The Broken Box

A/N – Whoops well it's been a while hasn't it. I'm so very very sorry for taking so long. This story is a fickle one, sometimes I'm churning out five thousand words in one go and sometimes I get nothing for weeks, but I will persevere. It's a pretty short chapter, I'm afraid and I shall be attempting to write an additional two chapters while I'm away to make up for the delay this month. But the awesome news is that I will be in France again next weel (for longer than three days this time as well XD) And France generally means creative output. I got the idea for the story there, so hopefully that shall continue.

Disclaimer – I don't own Phantom or any of its adaptations. This fic is for entertainment purposes and not for profit.

Raoul turned let the door swing open with a tired creak. The police had quickly dismissed Christine's room as a source for evidence but he refused to believe this. There must have been something, some clue or indication to who that man was. His presence in the academy dormitories left him a little nervous, all the dancers were at rehearsals for the reopening of Don Juan but there was still the risk of being detected. It would not be the wisest thing to get caught in the room of a girl who was missing and presumed dead.

He had never seen her bedroom before, even the night he stood guard at her door, and he was shocked at how small it was. It was barely more than a cupboard. Had he known that she slept in such a desolate place, he would have insisted on renting a house for her so she'd never have to return. Why didn't she tell him? Any other girl in her position would jump at the chance to get away. Still it was better that she had a room of her own, no matter how tiny it was, than sleep with the multitude of dancers in the dormitories. He briefly wondered why she had been separated from the other dancers in the dormitories, but regardless of the cause he was certain that monster had used her isolation to his advantage.

He pushed away the memory of that night, feeling as though he might break down again if it lingered too long in his mind. Never before had he felt so truly powerless. So foolish. And that music, that damned music that wouldn't leave him no matter how much he despised the composer. It had been the music that had made her hesitate; it was the music that had stolen away. The music was the one thing that man possessed that Raoul could not even begin to compete with and he hated it. He had thought that he had come to accept that he would never be much of a musician, content to express his love of the medium through his patronage and through simply enjoying the performances as a spectator. But that music had brought back unhappy memories. Just like her father all those years ago, Christine and that creature shared something that he would never truly be able to fully understand. They could make angels weep while he could only accompany tone deaf debutants as they sang after dinner.

She must have left some sort of clue, a diary perhaps or a letter. His heart leapt when he saw the small leather bound notebook on the shelf above her bed wedged between a Bible and a copy of Frithiof the Bold. But instead of the girl's darkest confessions the book merely contained her carefully written notes from her lessons. Christine clearly wasn't much of a diary keeper. He was about to place the notebook back on its shelf when he noticed the loose sheets of writing paper that were beginning to fall out the back. They were still in Christine's hand but the corrections were in that strange clumsy handwriting and red ink that he had seen in the mysterious notes he and the managers had been receiving.

After all of the disgusting and ungodly things he had imagined that creature doing, it came as a bit of a shock to realise that he had actually been teaching her. The Opera Ghost had actually given her homework. He almost laughed at the thought of the beast skulking in his lair correcting her grammar but choked on it knowing that regardless of the innocence of such an action the monster certainly wasn't setting essay questions now.

There had to be something else. The room was beginning to make him feel claustrophobic. He moved to the small chest of drawers in the corner which doubled up as a dressing table for on top of it stood her mirror, her comb, her cheap lavender hair oil and her jewellery box which looked as though it had been smashed to pieces then painstakingly glued back together again. He opened it slowly, finding that the lock had been broken beyond repair. The word "Ängel" had been painted on the inside of the lid and inside it lay dozens of dried roses, the flowers carefully pressed and removed from their stems.

What on earth did it mean? Why would she keep something so trivial? And why had she never kept any of the flowers he'd given her? Why did she only have her three old dresses in her room when he had practically ransacked the House of Worth for her? Why did she not keep the jewellery he had bought her in such a tender manner? And why on earth would she go to such trouble to repair a box that looked like someone had taken a hammer to it. Raoul began to feel the increasingly familiar stirrings of jealousy in his heart. As much as he tried to reason that his gifts were probably too valuable to be left in the academy dormitories, those dancers could be a disreputable crowd after all, he could not stop thinking about her and that monster onstage and how thoroughly enraptured she had looked.

