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Considerations
Erik was never more in his element than he was in music. Playing, singing, writing, all of it was exquisite, but teaching seemed to be one of his most natural gifts. How he managed to instruct her and now others so well when all things social were something of a struggle for him, Christine did not know, nor did she care.
Two hours they practiced in that room, largely in working with Alison and Murphy, and they all improved from everything Erik gave them. She even became something of an aid to him in his instructions towards Alison. Having gone through the turbulent trials of learning from him, Christine had better insight of passing that information on to a fellow feminine voice by just demonstrating what she learned.
After their impromptu and private session of music, Christine and Erik made a hasty retreat to his home, lest they be interrupted again.
What amused her most was how the Phantom was insistent on keeping the basket with the cardamon bun hooked on his arm throughout the journey, even their lake crossing. Once inside, Erik took her cloak from her shoulders and hung it with his jacket and the full mask before he began lighting lamps and candles throughout his home for her comfort.
Seeing Erik without the jacket that added a little bulk to his form, Christine realized how small he was in comparison to other men of his considerable height, which towered over her. His slim and nimble form made her feel buxom by contrast and sparked a strange stirring within her core.
"Is there something I can get for you, Christine?" Erik asked, as he lit the candelabra in the corner. "You must be famished by now."
Christine debated her response, as everything that came to mind was a bit cheeky. "Your company."
Erik spun on his heel to her with his visible brow rising, and for a fleeting moment, he almost appeared normal with the way the leather mask hid the deformity in soft lighting. "Unless I am somehow mistaken, my dear, you have it."
She pursed her lips, feeling a blush warming her cheeks in a telling betrayal of her inner stirrings that was an entirely new discovery.
"Ah…I see," Erik spoke with alluring softness, as he drifted to stand before her in a glide of silent steps. "The dressing room, before such an ill-timed interruption."
Surely, she was glowing scarlet now, but she bowed her head in admission.
"That was lust," he murmured and brushed cool fingers along her cheek in a soothing caress, his eyes as soft as his touch. "As much as we may have satiated a craving, you are worth more to me than a few minutes of desire, Christine. I have no interest in a mere tryst."
Christine melted to his touch and grasped his arms as an anchor to her spiraling mix of new wants and desires. He supported her with his free hand, supporting her forearm with his own as he clasped her elbow. "This…is new, and it…frightens me. But I want…more. I want you—I need you." Tears pricked at her eyes in her desperation to understand all that was happening between her heart, mind, and body. Everything was so conflicted and yet enough, sang the same tune, that went beyond her ability to decipher.
Her body ached for him, crying for him to take her to new physical feeling that teased something wonderful just beyond her reach. Her heart yearned for Erik, wanting everything growing between them to be real and not the imaginings of a lonely girl. Her mind struggled to comprehend all that her body and heart spoke in a whirlwind of excitement. It begged her to slow and quiet the other two parts of her, in its desire to understand and make some sense of everything. To not make some mistake.
"You must think me terribly indecent…"
"Oh…Christine, no, never. If you are indecent then I am salacious," Erik soothed and pressed a bold, yet gentle kiss to her forehead that lingered.
Her eyes briefly fluttered closed at the sweetness of his kiss. "If you are so salacious, why are you being so restrained?"
Erik continued to caress her cheek. "I will not be as every other man, who would claim you without a second thought. They would give in to that ache and please themselves…and little more…"
Silence fell between them as Christine mulled over his words and what little she knew, which was the barest minimum. That minimum told her nothing of value to make sense of what he just said. What she knew however, was the girls of the ballet that seemed to always be on the arm of some patron in an effort to at least become a maintained Mistress. Transactional and…rarely pleased. "I know so little…and I… it's improper to ask."
A sigh escaped him. "Propriety."
"It is not for a lady to know… until she is married," Christine explained, displeased by the concept to which the world demanded a decent woman to abide.
"Asinine," Erik growled, as he led her to the sofa where they sat, though he was not quite beside her. "Since you will not ask me directly… I will explain. A man does not require as much coaxing to achieve his needs. It is my understanding that a woman is better served when adequate attention is given."
