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The Silent Wish	By : LaurieBaker Category: M through R > The Phantom of the Opera > Het Views: 14629 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own The Phantom of the Opera, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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The weeks went by slowly.

Erik composed his music with more manic intensity than ever before. He did not mind working so hard that he would not eat or sleep. For when he ate, he recalled the memory of Aurora placing a sweet cake between his lips. When he slept, he would reach across his bed, yearning for her to be there. He did not care to go out. He did not care to attend the opera. Writing his music was the only drug to numb the misery of her absence.

He was outraged when the local papers announced the news of the engagement between Aurora Sorelli and the Baron Basil von Rothsberg. Why didn’t that man die at the end of his rope like he was supposed to? If only he had not been so foolishly drunk…

As he scribbled some musical notes upon the parchment, he heard a soft stirring noise.

Quickly, Erik arose to his feet with all of the agility of a large cat. Stalking about his lair, that was when he saw her. The figure of a cloaked woman sitting still upon his boat across the lake.

Aurora had come back to him! She had come to throw herself at his mercy, begging him to rescue her from the Baron. And he would agree, but he would suggest that they had to get married. After all, he had taken shameful advantage of her innocence. And if their relationship was to continue, it would only be proper and honorable as man and wife.

As he made his way across the alternate route to where the boat was, his mind raced. Surely, it would not be too difficult to find some parson to marry them. He could send Madame Giry out to find such a man, someone respectable enough to be of value but not adverse to a little corruption if his palms were greased enough. And he should have to get his finances in order, for a woman like Aurora would need for all sorts of feminine accoutrements to make her life underground more to her taste. Perhaps, he would even go shopping a bit. He would buy her expensive lingerie that would cling to her figure so enticingly that he would passionately rip the garments off of her violently before taking her. Then he would have to go out and purchase more seductive underwear for her.

Trying to ignore the hard excitement in his pants, he quickened his pace. True, he had not expected to become a married man quite so soon. But the idea definitely had its appeal. He did not want for money. His ‘salary’ payments from the Opera Populaire over the years had been nicely stored away where the authorities could not find them. He was more than capable of supporting a wife…and children. Oh, yes, he wanted a baby to love, a small creature who would need him and not know enough to fear him. And his child would have more toys than Santa Claus…not just a music box for a sole companion.

At last, he was at the bank of the lake where the boat was.

He reached out for the hooded figure swathed in a blue cape, wanting to pull her close and smother her with kisses.

At the feel of his intense grasp upon her shoulder, the woman shrieked and turned to face him with wide eyes of brown, not blue.

Erik reeled back from the woman in shock.

“Christine!”

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The Vicomtesse de Chagny felt as if she were losing her mind.

Ever since the accounts in the papers of the Phantom’s attack on the Baron von Rothsberg, she had not been herself. She should have been relieved that Erik had not died miserable and alone in the catacombs after she had left him. Even if he was still a violent man, at least she would not have his death on her conscience.

But she hated him for opening up those old wounds that she had tried so hard to heal.

Everything had been in order and in place. Although she had not quite won the approval of all of Raoul’s family, she was making more progress as the months went by. She spent days in the sunshine, laughing with her husband as if they were still children together. She spent her evenings letting him make love to her, blissfully content in his adoration.

And yet, in the dark of night when all was silent, the Phantom of the Opera haunted her.

She would dream of the masked man who had longed for her so intensely for so long. His angelic voice would sing to her in her sleep. He would stroke her hair like her loving father used to, making her feel so loved and safe. He would make her find the best in herself, helping her reach heights of perfection beyond her wildest imaginings. He was her dearest friend, saving her from grief and loneliness.

But there were also nightmares.

She would suffer visions of his cold eyes and violent rages. Trapped in her nightmares, he would rip off her wedding gown and take her like an animal upon the cold hard ground. With his brute strength, her struggles against him would be useless. Even if she could not fight his body, she tried to ward him off with her mind, unwilling to accept his caresses as anything more than manhandling. And yet, even then she could not win, for his voice and hands were everywhere upon her…stroking and teasing and tormenting her until she had to give in. He would assault her with pleasure again and again, making her sob helplessly with the intensity of it. And he did not want just her body. He did not want just her compassion. He wanted her love and her soul and her heart and her mind. He wanted her total submission to his will to such a degree that she no longer was herself.

She would wake up in a drenched sweat, panting as if she had been running a long distance. And her womb would ache desperately and clench hungrily in frustration. Her husband sometimes would hold her and soothe her from her nightmares. But even then, her agony only increased for Raoul’s touch would only feed the flames of her desire for another man. And she was much too embarrassed to demand that he take her right then and there, hard and fast, pounding away at her until the endless forbidden craving had subsided from her body.

So the need remained and festered and grew. And now that she knew that the Phantom was still alive, she somehow had to exorcise his ghost.

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The silence between them was interminable.

“Come,” he said at last, offering her his hand. “It is not safe for us here. Too many people know about this place.”

Erik led her along the alternate routes until they reached his lair.

“Why are you here, Christine?”

“I had thought you dead, Erik!” she cried out. “Everyone had thought so. And then when I read about the attack on the Baron…that they thought that you were involved…I knew I had to see you again.”

“Why?”

At his perfectly reasonable question, she paled, her eyes wide with dismay.

Christine de Chagny was still as beautiful as ever, so lovely that she broke his heart. Her voice was still as clear and light as an angel’s. Her features were still as delicate as a porcelain doll’s. Her figure was still as ethereal and wispy as always.

