Et Velle Et Perficere
Disclaimer: Don't own POTO… but I do own Jeremy, Michael and Marcus Christie, though he's named after a former character in Eastenders.
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Chapter 14: I Love Her and I Make No Excuses for that Fact…
Jeremy was bewildered… he had just left his room to go back to the Mac to supervise the rest of the night when the lift doors had opened to reveal the prone figure of his lovely surrogate daughter. She was lying sprawled upon the floor of the lift, blinking rapidly at nothing, it would seem, and he could feel the panic coiling in his stomach start to rise as he noticed that her dress was torn…
He was overcome with an intense feeling of dread as he looked at her and rushed forward to pick her up. She was delicate… so light in his arms that he began to cry at the thought of what he could not help but believe had happened to her… and he cursed himself for not having been there to prevent it. He would never leave her side again if only she'd forgive him. He had the presence of mind to hit the emergency stop button before he left the lift – he was not sure if whatever had happened had happened there… but he would make sure no one else used it in the meantime, just in case.
He carried her into his bedroom, laying her reverently upon the bed as she struggled to grasp onto the last remaining threads of consciousness, and he tried to make her comfortable as he picked up his private phone and dialled the emergency services for an ambulance and the police. Christine was completely unconscious now and there was no way he would leave her again… he would also not leave her with any other man as he had no idea who was responsible for her current state – better to offend them and keep her safe than for the alternative to happen. Therefore, he knew he was going to have to find one of the female teachers to, either, sit with Christine while he waited for the ambulance, or she would have to wait for the ambulance, herself… So, he made short work of phoning Mrs. Giry's mobile number as he knew she was not likely to be in St. Mary's while everyone else was outside. And those three rings were the longest of his life…
"Hello?"
"Ada, listen to me… it's Christine… she's unconscious… I think someone's drugged her… I think she's… I think she's been raped…" he said, unable to keep from crying and incapable of keeping his voice calm.
"Oh my God…" she breathed. "Where is she? Have you called an ambulance? The police…?"
"Of course, of course I have… We're in my room – I need you to watch for the paramedics and the police… and show them up. Oh, and use the stairs – the lift's out of service…"
"She's in your room?" Ada asked out of surprise, without thinking of what it had sounded like.
"What exactly are you suggesting, Mrs. Giry?" he spat. "For God's sake, will you just make sure the paramedics can find her…" He slammed the phone down in disgust and almost choked on a sob as he looked at Christine and contemplated phoning her parents.
In truth, he could only speculate over what had happened and, though the situation looked dire, he had no intention of worrying her parents more than necessary… but he cared too much about them all to lie through omission and he knew, if the situation were reversed, he would want to be told, however little they actually knew.
He picked the phone up again and took in a deep, calming breath before dialling the Daaés number. He hoped they were not out somewhere…
Michael answered after a few tediously crawling seconds… "Hello?"
"Michael… I…"
"Jeremy, what is it?" Michael asked, worriedly. His friend was an incredibly easy-going sort of man and it was not like him to not be able to find his words… something which completely unnerved Michael as his mind was suddenly filled with all the possibilities any parent would dream up upon receiving a phone call late in the evening from their child's boarding school teacher.
Jeremy moved over to sit on the bed beside the unconscious young woman whose father he was talking – trying – to talk to. He didn't know what to say… "I… Michael, it's Christine… she's unconscious… I think she's been drugged." When he heard nothing but silence on the other end of the line, he tried to think of something else to say that might help… but could come up with little constructive. "I've called an ambulance… they'll probably take her to hospital… I think you should be there."
Michael suddenly snapped out of the trance he had fallen into when Jeremy had told him what was happening to his daughter, and when he spoke, he found that his voice was uncomfortably choked with an emotion he really did not want to be hearing. "I'm coming… I'll be there as soon as I can. Oh, and Jeremy…?"
"Yes?"
"It'll be a few hours until we get there… look after her, will you? I trust you…"
"Of course, I will, Michael… I'll keep her safe, I swear."
After they had hung up, Jeremy wondered where Erik had gotten to – surely he would want to know what had happened… He tried calling his number but found that he got no answer – now he was worried about him too – it was not like Erik to be unreachable when it came to him or Christine. But what could he do – Christine was his main priority now and he would not leave her unattended.
