It was Christmas time in Paris. Just a short while ago, the thought would have brought Christine much more joy.
Each year, it was tradition for Meg to pester Christine into singing carols around the neighbourhood. It was tradition for Christine to decline, and it was tradition for her to end up right alongside Meg, smiling into the songs.
This year, there would be no carols. Christine would pretend not to miss the pestering.
The snow wasn't falling right this winter. Christine noticed this looking out one of the arched windows in her ward, on one of the many nights she worked late. Among other nurses, this is what she was becoming known for. They were calling her the 'nightbird'. She had to all but hold Meg back from having a word with whoever had started it. Christine herself didn't mind the name, there was truth in gossip.
In truth, any chance she got Christine took on night shifts, so often that many nurses came to her to swap shifts just to avoid them. Nighttime in the Grand Palais was not kind, full of echoing screams, men waking from their sleep in bursts of terror. There was very little you could do to soothe them. The snow fell in all directions, like it was lost.
Through the frosted glass of the window, she watched the snow cover the garden grounds. Though she could not see it, her eyesight too weak, she knew the fountain, the one with the statue of an angel and his horn, stood proudly in the middle of all that lost snow.
She moved away from the window then, to turn her gaze timidly to the bed. The one she couldn't see. On all sides were curtains, hung up to block all view of it. It made little sense for her to truly want to see her friend's old bed. The last few weeks, she hadn't dared step more than a foot towards it. Initially, she thought she would do anything to avoid them—the night shifts. She thought they would be too lonely without him. They were, but she still wanted them desperately, still found her eyes roaming to look at his bed, like she was still holding onto the hope of seeing him again.
It was not Pierre lying there, hidden behind walls of curtains. It was a new patient, those curtains put up the day of his arrival, and Christine hadn't seen him since.
Those eyes were impossible to forget, however.
They'd frightened her when she first found them locked onto hers. They were wide, dark, and unnerving. Although the eyes had stared into her, Christine wasn't certain the patient had really seen her, like he'd looked straight through her.
Marie and Meg became fascinated with the mysterious patient, conspiring on the reason for those curtains, and the many possibilities of who the man hidden behind them could be. Marie was certain he was a famous actor, far too humble to boast with his presence. Meg had more fantastical ideas, of a long-lost prince, one who valiantly enlisted into the war. Christine…she believed he was frightened. She'd seen it in his eyes.
They would never know who was right. No nurse was allowed entrance behind the curtains—except for Madame Dupont. The low whispered conversation the senior nurse shared with the medic who accompanied the new patient came to Christine's mind. Whatever the man's identity, he'd been allocated a privilege of privacy, one that no other patient on her ward had been offered. Why, she hadn't a clue, but it wasn't her business to wonder. Still, she stared at those curtains, until the cry of an alarmed man, awoken by his own shout, called her to attention.
When she returned home that morning, like she did each time before unlocking their door with her rusted key, she set aside a moment to think of Raoul. Any time she returned home, she had to do this. It first had begun as silent prayer, but quickly diverged into something closer to superstition. Fuelled by her worry, she thought perhaps thinking of him each time she returned home would in some fantastical way help him do the same.
She pushed her way in through the arduous door and breathed in the stale but familiar scent of home. It was still early enough that Meg was asleep soundly in her bed. This was a relief. On one occasion, Christine returned to find Meg still awake, having stayed up all night waiting for her to return home. It only happened the once, Meg came home sluggishly from work that very same day with recounts of Madame Dupont finding her on a chair fast asleep. Meg would never have waited up like that before; but recently, her worry for Christine was obvious. It frustrated Christine, knowing it was supposed to be her looking out for Meg, watching out for her as she promised Madame Giry—not the other way around.
Meg stirred in her sleep, and Christine made a point of keeping her footsteps light while moving about their room. She stopped to watch over Meg for a moment, to watch how funny she looked with her mouth hung open. She would be better about looking out for her friend, start making good on her promise. Christine's first step towards keeping that promise was to wake Meg up with breakfast—a proper breakfast.
