Gift Five and a Half
"A Gift From Erik"
(Part I)

The marriage certificate went missing the next morning.

Christine wished she could say she was surprised. Of course Erik would get rid of it. Because of course he would. She couldn't be sure if he had gone as far as removing their license from the records department in city hall, but she knew Erik was nothing if not thorough in creating his own delusions. He was the author of his own narrative… his own wicked, vile, and depressing narrative…

And now hers, too. Since the moment she had replied to that disembodied, cajoling voice in her dressing room, her fate had been irreversibly bound to his. Now he was revising his version of reality, attempting to undo the things he had committed in the hopes of creating the perfect fantasy to reside within.

The clocks in the house were now all perfectly set to five thirty, though she must have slept at least ten hours since midnight. Thankfully, she awoke in her bed alone… but upon leaving the room, she found her door unlocked.

"I locked it," Christine murmured, staring at the open latch with horror. "I am certain I locked it last night…"

She ran through the house in a frightful panic, searching for Erik to demand an answer. He was not in any of his usual haunts – not at the piano, nor in his favorite armchair by the fireplace, nor even dead in that ghastly coffin of his. She was about to give up and assume he'd gone out without telling her, as usual, when at last she stopped to catch her breath outside a set of doors she had not yet checked behind and heard a soft voice coming from within.

"Loin sur la mer, je n'peux m'en aller
Comment pourrais je sans ailes m'envoler?
Il me faudrait juste un bon bateau
Pour t'enmener au fil de l'eau…"

She cracked open the door to find Erik in his workshop, tinkering over some project scattered atop his bench. He was dressed in the same suit as the night before, but his coat was folded on a stool beneath his mask and his shirtsleeves were rolled past his elbows revealing his lanky forearms. One bony hand was fist-deep in a nest of wire and cloth, and on the table beside him was a large pile of fluffed cotton.

Facing away from her, with his shoulders drooped and his arms moving about with a slow, graceful ease, he made the picture of absolute tranquility. It was easier to hear him now, with the door open, and his words seemed to come straight from his heart as he sang them quietly to himself.

"L'amour est grand, l'amour est roi
Comme un jardin plein de splendeur…"

Her shoulders sank as some of her tense panic subsided. His voice was serene and doleful – quite the voice of an angel, indeed! – and she felt a placid calmness wash over her as she continued to listen from the doorway.

It was nice to hear him. He never sang for her anymore, except when he was instructing her or when she explicitly requested it of him. She didn't notice originally, when they first started out. She was the pupil, after all, and he was only the tutor. Why would he sing when she was the one who needed to practice?

But then the months passed, and repeatedly he would beckon her to sing while he played upon his piano – or sometimes his massive organ – but he would never sing along with her. Never, unless she asked.

And she rarely asked.

"S'en vient l'hiver, s'en vient le froid
Et l'amour meurt comme la fleur…"

She knew she had to interrupt him, in order to ask that question which burned in her mind… but couldn't she come back later? He had so few moments of peace, why should she bother him now? Especially when he was singing so nicely and sweetly…

And so she nearly stopped herself, hesitant to break through his relaxed trance… but then her own mess of emotions flew through her, spurring her on, because how dare he find peace at a time like this!

"Erik!"

He sat rigid as she approached, moving his body as if to shield his work from her, like a child who knew he was doing something wrong. Seeing that he could not stop her from seeing, he quickly said to her, in a overtly defensive tone, "This is just a thing to hang clothes on!"

For then she caught sight of a skull on the other side of the bench, half-covered with papier-mâché in a perfect imitation of her face, as well as a set of two perfectly manicured hands…

There were questions she could ask, but she knew well enough to leave them unsaid. Erik was Erik, and she knew there were matters of his that were better left unknown to her. So she ignored the skull and the body of wire, even as she trembled from the sight of them and all they could possibly mean, and addressed her main fearful concern directly: "Did you enter my bedroom last night, Erik?"