Ada Giry met the paramedics at the front gates, directing them to the left fork in the road and running to catch up as they parked outside St. Patrick's. She tried to explain to them everything Jeremy had said over the phone and led them hastily to the stairs round the back, up to the top floor. What she saw on the top landing, however, almost made her faint…
"Do you know him?" one of the paramedics asked as they both knelt down next to the unconscious figure sprawled on the floor to check his vital signs.
"Yes," she gasped, "that's Erik… but Jeremy didn't mention him… he was talking about Christine."
One of the paramedics nodded to the other to go and check on the unconscious girl this woman was talking about as the first made sure the young man in front of him did not have any life-threatening injuries.
Ada led the second paramedic quickly towards Jeremy's room and watched almost frantically as he looked over the young girl lying on the bed. Jeremy was looking on in a similar fashion as the paramedic spoke to them both… he could only vaguely make out what he was saying, however.
"She'll have to be taken to hospital," the paramedic said eventually, satisfied that she was in a stable condition, "so that they can do some tests and keep an eye on her. Which of you is responsible for her?"
"I am," Jeremy said immediately. "Her father has entrusted her into my care."
"Well, you can come in the ambulance with us if you want but we will have to take Christine and Erik in together…"
"Erik?"
"Yes," Ada said, explaining to him what had happened as they had come up the stairs.
"I don't believe it… Michael and Sarah trusted me to look after them and I've made both of them need the care of a hospital. Can you stay here and wait for the police, Ada? I can't leave the two of them now… not when they need me. Oh, and tell them that I found her in the lift…" He explained everything as he could remember it to her while the paramedics did what they could and came back for Christine after they'd gotten Erik into the ambulance.
As Jeremy sat in the back of the ambulance watching his two charges being attended to by the paramedic, he couldn't help clinging to the hope that, since both Christine and Erik appeared to have been drugged, that perhaps Christine had not been attacked…
A crowd had gathered around the police cars outside St. Patrick's and Ada watched them as they joked about what could have happened. She, however, did not think it was anything to joke about and she tried her very best to ignore them as she stood telling the policeman she was talking to exactly what had happened since she had become involved… not that she could tell him much, considering how little she actually knew of the situation.
"Can you think of any reason someone might have to wish to hurt either Miss Daaé or Mr. Phelps-Jones?" the policeman asked.
She shook her head. "No… I… Christine is such a lovely girl… everybody – well, most everybody – likes her and Erik keeps much to himself… apart from his attachment to Christine, of course…"
"Sorry… you said that most everybody likes her… who are you excluding?"
"Well, Carlotta Sinclair and Christine have never much gotten on…"
"Oh? And why is that?" he asked.
"It has stemmed from the fact that Christine keeps getting the lead in the school productions… but their intense dislike of each other surely would not lead to this…" Ada said disbelievingly as she shook her head at the notion.
"I have seen stranger things… And what about Mr. Phelps-Jones…? Does he have any enemies, would you say?"
"Well, not Carlotta, I don't believe… she was quite taken with Erik, I think… However, he has always been much closer to Christine and only Christine… which, I suppose, is a reason why he and Raoul de Chagny have never liked each other… I don't know if I would call them enemies, as such – after all, Erik does not make friends very easily anyway… But Raoul was very jealous of Erik – he wanted to make Christine his girlfriend… Since she and Erik met, though, they have gotten very close… Still, Raoul's such a nice lad – he'd never hurt anyone…"
"Well, thank you, madam," the policeman said, closing his notepad. "That'll be all for now but we will need you to come down to the police station tomorrow to give us a formal statement…" He tipped his hat to her and walked over to join his colleagues in the building.
"Mum, Mum, what happened?" Meg called as she rushed over to her mother's side.
"Calm down, Meghan… I'll tell you everything I know but not now," she said walking away from the building and towards St. Mary's. She would leave the other teachers to send the students home and to set both of St. Patrick's two remaining full-time boarders into temporary rooms in St. Mary's. She could not be dealing with that right at the moment…
"But, Mum…"
"No, Meg…" she said firmly, without looking back.
Later, in the family room of the hospital, Jeremy was pacing furiously as a doctor came in to speak to him. "Mr. Phelps-Jones?" he asked.
"No…" Jeremy shook his head, unable to find enough words to enlighten the man as to his true identity.
The grey-haired doctor looked confusedly down at the notes in his arms again. "Mr. Daaé?" he tried without success.
