Disclaimer: I have Erik kidnapped. He now resides in my heart where he sings like a nightingale and tries to Punjab me on rainy Thursdays. Gaston Leroux own this.

~Chapter thirteen~

"Alright Erik… then you shall have it. After all there's no one here except you and me."

Erik suddenly gave out a giggle when he realized that what Christine had just said was just what Richard had whispered once when it came to his twenty thousand Francs and the safety-pin they tried to secure them with. Christine looked puzzled though and when he saw her sincere expression he was grateful that the mask hid his face that was turning red because of it.

He let his hands drop to his sides, and turned his head to the side, giving her the opportunity to kiss him on the masks cheek. When she leaned forward and did, he softly put his arm around her waist. He did it softly as to not alarm her. Then he started to hum. Out of… was it joy? The feeling was so unusual to him that he had a hard time recognizing it, but it must have been joy. Here they were, alone. And she was kissing his poor Poirot's tears. His humming even seemed to relax her while doing it.

Surely he was loved for himself, and for his own sake by her. He closed his eyes and heard the quiet sound of her soft lips touching the mask, kissing it once, twice… three times more. Deep down he knew it was all an illusion, but that illusion made him feel better than anything else in the world so that's why he kept on doing it, even though he knew she had that booby Raoul somewhere waiting for her return.

He raised his hands to the mask and noticed how she naturally pulled away a bit to give him space to take it off. Underneath it is where he kept his real surprise though. He hadn't been sure whether or not he should show her it, but now seemed to be the right time to do so.

He was wearing the mask that made him look like an ordinary man underneath the devil and Poirot mask.

Christine couldn't believe her eyes when Erik first took off the Poirot mask and her jaw dropped. She had almost thought she was starting to grow used to his hideous face, or as used as one could be. But that wasn't what he showed her this time.

He had another mask underneath only this one wasn't from Commedia dell arte or some other play. This full-faced mask made him look like an ordinary man. He looked up timidly towards her, apparently afraid of what she was going to think about it. And honestly she didn't know what to think. She never thought she was a shallow woman but this mask made him look good, like a normal person compared to the monster she knew were underneath it all. With the soft, delicate voice of an angel he said "Like I said to you before Christine; Love me and I swear I will be gentle as a lamb towards you dear."

It would have been so easy for her to say yes right then. To forget that he had scared her half to death several times and that Raoul was somewhere waiting for her to marry him instead. To forget the bruises on her arms that were just there and that had been made by him. To forget that he was a murderer and a monster and convince herself that he didn't have the devil inside him.

But she knew too well this wasn't his real self. But if it was, oh if it was would she have been interested? If he was a man that she actually could go out with on Sundays, and if he was a man like any other, only with a magnificent voice and an ingenious mind? With his clothes on and his cape he could now almost pass like a normal man. If he had worn his felt hat too so she hadn't seen his lack of hair he surely would have. She was trapped in her own imagination when his voice seemed to come to her from first her right side and then her left, whispering in her ear even though he stood a bit away from her.

"So what do you think my sweet little wife? Is my face now to your liking?"