Her Lesson – Chapter 12
Her fingers grazed the grass, her back shifting so that it would ease an ache of standing in position for that morning. Erik had foully corrected her posture – as if she were a child! – and his eyes had been clouded in annoyance.
"Will you not learn the correct posture?" he had snapped at her, stalking closer.
Christine raised her head, jutting her chin out, "No one is perfect Erik. You said yourself that instructions are learned in time. You cannot demand perfection from me,"
His lip curled slightly, his frame radiating tension, "You managed posture before child," his back turned, skeletal frame almost hunched, "You have lost your spirit," he spat the word with underlying resentment, punctuating it with the squeeze of his leather gloves.
Her lips started to tremble, unable to convey the hurt bitterness of the situation, "I lost my spirit long ago,"
At this he turned abruptly, eyes burning, "No. Do not lie to me, dear. You cannot say that when you pledged it to me!" his musical voice rang through the air and she had to stop herself from stepping backwards in fear.
Her jaw clenched angrily before she gasped, "Pledged? I never pledged it to you – you demanded it - like the rest of my life!" she receded a step, backing away to a covered window. Her hands shoved the tapestry out of the way, hand catching it before the world descended to the eternal darkness his home seemed to inhabit. Angry pikes of trees met her eyes, piercing pines like thorns of a deadly vine of a rose, barring her way out from the cage he imprisoned her in. Her eyes sought the light above, yet a cloud had obscured it from view, casting shadows over his realm.
As if Erik was able to transmute his emotions into the elements surrounding him.
Her head rested on the pane of the window, its coldness soothing her pounding head. He was far far too much for her sometimes. Too intense, too demanding. Too needing for perfection.
"Don't you see that I have my own flaws too?" she whispered to the still air.
"The only flaw I see is myself," his voice curling beside her ear, even while his shadow lurked near the piano.
Yes, his temper was truly ugly.
His eyes were truly terrifying.
His voice was truly deadly.
But that was not the point!
She spun around to meet him, "No!" she cried, feeling so consumed with utter frustration that she wanted to scream, shake him until he started talking one bit of sense.
"At four I pushed past a little girl in my class in a hurry to get my bag, knocking her into a table and she had a bruise for weeks. When I was seven, I nearly ran into the street, thinking so impulsively when I thought I saw my mother. When I was eleven, I hit the ball so hard in tennis practice that I nearly brained my teacher unconscious. At thirteen I stumbled across a homeless person and I gave him my entire collection of fake arcade money, naively thinking it was real. At fourteen and a half I forgot it was my friend's birthday and the present I then later got them they were allergic to. So allergic that they almost had to go to hospital. I wasn't there when my father died –" her voice cracked, but she continued resolutely, "And I hurt all of my friends by lying to them for months. Then I abandoned them," she supressed the shuddering sob, "Without saying goodbye," her hand fisted unsteadily in the thick fabric that hung wearily beside her.
A something in her peripheral vison made her startle and her eyes focused to see that it was Erik's shape drifting closer to her. Fear froze her to the bone.
Skeletal fingers, so thin that they were partially translucent in the small ray of light that peeked through the clouds, caught her gaze. Her pulse pounded erratically, ears straining to hear his steps that she long knew by now were silent. A protest rose in her throat and died, as his lithe form stalked his prey took steady, measured steps towards her. Her back shrunk away, as if hoping to turn into the wall But all he did was graze the air beside her, his hands skating through the air, only to move the tapestry back into place, fingers curling around it protectively as the sun's weak ray was snuffed out once more.
Her gaze focused on his hand, eerie as if it would leap out and clutch her neck as swift as a noose –
Noose.
"Each occasion you named, -"words of spun gold breathed into her ear, distracting her thoughts slipping into that unending madness, "Was of mistaken goodness," Erik's words caressed softly, warmth tingling its way through her. Something unwound within her heart at the sound, only a small nagging thought at the back of her mind warning that something was slipping out of control. That something was too near.
