Chapter Twenty-Four
Save Me From Myself
Spencer watched from box five, behind Phillip, as Melanie as a man and the man himself is in drag, ripped off her skirt.
"Serraphino, away with this pretense!" Charlotte cried. "You cannot speak, but kiss me in my husband's absence." Charlotte held her fan over their lips and Melanie and she dove in for a stage kiss. Niall as the Count shook his fist upset from the door. The audience laughed.
Charlotte began her song. "Ah, old fool, he makes me laugh, ahhhhhhhhh-" she went on until they were interrupted by a voice from above.
"Did I not instruct that box five was to be left empty for me?" It boomed aloud, and the whole theatre looked for it's source. Audrey looked at Meg.
"It's him! The Ghost..." she trailed off. Melanie didn't listen. She stared at the ceiling.
"He's here..."
"You're part is silent little toad!" Charlotte hissed to the girl. Melanie stared at her friend. She smiled apologetically. "All is good..." Charlotte said to the audience as she scuttled off stage to get her throat sprayed. She began again.
"You cannot speak! But kiss me in my husband's gaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!" she croaked loudly at the end of the statement and the audience gasped.
She smiled uncertainly, her eyes wide with fear. "Poor old fool, he makes me gaaaaaahhh!!" she continued to croak and croak while the audience laughed her off the stage.
"Mama!!" she shrieked, running off. Fray ordered the curtains closed as he and Carlin ran on stage.
"The performance of tonight will continue in a few moments time when...Miss Wilkes-" they yanked Melanie forward from behind the curtain,"will be playing the role of Countess. Now, for you entertainment, we will now perform the ballet from act three of tonight's performance."
The orchestra director stared.
"The ballet!" Carlin cried and the director repeated it as the ballerina's ran on stage. Madame Greywald helped Melanie dress backstage, lacing her corset as she fingered a black rose. It wasn't one Phillip had sent.
She made eye contact with Phillip in the wings and just as the ballet was ending Melanie screamed, because she was the first to see it.
The stage manager's body flinging lifelessly from the rafter, the noose around his neck making him shake oddly as his body spun in midair. A young ballerina screamed as the rope fell and she had to dodge the body about to come down on her head.
Reid was about to grab Phillip, but Phillip had grabbed a curtain rope and was sliding down to Melanie in the wings. The team was behind them, but as Reid rushed toward Melanie, Derek held him back.
"We can catch him here. They're headed for the roof. Give them space." Derek and Reid followed from another stair case, never taking their eyes off the pair.
The two lovers ran smack into each other.
"Are you alright?" Phillip yelled over the chaos.
"Phil, we're not safe here!" she yelled, taking his hand and dragging him up toward the stairs.
"Why have you brought me here?" he said.
Melanie was mumbling,"We can't go back..."
"We must return-"
"He'll kill you! His eyes will find us there."
"Melly, don't say that-"
"Those eyes that burn..."
"Don't even think it."
"If he has to kill a thousand men!"
"Forget this waking nightmare-"
"Damien will kill and kill again!"
"There is no ghost in the opera."
Melanie yelled as they entered the labyrinth, Morgan trailing quietly as the lovers ran. "My God who is this man? Who hunts to kill-"
"His mask of death..."
"I can't escape from him..."
"What is this voice you here?"
"I never will...And in this labyrinth, where night is blind...He's still here...inside my mind..." The two made it on the roof, it was colder here in the spring.
"He's not here, Melanie. He wouldn't risk it."
Melanie stared daggers at the man she loved, tears springing in her eyes. "Phil, I've been there...to his world of unending night. To a world where the daylight dissolves into darkness...darkness...Phil, I've seen him. Can I ever forget that sight? Can I ever escape from that face so distorted, deformed, it was hardly a face in that darkness?...But his voice held my spirit with a strange, sweet sound. In that night there was music in my mind. With the music my soul began to soar...and I heard as I'd never heard before..."
"It was a dream and nothing more."
"Yet in his eyes, all the sadness in the world...those pleading eyes, that both threaten and adore..."
Reid and Morgan watched from a higher part of the roof, as Phillip took strides to take his fiance in his arms as the hurt tried not to show on his face.
"Melanie, please dear, don't cry...I've got you honey..." Melanie shivered as she let her head lay limply on her love's shoulder. "Baby..." Phillip whispered, turning Melanie to face him, her head falling lifelessly in his neck. "Darling, please forget you're fears...I'm right here....Melanie..." Phillip stuck his hand under her chin so that she would look at him. It was cold that night, and her breathe was visible in the air, swirling playfully in her fiance's hair.
