Sorry I haven't updated in forever. I have a lot less time than usual.

CloudxInxCrimson: Ooh…I'm going to make them go to McDonald's and get all sorts of pineapple crap! Not that pineapples are crap. They're one if my favorite fruits. It just sounds funny.

IcySunset: Oh, you'll love it. I saw it three years ago, and I can still remember exactly how it looked as if it was yesterday. It made such an impression on me.

MortRouge: I'm so glad you're happy. But be sure you e-mail me so I can worm as much information about you out as possible…without seeming like an Internet pervert. Which I'm not. But if I don't get the information you want me to have, I'm going to take your character and run with it, and make her do things you might not normally do. Fear my mystical authoress powers!

Songwind: I don't know, I might use it. But this first part is just vacation, Erik isn't going to work any music lessons in until the Paris part of the story.

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Erik awoke the hard way the next morning. He discovered that when the sun reached a certain point in the sky, it shone through an open patch in the ceiling directly onto his face. The glaring light was enough to wake him up. He squinted and fell out of his cot, reminding himself to move it over a foot or so, or to at least fix the roof.

Here's the layout of the little cabana, for future reference. When you walk in the front door, there's another door immediately across from you. That door leads to the kitchen. Erik's cot is against the wall on the left side of this door, as you look at it. The window is on the left side of the front door, and Hana's cot is right under it. The bathroom is through another door to the left of the main room. I'm not quite sure why nothing is on the right of anything. But I hope you can now picture what the place looks like.

Hana was still asleep when he got up, snoring contentedly in her cot, still in shadow. Erik went into the bathroom.

It may have had all the things a bathroom should have, but it wasn't very comfortable. The floor was hard cement, and the only thing decorative about the fixtures was that they were green. The toilet, sink, and shower were not at all attractively designed – but then, they weren't there to enjoy the bathroom. Erik was just thankful they didn't have an outhouse or some other nightmare.

After a shower and a change he looked more like the phantom he was. He decided to leave off his cape and fedora – he was going to be hot as it is.

Hana was awake now, and had already begun making breakfast. Erik had never had anyone cook for him before, and it was a lovely sensation to walk out of the bathroom to the smell of bacon sizzling.

"The fridge was already stocked with all the stuff we would need. At least most of it," Hana said to him as he took a seat at the round table in the middle of the small kitchen. Technically he took a cushion – the table was low and you were meant to sit on the floor. "There's no real junk food. We have bread and cereal and eggs and milk and all that generic crap, but no chips or cookies or sodas. We'll have to buy them."

"I guess that's an attempt at getting us to bond," commented Erik, who at this moment was wishing he had a chair with a back to recline in.

Hana served him slightly burnt bacon with scrambled eggs. "Thank you," he said, as she set the plate down.

"You're cooking dinner," she said happily. "And we can take turns washing dishes." As Erik had always taken care of these things himself he was happy to agree. She was a companion, not a maid. "I didn't know what kind of egg you liked, so I scrambled them." Actually, Erik preferred over easy, but didn't protest.

The kitchen was much nicer than the bathroom. The fridge and stove (with an oven underneath and a microwave above) were on the right of the room, with some shelves and cabinets for dishes and other foods on the left. The round table in the middle was varnished cedar, as were the cabinets, and had a single red rose in a narrow vase in the center. The cushions were red velvet on the side you sat on, but clear plastic on the bottom, to protect against any sand that might come through the mats. Hana picked up the rose.

"I think it came from a bush in the back. You know, we have a small backyard. A really big one if you count the palm trees as in the yard. And the hammock is yours."

"How can you tell?"

Hana shrugged. "Go see for yourself."

Erik pushed away his empty plate and went outside, while Hana checked out the main room. It can't be called anything else, as it was a combination of living room and bedroom. He went through the front door and around the house, as there was no back door.

The hammock was black, and there was a small, white stone table set into the sand beside it. A folded sealed letter lay on the table. He opened it.

Erik,

Hana isn't allowed back here when you're here. If you really need to get away, this hammock is yours to enjoy. Someone will always be here to serve you, and you can find something you may enjoy in the trunk of the tree at the foot of the hammock. But we can't have you totally isolated. Each day you are only allowed three hours here. Spend them wisely.