Food was becoming quite a sensitive topic among the city's residents. No one was in a hurry to discuss the slow rising of prices; but for two young women, left alone to provide for themselves, it was a sore subject that needed to be acknowledged eventually. Madame Giry had certainly not abandoned them, however, leaving more than enough financially to last her absence. Or, Christine desperately hoped that would be the case.
Right now, she just wanted to make Meg smile. And Meg did, when she wandered into the kitchen earlier than usual to find the warm plate of bread and jam. It wasn't much, but it was Meg's favourite, and it was far superior in taste to whatever it was being served as breakfast at the Grand Palais.
"What's the occasion?" She asked with the smile, stepping out from their shared bedroom, still in her white nightgown and hair a golden mess.
Christine, setting down a small pitcher of milk along with two delicate cups, looked up innocently. "Can't I do something kind, just for the sake of kindness?"
Meg plopped down at the table happily, already picking up a piece of warm bread. "Well, of course you can." Then she took a bite, in between chews saying, "Just not without making me suspicious."
"I'm glad you have such trust in me." Christine took her seat after pouring milk into their respective cups, wishing she could have scrounged up some coffee.
Meg seemed happy enough, however, as she slathered on more jam. She smiled at Christine from across the table. "I really do." Then, before things got too sentimental, she took a long sip of milk and gave a wry grin. "So much so, I might just tell you of my latest dream." She had a silly moustache made of milk.
Christine scrunched her nose. "Must you?"
"This time it was our wedding," Meg began enthusiastically, ignoring the groan Christine made.
Christine loved hearing about the dreams. They were always so full of life, always put them in another place, in another time, when things would be good. She couldn't tell Meg just how much she enjoyed them; Meg wouldn't be so adamant about sharing them if she did.
As the two women sat at their warm kitchen table, pretending to fight over the last piece of bread they both knew they were going to split, the fog that rested, waiting, under the table was nearly forgotten altogether.
Eventually, Meg had to leave; Christine had to all but shove her out the door, so Meg didn't receive the blunt end of another scolding from Dupont. "Get some rest," was what Meg said as sternly as she could while being shoved out, Christine responding with a few agreeable hums before shutting the door tightly.
All was quiet again—not peaceful, just quiet. The door to their bedroom was staring at her. It was about time Christine should lie down for a rest; doing so with the morning light streaming into their apartment wasn't so strange after having done it so many times. She forced herself across the threshold and under her heavy duvet.
There was a time when the weight of her blanket had been a comfort, but that time had long since passed. She tried a deep breath, but it got caught in her chest, so she threw the blanket off to rest by her waist. Sleep and Christine were not close, not like they'd been when she was little. When her father could still tell her stories, he would do so each night before she closed her eyes, and in her dreams, she would live out those stories. She hadn't dreamt in weeks. Perhaps that's why she enjoyed Meg's so deeply.
Her father was on her mind more and more these days. Especially at Christmas time.
It was the season for remembering, but the season wasn't the only reason for her bitter-sweet reminiscing. Accepting there was little chance she would fall asleep anytime soon, she picked herself up from the bed and left the room behind. As a child mourning their father—a child who desperately wanted to grow up, she was willing to let go of much that tied her to her adolescence. The doorknob of Madame Giry's room was cold, expected from the little use it was seeing. A childlike nervousness took over Christine for a moment before she entered the room.
The air was lighter in Madame's room. The sun floated in through her curtained window, leaving the room coated in dim light. Christine stood for a moment, feeling like she was doing something wrong by simply being there, but it hardly mattered with Madame so far away. Christine moved to sit on the bed.
The only thing she allowed herself to keep from her childhood was her desperate love and adoration for her father. That wasn't something physical, not like a toy or book of fairy tales that could be thrown away; it wasn't something you could hold on to.
She waited another moment on the bed before her arms reached underneath. She didn't need to look where she was reaching, not after reaching the same way for so many years. From under the bed came a heavy, dusty case. It was no longer made of a beautiful rosewood, but a grey, wilted wood. First blowing on the case, causing a puff of dust to make her cough, she turned to wiping the rest away with her hand. She continued to run her fingers along it, even when most of the dust was gone.