"I've never been so afraid..."
"No one will hurt you, Melanie. I won't let them."
"It's not me I'm afraid for. It's you and my team and my family and my friends. For people who barely know me. I don't even know the man who died tonight. He died because I'm living."
"Melanie, don't say that-"
"You know it's true!" she cried. "As long as I'm here and tangible to him...I should've never left Coney...I should've taken-" she stopped, not knowing who was listening, but continued regardless,"I should've hidden the boy, like I did. I should've stayed and let him kill me in a blind rage. He'd regret it enough and soon, we'd both be dead." she looked away from Phillip at the stars. "I should've died long ago. Think of the lives that would be so much better."
"What of I?" Phillip asked, jerking Melly's chin as softly as he could to look at him. "You think I'd been fine?" Melanie smiled weakly.
"I know you would. Because you are strong. You've always been strong and brave...and kind..." she whispered. Her blue eyes were boring into his this breathing intertwined as the steam from their lips danced above their heads. Slowly, with out thinking Phillip leaned in and covered Melanie's mouth.
His lips were warm on her cold ones and she gripped his jacket with her little hands balled into fists. Their kiss was slow and loving, Phillip slipped his tongue into her mouth and Melanie giggled, releasing his shirt and pulling away. Her smiled slipped as she saw Phillip's serious expression. Staring into his crystal eyes, her knees wobbled and she fell into him, sobbing.
"What is it?" Phillip asked.
Melanie shook her head, smiling through the tears. "I don't know what's going on," she whispered happily. "I'm upset and dizzy and happy and I want to scream," she said, ripping away from her fiance, twirling. They were a few yards away when they locked eyes again.
"What?" she asked.
"You don't have any idea how long I've dreamt of this moment," he whispered, taking three long strides to close their distance.
"I can guess," she whispered. And again, their lips met. Spencer caught sight of the three trinkets around her neck, all gold and one with a ruby in the middle. Melanie's ruby lips smiled when she leaned away to breathe. He was instantly reminded of Lila, who he hadn't thought about in...what? Years? Melanie was so like her and so unlike her. Spencer would always hold a special place in his heart for her, and he never dreamed he'd ever fall in love. But Melanie was his best friend. He had been her first kiss and the whole time, she'd been dreaming of Phillip.
What was this feeling?
***
Melanie sat uncomfortably folded on the threadbare couch, her hands wringing as she slept. The team decided it was unsafe for Melanie to sleep in her room and she refused to let them tear it apart. So, she was sleeping in the living room under the watch of Reid, Phillip, and Charlie. Phillip was snoring quietly on the floor next to Melanie. He had been holding her hand as she slowly started to doze, but released it when he fell asleep. Melanie was twitching and sighing now, her legs racing back and forth. What was she running from?
Her moaning got louder and her head and chest started to convulse while her hands beat furiously. She screamed at the top of her lungs, alerting Phillip to an upright position. Charlie and Reid rushed to her side, shaking her gently as she kicked and punched at them until she woke, sobbing.
"What was it, Melly?" Charlie asked.
"I can't save you!" she screamed it seemed without hearing Charlie. "I can't! I can't!! I'm so sorry!" she sputtered, her hands holding her self together, as if she would fall to pieces.
"I'm so sorry..." she whispered.
Mammy came in with a candle and Melanie finally focused through her tears.
"How many people did I wake?" she whispered as Mammy put a cold wash rag to her head.
"Just Mista Aggie and Miss Vicky. Yo momma and the team are still sleepin'. Or as far as I know. What was goin' on in yo head, Miss Melly."
Melly looked at the ground as Phillip returned with a glass of water. She thanked him.
"You don't want to know..." she whispered.
"Go on, Mel," Phillip urged. "It's better to talk about it."
"No!" Melanie screamed, curling her black blanket around her tightly as if one of them planed to yank it from her grasp.
"Melly..." Phillip whispered. Reid was about to object when Melanie sighed.
"I watched...everyone of you die...then the shape-it's always a shape, no matter what the nightmare is about-came for me. I didn't want to run, and leave you there, but I was so scared...I hate myself for what I did. I always run. I leave you all there to die while I live. Living in a world like that...I couldn't."
