Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to Phantom of the Opera

Chapter 23

I knew I was back in my own time, and not a minute had passed while I was with Erik. Looking down at my bare feet I realized that the crash had been caused from my Phantom of the Opera snow globe being dropped onto our hard wood floor. I didn't understand what was going on and I felt my breath rush in and out very quickly...I was so confused. So many emotions have been going through my body in the last few hours!

Very carefully I stepped back out of the water and glass shards. "Amanda what happened?" Chad asked as he sat up in bed. "Uh, uh." I said trying to clear my head. "I accidentally dropped my snow globe, I'll clean it up." I muttered, still confused, and Chad lay back down.

Even though it had been well over a year for me I still knew my way around my own house, and I turned and walked passed my short hallway into my bathroom and grabbed a towel where I started mopping up the water, glitter and glass that was all over my floor. Very carefully I picked up as much glass as I could see, but at the moment I had more important matter's to attend to.

Taking a deep breath I walked back into my bathroom and paused for a moment before I turned the light on. Was I going to look like I had before I was with Erik, or was I going to look like a more than a year had passed while I was with Erik? It seemed to take all my courage to flip the light on and I turned to the full length mirror and saw that I looked like I had when I was with Erik. My hair was so much longer, I was a lot thinner and I was still wearing my slip that I had died it. No wait, I didn't die. If I had died, I wouldn't be here. Maybe this was heaven though? Was I dead and I just didn't know it? Was that all I had to do? Die? If I had known that I would have let Erik kill me when I had gone to him in the first place, then I could have convinced myself it was just a dream...but I didn't really want that.

Carefully I pinched my cheek hard and tears sprang to my eyes. There wasn't any pain in heaven right? I had work that I needed to do. First off I grabbed a pair of scissors from Chad's bathroom drawer, but how did I have my hair? I couldn't remember exactly, but shorter than it was, so I started to cut until I was sure it was about the same, then I gathered the hair onto a towel and quietly took it outside and shook out all the hair, the wind would blow it away. Thankfully it was still very dark outside, and we lived in the middle of nowhere so I took off my slip and stuffed it under our porch, I would burn in after Chad had gone to work tomorrow.

There was no way I was going to let anyone know what I had gone though, I knew no one would believe me and I would be locked up, and after having given up that I would ever be back here I didn't want to be locked in an institution and be separated from Chad and Paige. I don't think I could give them up twice, but my heart did ache, I didn't want to be separated from Erik either and he was dead. The only way I had to him was my snow globe and it was now broken. Tears quietly ran down my face as I walked back into my quiet house and I grabbed a new pair of pajamas. What had I been wearing when I...left? It didn't matter, Erik had burned them long ago, so I figured Chad wouldn't know I had changed clothes in the night, he was a guy after all.

I had gotten rid of the clothes and tried to make my hair like it was before, but I knew there was nothing I could do about my weight loss. It seemed I had lost a lot of weight, but I couldn't be sure how much I weighed before. It just didn't seem right and I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep, so I walked back into the front room and just sat on the couch.

What was going on? Why had this happened to me? I just couldn't understand! With a deep breath I knew that I was going to go on like nothing had happened. I still loved Chad, but not as I had before I left, but time would change that, just like it had with Erik. I had to put Erik in the past though, move on and try to live like I have always done. As quietly as I could I checked on Paige again and once more tears sprang to my eye's as I looked at my beautiful daughter I knew I would never see again. Reaching out I pushed a piece of hair off her forehead knowing I would get to know her all over again.

Slowly I walked into my bedroom and sat down in bed to study Chad. The love was still there, but it was like the flame had been turned down so low it was barely burning, but just like Paige, I would get to know him and love him all over again. I finally laid down and tried to sleep but couldn't. There was so many thought's going through my mind I couldn't turn it off and tossed and turned for the rest of the night until Paige's soft cries alerted me that it was morning and moment's later Chad's alarm went off.

Before he got out of bed I warned him to be careful as I had not got all the glass up off the floor and I went to feed Paige and get back to what used to be my normal life.

It didn't take long for me to feel like I was returning to normal and get back into my normal, well what used to be normal, routine. It seemed the only one who could really tell a difference was Paige. At first she was somewhat standoffish around me, like she didn't know who I was, like she knew I had been separated from her for well over a year. Children are so aware of their surroundings, and I worked hard to earn her love and respect all over again, and it didn't take long for her to get attached to me as she once was.

As for Chad, he sensed no difference. It seemed strange to me at first, I was still in love with him, but I was more in love with Erik. It was almost like Chad and I were barely getting together, but I made an effort to love him like I had in the past, and every hour of every day I was with him the low flame was getting turned up, for Chad is my true love. Erik was my love, but not my true love.

Getting to love and know my family was not the only thing I had to work at though. I was used to doing things...well almost the hard way, I wasn't used to the things that everyone was used to anymore. The light was harsh and hurt my eye's. I had to remember how to do my hair, and put on makeup, even work the T.V. and even the DVD player was so foreign to me. The hardest thing for me to relearn however was cooking. I was a pretty good cook before, and it seemed to have left my mind entirely! Erik had done all the cooking, and the food's were so simple it wasn't hard to mess it up, but now with everything it seemed so strange. I had the freezer and it took time to thaw meat out and the stove, it was just hard for me to relearn everything I had once knew so well.

I was so used to being completely wrapped up into me and Erik that I had to remember I had friends and family that were used to hearing from me on a regular basis and to talk to them, it seemed so strange. I was used to having a conversation face to face, and over the phone seemed so cold and distant, but I would get used to it...eventually.