Her father had two loves in his life, and they were there together on Madame Giry's bed; they'd been together when Madame Giry took in the poor child, clinging to the violin. Finally, she opened the case and lifted the violin from its cage. She no longer clung to it, but she still clasped it, and she took in its comfort yet again. It'd become a terrible habit for a young Christine, always wanting to hold it, to look at it through blurred, teary eyes. To save the child from such frequent heartache, Madame Giry made the difficult decision to separate Gustave Daaé's two loves.
It took a while for Christine to forgive Madame. The violin was the last piece left of her father, and without it, she had to accept she would never hear him play it to her again. Christine believed Madame had gotten rid of it altogether, but that'd been an unfair assumption. The first time Madame brought her into the room, Christine believed it was to declare she could no longer stay—and just when she and Meg began getting along, too. Instead, Madame took something from under the bed, and that was the genuine moment her relationship with Madame changed from just ward and guardian, to something more.
Christine was not allowed unlimited access to Madame's room; but now and then, when Madame knew she needed it most, she would allow Christine to hold it again. She was always allowed to see it at Christmas.
No tears came as she looked at the violin now. She'd long stopped crying over her father, not because she missed him any less, but because she'd become comfortable in her grief. Grief was something she grew familiar with. It was the sort of sadness that never left you, but it was also an understanding sadness. It didn't numb like the fog did.
Alone, Christine was hyper-aware of it now, pooling out from underneath Madame's bed. It swirled around her ankles, making her shiver. She brushed it away as she tucked the violin back into its case, then slid it back into safe keeping under the bed. Before the fog could encapsulate the room, cause her to lose another day roaming her own mind, she left her Madame's room.
The fog would trail after her, but it wouldn't surround her as she lay back underneath her covers. It seemed perhaps the fog was finally leaving her alone.
On the chilly morning of Christmas Eve, she and Meg walked together up the steps of the Grand Palais. Christine gazed up at how the winter sun struck the building's glass. She'd forgotten how the roof glowed subtly in the sunlight, what with all the night shifts she'd taken recently. She breathed in deep, securing herself. There was always a hopeful aspect to Christmas Eve, and Christine carried this hope with her like a shield. Meg especially loved the season, and Christine knew how devastated she was when Dupont rejected her pleas to decorate their ward. Meg's disappointment was evident on her face when the two pushed open their ward's heavy door.
"It's just ridiculous." Meg scowled sourly at the bleak surroundings. Christine, however, had trouble speaking in the face of a room engulfed in the fog. It poured out from the faces of tired, lonely men, making the patients' beds look like islands bobbing in the sea. It was an invisible force that couldn't be ignored, but Meg did so when she waded into the cold mist easily and looked back, still with an incredulous expression.
"Can you believe this?"
The hopeful shield trembled in Christine's hands. She wanted to reply, yes.
The fog was the worst she'd felt yet, but she also felt so alone in the feeling. Her fellow nurses moved through the heavy sadness with ease. As Christine copied their movements, the grey feeling in her chest blended into the background of the day, just as it always did. The morning routines were carried out in complete normalcy, and Christine had to remind herself that this day was at all special from any other.
There was one, fairly new, development: the daily and continuous arrival of Madame Dupont onto their ward.
Each morning she would enter carrying a single bowl of breakfast, straight to the wall of curtains. She would slip in, leave, then return a short while later to retrieve the bowl. Throughout the day she would return, whether it was to deliver meals or medicine. She'd become the mystery patient's personal nurse.
Christine was at the bedside of another patient, feeding him his breakfast because he was in no state to do so himself. He was a relatively new man to the ward, but she hadn't yet learned his name. Against her better nature, she would not ask.
As she fed him a spoonful of the porridge, the room suddenly echoed with the click of Madame Dupont's pristine heels. They were quick but steady, like a soldier's march. Christine glanced in Meg's direction, but distracted by her bitterness towards Dupont, Meg wasn't lingering like she usually did, trying to catch a glimpse of her mystery patient.
Like clockwork, the sliding of curtains came and went, and then the click of retreating heels sounded Madame's departure.
Christine could not explain why, whether it was curiosity, or better put, a nosiness she didn't want to admit, but her eyes flicked in the curtain's direction. They were swaying from the recent disturbance, but then Christine's breath hitched. As the fabric's swaying came to a slow stop, there was an obvious, accidental gap left behind by Madame.