He blinked back at her, the picture of innocence. "No…"

She pressed her nails into her palms and prayed for the courage to persist… it would be so easy to turn around and pretend she had seen nothing at all. After all, did she even want to know the truth? It wouldn't change anything, if what she suspected was right… but then again, it wouldn't it be better to make him admit it than to doubt herself forever? "My door was unlocked this morning."

"You must have forgotten to lock it, then," Erik said after a moment's hesitation, before turning smoothly back to his work. "You know I have no reason to enter that room, especially not while you are sleeping."

"I feel like I slept for a very long time…" Christine mused suspiciously. "Much longer than I usually do…"

"Ah! That would be because of the tonic."

"Tonic?"

"In your milk last night," Erik explained logically, stuffing his hand back between the spheres of fabric attached to the wire cage, "I added a few drops of laudanum. You were very upset following our lesson and I wished you only to get the rest you sorely needed."

Christine's jaw fell agape. "You drugged me - again?"

"Now, Christine, let's not get hysterical over this. It isn't becoming." Erik removed his hand from the cage and gritted his teeth as a loose wire scratched his wrist as he did so. "As I said, I wanted you to sleep. I apologize for the deception but you must agree that it was a necessary precaution. I doubt you would have taken the drink if I had told you what was in it. But I am telling you now, so truly, Christine, if you think about it, it wasn't really a lie at all."

Christine felt her fisted hands raise instinctively up against her chest, pressing against her blouse to grasp at the silver crucifix hanging about her neck. Her breathing sped up, panic mounting within. He was right, she would not have drunk something if she knew it was laced with a sedative. Especially not down here, where she had only her wits to wield against Erik. "You cannot just drug me when you feel like it -!"

"You have never complained before."

Again she found herself staring dumbly at him. Now she whispered, not wanting to believe it, "How many times, Erik?"

He did not turn to face her, but she could see the bone in his throat rattle as he swallowed nervously. "Not often. But, Christine, you must understand, Erik just wanted you to sleep. He knows he is a difficult man to live with, and he fears he causes your mind a great amount of stress. He just wanted to grant you the ease of sleep without the agony of tossing and turning. That is all, Christine. That is truly all."

Oh, if only she could believe him… "Did you come in my bedroom, then?"

"You know I did," Erik said, and sank two fingers back into the cage, working the cotton stuffing deep into its apathetic core. "I have been in there too many times to count. I built this house and furnished that room, after all."

Christine's bloodless lips twitched into a deeper frown. "You're evading my question..."

"Am I?"

"Yes," she said uneasily. "I am asking you if you came into my bedroom while I was asleep last night."

Erik flinched as his finger was pinched by another feral wire. "I'm afraid I would not have been a welcome visitor… that's correct, is it not…? So Erik would not have had a reason to come into Christine's room… is that not enough of an answer?"

"You've never had a reason to visit me before," Christine pointed out. "And yet you always have, regardless."

"I respect your privacy."

"You do not."

"I do," Erik insisted. He pulled out his hand from the wire cage and turned back around to look her square in the eyes. "I respect that you deserve it. And I am sorry that I have not always allowed you to have it. But I am trying, Christine. Desperately and genuinely trying. So I have already given you your apology, which we both agreed will make you feel better, but since I see you are still upset, I will now in addition tell you this outright: I did not enter your bedroom last night."

His two hands came together carefully, touching upon one another with the light force of his fingertips. A trickle of blood ran down from the tip of his longest finger, where the wire had cut him, but he paid it no mind as he stared up at her with his despairing, pleading gaze. He certainly looked sincere… and how terribly she wanted to believe him, too, and put this whole terrible thing behind them…

But then a loud cuckoo! sounded around them, six times in a row, and Christine found her eyes flying to the wall behind his workbench. There hung, from a precarious nail, a Bavarian cuckoo clock from the Black Forest.

A clock which now read six hours from midnight.

"Ah!" Christine cried abruptly, eyes trained on the mocking little cuckoo bird that was squawking its song at them. "But there are still five and a half hours left unaccounted for!"

"I beg your pardon?"

