Sorry about the extremely long delay in updating. I am not going to lie. I struggled big time with this chapter. It is such a pivotal chapter, and I just could not, for the life of me, convey the emotions properly. About halfway through the chapter I scrapped the whole thing and went a completely different direction. I like how it turned out, but I'm still nervous.

Oh, one more thing before I let you get to reading. After combing back over the original novel I discovered that Erik's mask is actually black. So that is corrected in this chapter as well as chapter six.

Okay. Go forth and read and tell me what you think.

Chapter 7

I was crazy.

Coping with Ben's adultery, dealing with the divorce that followed, disappointment stemming from my dead-end job, and stress from my recent transatlantic travel had all apparently coalesced to push me past the tipping point of my sanity, and now, as a result, I was completely, one-hundred-percent, batshit crazy. How else would I explain what I was seeing now?

No. There was no other explanation. Because, here, in the real world nothing else but being one-hundred-percent batshit crazy made any sort of sense.

The Phantom of the Opera was a book. It wasn't real! Some guy made it all up. Well, okay, there was the part at the very beginning where the author claimed that the Opera Ghost had really existed, but I'd always figured it was there as some sort of a plot device, not something to be actually be believed!

And even if I did decide to suspend reality and pretend that such things could actually happen, the question still remained: why? What did the Opera Ghost have to do with the ring? From the information I'd gathered from the episode with the candle, he wasn't condemned to wander the spirit realm because he had lost it and had been searching for it, nor did it have anything to do with how he actually died. At this point I wasn't sure if it was even his. Every time I tried to ask if it belonged to someone else, he would cause a disturbance and the conversation would come to a screeching halt.

I needed something to calm me down, something to take the edge of my mounting panic and help me sort everything out. I pushed off my bed and went downstairs to the kitchen, where I rummaged through all the clutter on my kitchen table until I found a half-consumed bottle of merlot. Yanking out the cork, I skipped the glass and took a long pull straight from the neck of the bottle. Eventually I needed to find a healthier coping mechanism before I became a full-blown alcoholic, but at that moment I couldn't care less.

I chugged the rest of the wine and set the bottle down on the table with a heavy clunk. Then I ran my hands through my hair and took a deep, cleansing breath. I could already feel the effects of the liquor warming my veins as it slithered its way through my bloodstream.

All right, what did I know? I knew that I was being haunted by someone who bore a striking resemblance to the Phantom of the Opera. I also knew that I was currently wearing a ring that held significant value to him, whether it was his or it belonged to someone he knew. So, if it wasn't his, then who would have been special enough to him that removing said ring from the cellars would have thrust his spirit into this day and age?

A thought tickled the far reaches of my mind, just beyond my grasp. It seemed like I should know the answer to this, almost like I had seen it before….

Oh, shit.

I raced back upstairs, taking the steps two at a time until I reached the landing. Sprinting into my bedroom, I snatched my e-reader off the nightstand and switched it on, scanning back and forth through the electronic pages of The Phantom of the Opera until I found the passage I was looking for. There, located at the very end of the last chapter, was the part about the Phantom giving Christine a plain gold wedding ring in exchange for her freedom, along with his blessing for her to marry the Vicomte de Chagny. All that he asked in return was that she come back after receiving notice of his death and bury him with it.

All the blood drained from my face, and suddenly, despite the lingering heat of the day, I was cold all over. A sharp twinge in my stomach was all the warning I received before its contents, now swimming in half a bottle of wine, flip-flopped. Scrambling off the bed like my life depended on it, I raced into the bathroom, fell to my knees on the soft, cushy bathmat in front of the toilet, and heaved up everything I had ate and drank earlier that evening.

When it was all over I used the edge of the sink to pull myself up off the floor. My skin was slick with a thin layer of sweat and I was shaking from head to toe. I rinsed my mouth out and then splashed cool water on my face. Dabbing my lips and cheeks dry with the hand towel that hung on a hook next to the medicine cabinet, I gazed warily at my reflection in the mirror. My hazel eyes were dark, their brightness now shadowed by an intense amount of fear and guilt.

If what was written in the book had actually occurred, then it was no wonder why my ghost had reacted so violently to my probing questions. Because if all this really was real, then I had not only stolen his ring, I had stolen a keepsake—a final reminder—of the woman he loved.

Another wave of nausea swept over me as I realized that I could have very possibly taken the ring from the Phantom's final resting place. I wasn't just a thief. I was a grave robber.

Gripping the edges of the sink I tried to steady myself against the sudden onslaught of dizziness as darkness closed in around me.

XXX

When I came to everything around me was dark, and for one terrifying moment I didn't know where I was. Eventually, the cool feeling of the tiled bathroom floor pressing against my cheek and the pounding in my head brought me back to the present. Groaning, I slowly pushed myself into a sitting position. As I did, the thumping behind my eyes grew more intense, and the pedestal of the bathroom sink danced hazily before me as the room spun.

"Jesus," I muttered.

I had never passed out before, but I decided then and there that I never wanted to do it again. The aftermath was worse than any hangover I'd ever had.