"No… no, I'm Jeremy Harper-Matthews… I'm Christine and Erik's teacher. During term time, I am responsible for them and their father has entrusted them into my care, so you may tell me anything about them without worry…"
"Well," the doctor said, urging him to sit and then sitting in one of the chairs in front of him. "I'm Marcus Christie – a consultant here at the hospital… Christine and Erik will be fine, I assure you… Actually, quite a large quantity of gammahydroxybutyrate – more commonly known as GHB – was found in both of their systems… It is a powerful and rapidly acting central nervous system depressant which caused them both to become unconscious but should not leave them with any ongoing damage. And I am satisfied that there is no evidence of an actual rape. We cannot honestly predict when they will be waking up as different people react differently to different substances. Ordinarily, though, this particular drug only stays in the system for up to eight hours. But you are welcome to sit with them if you'd like…"
"Thank you," Jeremy breathed, relieved beyond words, as he followed the doctor out of the waiting room and towards the cubicles.
"Have their parents been informed?"
"Yes," Jeremy answered, his attention more focused on seeing his two charges again.
When they got to Erik he was already awake – the ratio of the amount of the drugs to someone of his height and weight meant that it had a much weaker effect on him than it had on Christine, who was considerably smaller. As soon as he was aware of their presence he asked where Christine was…
"She's in a different ward, Erik," the doctor said. "She needed more intensive care than you did, I'm afraid. You can see her later…"
"She's in a ward? Intensive care…? What happened to her?" He sat up in complete worry, ignoring the pain in his head, and stared at the two men for an answer.
"The same thing that happened to you, Erik… somebody put something in your drinks."
He didn't remember. It was scary – finding a big chunk of his memory just missing – but he was more concerned about his angel. Somebody had hurt her – the fact that they had hurt him too was just trivial – but somebody had truly hurt her and he was going to make bloody sure that they got what they deserved.
"Take me to her…"
"No, Erik, you need to rest," Mr. Christie said. "You can see her when you're better…"
"Either you show me where she is… or I will get up and find her, myself… one way or another I will see her but this way will take less time and you might just get me to keep my drip in."
Mr. Christie conceded – he could quite imagine that this boy would do just as he said. He did not know much about Christine or Erik, but he could tell at least one thing… whatever could be said about Erik – it was clear that he loved Christine very much, in whatever way.
He led the young man and his teacher to one of the upstairs wards, showing them to the cubicle the young girl was in before heading off to see another patient.
Erik's heart broke at the sight of his beloved unconscious on a hospital bed with tubes up her nose and a drip in her perfect little hand. He delicately sat on the bed next to her and brushed a curl off of her forehead… she looked so peaceful and so still that he could almost believe that she had passed away in her sleep – if not for the almost imperceptible, but still present, rising and falling of her chest due to her continued breathing.
It occurred to him that he had never so blatantly stared at her chest before and he could not control himself as he burst out laughing – partly out of a nervous kind of relief and partly out of the indistinct wanderings of his still cloudy mind. Jeremy was, not for the first time that night, totally bewildered…
"She's going to be alright, Erik," he said, putting his hand on Erik's shoulder.
"I know… she has to be, you see," he whispered, placing his own hand underneath Christine's on top of her stomach. "I could not function without her…" Suddenly he turned towards Jeremy and looked quite lucidly into his eyes. "I love her, Jeremy, and I make no excuses for that fact."
"Nor should you…"
A while later, Jeremy was sitting in the chair by Christine's bed as Erik slept in an unusual position by her side. Christine had not actually wakened up yet and Erik, having been still groggy from the drugs and overcome with relief that she was alright, had fallen asleep in a precarious position upon her shoulder. Jeremy had no intention of waking him, though… one did not separate the masked man from his beloved and get away unscathed.
After a short time, two policemen came through the curtains into the cubicle and asked to talk to him. He was really quite exhausted by now as he had been up for countless hours and was, himself, overcome with relief, but he agreed provided that he would be allowed to remain as he was.
They asked the usual run-of-the-mill type questions and got answers little different from the ones Ada Giry had provided their colleagues with. And, as they asked him more involved things about Erik and Christine, he found himself yawning quite regularly… until, eventually, they had to give up their questioning for the night as he had fallen asleep in the chair right in front of them just as he had been speaking.
They had learned a few things of worth from him though… enough, at least, to go on until they could question him again – and hopefully he would be awake next time.
© Copyright of CrawfordsBiscuits, November 2005
Any revising will be done when I get back from my music lesson. Enjoy...