Chapter 20 - A Lesson

Since Erik and Nadir had begun their partnership, Erik had become quite a bit closer to what one might consider "normal". He consumed more than just wine, interacted with people in ways other than sending threatening notes, and slept fairly reasonable hours. Still, sleep was hardly a necessity, and he knew there would be no chance of it after Christine had gone. Attempting to rest would be a waste of his time. So instead, Erik brooded and paced and berated himself again and again until he could no longer stand the sight of the same four walls, and then he climbed to the top of the Opera to continue his brooding and pacing and berating, for there truly was no better place in all of Paris for such a thing.

Of course Christine should have whatever she wanted, but what it seemed she wanted — what she'd asked for with eyes and voice, with the reach of her hand and the near brush of fingertips — was the one thing he would not give her: the entwining of their souls through song, an act which held far more intimacy and meaning than the mere entwining of bodies. And far more risk, for them both.

He simply could not allow it. They could still make improvements to her voice without letting the music infiltrate too deeply. There was no need to let it touch their souls, no reason to let passion flame. No, she would not reach the heights she had before, when spirit and voice combined and their music lifted her to the heavens, but that sort of divinity was hardly necessary for what she planned to pursue.

Reason told him he needed to end the lessons at once. This was dangerous territory. Being in the presence of her physical form was temptation enough; were she to open her soul to him again… No, he couldn't even think of it.

Reason be damned, though, he did not want to say goodbye just yet. He had already made a deal with himself to cut the six months he was given down to one; each of these hours was a priceless jewel he hoarded jealously.

It was an impossible situation.

Eventually, the sun rose, bringing life to the city beneath him. Erik retreated into the concealing shadows cast by the bronze angel, having finally reached a solution to his dilemma: he would simply ignore it. He would pretend that he hadn't seen, didn't understand that brief moment of connection. He would act as if the last minutes of that lesson had not happened at all. This way, he could still continue to see her, and perhaps she'd be hurt or disappointed, but he'd rather see hurt or disappointment on her face than not see her face at all.

...

And so, a few days later, when Erik again met Christine at the gate, the scene played out much the same as before. They did not speak on the journey down. She took her hand back quickly after he helped her off the boat, no lingering touches, which was for the best. And then, when they stepped into his parlor, she handed him her cloak and walked into the music room without a word, and Erik told himself it was relief that he felt trickle through him, cool and hollow.

Very quickly, it became apparent that ignoring what had passed between them would be easier than he'd thought. As he readied his instrument and gave instructions as to how the hour would go, Christine said nothing. She was, however, a bit unfocused, repeatedly straightening the sheet music and fiddling with the trim of her dress. Such a lack of focus wouldn't usually be acceptable, but Erik certainly had no intention of addressing it now, and so they moved through a set of standard warm-ups — stiffly, but efficiently. It was uncomfortable, this stilted taciturnity, but that would probably lessen with time. Besides, it was not even close to the most uncomfortable situation they'd endured by quite a margin.

Erik had chosen a piece for her to work on, a difficult aria which would keep their attention focused exactly where it should be: on anything other than what had passed between them. He pulled the bow across the strings, dutifully plodding out a four bar introduction before releasing a high, clear note for Christine to match with her voice — but only the sound of the violin echoed off the stone walls.

Erik looked up sharply. "You missed your cue."

Winding the ends of her sash around her fingers, head ducked, Christine stood in silent anticipation beside her music stand. "Actually, Erik…" She dropped the ribbon and lifted her chin. "I think we should talk." She let out a heavy exhale, then added quickly, "I mean...don't you?"

Erik tucked the violin under his arm; he could feel the wood groan under the pressure. "About what?" he asked stiffly. Of course, given the circumstances, there was very little Erik would want to talk about, but he felt he had no choice but to ask. And perhaps he was needlessly worried, and she only wanted to talk about plans for her career or about the song choice or something else that did not involve the issue that he was so determinedly trying to ignore.

"Well… About all this…" Christine said, with a vague gesture around the room. "And about…" Her hands were back twisting her sash. "About before."

Ah.

Ah...

