook her head firmly from side to side.

'No need,' she said. 'It was the night my husband left me that I visited Erik and we spoke about our solitude. His was a literal solitude and mine more emotional but we were equally lonely never the less.'

'What happened?' Christine asked, watching as the ballet mistress reached over and took a sip of water.

'We drank liquor and spoke for hours,' she said. 'And then, when it was time to leave I stood and he followed… when I got to the door he kissed me deeply.' Christine's mouth gaped. 'I had never been kissed with so much rawness in all my life and he pulled me close.'

'I…' Christine started but couldn't finish.

'We both gave in to each other that night, I stayed the entire night in his lair,' she said softly, more to herself than to Christine. 'That night neither of us felt alone.'

Christine felt the vomit from earlier in the day attacking her throat and she swallowed it back down. Madame Giry looked at her and laughed, much to Christine's dismay.

'It never happened again,' she said and touched Christine's shoulder softly. 'I was not what he wanted, he was not what I wanted… that night it was a sense of need, not love or want… simply need. The need of another person, another body… some warmth and comfort.'

'Do you…' Christine began, rubbing her throat which was suddenly hoarse. 'Do you love him?'

'Oh Christine,' she said with a small smile. 'We are simply friends.'

'That is not what I asked.' Christine said, leaping to her feet to confront Madame Giry, surprised at her own anger.

'I do care and in a sense that is love,' she said, not at all moved by Christine's display. 'So yes, I do love him but not the way you do.'