Sorry for the long wait, darlings, but I KNOW that part of this chapter will MORE than make up for it… (evil cackle)

Note for the readers: Several months have passed in between the last chapter and this one. It is now early fall.

Chapter Fifty Four: It Burns Like Fire, P.2

Leah

On a modest street of the great city of Paris, a baby's cry issued forth in the evening.

In the bedroom of a small, respectable flat on that street, I wearily stood from my seat to see to her. Tiptoeing into the freshly painted nursery, I scooped up a very unhappy baby girl and began to calm her before she could wake her mother.

"Hush, Olivita." I murmured as I rocked the tiny infant. "Tu mama es soñoliento. You will wake her if you are not quiet."

Olivia paid no attention to my cautioning, continuing to wail like a banshee.

I quickly inspected her diaper, looking for the cause of her discomfort. Seeing nothing amiss there, I jumped to the next logical conclusion.

"Tienes hambre, bebe?" I asked as I entered the kitchen.

I quickly began to fix my godchild a bottle in the hopes of giving Beth a few more hours of sleep. The delivery had been a difficult one, and both mother and daughter had come perilously close to loosing their lives. Now that the two of them were home, I had taken up the unburdensome task of attending the two of them while Beval was at work.

It had been nearly a week before Sharla, my friend of so long ago, had declared them fit to be dismissed from St. Elizabeth's hospital, and I was ordered that under no circumstances was I to allow them to overexert themselves. The sweet woman had been promoted to the position of overseeing nurse since I had last seen her.

But now that the happy family had returned home, their health continued to improve. I was glad that I could provide a bit of assistance for Beth, for we had grown as close as two women could during the unendurable thirty eight hours of her labor, through which her mother and I had held her hands. Mme. Giry and I had formed a tighter bond as well, for neither of us had left the bedsides of our loved ones until they had come home. Even now, it was rare that one or the other of us was not constantly present in the Monet family flat.

I had been more than glad to be out of that dreadful hospital, and not simply for the fact that Beth was well. Every moment spent within its massive walls reminded me more and more of the time not so many years ago that I had been the one confined to a bed there.

Those memories wakened violent emotions inside me that were much better left dormant. The terror, the horror, the awful loss that had enveloped me like a death shroud in my month at the hospital now fanned flames of fear, hatred and rage in my breast, for I now knew the true cause of all my pain.

The opera ghost.

I could no longer bring myself to think of him as Señor. That was the name of a man that had been kind to me, the name of a man I had cared for as deeply as I had ever cared for any man. That was the name of a man that I had once fancied myself to love.

It was the name of a lie.

Fury burned through my stomach at the thought of all that he had done to me.

It had taken me several days to realize all the implications of my horrendous discovery that night on the shores of the dark lake. Before seeing that unspeakable sight, I had attempted to ignore rumors of the 'phantom', still embarrassed by my superstitious presumptions about the first time I had met the man. I had believed him to be one of the black ghosts and upon learning that he was indeed a man when he sent me his missive, I had resolved never to give in to such a foolish idea ever again.

"How ironic." I growled, rocking little Olivia in my lap as she nursed her bottle. "First he was a ghost, then he was a man, and now he is both at once. Isn't it amusing, bebe?"

The sweet newborn was far too entranced with her meal to pay any attention to her crazy old spinster of a godmother. With a little gurgle that brought a smile to my lips in spite of my dark thoughts, she continued to imbibe the sweet milk like a drunk at his whiskey.

"More like you at your gin than anything else." I upbraided myself sourly.

I hated to admit my newfound sin, even if it was only to myself, but it was the truth. As soon as Tina came to 'relieve me of my duties' that night, I would head like an arrow back to the Garnier in search of my booze.

"It is entirely his fault!" I cried softly to the silent room, empty save for myself and the babe in my arms. "I would never have begun to drink again if I hadn't seen … that."

Once Beth had rescued me from the shores of the lake, returning for a forgotten article of clothing, I had shut myself away in my room for three days. I had only come out for food, the lavatory, and to beg a few bottles of strong alcohol off of Sorelli.

I had hated to have anything to do with the woman, but she was the only female in the opera house to keep liquor of that sort of strength on hand, and I would have made the niceties with Lucifer himself if it meant being able to erase that nauseating image from my head for a few hours.