This made a bit of sense with her lacking knowledge. "How is it… that you know this? Have you…?" Christine swallowed, not sure if she wanted to know.
Erik was silent a moment, the fingers of his left-hand rippling against his pant leg before he shifted to face her more fully. "You are the only woman that I have kissed, or has kissed me, much less considered…" he motioned to the space between them to complete his point. "What knowledge I possess is largely the result of my own study."
"Study." It was not a question, rather a reach for clarification.
"Most everything I know is self-taught. On this subject, there are books in the east that have been quite informative."
"There are books?"
"Yes, often with illustrations to accurately demonstrate various positions."
Curiosity piqued, Christine smoothed her skirt and slyly glanced at Erik to find him watching with rapt attention, brow raised.
"You want to see them," he stated rather than questioned.
Christine's cheeks burned. "I want to understand more."
"How would you rather understand more? Through partial stories from underappreciated girls of the ballet, a discussion with Madame Giry, from my books…or…"
"Now you are giving me mixed suggestions, if 'or' means what I think it means."
"I apologize, that is not my intent. The notion that someone like you might have some bit of desire for me in that way is…foreign."
"You inferred your wish for a wife, so the thought cannot be such a strange one."
Erik bowed his head a little and avoided eye contact. "Often, it seems that a marriage for love was rare. My understanding is that it can be more a contractional arrangement or a necessity, rather than love, with a bride's family offering a dowry to sway some suitor to claim her. I have long resigned myself to the notion that any marriage I might be blessed with, would be one of companionship, and if fortune smiles, some small bit of affection exchanged. Whether that marriage ever gets consummated, would be at the discretion of that bride."
Christine took her time in digesting his words, which accepted the reality the world had dealt him. "Me…" she said softly.
"You."
Christine found herself tracing a decorative seam on her skirt idly, processing everything and her damnable lacking knowledge, although she knew well of the other types of marriages that Erik spoke of, from a myriad of books and even more recent history, such as Raoul's parents. "In marriage, if you wanted copulation, it would be your right."
"No, not for me," he shook his head. "I will not be that man. Her discretion– your decision— is infinitely more important than any urges I may harbor. If you do not wish for it, or are at all unwilling to participate, I ask that you speak plainly in your denial."
There was something more that lingered just beneath the surface of their rather free conversation. Present enough to be known it existed, but deep enough below murky waters to remain unidentified. Christine did not view it, whatever 'it' was, as some misleading secret, but felt that there was something locked away in that bookcase of unwanted memories. In reflection of their interactions and even fleeting moments of more, she began realizing a specific pattern of conduct.
The manner in which Erik behaved around her was suggestive in many instances, but irrevocably restrained. "You scarcely touch me beyond necessary instances, floating your hand over me rather than make contact."
Erik gave a marginal incline of his head, watching her from the corner of his eye.
"I…initiated the dressing room."
Another slight nod.
Christine bristled as her mind churned over everything that was becoming a rapid torrent of information and even understanding, but she needed clarification. Dare she go the route of what she pieced together, or asked bold questions? Either way, Erik seemed to appreciate directness more than honied expression. "Apart from moments ago, you have not initiated anything, or even touched me, because you want my blessing."
Erik rose a graceful hand with a raised index finger to pause her. "I have initiated touch, which is left for you to take or leave as you please."
"But…it is still a matter of my blessing?"
"Yes."
"You are very strange man, Monsieur," she sighed, with a light smile
A flash of a smile came out before it vanished just as quickly. "That I am, Mademoiselle."
"Why is my blessing so important to you?"
"Must I say it again?"
"Beyond noted fondness," she pressed.
"Very well. Those who know what lies beneath my mask do not want my touch in any manner. Additionally, were I to touch you as I wished, whenever I wished, I am more likely to frighten you away by being too forward; even if it is not suggestive in nature."
"I have not known many men to have such considerations, especially when they are in the Dancer's Foyer," she recalled, with an involuntary shiver, of what few encounters she had in that room before and after a performance. Madame Giry thwarted much of that attention away from her and Meg. While Christine wanted some bit of masculine attention weeks ago, that was the one place she did not want any of those leering eyes and bold hands upon her. She did not want to be someone's Mistress, and so easily discarded.