Things seemed to be very hard on my stomach though. It must be the complicated food for I was used to simple food, and with all the new choices I had, I was getting sick constantly, and headache's too, though I was used to that. With Erik, I didn't have contacts or glasses and suffered headache's almost daily, but the headache's I was getting now was so much worse than that, but now I had medicine to help. Even with my contact's in I was still getting headache's every day, and I couldn't understand why I was still getting the pain in my head.

After a week I knew I had to leave the house, for I had holed myself up trying to get my family back together, and my feelings the same, and I put Paige in the car and slowly took off to the store. Driving terrified me, but it was like riding a bike and I didn't forget for too long, I was a pro again before I got to town.

I could tell that I was almost like a new mom, letting Paige have whatever she wanted. It was like I was making up for being gone for over a year, and couldn't help but laugh as Paige grabbed things off the shelf and dropped them into the buggy. I just shrugged my shoulder's and let her have the item's she wanted, and when I had everything I needed, we checked out and headed home where she was fed and put down for her only nap.

As she slept I put everything away in it's proper place and discovered that Paige had added a package of ball point pens, a deck of playing cards, a pregnancy test, and a new box of Q-tips, and I couldn't help but laugh as we needed none of those things. As I was putting it away though I had a new thought that chilled my blood cold. Maybe I did need something after all.

While living with Erik I realized that I had been somewhat irregular but had managed just fine and realized that I should have started already and I practically ran to the bathroom. It didn't even need the two minutes for two blue lines to appear. I haven't been back long enough for Chad to have gotten me pregnant.

I must have been pregnant when I came back and hadn't realized it yet. What was I going to do! Panic started to take over. It all made sense now, the sickness, the headache's, I was even sick before I...came back home. Maybe the reason I had thrown up and passed out right before I was kidnapped wasn't because I was stressed out and worried, it was just my body telling me I was pregnant before I even knew it. I was pregnant with Erik's child!

All I wanted to do was get back to my normal life and go on like nothing happened, but now that wasn't possible. I just wanted to be the normal Amanda that I was before everything happened, be with Chad and love Paige. Did a pregnancy really change all that? Yes and no. If I was pregnant with Chad's baby it would be okay, but I knew there was no possible way that I was pregnant with Chad's baby, it could only be Erik's baby.

The only way I could continue being normal Amanda was to act like I was carrying Chad's baby and not Erik's. It didn't seem right to Erik, but there was no other way. It's not like I could just call Erik up and tell him, he was dead. He was dead a long time ago, way before I was even born. I knew what I had to do, even if it did feel dreadfully wrong to me, I had to endure the heartache and keep the secret forever. I was a good and faithful wife, Chad would never believe what happened to me and I couldn't loose him. I realized I did love him so much and if there was ever a hint that this baby wasn't Chad's he would leave me and I would be left with nothing and I couldn't have that.

When Chad came home from work I told him the good news and he was so happy. I had already made an appointment with my doctor for them to do another test and they would make my first appointment with my OB/GYN.

All of this uncertainty and confusion of why I was transported though time, then my time with Erik and having to watch him die, well maybe being pregnant with his child was the only way I could really always have a part of Erik with me, for I would raise his child and a part of Erik would always be with me, so I could still love Chad but now I could love Erik too.

My life wasn't always as easy as it was before, for I had a hard pregnancy. Chad was so thrilled at the new's and we found out we were going to have a boy. Of course deep down I was terrified that this baby would have the same traits as his father, that his face would be disfigured. The ultra sound showed that our boy was healthy, but I was nervous still. The hardness came from our boy wanting to come early. I had gone into labor two month's early and was rushed to the hospital when they barely stopped my labor, but I was almost to a point of not stopping it, so they decided to keep me in the hospital for at least a month.

Finally I was able to go home, and three day's later I went into labor again, so once more I was rushed to the hospital and at that point I was to far in labor I was going to have him. I was already worried enough that our boy was going to be disfigured now I was scared that he would be disfigured and with him being born a month early have complications, but a few hour's later our boy was born and I got one look at his face and was relived, he had a perfect round and chubby face, just as a baby should, but his lung's were just a tad underdeveloped.

Chad and I decided to name him Caden, and besides his lung's was very healthy. Both Chad and I agreed that Caden looked just like me and I was so relieved, for if he looked nothing like me, then I knew he would look like Erik, and that would be terrible.

After a week in the hospital we were able to go home and Chad, Paige, Caden and myself lived as happily as we could. I never did tell a soul about what happened to me, and since Caden looked just like me, no one ever suspected that Caden didn't belong to Chad in blood.

Though it wasn't fair to Chad, I was happy because I had Chad and a part of Erik to love and keep me happy for the rest of my life, and I was content with that.

Well it's taken a few years, but that's the story. I have really enjoyed writing it and getting everything out there to the public. I'm so glad I finished this story and didn't let it die, it just didn't seem right and now that I'm back in the groove of writing, I plan on continuing with another one of my stories that I have started and left hanging while I had writers block. Normally I thank the people who have my story on favorites and such, but since this is the last chapter I wanted to thank the people who have stuck with me and reviewed most of my chapters. Musicalroza999, Cinnamon Selkie, Kellansladykatie11, RedDeathLvr, thank you all so much for sticking with me and giving my story life, and to all of my readers, if it wasn't for you, I wouldn't have continued and finished my story. Thank you all so much!

Desiree'