AUTHOR'S NOTE: Again, thank you to everyone who has reviewed! And, so, Chapter 3!

I want to make a quick note: This chapter (in case you couldn't tell) skips ahead quite a bit in the narrative. Remember, according to LND's plot, we have to span TEN LONG YEARS of our character's lives before we can come to Christine arrival. So I'm going to be jumping around months, maybe years ahead in the next few chapters. (This is only to spare you of a "Mme. Giry goes to the market. Little Meg stays home. Erik sits and mopes" chapter. Because those are boring.)

I glanced up at the old, spotted mirror hanging the wardrobe. I raised my eyebrows quickly: apparently, for the last hour or so I had been systematically pulling stands of hair out of my normally taut bun. My weathered face was now surrounded by a small halo of grey and black stands. Shaking myself, I lay my pen aside and walked over to the wardrobe to remedy this.

Our flat was small, but serviceable. Two rooms: one main room, one bedroom. For all we used it, the main room was our entire flat. Two beds were crammed into its corners, Meg's being the more luxurious of the two. A small armchair and a lamp stood in the final corner of the room. A single, circular wooden table stood near what served as our cooking area. The table, as of now, was covered with papers - advertisements - remnants of my recent attempts to secure employment. On top of the papers was a small book where I recorded our finances, and the source of my frazzled appearance.

I smoothed away the last piece of hair before moving back to inspect the small book. Almost immediately I had to stop myself from tugging at my hair again. America had grown expensive.

I sank into my chair, looking at the carefully recorded numbers in front of me. Our substantial starting funds had dwindled in the past year. By my calculations, rent would become scarce in a few months, should we continue to live the way we had been. I picked up my pen and began rearranging funds carefully, trying to stretch what was left of the Ghost's salary as far as possible.

After nearly half an hour more of this, I threw down my pen irritably and halfheartedly glanced through the advertisements and other papers on the table. There were very few work offers I would be able to take. I was far too old for factory work; my arthritis would never allow it. And my English was not yet good enough that I could take up a less strenuous line of work, such as sewing or tutoring. (Not that Americans wanted an old, hawk-like Frenchwoman educating their children, anyway.)

My gaze drifted up toward the splintered door leading to the flat's bedroom. The door was always closed and – in order to sooth all of our nerves – kept under lock and key. In the past year, Meg and I had come to generally ignore the door's existence, as well as the shadowy unknown residing behind it. And it was seemingly just as willing to be ignored. The Ghost's health had neither deteriorated nor improved since the crossing from France.

I felt it's presence akin to the toad a child brings home after an excursion to the beach: no matter the parents' disgust, the toad is kept and forgotten about in a small box. Eventually a foul odor seeps out of the box, and the parents are obliged to dispose of the toad's corpse. Such wild things are not meant for boxes, despite the child's charming attempts to feed it vegetables and dinner scraps. The toad had been condemned from the moment the child 'saved' it from the wild.

This toad - on the other hand - seemed to stay in its original unearthly, suspended state, despite my neglect. The Ghost seemed no closer to death than before, but neither could I truly consider it alive.

This was not to say I was trying to kill the Ghost. On the contrary, I provided the Ghost with the necessities of life: food, water, shelter. It was up to it to decide to die. I knew that it would happen sometime, as all things must eventually die. But I hoped for sooner, rather than later. Meg was still uneasy with its presence. Her demeanor had improved considerably since the crossing from France, but she still worried me.

Occasionally I would find her curled up in the armchair, or her bed, staring fearfully at the bedroom door, much as she had done in the ship's stateroom. During these moments, a fearsome depth came into her eyes, a haunted, beaten look that had no place on my daughter's face. The only thing I could then do was chase her out of the flat, command her to take a walk, do anything that would get her away from that damned door. And after she was gone I would look toward the door myself and send a prayer to God that the Ghost would die, and leave us in peace.

And still, I had no right to throw him out onto the streets. Some unspoken ethic prevented me from doing so – even now – as our financials were quickly descending into the red. The fact remained that Meg and I were living off of its money. It seemed that I had drawn myself into an unwilling contract with the Ghost when I pulled him out of the Opera. We were now at an impasse: he, unwilling to die; me, unable to turn him out.

There had been nights when I cursed myself for taking him in. It would have been much easier to take his money and leave him to his deserved fate. I wouldn't have regretted it. But in the frenzy of that night, any small debt I owed him seemed to have been magnified by panic. It was ironic that – in the end – it was the Ghost's selfishness that saved his life. Everything he had done for me at the Opera was to make me convenient to him: my large flat within walking distance of the Opera, my salary and the occasional large tip, Meg's position in the corps de ballet, among other things. My work at the Opera was always tempered by the uneasy alliance I had with the Ghost. And when I found him shriveled up in that horrid throne of his, I attempted to repay what little debt I still owed him. I saved his life, with the understanding that the arrangement would only be temporary.