Even now, nearly a month and a half after the fact, I was still unable to sleep without nursing a few shots of my carefully acquired gin. The vile substance burned like fire when it coated my throat, but it numbed the overwhelming tide of thoughts that had begun to spout furiously from my mind as soon as I gave thought to what I had seen.

Even in my sleep he tormented me, for I could not close my eyes without first becoming quite inebriated, else the memories of him would haunt me into insomnia. And despite achieving uneasy rest almost every night with the aid of my newfound ally, that odious man continued to plague me even when unconscious.

I had rarely been given to dreaming a great deal before 'the incident' at the lake, but now my nights were brimming with horrendous nightmares that were simply too disturbing to even consider recording them here. And my sleep was by no means restful, for Tio Giry often found me wandering the dark halls of the opera house in the wee hours of the morning, sleepwalking in naught but my pantalets and a shift.

But the sleepless nights were far from the worst of the crimes my heart accused him of committing, the villain. It had taken the entirety of those fitful first three days to fully comprehend just what I had been witness to.

Once the shock of my realization had worn off, I had seen the full scope of all his crimes against me. The truth had dawned upon me slowly, like the pieces of one of Joseph's mind numbing puzzles slowly fitting into place.

It had been passed about in the circles of gossip that the opera ghost had been the engineer of the stunt that had maimed me years ago. At the time I had dismissed it, sure that the ghost was merely a myth. Now I knew better.

He had been the reason for my imprisonment in that sterile, white curtained hell of a hospital. He had stolen my ability to dance, pilfered my joy in life away like a rat stealing cheese. Those words still left ice in the pit of my bowels and unquenchable anger in my chest. That man, that monster, had taken the best thing in my life without a second thought.

As though that injury had not been deep enough, that freak had had the gall to feign interest in my person. He had preyed on my loneliness, deliberately I was sure, obviously wanting to wound me further.

He must have had quite a few laughs at my expense, knowing that I was ignorant of the fact that I was willingly seeing the man who had condemned me to be a spinster for the rest of my days.

True, Philippe and his rude rumors about me had not helped me in that case, but it was quite rare for a woman who performed at the Garnier to leave her career without at least a claim as some noble's mistress, or more often as an average gentleman's wife. When my stage life was cut short, so too were my chances for a family.

Staring at little Olivia, who had fallen asleep in my arms some time ago, I felt the weight of that absence like a knife in my side.

"I won't ever have this, will I bebe?" I choked out in a whisper. "No child to sing to and kiss. No marido to hold me as we sleep."

My breath became jagged with unshed grief. "No one of my own to love."

"I am alone." Pain, loss, agony, and regret burned fiercely in me, but the tears that were meant to release them never came.

The sensation of cold emptiness began to fill me, coming unwanted and unbidden. To hell with making my mother proud! I had realized just how badly I had mutilated myself on the day that Henry left, when I discovered that I was incapable of weeping. The pain tore through me like the burns I had once seen in St. Elizabeth's.

After putting the little girl to sleep in her own cradle, I returned to Beth's side. While I waited for Tina to come to watch over them for the night, my mind continued to dwell on my hatred and my ever growing need for gin. I loathed the fact that I now depended on the distasteful stuff for my sanity, but I could no longer survive without it. I had tried several times to give up the bottle, but failed at every attempt.

"Damn him." I cursed softly. "Damn him to hell!"

Eric

I was writhing in hell.

Since the moment my angel had uttered that fatal name, my soul had been in agony.

"Raoul."

When she spoke of him, a light filled her eyes such as I had never seen before, brilliant and hopeful. I had known who it must have been the instant she danced into her closet-like dressing room at the appointed hour of the evening. When she presented herself for lessons, I had been about to congratulate her.

The performance had been unexpectedly mediocre, and even that idiotic Spanish cow of a diva had been passable. My beloved had continued to hide her growing skill the best that she could, but such genius could not be concealed forever.

Even buried in the chorus, her voice had taken on just a hint of the heavenly beauty that would one day grace the ears of the best that Paris could offer. In a few short months, I would have crafted a voice in that delicate little throat that would coax the creator himself to wrap his power around her finger. My humble dowry had slowly begun to win her heart, I had foolishly believed, and once she had displayed her radiance and claimed my gift of the hearts of Paris she would surely love me in return.