Aislin

Upon examining the tree, Erik found it to be fake, and discovered a trapdoor hidden behind it. In the trunk were assorted horror books and classical and opera CDs that he knew he would enjoy, along with a CD player with headphones. There was something else, farther down in the hidden compartment. It was bigger than the other things. When he finally pulled it out, he realized that it was his violin case. Several sheets of lined music paper were tucked into the case. He smiled and put everything away for later use.

Meanwhile, Hana let out a happy shriek from the main room. He went back inside. She was exploring a wooden cabinet on the right side of the room. "We have a CD player," she told him. "Along with soundtracks to all the best musicals and some of the better singers." She fingered the Phantom soundtrack, but then changed her mind. "Want to go shopping?"

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And so they headed out to the main part of the city. Erik hadn't thought he'd see it again so soon. But Hana wanted to load up on necessary junk food. And as much as Erik hated to admit it, he needed a new wardrobe for the weather.

He endured an hour-long expedition through the grocery store, watching Hana fill a cart with chips, cookies, sodas, ice cream, candies, and every imaginable unhealthy food. Erik even got himself a bottle of wine (which he planned to keep out of Hana's reach) and some Gummi Bears, which he snuck secretly into the basket. He was very fond of them, and wasn't about to let Hana know that. Luckily, at the register, they were lost in the jumble of food and she didn't notice. She showed the man behind the counter a card, and, somewhat sullenly, he let them pass without paying.

"What did you show him?" asked Erik curiously.

Hana held up a white card, like an ID. "Everything is paid for by the contest, and this means we don't have to pay people. I found it in the kitchen. We're not supposed to abuse it, so we're probably never coming back to this store to use it." She smiled, and tucked it safely into her pocket. "Now, don't you need clothes?"

He was not looking forward to this, but it was inevitable. At the department store they checked out, Erik flat-out refused to wear shorts of any kind, she Hana got him two pairs of the lightest colored jeans they could find. Erik had never had more trouble trying to find clothes that fit him. The jeans were either too tight or too low or too long…something was wrong with all of them. Hana was pushing for the low ones, but he settled on the ones that were an inch or two too long – he figured he could just roll them up.

At another store, Hana told him that he'd be miserable with long-sleeved shirts, and told him that there was no way around T-shirts. Refusing to buy the brilliantly colored ones Hana was holding up, Erik decided on three plain white ones – the nest best thing if he couldn't wear black. He got a gray one too, and that was as wide as his variety got. Desperate to put some color on him, Hana persuaded him to buy a red shirt as well, which he did seem to like.

Hana looked for shoes for him too, finding a white pair of tennis shoes that she made him buy. She also forced him into some red flip-flops for the beach. Erik's face turned red to match when she gave them to him, but she didn't let up, and he was obliged to buy them. She explored hats for a while, but Erik refused to wear any hat other than his fedora, and she gave up on it.

"Don't you at least want some beach supplies?" she asked, as he was ready to head back to their cabana with their parcels. So they got sunscreen and sandcastle supplies. Each of them got a new pair of sunglasses – the one dark thing Erik had bought yet. By now it was getting late, and Erik suggested they pick something up to eat back at the cabana. Hana agreed.

Carrying their bags – which totaled to seven large packages – they walked into a nearby McDonald's. Erik left Hana at a table with the bags and borrowed the contest card to order food.

"Hi, can I get a Bic Mac and…" Erik did not normally eat fast food – it was not good for his skeletal frame.

"Do you want pineapple with that?" asked the girl behind the counter seriously.

"What? Do I want pineapple with my hamburger?" Erik stared at her. "That makes no sense at all. Um, give me a salad too."

"Pineapple with your salad?"

"NO, thank you." Why the heck did he want pineapple with a salad? "And a large fry."

"Do you ?"

"NO! No pineapple!" He grabbed the bag of food when it came, flashed the card, and left hurriedly.

They walked to their little house as the sun was just deciding whether it wanted to set or not. Hana set the food out on the table as Erik deposited his clothes on his bed and began putting the food away.

"Hey Erik," said Hana suddenly. "Why did you get this?"

Erik groaned. Out of the McDonald's bag, Hana had pulled a large container of sliced pineapple.

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Yay! I liked this chapter – it was fun to wrote. And next time – dun dun DUN! Erik dons his new clothes! Review!