Christine immediately tore her eyes away, then slowly brought another spoonful of breakfast to her patient's lips. She hadn't looked long enough to see anything, yet even so, her heart thrummed in her chest. She didn't dare look again, but instead thought it best to stand and close the curtains before the gap was left long enough to be noticed. Before her mind fully made itself up, she excused herself from her patient's side. He didn't seem to mind. He'd hardly noticed her presence at all.
As she stalked towards the familiar bed, she looked back once to Meg, who had stopped a moment to speak with Marie. Christine couldn't fault the girls for their interest in the curious patient—not without being a hypocrite; but the patient had the right to his strict privacy. Part of her thought it was unfair, allowing one man a privacy that the other patients, left out in the open, had not been. This was not something to blame the mystery patient for. So, she pushed aside the resentment she held for her old friend's bed and approached it for the first time in weeks.
Her hands clutched the fabric of the curtains, but she kept her gaze glued to the floor. She wouldn't look. It was wrong to look. Before her terrible curiosity could get the better of her, a quick tug on the curtains closed the gap, and the nervousness that found its way into her stomach slowly retreated. She made sure the curtains would remain closed before leaving; and for the rest of the day, whenever Madame Dupont would enter or exit through them, Christine watched to ensure no accidental gap was again left behind.
In her watchfulness, the morning seemed to meld into the evening. The winter sun gradually disappeared, taking with it the light in their ward. To fend off the advancing darkness, nurses lit candles and placed them about the room. Meg was satisfied that the candles returned a little of the ward's missing festivity.
Later into the evening, men were returning from their dinners in the mess hall, some talkative, some not at all. Nurses, the ones who weren't scheduled for the night shift, wrapped up their duties so they could retire home and celebrate the special night. A shock to many, the nightbird would not be among the nighttime nurses this night—she would never leave Meg alone on Christmas Eve.
For her final task, Christine lay a cold cloth over a man's forehead, his skin burning with a persistent fever that made her nervous. "Thank you, Mademoiselle," he mumbled, then before she could step away, he wished her a Merry Christmas quietly. Christine, in her newfound resistance to speak with patients, still managed a response to his kindness. The loss of Pierre was a terrible reason to be cold to the others.
Christine was found by Annie a few minutes later looking out a window. Christine didn't even notice her friend was there, so enthralled by how the snow still couldn't figure out where it was going. The cloth in her hand had been soaked and rinsed in the little basin in front of her far too many times, but Christine wouldn't stop until a gentle hand mercifully took the cloth away.
"I think it might be clean enough," Annie said sweetly, but when Christine raised an amused brow, she put a hand to her lips. "Oh—that was rude. I'm sorry."
Christine stole one last glance out the window before smirking at her friend. "You know, I believe Meg and Marie are having an influence on you."
"Please don't say that," Annie said, smiling too. She set aside the damp cloth.
With one hand already occupied by a little tin, Annie's other hand took Christine's and led her over to where Meg and Marie loitered by an empty bed. Christine wondered where its patient was, even if she was sure she knew the answer. The girls were already unpinning their nurse caps, revealing their frayed and frizzy hair, when their ward door opened with an announcing creak.
Madame Dupont entered through the doors in her typical quick stride. Meg and Marie froze with their hands still up by their hair, but Madame simply strode past them. With no need to look, Christine knew where she was headed. She and Annie sidled next to their friends, and the four watched as Madame slipped behind the curtains.
"Perhaps he's her secret lover," Marie quipped, and Meg laughed, almost too loudly, then she hid her giggling behind her hand. When Marie noticed Annie, she pulled Annie closer to her, spinning the girl around so she could start unpinning her headdress as well.
When Madame reappeared from her secret cove behind the curtains, the girls turned their attention to anything that wasn't staring in her direction. Christine found a particularly interesting freckle on her hand. When she dared look back up, Madame was already standing in front of them, her hands held behind her back in her own practised way. In her hand she held a plate of dinner, the food untouched.
Satisfied by their full attention, she began. "I want to thank you, girls, for what has been a…" Her eyes flicked to Christine's for just a moment. "A rather successful few months here."