Christine's breath caught in her throat when her head rose to find only inches were between them, red velvet the colour that enclosed her in the nook her footsteps had retreated into, yet her mind was trapped within those swirling orbs, willing her to feel…something.
Something that wasn't fear.
She was trapped, the man before her just a man. A man with an ebony mask, with deep set golden eyes. Sweat beaded at the back of her neck, her shirt clinging to her back, toes curling into the carpet. No noise was issued between them, only the dissonant sound of their breathing. One faster than another's, yet it was hard to tell which.
"Do you fear me?" he asked, something oddly alarming in the way those lips twisted in saying so, as if they were in agony. Pleading.
Please don't fear me, was what she heard in those soft human tones. Her heart shuddered violently in her chest, a deep-set ache awakening at that Voice.
The voice she recognised from her dreams. The dreams she had of him, being the Erik she knew. She knew and – No, that expression wasn't appropriate.
The Erik she knew before – before everything went to hell.
When she was down there, in his home, sometimes things weren't bad. Like the soft silks of her bedroom, royal aquamarine covers and a velvet purple chair, molten-gold mirror frames and a simple silver hairbrush residing on the desk, just as how she had dreamed her room to be in her make-belief games. Even her bed was decked in those deliciously warm blankets, where the carpet was deep maroon. Warm lights hung from a black chandelier, yet it was small and oddly fitting.
She had drawn it once, as a child.
Fit for a princess. Fit for Persephone.
Did that make Erik Hades?
Her tote bag, with a small peach crown and unicorns decorating it, seemed slightly more modern than the rest.
Christine had found comfort in that room, she later realised. Erik would not disturb her, if only for dinner. Yet, she had found herself leaving it, unable to quench the hollow feeling of her heart with spending extended periods of time within those four drape-covered walls.
Loneliness was something Erik used as a weapon; it was either privacy or the sanctuary of his company.
Christine had been less resistant to defy him then, his pleasure was something that was ironically unmasked and Christine had not been able to bother with the complications of displeasing him. Of hearing that oddly desperate, devastated tone beckon to her to join him.
It was not for the selfish reason that if she satisfied him with her company, he might let her go early. No. It was not that.
Erik was a man of his word either way.
Had she forgotten how to fight? Had she given up?
No.
She looked every day for the bright message on her phone. From someone else that didn't belong in his world.
Yet her phone she left behind when she went to Erik's. It did not belong in his kingdom of etherealness. Somehow her conscience stopped her from bringing it, though she was afraid to admit that she had already known she wouldn't have received service anyway.
Erik would have seen the light under her door and probably have confiscated it, being ever-present on her welfare. Sleep was just another thing for Erik to organise.
He would not have her be distracted and up late because of a 'toy', she had thought with a smile.
But somehow it was a comfort that Erik was not of their time. That he did not use phones, (at least not that any she could see). That while she was there, she had no duty to the other world. No one could get her, call her, want her, need her.
Just her and Erik. And his music.
Sometimes, at the dead of night, she would hear him play. Sometimes, while pulling a jumper over herself and donning her pair of rabbit slippers, she would shuffle to his door and rest her back against it. Often curling up, wrapping her arms around herself and surrender.
Just to listen. Just to listen and breathe and weep. To hear the music of the night, that only he could write. To know that it was him on the other side of the door, bearing his soul to the world. And to her.
At some point, she would start to shiver, his underground home perpetually cold, especially at one o'clock in the morning. But she wouldn't have the will to move. Often, those orbs would gaze at her from the crack of the door and then escort her back to her room, his hand elegantly guiding above her silhouette. When her door would come into view, he would then wish her goodnight, with the stars in his eyes and the melody of devotion in his voice.
One time, she knew she must have fallen asleep there, curled up like a cat, but she woke only to find herself in bed and fancied it to have been a dream.
But truly, Christine knew that at one point in time, she had started to feel safe there.
Peaceful.
And maybe, just maybe…Happy.
Christine was transported back, the melancholy warring with nostalgia glimmering in her eyes, which not unnoticed by her companion.
"Can it not go back to how it was?" his soft voice echoed, leaving the faint tingling within her heart, a dull ache returning moments later. Her eyes shut wearily for a moment, knowing of exactly when he mentioned.