"Most men have not had my life experiences."
That box of an untold story rose closer to the water's surface before sinking down into the murkiness. Unsure how to broach the subject, or if she even wanted to know what that unspoken secret was, Christine felt a certain kinship in what little he divulged. It was more than just deformity and cruel perceptions thrown upon him as a monster. Those were simpler concepts that made how Erik functioned easier to grasp, when there so many more complexities that she was just beginning to decipher.
She shifted closer to him, causing Erik to regard her again, even after his gaze dropped to her hand when she slid it into his, as it rested upon his leg. "I want your touch, Erik. If that requires my blessing, then you shall have it until I say otherwise. Though I must admit, I like your hands floating over me too."
Erik shifted and looked into her soul with those orbs that read her spirit like no other. His hand was slow as it came to rest upon her abdomen, but his soft voice held his resolve. "I will not claim you in a manner that risks this; notuntil you wish to have me at your side up to the moment death claims me. I do not want to be the cause of undue burden to you."
Christine rested her hand over his, grateful for his awareness of something she shamefully failed to consider, although it would affect her the most. "Then hold me close," she whispered.
Erik obliged her in adjusting his position, to both accommodate and to ensure their mutual comfort while she tugged off her ladies' boots. Then, she curled against him with her stockinged feet tucked comfortably tight beneath her, while resting her head upon his chest. When his arms enveloped her, a strange tingle flourished within her core. A delightful shiver ran through her when his free hand came around her front to rest on the curve of her hip, and she a clutched the statin lapel of that cobalt-colored vest.
In his arms, Christine found the comfort and security she longed for. There was no safer place than in Erik's arms; she felt it in the faint warmth and unspoken words that began flowing between them. This discovery of contentment brought a burst of emotion that tickled at her lower eyelids, and the love she felt from him made those welling tears leak down her cheeks.
The moment brought back the murmur of a fading dream and its vibrant feeling that teased the back of her mind.
In Erik's embrace, Christine felt adored.
Erik's chin brushed against her hair, and his chest swelled when he took in her scent. "Christine?" he intoned her name like it was music itself. "Are you alright?"
"Yes…very much."
"Your tears suggest otherwise."
"They are not negative tears, Erik; they are good ones," Christine replied and released his vest to slide her hand over his chest to rest on his sternum, where she felt him shiver beneath her palm. "Much like yours when I gave you the bun this morning — which you still have not eaten."
"Forgive me, Mademoiselle. We have been victims of distraction and interruption," Erik pressed a sweet kiss to her temple, making Christine's eyes close with a contented sigh. "I have every intention in consuming it still, but not at the cost of your embrace."
Christine flexed her fingers a little before she felt her way to the knot of his cravat which, to her fortune, had no pin that day, and tugged the silk loose.
Erik's hand moved from her waist to catch hers and stilled her intent in a firm yet gentle grasp. "Christine…" he murmured.
"Teach me…" she said. "Teach me what you will, if risk can be avoided. I want to understand what I felt earlier, when you were upon me. I want to understand what I am feeling now for you. I need you. Please don't keep me in the dark…"
Erik released her hand before he cradled her cheek. "If you wish for me to fulfill your needs, then I shall make your body sing. Though you should know that I am jealous man, Christine. I will not take kindly to any other man attempting to court you."
"I wish for no other suitor but you. I feel as though you're the only one I can relax around in the ways that I wish, and still have good company. Shall I declare that I am in courtship with you, or merely state that I am spoken for?"
Breath left Erik in a ragged rush, but he recovered by sharp inhalation as he answered, "For now, say only that you are spoken for. They have no right to further detail."
Christine nodded and tugged his cravat free before their lips met in sensuous harmony, gentle love flowing between two souls who lacked experience, but possessed the desire to learn.
Erik pulled her close as her arms hooked around his neck, taking in her taste for several moments more, before his hands fell to her shoulders and held her back as he broke their kiss with burning lungs. "Allow me to romance you properly."