Once I was sure that standing up wouldn't result in a repeat performance, I got to my feet and examined myself in the mirror. A large, angry looking red bump on the left side of my forehead glared back at me. Well, that explained the headache, at least.

Sighing, I left the bathroom, pausing at my bed long enough to collect my phone from where I'd thrown in on the bedspread in my haste to get to the bathroom, and went downstairs to retrieve an icepack from the freezer. Then I returned to the front room, flopped on the couch without bothering to turn on any lights, and placed it on my forehead.

"Ow," I whined, sucking air between my teeth.

The silence that had descended upon the house was heavy and oppressive. I wasn't sure if that meant he was there in the room with me, or if I was creating the feeling myself due to a guilty conscience.

What I did know was that I had never had that sort of reaction before in my life. Even when I confronted Ben the morning after he didn't come home and he revealed he'd been cheating on me for months, nothing like that had happened. Sure, I felt sick. My whole world had just been upended. I may have cried and stomped around and maybe thrown a thing or two in anger, but I certainly never threw up or fainted because of it.

Perhaps, I reasoned, that was because I knew Ben would never hurt me physically. Emotionally yes. He'd torn my heart into tiny pieces without a second thought. But not once in the five years we were married had I ever been afraid of him.

My ghost on the other hand? I'd be crazy not to be scared of him. He certainly hadn't been shy about letting me know when he was pissed off. That upped the fear factor another notch just on poltergeist behavior alone. That sort of activity was enough to make anyone pause and consider relocating. And while it had had me on edge all week, I could more or less deal with those antics. No; it wasn't the slamming doors or the flickering lights or cryptic mirror messages that had me rattled. It was finding out just who he was that had me trembling in terror.

The Phantom of the Opera wasn't a nice guy. Despite the book's weak attempts at making him seem like the poor, misunderstood victim, the fact still remained that he was the villain in the story. He had done some truly appalling things in order to get what he wanted, and he didn't seem to find anything wrong with his methods of obtaining whatever that was. Stealing, lying, extortion, kidnapping, murder….

Murder.

In the book he'd killed a number of people. Anyone who angered him or tried to stop him or got in the way of what he wanted was swiftly and violently dealt with. He hadn't batted an eye when Raoul and the Persian had stumbled into his torture chamber. Then, to make an already bad situation worse, he'd threatened to kill Raoul and all of Paris if Christine didn't agree to marry him, virtually leaving her no choice in the matter. Hell, he even dropped a chandelier on several innocent people just to prove a point, and the scene-shifter, Buquet, was dispatched simply because he discovered that the Opera Ghost was a real person and not just a legend.

Discovered the Opera Ghost was real…. Just like I had. And I had given him plenty of reasons to be angry with me….

Oh my god.

I leapt off the couch, heart in my throat. Suddenly, I couldn't breathe! My chest constricted as panic coursed through my nervous system, closing off my airway. I coughed, clutching the front of my shirt as I desperately tried to catch my breath before I blacked out again. Tears streamed down my cheeks, but whether they were out of fear, and overreaction due to the wine, or a the lack of oxygen, I didn't know. I didn't care. I let them fall as I considered everything that had happened up to this point. Things were definitely escalating, the disturbances growing in intensity with each attempt at conversation. He'd proven he could move objects around the house whenever it suited him. Was he capable of making physical contact with me? If he could, would he? What would happen if I pushed him beyond the limits of his tolerance?

"Please," I begged when I was finally able to form a coherent sentence. Even so, my voice cracked. "Please don't hurt me. It was an accident, I swear! You have to believe me. I never meant to make you angry. Just…just please, don't hurt me."

XXX

Please don't hurt me.

I had lost count over the years of how many times those particular words had been said to me. How foolish of me to think that dying meant that I would never have to hear them again.

However, hearing them from the woman before me now left me stunned and more than a little confused. She didn't know me. She had no way of knowing what had occurred in my past. To her, I was nothing more than the ghost who was haunting her house. She'd never set eyes on me, and our only interaction thus far came from what I chose to reveal to her. Aside from the small disturbances I'd created, I had given her no cause for such an unexpected and dramatic reaction. Something had happened in the time since she had furiously stomped upstairs, something that had unsettled her and had her convinced that she was in the presence of something evil intent on doing her harm. It didn't matter how she came by such knowledge. My mind had already bypassed all rational thought and was now focused on an achingly familiar sight; that of a woman shrinking away from me, crying in terror and pleading for mercy.

I began pacing back and forth as she continued to whimper on the sofa. I needed to channel my energy into something else, and soon, before I lost my temper.

"I didn't know," she sobbed, her eyes darting frantically around the parlor. "I didn't know anything about you until after I left the cellars. If I'd known that was the ring you gave to Christine, I would have never picked it up in the first place!"

I whipped around to face her.

"How do you know that?" I demanded vehemently, even though I knew she couldn't hear me. My insides twisted with years of repressed aggression and longing upon hearing that name spoken aloud. The grip I had on my emotions snapped like a weathered piece of rope, severing the last of my restraint. Without thinking I surged forward, looming over her as I bellowed, "How do you know her name?!"

