Down Once More
The rain fell in cascading waterfalls down the roof of the abandoned building. The building itself was almost all ash and dust from the fire that had raged in its walls on that dreadful night.
Christine was always the strong one, now, since the fire; Raoul would always cry before she would; it hadn't been this way since the beginning…no… she had been the timid little girl who wanted to be a dancer. She had been little lotte, the creature so well cared for that she didn't think there was a problem in the world anywhere; nothing could happen to her, she was invincible. Then her father had died and it had shredded her heart into pieces. Madame and Meg Giry had kept her cared for but she always felt emptiness like nothing she could describe.
When she had went down that first night to pray in the chapel, she knew that there was something lurking in the shadows but she was too distraught to care who or what lurked. That is where she came every night after that to pray, and every night she felt him. Yes, it was male, the phantom of the opera, to be exact. He did not have a name, at least, not one that he used around her. To her, he was her angel: the angel of music.
"And her father promised her…" the words fell off her lips as if she had said them repeatedly for years and years. She had, when she was younger, but now wished she hadn't. If she would have accepted the fact that her father was dead sooner, then monsieur phantom would not have had any way to get to her, she never would have…no…I did not do anything…
"Past the point of no return…no going back now…" Christine's voice came from the depths of her heart tonight. Her task was simple and yet so complex. Questions ran through her head about how she had treated her life after the opera. Servants waited on her hand and foot, a husband adored her, and yet…she always seemed to want more than that in the depths of her heart.
She was so selfish sometimes that it bothered her. It was not until she realized what she was indeed missing that she lost her sanity. Her heart and soul wanted her angel, not Raoul. That night when monsieur phantom had given her that choice, she had chosen wrong, and now, months after Don Juan, she was paying for it.
"Raoul…" Christine's heart didn't ache like it should have. She had killed a man, her husband. She had made herself a widowed vicomtess and now she was seeking solace from a mass murderer in a mask.
"Why did you have to be so stupid, Raoul. You could have let me be…let me run…Why did you have to interfere with it all? You would still be alive and well…crying over the loss of your wife, yes, but still breathing." Cursing under her breath, Christine entered the charred doorway of the Populaire, only to be greeted by someone she wasn't prepared for…
"Meg? What are you doing here?" Christine noticed that she was stuttering and that her dress was still coated in blood. If Meg were to insist that she remove her cloak…it would ruin it all…but Christine would not let her being here look suspicious to Meg. "I thought that you and your mother left for Italy?"
"No, but…Christine! Oh my, Christine! Why you must be freezing!" Meg ushered Christine into the building while Christine clutched to her cloak in an attempt to keep it closed. "Christine lets get those wet clothes off of you! You are drenched to the bone!"
Just as Meg reached for the snaps of her coat, Christine spoke: "No Meg! Leave it be!"
"But you surely must be freezing!" Meg looked on at her friend in worry. The look on her face almost made Christine regret ever coming to the blasted Populaire, it was only causing her more trouble.
"Meg, I wish to walk through the Populaire one last time and then I shall be on my way. Do not wait for me… I see that you were ready to leave so you surely must leave without me. I will see you again, I suppose. Good night, my friend." Christine brushed her way past her friend, surprise clouding Meg's pale face.
"Christine…"
"Go, Meg, I do not wish to talk to you any longer. More important business acquires my attention at the moment. Nice to have seen you again." Christine plastered on a fake smile and continued into the dark front hall of the opera house. When she was certain that Meg had left the building, Christine began singing, in hopes that it would aid her.
When Christine had come to the conclusion that she had to leave Raoul, one thought had raced through her mind: where will I go? Her body, mind, and spirit ached for another yet she was still afraid to let that carnal side take hold of her sanity because, she knew, it would get away with completely controlling her thoughts.
"Angel, my soul was weak -forgive me . . . enter at last, Master! Angel of Music! Guide and guardian! Grant to me your glory! Angel of Music! Hide no longer! Come to me, strange angel..." Christine was frantic now. What if he isn't here? She thought to herself. I'll have done this for nothing! Christine began to cry at that thought. She never wanted to be alone. "God! No! What if…oh Gods! He could have been killed in the fire or worse…captured and hanged!" Christine began a tiring search for her phantom.
"The mirror! God…the mirror…" There, in Christine's old dressing room sat the frame of her blesses mirror, the pieces were broken on the floor. She stepped carefully over the shards and stepped into the passageway behind the frame.
