Adult-FanFiction.org : Books

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.

Chapter List
- 17
- 18
- 19
Chapter Eighteen

The following morning had been one of the best in my life. What could have made me more joyful than waking up next to the man I loved, who also was the man who loved me? We had exchanged the first sleepy kisses, which had quickly grown anything but sleepy. Then we had even had breakfast together, talking and joking. The atmosphere had been wonderfully relaxed. None of the momentary tension of the previous night had still been there.

If it had been for me, I wouldn’t have left his house at all. Yet somewhen in the middle of breakfast, I had remembered that my sisters and their husbands would come to eat lunch with my brother and me today. I couldn’t have possibly missed it. After all, it had been arranged by my sister Sophie as a way to cheer me up after the funeral. Since she had far more respect for my feelings than Philippe, there would be no nice girl from the neighbourhood present this time. That was at least a small comfort.

Saying goodbye to Erik had been terrible.

“You’ll only be gone for a few hours, not a year,” he had reminded me gruffly, as I had hardly been able to hold back tears, but I had sensed the sadness behind the indifferent façade. We had exchanged a lot of long kisses, and even now, as I walked back to my home, I could still feel his lips on mine. If I had known how fantastic it was to kiss him, I’d have tried it much sooner. He’d have probably killed me for my insolence, but it would have been worth it. I smiled to myself. After a morning like this, not even the thought of death by the hands of Erik could scare me.

The gates stood open when I reached the estate, which was a clear sign that my sisters were already there or at least that they’d arrive any moment. The servant standing outside confirmed my assumption.

“Ah, M. le Vicomte!” he greeted me, bowing deeply. “I’ve just had the pleasure of welcoming your sisters. They arrived within minutes of each other.”

“Good,” I muttered, not sure what else to say. “I’ll go in then, too…”

The servant nodded and started closing the gates behind me, while I made my way to the house, walking much more slowly than I’d have usually done. I didn’t want to meet all my siblings at the same time, in case Philippe made a comment on why I hadn’t come home last night. It would be better to see them already sitting at the table, distracted by the food.

At the first glance, my plan seemed to work, for the entrance door was closed as I approached it. I pulled the key out of my pocket and inserted it into the lock. Opening the door, I stepped into the corridor quietly. Perhaps the servants were the only ones who had noticed that I hadn’t come home. If I was lucky, my brother had been out as well last night and hadn’t bothered looking into my room when he had come back. In that case I could slip into my room, change my clothes, come back down and pretend I had still been sleeping.

My hope was crushed when I turned around to the coatrack behind the door. Philippe was leaning against it, the expression on his face triumphant.

“Ah, it’s the Prodigal Son!” he remarked. “Have you found your way home at last? And just in time for lunch – how very considerate of you! So… where have you been?”

“That’s none of your business,” I snapped. I could have kicked myself. Had I seriously expected him to miss a chance to taunt me? “Have you ever heard of privacy?”

“Yes, but I never liked it,” he gave back lazily. “Besides, I always tell you where I spent the night…”

“…even though I never want to hear it,” I finished his sentence. “And even if you didn’t tell me, it wouldn’t make any difference. Anyone in the street would be able to tell me about Comte Philippe’s latest escapades.”

My brother placed a hand on his chest in an exaggerated gesture.

“You’re hurting my feelings, Raoul,” he complained, making a face. Then he smiled again. “But you won’t distract me. Where have you been? Or would you rather have me take a guess?” He pushed himself away from the coatrack and walked around me. “Let’s see…” he muttered. “Dishevelled hair… untidy clothes… and that unmistakable huge grin on your face when you came in. There’s just one explanation: You’ve finally done it!”

“No!” I protested instantly. “I didn’t do anything. I… I…” My voice trailed off as I squirmed under my brother’s gaze. I simply couldn’t come up with a good excuse as long as he was staring at me like that.

“Oooh,” he made, giving me a knowing smile. “Now I understand. It didn’t work, did it? You were… unable to perform.” He gave the last word a delicate little stress that made me want to slap him. “But Raoul!” he went on, shaking his head. “That really shouldn’t happen to a man as young as you. It certainly never happened to me… on the contrary! But let’s not get into that now. After all, I don’t want to make you jealous.” I snorted. “What was the problem?” he asked in a would-be sympathetic voice. “Was the girl so ugly that you didn’t get aroused? You should have taken Cecile while you still had the chance to. Maybe I’ll invite her again tomorrow. Or was it just the other way round? Were you so excited that you came too soon? Did the girl laugh at you? Or – ?”

“Stop!” I cried. It was enough. Up to now I had been too shocked to react, but the last part had hurt my male pride too much to bear it silently. I had not been with someone ugly, at least not from my point of view. And I had not come too soon. I had come just at the right moments. How did my brother dare assume such things about me? And how did he dare address me in that way, as if I were a little boy who had done something wrong? I knew he only wanted to talk about this topic because he seized every chance to brag about his legendary success with women. He didn’t care at all about what had happened to me. “None of what you said is true,” I continued. “And even if it were true, you’d be the last person I’d tell about it.”

