There- almost done. All he had left was her hair, which was easy. Christine's hair was wavy, chocolate brown and beautiful. Erik smiled at the opportunity to paint it, again. Content with his newest piece of art, he observed the complete picture of Christine Daae. Just a picture of her could make him feel good. However, his expression turned sour. Erik was getting sick of painting, even if the pictures were of Christine.

He forgot which philosopher said it, probably many of them, but someone did say that in life, you are either suffering or you live in boredom. Erik had to agree, because after a life time of suffering, he had finally reached the point of boredom.

Erik had made his home in the old church of Alfred, New Hampshire. He couldn't have picked a more uneventful town, but it was perhaps best for him to live without excitement in his life for a while. In his church, he had mastered everything he could have thought of; painting, pottery, five languages (German, Italian, French, Russian and Mandarin Chinese), ventriloquy, illusions and architecture.

The only things that entertained him anymore was music; composing it, playing it, hearing it, teaching it. Teaching music was his favorite thing to do. The thought of it made made him smile, a small smile, but it was definitely one of his rare smiles.

He looked at the small clock in his dark room. Seven thirty, AM. Erik hadn't even realized that he had spent the night on his latest drawing.

Oh well, at least he had time to see church. Before he had met Christine, he had hated church services. The minister that spoke was undeniably boring and the organ of the church echoed loudly down into his own home. However, Christine sang in the choir and was faithfully there to appear at both the eight o'clock service and the eleven o'clock.

In fact, he could hear the choir rehearsing then and thought the male voices were sounding particularly dull that morning. Erik had to admit they still sounded pretty good. He decided to climb up to the top of his intricate home, two floors up with a full view of the church. Erik watched as the choir dispersed from their loft in the balcony. Only Ginger, the woman in charge of the music program, remained.

A man walked up to her, Erik recognized him as the minister of the church, Jeffery Martin. He never thought much of Minister Martin, besides the fact he wasn't a good public speaker.

The man through up his hands, clearly frustrated. Erik continued watching the two. "Ginger, what will we do?"

"Nothing, there's nothing to worry about." The choirmaster was obviously annoyed with the man, and Erik had to wonder what they were even talking about. With a nervous pang in his chest, he had to worry they had discovered him.

No, there was absolutely no way they could have any idea about him. It wasn't possible.

Erik, putting his angst away, decided to enjoy his morning and was sure to pay attention to the choir's singing. After her first performance, he watched as Christine journeyed back into the church, near the organ. She had nothing to do now for an hour until the next service, and Erik's heart pounded a bit at the thought of Christine coming to visit him.

"Angel," she called softly. He waited. "Angel?" she called again, but this time he answered.

"I'm here," he said, still not revealing himself, "Come through the door."

The door, of course, was one of his many trapdoors he had installed in the centuries old church. Obediently, Christine checked to make sure no one was around and snuck through the door.

Erik had taken the liberty to steal some of the church's candles, as to make his home a little less dark whenever his student came down. However, instead of wanting to sing, Christine went into great detail of her Friday night.

"Who went with you?" Erik drilled her, becoming extremely curious.

"Meg and Cosette, she's new to school," Christine explained, "But we met up with Raoul and two of his friends there." His heart twisted at her words, terribly scared that she and her two friends were dating the three boys she had mentioned.

Erik did not like Raoul Chagny. Christine spoke of him often, they were best friends. He had observed Raoul from a distance a few times, and he just gave off bad feelings. He seemed cocky and ignorant. However, he didn't dare let his expression change at the name Raoul.

"And Meg just got so wasted. Oh my God, it was awful. She's so skinny anyway and alcohol just doesn't cooperate with her, I guess," Christine continued, her face in her hands, shuddering at the thought. "Her mother's furious, of course, Mrs. Giry's so strict. She's not letting Meg leave the house for a month."

"Did you drink?" he questioned her, letting his facade escape him to show his very concerned side.

"No, I would never," she said, shaking her head quickly, "I know what that does to your singing voice. I don't think I'll ever drink."

"It's not that, Christine. You could get sick and it's just bad to get drunk. Promise me you'll never drink too much and not until you're old enough," he told her, his voice coming off a lot more stern and harsh than he had attended. Erik inwardly sighed. Instead of showing Christine how much he cared about her, he just sounded like he was yelling at her.

"I promise," she said seriously, and Erik couldn't tell if she was touched or terrified by his proclamation.

Racking his brain for something she may have said earlier, Erik began to inquire about how school was going and they managed to keep a conversation for the rest of her hour break. He couldn't help but worry about her, what if something happened to Christine at one of those high school parties?

Reluctantly, Erik showed her back to the main floor of the church, where she returned to sing for the next service. Once she was gone, he sighed longingly and returned to watch the next service, mostly to see the choir.

The next morning, he had actually gotten a few good hours worth of sleep, which surprised him. By the afternoon, he hadn't done much by his standards, only composed a bit and read one of his books. It was listening in on that Minister Martin which made his day interesting, and it was not a good type of interesting.

Erik had caught him talking alone in a room with Ginger, the music director, in an urgent and hushed voice.

"Jeffery, you don't have to worry," the older woman said. Erik almost noticed a hint of annoyance in her voice.

"I know you think I'm crazy... but I think there is a ghost." His heart nearly stopped. Erik wanted to throw up. How could anyone have found out? His thoughts were racing and forced himself to listen further.

"Well, if there is a ghost, how could it bother us?"

"It's not that kind of ghost. It's some kind of... I don't know, yet. But there's some kind of unwelcome... something! There's some kind of unwelcome thing in this church, I know it! I hear it!"

Ginger still did not look convinced, for which Erik was grateful. If he was lucky enough, people would pass off the minister as a lunatic. No one even knew of his existence in that town except Christine.

They discussed it more, but there talking was mostly composed of the minister assuring her that Erik was real and her denying it.

Just to agitate the man even more, Erik decided to write him a letter.

Dear Mr. Martin,

It has come to my attention that you are telling others of my residency in your church. Respectfully, I ask that you stop this because I'm at the moment very satisfied living here. I think if you obey this note and any that come from me in the future, we may be able to get along.

Sincerely,

Your Ghost