"Angel of Music! I denied you, turning from true beauty . . . Angel of Music! My protector . . . Come to me, strange angel . . ." Christine practically ran to the beginning of the canal. Seeing no boat or other way to travel across, Christine jumped in. The blood in her clothes spread into the water and the cuts from the struggle stung from the filthy, infiltrating water that washed into them from the unused canal. "Phantom…hear me…please…" Christine ran through the shallow waters, ending up in the lake of her nightmares. She pushed her way onto the bank and began looking everywhere for her phantom. "No! He has to be here! I came to him! God…" she looked to the ceiling, "what do you want from me? Why do you torment me so? You lead me to murder my husband for this man that you deny me for untold reasons! Was I meant to be alone?" Christine collapsed onto the stone floor and was soon crying herself to sleep. Her blood stained clothes covered her in a blanket of death and grief as the angel of sleep overcame her. "I did not even know his name…I shall never know his name…"
Part Two of Chapter One
Erik placed his gloved hands over his ears…he could still hear her…Christine still sat there…in his mind, his soul, his heart. This time, though, the voices sounded so different, so unlike the night of Don Juan. These voices sounded pained and terrified.
"No…" Erik had to know if it was his Christine…always in his thoughts she sounded arousing and sensual…never scared…Christine never sang out of fear to him…maybe about him…but never to him. Even in the tunnels during the fire when he had her vicomte trapped in the Punjab, she did not sing to him in fear…only in sadness.
His angel had cried for him and yet they were not tears of hate, he could feel it. They were tears of regret. When she had kissed him, he had felt the air of sadness dissipate, Christine knew that she had found her soul, but yet the world took her from him.
"Christine…" Erik began following the singing. First it led to the mirror in her dressing room, then through the passageway, and then to the canal.
There was something different about the canal, though. Then he realized it: there was a crimson band of…what was it…blood? Yes…a crimson band of blood was running throughout the water and it was fresh. His Christine was bleeding!
New found speed propelled him farther into the Populaire, still following the song of his angel.
The voices continued on into the end of the canal but then they stopped. Then he could hear the faint traces of sobbing and then finally words reached his sensitive ears:
"No! He has to be here! I came to him! God…what do you want from me? Why do you torment me so? You lead me to murder my husband for this man that you deny me for untold reasons! Was I meant to be alone?" There was silence for a mere moment before the voice came back, sadness even more evident. In between the sobs of anguish…the voice rang out: "I did not even know his name…I shall never know his name…" Then the voice was gone as soon as it had begun.
"Christine…my angel…" Erik ran to the bank and saw her. Christine sat there drenched in water, in clothes stained with blood, unconscious. "Christine…" He sat down next to her bent form and sobbed. "Please…mon ange…open your eyes…let me know you can hear me…" Erik then placed his head in his hands and sobbed. He sobbed for his stupidity, for Christine, and for the fool mistake she had made. She had come back to him and had killed a man in the process.
"Oh…Christine…" He placed a loose curl of her auburn hair behind her ear and lifted her into his arms. He then promptly removed the drenched clothes and placed her beneath the silk covers of the swan bed he had made for her.
"Sleep mon ange…sleep and come back to me…be with me…" He then placed his head on the side of the bed and was soon fast asleep.
Part Three of Chapter One
Christine awoke to the feeling of silk on skin. She looked up and noticed a ceiling drenched in water and ash.
"The Opera House?" Christine lifted herself up from her sleeping position and glanced around the room. Her modest mind took what seemed like ages to realize the horrid fact that she was bare. "Who dares to—" before her sentence could be completed, she heard something: breathing.
Christine looked to the side of the bed and saw the source of the breathing. It was a man, correction, a handsome man. His blonde hair was tousled and ratted and covered in dirt and grime. His forehead had a line of dirt all the way around, from ear to ear, most likely from a very dirty hat.
"Monsieur? Monsieur, please wake for me…I would like to know why you removed me of my clothing…and where you put it…Monsieur?" Christine poked a cold finger on the face of the man, only causing him to roll over in his sleep. That's when she noticed his marred face. Christine almost jumped off the bed when she realized who this man was. At the same time of being scared, she was also overjoyed. This was her angel, sleeping here next to her. This was the man she had come here to be with. This was the man that she had killed for and this was the man that, at the same time, destroyed her life. Her heart had pained for him so much that it had driven her to the brink of insanity.
"Mon ange? Speak to me. Do not tell me that you can not hear me! You always heard me…always…has living alone caused your hearing to fail?" Christine slammed her fists into the bed. Insulting him got her nowhere, especially into his embrace, where she longed to be. She needed someone to hold her, protect her and to tell her that she would ever be safe, and loved.
"Me amour, Mon ange, please wake up…" Christine placed one of her hands on his cheek, raising his face to meet hers. Seeing this have no effect, she began to do the one thing that she knew he would respond to. Christine began to sing. She began to sing a melody so beautiful that even the most feared of creatures would stop and listen to the harmony in it. She sang with all her heart and it showed.