He was about to leave when he noticed the letter that had fallen from the many folds of her dark cloak.

We cannot tear out a single page from our life, but we can throw the whole book into the fire.

Forgive me

Christine

Erik had tried to concentrate on what the priest was saying but his head felt like it was encased in ice and the ringing in his ears had become insufferable. There was something about being entitled to what remained of his grandfather's fortune, although he couldn't remember the exact sum. But how on earth would that work, he had no way of proving his identity. Well there was one way, and there was no way he would ever do something like that. Everything hurt, and he wanted nothing more than to go back to bed but he knew the monkey would be there waiting for him and he was far too weak.

The voice from his past soon left with the parting message that the doctor would be with him that afternoon and that he would send someone from the farm to take care of Cesar. True to his word he soon heard voices outside but couldn't move from the foetal position he had curled into. He was glad the old man had thought to take care of his horse, well not exactly his horse but the two of them had been together since he returned to the opera house, he had not thought that far ahead in his spur of the moment sobriety and Christine didn't know the first thing about caring for the creature.

He found it amusing how the opera ghost's horse was probably the sweetest natured creature in all of Paris, possibly rivalling Christine in that respect. When he was still being used for stage performances he would tolerate the younger ballerinas with the patience of a saint in exchange for sugar and apples. He was afraid of the dark and practically had a nervous breakdown if he was left alone for too long. Not phantom-like at all.

But the thought of another visitor, even if it was only to the barn in the courtyard almost paralysed him. If he couldn't handle this then how was he supposed to let a doctor into his house? It took him almost five years to show himself to Christine and now he had to deal with a physician who would ask endless questions and examine the mottled mass of scar tissue he had become. Perhaps he should just ask the man to leave; he would be able to function again soon, at week at most, then he'd make it up to her.

He peered out from behind the curtain to see Monsieur Delmas the farmer he had agreed the food deliveries with, leading Cesar through the front gates and breathed a sigh of relief that he was leaving. It was better that Delmas decided to come out here himself than to send one of his sons or farmhands. It would not do to have their youth and beauty remind her of the boy she left behind and rethink her choice to come here.

He staggered up the stairs trying not to look at his bedroom door and rifled through the medical cabinet. If there were going to be more visitors then he would have to make sure that he was not phantom-like at all either. He had forgotten the bottle of laudanum that had somehow found its way into the collection. He had not used tinctures in many years, preferring the quick and relatively painless stab of the syringe. His first reaction was to down the entire bottle, without a care for how old it was or what other chemicals could have seeped into it, but his hands were still shaking so much that the brown glass bottle soon crashed into the sink and smashed in half. The sound brought him back to the task at hand and he quickly turned on the taps to wash away the evil liquid before finding the bandages at the back of the cupboard. He had to work quickly; he could already hear her on the stairs, undoubtedly to investigate the sound of breaking glass.

She tapped nervously on the bathroom door. How many times was this going to happen? How many times would he lock her out and leave her in the dark, expecting the worst? Although she had been informed by Erik's clergyman friend with a reassuring smile that a doctor would be on his way it did little to ease her worries. In her experience doctors only ever seemed to be the bearers of bad news.

"Erik? Are you all right?" she called through the door and jumped when the lock clicked, the door swinging open to reveal not an angel or even a phantom but someone else entirely. The coarse, dark wig had been removed once again and Christine felt a strange urge to reach up and run her fingers through it. The mask was gone too, replaced instead by a linen dressing held on with bandages. It didn't reveal any more of his face than before but the effect seemed far less frightening somehow. He could easily pass for a veteran soldier. But what on earth was it for? Had his mask been broken somehow, was that what the crashing noise was? Had he had an accident and injured himself while she had been outside? There was no sign of blood, but nevertheless she felt the guilt creep up upon her at the thought of such a thing, and all because a few bad memories and dreams had spooked her.

"Erik, what have you done to yourself?" she said, her voice reduced to a frightened whisper.