"Don't you say things like that, Miss Melly. It ain't do no one no good to say em. You go to sleep now."
"...I don't want to. I know what will happen when I close my eyes," she whispered.
"Surely you have some good dreams," Phillip said.
"...I haven't had a good dream since my father died. Since that night it's been the same. 7 years of horrible nightmares over and over and over again. All different. Some times I die, but it's mostly me seeing something...something I never should. Every time I close my eyes..." she sighed, looking down. "Do you think they'll ever stop?" she whispered.
"Of cou-"
"I was talking to Dr. Reid, Mammy," Melanie whispered.
"...7 years straight?" he asked. Melanie nodded. "...Then, no. I don't think so."
Melanie looked down.
"...G'night, Miss Melly."
"Goodnight, Mammy," she whispered as her nurse maid left. Charlie retreated to a desk in the corner of the room her father used to drink at. Now, as Charlie pulled a glass and filled it to the brim, Melanie's eyes grew sad as he drank it down in mere seconds.
"I wish you wouldn't drink so much," Melanie whispered, her arms around his neck.
He smiled drunkenly,"Next time a man tries to drown his sorrows, kindly remind him they can float." His eyes, still sad, locked on Melanie's. He touched her face, and traced her red lips with his fingers.
"Do you know what I wish?" he asked.
"...What?"
"That you wouldn't look so sad all the time."
Melanie's eye brows pushed together, and her sad eyes got even sadder. "I didn't know I did."
Charlie nodded slowly. "You know what you're name means, don't you?" he asked. Melanie shook her head that she didn't.
"We were named after book characters," she whispered. "Because our last name was Wilkes. Father loved the book Gone With the Wind and wanted two children named after then, but he didn't want to name a son Ashely, for fear he'd be made fun of, and Melanie Wilkes was his favorite character, so he went with the Hamilton children, even though Melanie's last name was changed when she was married to Wilkes."
"Yes, but Father, being the philosophy lover he is, wanted to give you a deep meaning," Charlie smiled. "Did you know he knew you'd be a girl? And he knew you'd be blonde and blue eyed? He just told Mother he knew. She was happy about that, but you weren't quite what she expected." He chuckled again. "Melanie means dark or black. Darkness. You were born to be afraid and meek, Melanie. But you were also born to change. Do you know what my name means? It means strong. It means 'free-man'. Maybe that's what I was born into but now...now all I am is a protector."
Melanie stared simply into her brother's eyes.
"Do you remember why father said he loved mother when they first met?"
"They were so different. He said they were like-"
"Fire and rain," Charlie whispered. "You and I are like fire and rain, Melanie. You once said to me that some people are born to be stars and others to be secondary characters. You sold yourself short when you said that, but I learned this:
I was born as a secondary character. I was born to protect you. We may not see eye to eye because we're so different now. You left and it changed everything. But you were born to grow out of the legacy that was planned for you. You were born for so much more. You can't even imagine."
"...Charlie..." Melanie whispered, her voice rising at the end.
"I love you so much," he whispered.
"What are you talking about?" she whispered.
"I am going to save you," he said, gripping her face in his hand,"from all the evil. I have to keep you alive and happy. At any cost."
"...First, you'll have to save me from the most dangerous thing," she challenged, tears in her eyes.
"...What?" he whispered.
Her voice was thick with tears as she whispered,"Myself."
Reid was about to grab Phillip, but Phillip had grabbed a curtain rope and was sliding down to Melanie in the wings. The team was behind them, but as Reid rushed toward Melanie, Derek held him back.
"We can catch him here. They're headed for the roof. Give them space." Derek and Reid followed from another stair case, never taking their eyes off the pair.
The two lovers ran smack into each other.
"Are you alright?" Phillip yelled over the chaos.
"Phil, we're not safe here!" she yelled, taking his hand and dragging him up toward the stairs.
"Why have you brought me here?" he said.
Melanie was mumbling,"We can't go back..."
"We must return-"
"He'll kill you! His eyes will find us there."
"Melly, don't say that-"
"Those eyes that burn..."
"Don't even think it."
"If he has to kill a thousand men!"
"Forget this waking nightmare-"
"Damien will kill and kill again!"
"There is no ghost in the opera."
Melanie yelled as they entered the labyrinth, Morgan trailing quietly as the lovers ran. "My God who is this man? Who hunts to kill-"
"His mask of death..."
"I can't escape from him..."
"What is this voice you here?"
