Ana, Mat, and me all returned home late that night. Flet and Jet had headed home, having not joined us for dinner, saying they had something to do back at Ana’s Grotto. The moon was high in the sky. Thank god it wasn’t full yet. I couldn’t look at the full moon…bad…things happened when it was the full moon and I was out in it (but that’s for another day). We were laughing and joking on the way back home. It was….relaxing. Considering Ana had been somewhat of a pain to me sense I’d been stolen away from Lelouch I could get along with her. When we got home Mat bid us good night and retreated to the couch (Ana was working on making another guest room), and me and Ana went upstairs to my room. I changed, and got in bed, ready to fall asleep. “I told you I would tell you more about me. Serena and myself,” She said, sitting down beside me on the bed, “and so I shall.” She glanced out the window at the moon before beginging.
“It wasn’t too long ago. I was the oldest daughter of a prestigious government official, so it wasn’t like no one knew me, but I didn’t have many friends because of my quiet nature. My family didn’t live in luxury but we were better off than most; my siblings and I had our squabbles, as did our parents, but life was generally pretty good.” She said. This would explain why Ana was as educated like she was. “Then, I entered middle-school. Apparently, it wasn’t cool to be smart there because the other kids picked on me like crazy. They invited me to parties and then stood me up, put bugs in my hair, one girl even though it was funny to throw a shoe at me. The other kids laughed when they saw my tears. My mom always told me ‘I’m sure it’ll pass’, but she didn’t understand me; no one did.”
Ana and I weren’t so different after all. She like me growing up…had been picked on. “No one, that is, except my older brother, Jasper. He was 17 and went to a college that was close to home. He was the only one in our family who looked like our mother, who had sandy blond hair and grey-green eyes; my sister and I took after our dad. He was the one who looked at me with the most concern when I came home, depressed, almost every day, sometimes even in tears. I was 12 years old.” She told me. Least she wasn’t picked on till she was in middle school. I had private school lessons where I was a princess, but outside of the palace kids picked on me…but not till my mom had been killed when I was 5 years of age.
“He called me aside one day and said he wanted to show me something. I sighed as I followed him to the secret place. It was autumn, a few days before Halloween, so I thought maybe he had made me a costume or something.” She paused and then continued, looking down at the covers. “I was half-right; he did have something for me, but it wasn’t a Halloween costume. It was a friend.” What was the thing ‘Halloween’ she kept mentioning? “‘Ana,’ he said, indicated the dark-haired man standing in the clearing, ‘this is Erik.’ I didn’t know what to say, so I just stood there and marveled at this peculiar creature. The fireflies dancing around him gave him an almost ethereal glow on that moonless night. ‘He’ll be your new voice teacher.’ I couldn’t be happier; he had known I wanted someone to rid me of my fear of performing on the stage alone. I ran up and hugged him as I said, ‘You’re the best brother a little sis’ could hope for.’” Ana explained further.
“‘Your parents don’t deserve either of you,’ said my new teacher, who I now noticed had the same eyes as my brother. ‘You are both curious and empathetic souls; may the Angel of Music watch and keep you always.” Angel of Music? Had this person meant Lelouch or…Erik…the original Phantom? “‘Jasper,’ he asked, turning to my brother and coming over to us. ‘Is it all right if we have our first lesson tonight? I want my little muse’s voice ringing through-out this forest as soon as possible.’” Damn her teacher just got right down to it.
