Disclaimer: Don't own anything.
A/N: Thank you again to my beta, FantomPhan33. Thank you for the four reviews. Enjoy the double update.
Chapter Five
Nerves are rife backstage as we performers ready ourselves for the show, the ballerinas donning the pale green and pink tulle skirts and bodices and weaving flowers through our upswept hair.
Sylvie sweeps past, her light brown hair piled on the top of her head. "We don't need the Opera Ghost for everything to go wrong tonight," she says, her tone dripping sweetness. "We have our own little bouffon right here."
I lower my gaze in the mirror, flowers and ribbons dangling from my dark brown curls.
"Leave her alone," Christine's voice echoes from the doorway, and I turn to see her clad in her pageboy costume. I rise on wobbly legs, push through the throng of dancers to greet her. Seeing the anxiety clearly displayed on my face, she puts a comforting arm around my shoulders.
"It'll be alright," she says. "Meg told me that you're so much better than you were when they started."
"Thank you," I offer her a weak smile. "You'll be marvellous, though, even if they won't let you sing."
She smiles, and squeezes my hand. "Thank you for sticking by me through this," she says. "I know the other ballet girls think that my taste for fame has made me ambitious for more, but…thank you…"
"For not listening to them," I supply. "It's no problem, Christine. You're a lovely friend…just…be careful, alright?"
For the past few weeks, the Phantom has been in a foul mood at our meetings, has been composing nothing but angry music that is worthless for most of the plot. He didn't deign to share with me the cause of his anger, but I could guess it as well as the next person. Christine has been out with Raoul, Vicomte de Chagny several times now, and anyone who didn't know better would say that they are courting.
"I will," Christine assures me, jerking me back to the present. The music of the overture starts to play faintly from the stage and she smiles. "I'd better be going. Reyer will have my head if I'm late."
"Break a leg," I call.
"You too!" she replies.
...
I am in the wings when he interrupts the performance, standing next to Madame Giry as his voice echoes across the auditorium.
"Did I NOT instruct that Box Five was to be kept empty?"
Meg's face turns as white as a sheet. "He's here…the Phantom of the Opera…"
Christine's eyes are wide with terror. "It's him…I know it, it's him…"
Carlotta grabs the front of her costume, red face within inches of my friend's pale one. "Your part is silent, little toad!"
Madame Giry puts a hand on my shoulder as anger starts to bubble up inside me, at Carlotta, at the idiots who sat in his box, even at the Phantom for disrupting the night when my mother is watching, ruining her first treat in years of hard work.
My stomach clenches as he says softly, "A toad, Madame? Perhaps it is you who are the toad."
After that, I remember it in flashes. Carlotta croaking. The ballet being ushered forwards, me stepping on Sylvie Belanger's foot in our hurry to pick up our garlands and get on stage. For the first time, me getting my steps right. Imagining my mother's face in the crowd, beaming with pride.
And then Joseph Buquet, plummeting from the flies with a noose around his neck. I scream, stumble backwards, away from his red face and twitching body.
It was him, The Phantom. He killed a man, a man who told stories of the Opera Ghost, claimed to have seen him. An unsavoury character but a man nonetheless. My composer is a murderer.
Madame Giry ushers us all off stage as the managers try to calm the audience. Christine rushes past with the Vicomte in tow, her brown hair flying behind her.
"Ssh, girls, ssh," Madame settles us backstage in one of the practice rooms. We are clinging to each other, sobbing with trails of make-up running down our faces.
Meg holds my hand so tightly I'm afraid she's going to break it, white as a ghost.
"What will happen, Maman?" she asks.
"They are going to re-start the performance," Madame Giry says smoothly, only her eyes betraying her distress.
"But how can they?" I burst out. "A man died, Madame!"
"It is our manager's decision," she curls her lip. "Tidy yourselves up, girls. There, there."
And fifteen minutes later, after a giddy Christine re-appears in her Countess costume, smiling from ear-to-ear, we go back on. Run the whole show again.
This time it is uneventful. Christine is beautiful in her role, innocent and sweet, and a dancer, Jeanne, who had been understudying Christine takes the part of Serafimo.
But as we file onto the stage to take our bows in front of a cheering audience, it happens. It starts with a creak, a groan, a clanking of chains. I see my mother in stalls, her smile stretching her face wide.
The clanking grows louder. There is a scream.
The chandelier starts to fall, down, down, down. Right in the place where my mother was standing. I stand there, my feet refusing to move as she runs, screams with her hands up to cover her face. I watch, horrified as she is pushed over in a wave of silk and satin, top hats and canes. And as the chandelier crashes into the stage and Meg drags me off by my skirt, all I can see is her lying in the aisle, eyes wide open in death.
...
"Marianne," Madame Giry kneels in front of me. I clutch at my dance teacher's hands, the tears streaking down my cheeks. I am numb inside. "Marianne, I'm sorry."
She's gone. My beautiful, kind, wonderful mother is gone. I'll never see her smile again, or laugh, or hear her delight when I describe our costumes to her. She'll never hold me close in the warm circle of her embrace, I'll never see her gold flecked brown eyes looking into mine, plait her hair for her, or bring her Les Miserables to read through.
She'll never see it performed.
