Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to Phantom of the Opera, sadly.

Chapter Two

A soft knock sounded from her closed door. She closed her eyes and sighed pushing herself up from her bed. She walked over to the door and opened it. Her mother stood before her with a smile on her face.

"Was you first day at school okay?" Her mother asked looking concerned.

"Yes mom" Aubrey said with a smile on her face.

"Are you sure, you haven't said anything, and you are awfully quiet."

"Oh, just homework blues I guess."

Her mother seemed to take this excuse because she stopped jabbering and left.

Aubrey sighed, now she really did have to do her homework. She pushed some boxes out of her way and sat down at her desk where she had laid her binder. She had picked it up and opened it, but halfway through getting her homework out did she realized it.

Erik DESTLER.

How could she have been so stupid, was she not obsessed over Phantom of the Opera? How ironic it was that he had some kind of disease that required him to wear a mask and have the last name as Destler, and even more of a coincidence that his first name was Erik?

He was now her favorite person, to have the exact name of one of her favorite characters in the written world and some strange occurrence for him to be like him, in the sense of wearing a mask.

Aubrey opened several boxes looking for the phone she had packed. After the second box she pulled it out along with several books. She searched the floor until she found the jack and plugged up the phone.

What good was this going to do? Why in the world would he want to know he had the same name as someone from a book? He wasn't even nice! No, it would be best if she forgot about Erik Destler, like Jane had said.

Grudgingly she did her homework finishing it before she heard her mother call her down for dinner.

Dinner was always a sordid affair in which her parents threw question after question about their day. Did they make friends? Did they like their new school? Did they find their way around okay?

Aubrey patiently answered all their questions and kept a smile on her face wishing beyond anything that she could escape to her room and be left alone.

After she had helped Delilah clear away the dishes she rushed upstairs. She slowly started to unpack her room, leaving it, if possible, messier than when she had entered for now everything was strewn about instead of in boxes. She pulled out all of her posters of Phantom of the Opera, from the original movie starting Lon Chaney, her many pictures of the new movie with Gerard Butler and Emmy Rossum.

Finally her room was starting to become her usual sanctum she could hide away from the world in. Having exhausted herself from unpacking she fell into her bed and curled up only to find herself in many dreams.

Aubrey had been at her old school with surrounding friends. She laughed and joked with them, knowing her move had been a dream. She felt a tap on her shoulder and turned with a smile on her face only to come face to face with Erik Destler, and not the Erik Destler from her normal dreams, but this new Erik, this young pompous Erik.

"What are you doing here?!" Aubrey shrieked at him. "I never want to see you again."

"Aubrey, please calm down and listen, I don't have much time. You need to trust your feelings; I am who you think I am. Dive in and do some searching, you will find that what you think is true."

Aubrey looked at him confusion clouding her face. "Erik you aren't making any sense."

He reached out and grabbed the upper part of her arms. "Please, just understand, you will find it."

Aubrey felt a shock run down her body as he touched her. She looked up into the blue green eyes of Erik's, but before she could respond he had turned and started running from her.

"Wait! Tell me what to do, don't leave me." Aubrey shouted at Erik's back side.

Once he was gone the dream changed. She was no longer with her friends from her old school, but her new one. Alice was escorting her to class and she gladly followed.

"Aubrey come on now or we are going to be late for choir."

"Alice, I don't take choir silly, I can't keep a tune."

"Yes you can Erik taught you, he has been teaching you for years, don't be silly."

"What are you talking about? I met you today, along with Erik." Aubrey said more confused than ever.

"Not that Erik" Alice said dropping her arm. She rushed to a class room and opened the door. "This Erik." Alice said bringing the man of her dreams to meet her face to face.

Aubrey was speechless at the tall masked man. She felt the breath in her throat rush in. "Aubrey, you must listen to me. Erik is a good person, just let him know. Break him out of his shell. Don't let him end up like me."

"What's wrong with how you ended up?" Aubrey asked.

"I died alone. I may have been married, but not to my love, she walked out of my life and took my heart with her. I was never the same again. The reason for her leaving always skipped a generation, let him know you love him, it will take time, but don't give up."

"I don't love anyone though."

"Yes you do, you just don't know it yet. Please take care of him, don't let him turn into me."

He reached out and grabbed her hand feeling a jolt as though someone had shocked her.

She woke up with a scream in her throat, threatening to be released. Sweat was pouring off her and she was breathing as though having run a mile.

What was all that about? Aubrey had always had weird dreams, but this was beyond weird. She rolled over and saw that it was almost time for her to get up anyway.

She shakily got up and went to her bathroom. She took a long hot shower and finished getting ready for school. She was in the middle of trying to eat breakfast when she heard a horn honk. It was Jane coming to pick her up for school.

Thankful for the distraction she grabbed her bang, rushed to say goodbye to her parents and into the chilly outside.

She got in the car and shut the door. "Morning Jane, thanks for picking me up."

Jane was looking at her in a strange way. "Aubrey, are you okay?"

"What? Oh yes I'm fine, why?"

"You're so pale." Jane said looking her up and down.

"Oh, I didn't sleep very well last night."

Aubrey was on the verge of telling her new friend about it, but couldn't bring herself to do it. Especially after her warning yesterday.