“I didn’t say anything. I was proud that this teacher to the point but with gentility and companionable friendliness. I liked him already. Nothing like the silly opera instructors my mother had found for me before. Jasper merely nodded to Erik and turned leave. ‘Just know Erik, she can’t be with your forever.’ Was the last thing he said before he started back for home. The next few months were spent with nightly meetings between Erik and me, always at the secret place; several people asked questions about how my voice had gone through such dramatic changes, my mother in particular, but I never told them about the mysterious tutor I met by moonlight. On one of these occasions, which happened to be the night before my 13th birthday, it began to snow in the middle of our lesson, just when we had finished warm-ups. ‘Ana, hold on to me,’ Erik said, gesturing for me to stand close. I hugged him tightly, shivering from cold in my thin pajamas, as he enveloped us both in his black velvet cloak.”Then her tutor…was the original Phantom of the Opera! “The next thing I knew, I was standing in a spacious, underground cavern on the shore of a small lake. I started around me, half in wonder, half in fear, at the place where my friend had taken me. ‘Where are we you ask?’ Came Erik’s voice from close to me. He removed his cloak, swirling it once around his head before depositing it on the cave floor, before answering his own question. ‘We are in my home, or at least what was my home.’” Ana explained. “‘What do you mean “was your home”?’ I asked. I took a good look around me, then a good look at Erik, and everything came together. I was standing inside a cavern that was identical to the one in the Phantom of the Opera, just like Lelouch’s cavern I discovered in recent months. I blinked my eyes in disbelief at my tutor, who I presumed was Erik’s ghost or something, astonished into slience. ‘Do not think I wish to frighten you, Anastasia,’ he said, addressing me by my full name for the first time. ‘Jasper told me you might be when I broke the news to you.’”
“‘He knew,’ I said, biting back the anger rising inside me at the only person who had really cared for me in my disconnected family. ‘He knew all along and he never told me.’ So Jasper had deceived her all that time about who her teacher had been. “‘He wanted me to tell you, but I was afraid that you would discontinue your training before you could hold your own if I told you sooner. Besides, considering what you’re doing tomorrow, I thought it might be an appropriate surprise.’” He had told her. “Jasper had told him I was going to see Phantom of the Opera for my 13th birthday I would find out later. I embraced him, my heart aching with joy, rejoicing in the fact that reality had finally let up on me for a change, or if it was a dream-that it was a really good dream. Our lesson resumed until 3:00 in the morning, the time that I had actually been born; this had time to be taken before I woke up in my own bed the next morning.”
She then handed me a photo. To be honest, even though I hadn’t exactly been on friendly terms with Ana sense I was stolen from Lelouch….I was jealous. She had met the original Phantom of the Opera. In the photo were her and Erik together. What was more is this was Lelouch’s great grandfather. “Our lessons continued for another year. The other children eventually let up on me, keeping their distance for fear of my rage. The ridicule was gone, but the hurt stayed; I spiraled into a cycle of self-induced depression, constantly putting myself down for lack of people doing it for me, and maybe out of fear they would do it again. On top of all that, my sister occupying most of our parent’s attention finally got to me. I had also begun hearing arguments about a divorce between my parents behind closed doors.” Ana explained.
I couldn’t help but feel sorry for her, despite the terms we’d been on sense my forced return. I could relate to the sibling thing so easily. When it came to my siblings and my care the oldest went first and the youngest last. My father said it had to deal with who was to take the throne when he died. And I was always ignored mostly because of it; always last. Before my mom died, she and Kaname would go out of their way to make sure I was ok. I felt sorry that Ana’s parent’s talked of divorce as well. My mom had been killed though, so I couldn’t entirely relate to her situation. “The only thing that kept me going was my lessons with Erik, the only person who I felt really understood me being an outcast from society all his life, for he told me so at one of our secret meetings. Then, one day, even that wasn’t a comfort. I came home from school one day, strangely enough in a happy mood, to find the photograph you’re holding on me pillow.” She said.
I handed it back to her with a small, sad smile. Had Erik…left her? Left her alone…with just her memories and a picture? “Erik had gone off somewhere else and hadn’t taken me with him; I cried myself to sleep that night, and for a week afterwards, so distraught with worry and sadness that I woke up from searching my dreams for him as if I hadn’t slept at all. After a week of frantic searching and sleepless nights, I was fully convinced there was nothing left for me here. My parents wouldn’t miss me, being too busy arguing with each other and lavishing their favorite child (the diva of the opera Sophia) when they weren’t doing that, school was a prison for my tortured soul, not to mention I didn’t have any friends to fall back on. That night, in the warm April air, I ran away from home. I joined Gaia the following year, where I met you and Flet and Jet, and the rest is history.” She said finishing up her story.
She was staring out the window, and then she smiled at something outside. She left my room quietly saying we’d spend some time together tomorrow on our day off. I was actually excited about it too.
To be continued in Chapter 65...