XXX

I watched, horrified, as the shadows around the room shifted. All of a sudden, a black shape materialized out of thin air and seconds later the outline of my ghost appeared before me. His form, while still transparent enough that I could see the furniture behind him, spun around, the movement causing the long, black cloak he wore to swirl around him. When he turned I was immediately drawn to the golden eyes that glared at me from behind a black mask. My next impression was of how tall and slender he was. I clocked in around five-seven and he towered over me by at least four to five inches.

I was only afforded the briefest of glimpses before he rushed toward me. Something about the way his fists were clenched at his sides, and the set of his jaw filled me absolute terror. Before I even knew what was happening, he was right above me.

"How do you know that?" the ghost shouted in a terrible, booming voice. "How do you know her name?!"

"Stop!" I screamed. I slid off the sofa and crumpled to the ground. Curling into a ball, I covered my head with my arms. "Y-you showed up in one of the…the pictures I took earlier. Once I discovered it was you, it wasn't hard to figure the rest out."

"No one knows who Erik is!" he raged. "Everyone who knew Erik is dead! So how is it you know about Erik?!"

"The book, from the book! Oh, god, I'm sorry," I stuttered, trying to make myself as small as possible. "I read about you and Christine in the book—"

I froze, and the rest of the explanation died on my tongue. My head reared up at the same time that the ghost recoiled and took a step back. Those strange, glowing eyes cut to mine in search of answers and widened when our gazes locked. The spark of acknowledgement, of realization, sizzled between us. As we stared at each other it felt as if a white-hot bolt of electricity arced from his body to mine, and it was apparent from the look of utter disbelief dancing across those amber orbs that he was just as shocked as I was.

A thousand questions exploded in my mind all at once. What just happened? Was I really seeing this, or was it just some sort of alcohol induced hallucination? And if it wasn't, then why, after a week of torment, could I suddenly see and hear him now? Was this the gift that Danica told me I had—that I could talk to the spirits? Why just this ghost, then? If I truly was medium, shouldn't this have happened before now? Wouldn't I be able to walk out my front door and find and start conversations with all the other ghosts in the world?

The whole thought process probably took less than thirty seconds, but by the time my brain had finally made the connection with my mouth, his figure had vanished.

I wasn't waiting to find out whether or not he still lingered in the room with me. I jumped to my feet and ran into my office-slash-formal dining room and yanking open the laptop that sat on the small freestanding computer desk.

In all the books, movies, and TV shows I'd read or seen that had to do with hauntings, the number one way to get a ghost to stop was to give it what it wanted. So maybe if I returned the ring to where I found it, it would loosen to the point I could get it off my finger and he would be happy and leave me alone.

Opening up the internet browser, I quickly navigated to the travel website I'd used to book my vacation to Europe. Then I typed Paris, France in the destination field and hit enter. I didn't need to stay long. After all, I wasn't sight-seeing or anything like that. I just needed to land, get to the Opera House, hopefully put the ring back in the cellars, and fly home.

The little 'busy' icon circled around, indicating that the program was thinking and tabulating the results. I tapped my fingernails against the computer's housing impatiently. Finally, the page loaded and the list of available flights populated the screen.

My heart sunk.

"You've got to be freaking kidding me," I moaned.

The prices it was showing me were almost as much as my entire vacation! It had cost me around twenty-five-hundred dollars to book my trip to Europe seven months ago, and that had included airfare. So naturally, I thought a quick trip to Paris and back—three days at most—would have been substantially cheaper.

Boy, was I wrong.

Even if I went with the least expensive flight option, I'd still be paying around eighteen-hundred dollars, and that was with an airline that was notorious for reportedly bad customer service, high baggage fees, and small, uncomfortable seats. I would willingly put up with all that hassle in a heartbeat if it meant freeing myself of the ghost, but there was no way I could come up with that kind of money. If I scrimped and saved every extra cent from each paycheck and only spent the bare minimum, it would still take me at least six months to be able to afford to go.

I slammed the lid of my laptop in disgust.

Now what was I going to do?

Was I condemned to be haunted by the Opera Ghost forever? Danica was wrong. There was no talking to him. Helping him was impossible when any attempt I'd made was met with a ferocious temper. It was clear he didn't want my help. Would I always be forced to live in fear, afraid that the next time we had a confrontation he might actually do something that caused me harm?

How had one good deed, which seemed so selfless and noble at the time, turned in to such a nightmare? Why was I being punished?

I pulled my legs up so that my heels rested on the edge of the chair. Wrapping my arms around my knees I buried my face against my thighs, and, for what seemed like the hundredth time that week, began to cry.

Poor Christine! She's a strong gal, but everyone has their breaking point and I think she just found hers. And Erik. Woah. He got a bit dark there.

I'd really appreciate your feedback on this one. If you get a chance, please leave a review or PM me and tell me what you thought.

Thanks everyone!

~Jamie