"I never will...And in this labyrinth, where night is blind...He's still here...inside my mind..." The two made it on the roof, it was colder here in the spring.
"He's not here, Melanie. He wouldn't risk it."
Melanie stared daggers at the man she loved, tears springing in her eyes. "Phil, I've been there...to his world of unending night. To a world where the daylight dissolves into darkness...darkness...Phil, I've seen him. Can I ever forget that sight? Can I ever escape from that face so distorted, deformed, it was hardly a face in that darkness?...But his voice held my spirit with a strange, sweet sound. In that night there was music in my mind. With the music my soul began to soar...and I heard as I'd never heard before..."
"It was a dream and nothing more."
"Yet in his eyes, all the sadness in the world...those pleading eyes, that both threaten and adore..."
Reid and Morgan watched from a higher part of the roof, as Phillip took strides to take his fiance in his arms as the hurt tried not to show on his face.
"Melanie, please dear, don't cry...I've got you honey..." Melanie shivered as she let her head lay limply on her love's shoulder. "Baby..." Phillip whispered, turning Melanie to face him, her head falling lifelessly in his neck. "Darling, please forget you're fears...I'm right here....Melanie..." Phillip stuck his hand under her chin so that she would look at him. It was cold that night, and her breathe was visible in the air, swirling playfully in her fiance's hair.
"I've never been so afraid..."
"No one will hurt you, Melanie. I won't let them."
"It's not me I'm afraid for. It's you and my team and my family and my friends. For people who barely know me. I don't even know the man who died tonight. He died because I'm living."
"Melanie, don't say that-"
"You know it's true!" she cried. "As long as I'm here and tangible to him...I should've never left Coney...I should've taken-" she stopped, not knowing who was listening, but continued regardless,"I should've hidden the boy, like I did. I should've stayed and let him kill me in a blind rage. He'd regret it enough and soon, we'd both be dead." she looked away from Phillip at the stars. "I should've died long ago. Think of the lives that would be so much better."
"What of I?" Phillip asked, jerking Melly's chin as softly as he could to look at him. "You think I'd been fine?" Melanie smiled weakly.
"I know you would. Because you are strong. You've always been strong and brave...and kind..." she whispered. Her blue eyes were boring into his this breathing intertwined as the steam from their lips danced above their heads. Slowly, with out thinking Phillip leaned in and covered Melanie's mouth.
His lips were warm on her cold ones and she gripped his jacket with her little hands balled into fists. Their kiss was slow and loving, Phillip slipped his tongue into her mouth and Melanie giggled, releasing his shirt and pulling away. Her smiled slipped as she saw Phillip's serious expression. Staring into his crystal eyes, her knees wobbled and she fell into him, sobbing.
"What is it?" Phillip asked.
Melanie shook her head, smiling through the tears. "I don't know what's going on," she whispered happily. "I'm upset and dizzy and happy and I want to scream," she said, ripping away from her fiance, twirling. They were a few yards away when they locked eyes again.
"What?" she asked.
"You don't have any idea how long I've dreamt of this moment," he whispered, taking three long strides to close their distance.
"I can guess," she whispered. And again, their lips met. Spencer caught sight of the three trinkets around her neck, all gold and one with a ruby in the middle. Melanie's ruby lips smiled when she leaned away to breathe. He was instantly reminded of Lila, who he hadn't thought about in...what? Years? Melanie was so like her and so unlike her. Spencer would always hold a special place in his heart for her, and he never dreamed he'd ever fall in love. But Melanie was his best friend. He had been her first kiss and the whole time, she'd been dreaming of Phillip.
What was this feeling?
***
Melanie sat uncomfortably folded on the threadbare couch, her hands wringing as she slept. The team decided it was unsafe for Melanie to sleep in her room and she refused to let them tear it apart. So, she was sleeping in the living room under the watch of Reid, Phillip, and Charlie. Phillip was snoring quietly on the floor next to Melanie. He had been holding her hand as she slowly started to doze, but released it when he fell asleep. Melanie was twitching and sighing now, her legs racing back and forth. What was she running from?
Her moaning got louder and her head and chest started to convulse while her hands beat furiously. She screamed at the top of her lungs, alerting Phillip to an upright position. Charlie and Reid rushed to her side, shaking her gently as she kicked and punched at them until she woke, sobbing.
"What was it, Melly?" Charlie asked.