In that case, no, Erik certainly did not want to talk at all.

In fact, being forced to confront the past, to give form to those feelings of shame and regret, was quite high on Erik's list of things that he'd rather never have to speak of again. Even the mention of it caused sweat to prickle at the back of his neck.

And why should they dredge it all up? As if the present wasn't bad enough! The past was in the past — and even the present, well, that too would be in the past in a few short weeks. There really wasn't any point to it. Nothing could be changed, and it could only end in tears, which were horrible for her voice. And, oh god, once they started talking, she would remember every terrible thing he'd ever done to her and she wouldn't want to come back for the remainder of these lessons, and that was intolerable. Blood was pounding in his ears, quickening to a dizzyingly rapid beat. No, no he couldn't allow it. She didn't know what she was asking.

So Erik kept his voice firm as he answered — "Do you want to talk or do you want to sing?"

The sash slipped from between Christine's fingers. She stared silently at him, clearly taken aback, long enough that Erik began to feel the stirrings of regret. But then, her hands curled into fists against her skirt and she smiled a tight smile, a flinty look in her eyes despite their watery shine.

"Am I actually meant to answer that," Christine asked, her voice dripping with deceptive sweetness, "or will you be telling me what it is that I want, as usual?"

Despite himself, Erik's mouth dropped open. The last thing he'd expected was a scathing reproach — and it was also the last thing he wanted.

"I—" He fumbled for words, but none would come. "Excuse me?" he finished lamely.

"Erik…" Christine sighed, and there was a weariness in her voice which twisted his stomach into a knot. "I can't do this anymore. Do you not want me to be here?"

Under less strained circumstances, Erik might have laughed. What kind of question was that?

There was nothing he wanted more than to simply be in her presence. He had only wanted to do the right thing and keep himself at a safe distance; surely she had understood that? He swallowed, trying to moisten his dry mouth enough to answer. "Is that really what you think?"

She shook her head, her gaze falling to the floor. "I don't know what to think. There was a moment, right when we were first alone together, when I thought…" She trailed off as tears began to rise; he watched as she swallowed them down. "But you turned so cold and harsh, as if you were...angry with me. As if you didn't want me to be there."

"What?" The accusation made Erik flinch. A memory flashed behind his eyes: Christine, standing close, almost close enough to touch — her hunched shoulders, her trembling hand, her tear-filled eyes. Indignation pulled his spine straight. "You were the one who didn't want to be there."

Christine's expression hardened. "And how did you come to that conclusion?"

"You— you were going to cry." The words hurt more to say out loud than Erik had expected, and he could feel the burn of tears behind his own eyes.

"Of course I was going to cry!" Christine said in a tone of complete exasperation. "I was overwhelmed! Do you think people only cry when they are unhappy?"

He could only blink dumbly in response.

"I thought I would never see you again, Erik," she said, her voice softer now, but wavering. She drew her arms around herself. "Do you know that I wasn't even certain if you were alive? But there you were, after all this time. I had so many different feelings all at once — it was all so much. And then you questioned why I was there!" She narrowed her reddened eyes. "How could you ask me that?"

Heat spread across Erik's face, burning the tender flesh trapped beneath his mask. He clutched the violin to his chest and held his head high. "You would never have chosen to be there on your own. You were only there because you were forced into it — if not by him, then by your circumstances."

Christine laughed, but it was a spiritless, tired sound. "Erik, has it never occurred to you that sometimes you are wrong?"

Erik pressed his lips into a firm line. He did not trust himself to speak.

"Do you actually believe I would have come if I didn't want to? No one forces me to do anything I don't want to do, not anymore." She pressed a hand to her chest, just above her heart. "I wanted to be there. I chose."

"But why? It's not as though you'd intended to actually follow through with—" Erik shifted his grip on the violin bow — "with that plan of his when you agreed," he said, hoping very much that it didn't sound like a question, despite the fact that it most certainly was one.

"No, not exactly, that's true." Christine ran her hands down her skirts, smoothing out the rumpled lace and twisted sash. She crossed her arms over her chest. "But clearly you didn't either, did you?" She raised an eyebrow, and if ever there was a moment when Erik longed for a conveniently-placed trap door to allow him to simply disappear without a trace, this was it.