It was the first time he had recognised that things were not how they should be.
For a moment, her heart longed to say yes. Yes, that his actions did not condemn him. Yes, that blissful week with Raoul never occurred and those kisses were nothing but ash.
Yes, that she chose to be with him, for purely she could not go on without him within her life. That she wanted him; not having to deny the music that swirled in her mind when she thought of him.
To fall into that illusion that promised a life. That promised simple happiness.
But why? Why did this man invoke within her such emotion, such compassion? What had he done to make her feel so close to him? That she had a right to feel this. These bonds of which seemed eternal.
How could a year, less, made me so hard pressed to find an escape from the mortal confines of his soul?
Did it matter that this lack of resistance was based on forgotten flaws, when the emotions, her soul-binding connection to him was true?
Yes, because to forget his past crimes was to become as bad as the person who committed them.
But why should she inflict such pain? When it was she, over and over, that denied him entrance to her heart; who seemed the villain in his eyes.
Why was she tortured with her own resistance? Why would she be tortured for anything but?
She spun away from his grasp, those reed-thin arms that seemed to be drawing nearer with each moment. Confining, conforming caresses.
No! She could not be prisoner to them!
His agonised intake of breath however that soon followed her curt dismissal threatened to make her heart clench in despair. How she hated to hurt him! Not when he could seem so human. So sad, so desperate. So Erik.
Her arms wrapped around herself, unable to stop her strength from waning. How she grew tired of this fight. Of trying to remain a step away from any decision, she was only losing the fight within herself.
"You are weary of denying me," he whispered, coaxing. Gentle. His kindness was more damning than his rage. His presence was drawing nearer, nearer…
She willed herself to rally, her the fear within her heart to harden. A pained expression remained on her pale features.
Each fight was taxing.
"I need to leave," she whispered to him, eyes upon the door, yet her body longing to just sink to the sofa. A headache gnawed in the back of her mind, perhaps the start of a migraine.
Why wasn't she leaving then? Why was she giving him time to respond, to persuade her with his sweet protestations? Her body couldn't move. She didn't know how; everything seemed to be costing too much energy.
"Then your presence here, unmoving, convinces me otherwise," a dark intonation in his voice made her shudder.
Angel. Demon. What was he? How was that he donned the disguise of both so easily? He was a far better thespian than she could ever dream of being, when his very character was made up of several personalities.
Silence surrounded her and the staccato tick of the clock did nothing to help her growing fear. He was lurking, stalking, growing.
"Stay where you are-" her voice caught as she sensed a movement behind her.
All thoughts froze when his mask hovered above her, today's one without the silken floating beard, revealing his pasty skin and thin dry lips, descending nearer, nearer-
And without a conscious thought, her hands came up between them and pushed him away, panic driving her motions. His silent footsteps shuffled backwards against the carpet in shock, his body never anticipating such a blow from her.
"Don't come any nearer!" her voice gained a shrill pitch as her footsteps retreated to the sofa, bumping into it. She found herself sitting upon in the seat, mouth opening in surprise. Her eyes flickered to the imposing man, eyes shining with something dreadful curling in their midst. A faint glow of hope withered in her heart, like a flower being crumpled – as if knowing that her very refusal mirrored his own encroaching pain, bubbling his eyes.
Those eyes that demanded empathy she was helpless to resist. Was it that some of her heart was given in compassion only? Even while she was unknown to the cause, other than the man's terrible loneliness and aversion to the light.
But her heart knew that it was more than that. Much, much more. Why? Why was the black mask upon his face such a cause for darkness? Her mind only knew twisted pieces he had slipped to her through inadvertent means. Yet none seemed to fit together and so, she was helpless to know his plight.
Steps creaked as she descended, the sounds echoing an eerie moan. Eying the derelict staircase with unease, as the amber lights flickered ominously, she continued her trek into the depths of the earth. Her fingertips clung to the chilled iron rail, wishing for a moment that she was not alone, bar for the note bearing his instructions tucked into her pocket.
