The Angel's Shadow || The Phantom of the Opera || Book Two

15. Without You

Chapter Fifteen || Without You

"Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
To think that I do not have her. To feel that I have lost her.

To hear the immense night, still more immense without her.
And the verse falls to the soul like dew to the pasture.

What does it matter that my love could not keep her.
The night is shattered and she is not with me.

That is all. In the distance someone is singing. In the distance.
My soul is not satisfied that it has lost her." ~ Tonight I Can Write the Saddest Lines by Pablo Neruda

Three Months Later

Mélodie

Outside my window the birds in the trees sang summer's tune. I rested my hands on the swell of my stomach and listened, thinking that my voice probably sounded awful now. Surely the months of inactiveness has robbed it of its beauty, the beauty Erik had given it. I've lost all desire to sing or to even listen to music.

"Erik? I know you can hear me, Erik."

Leaning my head against the window frame I looked at the glass, seeing in the reflection the small girl I had been. Her bright eyes desperately searched the mirror in the Prima Donna's dressing room for any sign of her Opera Ghost she had met the night before. A breeze caressed the tree branches and I remembered that tell tale gust of air that arose whenever Erik was there, watching with those green eyes.

"I know you're there."

The memory of my persistence cracked a smile onto my lips. He had been so silent. So uncertain of revealing himself to the child who called for him.

"Fine. Be that way. Why would you want to talk to me anyways?"

But he had revealed himself to me. He had opened the gate that guarded his life and stepped into my world after much trepidation.

"I know why you were here last night."

The way he had looked at me; his head lowering and his eyes peering through his thick lashes, overflowing with sorrow and pain. He had come there for the anniversary of Christine's first performance. He had come to remember a time when he was still her Angel of Music. When he was still a beautiful creature in Christine's eyes and not the monster everyone claimed him to be.

"You must miss her terribly."

And he had answered, with all the sadness of the world, "Yes."

"Knock, knock! May I come in?"

I started slightly, causing a tear that had collected to fall onto my pregnant stomach. Quickly wiping any other tear that may have sneaked up on me, I mustered a smile and turned to the middle aged woman sticking her head through the door, "Of course, Nana. You needn't ask."

The tall cream colored door closed with a light thud as Nana walked further into my bedroom. Nana - or Mary - had been my nanny when I was a child here in the palace. I could almost say she was more of a mother to me than my mother. The short woman had gained some weight since I had ran away and the color in her hair had changed to gray. Nevertheless, she remained as energetic as I remembered her, her lips permanently turned up into a joyous smile.