Erik’s heart soared as Christine’s crystalline soprano lifted his words and music upwards to the heavens.
He longed to embrace her, to take her in his arms and make her his. He let the curtain in box five drop down again to shroud his presence there. Gloomily he seated himself in one of the two velvet chairs that were set at the front of the box as this final dress rehearsal ended. Earlier, he had asked Antoinette to deliver a single rose tied with a black ribbon to her dressing room.
“Why don’t you just bring it to her yourself?” Antoinette had scolded him.
“I can’t bear for her to see me and then spurn me. I would rather she imagined me as the angel she thinks I am…”
“Nonsense!” Antoinette replied. “She is not so fragile as you may think. Plus, it is hard for me to keep a secret from Meg; she asks me why I am delivering this one rose to Christine. I can’t tell her because she can’t keep a secret from Christine, so you put me in quite a predicament, Erik.”
“I don’t know, Antoinette,” he muttered. “No woman has ever wanted me for myself. They stop at the mask. Some have been intrigued by it, but not by what lay beneath it. Well…” he paused, remembering someone long ago, “there was a girl. But she died.” He sighed.
“Enough of this self-pity, my friend. Your music has been celebrated. Everyone wants to know who this new composer is. You have been called a genius!”
“Genius? Yes, pretty words until the reality faces them.”
Antoinette stood, arms folded. “This night, tonight, will be a triumph for you and for Christine. For me and the ballet as well, as Meg will dance the lead. Rise of the Phoenix is brilliant, Erik, and I thank you for adding the ballet interlude and the number for Meg. You are not only a genius, you have a good, kind heart, which you rarely show to anyone. I am honored we are friends. Meg and Christine are so excited for this premiere! All the performances have been sold out. You must take your bows at the end. You deserve them.”
With that, she left him alone in the box to watch the rehearsal. Was she right? Should he risk everything? He reached behind the side curtain and slid the secret lever to the door that allowed him entrance to one of his secret passages, and made his way silently back down to his lair.
Once there, he paced his parlor. He was too on edge to sit or even to finish “Don Juan Triumphant”, the piece that he originally wrote for Christine’s Prima Donna debut. But then, the idea for Rise of the Phoenix had come to him – the story of a girl who was condemned to burn as a witch, but a mysterious sorcerer appears to her in her prison cell and confesses his love for her. He gives her a magic potion which would allow her to rise from the ashes and become his queen, and together they flee to a night world where they celebrate their love for eternity. It was romantic and powerful and grand and all the things audiences loved. They were not ready for the avant garde aspects of his Don Juan.
What should he do? He was torn.
Later that evening Erik, dressed in his finest evening clothes, made his way to the space behind the mirror in Christine’s dressing room suite. It was here he had given her voice lessons from the time she was a young girl. She had always called him her Angel of Music and he allowed her to call him that despite his reservations and the knowledge of his dark past, not always dark by choice, but by circumstance. Her name for him seemed to make him feel somehow cleansed. He was his best self at these times, and his guidance over her voice and secretly over her life as her unseen protector had given him a reason to live.
He collected himself and then addressed the vision of loveliness that stood before the mirror putting the finishing touches on her stage makeup. She had captured his heart, though he knew not exactly when he realized she had turned from ward to woman.
“Christine…” he whispered, a breath caught and delivered to her ear.
“Angel…” she replied. “I was hoping you would be here. Tonight I sing your words for you, alone. If only you were by my side, I know this nervousness would leave me.” She tucked a strand of her auburn hair up in a star-shaped clip. She was dressed in black and purple velvet, the image of the drawings he had sent to the costume department.
“Have no fear, my dear. I will be there.”
“Will I see you? Really?”
“If that is your wish.”
“It is what I have wished with all my heart, Angel, for such a long time. Maybe since I first realized that it was more than your lessons I longed for and looked forward to.”
She faced the mirror and placed both palms upon it. “Somehow, I know you are there, somewhere. At night, it has been a comfort for me.”
Erik was silent. What did she mean? He knew many were drawn to her – that Vicomte de Chany, Raoul – he was always hanging around. Christine had known him before she came to the Opera House. When her father was alive. She was a child then. But she thought of him, Erik, at night.
“Ready yourself for tonight; all of Paris will be at your feet,” Erik told her.
“And yours, my angel,” she whispered to the glass, and then stepped away, swirled a black velvet cloak about herself and left the room.
~~~~~
“Brava!!! Bravo!!!” The shouts and foot stamps and applause filled the Opera House as all involved took their bows, and Christine’s arms were laden with so many bouquets and so many thrown at her feet, she almost couldn’t move, and stood there blinking, unbelieving at this triumph.
But one thought was in her head. Where is he?
“Author!!!” the audience cried, “Author!!!”
Antoinette looked around; Meg and the ballet rats were leaping with joy about the stage, and bowing and crowding around Christine and Antoine Aubert, the Baritone who had played the Sorcerer, and Erik’s specific choice for that demanding lead.
A movement caught her eye and Antoinette briefly left the stage and caught hold of Erik as he was making his way back to the shadows. “Oh no, Erik, come meet your public!”
“Leave me, Antoinette. Let me enjoy this night in my own way.”
“Alone?” she cried. “Never!” And she took his hand and pulled him to the stage. She practically dragged him onto it and then shoved him with surprising strength to the center, and there he stood beside the startled Christine as Antoinette stepped to the front of the stage and held up her hand to the audience.
All went quiet.
She gestured with a sweeping arm to the man who stood behind her and then she stepped aside. “May I present the author of tonight’s original work, and a genius, Monsieur Erik Fantome! Take your bows, Monsieur. They are rightly deserved.”
He stood there, staring out at the stunned crowd who took in this commanding presence, a tall handsome man with one side of his face covered by a mask and then, all at once, they rose as one and cheered. Cheered for him! Cheered so loudly, it brought tears to his cynical, lonely eyes.
Christine, watching him all the time, moved closer and took his hand. “We meet at last, my angel,” she said softly, for his ear only. “My Erik.”
His hand tightened on hers. “My angel, my Christine,” he whispered back.
She nodded at him, and he bowed as she held his hand, then let it go and curtsied in his direction.
So together they celebrated the night’s triumph on the stage and later, alone, where he revealed his true self to her and she did not turn away. She only embraced him for what he had suffered in the past, but if it was up to her, he would never know such pain again. From this day forward he would be loved by her and admired by the world.