Desolation Dreamed Of
Of Legends and Leitmotifs
It was difficult for Christine to make up her mind as to whether Raoul's concern was heartwarming or irksome. In one moment she would identify his actions as childish and meddlesome, and in another moment she couldn't help but to cherish his deeply seeded devotion. She couldn't wrap her brain around it—she loved Raoul (whether that was platonic or otherwise, she had no idea), but for some inexplicable reason, all she wanted to do was push him away.
Raoul was safe, and a different Christine from an earlier time would have embraced this with all of her heart. But she too had noticed a change in her demeanor and in her thoughts. Her perspectives on the world around her were changing and widening in a rather enigmatic way, while her erstwhile patterns of thought were giving way to new, more complicated ones.
She was thankful that the abandoned dressing room she frequented was not far from her encounter with Raoul, for she had no desire to wallow in her thoughts. When her hand finally came to the cold metal knob, though, she paused for a moment; her hesitation manifested itself in her fingertips, which were gradually circling the knob, forcing her attention to its texture rather than what lay ahead.
Open it. Grasp it and open it. There is nothing beyond this door that I cannot face.
This brute force of will finally prompted her to turn the knob and open the door, and she made no delay in crossing the threshold into the room rather quickly. She couldn't give herself too much time to think about what she was doing or where she was going. And much to her relief, as soon as she shut the door behind her she heard his voice. It was still odd for her to hear him as a real human being rather than an omnipresent voice or a whisper in her ear, but she did her best to mask her wonder.
"Are you ready?" he asked without preamble, and as soon as she nodded, she felt his hand delicately take hers. With that, she was once again led through some unknown mechanism into a damp tunnel.
How peculiar it was to descend to his home a second time, somehow more aware of everything around her. She wracked her mind, trying with all her might to uncover the memory of her last trek through these passages, but all she could recall was the smell of dirt and the sensation of flying. Perhaps it had all been a dream—perhaps those countless days beneath the ground, mindlessly rehearsing for Aida, had been constructed by her overactive mind. In fact, his ominous silence both unnerved and half convinced her that she was dreaming in that very moment.
"We've reached the lake. Mind your step." The words jolted Chistine out of her reverie and her grip on his hand tightened faintly.
With his help, she took a step into the boat and cautiously let go of his hand. He stepped in behind her, and as they began to move across the lake she recalled with a smile what he had said about the monsters that resided underneath them. No, it couldn't be a dream after all.
It probably hadn't taken an inordinate amount of time to reach the shore, but in her infinite anticipation, it felt like an era before the boat nudged up against the shoreline. She took a sharp intake of breath as she felt his hand on hers, leading her out of the boat and onto a rock. She had no recollection of these events from her prior visit which puzzled her greatly, but before she could mull over the realization, she was being led into the house.
"I would like you to go straight to bed tonight and rest for most of tomorrow," he instructed, his hand still clutching hers as they moved through the house. She nodded deftly, doing her best to keep her head high and shoulders back. Something inside of her desperately wanted to prove her bravery and maturity to Erik and smother any sign of meek behavior before he saw it. "I would hate to have you fall into the trap of a second performance slump, so we will not begin rehearsing until the day after next."
"Rehearsing?" she breathed, cocking her head in question. Surely he didn't mean to have Christine usurp Carlotta's role once again as Prima Donna.
He slowed to a stop and she heard him turn a door knob, presumably leading her to her room. "Yes, rehearsing. There are roles to play after Aida, my dear." It was firm but not condescending, much to her appreciation.
"What are we working on?" she queried, chin high.
There was a long pause and she could feel his ambivalence. "Faust," Erik finally said and she felt him move into the room. She followed slowly, her hands touching the door frame in order to gain more understanding of her surroundings.
"La damnation de Faust?" she asked quickly, receiving a low chuckle in response.
"Would I ever make you a mezzo?" Christine cracked a small smile, taking another marginal step into the room. "Not Belioz. Gounod. You'll be performing as Marguerite, of course." It sounded so very simple when he said it, but she knew this was no small task. If the wide vocal range the role called for wasn't enough, the story's heart wrenching arc was enough to spark uneasiness—uneasiness that he could plainly read in her face, evidently.
"There is ample time to prepare. No need to worry, ma mie."
Her trepidation all but vanished at this. "Ma mie?" she said, restraining a giggle behind the back of her hand. "How archaic, Erik." She stifled her laughter quickly, though, in fear offending him in some way.
"I like to call it old-fashioned," he replied with the scantest hint of amusement in his words. "Now, I've brought you to your room. There are spare clothes in the closet, just as there were on your previous visit." There was a short pause here before she heard him move past her towards the door. She heard him stop in the doorway and she turned towards him expectantly. "You know you mustn't be afraid to laugh in this house. I would hate to… Dampen your exuberance."