Her phone was slid out from the same pocket; however she was dismayed to see its torch did little to illuminate the darkness at the bottom of the staircase. Christine's eyes rose to the top of it, but her heart hammered to see the hatch she had to open to enter the way underground had somehow resealed itself without her noticing. As if she was a tiny bird and he had lured her away from all what was good and right.
The natural light had vanished, leaving only those amber blinking lights staring at her embedded in the wall. Their eerie presence like lanterns, wavering configurations on the wall.
A ripple of fear slithered in her stomach, but her hand did not disengage from the railing, suddenly aware that should she let go, she would be wondering aimlessly in the darkness, nothing to protect her. Nothing to allow her to see what waited for her. When the soles of her trainers pressed on something other than wood, she angled her phone's torch to see and let out a sound of surprise at sight of the furnished carpet underfoot. Had she been able, she would have taken her shoes off out of respect not to damage the expensive fabric. Springy bristles were only an illusion to plush softness when her hand came to test the texture of it, her eyebrows raising in curiosity.
Basements weren't uncommon, though something seemed off. Did anyone actually care about having expensive furnishings in a rarely used underground refuge?
For a moment, she indulged in the moment of silence, glancing around as her eyes slowly adjusted in the dim lighting. Squinting, she made out the shapes of a sofa, coffee table, an ornate lamp. No television, however, graced the room.
Perhaps he couldn't afford one downstairs? Her mind excused weakly. Yes, that made sense, when she couldn't afford his carpet even if she saved up for two years.
Wavering light from her phone faltered and in dismay, she saw that her phone's percentage had been depleted thoroughly – it's dimmed screen was enough of a sign. Christine gritted her teeth, knowing she shouldn't have used her phone to play her music during the (hour), ride there. The thing was already old, how could she had been so foolish to think that it's battery would last?
But how could she turn it off? The fear of darkness was her nemesis; visons of her crying as a child flashed before her eyes as the nightmares came at night. Always night. The weak flicker of a nightlight bought for her with angels upon it were enough to allow her to sleep, where upon her father told her of the Angel of Music, the dancing Korrigans of the far north. She had named each angel on the light and the one which ruled over them all she faithfully christened the 'Angel of Music'. When Christine would hear her father's lament upon the strings of his violin, far after the time she should have been asleep, she imagined it was coming from the Angel of Music upon her bedside, gracing her with his divine music. Even in the next room, the glow of the light was his Grace – his human form upon earth, a mere mortal in the name of her father.
Yet, to brace the turmoil of darkness, with nothing but a few flickering lights at the start of the tunnel, surely not? However, Christine knew that her safety of accessing her phone was far more important than her fear of darkness.
To succumb to the darkness or risk her last line of communication wink out – she chose the former. Gulping, she switched the torch off, hoping the remaining battery would last, lest she need to call someone.
At least, she hoped that there would be reception down here. God help her if there wasn't.
Her footsteps padded towards the living room, stomach turning when the shadow in the corner of her eye seemed to form into a kind of spectre, before disappearing. She glanced behind, watching the flickering amber lights from the stairwell with no entrance.
When she turned, however, the hair prickled on the back of her neck.
She wasn't alone.
A sweet set of notes of a tuned piano filled her senses, like rich chocolate, aged fine wine. It made her want to run her hands along those keys. See the dark mahogany piano that melody surely came from. Somehow, she was able to remain aware, vaguely to follow that music. Her body was a sleepwalker, being led from a tune of the pied piper. But this tone was haunting, dark. Dark as the unlit hall she stumbled down, fingers feeling edges of paintings of the wall, the texture of the paint and wallpaper. At last, her fingers found that door that was the barrier to the Music and her.
And she wanted to listen at the sweet music's throne, as if it would lead her towards such heavenly light.
At once, the lights around her blinked on and the music cut off. Disorientated, she stumbled on the plush carpet, her back thumping against the wall behind her. Christine moaned, head pounding and squeezing her eyes shut.
What in the hell just happened? How did she get from one dark room to – to – to this weirdly old-fashioned hallway?