It was selfish for Christine to feel a pang of resentment at that, but she did.
"I wish you all a very Merry Christmas." She didn't wait for a reply before adding, "Although, I do suggest you wait until leaving the premises before you begin stripping." With that, in her usual clipped manner, she marched away to the door and left—although Christine was sure she threw a brief glance Meg's way before doing so.
Meg and Marie both threw their own faces at the woman after she left, while Annie's face was beet red. When the clicking of heels disappeared down the hall, Meg turned to the girls with a disgruntled pout. "I mean, did you not see that look ? I swear she's out for my neck!"
"I think your asking to hang a wreath was her last straw," Marie said as she pulled the last pin from Annie's headdress, removing it to reveal the mousy-brown hair beneath it.
Meg threw her hands onto her hips. "She wouldn't allow even a meagre little wreath! I have half a mind to march up to her and demand a little damn festivity in here."
Marie snorted, pausing in fixing Annie's hair to instead fix Meg with a snarky brow. "Well, I believe that's just a brilliant idea. Don't you Christine?"
Christine, distracted by her exhaustion, faked the energy for her friends. "I suppose it is…if the goal is to be dismissed permanently."
Meg waved a hand. "Dupont wouldn't get rid of me—she couldn't. She's too afraid of Maman." The last bit was said with a laugh.
"Madame Giry?" Marie asked, as if to clarify if Meg knew who she spoke of. Then she laughed heartily. "If Madame Giry discovered you were challenging a superior, she would rid of you herself , Marguerite."
All the girls hummed in amused agreement. At the mention of her Maman, however, Meg's fire seemed to dwindle and her smile faltered. Surely noticing this, Annie perked up. "I almost forgot.'' She picked up the tin she'd set aside on the bed beside them. Opening it, she said, "It isn't much…but it wouldn't quite be Christmas without a treat." Inside the tin were a dozen or so sweet cookies, made into shapes that vaguely resembled snowflakes.
Meg gasped, and Marie's hand was already digging into the tin. "You're an angel," said Marie, before taking her first bite. Christine's breath caught for a moment before she took her own cookie. Annie then stood from where she'd been leaning against Marie to make rounds about the ward, going to each patient who seemed well enough and offering them a treat as well.
When she returned, Marie was in the middle of digging a hand into her uniform's front pocket. "I actually brought you all a treat myself," she said, and Annie was grinning. That is, until Marie's hand returned from her smock with a silver flask.
"Oh—Marie !" Annie spluttered, which seemed to delight Marie. Then she took a practised swig, to Annie's horror.
"Well? Am I going to be drinking alone on Christmas?"
Meg was the first to rise to the challenge, again to Annie's horror. Although she quietly laughed along with the rest of them at the disgusted face Meg made after her swig. Annie was next to take a drink, and Christine was stunned she actually did so—discreetly. She downed the sip better than Meg or even Marie had. Then the flask was held out to Christine. Christine hesitated and looked over her shoulder nervously. They were still sporting the nurse's uniform, but they also were technically off the clock. She sipped on the grey bottle, and the burn of the fiery liquid inside startled her. She coughed; then her coughing tangled with laughter. The group's giggling must have drawn eyes towards them.
"What's that in your hand?" Another nurse, a slightly older woman, said, coming to a stop in front of the group. Christine tried to hide the bottle—poorly—but the woman just rolled her eyes. "Hand that over." And Christine was handing her the flask before she knew what she was doing, Marie opening then shutting her mouth furiously as she watched it go. The nurse held it for a moment. Then she took a swig, wiped her mouth politely and handed it back, saying, "You're fortunate it's Christmas. If I catch this in here again—it's all your heads."
One patient must have sniffed the liquor in the air because he was over beside them, taking his sip from the bottle. Before they knew what was happening, a group of patients and nurses had congregated around their no longer empty bed. They began to pass the flask around as they shared funny stories of past holidays. Christine listened intently as some soldiers even shared snippets of their time in battle, but they never did share much. A man with a greying beard, sitting in a wheelchair, was the last to drink from the flask. After he'd downed the last drop, he tipped it upside-down to show the group it was finished.
