Author's Note: After ten or so years of reading POTO fics, I've finally decided to take the plunge and write one myself. Cue much terror and uncertainty. Not beta'd—feel free to point out any glaring errors!
Update, 9/12: I'm finally getting around to doing a proper editing of this story. As of this notation, I'm only a few chapters in, but will continue apace. Cheers!
Update, 2/15: My God, I'm at it again. Just bits of editing—nothing extreme. I'm finally getting around to cross-posting on Ao3, and figured I might as well take the opportunity to get my p's and q's in good order.
Those whom the gods love, die young.
Those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad.
Erik had never questioned which category he belonged to. It had been made abundantly clear to him throughout his life, by various means and circumstances. How many times had he cheated death? And how many times had madness touched him? Too many times to count, too many times to doubt.
Both continuing life and a faint echo of madness were with him at this moment, there again reminding him that, surely, heaven hated him.
He sat, alone save a bottle of fine Shirazi wine, watching the clock on his mantle move forward to midnight. When the hour struck, it would be his birthday—his fiftieth.
The date was quite arbitrary. A found date, to complement a happenstance name. Even the year he had chosen was questionable. By his calculations, he could have been incorrect by as many as three years in either direction.
Still, it was a date that served him well enough. As well as the name 'Erik' had, at least.
By that score, not particularly well.
He refreshed his wine glass and lifted it in idle salute as the chimes rang twelve times in slow succession.
There. If not a celebration than at least an acknowledgment of fifty—or fifty-three—or forty-seven—years quite badly lived.
He drained his glass too quickly, in the hope that the alcohol would either lighten or deepen his depression. It did neither.
What had he to show for fifty years on Earth?
A palace by the Caspian Sea? An opera house to rival any made before or after it? A hundred other houses, not quite as grand, but never truly ordinary?
A thousand trinkets of outstanding ingenuity, and hundreds of thousands of notes that no one would ever hear.
Oh, yes, many works. Did those count? Perhaps. Perhaps not.
And let us not forget those who do so love you, Erik thought, not entirely bitterly. Mother dear, of course, and those in the riotous Romani carnival company. Perhaps the jealous shah or his little wife who could not fathom the price of anything— even blood.
The Daroga. Old friends, weren't they? Though it always seemed that the Grim Reaper tried to intrude on their rare social visits… Erik supposed the old skeleton had never heard that charming little English phrase about companies and crowds.
Speaking of companies: the opera company. What enthusiastic greetings they all gave him! Everyone from the ever-generous managers to the humble errand boys knew him!
And, of course, his one great love.
Surely theirs was a romance fit for storybooks, destined to be told over and over again for all time…
Ah, that last bit was a knife in his heart. The other tragedies of his life he could mock, but that one defied every attempt to soften the pain. Even death fled from that wound, preferring to let injured Erik survive and suffer.
Had he been so wrong, so wicked that he could not be allowed to escape that one pain? A wife—how simple! A wife, like any other man might have a wife. A wife that need not even love him, merely like him. A wife to take out on Sundays.
Funny, how the words brought tears to his eyes now, even as they had brought tears to her eyes then.
Through the veil of his blurred eyes, he could see what might have been.
Eventually, there would have been some quaint house in some little town, but for a while it would have been here. The house on the lake, the Palais Garnier, Paris.
They would arise early, each Sunday morning. They would take the Rue Scribe exit and start in the direction of the train station. She would hold onto Erik's arm here, just to ensure that they would not be separated. Through Le Marais. They would admire the medieval architecture, and Erik would point out those small details that so informed his own aesthetic. The walk would continue by Notre Dame, as the bells tolled to bring in the faithful. Finally, a stroll by the banks of the Seine until they—well, she—wanted to stop.
Breakfast at a café? Why not, with his unremarkable mask that made him look like everybody-and-nobody? Church services? If she desired.
But, oh, to walk on a beautiful Sunday morning, with her by his side.
He stared at the clock face for a long, mad moment. Alive and mad, most assuredly hated by heaven.
He set down his glass and stood. His mask, his felt hat, his cloak…
It was Sunday morning, and Erik was going out for a stroll.
My Dear Uncle,
Forgive me if I omit my typical pleasantries, but I write on a matter of business.
I was occasioned to look at the conditions listed in the back of the manager's memorandum-book, and was quite surprised to find an addition to the expected four.
Written, in the queerest hand imaginable, was the following paragraph:
"5. Or if the manager, in any month, delay for more than a fortnight the payment of the allowance which he shall make to the Opera ghost, an allowance of twenty thousand francs a month, say two hundred and forty thousand francs a year."
You may well imagine my surprise at this.
I flatter myself in saying that, I have, I believe, acquitted myself admirably in managing the Palais Garnier in your stead.* It has been many months, and not once have I heard of this clause, nor, indeed, of the 'Opera ghost' or his outrageous salary! When I questioned M. Richard, he appeared to go into a panic, insisting that I never speak of the Opera ghost again, lest he return.
Am I correct in assuming that the addendum in the memorandum-book is some sort of vandalism or practical joke?
Please advise.
Your Nephew,
Didier Moncharmin
*Ticket sales have held steady since the departure of La Carlotta. We have managed to maintain a fine schedule of excellent guest singers, though the position of resident 'diva' will soon need to be filled.
M. Didier Moncharmin
Palais Garnier
Paris, France
CLAUSE NOT JOKE. IF CONTACTED BY 'OG," FOLLOW HIS INSTRUCTIONS EXACTLY. REPEAT, EXACTLY. PRAY GOD FOR NO SUCH CONTACT.
ARMAND MONCHARMIN