Disclaimer: As much as I tried to lure Erik to my house, he remains uncatchable, and therefore does not belong to me…yet…

AN: One review, but over 60 hits for my previous chapter. Hmm...that means that something does not add up here. I don't mean to lecture, but I ask for readers to please be considerate to all writers (not just me) and review, whether you enjoyed the chapter or not. After all, it is only fair: you get enjoyment from stories, and writers get pleasure from feedback. But I'm sure you understand the whole process: writers write, reviewers review, reviews encourage writers, etc. Reviews keep everyone happy...kind of like the Circle of Life and all that jazz. But enough of that...

On another topic, I thought I'd mention that (later on) I'm going to speed time up a bit, since I'm eager to get to the film. I'm going to try my hardest to stick to the movie plotline, but if I stray a bit, please be kind since I'm also following my own creative path on this. Meanwhile, enjoy the chapter!

Chapter 7: Of Tales & Friendship:

Taking a sip of tea, Marie watched Erik's movements over the edge of her cup. He seemed very uncomfortable, and the two had only begun their tea a few moments ago. She kept reminding herself that he was likely unused to having company, but her annoyance at the awkward situation refused to diminish. Besides, this had been the quietest tea that she had ever attended! The ballet girls were always chattering about something or another, but Erik refused to start a conversation. Worse yet, whenever Marie felt the slightest courage to begin speaking, a glance over at her partner showed that it probably wasn't a good idea.

Biting back a sigh, Marie set down her cup and did her best to think of a way to get Erik to speak to her, since he obviously did not want to be the one to take the first step. Looking up, she saw that he was currently staring at the croissant in front of him, as though it held the answers to all of the questions in the universe. She bit her lip to keep from laughing at the sight and decided to take matters into her own hands.

"I'm afraid we're intended to have at least some conversation, Erik," she said pleasantly.

Erik jolted in his chair, obviously startled by her words. "What?" he asked, his eyes slightly out of focus.

Marie sighed. "I know that you brought me down here for a purpose, Erik," she said, her voice gentle but slightly impatient. "Did you want me here so that we could talk about what you couldn't bring up in an earlier conversation?"

Green-gold eyes flared to life at her words. "Actually, yes," he said, leaning back in his chair as he looked at her. "I would very much like to speak with you about yesterday."

"What about yesterday?" she asked, looking a bit puzzled.

Erik took a deep breath, as though he were stating the obvious. "I speak of the story that you told the little ballet rats and the gift that you gave me," he said, frowning slightly. "How can you believe in the moral of the story about the Beast so faithfully in a world that despises those who appear different? And what could possibly possess you to present a gift, however small, to the Opera Ghost while standing in his Box?"

Marie chewed her lip in thought as she looked at the half-empty teacup in front of her. She had no idea how to present her reasons to him, especially after he had presented the question and topic so unexpectedly. The fact that he had heard her read the story aloud to the younger girls was rather disturbing, but shouldn't have surprised her, considering that there were hidden passageways woven into the walls of the Opera House. But she felt that she did, indeed, owe him an explanation of her actions, and was willing to give it.

She sighed. "I suppose you know that my sister and I are not actually related by blood?" Erik nodded in reply. "Well, then, I imagine that my behavior towards others is because of my abandonment as a babe."

Erik stared at her in surprise. "Abandonment?" he said, his beautiful voice suddenly going soft.

Marie nodded. "When I had just turned ten-years-old, I knew that there was something different about me," she explained, her eyes glazing slightly as she remembered the tale her father had told her many years ago. "My features of face, body, and hair was, and still is, very much different from all of my family members, and I wanted to know why. So my father told me the story of my background.

"Apparently the man I believed to be my father found me on his doorstep on a cold winter night in England, when he and Mama were touring Europe for his violin performances. At that time, they had been married for several years and they wanted a child very much, but had been unsuccessful in conceiving. They had almost given up hope when there was a knock on the door of the cottage they were staying in at the back of a small English inn. Papa had opened the door and there I was, lying in a basket and wrapped in several blue blankets.

"At first, since my face was not showing, Papa had assumed that I was a bundle of abandoned puppies or kittens that no one wanted. He had then brought me inside so that Mama could take care of me, and it was then that they discovered that it was a baby. They then chose to raise me as their own, and I was very happy with them. They treated me as though I were their birth-daughter and not one that they had merely discovered on their doorstep."

