1Christine
The glass slipped from my hands just as my heart fell at your feet; shattering. The people around you stopped talking and looked around wondering where the sound had come from. Some turned to the locker room, others shrugged carelessly. But you turned to see the mirror. As if you were looking at me.
Oh. My rotten chest breathed once more and my heart shook its cobwebs with a lurch. Is it an angel I see? A trick of my eyes? A devilish and cruel illusion for this poor woman? Your gaze was so beautiful, as sharp and brilliant as the edge of a scimitar.
If your gaze for its beauty hurts me, not seeing it... I don't know what it will do to me. The glass shattered under the subjugation of my heels, watching you through the double bottom mirror as you approached too, curious.
How could the world in the midst of all its rottenness and filth, create such an angel like you?
I reached out one of my hands, these witchy hands, bony and blackened, stained with blood and hardened from work, and traced the shape of your face. White as snow, smooth as porcelain, hair dark and shiny as raven feathers. Your eyes glowed amber; obsidian pupils floating in the most beautiful of resins.
Little Meg, Giry's daughter, looked at you curiously and said silly, that the sound couldn't come from the mirror because there was a wall behind.
Your face profile couldn't be less holy. Neat forehead, black amber eyebrows, sharp nose -Oh, I could crack my skull on that nose and those sharp male cheekbones-, beautiful thin lips ... I could drink from your image a thousand years, and if I could drown in it I would not have a death more blissful.
Meg snorted and holding your hand you went back to rehearsals. I scratched the glass and it cried at my touch. Ah, everyone cries with my touch, and you would not be the exception my dear. Only my loneliness, the soul of the perfume and me remained.
My heels warn the walls of my presence as I go to box number five. Under the double bottom fabric that covers the box - a great courtesy of director Debbiene, who thanks to me said that the box was constantly remodeling - I could see you dance on the stage with a delicious grace.
How could you know that the choir member you're covering, the reason you're here, was crushed by an angel's trumpet? Whoops. What a pity. They all turned to see the statue on the roof of the opera with his hand raised without his trumpet, which now lay in pieces on a man's skull. That choir member, fueled by Buquet's spirits, was constantly looking for me at the opera to challenge me and it was time to put an end to it.
Oh my dear, I hope you don't get in trouble with me. I would hate if, like the perfume that slipped from my hands, you would slip off the roof of the opera and shatter. Your bones broken like glass and your blood spilled like perfume... It would be a shame, a loss for the little beauty that still remains in the world. I just hope your insides are not as rotten as my appearance.
My deformed lips curl into a smile. Ah! How long ago! No, I wouldn't push you, I would rather dissect you and turn you into a doll than throw you off the building. I'll fill your coffin with roses, put on a fancy suit and build you a glass case. And we'll live together under the opera until the end of time. Oh! Isn't that a better destination? And even if you told me no, honey, I'm not asking for your opinion.
Take care of yourself. You better behave yourself and get your feet out of Jammes's path, or she could rip you apart in one of her thousands of cow kicks and her steps out of time.
Congratulations on your first week, dear. Everyone loves you for being the novelty at the opera. Ballet rats smile at you and stagehands are envious of you. Tonight I saw you play a gallic soldier in Norma. Great progress to face the stage, a forgettable performance.
Didn't you like to see how Carlotta didn't stay still on stage while she was sweating profusely, and Piangi had to turn around to follow her? I covered her heels with itchy powder. I hope she remembers and keeps her restless Norma very well on her heart.
I discovered that you like to rest in the haunted room, as ballet rats say, the old dressing room located at the back of the stage, now used as a room to store old props.
Today I passed by and stopped behind the mirror, what are you doing in your loneliness, darling? I hoped you would delight me with some soft dance, but after a breathing exercise ... You started singing.
Your voice is delicious, velvety, captivating, incredibly beautiful baritone ... but it is flat, without training, without relaxing and above all, it lacks dedication and passion. I can ... I can take that voice of yours, mold it, make it shine like a diamond. It could put Paris at your feet! I could make all Parisians beg for a hum of yours!
But my love, I can't let you see me. You would run away from me; you would leave the opera and leave me alone and trembling in my sadness. Oh! I know that I look like a corpse, I look like dead lying in the open air for months but ... My heart, this broken heart, bleeds and cracks with longing for you. I touch the cold mirror with my hand and think about talking to you, but the door opens and little Meg enters.
"Erik! I was looking for you! What are you doing alone in the old dressing room? It's so full of dust I can't breathe!" Erik ... A king's name. Erik ... with a whisper your name slides between my lips like a snake.
"I was practicing my singing Meg. I wanted to be alone."
"Then enough practice for today. Let's go to the bistro together! The ballet rats and operants will be there, like every Friday. The Sorelli will be there, too!"
"I, ah, I don't know Meg."
"You don't have to talk to her if you don't want to, but let's eat and see what happens next!"
You went out together, with Meg holding your wrist. I open the mirror door with the mechanism and pick up the music sheet you forgot. It's written in your own handwriting. This music sheet will disappear in my rooms, as you will in the world above… soon, very soon, your destiny will unite with mine and they will become entangled in a rope where only one will remain alive.
It's a matter of time and hopefully... hopefully the notes from my heart reach yours. Otherwise, ah, you never know when the angels of the opera get angry and let stone trumpets rain.