"Marianne," Madame Giry says. "You're going into shock, come my dear. We need to get you out of here…"
"I need to see him," I murmur, wiping at my eyes. Then, more urgently. "I need to see him!"
I have to see him, to scream my agony out so that he might know what he did tonight, what he did to me and to my mother…my mother….oh my mother…
If the chandelier had never fallen, then she wouldn't have been crushed by the mob trying to escape it. If the chandelier hadn't fallen, I would still have her with me.
"That would not be wise," Madame Giry glances around, nervously.
"I need to," I growl, pulling myself free of her grasp. "Please, Madame, please."
She mutters something under her breath. And takes me through the corridors, up to her room. She opens the wardrobe.
"There is a door at the back. Turn left. It's the first right, third left all the way along."
"First right, third left," I murmur, willing myself to stop crying.
I open the door, and the darkness surrounds me. I cannot see.
But I must find him. I must.
The passages are dark, winding. But I keep putting one step in front of the other, the tears drying on my cheeks.
First right. Third left.
Finally, I come to a door. Push it open. Candlelight blinds my eyes after the perpetual night of the tunnels.
"What are you doing here?" the voice is a roar, echoing off the walls, no hints of the golden song that is ever present when he speaks.
"I…I…" I stutter, backing against the wall. Fear is twisting at my heart, and I am berating myself for coming here. I have never seen him like this.
But he has to know what he has done.
"Get out!" he shouts, throwing something that just misses me, shattering into pieces above my left shoulder. I'm shaking again, and there are tears pouring down my face. All I see is his dark shape, blurry through the sobs wracking my body.
Then his leather-clad hands are around my neck, and I'm choking. Panic bubbles up inside me and it's all I can do not to pass out, blackness teasing the edges of my vision.
"The chandelier…"I get out. "The panic. My mother…she's dead…"
The pressure instantly releases, and I crumple to the floor, wheezing breath in and out of my relieved lungs. "You killed her! If you hadn't dropped the chandelier, my mother would still be alive!"
"I am sorry," his voice is calm once more, quiet in the previous echoes of his rage, almost sad.
"No, you're not," I spit, the anger that has left him is rearing its head inside me. "You're not sorry at all. You never knew her. She was kind and wonderful and you killed her. I hate you."
"Is that why you came down here tonight? To lay your mother's death at my feet?" I hear him ask as a gloved hand passes me a handkerchief, and I wipe my tears from my face. He is now crouched before me and I stare into his dark eyes, then suddenly I've fallen forward and am sobbing again, sobbing into the material of his cloaked shoulder. His hands awkwardly pat my back.
"I'm sorry," I whisper. "I don't mean it. I know you weren't planning on killing her, it's just…"
"You needed someone to blame," he says. "I understand. I have often lashed out upon those who do not deserve it."
"Why?" I ask shakily. "Why did you bring it down? She performed, she sang, just like you wanted her to." I need answers so badly, but they are not there, ghosts in the shadows that will never see the light.
"You are not the only person who has lost a loved one tonight," he murmurs.
"Christine…and the Vicomte?" I sniffle as I remember seeing them disappear after Buquet was hanged, but don't move, the rise and fall of his breathing comforting me, calming me. "She can be so naïve sometimes."
Slowly, I sit back on my heels. He stays where he is, crouched in front of me, and I see such vulnerability in his eyes, such pain…he looks broken. Stupid, selfish Christine, I think.
"I am truly sorry, Marianne. I am to blame for her death," he says softly. "I am not fit to live after what I have done to you, caused you so much grief. Death would be a blessing."
I put my hands on his shoulders, force him to look at me, the anger bubbling like a witch's cauldron. "Don't ever say things like that," I glare at him through fresh tears. "It was not your fault, only my grief which made me blame you. I'm sorry. You're one of my only friends, now Mama's gone. And it may have been to do with you, but you were driven to it by a selfish child who only thought of herself. And you didn't kill Mama, the patrons did in their flight."
"Don't insult Christine!" he says, pleading. "Please, Marianne. Don't."
I stand upright, my legs still shaking. He remains on the ground, drops his masked face into his hands. His shoulders start to tremble, I have to fight to control my anger at Christine and her damned foolishness. How could she do this to a man who's only ever helped her, taught her to shine? I will never understand her. And I will never forgive the part she played in the death of my mother.
But for now, we both need to be alone, to grieve our losses – his angel to another man, my mother to heaven, to my father.
"Goodnight," I whisper.
He doesn't reply as I turn and walk away.
...
Meg is waiting for me in Madame's rooms as I enter through the wardrobe.
"Anne, I'm so sorry…" she starts, cerulean eyes filled with tears. "I…"
"I need to be alone, Meg," I say, holding myself tightly in control. If I don't, I'll break down.
"I understand," she says, worried. "I'll find Maman. You'll stay with us, won't you? Since…"
"Thank you," I say as she shuts the door behind her. I sink into the armchair beside Madame Giry's bed, draw my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around him. My loose brown and dark curls fall around my face as my body start to heave in gut-wrenching sobs.
Maman. Maman, why? I can see her eyes, the exact same as mine, her smile, her laugh. I see Papa's arms around her waist, his smile wide.
I love you, he says in my mind. My girls. I love you both.