Le deuxième occasion insaisissable

The elusive second chance

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Scene VIII

Focus: la Suédoise

When she woke up, it had snowed. It was just five o'clock; the others had not stirred from their rooms. She had not given them an explaination. The night before she had immediately fled to the sanctuary of her room. For a moment she paused at the window, hand resting on the curtains. Then she turned and slipped her legs out from between the yellow sheets. Silently, she pulled out a pair of black creased and cuffed trousers and a sweater.

As she wound down the stair to avoid the noise of the antique elevator she put her arms through the sleeves of her black mac, passing her scarf from hand to hand. Pulling it around her, she cast swirling shadows across the walls.

"Is that you Charlotte, cherie?"

Charlotte paused on the last step and drew up her shoulders.

"Yes, Mama Val."

Her white chignon appeared around the mail pigeonholes beyond the lobby desk.

"Going to visit your father, I see. Well I shan't keep you, cherie. I only thought I'd offer you a fresh muffin. Say hello for me."

"Oh merci, Mama Val. It's so kind of you to send flowers the way you do."

"C'est rien ma cherie. It's nothing at all," the dear old woman said as Charlotte kissed her on the cheek. Her vivid childlike cerulean eyes followed Charlotte as she stepped out into a brave new world.

A few blocks over she flowed down the metro steps and got off at the place de l'opéra. She stood there in the blowing snow for an immeasurable time. Thinking thoughts no one else could know. And if, for a moment she did think she saw someone on the roof, it was gone before she had decided on ghost, statue, or maintence man. So she attributed it to the snow and an enthusiastic imagination—fueled on her father's folklore from her childhood. Turning she returned to the metro, this time to take an RER out into the countryside.

—

Scene VIII

Focus: le gardien galant

He had only to look at the coat rack and see what was missing to know where she had gone this time. Which irritated Maxwell all the more.

"If you don't want to go after her, I'll leave on my own."

Maxwell groaned and dragged his fingers through his messy coffee-coloured hair. It wasn't even twelve o'clock yet and already he felt a headache coming on.

"She's already furious with you, do you really think this is going to help?" Max asked sharply.

He ignored the question and kept slamming about the flat getting his things in order.

"You're shaping up to be a real asshole, you know that?" Max shouted, and followed him into their small lounge; "You know she goes to see her father every Saturday. Even if the cosmos fell out of line and that's not where she went, it's none of our business. You aren't her husband, and I'm not her nanny. What the hell has gotten into you?"

"I don't know," he groaned. He sank down onto the couch and put his head in his hands.

"I'm coming off as jealous and crazy, but I'm worried about her, Max! She hasn't got anyone else in the world, but Marguerite and us. Maybe I shouldn't, but I do feel responsible for her," he paused. Thinking about what he'd just said. "I'm telling you, she was freaked out yesterday; I just don't feel good about it."

"Maybe you should go then, at least to make up with her."

"Really?"

"Yeah, just don't do anything stupid, kid."

"Shove it."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever…kid."

—

Scene VII

Focus: les monstres

"My darlings are getting bored," she drawled. Flipping a manicured hand out to dangle listlessly. He froze where he stood, having not seen her in the room. She lay sprawled across a listing divan wearing a seductive smirk and a white gown that was neither revealing nor modest.

"Get out," he ordered, blankly.

"You've been hiding something from me," she called out in a singsong tone.

A physical wrench of terror tore through the vicinity that the human heart was known to occupy. With a new wave of misery, he understood exactly how his beloved had felt.

"I would tell you to go to hell…" he retorted.

Her shapely figure jerked to a stop in the door as she let lose a katabatic scream that came dangerously close to rupturing his eardrums. She flung out her arms and Erik collapsed, clenching his jaw shut in pain. For a long moment she stood over him coldly as he convulsed and stilled alternately. He relaxed as she unclenched her fists. As his vision greyed and darkened mercifully her sotto voice dripped poisonously into his ear.

"Do not toy with me, you of all people should know there are things worse than death. Do I really need to remind you what happened last time?"

To her dismay and confusion he smiled beneath her glare before falling unconscious.

Erik knew what had happened now. Knew what had gone so spectacularly wrong in his plot to win the heart of Ms. Daaé.

She growled, wretchedly and gave his form a kick with a dainty foot. Livid that somehow she had not broken him properly before he passed out, but there was nothing she could do now.

Before she could react he held her by the neck. She gasped and choked, shocked enough that she forgot momentarily she didn't need to breathe. Her feet dangled, and her eyes narrowed as she ceased struggling. She could not speak, but the message was quite clear.

"Milady, did you think it would last forever?" he hissed, pleased to see her eyes widen. A sickly smile contorted his lips as he drove the dagger home. "Did you think that he would welcome you as his queen? Well perhaps he has changed his mind. It has been quite awhile, you know, plenty of time to think things over again. Shall we see?"

Her eyes narrowed and she rasped in a demonic strangled voice.

"By heaven, hell, and limbo you will regret this, but go on, if you dare, you wretched hideous fool."

"Yes, I dare say one so beautiful as yourself has spent far to much playing with abandoned bones, socializing with living corpses," his voice was scathing, soft and maniacal.

"Do it," she whispered evilly.

Deftly, his thin elegant fingers snapped her neck.

"I'd ask you to send my regards, but…you understand. Bon voyage," he muttered derisively as he tossed her limp cadaver into the underground lake.

—

I hope that appeased you Erik lovers. ;) Sorry I've been gone! I've been pulling my hair out over my writing, but I'm really quite pleased with this. Work and Harry Potter were also cause for delay; I will try and get back to regular updates though. It probably slipped your notice, but Erik's scene happened before the others, just so you know.