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Emptiness	By : Josephine1881 Category: M through R > The Phantom of the Opera > Slash Views: 8257 -:- 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.

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Chapter Sixteen

For several minutes, there was silence. Erik seemed to think about how to start his story, and I didn’t want to disturb him. Besides, I enjoyed simply lying there, feeling his body next to mine. It was a feeling that was slowly growing familiar, but that didn’t mean it was boring. On the contrary: Every time his hand touched mine, a shiver ran down my spine.

“My father was a lucky man,” he finally began in a matter-of-fact voice.

“Why? Did he have a loving wife, a big family and a lot of money?” I asked, enumerating a few things that were commonly regarded as signs of luck.

He shook his head.

“When I say he was lucky,” he replied, his voice growing bitter. “I mean that he was spared the sight of me. He died before I was born.”

I sensed that the usual phrases of ´I’m sorry´ would have been inappropriate, so I didn’t say anything.

After a moment, he went on:

“My mother despised me right from the beginning. Among other reasons, she never forgave me for not looking like her late husband. It must have been nice for her when she was with child, sitting there and imagining that if she gave birth to a boy, he’d grow up to be exactly like the man she had lost. Well, that wish didn’t come true. I looked nothing like him… or like her, for that matter. I don’t think I look like anything anyone had ever seen. I grew up in a village, you know, and rumours about my appearance spread fast. Everyone was keen on getting a good look at me. I suppose they enjoyed looking down at me, with the safe knowledge that no matter what flaws their own children had, at least they weren’t that ugly.”.

He gave me another moment to take in what he had said, then he continued his tale.

“Do you know why I had to wear a mask? No, it was not to protect me from the neighbours’ prying gaze. My mother simply couldn’t stand the sight of me.”

“Do you mean that you had to wear a mask all the time, not only when you went outside or when guests came to your house?” I asked incredulously.

“Guests?” he spat. “I wasn’t allowed to be around when my mother had guests – not that it happened too often. I was always locked in my room at such occasions. And to answer your question: Yes, I had to wear it all the time. I don’t think my mother would have cared whether wore anything else, but she insisted on the mask. Not once did she look at me without revulsion. There were other people who were nice to me because they pitied me, one of her friends and the local priest, but that helped neither her nor me. My mother was trapped in our house, with me, the bane of her life. The more she longed to break free, the more I held her back. It almost drove her insane. When I realised what I was doing to her… I left.”

It took me a few moments to notice that the story was over. There were many questions on my mind, and I settled for the most innocous one.

“Why can you still remember all that so well?”

“Years after I had left the village, I came back one last time,” he replied. “I met Marie, my mother’s friend, and she helped me fill the gaps and see connections I couldn’t have understood as a child.”

“What about your mother?” I asked. “Did she no longer live there?”

“She had died a few days previously,” he answered in a flat voice. “You see, in the end she was lucky as well.”

Now I couldn’t hold myself back anymore. I simply had to say it.

“I’m sorry. I understa-“

“Don’t!” he hissed, his eyes flashing angrily. “Don’t you dare pity me! I don’t need anyone’s pity, least of all yours! And don’t you dare say that you understand me! No one understands me, no one.”

“And you love it that way, don’t you?” I heard myself ask. I didn’t know where I took the courage to do so. Yet now that I had started, I had to go on, as long as Erik was still too stunned to speak. “You love playing the role of the man with the horrible past whom nobody understands. That’s why you don’t even want to let me try.”

“You?” he asked. “You’d be the last to understand me. Your childhood couldn’t have been more different from mine. Surely you were brought up by a loving family who pampered and spoilt you, who fulfilled every wish you had, who always supported you. How could a little prince like you ever know what it means to have a mother who hated her own son?”

“You seem to know more about my family than I do,” I remarked coldly. “But in that case you couldn’t be more wrong. It’s true that my mother loved me, but I never experienced that love. She died giving birth to me.”

“Oh,” he made. That was his only comment.

“And when it comes to parents… my father hated me,” I continued. “He hated me because my birth had killed his wife, and he hated me because I wasn’t the boy he wanted me to be. I was too short, I was too beautiful – too effeminate. He never accepted me. If it hadn’t been for my sisters, I’d have had no idea what love feels like…”

At this point I couldn’t go on. It was as if a heavy weight was pressing onto my chest, suffocating me. But I refused to cry. Erik hadn’t cried either.

“I… I know… your fate is… much worse than mine… but I do think… I can understand you…” I mumbled, gasping for breath. I’d have never believed that speaking a few words could be that difficult.

Wordlessly, he seized my hand and squeezed it lightly. That little display of affection was all it took. I burst into tears. I cried for the lonely boy I had once been, but also for the lonely boy in the mask whom I imagined crouching in a corner, shedding silent tears because his mother didn’t love him. My heart felt as if it would break any moment. I needed something to hold on to, preferrably something soft and warm.

Erik wasn’t exactly soft, but he was warm and he was there. I flung my arms around him and clung to him as if for dear life. Yet I didn’t dare look at him. I knew he disliked both pity and self-pity, so it was just a matter of time till he’d push me away. He had comforted me in the past, but I couldn’t expect him to do so all the time. I was a man, for Heaven’s sake! I had to pull myself together.