"So why did you agree?" Christine asked, squinting at him in a way which made it abundantly clear that answering was not optional.

"Because…" Erik swallowed hard. The truth was shameful, even more shameful to discuss than his reasons for not joining her on the bed during their first arranged meeting: it had been sheer selfishness, putting his need to see her over every other consideration, including what was best for her. He shut his eyes so that he would not have to see her expression when he answered — "Because I wanted to see you again."

There was the sound of footsteps, and with a pang of resignation, Erik waited for the inevitable thud of the door as Christine left, pulling it shut decisively behind her. But it never came. Instead, he flinched as a feather-light touch fell on his arm. His eyes snapped open. Christine was standing close, very close, her hand on his arm, her brows drawn together entreatingly. "Then can you not believe that it was the same for me?"

With the gentleness of her touch and her open, innocent eyes, and the close, so close warmth of her soft, soap-scented skin, Erik very much wanted to believe.

But no. No, he could not, actually. He couldn't think, couldn't speak, couldn't even breathe — couldn't do a damn thing. Except pull away.

He turned from Christine, swallowing down the rising lump in his throat, strode swiftly to the violin case and began putting the instrument away. With distance, thought began to return. Yes, the vicomte had said that she had wanted to see him. Erik had known that, but he never truly believed it. Of all the forbidden hopes, the hope that after all that had happened, she still thought of him, and kindly enough that she would actually want to see him...that was the most unbelievable of all.

But she spoke so earnestly, it seemed impossible to doubt it was anything but the truth.

Oh god, he had gotten it wrong, hadn't he? He had only seen what he'd expected to see, and, as always, he had expected to see the worst — and, as always, he had responded with the worst.

"Everything happened so fast at the end," Christine continued from behind him. "There was so much I didn't get to say — so much I still needed to understand." She paused, just briefly. "I cried for weeks."

Erik cringed inwardly. Yes, tears of hate — those were words he'd never forget.

Yet when he looked over his shoulder to search her face, the only thing he saw there was sadness. Shaking her head, Christine turned and walked the few steps to where the piano stood, untouched these many years. She kept her back to him as her fingertips skimmed along the ivory keys. "I couldn't imagine how I was supposed to carry on as if everything was fine, as if none of this had ever happened, but...it seemed like that was what was expected. So I had to." She pulled her hand from the keys, curling it into a fist, and turned toward him again. "But did you think I would just move on and forget all about you? That all that happened meant so little?"

With each word, Erik's heart felt as though it was being pierced with a dagger, over and over. The implications behind what she'd said were agonizing. He felt dizzy with the pain and helplessness of it all, and unless he hardened his heart enough to withstand further attack, he felt he might bleed out within moments.

Despite a tremor he hoped was too slight to be noticeable, he pulled his shoulders straight. "Well, perhaps that is exactly what I thought," he said crisply, brushing a bit of rosin dust off of his sleeve. "You certainly wasted no time getting married."

For a moment, with cheeks flushing red and lips pressed shut as if they were holding back an explosion of curses, Christine looked as though she might slap him. Good, Erik thought, he deserved it, and much worse. And at least it would be a distraction from the miserable state he was in. But, as was always the case, he was not so lucky. He'd braced for physical impact, leaving himself unguarded and unprepared for something much worse: her tears.

All at once, they filled her eyes, slid down her cheeks. "I lost everything," she said, and the way her voice broke over the last word made Erik feel as though he too might break. "My career was over. All I had worked for was gone. I had no income, and only a little money saved. I was so grateful that Raoul took me in, but for his kindness, he was nearly disowned by his parents. We had to endure constant rumours." She swiped at her tears. "The things people said about me..."

Erik's stomach lurched. He had often tormented himself with thoughts of how terrible the aftermath of what he'd done must have been for her, but that was nothing compared to hearing the words come out of her mouth.

"Marrying right away was our only option. What else could I do? But it's not how I wish things had happened." Christine pressed her eyes shut. "It's not how I wanted it to be."