It was like she had stepped into this old manor house, minus the windows.
Did he – did he live here? Why would he do that? Hadn't she gone through this perfectly majestic country home that only a millionaire could afford?
A house she would have been envious to have owned. And he contented himself to only a cellar?
"Man's insane," it registered dully. Yes, because along with blackmail, he would also live under the earth with a perfectly good house right on top. Maybe he was one of those survivalists who was preparing for the end of the world? No, that was too logical, her mind sniggered.
If only she could wake up now, she'd promise that she'd never do drugs, move a thousand miles away to another continent and never even think of looking back.
This is just a dream. Just one freaking crazy dream. There's no masked (insane), man who wants my voice, no underground eighteen hundred's style basement that I am currently in…No danger.
Her pounding heart was enough to convince her otherwise.
No, this was no dream.
The door in front of her loomed, it's average size with slight engravement and bright golden doorknob gleaming with those lights (no that's a chandelier), above. The music had stopped, just that there was a presence that prowled inside it. She could feel it, almost patiently waiting for her.
Run. Her mind told her. Her eyes flickered down the hall, sizing up the chances that it led to the living room. But there was no escape.
Come. Her heart said. There was no point.
They had an agreement.
So, straightening she pushed away the dizziness, it retreating to the back of her mind, and quietly, but firmly knocked on the door.
"Enter," came his smooth whisper beside her ear. A scream nearly erupted from her, the sound scaring her out of her skin in the glaring light.
Bastard, she mouthed quietly, but dared not say it out loud. Apparently, he was a spiteful maniac too.
Raising as much courage as possible, Christine raised her shaking hand, turned the cold knob and stepped inside.
Rise and fall, rise and fall. A circle of unending push and pull, retaliate and retreat. When would it end?
Her head dropped into her hands, her pale fingers somehow all the more fragile. As if they were only skin and bone, the things he reduced her to. What more would he ask, what more would he want?
"I don't love you, Erik," her words were monotone.
If she thought Erik would reveal something else at this, she was proven wrong.
"In time," he emphasised the words carefully, as if they were the two precious glass pieces he cradled within his heart, "There will be changes," At this his words take on this fervent tone, his eyes alighting, posture straightening, "You need only to ask Christine! Only to guess the answer to the riddle, my dear. Then to you I offer the world!" he was so passionate; it made her wince.
Why didn't he understand? Why wouldn't he understand! She took in a breath – knowing that if she erupted into anger, all would be for naught. Her thin fingers unwound from her head, the hair soft, lush – beauty and dichotomy – it was almost laughable. Her body was a state in disarray, just a mirror of her mind.
Her skin had never been more flawless, pale, evanescence, gorgeous bouncing curls, along with gaunt figure and haunted grace. It was as if the longer she stayed with him, the more ghostly she became. As if the toxicity she breathed was a life-like disease.
"Just think, my dear," he breathed quietly. In the corner of her eye, she saw those fingers moving to a tune. "Open your mind to possibilities,"
What possibilities?
Her eyes flitted towards his mask and his gaze looking into the distance. He wasn't there, no. Not really.
Lost within the mind of his genius.
He regarded her with the eyes of a detached critic, a passionless scientist who was ready to dissect the pieces of a corpse, if only to sew them together again for the point of knowing that it was he who accomplished such a feat.
He disturbed her.
Such menace, such coldness, such frightening displeasure. She winced at the mere thought of his wrath. How helpless she would be to stop it.
"I always expect punctuality," was his velvet greeting, short and clipped.
"It was your car of which cornered me – if I am late, blame it on your driver," she snapped, crossing her arms over her chest.
From the piano seat he rose and her frame froze, unable to comprehend his height and towering stature. How thin and lean he was, angular as he was wiry, yet his aura excluded a coiled power waiting to be unleashed. Her trembling started in earnest, with hands balled and vibrating and legs of which were both knocking together.
The mask shifted. She was ready to bolt at the slightest chance of him becoming violent.
"Sit," he gestured to a plush armchair before the fireplace. Her wide eyes looked at his in alarm.