And he still felt that searing agony in his soul.

Had she always looked at him with such a mixture of desire and fear? He recognized that expression of longing now…the half-closed lids, the glazed expression, the softly parted lips. And yet it was the fear that was so unsettling. Yes, he had deceived her. Yes, he was a murderer. Yes, he was frightening to look at. So why could she not leave him in peace?

“I wanted to know that you were well,” she finally answered.

“Such moving concern,” he said coldly. He hated the sound of his own icy bitter tones. Yet, he could not seem to help himself. “As you see, the rumors of my death were greatly exaggerated.”

“You could have let me know that you were alive,” she chided, sounding as if she were on the verge of tears. “I was so miserable at the thought that you were dead.”

“Would it have made any difference?” he snapped. “Nothing would have changed between us, besides the fact that your conscience would be clear. Would you have even answered my letter if I had sent you one?”

Christine averted her eyes, full well knowing that he was right.

“No,” he answered for her. “You would have tossed the letter aside or packed it away somewhere, smugly content with the knowledge that you were a virtuous woman who had not given her heart away to a monster. Isn’t that right, Christine?”

Her silence was answer enough.

Depression that he had not felt in some time started to hover over him. As long as Christine was determined to be a hypocrite and a coward, their situation would always be a hopeless one. And inwardly he was confused. Where had this harsh vision of his muse materialized from?

She then spotted something at the edge of the pipe organ and blanched to a ghostlike white.

“Oh, now I understand,” she said, her voice becoming as cold as his. “You have moved on.”

Erik was appalled to see that she had spotted Aurora’s sketchbook. There had been one other drawing she had made of them, a simple one of the two of them dressed and clenched in an embrace. It had been his favorite drawing, reminding him of the simplicity and elegance that was Aurora. He kept it out where he could see it whenever he felt too lonely. When Aurora left the book by accident, he rather selfishly held onto it in the hopes that she might return for it. He also excused his actions by telling himself that it would be unsafe for others to possibly see this sketchbook, especially now that she was to be married. At any rate, he had never intended anyone else to see it ever.

“Was I to become a monk after we parted?” he quipped.

“Who is she?” Christine asked sharply. “She looks familiar somehow.”

“I see that you still have no regard for my privacy,” he stated, damned if he would ever reveal Aurora’s identity to her. “You tear off my mask. You inquire about other women in my life. What right have you to such knowledge, Christine? Or should I address you as Vicomtesse?”

She looked as if he had physically struck her.

“None at all,” she said with lowered eyes in a whisper.

Erik hated this. He hated himself when he was like this. He hated wanting her when he could not have her. He hated being ashamed for wanting her. He hated her being ashamed for wanting him. And most of all, he hated knowing that he was the one responsible for the pained look in her eyes.

“You should not have come here, Christine,” Erik replied quietly. “We said our goodbyes long ago.”

Erik remembered how devastated he had been when she had come back that last time, returning for one last goodbye. Even now, he could recall sitting there, listening to the mocking cheerful notes of his music box...his only toy of the ‘carnival years’. After all of his exploits and murders and daring, he was still only that pathetic little boy with just an old toy for a companion. And he wanted to die. Filled with anger and despair, he had smashed his wrists against one of his hated mirrors. Had not Madame Giry found him when she had, he might indeed have died.

And he would have missed out on so much if he had bled to death that night.

Even now, as he looked intently at Christine, he could see his reflection in her eyes. One of pain and disgust and lust and fear and sadness. He knew that he alone was responsible for that. But he could not undo what had been done. The past would always stand between them.

Yet with Aurora, his reflection had been so different. There was lust there certainly. But there was also respect and affection and tenderness and trust…and not for some perceived angel or father, but for him. He liked the man that Aurora saw. He wanted to live up to that image, even if it was somewhat distorted from the truth.

“Erik...I don’t want to say goodbye…please don’t be angry with me…”

Christine reached out to him, pulling his mouth to her own. She shyly touched her tongue to his, silently begging him to respond. Unable to help himself, he tasted of her sweetness. How long had he dreamed of her kissing him just like this? Not out of fear but out of pure need.

Yet something held him back. Someone held him back.

Determined, he pushed the unwanted image out of his mind. He had made no promises or commitments. Now Christine was back, and he would be a fool not to welcome her with open arms. He should take her any way that he could: married or unmarried, willing or unwilling, out of love or out of lust…

But as he plundered her soft mouth with his tongue, he could not have been more surprised. Here he was, at last with the woman that he had dreamed of for so long, yet he pined for another woman…a slight girl with fair hair who smelled of roses. Aurora, goddess of the dawn...

And it frightened him when he realized just how far she had reached into his heart.

“Go home, Christine,” he said resolutely as he pulled himself out of her arms. “If we go any further, you shall become an adulteress and I shall be even more of a blackguard in your eyes than I already am. Go home before you do something that you shall regret the rest of your life.”

“But, Erik...”

“You love that boy, Christine. And you made your choice.”

And I have made mine, Erik thought to himself as he sadly watched Christine flee away from him, making her way back to the daylight above ground.

His choice was Aurora.

And he knew that once more, he had to risk feeling that agonizing pain of rejection all over again. He would not allow himself to be prisoner to his own fears as Christine was to hers. He had to put aside his pride just long enough to know if true happiness would be possible for him.

And he would have to do so before Aurora married the Baron von Rothsberg.
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The Silent Wish