Erik's wounded heart was thudding sickeningly in his chest. It couldn't be, but it almost seemed as if... "You make it sound as if you regret your choice," he said, his voice unexpectedly raspy.

Christine's eyes flew open. For a moment, she looked at him blankly — and then she laughed. It was sharp and bitter, yet when she spoke, her words seemed shaded with sorrow. "What choice? You took away any choice I had when you did the terrible things you chose to do. What I wanted didn't matter."

At Erik's stunned silence, she laughed again, even more bitterly. "And it still doesn't matter, apparently! I begged Giry to tell me if she knew what happened to you, and she swore she didn't know. But that was a lie! You chose to keep yourself hidden, letting me live with years of uncertainty. All the while, you were right here! And during these last weeks, how many other choices have you made for me? How much of all that's happened between us has had anything to do with what I wanted? So, yes Erik, to answer your question, I do have some regrets, but it's not true that I had a choice."

A small chair, upholstered in crimson damask, sat beside the piano. Christine fell onto it heavily, as though she'd been drained of every last drop of energy by her speech. She cut her eyes at him. "My marriage is not one of those regrets, though," she snapped, and Erik could feel heat lick the edges of his ears at how easily she'd been able to see the thought which had begun taking shameful shape in his head. "Raoul is a good man and I have been happy, for the most part." The sharpness of her tone softened. "But I wish...I wish I could have chosen my own path."

After years of emotional starvation, Erik was now overfilled to queasy excess. His sour stomach roiled, and he worried he might actually be sick.

Staggering slightly, he joined her by the piano, pulling its small wooden stool out from beneath the keyboard, and let himself collapse onto it. He took his face in his hands, the hard shell of his mask pressing into the ruined flesh beneath. She was right, of course, about all of it. He could spend the next five years processing all that had been said and torturing himself over all the new ways he'd just learned he had wronged her. But for now, maybe he could do what little he could to set things right.

"Do you mean that you wish to have your career back?" he asked, and though he tried, he found he could not look her in the eye.

"I don't know. Maybe. I suppose I just want to sing, the way I used to be able to." She clasped her hands together, her thumb worrying at the gold ring Erik usually tried to ignore. "I had to lock so much away. Music had no place in my new life. I missed it, though, more than I let myself feel. When I found out that I couldn't be a mother, I felt that was justification to let music back into my life. But...it wasn't the same. It felt so empty. And I thought..." she squeezed her eyes shut, "I thought it was just another thing I lost."

A burning band of pain encircled Erik's ribs as he tried to draw in a breath. Of all he was responsible for, somehow this felt like the worst.

"Oh, Christine…" he whispered almost mournfully. An apology was poised on his tongue, but his unpracticed lips could not form the right words.

"It's the same for you, isn't it?" she asked, looking directly into his eyes, and he might have lied — he certainly wanted to — but he could see that she already knew the answer.

"It is," he said simply.

"Then why do you keep pulling away? Why do you keep denying that connection?" she asked, and the mix of hurt and tenderness in her voice was unbearable.

Absolutely unbearable.

Erik shot from his seat. "I don't know what you mean." He stalked over to the music stand, gathering up the loose sheets. It wasn't too late, he reasoned wildly, to stick to his plan of ignoring this perilous appeal for connection.

Christine's long, irritated sigh sent a ripple of shame down his spine, and yet he did not lose his haughty rigidity. He stood tall, immovable. He knew what was right, after all.

"You know," she continued, weariness once again weighing down her words in a way that made her sound much older than she was. "I really wasn't going to tell you about any of this. I hoped I could find inspiration again on my own, eventually. You were the one who forced me to reveal the secrets I've had to keep hidden from my own husband. You were the reason I had to keep my singing secret in the first place."

"I'm hardly to blame for the things you choose to keep from your husband," Erik replied tersely, a grimace distorting his already distorted face; that hated word always left behind a bitter taste.