Marie smiled in fondness at her memories. "My sister, Christine, was born after my fifth birthday, and it was the happiest time of my life," she continued, smiling dreamily. "I was so proud to be a big sister, and I took my role in her life very seriously."

"I know," Erik replied, leaning back in his chair. "I saw the way you soothed her fears when you both first came here," he hurriedly explained when Marie looked at him with suspicion in her eyes. "Her cries from her nightmares could literally pierce the walls."

Marie laughed, which seemed to both surprise and please him for some reason. "Well, she was very young back then," she said, still smiling at the man in front of her. "I am glad that she has managed to overcome it, though."

Erik nodded before reaching for the croissant in front of him. "Yet you still have not answered my question," he gently chided her.

A small smile tugged on her lips. "I was coming to that," she replied in a playful tone. "The reason I told them the story is because I feel a…sort of understanding with them about it feels to be different from others, to be cast aside from society for one reason or another."

She saw the anger flash in Erik's green eyes, the gold in them flickering like a deadly inferno just waiting to consume everyone in its path. Marie knew that she had to stop his temper before he did something drastic that he would regret later on.

"Please allow me to explain," she quickly begged the man before her. He nodded, but the anger did not fade from his eyes. "My blood parents cast me out of their lives for no reason I can think of, but I was fortunate enough to find someone to take me into their home and love me. I feel the same pain and sadness as any other outcast, for I sometimes wonder what was so wrong with me that it caused my birth parents to leave me to die on another person's doorstep. For others, they know why they were not accepted; their behavior was too wild, or their minds are not fully developed…"

"Or their faces made differently," Erik snapped, interrupting her. "But your face is whole and perfect while mine is twisted and monstrous."

"But at least you knew for certain why your mother and father felt no love for you!" Marie cried, her voice turning shrill. "I will never be able to ask my parents why they left me to die, never be able to know for certain why they abandoned me the way they did. Was there something that I cannot seem to find about myself that caused them to spurn me and throw me aside? Or perhaps it was because I was born a girl instead of a wanted son and heir? Was I the youngest, and therefore unwanted child of parents who already had too many children to feed? There are so many questions that I have had in the back of my mind, and I will never be able to ask them, for the people who truly know the answers are beyond my reach!"

As she spoke the last word, tears streamed down Marie's now flushed cheeks. "I am not ungrateful to my adopted mother and father," she said, her voice calming as she drew a handkerchief from her pocket and dried her eyes. "My life has been a happy one filled with love, but I have had a difficult one, nonetheless. Twice in life, I have lost two sets of parents and have spent my life caring for Christine as both mother and sister." She gave him a small smile. "And yet, I would not trade it for the world, for I know that there are others less fortunate than myself, and I would rather give them a kind smile than a harsh word. After all, they have had enough of that sort of torment in their lives."

Without another word, Marie turned her attention back toward her teacup and the food in front of her.


Erik could only sit and stare at the young woman in front of him. Marie Daae was amazingly strong in mind and spirit after having to endure so many traumas in her life, and yet here she was, sipping tea and eating cakes as though she had not just spilled her life story to him! Erik had thought that his life had been hard, but Marie's had been just as bad, and she had been right about many things.

'Including me at least knowing the reason for being unloved by my parents,' he mentally spat, trying to keep a sneer from twisting his lips as he thought about his mother and father.

Yes, his loving parents who sold him to the gypsies, likely in the hopes that they might get some use out of the beast that had been borne to them. Immediately after his birth, his mother had paid an elderly woman to care for him, since she herself did not want to even touch her only child. The old woman, Nana, had held him, fed him, cleaned him whenever she felt he was too dirty, and even played or sang songs with him whenever he got restless.

A small smile tugged on the corner of his mouth as his mind drifted to the music box that sat in his room. The monkey that sat on top of the box, two tiny cymbals in its grasp, was the only toy he had ever been given. At first, it had been a rag toy made of bits and pieces of cloth and cotton, but it had been his. It had been Nana's first (and only) birthday gift to him, a week before she died. Now it was elegantly re-crafted and dressed in red silks, a neat red cap on its head as it eagerly chimed its accompaniment with the music box that was its throne.