"I can't save you!" she screamed it seemed without hearing Charlie. "I can't! I can't!! I'm so sorry!" she sputtered, her hands holding her self together, as if she would fall to pieces.
"I'm so sorry..." she whispered.
Mammy came in with a candle and Melanie finally focused through her tears.
"How many people did I wake?" she whispered as Mammy put a cold wash rag to her head.
"Just Mista Aggie and Miss Vicky. Yo momma and the team are still sleepin'. Or as far as I know. What was goin' on in yo head, Miss Melly."
Melly looked at the ground as Phillip returned with a glass of water. She thanked him.
"You don't want to know..." she whispered.
"Go on, Mel," Phillip urged. "It's better to talk about it."
"No!" Melanie screamed, curling her black blanket around her tightly as if one of them planed to yank it from her grasp.
"Melly..." Phillip whispered. Reid was about to object when Melanie sighed.
"I watched...everyone of you die...then the shape-it's always a shape, no matter what the nightmare is about-came for me. I didn't want to run, and leave you there, but I was so scared...I hate myself for what I did. I always run. I leave you all there to die while I live. Living in a world like that...I couldn't."
"Don't you say things like that, Miss Melly. It ain't do no one no good to say em. You go to sleep now."
"...I don't want to. I know what will happen when I close my eyes," she whispered.
"Surely you have some good dreams," Phillip said.
"...I haven't had a good dream since my father died. Since that night it's been the same. 7 years of horrible nightmares over and over and over again. All different. Some times I die, but it's mostly me seeing something...something I never should. Every time I close my eyes..." she sighed, looking down. "Do you think they'll ever stop?" she whispered.
"Of cou-"
"I was talking to Dr. Reid, Mammy," Melanie whispered.
"...7 years straight?" he asked. Melanie nodded. "...Then, no. I don't think so."
Melanie looked down.
"...G'night, Miss Melly."
"Goodnight, Mammy," she whispered as her nurse maid left. Charlie retreated to a desk in the corner of the room her father used to drink at. Now, as Charlie pulled a glass and filled it to the brim, Melanie's eyes grew sad as he drank it down in mere seconds.
"I wish you wouldn't drink so much," Melanie whispered, her arms around his neck.
He smiled drunkenly,"Next time a man tries to drown his sorrows, kindly remind him they can float." His eyes, still sad, locked on Melanie's. He touched her face, and traced her red lips with his fingers.
"Do you know what I wish?" he asked.
"...What?"
"That you wouldn't look so sad all the time."
Melanie's eye brows pushed together, and her sad eyes got even sadder. "I didn't know I did."
Charlie nodded slowly. "You know what you're name means, don't you?" he asked. Melanie shook her head that she didn't.
"We were named after book characters," she whispered. "Because our last name was Wilkes. Father loved the book Gone With the Wind and wanted two children named after then, but he didn't want to name a son Ashely, for fear he'd be made fun of, and Melanie Wilkes was his favorite character, so he went with the Hamilton children, even though Melanie's last name was changed when she was married to Wilkes."
"Yes, but Father, being the philosophy lover he is, wanted to give you a deep meaning," Charlie smiled. "Did you know he knew you'd be a girl? And he knew you'd be blonde and blue eyed? He just told Mother he knew. She was happy about that, but you weren't quite what she expected." He chuckled again. "Melanie means dark or black. Darkness. You were born to be afraid and meek, Melanie. But you were also born to change. Do you know what my name means? It means strong. It means 'free-man'. Maybe that's what I was born into but now...now all I am is a protector."
Melanie stared simply into her brother's eyes.
"Do you remember why father said he loved mother when they first met?"
"They were so different. He said they were like-"
"Fire and rain," Charlie whispered. "You and I are like fire and rain, Melanie. You once said to me that some people are born to be stars and others to be secondary characters. You sold yourself short when you said that, but I learned this:
I was born as a secondary character. I was born to protect you. We may not see eye to eye because we're so different now. You left and it changed everything. But you were born to grow out of the legacy that was planned for you. You were born for so much more. You can't even imagine."
"...Charlie..." Melanie whispered, her voice rising at the end.
"I love you so much," he whispered.
"What are you talking about?" she whispered.
"I am going to save you," he said, gripping her face in his hand,"from all the evil. I have to keep you alive and happy. At any cost."
"...First, you'll have to save me from the most dangerous thing," she challenged, tears in her eyes.
"...What?" he whispered.
Her voice was thick with tears as she whispered,"Myself."
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