Chapter 11 –

Erik woke the next morning to hear some music playing elsewhere in the house. He walked around, and found Elizabeth playing in her study with the door open. She wore a holly red dress with green embroidery on it. He finally realized that she was as talented as the school played her up to be. When she saw him, she couldn't help but smile. "Happy Christmas, Erik!" she said happily.

"Yes, you too." he replied, Erik had never celebrated Christmas before. He never had anyone to celebrate with. Madame Giry would send him some extra food and a few small items at the holidays, but he never saw the woman on the actual date, nor had he been given a proper gift by her. It wouldn't look proper for an old widow to be buying gifts for a young man. "You look nice today." he added, trying to sound at least partly kind.

"Yes, I love this dress, but I only get to wear it one day a year. Let's go downstairs and we'll exchange gifts after breakfast."

Erik froze up; he had never thought to buy her a gift for Christmas. He had known it was coming up, but he had never thought it proper to buy an employer a gift. Now he had embarrassed himself. What was he going to do?

"Every year, I always buy gifts for my staff, both here and at the school. You didn't know, so I don't expect anything in return." she replied, reading his mind.

"Well, I was, in fact, going to get you a gift, but you see I only get my salary once a month, and I had no prior funds." He replied. It was a lie, but it would hold her over for a while. "I promise to take you out and buy you a gift sometime soon. For today though, I'll do something better."

"Thank you, but it isn't necessary," Elizabeth said with a smile.

"Okay, then I won't give you the special, better, gift."

"Okay, forget that, I want to know my special gift."

"I'll play for you later, some of my own work, I don't play for too many people, but I'll play something for you."

"And sing?" She asked acting as she did when she was a child at this time of year.

"And sing." He replied in a sigh. She smiled and headed downstairs

When they reached the dining room, the staff had prepared one of the most elaborate breakfasts that Erik had ever seen. Everything imaginable was there including some French dishes he had not had for nearly two months. "You thought of everything." he said, impressed.

"I thought you'd like some dishes from home, and I in fact enjoy French Crepes very much."

"I have missed some of the French food from Paris."

"Yes, I'm sure the food from the opera house was very fancy and elaborately prepared." She wasn't trying to be sarcastic, but she regretted saying it as soon as she did.

"It was decent." Erik replied coldly and sat down.

Elizabeth sat down across from him. He did not seem to be into the Christmas spirit.

They began eating in complete silence. During breakfast Elizabeth tried to get a conversation going, but Erik would either give her one-word replies or he would just shrug his shoulders and continue eating.

After they had both sat in silence for long after they were both done eating, Elizabeth got up and asked Erik to join her in the sitting room. She carried a small box with her. Erik knew it must be his gift. His first in fact; the only true gift anyone had given him. "Open it." she said with a smile.

He had to laugh at her. "You are such a child."

"Only at Christmas," she replied, acting as if the statement really bothered her. "Now open it." she commanded jokingly. "It's not much, but I think you truly need them."

He looked down at the small package and slowly began to open it, knowing that it was killing Elizabeth that he was doing it so slowly. Inside the box was a pair of leather gloves, much like the ones he always wore. She must have noticed as well that his were getting worn out. "Well, yes. I do need them, don't I?" he asked, not expecting an answer.

"Yes, one day I noticed that the pair you wore were nearly worn out, and it looked very unprofessional. You should have seen the commotion about how a young unmarried woman was shopping so intently for the perfect pair of men's gloves. I don't think this town will ever recover."

"No, it must have been the scandal of the year." he replied, mockingly.

"Yes. Well, you are not in Paris anymore, so this is as exciting as it gets." She smiled. "It was Wednesday that I finally decided to get you gloves. In fact, I borrowed yours when you weren't wearing them, and took them to the tailor to have a pair made that would be exactly the same. It was horrible. All the ladies of the town were in, looking for last minute things for whatever plans they had for Christmas, and every single one of them went silent when I asked if the tailor had any like them. When he went into the back they all began whispering to each other, obviously about me, so I was very happy to find that he did have a similar design. He told me they should fit, by the way, and that if they don't we can exchange them. However, let's get back to the story. I bought them that day, and by the next day, I had already been asked by a few others who had not been at the store who the lucky man was! I am actually very surprised you didn't hear about it yourself, I think they'll be talking about it forever."

"Yes, well. That is the small town existence, is it not?" Elizabeth nodded. "I am curious, however," Erik added. "To know what the other things you had been thinking of were, when you said you 'finally decided on gloves.'"

"Well, I thought about getting you some supplies for music but it felt too impersonal. I get those types of things for my other employees, and it seemed different with you because it was not going to be left sitting on your desk until you found it. I figured I should really look into what Erik would want or need, rather than take the easy way out."