"You're right, that's true," Christine said after a long pause, though the defeat in her voice diminished any sense of righteousness. "It was my choice. But I didn't know how to tell him that I wanted to start singing again. We haven't—" she stared down at her fingers, threaded together on her lap. "We don't talk about what happened. I don't think he understands everything. How could he have suggested this otherwise?" She looked away, her cheeks coloring. "But I do know that, for him, my voice will always be connected with you."

The sheets of music hung loosely from Erik's numb fingers. These words were a double edged sword: one side held the power to cut away some of the scar tissue which had grown around his heart, while the other was ready to slice the whole thing in half. He should usher her out right away before she said another word, but the deepening pink flush spreading from her face to throat and farther down was impossible to tear his eyes away from. He held his breath as she continued.

"And Raoul is not wrong — my voice, it is connected to you. And not just by association. It feels like…" She chewed at her lip, thoughtful. "It feels like it's connected vitally. Perhaps inextricably. It's true what I told you, my voice is not what it once was — when I sang with you. And I've realized..." Her eyes locked on his, and she smiled, almost apologetically. "I need you. This part of me does not feel whole without you."

Erik drew in a sharp breath. Behind his breastbone, warmth bloomed uncontrollably. It was sweeter than a kiss — well, not quite, but it was still every bit as breath-taking as one to hear those words spoken aloud.

And how easy it would be to respond in kind, to say yes, I understand, I need you, too, and then at last take her in his arms, and—

And then what?

And then she would leave her husband, leave everything behind and stay with him? No, no. Of course not. She was not his.

A part of her, she'd said — not all.

What did that even mean? Certainly the vicomte would not allow Erik to become involved in her life in any way other than these very strictly defined terms he had set. And if there were some way, would Erik be able to accept only a part of her? Could he share her with a man he despised? He had changed in many ways, yes, but he had not had the opportunity to test if his...tendency toward jealousy and possessiveness had improved. Could it end any way other than unhappily?

There were far too many questions — too many to answer now. This, a direct appeal for connection, was not in Erik's plan. There was a reason he'd decided that keeping up a professional detachment was best — he would not be tempted to make rash, impassioned decisions. He would not choose wrongly.

He simply could not trust himself.

Erik snatched the rest of the music from the stand and held the sheaf of papers against his chest like a shield. He needed her to go, he needed to think. "I see," he said with cool authority. "Hopefully you will get what you need out of these lessons, then." And he turned and strode over to the door, with a crisp gesture commanding her to exit first.

To Erik's relief, Christine wasted no time leaving the room. She bustled past him, head down, likely just as grateful as he was to put the subject to rest, and didn't stop until she reached her cloak, draped over the sofa. Erik hurried over to help as she gathered it up into her arms — but was stopped suddenly in his tracks as she whirled round on him, her face incandescent with barely-suppressed fury. The effect was as breathtaking as it was frightening.

"You didn't have to offer to do these lessons, you know. You could have just bedded me and sent me on my way, if having to actually talk to me is so horrible for you," she spat. Erik's mouth dropped open, ready to protest. "Oh, save it," she cut him off bitterly. She yanked the heavy cloak around her shoulders, her fingers shaking as she fastened it. "I know you wouldn't have. Turning that down was one of very few things you did right."

From an inner pocket of her cloak, she retrieved her gloves, and began pulling them on, one by one. "I don't understand you," she said, keeping her eyes on her hands as she tugged the thin cream-colored leather over her wrists and buttoned them tight. "Again and again you've done this, as long as I've known you. There are these moments where it seems as if you will reach out to me, allow yourself to be honest and vulnerable, try to connect with me, only for you to turn cold and close yourself off and order me around." She looked up, glaring at him with reddened eyes, and Erik could not help but shrink from her. "Why?" she demanded. "Why do you do this?"

"I…" Erik shuffled backwards until he felt the hard back of a leather chair under his hand. He braced himself against it, struggling to stay upright, to not collapse under the weight of her well-founded accusations. "I have tried to do what's best for you," he said, and he truly did mean it.