After Nana was gone, and there had been no one else who wanted to take care of him, Erik had found himself behind the bars of a cage in a gypsy caravan, the centerpiece in their show full of terrors and beasts. His parents had brought him there, coaxing him into the night with a single cookie and (what he now knew as false) smiles and loving words. They had delivered him up to the gypsy leader and been rewarded with a pouch full of coins in exchange for Erik and his freedom…as well as his face and name. Instead, they called him by another title…

The Devil's Child.

His face (or rather, lack there of) had brought in more patrons than anything else the gypsies had, and been the most terrifying. First, people would gawk at the canvas bag over his head, wondering what was hidden beneath it. Then, once the tent was full enough, the lead gypsy man would pull off the bag, revealing the deformed mass that was his face. Then the screams would start, shortly followed by handfuls of rotten food and stones, perhaps even broken glass to cut his back, when he turned to protect himself from their attacks.

Erik winced and brought his right hand up to his masked cheek. There had been only one person in the crowd who had not screamed at the sight of him, and her name was Antoinette Giry, back then a young girl with the Populaire's corps de ballet. She had helped him escape from the nightmare that was his life, stolen him away in the night and tucked him underneath the massive building of the Opera House that was to become his home and sanctuary. Over the years, the numerous caves by the lake found a place in his heart, and became the only thing he was ever able to call home. Meanwhile, a great deal of trial and error during his explorations had helped to better craft the already existing passageways behind the walls, finding forgotten treasures in rooms long sealed up.

And it was there that the Phantom of the Opera had been made.

Breaking into those forgotten supply and costume rooms, Erik had fashioned himself a wardrobe full of elegant clothes that matched those the Opera patrons wore. A mask was made from other materials he had taken from the supply room, and stolen props from the Populaire were taken in between performances to furnish his house by the lake. After that, all that he needed was to set up a haven for the music that had danced through his head since Nana had begun crooning to him in his cradle.

Once again, Antoinette had proved invaluable in procuring the used organ from the Opera House, when a new one had been installed. She had merely informed them that she would take it to a poor, unfortunate soul who loved music and that it would be moved with little trouble to the managers. Within a week, the entire instrument (and all of its spare parts) had been set up for Erik's amusement. After playing the first key, he had never stopped.

The money he had managed to acquire from the Opera managers had come much later, when he was a young man of 25 years. Previously, he had stolen his clothing and music writing materials when he knew they would not be missed, and had waited until just before the daily meals to swipe food from the kitchen when the backs of the cooks were turned. After living so long like a ghost, he decided to make it his occupation. Sneaking around the Populaire was not difficult anyway, so he might as well make a living off of the beliefs of more simpler and superstitious folk.

Stealing into the managers' office, he had left a note in red ink and sealed it with a skull-shaped seal that he had crafted himself. The managers, of course, had laughed off the note and its threat, but had taken him quite seriously when things began to go wrong during preparations for the next production. Missing props, destroyed costumes, and terrified dancers tend to slow things down quite a bit. After that, they had begun to pay him handsomely without question. With his financial future secure, Erik could then devote his entire attention to his music.

At the thought of his music, Erik let his thoughts drift towards the next piece that he had floating through his creative mind.


While Erik's eyes glazed over in what she assumed was a haze of memories, Marie Daae had finished her tea and was getting impatient to return to her room in the Opera House. Surely someone was looking for her by now! In her years here at the Opera House, she had learned that, curiously enough, people of all sorts tended to look for her at all hours of the day, and would take a lot of trouble to try and locate her if there was an emergency that needed to be taken care of in the dorms or the costume rooms.

'Especially if it concerns the little girls,' she thought with a small giggle. 'They are so adorable when they pout and form a group search for me!'

Snapping back to the present situation, Marie yawned and looked over at her tea partner. Erik appeared to have stopped focusing on his memories and was now sporting a rather dreamy look on his face, one which made him look very handsome indeed. The gold in his eyes was sparkling merrily as the green seemed to shimmer in an otherworldly manner. His lips were pulled into a joyful smile and his fingers (still clad in gloves) were moving as though they were playing the piano or organ. Marie laughed out loud and the noise seemed to bring Erik back from his dream world. He blushed a little, but the telltale movement at the corner of his lips showed his amusement.

"And just what is so amusing, Mademoiselle?" he asked, leaning back in his chair and resting his right elbow on the arm of his chair, his chin finding its way into the palm of said hand as he gazed at the woman before him.

A gentle, playful smile graced her face as she looked back at him. This was the most relaxed she had ever seen him, though she did not know if that said a great deal or not. Still, it was nice to see him so amused; she could imagine that he likely had not had many cheerful moments in his life.