The sound of the flat's front door opening jerked me from my thoughts. I glanced up to see Meg shutting the door closed behind her and locking it. I sprang from my seat and began stowing all of the papers on the table into a small wooden box at my feet.

"Mama?" said Meg curiously. "What are you doing? What is this?"

"Nothing for you to worry about, Meg, dear," I said quickly, snapping the little notebook shut. "Just something I occupy myself with when you're – "

"Mama?"

I looked up. Meg was holding one of the job advertisements in her hand. I quickly snatched it from her and placed it in the wooden box with the others. I closed the box and went to tuck it away under my bed. When I turned around, Meg was still looking at me.

"Mama?"

"Everything is fine, Meg," I said, smiling at her. She frowned.

"I will get a job," she said. "I'll work, if we need the money. The factories – "

"No," I said harshly. Meg stared. "No, Meg," I walked over to pat her on the head. "I will not have you working. American jobs are dirty, dangerous. You are an artist. You must not roughen those gentle hands of yours." I took her hands in mine and patted her cheek. "You leave that work to your Mama, should we need it."

Meg looked as if she were about to protest, but I silenced her by settling myself into the old armchair. "Enough, Meg. The matter is settled. But now you must please your Mama by telling her of your day. Did you enjoy your walk?"

The moon was casting long blue shadows across Mama's bedspread. I shivered as a small draft played across the back of my neck, and I wrapped my own quilt around me tighter.

I stared down at the small book open in my lap. Mama's wooden box lay open at the foot of my bed, its papers spread across my sheets. But the book was the only thing of interest to me. I squinted in the room's faint light. The moon was not bright enough to reveal the exact numbers, but I could plainly see all of Mama's scratch-outs and scribbles through entire columns of calculations.

I swallowed and shut the book softly. It was obvious that we needed income. Mama could hide it as much as she liked, but we were running out of money. I began putting the papers back into the box carefully, so as not to rustle them around too much. I would have to confront Mama about this in the morning, make her see reason. She was too old for most of the available work. I glanced over to her sleeping form on the other side of the room. There was no shame in my supporting her. We were not in Paris. Whatever dreams she had of my returning to dance were lost. I had not practiced for a year. At this point, what skill I still retained would pale in comparison to any professional.

I shut the wooden box softly and rose to slide the box carefully under Mama's bed. I walked cautiously, one foot in front of the other, easing my weight into each footstep. Mama still had ears like a hawk, and would wake at the tiniest bump in the night.

Suddenly, the hairs rose on the back of my neck. I heard – although I supposed it was more feeling than hearing – a soft breath drift past my ear. My arms erupted into goose bumps as I turned swiftly to confront the wind. A rat, I thought, though the sound was far less harsh than the scurry of small feet across the flat's floor.

Nothing. There was nothing there.

I wondered if I had imagined the sound entirely. It had come from a completely bare patch of the flat. No furniture for a rodent to hide under, no open window for a breeze to squeeze through. Nothing but the wall, the floor, and the splintering wooden door.

All of my blood seemed to drain into my middle. I felt a whimper rise in my chest, but my throat had clamped down and it died there. Dear God. Not after so much time.

And as I stared, fixated in terror, the breath floated past my ear again. It was quiet enough that I began to wonder if it was intentional at all. Another breath, then another. Quiet, so quiet that I had to strain to pick up on them. One after the other, each breath with a different feel, a different chill associated with it.

It struck me. Singing.

But it wasn't as simple. Moaning, perhaps. Weeping, even. But I began to be able to pick out notes, soft melodies in the feel of each breath. My fear lessened; suddenly I felt that I was privy to something forbidden, that I shouldn't be hearing the soft, almost nonexistent sounds seeping from the adjacent room.

I worked to steady my own breaths. I looked down into my hands, the wooden box trembling in my grasp. Looking back up at the door, I slowly lowered myself to kneel on the floor. I carefully open the box and pulled out an advertisement and Mama's pen. I set the paper on the floor, and quickly drew out a set of staffs on the paper.

Squinting in the moonlight, I listened carefully to each breath before guessing as to its corresponding note and length. And so I made a rough estimation of the sounds in the next room. Hours, maybe minutes, passed before the breaths finally died away. I looked up at the window to see the grey dawn light beginning to filter in.

I stood up carefully, wincing as my back complained from the night spent hunched on the floor. But for all my back moaned, my extremities buzzed with unspoken triumph as I surveyed the large pile of papers before me. In this, at least, I had outsmarted the Ghost. Overnight, the breaths had formed into a concrete melody, of which I felt certain I had managed to copy down many of its nuances. Two minutes in front of a piano – if I could find one – would have me certain of this.

And once I was certain, to the printer's I would go. Mama and I would be in business.

AN: H'okay. I'm not too pleased with the way this chapter turned out. But let me know what you think. Either I will completely rework this whole chapter, or I will leave it alone and try to forget it. It all depends on your feedback.

So, review, review, review!