I am not sure how long this will be, I am sure it will not be a short 5-10 chapter story but beyond that I do not know, I think it will probably be a longer one. Anyway… I want to dedicate this whole story to Gevaisa because she is sort of my inspiration for it. )

Chapter 3 –

They were now sitting at the table in silence and Elizabeth finally gave in and started conversation. "Would you like to know about any of your students and co-workers?"

"Sure. I guess I better know something about them before I begin to teach them and teach with them." Erik replied. They were both trying very hard to be nice to each other, and both were having a hard time of it, but they managed.

"Well, in total you teach only ten kids. Our school has only fifty in total. We have had up to seventy-five, and we can handle up to one hundred, but for now we are at the comfortable number of fifty."

"I see, and what of my students, what are they like?"

"Very talented and very rich, but they are the sweetest kids I know. Would you like to know about each individual student?"

"Sure. I guess I will have to learn about them all soon enough."

"Okay. Well, to begin, we have two siblings, Jennifer and Andrew Billings. Andrew is older by one year. Jennifer is one of the very few altos we have. She is very talented. Andrew is obviously a tenor, for now. You must understand that you do not have any students to sing bass, because truthfully they are too young to have low voices. If you choose a song that has a bass range, you may sing it if you like."

"I didn't think about that, but I understand." This was not what he had been planning. He had many ideas for what to teach them, but without a bass part, it would not work.

"Next, you have Julie Barns and Hattie Caldwell. They are best friends, have been for years. They both sing soprano. Julie would be a good alto, but she won't leave Hattie's side. She is one of the shyer students." She took a break to think for a minute. "The only two other boys are Jimmy Davis and Fredrick Henderson. They have very nice voices, and Fredrick is our scholarship student. He is quite talented, but his family could not afford the tuition, so we pay his way.

"We have one more alto, Aurora Walker. Between her and Jennifer, they do a very good job, but sometimes are overpowered by the five sopranos. I would seriously suggest getting Julie to switch." He just nodded not saying anything. "The other three sopranos are Caroline Henson, who is quite talented. Unfortunately, she knows it, so you may have to keep her in line. She likes to take all the solos. Caroline is probably your biggest problem in the class."

"Oh, I assure you, I can handle girls who want to be future divas." Erik replied with a laugh, thinking of how he could drop something on her, but the thought left as soon as it came. It was too cruel. He would, though, put this girl in her place.

"In addition, there is Brianna Carlson. She is Caroline's closest friend, but I think she is more terrified by the girl that anything. Brianna is just as talented as Caroline, but she would never even try for a solo in fear she might get it, over Caroline. Oh, and Emily Dulaurier, she is your youngest student. She has promising talent, and everyone enjoys her company." She sat thinking for a minute if there was anything else she should tell him. "Oh! Yes, I just remembered, we may or may not have a young boy who lived in America join our class. His family is coming back and he may be attending the Academy, if his parents find it suitable. He will not be here until after Christmas, though, if he comes. I have gotten letters from his old tutor giving him nothing but praise, so he will most likely be coming here. So your total may rise to eleven."

"I see. That is fine with me. So will I be starting tomorrow?"

"I can show you around and introduce you tomorrow if you'd like." He nodded.

"If I decide to leave, how long will I have to stay?"

"Hopefully, you would be kind enough to stay until I find another teacher, but if you insisted you could leave—whenever." They sat in silence for a few more minutes. "So, Erik, do you compose?"

"Compose? Yes, I do." He replied surprised at this.

"Have you had anything performed?"

"One, but it went bad in the opera house it was performed in. That was six years ago, I have not had anything performed since. Why do you ask?"

"Well, as of now, our school has no one other than me who composes. I usually write a finished piece at the end of the year for the students to perform. Almost like a mini opera, only for children. Madame Hartford, our dance instructor, makes the dance part of it, and the vocal teacher teaches the songs to the singers. It usually attracts people from all over. Sometimes our oldest students are offered instruction in other places since we only keep the children until age twelve. If you compose, it might be nice to have some help in the writing portion of it." He nodded thinking it over. "But that is in late May, and you may not be here for that."

"When does your school year end?"

"We go all through June, the students have July off, and then they return in August. They are given two weeks at Christmas, but most of the parents come to visit at Christmas so the children stay here. Oh—speaking of that, we need you to teach the children some Christmas carols. We do a Christmas concert. You can teach them other stuff, but it will have to wait to be performed. We carol at Christmas. Is that a problem?"