"I was just thinking that you likely did not know that you play the organ even when you are not actually seated in front of the instrument," she said, giving him a teasing look as she poured herself another cup of tea. Well, she was here, so she might as well enjoy the food and drink he provided.

"You mean I was practicing and I did not even know about it?" he asked, looking genuinely surprised. Marie nodded as he frowned. "Well, that's interesting…that's very interesting."

Marie merely smiled. "As interesting as that may be, I'm afraid I must ask you to return me to my room," she said, gently bringing up the subject. "It may be a day of rest, but there tend to be many things that need to be done before the performance."

Her host nodded his understanding and stood up.


It did not take long for him to return Marie to her room, and he was quite surprised at the impeccable timing that they had. No sooner had he shut the hidden door behind him than a group of little girls had swept into the room, their voices pleading for Marie to help them with their dance steps, to do their hair nicely, or to help them read their letters from home.

He watched with envy as Marie organized everyone according to the urgency of their needs and quickly went about putting ribbons or pins in one girl's hair while helping another read through her messages from home. Once the hair and letter troubles were taken care of, the older girl led the entire group to the practice rooms. After everyone was in their practice outfits and in their assigned positions, Marie began to assist them with their steps and their arm movements.

As he watched them prance around the room, Erik could easily see that most of the girls' mistakes were largely due to their small amounts of stage fright. He knew that most (if not all) of them had never been in an opera production before, and it was the idea of being in front of so many people that caused them to misstep or even to fall over. If he hadn't been so understanding of their fright, he would have laughed at the amusing sight of a dozen or so little girls tripping over their own feet.

Eventually, Marie decided they had practiced enough, and that after supper, they could return and attempt the steps again. The little ones all cheered and nodded in agreement before racing off to change, Marie following behind to help them with their clothes.

Once they were out of sight, Erik headed back down to his lair to complete one last thing before the day was done.


Dinner had been a very exhausting affair that night. Considering the début performance of the younger corps de ballet was approaching, many of the girls were experiencing periods of heightened emotion. Some were nervous, some excited, and some were nearly panicking with the prospect of being onstage for any given amount of time. It was times like this that made Madame Giry thankful for her assistant and her assistant's calming presence.

Although Marie had endured this several times before, it never seemed to cease in giving her a monstrous headache and a tremendous desire to sleep for a whole day. A mug of soothing tea, however, would help deal with the headache, and the ability to sleep for a whole day would come after the final performance, when the entire Opera House shut down for a week to give everyone time to relax and mentally prepare for the next performance.

Tonight, though, seemed the ideal time for her to sit alone in her room with her cup of tea, a good book, and complete silence after spending the day with a crowd of noisy little girls.

Once she had led the girls to the dormitories, Marie practically ran to get to her room, hoping to shut and lock the door behind her before anyone could snatch her up for some sort of chore or another. Energetic little girls she could handle very well; dealing with the more senior members of the staff was much more difficult, mostly by way of being unable to get away from them once they had caught their target in their grasp.

Finally making it to her room, Marie slipped in and locked the door behind her. She would not have to worry about Christine this night; she was sleeping with the other ballet rats under the watchful eyes of Meg and Hayley (who had only agreed to 'guard duty' after Marie had bribed her with a three small bags of peppermint candy). Tonight, Madame Giry and Marie were free to have the evening to themselves. The younger dancers were going to have a small pre-performance party, and, of course, Christine had wanted to attend it since all of her friends would be there. The Opera House cooks had supplied two large platters of cookies and fruit-filled croissants for them to eat tonight and tomorrow morning. The girls could fetch pitchers of milk whenever they felt it was needed.

Taking a huge sigh of relief, Marie leaned back on the bolted door, savoring the peace and quiet of her room. She noticed, though, that her room smelled strongly of roses. Opening her eyes, she found half a dozen vases of lovely white and yellow roses on every open table space.

Wondering who could have done such a wonderful thing, she spotted a piece of parchment with her name on it center table in the sitting room. She quickly snatched it up and read it, smiling at the message written there.

From one outcast to anotherErik.

Marie smiled, plucking a white blossom from a vase and inhaling its wondrous scent.


AN: Aww, isn't that sweet? Erik has a new friend! I hope that this chapter wasn't too mushy or anything, and that people enjoyed it. Please review and let me know how I'm doing!