"You say you did not enter my bedroom last night, but what of this morning?" Christine pointed her quaking finger at the clock as the bird retreated back into the dark confines of its wooden prison. "I warned you that I would not be fooled by your lies and deceptions any longer. I know how you are, Erik – I know the way you twist words into half-truths, just so you can say you didn't lie. I have caught you now, in the trap of your own words. Not last night my foot! You've been not only in my room this morning, but in my bed as well! Shall you attempt to deny it, you wretched man?"

"I – I -" Erik gaped. "I would never -"

"You would," Christine said, "and we both know it! My door, Erik – my door was locked last night. I know it was! Do not make me doubt myself!"

"You were very tired after the draught…" Erik attempted. "You must have forgotten to lock it…"

"I would never forget! You miserable man – you keep doing this! I lock that door every night. I would not have forgotten last night. I am telling you I would not have!"

He huffed defensively. "And I am telling you that you must be mistaken."

"I am mistaken? I am mistaken!" Christine laughed madly. "For once, I am the one who is mistaken! No, Erik – I am not! Where is the marriage certificate? Have you burned it? You must have! It certainly isn't where I left it on my desk! Is that what you were doing in my room? Going through my things? I have caught you before, Erik – you cannot play dumb forever! You are not innocent of anything! I have seen you, Erik, a hundred times before, in my room… sleeping beside me… with your hand between my legs… oh, God… oh, Erik…"

She descended into sobs, fighting against herself to stay standing as she leaned and clutched at the edge of the workbench. She could feel Erik's piercing gaze upon her, and she knew as the seconds of silence ticked by it only meant he was trying to come up with another lie to say to her. Lies! All lies he was telling her! Had he ever spoken a word of truth? Even in the beginning, when things were simpler and he was just the Angel of Music to her, even then he was lying! And how stupid she was to believe him!

She raised her hands to her face, pressing her palms against her wet, burning cheeks in an attempt to hide her shame. Stupid girl! Stupid girl! Stupid girl!

After a while, from somewhere behind her palms, she heard him at last let out a deep sigh.

"What, am I supposed to comfort you now?"

Her shock made her hands drop, just momentarily, to stare at him incredulously. "Comfort me? You think I want you to comfort me right now? You, who are the source of all my pain and who has hurt me beyond measure? Dear God, Erik, you must be truly deranged if you – don't touch me!"

For he had begun to reach his hand out to her while she was talking, and presently she recoiled from him in horror, springing backwards and sliding against the side of his work bench without a care for what tools she displaced along the way. She just needed to get away.

"I am not crazy," Christine sobbed. "I know I locked my door. I would never leave it open. The marriage certificate was sitting right in the middle of my desk when I went to sleep last night - and now it's gone! And my clock is reset, too! I did not rewind it, I do not know how to rewind it. So it was you, Erik, it was all you! And then, while you were at it, while you were in my room, where you knew you shouldn't be, you laid down in my bed, in your rightful place, because I couldn't stop you, because you gave me the milk, the milk with the drug, and then - and then you put your hand upon my thigh and you -"

"Christine," Erik said coldly. "I grow rather resentful of your malicious accusations."

She sobbed harder. "Yet you do not deny them!"

"What good would it do?" Erik sneered. "You do not believe a word I say! I will always be some duplicitous fiend to you, won't I, Christine?"

A screech sounded as the metal stool scraped against the floor. She pulled her hands from her face away just in time to see Erik standing at full height before her.

"Go now, Christine. Go away. Cry into your pillows if you must, but do not dare make me hear you. I detest the sound of your pathetic sniveling. I do not care to burden my ears with your bawling any longer. But, please, do me a favor, Christine, and this time make certain you have locked your door… so that next time there can be no question!"

Face in her hands, she ran crying from his workshop. She did not look back - did not even have the presence of mind to worry if he would follow her or not - but ran directly to her bedroom without delay and once there slammed the latch on her door shut as she shuddered out her sobs.

For a long while she obliged him, burying her tears in the bedspread's satin lining… until a dangerous, brewing anger from deep within her core suddenly and without warning possessed her. She dragged herself from her bed to her desk, and with a furious hand she began to pen a new, heartless entry within her journal.