Disclaimer: Don't own POTO…
Okay, this chapter might be a little boring…but I'm trying a different twist on Christine (I won't say new b/c it's probably been done) and so this chapter is one of those necessary hoops through which I must jump in order to move the story forward as I see fit.
Phantress: I have to admit that "Life sucked donkeys" is not an original line. I got it from a rerun of a "Wayne's World" sketch on SNL. Wayne and Garth are doing movie reviews and they get around to The Bear and Wayne has this look on his face as he says the title, like, Why did they even think about making this? and he says, "The Bear sucked." Garth agrees and one of them decides to reemphasize the point with the "sucked donkeys" comment. It was hilarious. (sniggers) Got Erik quoting "Wayne's World."
Solecito: Christine drained? Oh, no, she is back, my friend, in all her bug-eyed moronic-ness. Who else will be the target of Anna and Brooke's insanity?
IndiaPyro: Sorry about the whole spiders thing. I hate them, too. Don't ever see 8-legged Freaks.
Ridel: I am not at all opposed to EC-ness and I am not usually inclined to Christine-bashing unless it's hilariously written. However, the story has taken control of itself and what can I do? (air tank breathing effect) I MUST obey my master. P.S. I knew someone was going to make the green eyes argument. I think they're blue, but, hey, so long as they sparkle and burn.
Maggie: In answer to your question in the post script of your review: neither.
jaderose01: I never thought I'd be capable of making phans despise Gerry (besides those who don't like him already). I'd think I was ill too, but I'm enjoying the reaction.
Tian Sirki: Here's a CHAPTER DEDICATION for you b/c you asked for some more involvement of Christine and you got it!
SimplyElymas: I'm sure Erik would be pleased with your reaction (Erik hands reviewer a special edition Punjab lasso). I don't how this became an OW phic. (shakes head as characters run amuck).
Lady Brandybuck of the Shire: If I could see to the ends of the earth…I'D TAPE MY EYELIDS OPEN!
MiserableRevloutionary: Congrats! You are the first person to pick up on that. Yes, the tailor is named after Jean Valjean from Les Mis.
Mrs. Tom Riddle: I can't believe you actually felt compelled to Punjab Gerry! (looks impressed)
And everyone else begging me to send Gerry home: He's feeling pretty comfortable where he is…so I think he'll stick around to torment Erik a while longer.
Anywho. On with the show.
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REFLECTIONS OF A BUG-EYED MORON
Christine never told anyone about the tarantulas. It might have been because she feared the quizzical arch of eyebrows and the subtle squeak of chairs putting a few more inches betwixt their occupants and her. It might have been in response to the suspicious and not-so-friendly parchment airplanes that had soared in through her bedroom window. cough. Or she might have simply written off the whole horrific experience as a nightmare brought on by moonlight and too much violin. In any case, she never told.
She spent the following three or four days in bed, making herself as pitiable as possible, berating Raoul for not coming to see her even though he had been found passed out on the church steps. Mlles. Duff and Lohan came to visit her every evening after dinner.
"Christine, you simply have to see the new man staying with the Leroux family," Hilaire chirped, bouncing in her seat, head wobbling from side to side. The singer had long ago given up any attempts to follow the movements of the bobbling blonde.
"The Leroux family?" she questioned with uncertainty.
Hilaire frowned, then playfully swatted Christine's shoulder, "Those funny girls you talked to in the street the other day!"
Erik's sisters? So they were the Leroux family! Christine sat up with renewed interest.
"What man?"
"He's utterly divine," said Lizette, heaving and breathing as though she were practicing for a Baywatch audition.
"Truly?" Christine leaned forward, like a fish biting a hook, begging for the details. Who in the world could Anna and Brooke know that was 'utterly divine'?
"Yes!" Hilaire squealed. "He's very tall and very strong. Blue eyes that are to die for. The half of his face that you can see is the most handsome I have ever beheld!"
Christine's brow furrowed and her bulbous eyes narrowed enough so that they looked normal. "What do you mean the half you can see?"
"He wears a mask like M. Leroux, only this one only covers a part of his face. Though he acts like M. Leroux, very aloof and quiet," said (and heaved) Lizette.
Christine worried her bottom lip. This news startled her. More masks? Maybe Erik had a brother.
"What is the gentleman's name?"
"Monsieur Gerard."
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"THAT'S M. Gerard!" Christine's jaw nearly hit the ground. Her companions moaned in response. He was all they had described and more: tall, dark, handsome, intriguing…sexy. Why couldn't Erik be like that? The dim-witted trio clustered round a rose bush, peeking through the branches as the dashing fellow walked toward the beach, flanked by the Mlles. Leroux. The lukewarm slime of a dribble of drool oozing down her chin caught the soprano's attention. Hastily swiping it away, she ran to join her friends in a carriage bound for town.
Christine did not say much during the brief journey. Instead, she did something admirably serious and shockingly mature: she reflected. (Everyone picture giant Christine-shaped mirror).
Hilaire and Lizette were good friends. Good in the sense that they were rich and well positioned in society—plus, they wore the same size clothes as Christine. However, they would never understand the difficulty of her situation. They could chatter and squee over the hotness that was M. Gerard, with some hope of gaining his favor. Christine, on the other hand, was doomed to abstain from such girly pleasures. (Christine sits up straighter and adopts martyr-like look).
Christine recalled with a faint smile the image of her father talking in a fevered pitch, with wild gestures, of his plans for her future…
Que sentimental, fuzzy flashback.
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"Rich and famous, Little Lotte! You shall be rich and famous! You will have sparkly jewels and pretty dresses. You will be invited to all of the best parties. Everybody will know your name!" Gustave Daaé cried with gusto.