Yet when I looked into his eyes to apologise for my childish behaviour, I saw that there were tears trickling down his face as well. At least they were trickling down the left side of his face; I couldn’t tell it with the other half. Confronted with that sight, I abandoned the idea of pulling myself together. Erik was sad, and all that mattered now was comforting him. So I kissed away the tears on his cheek and chin, before my mouth found his almost instinctively.

He returned the kiss with a strange mixture of hunger and affection. It was passionate, but I could feel that he didn’t want us to go any further, at least not now. All he craved was love, and I was more than willing to give him as much of it as I could. We continued kissing and crying till we were too exhausted to go on. Then we simply lay there, as close to each other as possible.

“I had no idea,” Erik muttered. “I had been sure that a boy like you had been raised by the perfect family. This proves that even I can be wrong… though it doesn’t happen too often.” The sarcasm of his statement was lost on me. I was still thinking about the past.

“For years I tried to be the son my father wanted,” I told him softly. “Of course this mostly meant trying to become like my brother. He was a ´real´ boy, as my father called it. He ran around with his friends, getting into fights and coming home bruised, whereas I stayed inside, reading or playing with my sisters. I even tried to fight with Philippe sometimes, but I always lost and ended up hurt. He didn’t show any mercy, just because I was his brother.”

“And once more, I wish he had drowned in Lake Averne,” Erik remarked.

I hardly heard him.

“Years after my father had died, I still tried to behave they way he’d have liked it,” I went on pensively. “And still Philippe is the better son. The way he struts around in our home, the way he treats women – my father would have loved it.” I gave a bitter laugh.

“Who cares?” he commented simply. “Who cares about what your father would have loved? He’s dead, Raoul. There’s no point in trying to please a dead person. And even if he were alive… You’re no longer a child. You have your own standards, your own way of living. Of course it’s different from that of your brother, but that’s not bad.”

“But I feel so guilty sometimes!” I cried. “I wonder whether I should have tried harder to be a good son. Maybe he’d have loved me then…”

Erik looked at me for a long moment, then he shook his head.

“If there’s one thing I’ve learned from my childhood, it’s that if your parents don’t love you – or rather, if they’re determined not to show it – they won’t do so, no matter how hard you try,” he said in a low voice. “I was a good son. I was pious, I studied hard, even though I never went to school… but all that effort was in vain because I couldn’t change my appearance into anything resembling a human face. When I realised that, I stopped being a good son.”

I nuzzled his shoudler affectionately.

“I’m sure that, deep down, your mother did love you,” I whispered. “Perhaps she just couldn’t show it.”

“I don’t think that’s very likely,” he gave back slowly. “But thank you for trying to comfort me. I’ve found peace. I no longer need the illusion of a loving mother.”

I didn’t remind him of the tears he had shed just a few minutes before because of his mother. He hadn’t appeared to have found peace with his past. But if he wanted to pretend it hadn’t happened, it was fine with me.

“It is you I pity,” he went on. “You don’t deserve having had such a childhood. I’m sure you were a very lovable little boy. I, on the other hand…” He sighed. “I should have been grateful for what I had, a roof over my head and enough to eat, instead of demanding more. Love! A monster such as me doesn’t deserve being loved.”

“That is not true,” I stressed. “Everyone deserves to be loved. It has nothing to do with what people look like.”

“Oh, spare me the sermon!” Erik said, but he sounded weary rather than angry. “It’s a wonderful hypothesis they’ve probably taught you in church, but you know as well as I do it doesn’t work like that. My mother didn’t love me, Christine didn’t love me, and … Never mind. No amount of nice words can change that. It’s just the way it is.”

If he thought that I was impressed by his determined manner of speaking, he was wrong. The more often he told me that no one loved him, the harder I tried to find arguments against it… even if it meant saying things that hurt me.

“Christine did love you,” I told him quietly. “She didn’t love you the way you wanted her to, but there were feelings on her side as well. You were her friend, her teacher, her protector. Do you really think that would have been possible without any kind of emotional bond? You must have felt it, because even I did. Sometimes I thought there was a part of her soul which I’d never gain access to. Only you could…” I swallowed hard, fighting back a fresh wave of tears. I wanted to make him understand what I was saying, and that was much harder if I cried while doing it.

“Why did she never come to see me then?” he asked, and juding by the sound of his voice, he was holding back tears as well. “I waited for her…”

“She was afraid,” I replied. “Afraid that you might have been angry at her, afraid that you might have tried to make her stay… and also afraid of the feelings that might have welled up inside her or you. She didn’t want to raise your hopes. We’ve talked a lot about it, you know. Maybe… if she’d have had more time… she’d have visisted you in the end…”

“But we’ll never know that,” Erik uttered what I had been thinking as well. “And even if she loved me, in one way or another… she’s gone now. She’s dead and buried. The only person to love me is dead – how fitting. After all, I’ve been told that I look like a walking corpse.” His fingers danced across the shining white surface of the mask, which truly looked a little skull-like in the candle light.

I had never heard a man speak about himself with such disdain. It hurt me, deep in my heart. I didn’t want Erik to think that we wasn’t loved by anyone, because… It took me a moment to understand what that pain meant, but when I did, I smiled. I straightened up and looked into his eyes. This one time, I didn’t want to miss his reaction.

“I love you, Erik,” I whispered.

Author’s note: As you’ve probably noticed, I’ve taken over Erik’s past the way it is told in Susan Kay’s book, whereas Raoul’s past is more Leroux-like. I hope I’ve made both aspects clear, also for those of you who are not familiar with both versions.
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Emptiness