"I am not going to harm you, Miss Daae," and the Voice softly surrounded her and with it, everything went slightly hazy. She struggled to blink, before the Voice led her to the sofa, his shadowy arms gesturing to the seat. The leather creaked beneath her, it sinking beneath her weight.
So…comfy. Something was placed around her. Soft. The Voice chuckled something about lack of heat and her mouth twitched into a smile. She may have said something about an angel. Yes, the Voice was like an Angel of Music. The Angel of Music? Yes, her Papa said that he would send the Angel of Music when he died. Died…Died…Died…
Pain. Head pounding, shoulders hunching, barely breathing, tears stinging, illusion shattering – why was she on a chair? She didn't get to the chair, and god her father, why was she telling this monster about her father an – music.
Beauty. Music. Soft. Lilting. Music.
The Voice and his music. Drowsy, but alive and his music…Angel. Her Angel.
Angel…
Angel…
"Why does everything ride on a riddle?" she murmured, almost to herself.
"Why do humans breathe?" he answered distantly, his keen ears picking up her words yet it was as if he was responding to another, "Why do humans do anything? Why do they poke a monster, whip a monster as they would whip an animal? A prodigy."
Her eyes rose to him, hands folding in her lap, almost dreading what else he might say, dreading that it was far more real than she feared, "Humans fear…death, love, loneliness. Ugly things; like spiders and childish things like clowns." He paused, eyes moving but not seeing, "Clowns aren't always kind either," he added sadly, hand coming and brushing away a spec of dust on the window sill, "Big shoes, red cheeks and noses, guns that are black and garish at once, wobbling amounts of unclean flesh-" his breathing hitched slightly, rasping against the mask, " -Large belts that seem so innocent at first-" he stopped suddenly with a cry and he fell back towards the wall, yellow eyes flashing wildly, "No! No! Erik has been good, ERIK has been go-" she leapt up as she saw him flinch back, his body seeming to crumple against the wall. Rushed from the sofa to him in alarm, he was shuddering, letting out a slow unintelligible moan.
Instinctively her hands reached towards his arms, aiming to subdue his thrashing, "Erik! Erik – it's me. Christine,"
The black mask swam before her eyes, sharp cheekbones and those floundering eyes on the brink of devastation. A sudden idea flashed in her mind. But she swallowed revulsion at the very thought of it.
It didn't matter, as long as she saved him from this – this – this episode.
As the man with terror-filled eyes started to rock, she knew there was no time to waste. God, was she really allowing this to happen?
He won't remember. Right? This is just an episode.
Her grip on his arms loosened and moved down those skeletal arms, to the inhumanly long fingers trapped in black casings. "Sh, Erik, sh, it's only me," her fingers slowly tried to peel away the gloves but the moment she did Erik made another moan, "Please, Erik will be good. Erik won't take off the mask," his beautiful was wrought with pain, cracked and dry, it the broken strings of a harp. Tears stung her eyes.
No, she would feel no pity for this man. Not after all he had done to her.
Yet all she saw was a husk of one, a very frightened child hiding within the ruins of an innocent soul.
The gloves slid off, with her careful prying. Christine knelt with him, unable to stop the nausea in her stomach at the sight of those appendages. The skin was worse here. Flakes of skin rubbed off by the constant feel of the leather, yellow bruise-like flesh and pulsing blue and purple veins, joints that you could see each bone of his skeleton hands. Even the smell of them made her choke back a gag, but then those eyes, those terrified eyes, stuck in this tormented memory.
She couldn't do it.
"Erik's a corpse, Erik's a corpse, Erik's a corpse," his voice began grunting, repeating the same phrase like a mantra that was installed. Pain bloomed within her heart.
But he was helpless.
She squeezed her eyes shut once, before guiding those hands to her and cradling them against her. There was some resistance and she was aware that those moans increased with desperation. In a heated move she put them against her face, feeling cold clammy palms and rotting skin. Her fingers held them there, despite his attempts to move away.