"This is how I look when necessity demands that I deal with the outside world." He replied calmly "I suppose it's the closest I can get to appearing forgettable."

She smiled nervously, realising that this and their encounter earlier that morning were closest she had come to seeing Erik as he truly was. She wasn't sure whether to be elated or worried, for he must surely be in terrible pain for him to let the mask slip. "I find it rather hard to believe that anyone could forget you, Erik." She said and flushed slightly with embarrassment when she realised what she had said. "Will you be able to see alright?" she asked, changing the subject as she noticed that the dressing covered his right eye completely.

"I think I'll manage." He replied with a wry smile, perhaps he was so used to living in darkness that a slight visual impairment was no longer a problem. Perhaps he found the daylight too bright after living in that awful place for so long. The mere thought of that dungeon with its rats and filthy waters brought the sting of tears to her eyes but she refused to cry again. She no longer cared aout the things Raoul had accused him of, if the worst should happen the least she could do was provide the ordinary life he seemed to want so badly. It wasn't much to ask, hardly anything compared to what he had done for her.

"The man who was here just now brought us some eggs. Are you up to eating something?" she said changing the subject.

"I am if you are."

Half an hour later and she was serving cheese omelettes, slightly burned at the edges and a little rubbery and overcooked but still edible. The range would take some getting used to as she probably hadn't cooked anything since moving into the dormitories and he had never owned such a contraption before. There was no way of transporting something so heavy underground without assistance and no way to ventilate his lair without drawing attention to himself. So on those rare occasions when he needed to cook something he would make do with an alcohol stove. And if he was in need of a heater he would have to do without. He realised that Christine was probably the first person to ever cook for him, or at least the first who wasn't employed to do so. And for that reason alone the meal was wonderful and he was able to force down more than half of it, when food was the last thing he wanted. She had also made him another pot of tea which he drained before it had even had time to cool.

He noticed that she had not eaten much either, but it was a start at least. He remembered from the last time he had kicked the habit that his appetite had suddenly grow n from nonexistence to a ravenous monster. He had gorged himself on bread and cheese and cold cuts and tea and coffee and music and her, her more than anything else. As long as she was here with him in this house his resolve would not waver.

He had felt it earlier that morning as she sang for him. Her voice always seemed to make all his troubles fade away. Her bittersweet folksongs eased the furious pain that wracked his body and staved off the hideous memories. He had never thought much about how one person could inspire another; truthfully he'd never had the opportunity to be inspired by anyone. But he had become aware that everything he had written without her was completely dreadful as was everything he had written under the influence. There was scores in his portfolios that made no sense at all and were so hard on the ear that it wouldn't have surprised him if the listener developed a headache by the end. And that damned second act of his opera. He was still teaching when he wrote the finale which had been glorious but it had fallen in the middle, it was too full of spite and fury. It was better than no emotion at all; the production was anything but mediocre but if unsettled him and if an opera could make its composer uncomfortable then what chance did the audience have. Somehow Christine had helped him refine his music and bring order to the chaos he created.

It was ironic that she was able to do such a thing when she was the root of that chaos. Even now that he had her she still continued to infuriate him with her naive ambiguity. His mask made no difference to her? What on earth was that supposed to mean? She found it hard to believe that someone could forget about him? Was that a good thing or a bad thing?

"Are you feeling alright?" her voice pulled him from his thoughts, and his eye darted to meet her glance.

"Pardon?"

"You looked like you were miles away." She clearly had no idea how much she affected him. Just one look in his direction could paralyse him, where one part of his heart was doing summersaults and the other half was frozen with fear in case she should suddenly realise what he was and run from him again. He had felt the same way on the train, unaccustomed to having someone look at him in such a benign yet curious manner. The mask might not have been there at all for the difference it made. For it was not his face that he had been hiding all those wasted years but himself as a whole and his every being, every movement and every gesture could be seen by her. All these things could reveal something far worse than a mere deformity. Compared to her he was merely a thing of shreds and patches, a tattered old burnt out mess riddled with scars and traumas that would make a soldier weep. She had already peeled away the mask once but soon she would unveil the true distortion.

"I'm just tired I suppose." He said.