The melody flowed from her like doves flying from their life-long cage prison for the first time. The notes poured out of her until she could no longer breath, only then did she stop their forthcomings. When the song had ended, Christine was flushed and her heart was racing but she was also quite oblivious to the fact that the certain someone she had been trying to wake had moved himself to her side. That is, until he grasped her from behind.
"Christine…what a beautiful melody…where is it from?" Her angel had wrapped his arms around her tiny waist and had placed his head on her own. She sighed to herself. This had to stop.
"Monsieur Fantôme, stop. You may have been my angel all of those years but that does not give you the right to place yourself all over me or, further more, take my clothes!" At her last statement, the man behind her gave a hearty laugh, something she had never heard come from him before.
"Ah, I see you have grown even more modest with your years with the vicomte? Was your time ill-pleasing?" He gave her dashing look before lifting himself off the bed and into the outer-room. "Do not expect me to gather your clothes for you if you cannot even grant me gratitude for taking them off for you."
"Ah, but monsieur, why would I grant you gratitude?" She gave a flirtatious look to the door through which her phantom had gone. "I did not wish for you to take my clothes off, did I? Did my corset have a note saying: 'Please remove'? I surely doubt it." She then rolled over and crossed her legs; she could hear his heavy breathing from outside the door. He was getting mad at her.
"Madame, do you wish me to cast you from my home out into the cold?" He was definitely angry with her. "Is that why you came here, to just get kicked out again? Well, did you Madame?"
"I don't think you have the right to kick me out considering I haven't even been granted the name of my savior. Do not call yourself fantôme or ange. I am not an innocent little girl anymore. I want your name, and I mean your given one…from you parents." She then heard an abrupt silence from her protector. "Did you not have parents, monsieur? Surely you did."
"I did not have them in the way I should have. They did not care for me, and they did not love me. I was alone my entire childhood. I was scorned by my mother and then kicked out by my father into the streets or Paris. Then I was sold into the gypsy circus and used as entertainment for all the little ballet brats and men in suits and ties that wanted to watch me. Yes, Madame, I had a name, and it is the only thing that I still hold onto from my childhood, but I am beginning to think that I should let it go." Christine then heard footsteps as the fantôme walked away from the door.
"No! The fact that I have not known your name has tormented me for years and years, ever since I was a child. I do not want to be tormented anymore. I want you to trust me enough to tell me your name. If you tell me this one thing then I will know that I can trust you with all that has happened to me. I am not an innocent woman anymore, monsieur. My virginity intact, I am much more unholy then the lowliest harem girl in Persia." Damn…she sighed to herself. The tears had come again. She had kept them at bay all the while she had been here, but yet, now that she was not alone anymore, they had come to greet her again. Her sobbing did not go unheeded.
"Christine…why would you say such things about yourself?" He had stepped into the doorway again. She could feel his intense stare.
"Because it's true. But I guess I am not wanted here, it is to be expected. When God, himself, shuns you, then you should not be given charity anywhere else, so, with that said, could you kindly hand me my chemise and corset so I may leave you home once and for all, monsieur?"
"No…I told you I would not give you your clothes. So you will have to stand and get them for yourself. If you are as unholy as you say you are then you will have no problem in showing your body to a hermit such as I."
"I suppose you are right." Then, to the man's surprise, Christine stood and gathered her clothes, right in front of him. "Is this what you wanted, monsieur?"
"No. I wanted you to see that you are still as pure as you once were and that you deserve all that you once had. I wanted you to see that I don't want you to leave and I don't want to be a lecher, I just want to be trusted. I did not want you to strip yourself of your modesty for me or for anyone. You are you because of the things you do." The man then sat himself on the bed and turned to Christine. "Erik."
"Excuse me?" Christine turned to him, confusion etching her flushed face, and her chest fully visible to him, but he didn't look, he cast down his eyes.
"My name is Erik. Erik Guerrier. That is the name given to me, and if you wish the name you can call me by. Do you trust me now, angel?"
Christine's eyes lit up with the promise of hope in her future as she looked at her old friend with new eyes. As she clutched her chemise to her bare body, she gave the biggest smile she had ever given. "Erik. I never once said I didn't trust you. I just didn't believe that I had fallen in love with a ghost. I needed something tangible to grasp onto. That's why I came here. To tell you all that has happened to you pupil while she had been out form under you wing, angel." Christine then thrust her chemise over her head and threw her corset to the floor.
"No more hiding from you, Erik. And you shall not hide from me." Then Christine climbed onto the bed next to her angel and laid her head on his legs, like a young child would to her father. He is not like my father…no…but I love him just as much… With that thought, she was asleep in a matter of moments.
"Christine…I shall never hide again."