Taken aback, Christine brought a hand to her heart and smiled brightly. "Of course…Ma mie." And with that he closed the door behind him, leaving her to her thoughts.
Before she could get too wrapped up in her mind, Christine felt her way to the edge of the room, surprised at how quickly she recalled the layout of those four walls, right down to the embossed fleur-de-lis on the wallpaper. She felt her way towards the closet and slowly changed out of her gown into a simple nightdress. Yes, she remembered the feel of this too—far more luxurious than what she was accustomed to.
The anticipation of arriving at Erik's home once more had kept her alert for some time, but when she slipped underneath the blankets in her bed—could she call it her bed?—she felt exhaustion take over. Her entire body was drained from the performance and her eyelids felt like lead. Yet somehow, she found herself lying awake as her thoughts raced.
Hours ticked by before she found herself in that mystifying trance that occurs between waking and sleeping, where the line between reality and dreams blurs in the most mind-bending way. And so, when she heard the door open almost imperceptibly, she couldn't have said whether it had truly happened or not. And when she felt a gaunt hand trace her hairline with the lightest of touches, she attributed it to a foggy dream.
But when lifeless, thin lips kissed her forehead for a fleeting second—that, she knew was real.
"Madame Giry. I must speak with you."
"It is quite late, Monsieur. If you'd like to come back tomo—…" she began diplomatically, but he held up an unyielding hand.
"No, I don't want to come back tomorrow. We must speak now." There was a pause and he watched her eyes narrow slightly before finally opening the door just far enough for him to walk in.
"Very well," she replied stoically, closing the door behind him. The room was quite dim, lit only by a few candlesticks littered about the room. As she led him to a small sitting area, she grabbed one of the candlesticks, hoping to provide a bit more light for their conversation. "This is about Christine?" she asked, motioning for him to sit down and following suit shortly after.
"In a way…" Raoul replied, running his thumb along the arm of the chair slowly. "I came to talk to you about the Phantom of the Opera," he said frankly, looking her straight in the eye as he spoke.
She didn't react as he had hoped, and even smiled slightly in response. "There is no such man, Monsieur. It is a nothing but a silly myth."
He should have expected as much. Raoul looked down into his lap for a moment, gathering his thoughts as he contemplated how to continue. Finally, he looked back to Madame Giry with a harsher look in his eyes. "I have come here to talk to you about the man who has seduced Christine."
Yes, this had the desired effect: her eyes widened ever so slightly and her jaw dropped just enough to ensure him that she was listening. She gained her composure just as quickly as she had lost it, though, and clasped her hands together in her lap tightly.
"I think you're mistaken. There is no such man—…" she began once again tactfully, but he cut her off, jumping up from his seat as he did so.
"Stop! She is with him at this very moment. She is being manipulated and brainwashed by this man right now and you choose to turn a blind eye? Do you have no care for the girl?" he hissed, watching as she stood up as well.
"Christine is like a second daughter to me."
"I hardly think you would allow Meg to have a dalliance with this man, Madame Giry."
Madame Giry pressed her lips together at this and turned her back to him. "I would like you to leave, Raoul."
"Perhaps you would like to pretend otherwise, but my family has an incredible amount of control in this opera now. If Phillipe and I choose not to contribute our money, you will be out of a job, Madame Giry, I can promise you that." How he hated to use his money or his rank to sway people, but it was beginning to look like he had no other leverage.
He watched as her shoulders slumped slowly, either in defeat or acceptance. "Please, Madame Giry. I just want to help." When she didn't turn around, Raoul let out a slow breath. "Why do you allow him to do this to you?"
"You leave me no choice." She made a move to sit back down and he did the same, perched at the edge of his seat. "I'm forever indebted to him, Monsieur," was all she said at first, and when their eyes met he urged her on with enthrallment. "My life was in shambles when he found me. You see, I was much like Meg in my younger years—a featured ballerina on the brink of truly making a name for myself. And then I met my future husband…" She trailed off regretfully, turning away from him to examine the flame of a nearby candle.
"He was the most charming man I'd ever met. And I was young and naïve." Another beat before she turned to him in frankness, the dullness of her eyes betraying the bleak nature of her story. "I ended up pregnant out of wedlock and we married immediately. I knew nothing of his less than reputable habits, though—namely a severe gambling addiction and an affinity for liquor. It became blatantly evident when Meg was born that we could not afford to maintain his lifestyle on such a small income which he fettered away as quickly as he could."
It was at that moment when Raoul saw her dark eyes change, and she no longer seemed aware of his presence. She was lost in another time and place.