"Now this is the Christmas I remember," he said merrily. Marie took back her contraband as she grumbled about having only a few sips herself, but she was still smiling as big as the rest of the group. Christine felt light as she glanced from face to face. For the first time in quite a while, she realised she was having fun.
"Sure isn't the same without some music, though," one man noted, and the rest of the group wistfully agreed.
Christine's stomach suddenly did a dip, like it knew a little switch had just gone off in her friend's head before she even needed to see the mischievous smile.
"Oh, Christine! You have to sing!" Christine was shaking her head before Meg finished her sentence.
"I didn't know you could sing, Christine!" Annie's face was bright with excitement—and pink in the cheeks after her last two sips from Marie's flask.
"She absolutely can. You've just got to hear her!" Meg batted her eyes pleasantly at Christine, then jostled her arm happily.
"But…but what about Madame? She'd surely have a fit if—"
"The old lady is gone home," Marie cut in from her place with a content head on Annie's shoulder. "She's the first one out those doors when the day shift is done."
Christine was feeling like a mouse backed into a corner by a clutter of friendly cats. "Oh…these men don't need me disrupting them," she tried, but the man with the greying beard only smiled.
"Mademoiselle, you would brighten each one of these men's nights—if you'd only do us the honour." The rest of the men who still lingered around the bed voiced their agreement with hopeful eyes.
There was no reason to say no, except the shaking of her hands. But, despite how sick to her stomach she felt, she really, truly wanted to. She missed it dearly, but she just hadn't anything to sing for in so long.
Taking a breath to steady her suddenly fuzzy vision, she cleared her throat with trepidation.
"Well…alright, then."
Quickly she picked out a song—O Holy Night—the prettiest Christmas song, and the first song she ever learned to sing in French. Meg had stayed up late into the night when they were little, teaching her Maman's ward with the funny accent how to sing it. Christine wasn't sure she remembered how to begin. The moment she opened her mouth, however, it came back to her like an infant's first step came to them.
She started softly. Her audience listened contently, and they didn't seem to mind when her voice shook, not entirely with vibrato but from her nerves. When her hand was scooped up by Meg's, and she began to sing along, Christine's confidence bloomed. Slowly she discovered her voice once more—brushed away the dust. Other patients, men who hadn't joined the late-night party, were sitting up in their beds. They listened too, and she hoped she wasn't bothering them.
Her voice filled her chest, clearing out the fog that had made its home there. The smile that crept onto her lips as she sang couldn't be helped. Then when she reached the chorus, she felt it again: The presence of her father's angel. One hand held by Meg, it was like the other was being held too, leading her through the song. She wished her father were there. She wished he could hear her, listen to what his little Lotte's voice had grown into. Perhaps he was—perhaps he and the angel of music listened to her now. Pierre, too.
As they sang with her, the faces of her audience became mixed with smiles and expressions of longing that Christine was familiar with. It was difficult not to mourn estranged loved ones, especially during the holidays—especially when you were forced to be so terribly far apart. Grief was a hurtful thing, but when it was shared, it became just that little bit easier to manage. As they sang together, they were sharing their grief together.
She didn't want the song to end, but after the last note, she took a finishing breath. She was embarrassed when a handful of the patients clapped and whistled for her, but she bowed with just a quick nod of the head. When her hand was squeezed and her eyes were pulled to Meg, who was simply beaming, she felt proud.
"Thank you," Christine said, and Meg knew what it was for.
Then came a funny sound, and their attention was suddenly on Marie. The tall girl was the reddest one among them, her tear-stained cheeks hidden against Annie's shoulder. The shorter girl was patting her head comfortingly.
"My family is having Marie over for Christmas supper," she said with a hopeful smile, "We have room for two more—if you could stand us for a short while longer." Christine and Meg both agreed immediately.
As the four friends braved the freezing walk to Annie's, they played like children, kicking the fluffy snow and sticking their tongues out to catch a snowflake. The fog was nowhere in Christine's thoughts. The snow fell like it wasn't sure of its direction, but in that moment, that was alright.
Her voice was gone, the song was over. The bandages around his eyes were damp.