"So you've spied on me for the last week to find out what I might want or need?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes, and you are a very difficult person to understand."

"You've no idea." he replied. The statement hung in the air, bringing back the events of the day before. In a way Elizabeth wanted to know what made him difficult to understand, but on the other hand, there were things better left unknown. "Would you like me to play for you now?"

"Yes!" she replied, and her eyes lit up. "We can go to my study, it's the most well taken care of in the entire house."

"Well, until I tuned the other two to my liking." Erik replied.

"Then we shall go to the one in the parlor.", she replied hiding her annoyance. There were still moments when she wanted the man to disappear of the face of the earth.

She went to the parlor and he went upstairs to retrieve some music he had written since his arrival. He couldn't find the exact piece he had been looking for, so he brought the entire messy pile.

When he reached the main level and found Elizabeth sitting on a stool some distance from the instrument, he set the papers down and flipped until he found the one he was looking for. He set it down and began to play; he had yet to write lyrics to this particular song, so he decided he'd play another that he had written lyrics for afterward.

As he played, Elizabeth tried to focus on the melody he was playing, but her mind was being drawn to the papers sitting next to her. She reached for one and read the notes and the lyrics. The words were very seductive and as she hummed the melody in her head, she completely lost all thought of the song Erik was still playing.

When Erik finished, he was happy with himself. The song had seemed to flow nicely. When he turned to Elizabeth, she was humming, apparently lost in thought. He was at first amused, but then he saw what it was she was looking at. The score of Don Juan Triumphant was in her hands and she was softly humming the tune to the song he and Christine had sung.

Erik jumped up quickly, causing papers to fall to the floor, and snatched the music from her hands. "What do you think you are doing!" he screamed at her.

Elizabeth jumped back in fright, falling off the stool she had been sitting on. Erik kicked it out of the way and towered over her. He reached down and pulled her up, hardly giving her a chance to gain her balance. "Well?" he screamed at her again and shook her violently. "Where do you think you get the right to read my work?"

"You set it right in front of me." she said, gathering all the courage she could. This surprised Erik, for no woman had ever tried to fight back before. All they ever did was scream frantically, and cry. Elizabeth did neither.

Erik let his grip go and grabbed his music. "From now on, I'll try and avoid tempting you, then." He threw all the pieces into the fire, not caring that he only remembered some of them off by heart, but people do blind things when enraged.

"I'm sorry. I didn't realize they were this private to you, Erik. But since they are, first, you should never have set them in plain view of anyone, and second, that doesn't give you the right to do what you just did. I hate to think what you'd do to anyone other than me who had seen them."

"What makes you think that I would trust you to read my work over someone else?"

"Because I would never tell, and deep inside, you know that." She stormed from the room and headed upstairs. Erik didn't move, angry at himself for not only losing his temper again, but also for throwing away a lot of his own work.

Almost an hour later, Elizabeth came back down the stairs dressed to go out, and Erik was heading for his room. "I'm going to the school to check how all the students who didn't have parents to pick them up last night are doing. I'll be back within a few hours."

"I'll co…"

"No." She replied and closed the door behind her.

Elizabeth got inside the carriage and sat inside. They arrived quickly at the school. The night before, about six students were forced to spend the night because their parents had not been able to make it for the concert. Caroline was among them. Elizabeth also wanted to see how the girl was doing.

When she arrived at the academy the parents of all but two of the students had arrived to pick up their children. All that remained was Caroline and a young ballerina whose parents arrived almost immediately after Elizabeth. "Do you know when your parents are coming?" she asked Caroline. As long as the girl remained, Elizabeth was forced to keep a member of her nighttime staff to watch her, and they were also ready to begin their break.

"No, the last time I got a letter from them, they were in Italy. They travel a lot while I'm at school. I wrote to them about the recital, but they never wrote back, I hoped they were going to surprise me, but for now I'd just like to get home"

"Don't you just live down the street, though?"

"Yes, but after last night I'm not allowed to walk down there myself. Everyone says it's too dangerous, and the school's only carriage is buried in a snow drift."

"I'll take you." Elizabeth replied.

She drove her down to her home. She felt sorry for the girl, who was to spend Christmas alone at a house full of servants without her family. "Caroline?" She asked as the girl got out.

"Yes?"

"Do you have a driver on staff here?"

"Yes."

"How would you like to come down this evening and have Christmas dinner with Mr. Erik and me?"

"Alright, what time?"

"Is around six-thirty all right?" Caroline nodded with a smile, she seemed excited at not having to be alone, and Elizabeth knew she herself, and Erik, could use the company as much as Caroline.