"No, it was not what I had in mind, but I can do it." Christmas Carols! He was not at all happy about having to teach them Christmas carols.

"Oh, and you have the students all to yourself, all day on Tuesday and Thursday, but on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, they do their other studies. They learn Math, Geography, Reading, Writing, and such. So tomorrow your students will join the ballerinas and do Math and Writing, I think." He nodded. "Would you like to know more about your staff?"

"Not really, I have a lot to comprehend about my students and the way this school is run. I do think it is done oddly."

"I take pride in the way I run my school, and I don't believe it is your place to tell me how to run it. The parents and the students don't complain, and none of the other teachers have a problem with it."

"I understand, but I am not one of your other teachers. Well, I am done with my dinner now. I shall go and finish the work on the violin and start on the others." He got up quickly and exited the room. Elizabeth had no desire to eat now; she pushed her plate away and retired to her private study. She had instructed Erik to avoid her private study and her bedroom, other than that he had free reign over the whole house.

At around ten o'clock, she became tired, put down the book she had been reading, and headed up for bed. She awoke at around two in the morning to a loud bang and was instantly wide-awake wondering what had happened.

As she got out of her room, she saw some of the maids coming down from the top level where they lived. "I can handle it dears, go back to sleep." Elizabeth said kindly to them and they nodded and went back upstairs.

She continued down to where she thought she had heard the bang and she found Erik still sitting at the same table. "Erik, I don't need those done tonight. The students won't need them until Thursday. In fact, they probably won't need them until next week." She said annoyed to find that it was probably him causing all the noise.

"I can finish." He snarled back at her.

"Yes, but if you do keep going you will continue to wake me up and put me in an even worse mood than I already am. Go to bed."

"I do not take orders from anyone." He said angrily not taking his eyes off the instrument. He now had the first two done and was working on the last one. "Besides, I do believe you gave me free reign over this house, aside from your private rooms, so I shall finish this, and then, if I have time, get some sleep."

"If you don't go to bed now, you will be grumpy tomorrow for the first time you meet your students. How would you enjoy that? Do you really want them to be terrified of you while you teach them?"

"I will be fine. I am not one to sleep much anyway. I will be fine in the morning."

"Please go to bed, Erik. I can't sleep knowing you are down here, doing work for me all night." she said, almost in a pleading voice.

"I will be fine, Elizabeth, just go up to bed and I will see you in the morning. I am almost done with this one and I promise there will be no more loud noises to wake you from your slumber. I'll get some sleep, I swear to you." he said calmly. "In fact, this instrument is not broken at all, it just has…" He pulled something out of it. "…A surprise inside." He held up an old moldy sandwich and her face was one of disgust. "So now I shall retire to my room, and Elizabeth, you should do the same." He smiled to her and as a gentleman would, he escorted her to her room, then turned the other way and went to his.

When she closed the door, she began to breath heavy and leaned against it. Sometimes she hated the man, and other times he was nothing but kind. For this, she was beginning to hate herself. She did not like the way she acted around Erik. He seemed to bring out the worst in her character.

Erik headed towards his room but stopped at the library first. He skimmed through her collection and found one he had yet to read, so he took it to his bedroom. He knew he would get very little sleep that night. He took off his outer clothing, lay down on his back, and began to read. His thoughts kept going back to Elizabeth, though ,and soon he could not even read. Why could he not get her out of his mind? There was nothing special about her. She lived by herself, and her life was consumed by her work. She had also insulted him and that was not a fact he liked about her, but for some reason all he could do was think of her. He almost wished he could reveal his past to her. Then he would be able to control her through fear, but in doing that, he would be taken away from his music once again. He was not excited about teaching an entire group of young rich kids, but he did want to be surrounded by music again, and it seemed that these little brats would be his way to it.

Then his thoughts drifted to the children. He was not going to put up with the snotty girl who wanted to be the next Carlotta. He was interested in working with the younger kids. A younger child would be much easier to teach because they were not as stuck up, and it was easier to mold a young mind than an old one full of ideas for themselves.

He then thought about his Christine: where was she, and was she happy? If the boy had made her unhappy, he would easily kill him. He wanted to be able to teach her again. She had been his life, and he could tell already that he would never feel the same way about another person. He did want to be able to teach, but if he could teach Christine, he would be the happiest man on earth. That, however, would never happen. He had let her go, and he was going to have to live with that for the rest of his life.