Your Voice

Chapter 4

Christine
10 months later

"Raoul, darling, don't shout in front of Gustave!" I cradled the screaming child in my arms while calling out a futile request.

"Dammit, woman, who owns the house! I AM IN CHARGE!" In a furious rage, he violently smashes the bottle of beer onto the floor and looks up at me with flaming, drunken eyes.

"Raoul, please, I only reason why I'm not home often is because I have to sing! We need the money!" Crying, tired and desperate to calm him down, I try to embrace him, only to recieve a tight slap across my cheek.

"Do you think I am stupid?! Don't you try to butter me up, you're still a worthless, unfaithful woman!" Gustave, barely two months of age, was crying and squirming in my arms. I couldn't put him down; Raoul might hurt him. The side of my face stung, but not as painfully as my heart did. My heart broke to think that the child wasn't even his, and the innocent darling had to endure the wrath of my childhood sweetheart. If Little Lotte wasn't so caught up in her thoughts of everything and nothing, she would have seen past the beautiful exterior and into the malicious soul of the Viscount de Chagny.

I fled from the scene with my baby, tired of explaining countless times to Raoul that I was not wasting our money on dresses. His drinking problem cost a lot - our earnings and the family's relationship. I hurriedly wrapped Gustave in a baby blanket, myself in my hooded cloak, and scurried into the carriage.

"Madame Giry's." I tell the driver, passing him two silver pieces. I breathe short, jagged breaths and try to shush Gustave. Although my eyes were brimmed with tears, I smiled weakly and looked at my child. He very obviously had Erik's dark eyes, which were questioned by Raoul but I lied that my grandmother had those eyes. I saw so much potential in him, and I couldn't let a man like Raoul take that away.

Look with your heart

And not with your eyes

the heart can't be fooled

the heart is too wise...

I trailed off; I couldn't bear to finish the lullaby. I know that my heart was fooled. I wish I never agreed to marry Raoul. I had thought that before, but I always told myself to perservere. I snapped back in that house. Luckily, Gustave had stopped crying, and I kissed his forehead.

Madame Giry greeted me as soon as I stepped out of the carriage. My tears rose up once more, and Meg - who was standing next to her - carried the sleeping baby out of my arms and into their house.

"Christine! What happened to your face?" she gently touches the painful side of my face, and her hand comes away wet with blood; Raoul probably used the broken glass. "Come inside, come inside, it's cold. Meg! Boil some water!"

I sat on one of the stools in the kitchen. Meg wipes my face with a damp cloth, while Madame Giry urges me to tell her what happened.

"It was Raoul, he said I spent way too much money and said I left home too often... he's spending all the money on his alcohol, and I have to leave the house to sing extra shows to earn enough to support all of us..." I looked over at Gustave, who was asleep in a makeshift crib of pillows and a large basket. "Madame, he's not as he used to be! He's no longer the boy who ran into the sea to get my scarf, he's-" I break down and cry my eyes out. Meg puts an arm around me, and out of the corner of my eye, I notice them exchange a glance. After crying for about half an hour, I fall asleep.

Erik

"What do you want, Giry?" I lamely inquire as I lay on my bed, staring into nothing.

"Christine is in my home." She announces after sighing heavily. A bit too eagerly, I sit up, but then reminded myself that I could never see her again; how angry will she be at the fact that I left? Nevertheless, I need to see her, I need her voice in my ears once more! I miss her bright eyes, her warm touch, and her inhuman voice. My heart won over all sense of control. "Can I see her?" I stood bolt upright.

"No," Madame Giry tells me reluctantly, "to keep the mobs from finding you - they were very close to searching this opera house - Meg and I told the press that you were dead, and paid someone to bury someone else under your name."

I wasn't angry, I wasn't one bit. I understand that she did it to protect me, as she has done all these years. But Christine... she was barely one block away from me, and yet she seemed worlds away. Crouching back onto the bed where she slept that night, I felt that empty, depressing feeling that had been relieved for a brief second. On the rare occasion of me going to sleep, I swear I could feel her warmth and tenderness when I reached out to the other side of the bed. I couldn't hide from her forever - I'd go mental. One day, I shall reveal myself to her, to apologize for leaving on that night. If I ever gather up the courage to meet her eyes.

I continued to stare blankly at nothing, and Madame Giry left me to it. It was as if a knife had been driven through my weak, brittle heart, and it would remain there until I heard her again.

Wishing I could hear your voice again

Knowing that I never would

I forced myself to eat something, and then I composed another rubbish song for Meg to sing at tonight's show. In a rush, I knocked down the bottle of ink, which rolled over to a box in a corner. That box... it was mahogany, and it had the initials C.D carved on the lid, for I think you can guess who. Nostalgic, I opened the box and rummaged through it's contents. Wads of sheet music: the music she sung - Think Of Me, The Point of No Return from Don Juan Triumphant - and the melodies that I never heard out of her mouth. I didn't realize I was crying until a tear spattered on the unsung notes. Frustrated with myself, I crumpled up the pieces, along with a dried red rose I kept in the box. Bits of the rose fell slowly to the ground as it did on the rooftop of the Opera Populaire lifetimes ago.

Christine

I was alone at the Girys'; Meg had rehearsal at the opera house and Madame Giry had to train a new batch of ballerinas. Gustave had been left a little rag doll by Meg, which he was beginning to grow very fond of. Tired, I sat at the window of the lounge on a way-too-soft purple armchair, a deep longing for Erik burning in my stomach. The baby started to wail. I got up and attended to his needs; he was hungry. While making him some food, I realized that little Gustave would never see his father - his true father. A smiling Erik was playing with the baby in my imagination, and I imagined him playing his child countless symphonies and singing lullabies. I proceeded back to my seat, taking a daily paper from the table as I did so, hoping it would distract me. All it did was worsen my pain.

BREAKING NEWS: OPERA GHOST DEAD AND BURIED

The Phantom of the Opera aka Erik Destler, the 'ghost' that supposedly haunted the Opera Populaire was found dead by Madame Giry on the stage when she and her ballerinas came in to rehearse...

I didn't feel anything, only numbness, and a sharp pain in my throat, like I just swallowed millions of tiny blades. Only when the pain ached for a while did I realize I was screaming. ERIK! Did he kill himself: hanged himself on the stage to imitate the murder of Joseph Buqet? Did someone find him? Could it possibly be that someone had followed me when I found him that night? Did Raoul find him? The thought of him being able to kill the Phantom of the Opera made me tremble. Paranoid and grieving, I stumbled into the kitchen, retrieving Gustave, and holding him as I fell into a corner and cried out helplessly for Erik. Now I could never find him and Gustave would never meet his real father.

We had such hopes and now those hopes are shattered