"I'm just glad to be out of the house, that's all."

Jane shrugged and started to drive to school where they met up with Alice, Natalie, Ashley, and Danielle.

She was starting to get to know the faces around her in class. Aubrey was dreading going to first period where she would see Erik, but when the bell rang she had to hold herself back from running to class.

All the girls she had been hanging out with before school started, except Danielle, walked to their first class.

Aubrey made sure to not sit in Erik's seat again, but sat to the one next to his. The teacher called the class to attention.

"Listen class, we are starting our new projects today. You are to read anything written by Shakespeare and write about it." He wrote a list of topics they needed to include on their reports. "But to make things easier, I have decided to let you have partners." The class gave a small cheer. He gave a small smile, "in order of my generosity, I will be assigning your what you will read."

There was a small groan. "I could let you pick what you are doing, but you have to do it alone." There was a resounding no that rang through the class. "That's what I thought." He said with a smile.

Aubrey walked up to the desk to stand in line. She noticed that Erik had been the last to leave his seat, therefore was last in line.

"Miss Inmon, your partner will be umm…" Mr. Bamoria said as he ran his finger down a list. "Mr. Destler, and you will be reading 'A Midnight's Summer Dream." He said as he handed her the book.

A small thrill came to Aubrey's stomach and she couldn't suppress the smile that came to her lips.

She saw him write her name down next to Erik's and the book they were reading. She walked numbly back to her seat and sat down.

Natalie was waiting for her at her desk. "Oh Aubrey I'm so sorry you had to get paired with Erik. I feel for you." She said placing her hand on Aubrey's shoulder.

"Oh I don't mind." Aubrey mumbled.

"You will after you have to work with him." Natalie said.

After everyone had been told who they were working with Mr. Barmoria said "Okay you can work for the rest of the class together. I expect you to hand in your report in no less than three weeks."

Aubrey looked over at Erik, who had just barely sat down. "So I guess were working together. Have you read the book before?"

He turned his blue green eyes on her and looked at her like she was scum on the bottom of his shoe.

"Yes I have read it before, so I imagine this will go fairly quickly. I can have the report written up tonight, we don't need to work together, and I'll put your name on it so you can still get credit."

Aubrey was shocked. "I really think we need to do this together."

She saw Erik roll his eyes. The bell rang over head and he stood up. "Wait, this is my number, call me tonight and we can work together. I don't want you to have to do it all." Aubrey said handing him a slip of paper with her number on it. She stood up and slung her bag over her shoulder and walked out of the class surrounded by her new friends.

"Aubrey you poor thing, Mr. Barmoria has thrown you into the Devil's pit." Ashley said.

"You could say that again." Aubrey muttered.

The rest of the day was wonderful though she chose to ignore Erik in her other class.

Jane once again drove her home. "I'll see you tomorrow." Jane said waiving to her from an open window before driving off.

Aubrey had walked into the kitchen and grabbed a cucumber and peeled it quickly she cut it up and sprinkling salt on it. Aubrey headed towards her bedroom and decided she needed some mood music.

Placing her plate down on her desk she turned and found her IPod and put in her iHome switching it on. She set it to random and noticed that her IPod seemed to deflect her mood and started playing Requiem of a Dream by Clint Mansell. It had been one of those lucky mistakes that she found this song.

One day searching YouTube for Phantom of the Opera scenes Aubrey came across this particular video. The music seemed to pull her into some kind of trance that didn't want to let go. She immediately downloaded it to her IPod, and placed the video on her favorites list for YouTube.

Aubrey fell once again into the trance that over came her at the sound of this music and smiled slowly eating her snack. Just then her phone rang. She came to her senses and had a jolt of excitement run through her. It would be Erik calling her to work on their project.

She seemed to almost float to her phone and with a shaking hand picked it up.

"Hello."

"Aubrey, please tell me you have read Two Gentleman of Verona!"

Aubrey's hope's deflated at the sound of Ashley's voice. "Oh Ashley it's you." Aubrey said disappointed.

"Why were you expecting your secret love?" Ashley said laughing.

"Not a secret love, no." Aubrey said sighing. "Anyways, no I haven't read that. Is that what Mr. Bamoria assigned to you?"

"Yes, it looks horribly difficult. James hasn't read it either and we can't make heads or tails of this story."

"Ashley I'm sorry, I wish there was something I could do to help, but I unfortunately I have my own problems to deal with." Aubrey said rolling her eyes at herself.

"Yeah, I would rather read my story than work with Erik. Good luck, I'll talk to you tomorrow. Bye."

"Bye Ashley." Aubrey said hanging up the phone.

She had to stop laughing at herself. How predictable was she to expect Erik to call her as soon as he got home from school? No, he probably led a wonderful life where he had tons of things to do instead of sitting around waiting for a call that would never come.

A growing feeling of dread came over her as she sat down to do the rest of her homework.

"Dinner's done." Her mother shouted up the stairs. Aubrey threw down her pencil and started heading out of her room when the phone rang.

Oh a cliffhanger, I'm so evil! I really suggest that you look this video up on youtube, yes it is a real video, .com/watch?v=m2TETmU4tUM, I think you will enjoy it as much as I did. Please review and let me know what you think about it, I want to give a special thanks to my wonderful readers!

Desiree'