Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Chapter 31: Learn to be Lonely
I expected to wake up in some hospital, doctors and nurses leaning over me and asking me how many fingers they were holding up. I had no such luck.
I slowly woke up, rolling over onto my side. I was lying in bed and as soon as I moved, I knew something was definitely wrong. Sunlight was filtering in through my closed eyelids (when had Erik and I ever kept the blinds open all night?). The sound that had waked me was the sound of someone pounding on my door. The voice sounded strangely like my little brother, who I had left back in the future. Impossible, I thought. This was all just some strange dream. I'd wake up soon and find myself in my room back at the Parisian house or a hospital. A loud shout erased that thought.
"Elizabeth, wake up! Are you going to sleep the whole day away? It is 2:00 and Mom demands that you get up and get moving." My younger brother shouted through the closed door. I yelled back, telling him to go away. I realized my mistake just as he asked what language I had just spoken in. It was French, of course, but I kept that observation to myself.
Think, Elizabeth, think. I commanded myself. I was rusty on my English. I finally found the words for go away and after one more attempt to rouse me, my brother departed for the television. I sat up in bed and looked around.
I was back in my old room again. Nothing had changed. It was like I had never even gone away. I looked at my body and nearly screamed. This was not the body of a sixty-five year old woman. I was eighteen again. I felt my face; no wrinkles. I examined my hair in a mirror; no gray hairs. I flexed my wrists; no sore joints. I was young again. I wanted to cry.
A dream? It had all be a dream? My whole life in Paris, Erik, Louise, Jack, Alex, everything had been a dream? Impossible. I remembered every detail, from the way Erik smelled to how many rooms were in our house. So many details, it couldn't all be a dream. Confused by my thoughts, I scanned the room again, looking for anything that would explain this nightmarish dream I was now in.
My eyes alighted on a little hand purse sitting on my chair. It looked delicate with age. I realized it was my bag from Paris. I grabbed for it, being careful not the rip the material. It was heavy. Reaching in, I pulled out a picture frame. Inside was the picture Erik and I had taken after our wedding. There was his scowling face and my happy smile. The picture was brown with age, showing it had traveled through a century. So, it hadn't been a dream. I had gone to the past, lived there for nearly fifty years, and returned home. I was home.
I placed the picture on my desk for the moment. I got out of bed and stretched. A spark of light hitting the wall caught my eye. Tracing it, I found a ring on my finger: my wedding ring. I sank back down to the bed. My wedding ring was still on my finger. The one Erik had given me. I needed no further proof. How it was possible, I do not know. But, I had gone to the past and come back with mementos.
The next few weeks were a blur. I had to relearn English and then explain to my mom that I had been secretly learning French in my spare time. Of course, that didn't explain why I was so fluent in it, but she let it go. I hid the picture in the top of my drawers. I had no way to explain that. My ring I never took off, save to sleep or take a shower. Mom noticed it, but asked no questions. She somehow knew I wasn't telling all about something. I doubt she would have believed me if I had told her.
June went on to become July and so forth. Soon, it was March. My body may not have aged, but my mind had. I felt so much older than the rest of my peers. To them, I must have seemed old fashioned. Which I was. Living that far in the past does that to you. And I was lonely. I missed Erik so much. I missed his comforting presence, his music, his everything. I couldn't even go see his final resting place. I was in a very melancholy mood.
To try and cheer me up, my best friend planned on having a Phantom of the Opera party. We'd all dress up as characters, play opera related games, and then watch the movie. She knew how much I loved that movie and thought it would revive my spirits. The party was fun. I enjoyed seeing my old friends and I laughed a little. But, when they played the movie, I ran.
I couldn't watch it. I just couldn't. All I saw was him. I couldn't bear to watch him kill someone. Most of all, I couldn't bear to watch him love Christine. She had been the reason why he died. If she had lived, he would have lived and I would have been home in Paris, making breakfast with him. I raced into my friend's room, shut the door, and cried. She found me there a few minutes later.
"Elizabeth, what's wrong?" She asked, kneeling next to me, comforting me as best she could.
"If I told you, you'd never believe me." I whispered, choked on my tears. All my thoughts were centered on one person: Erik. How I missed him.
"Try me." She challenged. So, I did. I told her everything. I told her about my waking up in Paris and Erik rescuing me and our courtship and getting married. Through tears, I told her about Christine's death and then his own. I recounted going to Notre Dame, feeling sick, and waking up back here. When I was done, she sat back on her heels, thinking.
"You don't think I'm a certified nutcase, do you?" I asked. She shook her head.
"I see the ring. And you've promised to show me the picture." Grasping my hands in hers, she smiled. "I believe you. I know you wouldn't lie about something like this. Oh, it's so exciting. I want to hear every detail." I laughed, some of my sadness evaporating. Here was a comrade I could trust and who could help me through what I knew would be hard times.
And hard times came. Nights when I would wake up, thinking I was home, only to find myself back here. I cried more tears than I thought could reside in a body. I had so wanted to come home. Now that was I back, all I wanted to do was go to Paris. My friend was always there, though. She knew the right words to cheer me up and I made it through it.
At twenty-one, I graduated from college and married my boyfriend of six years. He had proposed and I loved him with that second love Erik had loved me with. So, I said yes. Our wedding was a gorgeous outdoor event. The sun shown high and birds sang. I did my best not to cry. Again, my friend helped my get through it.
For our honeymoon, I convinced him that we should go to Paris. Not very nice, I know. I never have told him about my life in Paris. He might believe me, but I don't think he'd like the thought of me having been with another man. After all, only my best friend knew I wasn't a virgin on my wedding day.
We wandered around Paris for about week. Okay, we didn't wander around every day. The first three days were spent… well, that's something I'll let you think of yourself. After those three days, I had to go out and see the city. My husband was surprised to see that I could speak the language, find my way around and not get lost, and knew where all the cutest places were. Unfortunately, many of the places I had seen in the past stay at Paris were no longer around. One or two of them remained.
After much pleading, I finally convinced my husband to take me to see the ancient graveyard on the outskirts of Paris. The graveyard had fallen into decay after the last World War. The Germans had decimated it with bombs and the like.
"Why would you want to go see that old thing? I thought you were afraid of dead bodies." He asked, as we sat outside a café.
"Please." I begged. "I'm interested in that old place. I've heard some amazing stories about it. Please? Please?" In the end, I won out. He could refuse me nothing, just like Erik.
The graveyard was now a place full of weeds and untended out growths of plants. The statues of men and virgins had long since toppled and been covered by the undergrowth. It was a jungle out there. Using as much of my memory as I could, I directed our steps in the direction of where Erik's grave should have been. Wasn't I shocked to find nothing there.
I thought I had to be wrong. There should at least be a gravestone in this spot. There was nothing. Just an empty spot of land overgrown with brambles. Tears sprang into my eyes and I angrily wiped them away. Had I gone the wrong way after all? I glanced at my surroundings, my husband admiring a few flower blooms in the distant. There was an old tree, all bent and twisted, that I recognized. A tombstone stood a little off to my left. I picked away the plant entwining it and found these words: "Anne Rigaletto, 1862-1915". I remembered that stone. It had been right next to Erik's when we buried him. I was in the right spot. So, why was there no tombstone?
I pondered that on our way back to the hotel and through the airplane ride home. I quickly settled into the homemaker mode once I was backing the States. Where was Erik's tombstone? Had someone taken it? Or had it never really existed in the first place? As much as I wanted to know the answers to those questions, they were doomed to remain unanswered.
All I ever knew was that I was lonely for Erik. And the ache in my heart would never go away.