ballerina in the music box

chapter five - the past is the past

Erik’s POV

Just, Wow… Elizabeth stroke the bow gently over the strings of the violin and the sound was just… magical. Who had taught her to play like this?! When the song came to its end I starred at her, maybe my eyes just where tired, but I could swear that she was glowing in the darkness. I insisted to play another song with her and another… and after maybe 5 songs I decided to ask her. “Who taught you this?, I mean you’re great!... but you’re a ‘ballet rat’ not a musician…” she smiled and looked up at the celling as if she was looking back on an old memory “I’m maybe not a musician but my mother was, she was known all over the world and always when she came home from different countries she’d tell the best stories, we all gathered around an open fire and she played the violin. She thought me how to play in the hope that it would lighten up my world just like the music did for her… but when she died I got very sad, and so did my music… I haven’t really played since then…” she said as the happy memory went sad. I took her into my arm just held her close, I could feel her cold tears dripping down on my neck, I didn’t like to see her cry and it made me feel a little uncomfortable, people didn’t really show their feelings around me, the only feeling I knew was fear… I tried my best to comfort her; I tried to talk to her it helped a little and she wiped away the tears, it was weird to see her cry, I mean in my eyes she was a brave, happy and intelligent young girl, she didn’t really seem like the person to cry. I looked her in the eyes they were red and I could see tears forming. She looked at me and asked “how about you…? What’s your mother like…?” I thought about what she said, my mother? I couldn’t really remember her… as long as I could think back there were only me and my father. I could remember my father in every detail, he was a long and gruesome man, he had been an alcoholic and he sometimes hit me and screamed at me. He hated me and said that I was shame to his family… he looked me up and pretended I didn’t exist, never gave me much food and I was sure I would have starved but the worst had been the loneliness… I had no friends because I was different… no child should ever have to grow up like I did… It was kind of a realize for me when he sold me to the circus where I was presented as “the devils child”, sure, there I wasn’t treated much better but it was better than having your own father scream at you that he wished you wouldn’t been born… I didn’t answer Elizabeth’s question, I didn’t have to, she understood…

We just sat there and talked till long into the night, she told me about her live and I listened to every word, she had gone through a lot to keep her and her sister save, and I was impressed how much this little girl could handle. But not even she could stay awake forever so when she fell asleep I gently picked her up and placed her on the bed, at first she mumbled something I did not quite understand but then she fell asleep again, she looked so calm as if nothing could worry her right now. I smiled, I don’t know why but every time I look at her a warm feeling is speeding in my body, I this love…? I’ve never really felt like this before, not even for Christine… my feelings for Christine had mostly been painful for I knew that she never would feel anything other than hate towards me… no, this feeling was quite nice…