For several long moments, Christine squinted at him though she was once again astounded by his unparalleled idiocy, as heat rose up his neck. "And you know better than I do what's best for me?" she asked quite matter-of-factly, and when she put it like that, Erik had to admit she had a point. She shook her head. "I am here because I want a chance to say the things that weren't said, to understand the things I need to understand. And yes," she said, her voice beginning to rise with the strain of holding back her rising tears, "I want to feel music again, in my soul. And I need you for that." She paused, collecting herself with a deep breath, and brought her clasped hands to rest over her heart. "That is what I want. If it's not what you want, I understand. But please stop dangling it in front of me and then jerking it away."

She stepped forward, her brows drawn together in a pained expression of exhausted supplication. "Please, Erik, won't you just tell me what it is that you want? Do you know?"

Yes, Erik did know what he wanted.

And he wanted to be able to tell her. He truly did.

But he could not.

Because what he wanted — what he truly wanted — was something he would not admit, not even to himself. Something he absolutely would not let himself feel. He needed to ignore it, deny it, reason it away — but now here it was, impossible to ignore, distressingly undeniable, and entirely, ridiculously unreasonable:

He wanted to love her.

And to have her love him back.

It was impossible.

Impossible because she was not his and could never be.

Impossible because she'd never said she wanted to be in the first place.

Impossible because he remembered far too well what happened the last time he loved her and wanted her to love him back.

Blood beat in Erik's ears, making him dizzy. No, no, no. He should not have even allowed the word to form in his head. It was why he had to keep himself protected. It was to protect her — to protect her from him.

No, no. What he really wanted didn't matter. Only what she wanted mattered.

And what she wanted, he wanted all of that, too. He would love to find understanding and closure, to share in the passion of music with her, to take whatever she would give him, but when had he ever been able to do anything halfway? He could not trust himself. She should not trust him.

But he did want to see her, and she supposedly wanted to see him too, and that they could manage. For that to happen safely, though, he would need to take all his feelings and shove them down as far as he could, keep them controlled, keep himself controlled, keep their time together controlled. There were rules that needed to be followed, she had to understand that, and she would see that it was for the best. Erik knew what he was doing. He was doing things right this time and not taking chances that could lead to disaster, keeping expectations low, not letting himself get too close, not letting himself hope. They didn't need to talk, she could sing and that would be enough, if only she could understand that—

"Do you know," Christine's voice cut cleanly through his rapid rush of thoughts, "that I almost didn't come back after last time?" Erik froze. No, he did not know, it had not even occurred to him, and just the suggestion of it made his blood run cold.

"I spent these last days trying to make excuses for you and convince myself that it would get better. But you haven't changed!" She threw up her hands. "I've had enough. If this is how it's going to be, I won't come back." And with that, Christine turned and stormed right out the front door before Erik had time to remember how to even speak.

Full-blown panic drove his feet as he rushed out of the house and into the gloom of underground. "Christine, wait!" he called out into the darkness.

Wait for what, exactly, he wasn't sure. He had no confidence that he knew the right thing to do, no hope that he hadn't damaged everything beyond repair. The only thing he knew was that he could not let her leave for good — she had to come back. She had to stay. Not forever, no, no, he knew this would end and she would leave and he would accept that, but he simply wasn't ready to go back to how it had been without her, not yet. If she didn't come, he would have nothing else to live for, and he would be so alone again and— Fuck! How had he fucked everything up so badly? He'd only been thinking of her…hadn't he?

Heart racing, Erik stood high on the stone walkway overlooking the lake and let his darkness-sharpened eyes scan for any sign of her. She could not have gone far, he reasoned, and she hadn't — in the boat, a dark silhouette wavered against the silvery mist of the lake, heaving with stifled sobs. Slowly, he made his way down the mossy stone steps to the dock, unhitching the unlit lantern and taking it with him as he stepped gingerly into the boat.

"May I?" he asked, and at Christine's nod of assent, he pulled a pack of matches from a jacket pocket, struck one, and set the lantern aflame. A sphere of weak golden light bloomed in the darkness, illuminating Christine's tear-streaked face. Erik crouched down, leveling his eyes with hers.

He had to fix the mess he'd made of things...

If only he knew how.

He took a deep, steadying breath. And, at a loss, he spoke without thinking.

