It was two days after Raoul had left that Christine next had her lesson with Erik. In those two days she had been quite busy with ballet practice - she would have been a little sheepish to admit that she had barely thought of Raoul as more than a passing though since he had left. She certainly hadn't thought any more on the feeling of butterflies.

Erik paced the room with his arms behind his back, a frown on his face as he listened to Christine sing.

"No, something's wrong," he stopped her. "You're missing out on the depth you could be getting - your breathing is too shallow."

He moved behind her for a moment, the fingertips of a splayed hand briefly touching her back just below her rib cage.

"You should be breathing from from all the way down here - let your diaphragm expand more."

Christine's mind froze, only half taking in what he was saying. That touch, that inconsequential, professionally offered touch, had awakened the butterflies.

It was as if in that briefest of moments, her spine was the copper wire and his hand was the switch, causing the white-blue feeling to shoot up her back - and just like when she had first seen the Climbing Arc, it was exciting and frightening all at the same time.

Her eyes darted to him, seeking understanding, but she found seemingly none. He had continued his pacing and was in front of her again, though he was looking at the floor as he often did when he was fully focused on hearing her voice.

She swallowed hard. Surely- surely she was mistaken. This was Erik, for heaven's sake! She didn't feel those kinds of things for him... did she?

"Keeping that in mind, please try the piece again from the beginning," he said.

She furrowed her brow.

"I- I don't think I understand," she told him, her face a picture of questioning innocence, and it was true - she didn't understand. Oh, she understood about breathing just fine, but that wasn't what she was after.

"Breathe from where, exactly, Erik?"

A question asked purely for the scientific reasons - for the testing of a hypothesis, for the pursuit of knowledge - there was nothing untoward or lewd about seeking knowledge!

But to her utter disappointment, Erik merely turned his own back towards her and pointed out the area he was talking about. He began a long and detailed explanation of which muscles connected to where and the process of breathing and how it might be manipulated to produce a better quality to the voice.

Christine pressed her lips into a thin line. She didn't care about the Latin names for each muscle or whatever he was going on about. She only cared about figuring out why his touch had made her feel like Raoul's kisses had. If he touched her again, would she feel it again, also? She desperately wanted to know, but it seemed she wasn't going to get the chance to find out.

She watched him carefully the rest of the lesson, but nothing seemed different. Had it been a mere fluke? Could the butterflies happen from surprise? Perhaps she had merely been surprised to feel a hand on her back. He seemed completely unaware of the feelings he had stirred in her, still obliviously wrapped up in the music they were practicing.

The lesson went as normally as nearly every other lesson did. He seemed to be his regular self, and she didn't think she was being any different, barring what she had felt earlier. They finished the lesson and he bid her farewell, and it wasn't until she was well on her way back to her dormitory that she realized that he hadn't even called her my dear, and was surprised and rather stricken to find that the thought of not hearing those words sent her into a pout.

She lay in bed that night and twisted the sheet between her hands, nervously pulling at a loose thread. Her mind was too full of thoughts to go sleep, though she had been in bed for over an hour now. What on earth had happened during her lesson?

She wished she had someone to whom she could ask questions. Mamma Valerius had seen fit to prepare her for what lay ahead of her, letting her know in a frank conversation what any future husband would expect of her once they were married, and what she could expect of that as well. Her Mamma Valerius has always answered her questions, although at the time she had precious few that she had considered to ask. She certainly had no questions about that aspect of it all - and any gaps in the knowledge that Mamma Valerius had bestowed upon her were easily learned from listening to the other girls backstage at the opera house.

It wasn't about the physical that Christine had questions - no, it was about the emotional. Meg was the only one she trusted enough to completely open about it to, but Meg was a year younger than her and barely knew any more than she did about it all. She could ask Sorelli, perhaps - she was always kind and almost motherly to the other girls, and she was a little older and had a lot of experience in matters of the heart. But just how many questions could she ask before curiosity and suspicion grew about the man - or men - she was possibly having feelings for?

She squirmed a little under the blankets. Did she have feelings for Erik? That felt so wrong, somehow. Perhaps a better question was, did she have feelings for Raoul? If she could put a name to what she felt for Raoul, it would be easier to understand what she felt towards Erik.

She enjoyed Raoul's company. He was funny and charming, sweet and kind. She liked him. But did she love him? She didn't think so - not in a particularly romantic way. She might one day, it was highly possible.

But if she enjoyed his company and got butterflies when he kissed her, and she wasn't in love with him but might be in future - then logically, what stood in the way of saying that she might also one day fall in love with Erik?

It took Raoul kissing her to make feel those electric feelings - all Erik had to do was brush his gloved hand across her back for a fraction of a second.

She swallowed hard. Her mind protested every time the thought came up. Erik was so... Erik. It wasn't necessarily the thought of Erik that made it sit so uneasily with her - she did like Erik as a friend and mentor - it was the thought that she shouldn't like Erik as anything more than what he already was.

She still didn't know if the feeling she had during the lesson was a mere anomaly or actually how she felt. What if that feeling didn't really mean anything? What if it was just how one felt when certain things happened, like being kissed? What if it had nothing to do at all with either Raoul or Erik?

She buried her face in her pillow and let her mind wander. Erik? She would try to think about this logically.

The first confusing thing about it was the fact that he was old. She didn't know how old, exactly, but he was surely old enough to be her father. She was going to be twenty next month. Was it okay to feel those kinds of things about someone who was so much older? She knew of plenty of married couples that had rather large age gaps between them - and some of them seemed quite happy. But just because something had been done before - even done with good results - that didn't always mean it was right.

It seemed right - normal - to think of herself having feelings for Raoul. They were practically the same age, they had plenty in common, they had known each other since they were children. Feelings for him would be expected - and accepted - by most people, she didn't have to wonder if anything was unorthodox there. Would her having feelings for Erik be so widely accepted? Erik wasn't even accepted by society - how would she fare any better in the world if she loved him? Maybe there was something wrong with her that made her feel that way with Erik.

Was she bad if she felt those things for Erik? Was it bad of her to even think about feeling like towards him? He was practically a criminal! And yet, he was so sweet to her... After he had stopped lying to her, of course. Did that make her wicked to feel that way about him when there was so much stacked against him, so many reasons that she shouldn't? She didn't want to be wicked.

Raoul was handsome and well-off. If she did like him as more than a friend, no one would be surprised in the least. Raoul had so much to offer! If anything, most people would be confused why she didn't already feel more for him, all things considered. But what would people think if she had feelings for Erik? What did Erik have to offer, besides his training for her voice and his company? He lived in a cellar, he was a recluse and disfigured, and whatever money he had was gained through underhanded means.

She groaned to herself. She didn't want to feel feelings for either of them. Raoul was her friend, and Erik was her friend. Couldn't it just be left at that? She huffed. How dare Raoul kiss her and make her feel things! She made up her mind to have a discussion with Sorelli soon. With that decision settled, she firmly reminded herself that no feeling would ever truly matter until she was prima donna, and finally she fell asleep.