“Temper, temper!” he chided me, smirking. “Or would you like to discuss the subject with our sisters and their husbands present? If you go on shouting like this, they’ll come running sooner or later, demanding explanations. And do you really want that?”

I said nothing, knowing that he was right and hating it. The dining room was far away from the entrance hall, in the part of the building overlooking the garden, so the chances that someone heard us were remote. Still I didn’t want to take any risks. My sisters, especially Sophie, had always had a very good sensor for detecting arguments between us brothers.

“I’ll go to my room now,” I announced with as much dignity as I had left. “I’ll be with you in a quarter of an hour’s time.”

“And make sure you do something about your hair!” Philippe called after me as I ascended the stairs. “It looks as if you had spent the night hanging upside-down in a cave!” He always had to have the last word.

Ten minutes later I walked down the corridor to the dining room. Although I had hurried very much, I had hardly managed to wash myself, change my clothes and comb my hair, which had truly looked rather untidy. This had been due to the fact that I had yet to find a mirror in Erik’s house. He surely possessed one – how else was he able to shave? Yet I hadn’t dared ask him, but simply combed my hair with my fingers.

Anyway, I looked immaculate now. My black trousers didn’t have the slightest crease, and the pale blue shirt had exactly the same colour as my eyes. My sisters would like it. So would Erik. He was a man who noticed such details. Only a few short hours till I’d see him again… I could hardly wait. But first I had to survive lunch with my siblings. Well, maybe it wouldn’t be too bad. At least the presence of my sisters would keep Philippe from talking about my love life… or so I hoped.

Approaching the dining room, I ran my hands over my shirt one last time, took a deep breath and opened the door. At once, everyone stopped talking and looked at me. For a few moments, I simply stood there, letting my gaze wander over the people assembled at the table.

My brother sat at the head of the table, the expression on his face self-assured as usual. My sisters were on either side of him. Sophie, the oldest, gave me a warm smile. From an old painting of our family I knew that she looked a lot like my mother, and her smile always had a motherly character. My sister Clarille’s smile was just as warm… and very contagious. She had the same blue eyes and blond hair I had. In our childhood we had loved playing a game in which we had been twins and Sophie had been our mother. Philippe was the only one who had inherited our father’s appearance, ´the only one who looks like a man´, as he put it.

Each of my sisters was seated next to her husband. Richard, Sophie’s husband, was easily the oldest of the group. He threw me a questioning glance, raising his eyebrows slightly. It was his way of saying that he’d be interested in an explanation for me being late, but he wouldn’t mind not getting one either. He was a professor for ancient languages and just couldn’t find too much interest for such mundane matters. It was good that Sophie was a very practical woman, for he certainly wasn’t a lot of help with every-day problems.

Alexandre, on the other hand, smiled at me brightly. Clarille and he were made for each other. Not only were they both passioante about art and horseback-riding, even their smiles looked very much alike, for they had the same honest faces.

“We thought you wouldn’t join us at all,” he said, after I had bid everyone welcome and settled down, opposite Philippe.

“Well, I was… going for a walk and must have lost track of time,” I told them. It wasn’t even a lie. I had indeed been for a walk… yesterday afternoon. Yet as long as nobody asked when I had left the house, they would never know that. The only one who could tell them the full truth was my brother. I threw him a warning glance, which he returned unflichingly. I should have known he hadn’t forgiven me for not telling him where had spent the night.

“Yes, it’s easy to lose track of time,” he remarked. The expression on his face reminded me of a cat, ready to pounce on a mouse. “Especially if one’s busy with – “

“The soup, Mesdames and Messieurs!” I had never been so happy about seing our cook before. She marched into the room with a large pot in her hands and started filling the plates in front of us with soup. I could have kissed her. She had spared me a lot of embarrassment.

It was custom in our family not to talk during the meal. My father had always done it like that, and even years after his death, we didn’t dare change it. Philippe sometimes made exceptions, especially when he was entertaining a girl, but when all siblings were together, the only remarks that were exchanged every now and then were about the quality of the food. Usually I found the silence oppressive after a while, but today I cherished it.

The only part of the meal I was dreading was the coffeee afterwards, which we always took in the sitting room. We usually sat there in two groups, the men and the women, and I already knew that my brother would tease me again for rather being with my sisters. But then, I’d have rather sat down with a hungry lion than with him.

Yet this time, it turned out that I didn’t have another choice than going with him. The moment we got up from the table, he came over to me and seized my sleeve, gently steering me out of the room.

“No, no, little brother,” he whispered. “For once you’ll sit with the men.”

I wanted to protest, but the words didn’t leave my mouth. I hated drawing too much attention to me, which would have doubtlessly happened if I had raised my voice. So I remained silent once more, fuming inwardly. Why could my brother never just leave me in peace?

My sisters threw me questioning glances as I settled down next to Philippe in the sitting room instead of choosing my usual seat at the window. Yet they didn’t say anything either. Philippe was the oldest son. He could still tell us what to do.

After just a few moments, we were joined by Richard and Alexandre.