"I don't want you to leave and not come back. I do want you to be here. Very much," he said, and he was surprised and quite relieved to find that it was, at long last, exactly what he should say: the truth. Or at least some of it. "I do understand the loss of music, and I want you to have it back." His throat burned as he swallowed hard. "But what I want more than anything is...for you to just be happy." Desperately, he longed to look away, but he forced himself to hold her eyes. "And I am so sorry, Christine. About...all of it."

Tears once again began to slide down Christine's cheeks, only this time, they were accompanied by a small, apologetic smile. "Thank you, Erik," she said softly. "And I'm sorry that I—"

"Please, don't be. I deserved all of that. You're right, I have behaved like an absolute ass," he insisted, grimacing, and her widening smile, though it wavered, melted what little bit of resistance still remained within him. "Tell me," he added quickly, "what can I do to make you happy?" Erik braced himself for the lengthy list of demands, stipulations, and ultimatums he deserved; whatever it was, he would do his best to comply. After all, he had always been but a dog ready to die for her— but no, no. That was not quite true, not anymore. Now, Erik wanted to live. And he wanted that life to include Christine in it again, for as long as possible and in whatever manner she would allow. And at whatever cost.

Christine wiped her tears with the hem of her cloak and took Erik's hand in hers. Even through her glove, he could feel the warmth, the life, radiating from her, seeping into his cool and rigid hand, and he allowed himself to wrap his fingers around hers and gently squeeze.

"I want to sing," she said. "And I want to talk."

"And…?" Erik's brow furrowed.

"And that's all," Christine replied, and she squeezed his hand in return. "Except you mustn't insist that it be one or the other. I will not be forced into a choice I never wanted to make. I've had quite enough of that."

Erik bowed his head solemnly. "I understand. It will be just as you want." How she could be so forgiving and so undemanding, Erik couldn't understand, he only hoped to make himself worthy of this second chance. "And I promise to let you make all your own choices from now on. You are in complete control. Only," he took out his pocket watch and checked the time, "we really ought to be getting back now. Perhaps...perhaps we could talk more on the way?"

"Yes," Christine smiled. "Let's." And she settled herself among the pillows, rumpling her skirts and pinching color into her cheeks, as Erik readied the boat for their journey.

"You know, Erik," she said, after she'd tugged a curl free from her pinned-up hair, "talking about difficult things isn't going to make me want to sing with you any less. You can believe that now, can't you?"

Erik nodded emphatically.

Actually, he wasn't sure that he did, not entirely, but if it would please Christine and keep her near, then he would happily pretend.

…

For the next two weeks, they did just as she asked: she sang and they talked.

They talked, during their journey to and from the surface, during breaks in the lessons, and during many other small, quiet moments, about his life since they'd parted, and about hers, and it was nicer than he'd ever imagined, that easy, unexpectant companionship.

She sang, and as the lessons progressed, her voice progressed, and though Erik wouldn't let the music touch soul-deep, he did open enough to find a comfortable compromise.

She smiled when she saw him. And he let himself smile back.

All in all, their hours spent together were actually rather pleasant.

Or they would be, Erik thought as he spent yet another night tossing and turning and wishing desperately for sleep, if music wasn't so damnably, painfully, exquisitely arousing.

HEY. HI. Yes, I am still writing! I promise I will not abandon this story, sometimes it just takes me a while. Hopefully the next couple chapters will come a bit more quickly, as these two have gotten quite a bit of angsting out of their systems. For the time being, anyway. Thank you all so much for hanging in there, and for you kind and supportive comments! Each one keeps me going more than you'll ever know!

And many, MANY thanks to Aldebaran, who is my first and BEST reader, and helped in so many places, plus provided the perfect word I could not think of, which is a particular talent of hers.

Up next: ...Arousing?

a·rouse

/əˈrouz/

verb

gerund or present participle: arousing

1. evoke or awaken (a feeling, emotion, or response)

- excite or provoke (someone) to anger or strong emotions

- excite (someone) sexually.

2. awaken (someone) from sleep.

Hmm...well it's definitely at least ONE of those.