Author´s note: There are a few things I need for a day to start well.Going to my e-mail account and seeing lots of lovely reviews is certainly one of them. Thanks to all of you! PhantomLover05: You´re so right about that. Beata-beatrix: Thank you for indirectly mentioning me! I´d have never thought you meant my story. And of course Raoul loves Christine. If he only liked her body, he´d be perfectly happy with the ´relationship´ they have at the moment. Oh, one more thing: This chapter features Erikalus (That´s my personal name for dark Erik. By the way: Who can tell me where it comes from?).It´s nothing too drastic, but I thought you might want to know.
28) Something in him that I simply didn´t see
Christine woke up as a divine scent entered her nostrils. She opened her eyes quickly and saw Erik, who was just coming in. In his hands he carried a large silver tray. "Ah, you´ve woken up at last.", he said. "At last? How late is it?", she muttered with a little yawn. She turned her head to look out of the window, yet could make out nothing but darkness. It was slightly unnerving.
"It´s past eleven.", Erik replied. "But since you don´t have any appointments today it doesn´t matter. All you have to do at the moment is enjoying your breakfast." With these words he lowered the tray. Christine stared at it in disbelief. There were delicious looking crepes, different sorts of bread, butter and a number of small jars probably containing jam and honey. A bowl was filled with an assortment of fruit, already peeled and sliced. A teapot completed the picture.
"This is amazing, Erik.", she exclaimed. "I´ve never got a meal like that. Did you prepare all this yourself?" He chuckled softly as he helped her sit up once more. "I bought it myself.", he answered. "There is a restaurant not too far away where I get food when I dine with Meg down here." Noticing that Christine´s cheeks had flushed he assured her: "Don´t worry about my expense; I certainly won´t ask you to give anything back to me. You know I have more than enough money, and you need decent nourishment.".
Forcing the thought of Meg and Erik having a romantic dinner out of her mind the girl wanted to know: "Do the managers still pay you?". She remembered that he had once told her about it. "Of course they do.", he replied a little indignantly. "After all, it´s my opera. I certainly don´t run around and steal money like a common thief… How do you drink you tea? With milk and a drop of lemon juice? Or with cream? Honey? Sugar?". He indicated the place of each thing on the tray while filling two cups.
For a moment Christine was completely overwhelmed by this enumeration. "I think I´ll take cream.", she eventually decided. Reaching for the tiny glass jug she noticed that it was decorated with strange letters she couldn´t read, just like the rest of the tea service. "Did you get all this with the food?", she asked curiously, pouring a little bit of the white liquid into the cup Erik handed her.
"Actually this is my own.", he remarked, putting the other cup on the bedside table. "I wasn´t truthful when saying I had bought the entire breakfast. I made the tea myself. Honestly I was afraid you might not drink it if you knew I made it." His good mood was gone as he thought of Meg and how often they had drunk out of the very same cups. Why should Christine trust him when even the girl he loved didn´t do it? Frowning his guest looked at him, forgetting to stir her tea. He had sounded so very serious. "What?", she muttered. "Did you assume I thought you planned to poison me, so shortly after saving me?"
She leaned across the tray and patted his shoulder softly. Erik, however, jumped as if she had hit him, uttering a small cry. "Don´t…!" Accidentally she had touched the same spot as Meg the last evening, adding to his pain. "I´m sorry.", she said hastily, wondering what had caused this change in his behaviour. The girl placed her cup back onto the tray. Suddenly the breakfast didn´t look appealing anymore.
"It´s… nothing.", he mumbled. Yet Christine had already seen the tears in his eyes. Quickly she pushed the tray to the unoccupied half of the bed and seized his hands. "Erik.", she said quietly. "You call tell me it´s none of my business. You can tell me I´m a stupid child and wouldn´t understand your problems anyway. But don´t lie to me."
"Meg… she… doesn´t love me anymore.", he exclaimed, his voice breaking. Christine should have been triumphant, but just the contrary was the case. She hadn´t often seen someone that miserable and she wanted to make him feel better. "I´m sure she loves you.", she whispered, not knowing if the lump in her throat was caused by pity for him or herself. Erik shook his head. "How can she? She´s still afraid of me because of what I… almost did to her a few months ago.", he stammered. "Last night I visited her. She had had nightmares, and I tried to comfort her… till it turned out that she had dreamed about me! I wasn´t even allowed to touch her."
"But love-", she began, yet Erik cut her short. "Love, love! What do you know about love?", he shouted, tears spilling hotly down his deformed cheeks, naturally unnoticed by the girl in front of him. Suddenly feeling fear herself she tried to pull her hands back, but he held onto them. "You´ll listen to me now! I´ll tell you a nice story about your life. You have your handsome Vicomte. He´ll always love you, even though you treat him like dirt. He´ll always be there, whether to give you an expensive necklace or to satisfy your needs on some floor in front of a coachman!"
With each sentence he gripped her wrists more tightly, making her gasp for breath. By now she was crying as well, silent tears of shame. Erik didn´t care. He wanted to hurt her, to hurt someone. Maybe this big black hole in his chest would grow a bit smaller. "You´re so superficial, Christine.", he accused her. "All you care about is beauty. I bet the boy has already found you a handsome teacher after you had complained about the old one´s ugly mask. He´s probably teaching you other things as well, perhaps even in the presence of the Vicomte. I guess he enjoys watching as much as being watched!"
"Erik… How can you say such things?", she asked in a terrified whisper. "None of that is true. I thought you were my friend." "Your friend?", he repeated, his voice dangerously calm. At last he released her hands, but Christine, sensing that something terrible was about to happen, shrank back into the pillows. "Then I suggest you… look at your friend properly!", he suddenly yelled. With one quick movement he ripped the mask from his face. "Could you imagine feeling friendship or even love for this?"
Christine´s mouth opened, but no sound came out. She was too shocked by what she saw. Erik´s skin was red and raw. There were lots of ugly scars on one side and twisted flesh on the other. Yet for the girl the worst sight were his eyes, big and tear-filled and unbelievably sad. In this moment she realised two things: Although he had just humiliated her like no one else before, she´d never be able to hate him. And even though his question seemingly was the perfect background for her confession, she couldn´t bother him with it now. He was in desperate need of a friend, not a second lover.
"Yes.", she replied, moving a little forwards again. She wasn´t frightened anymore. "I could imagine that very well.", she said almost solemnly. Then she pulled his shaking body into an embrace. This tenderness was too much for Erik. Sobbing he buried his face at her shoulder. "I didn´t mean to say all that.", he murmured into the fabric of her dress. "This thing with Meg… is driving me insane." "Shh… don´t talk about it now.", she said soothingly. Neither of them knew how long they had sat like that when a girl´s voice made both of them jump slightly. "So you´ve already found someone else.", Meg stated.