"Yes, I barely slept at all last night. Perhaps we should go to bed early after the doctor's seen you."

She said "we". He knew she didn't mean it in the way he wanted but the word alone made him shiver, and try as he may he couldn't blame it on the withdrawals. How pathetic, that a mere grammatical association could affect him so much. It seemed as though the tiniest thing could set him off as he was caught permanently between his desperation for any sort of human affection and his blind terror of mankind at large.

"Yes, perhaps...we should." He agreed, putting a little too much emphasis on the 'we' and wanting to kick himself for sounding so horribly suggestive and he could see by her blush and the awkward silence that followed as she pushed her food around her plate that she had noticed. To his immense gratitude there came a knock at the front door and as he watched her scurry away to answer it, Erik wondered if there would ever be a time when he would be able to go near her and not ruin everything.

"So, you're the prodigal grandson are you?" said the bespectacled old man who called himself Dr Bordasse. They had the library to themselves now that Christine had left them alone for the examination and Erik was practically hyperventilating again. He didn't necessarily have anything against the man, but he feared scrutiny of any kind and doctors had a way of scrutinizing you.

"You knew my grandfather?" he looked up, unsettled that the people in this remote little town seemed to know more about him than he did. That damned priest must have told everyone who'd listen.

"At the very end, yes, not that it counted for much. I see the resemblance though." The older man replied and began to open the leather bag he had brought with him. "So, what seems to be the problem, Monsieur?"

"Well, doctor, I seem to have found myself at the end of a rather unfortunate addiction."

"Ah, let me guess...morphine, am I correct?" he smirked and raised a grey eyebrow at Erik's amazed expression. "I used to treat the soldiers for it back in the day. Were you in the war Monsieur?" his black little eyes darted to the dressing making Erik feel as though he could see right through it into the empty eye socket and out the other side.

"I was in a war."

"I thought as much, I have a theory that it's the injuries combined with highly stressful living conditions that bring about these things. Is this the first time you've tried to stop."

"No, this is the second time I've tried."

"Ah then you'll know what to expect." The doctor said cheerfully. "I probably won't be able to tell you anything new, just make sure you drink plenty of water, take warm baths and I'm aware that the last thing you probably want to do is eat but you must keep your strength up. Are you prone heart problems or convulsions?"

"I don't think so."

"And just how long have you been...medicating yourself, Monsieur Destler?"

"About four months. Prior to that, I hadn't taken anything in three years. And before that I was using opium for about ten years."

"Three years? That's very good for a first attempt, although it's unlikely that this will be your last. You're probably aware that many people in your position struggle with this their entire lives."

"Well, what do you suggest I do?"

"Not much, I'm afraid. I can't really suggest that you take anything for the pain that would be counterproductive. Simply wait it out, try to keep yourself busy and avoid things that previously provoked you to consumption. So I suppose moving to new place with a new wife will serve as a pleasant distraction from such things." Erik flinched a little at the comment, he was aware that the old man was probably making an assumption but it only served as a stinging mockery. She was more than he deserved and they both knew it.

After Bordasse had checked his arms for infection along with his heart and his breathing, the ageing doctor left with a discreet assurance to Christine that all would be healed before the week was out.

And it would be a difficult week for all involved.

To be continued...

A/N – So how will Raoul react to the note? And its only a matter of time before Christine puts two and two together...and comes up with ten. And now to get my arse in gear for the planned double chapter. Wish me luck XD. And of course reviews are always awesome and give me the drive to continue writing.

A few more historical notes for you.

-The House of Worth was an Haute Couture fashion house that was one of the leaders of high fashion in the late 19th century. It's also worth noting that Christine's dress from the Mystery Legends PC game is based on a Worth design.

-The suicide note is a George Sand quote.

-19th century range cookers had no temperature control, so they took some getting used to. Keeping the oven and hob at a constant cooking temperature was something of an art.

-In the 19th century opiate addiction was considered less harmful than alcoholism as it was thought to cause less moral impairment. Smoking was considered to be healthy and you could buy any number of poisonous, addictive and explosive substances at your local chemist.

-The war mentioned is the war between France and Prussia in 1870.