“How is your business going?” Richard asked my brother. He didn’t seem to be too interested in the answer, but Philippe had never been one to be distracted by a lack of enthusiasm. It would have interfered with his overwhelming urge to talk about himself.

“It’s simply splendid,” he replied. “Only yesterday I managed to…”

I stopped listening properly almost instantly, knowing only too well that my brother didn’t need more than the occasional ´I see.´ and ´Really?´ to go on for at least half an hour. It was dull, but better than the alternative. Every minute I didn’t have to talk to him was a good minute. I let myself sink into my own personal dreamworld, in which there was nothing but Erik, me and a very comfortable bed. It was a wonderful place, full of whispered conversations and tender caresses. It was a place of love.

“Aren’t you listening?”

A hand came out of nowhere, grabbed my forearm and pulled it away from under my chin. I fell forwards and straightened up hastily, massaging my neck, which felt as if it had just snapped in half.

“It isn’t polite not to listen when someone tells a story,” my brother went on.

I felt like saying ´And it’s even less polite to tell a story when no one wants to hear it´, but the journey into my dreamworld had made me rather peaceful.

“Go on then,” I muttered.

“Right,” Philippe said. “I was just about to reach the truly interesting part of the story… So I met this Comte de Matoine, and we were talking about business and seemed to agree about most aspects. So I asked him to come to dinner one of these days and bring his wife with him if he wanted to, but he told me he wasn’t married. That made me a little suspicious, for he’s almost forty years old and should have found a wife by now, even though he’s not that good-looking.” He flicked back a strand of his hair, causing in me the urgent wish to part with my lunch. “Anyway, I asked around and found out that…” He made a dramatic pause before finally revealing: “… he prefers the company of men!”.

It was very unfortunate that I had just taken a sip of coffee, for it went down the wrong way, and I started coughing. Alexandre gave me a few hearty pats on the back, which nearly sent me tumbling to the floor. I could only hope that he was more careful with my sister.

“It’s all right,” I assured him hastily. His enthusiasm was nice, but it could become a little annoying every now and then.

My brother, on the other hand, looked positively delighted that I had shown such a strong reaction.

“I know you’ve probably never heard of that… phenomenon, but it exists,” he told me.

“But surely not in our circles… right?” Alexandre asked uncertainly. “I mean, I’ve heard about such things among sailors who… well, who don’t see a woman for months on their journeys… But here in Paris? In the aristocracy?”

“Such ways of living have always existed,” Richard informed us in his slow voice. Unlike Alexandre and me, he did not look shocked. He had the rare ability to regard everything he heard as a purely academic matter. “They were well-established in Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece… we even have proof of such things happening in countries such as India and Persia.”

Remembering the manuscript that I had bought in the book shop, the manuscript that I had picked up again on my way out of the opera and that was lying in my room now, I looked down, afraid someone could notice me blush.

Meanwhile, Richard went on:

“Even the great Dante mentions them in his ´Divine Comedy´. Sodomites are kept in the seventh circle of Hell, forced to walk around in a desert of burning sand, with flakes of fire raining down onto them. ´Oh figliuol,´ disse. ´Qual di questa greggia s’arresta punto, giace poi cent’anni senz’arrostarsi quando ‘l foco il feggia. Però va oltre: I’ verrò a’ panni; e poi rigiugnerò la mia masnada, che van piangendo i suoi etterni danni.´.

He paused, noticing at last that we were staring at him blankly. Even I had looked up again. I spoke a little Italian, but not enough to translate a passage I had only heard once. My English had always been better than my Italian.

“Could you perhaps repeat that in a language all of us understand?” Alexandre finally asked.

“Oh,” Richard made, shaking his head slightly, as if puzzled that not everyone spoke Italian as fluently as he did. “Of course. ´Oh son,´ he said. ´Whoever of his herd a moment stops, lies then a hundred years, nor fans himself when smitheth him the fire. Therefore go on; I at thy skirts wil come, and afterwards will I rejoin my band, which goes lamenting its eternal doom.´”

“Erm… nice,” my brother commented. He had never had a liking for poetry.

“What a terrible punishment,” Alexandre muttered. “Fire… walking around forever without pause… eternal doom…”

“Well, it’s their own fault,” Philippe said. “Did anyone force them to do those things with men? No! They must have been insane. I mean… who’d do that with men as long as there are enough women around? Even an ugly woman would be better than that…” He threw me a sideways glance and winked. Then he continued: “I once heard what they do together. Did you know they even lie with each other, like a man and a woman? It’s digusting.”.

He talked and talked, but the pounding of blood in my ears was so loud that I no longer heard him. It took me all my willpower not to jump up and run out of the room. Yet I knew that if I left now, I’d only made them suspicious.

I felt sick to my stomach. Apart from a few small doubts at the beginning of my meetings with Erik, I had never thought about society’s opinion of people such as ourselves. Until now. Was it abnormal what we were doing? Was it disgusting? Would we go to Hell?

Author’s note: The passage Richard quotes is from Canto 15 of Dante’s “Divine Comedy”. I used the Longfellow translation for the English part.
- 17
- 18
- 19
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Emptiness