His little daughter gazed up at his handsome, towering figure in bug-eyed wonder.
"But how, papa?"
"I shall teach you to sing like an angel and you shall be an opera star like maman," Gustave Daaé crooned, kneeling down and pulling his darling daughter into his strong, loving arms.
"Like Maman! And will that make me rich and famous?" she asked, bubbling over with excitement.
"Famous to be sure, Little Lotte, but to be truly rich you must marry well."
"Whom shall I marry, papa?"
"Raoul de Changy."
Little Christine giggled with childish delight. She liked Raoul. He had rescued her red scarf from the sea. She snuggled deeper into her father's embrace, inhaling the dusky smell of tobacco smoke and cedar wood. As she drifted into sleep, she dreamt of jewels and prima donnas and how she would always have papa and Raoul to make them hers.
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But papa died before she reached her eighth year and Christine had passed into the hands of Madam Valerius, a kindly, but poor woman living in Paris, entirely unconnected with the de Changy family. Thus, in one swift move, Christine had lost all hope of ever achieving the goals to which her father had urged her to aspire.
For years, even after Madam Valerius had sent her to study at the Paris Opera House, Christine harbored a deep resentment towards her father. She despised the glittering castle of fairy tales he had built around her, all those dreams and aspirations, only to tear them down in a single, fatal blow.
Perhaps the bitterest disappointment was the apparent non-existence of the Angel of Music. As he lay dying, just a faint shadow of his former self, Gustave told his little child of the Angel of Music, who would come to guide her and train her voice after her father had gone to heaven. Madam Valerius had supported and encouraged this notion and little Christine believed them. She clutched to that small, thin strand of hope for some time until she bitterly relinquished it as well.
If I didn't know that Christine's sorrow was entirely motivated by materialism, I'd almost feel sorry for her. Almost (snorts).
At one time she suspected her father had done it on purpose. But Gustave Daaé was not as careless as his selfish, little bug-eyed brat imagined.
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When the famous Swedish violinist had first perceived that Plan A for his daughter's rise to fame and fortune was going to nose-drive six feet under ground, he instantly instituted Plan B. A speedily dispatched letter found its way into the long, cold, (sexy), elegant hands of a certain musically inclined ghost, via the ever-reliable Madam Giry.
Naturally, this certain ghost had been surprised to receive such correspondence from the talented violinist he had briefly befriended during the Opera Garnier's opening year. The ghost was suspicious and apprehensive about Daaé's request on behalf of his soon-to-be-orphaned daughter. It was an unusual demand, to say the least; and the particulars were rather insulting. So the dying father was desperate enough to appeal to a madman to help his child, but asked that said-madman hide his true identity and teach her under the guise of the 'Angel of Music.'
Eventually, the ghost replied to the frantic letter, answering that he would acquiesce to Daaé's request, though, in truth, the ghost had no intention of keeping his promise. Daaé was relieved, thinking that he had secured Christine's ticket on the road to fame. As for riches, he banked on his pretty little girl catching Raoul's or some other wealthy lad's eye once she was in the limelight. Everything would go well for her…he was such a clever, caring father.
What he hadn't counted on was the heart of the lonely ghost.
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Thirteen years since the death of Gustave Daaé, Christine had her hands full, juggling the two men who were her keys to rebuilding that glittering castle. She was scheming to climb to the top of the social ladder, but unlike Thackeray's Becky Sharp, whom she so resembled in ambition, Christine did not intend to do the bulk of the work for her pot-of-gold. Erik would make her famous and Raoul would make her rich. All she had to do was please both men without offending either. Easier said than done, it turned out.
One really has to wonder what was going through Gustave's fever-stricken mind when he decided to ask a deranged, reclusive murderer to teach his daughter to sing. Erik was totally unpredictable. His passion for Christine was a double-edge sword. She could be sure he would stop at nothing to make her the best soprano the world had ever heard, but he had his own desires to fulfill as well. He was like a temperamental Greek deity, showering his mortal pet with gifts worthy of a goddess one moment and raining lightning on her the next.
Christine played on Erik's love for her as much as she dared. A light brush of fingertips here, a fleeting glance there, a little blush, a lot of swooning, she did her best. It was enough to make the poor Phantom shake with agonizing desire, but any interaction with the Vicomte de Changy would send him on a terrifying rampage. Christine's only concern was not her cruel destruction of Erik's hope, but her own safety.
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Christine climbed out of the carriage and followed her ditzy friends into the nearest shop.
"What a shame Raoul did not join us," Hilaire gurgled.
"Yes, what a shame," Christine mumbled, obviously miffed at the thought. To her surprise, the young Vicomte was turning out to be much more difficult than she had anticipated. Apparently, Raoul had some idea that he expected Christine to love him whole-heartedly for himself, not his wealth or title. She did her best to flatter him, to appeal to his innate sense of romanticism and heroism with her chilling tale of the Opera Ghost's deadly obsession. It rather irked Christine that Raoul was not easy to manipulate. Just like his archrival, Raoul was only a means to an end.
"Too bad M. Gerard seems to be only interested in the Mlles. Leroux," Lizette was saying to Hilaire. Christine shook herself out of her reflective trance to listen.
"Ay. He never says a word to anyone else, but he seems devoted to them," Hilaire said sadly.
Christine felt a little more hopeful. Perhaps this new fellow would distract those "sisters" from protecting Erik. She often got the uneasy feeling that Anna and Brooke were on to her. She was having a hard enough time as it was without those two marring her carefully constructed web.
If only she knew…