"That was when he found me. I couldn't tell you how he knew of my dance background or learned of my circumstances, but somehow he came to me. I remember it clear as day; I had just walked out of Printemps when something stopped me dead in my tracks. It was no person or event, but just a feeling— feeling that told me to go into the Opera House just around the corner."
She was pulled out of her trance as she laughed guardedly. As she did so, it became increasingly evident these were words Giry had never spoken aloud. "I had, of course, never been in the Opera House before that day, and so I continued to walk away. But this feeling was boiling within me, telling me that I had to enter the building if it was the last thing I did. I attributed it to some odd portent or premonition and I tentatively turned back to the Opera House, making my way inside.
"It was midday and the grand entryway was empty. And how astonishing it was to see for the first time!" she recalled, a ghost of a smile dancing on her lips. "And then I heard him. He was calling my name so faintly that I thought it was my imagination. But this voice, like strung gold, wouldn't go away and wouldn't stop willing me to come towards it. How silly I must have looked, bags in hand and wandering blindly through the hallways of a building completely unknown to me. Of course, now I realize that he must have ensured that no one would stop me, but I was wholly bewildered at the time."
Their eyes met again and Madame Giry studied him for a moment, perhaps debating whether or not to continue. Finally she shrugged and sighed brusquely. "Well, I couldn't bore you with the details of the conversation if I tried—I was in a trance. I know no other way to describe the spell he put over me. But when I walked out of the Opera House, I had agreed to become the Premier Maître de ballet of the Palais Garnier. And of course I had no experience as a ballet mistress. Furthermore, I hadn't been en pointe in over a year."
She shook her head, clearly as bewildered by the events as he was. "To this day I still haven't the faintest idea why he thought of me, but I have no doubt that if he hadn't, I would be begging on the streets. Meg has had a blessed life due to him, and there is nothing more in the world I could hope for."
"And your husband?" Raoul pressed, receiving a dismissive wave of her hand from the ballet mistress.
"He did not question the job, and was sent off to fight in the Franco-Prussian war before long. He was killed there, leaving Meg and I contentedly alone. I have been in the service of the Phantom of the Opera ever since."
"But who is he?" Raoul demanded, his frown deepening as he leaned his elbows on his knees.
Giry shook her head, smiling blithely to herself. "That is not a question easily answered, Monsieur de Chagny. He is a man of many masks. He is a magician and an architect; he is a composer and a violinist, an organist, a pianist, a singer; he is a lover of trap doors, and a master of mirrors; he is an utter genius, able to conquer anything he sets his mind to."
"Then why is he here, haunting an opera? Why isn't he out in the world?"
"He is terribly deformed, I'm afraid." Madame Giry looked away once more, a grim expression crossing over her face. "Although most of the rumors about his features are exaggerations or outright lies, his mask is not. And because of this, he has always been an outcast, forced to live on the outskirts of society rather than thrive amongst the other artists of Paris."
What a surprise this was—the man that Giry was describing seemed pitiable at best. He certainly didn't sound like one to be feared, but rather a simple human with a barrage of empty threats.
"And that is all?" Raoul hesitated, his eyes narrowing slightly as he observed Madame Giry's expression. She stared at him back, her jaw clenching as she did.
"Yes, that is all."
Raoul stood up, feeling rather victorious as he did. So the rumors that he was a murderer by trade were false. There was no danger behind him! Yes, he could rest much easier knowing this fact. What's more, he knew exactly what his next steps were to be—reveal his newfound knowledge about this lover of trap doors and convince her of his disreputable and manipulative nature. Surely Christine would think twice about going back to a man who had clearly hid so much from her.
When he reached the door of the office, though, his attention snapped back to Madame Giry, still sitting stiffly in her chair.
"Knowledge is a very dangerous thing," was the cold warning she delivered.
He paused momentarily, but continued on to grab the doorknob.
"Do not underestimate him, Raoul. Do not presume to know him."
At her crisp words, Raoul turned and found her standing, staring at him severely. He looked back at her for a moment, his brow furrowed bewilderedly, before steadfastly nodding as his only response. He finally took his leave and exited the room, but not before being struck by the almost inaudible murmur that came from Madame Giry as the door clicked shut: "Even I do not know him." A shiver ran through him, but he pushed away any alarm and began to make his way out of the opera.
He would not fear this man, and he would not fear winning Christine back. Nothing was written in stone yet. As a matter of fact, it appeared that they were only at the beginning.
I want to thank everyone who has read and reviewed the story—I deeply value the feedback, and the reviews really push me to get chapters out in a timely fashion. In particular, I want to thank LadyCavalier, whose review was a downright honor to receive. I hope you all enjoyed this chapter, and please let me know what you think!
Until Next Time,
Christine