"Stop crying Erik," her voice as hoarse as his, "I'm here, I'm here," she breathed, aware that Erik had suddenly fallen silent.
And they breathed. Her knees were crying out, the carpet was too bristly against her knees and that smell was everywhere –
And they breathed. Her head was not just hurting, but a raging storm and his breaths were slowing, and that poor man wearing that mask –
And they breathed.
Her eyes didn't see his amber ones shut, nor how they again opened again slowly in wide lucidity, blinking at the angel's head his hands now held.
And softly, ever so softly she said, "Masquerade,"
At some point she remembered there had been a lesson. Under the haze of mind, of the Voice, she had been shown where to stand and a voice had come out of her. It almost had broken her out of her reverie, that it was her voice he commanded. Yet under the enchantment, the Voice quickly established control. Distantly, she had called that Voice her Angel.
She had not been terrified.
What sorcery had that been? A man's voice, no even his music making you dance, walk, sing like his marionette. She should be terrified. She should be screaming, running to the police, Raoul, someone – but there was a detached calmness around her. As if it had been a pleasant dream, rather than a memory. A dream she wouldn't half mind to experience again. That thought alone subconsciously registered that it was wrong to feel that way.
Had it been a sort of hypnotism? She pondered abjectly, her fingers calmly putting on a show she wouldn't really watch. Again that part of her mind warned that if it was, she really shouldn't be just sitting there, peacefully thinking about her singing lesson.
But it was so calming, he seemed nice.
Nice? He didn't seem so nice at the start, her mind retorted.
Voice was pretty. Angel.
Pretty? No, it was beautiful.
And she knew, whether consciously or not, that she wasn't going to the police.
The Voice called from the void, but it was the Angel that stared back.
I'm HEREEEEEEEEE! YAYyy! I'M NOT DEADDD.
Hehe.
Please forgive your poor, tired authoress, for not posting sooner. This was one hard chapter to write. It was definitely very interesting. I do feel like I've faced the void too, you know. Writing essays, doing algebra (LETTERS AND NUMBERS SHOULD NEVER MIX OR SO HELP ME), thinking about God and all that jazz, is a lot to do. Not to mention my timetable has changed four times in the last term. I'm not joking, my mind is in twenty places rather than my five usual ones. (Sleep, daydreaming, chocolate, Erik and family/pets).
Yes. I do have a whole space allotted for my family and pets. I am such a generous person, you know?
But generally, does anyone feel like there could be a soap on your family? Like there is so much drama that you could do a forty-five minute show on it every week and not run out of content?
I don't know, but anyway…YAY FOR BONDING!
I've actually had experience with hypnotism. No, I'm not a hypnotist. I've had therapy from one and a few others I know. It helps place things of anxiety into a place of intellectual calm…Like being terrified of spiders, into a mode of mind that isn't as affected by them. You still feel uncomfortable around them, but you're not screaming Bloody Mary and running from the room. ;P Or other things, it can potentially be a lot of things and you don't even have to be anxious for it to work. But if you want to know more, there is such thing as the internet that might help :)
Also, how did people feel about Erik and Christine in this one? This answer some of those questions?
Does anyone like Erik a tad bit more now, or are just in shock that Christine actually took his gloves off? Let alone put them on your face. Big guts.
Joking, of course I would hug Erik had I the chance…No you're crying not me. Sniffs.
Did people understand how the Voice and the Angel came into play? Erik is such a good thespian – as Christine said ha ha ha…
Also, if I'm going off topic, it's late and I'm very tired.
ON another note, a reason for my username (Enigma) is that I just ADORE that word. And I've seen it used to epitomise Erik so much – but I christened him as that before I saw any fanfic :P great minds think alike, right?
Ok, I'm hearing my dog snore. I'm going to bed.
Thanks MEGA A LOT FOR EVERY REVIWER, YOU ARE SO SO APPRECIATED, Batty Dings, Chevesic, TheTenthMuseSappho and my newest follower/reviewer Misanthropic! All get a box of favourite chocolates, cookies and a rose from Erik.
Does anyone hear a Masquerade in the distance? ;)