But I had seen the error of my hope the moment that I made myself known to her.

Those sweet blue eyes, those terribly hopeful, happy eyes had warned me that something was amiss. That was the look that she would one day give to me, but now it was obviously displayed for the thought of another.

And she had proceeded to enlighten me about her childhood romance. How they had 'loved' one another at Perros, how he had abandoned my poor beloved at the end of the summer. Now, it seemed, the damnible creature had made pilgrimage to the very steps of my home! My darling little blonde divinity had seen him in the audience, and told 'her angel' that all her feelings of affection for the insufferable being had been revived, and that she was eager to absolve him of all his past sins against her precious person.

Scrambling wildly in my panic as I imbibed my nightly vodka, I had concocted a pile of sheep swollop that I was sure would placate her innocent young brain, when I explained it to her the next morning. I would tell her that her heart must be free of any earthly bond should she wish to continue under my tutelage.

Still, it was a risky maneuver. What if she forsook me for that little prat?

"I was too slow, God damn it!" I roared, flinging my glass of vodka into the steaming fireplace. It shattered into a thousand tiny shards that glittered back at me, mocking my futile attempts at winning her heart.

As the fire roared up, I welcomed the heat on my bare skin. I had burned all of my clothes earlier that night in my rage over the Viscomte's unwelcome appearance in my realm.

It did feel rather pleasant to be free of my cumbersome garments, but my mind was far from my state of undress.

"Will I never win?" I screamed. "Is there no hope for humanity? Am I doomed to rot in this hole till I die?"

"Will I always be alone?"

My tirade went on for several hours, as I ranted and wept by turn before limply collapsing in my coffin, utterly exhausted. Only now that my bothersome emotions were dealt with could I strategize with a calm, collected, focused method of thought.

"I must prepare for our first meeting." I pondered aloud to the pitch black room, straining for a plan. "Think, Eric! Think!"

"How soon can we allow her on stage? Obviously Eric cannot put her in the spotlight till she is ready, but neither can we meet her until she understands the proof of our love." The conundrum was fast approaching irritating.

After much deliberation, I decided that I would present her with the Jail cell aria from Faust in the midst of the variety of pieces for the gala performance. This gala performance was due in a few months time to celebrate the opera's changing hands. Though the idea of new management did give me slight pause, for I should have to cow a new pair of idiots, I gave it little thought compared to my beloved.

She had already been promised a short passage of Gounod's 'Romeo and Juliet', for the new choir master, Gabriel, had spotted her blooming promise. But it was not enough. For every hour I had spent drilling the lines of that romantic epic into her magnificent little mind, another two would be given over to Margarita's final aria in Faust.

She would shine like the brightest star, the hottest fire in all the earth when she sang that night. She would lift the audience up with her to the heights of heaven itself. She would be radiant, and she would know how dearly I cared for her.

There was the little problem of Carlotta, who was currently cast to sing that part, but it would be easy enough to alter when the time came.

"Yes, the gala it will be." I decided with a contented sigh. "She will learn to love us soon."

My slightly tipsy thoughts began to run towards that certain, fast approaching future. We would marry, have children … I would be like any other man.

But would she agree to wallow in this little rodent's den with me? Would she be alarmed by my mask?

As I drifted off into a sleep filled with dreams of my beloved, I began to solve every problem that I might encounter. I made a massive mental list of all of the supplies that I would require soon. Bonar would be quite busy for the next few weeks with gathering all that I would need.

Not to mention finding me new clothes.

Authoress's Notes: Streaking! (and everybody gave a little cheer.)

Marido- husband in spanish

Kipper- Mmm. Eric and Axe. Almost as good as streaking Eric, but not quite. Hope you like this chapter a little better.

JPT- Well, then I shall lead away. Yes, it is not a fun chap., but this one is quite angsty as well. Well, more for Leah than for our favorite masked man, but that is just cause he's psychotically obsessed with a certain other someone. Idiot. Any who, I cannot make it all better now … or anytime in the near future … but it will get there eventually.

Tigger- Did you catch the aviator refrence?