It's been nine and three quarter years, if you ask him, since the Lord blessed me with my loving Gustavé. He sent me an angel, an angel of love and music. And that angel gave me my Gustavé. Gustavé is a very lovely and intelligent boy. There is so much of him that reminds me of Erik, small things only I could notice.
"Gustavé come here!" I could hear Raoul yelling from the music room. The music room was made for Gustavé's fifth birthday. He started playing the piano and singing at the age of four. He overflowed with his father's talents. He was so gifted and so talented. I could watch him write music for hours just as I had with Erik. I ran to rescue Gustavé from whatever punishment Raoul was about to sentence upon him. Raoul's happy and loving mood towards my son didn't last. He grew irritated very quickly by the boy's crying. Something about Raoul unsettled Gustavé as a baby. Whenever Raoul entered a room Gustavé would cry. He could only be hushed by the sound of my singing. He was so much like his father.
When I got there Raoul was complaining about all of the sheet music strewn across the floors of the music room. Gustavé sensing my presence ran to find comfort with in my arms.
"Shhhh… It's alright dear." I looked up at Raoul with an angry expression. He had grown to know my love for my son. Where there were lines I knew never to overstep, when it came to my son, I would never let anything cause him harm, whether it was emotional or physical. "He is an artist, darling. He needs room to make a mess and solve problems. He needs a room to let his genius flow."
"If it was up to me this house would have no musical genius in it." I could hear the faint whisper under Raoul's breath. I picked up Gustavé and brought him to the piano bench. I started looking through his delicate pieces of parchment. I was trying to calm and soothe my sweet boy. I soon found a piece of music he had just recently finished. I started to sing his music back to him rocking him back and forth in my arms. Raoul, realizing that this would be a battle he wouldn't win, stomped out of the room, making sure to slam the door shut.
"Why does he hate my music mother?" I could see the tears start to form in his eyes.
"Oh darling, he doesn't hate it. He just doesn't have the ears to appreciate it. How about we clean up this mess to soothe his trouble mind?" Gustavé wiped his eyes and we knelt down to clean up the sheets. Suddenly somewhere back in my mind I could hear the fierce playing of Erik as he wrote another beautiful song. It was something I had never heard before. I knew that it was just my mind playing tricks on me, but at the same time it felt as though he was there at Gustavé's piano soothing away my troubles. I looked over my shoulder to find nothing but my darling boy picking up his music to make his father happy. Oh how I wish I could tell him of his real father. Erik would love that child more than anyone could. He would except him and hold him and sit him on his lap as they played beautiful melodies and harmonies down the black and white keys. Raoul needed his father.
"Mother, do you know where Coney Island is?" Gustave's light tenor voice rang in my ears. I shook my thoughts out of my head and looked at him.
"What?"
"Some boys were telling me of this place called Coney Island. It's in the paper." He got up and went to the parlor bringing back with his the thick newspaper. He showed me the first page. Sure enough there was an extravagant photograph of what looked like to be a large circus tent. I could sense the bright colors and beauty hidden behind the black and white ink. The headline read: "Mr. Y welcomes you to Phantasma." The article was explaining the opening of a new show in Coney Island. "Can we go mom? PLEASE!?"
"Gustavé darling, the article says that Phantasma resides in New York." Phantasma. There was something about reading and saying and even hearing that word that put a weird feeling in my stomach.
"Where's New York?"
"Well." I picked up Gustavé and brought him to Raoul's study. It was his father's old study and was hardly used these days. I sat at the large desk and sat Gustavé on my lap. I placed my finger on the globe directly on Paris. "We're here and New York is allllll the way over here." I turned the globe and drew a direct line across the Atlantic Ocean to New York." This all felt too familiar. It was like a really weird case of Déjà vu. I shook the thought from my mind.
"Oh please Mother!" My poor little boy had so many dreams. His eyes were pleading and it was so hard to say no.
"Maybe one day, Gustavé."
"You spoil that child!" I could hear Raoul yell from the room next door to his father's study. He walked into where we sat. "We are never going to go to America Gustavé. We don't have the money." I could feel Gustavé's dreams crumble in my lap. My poor son.
"How dare you say such things to him! Go to your room Gustave and let me speak to your father." Gustavé slipped off my lap and ran to his room before the tears could slip out of his big brown eyes. How dare Raoul treat him like that! Gustavé wasn't his child! He looked nothing like him! Why was Raoul ever foolish enough to believe he was! Raoul was an average height man with dirty blonde hair. His eyes were blue and cruel. Gustavé had my dark brunette curls with the slight touch of red when the sun hit it right. He had deep chocolate brown eyes like Erik and I. The shape of his eyes was that of his father's. So round with amazement yet usually set in a sad way as his mind contemplated the dark beauty of the world. He was taller than most boys just like his father and his fingers were longer like his fathers. His nose had the straight slope of his father's and the rounded button nose of me. He was our child and any fool could see that. How dare Raoul ever treat our son like that! He had no right.
"You dare question my own authority in my own home!?" He was past furious he growled his words and it was then that I could smell the mistake I had made. He had been drinking and I hadn't noticed. He walked toward me and in the blink of an eye he slapped me hard across the face. I heard it before I felt it. I stumbled back a little and as I clutched my cheek I could see him begin to register what he had just done. Raoul had never hit me before. Yes he sometimes grabbed my arms to hard and hurt me but never with such intent. Yes I was used to his aggression. Especially when he started coming home at night more sober. It wasn't as easy anymore to get out of sleeping with him so after a time I had to start separating my soul from my body.
I stood there stunned unable to comprehend what to do next. He fell to my knees apologizing. I was too stunned I walked past him and left. The opera house was finished now. With the new construction came the destruction of Erik's lair. I had nowhere to go. Raoul forbid my singing and attending of an the shows and so I hadn't been to the Opera Populaire in a while. But did I really want to make him even angrier? I found myself just sitting on the front steps of our house unable to understand him. I tried my hardest to love him but he made it so difficult. I couldn't leave him. My child needed a father… even if it wasn't his real one. I walked back inside to where Raoul was crumbled on the floor.
I knelt down to where he sat and placed my arm around him.
"It's okay darling. I understand that you meant no harm. It never happened." He looked up at me with a tear streaked face.
"Oh, Christine!" He threw his arms around me holding me a little too tightly. "I'm so sorry. I've just had so much stress lately. I need to tell you something." He pulled me into his lap much to my discomfort. "We're broke. I lost the last of our money last week in a game." That made so much sense with the way he had been acting recently.
"Oh darling, it's okay. We can move to a smaller home perhaps. If we can't afford this one. I have some money put away from my days at the opera house. I also have the money my father saved me before he died."
"Gone! It's all gone! I wasted it all on one hand" You did what! I almost yelled at him and pushed him away until the image of my son sitting unhappily on his bed flashed into my mind.
"It's okay we'll finger it out dear." There were only a few words that came to mind. Just love. Just live. Just give what I can give and take what little I deserve.