Inception/The Phantom of the Opera: You Won't Forget My Name
Title: You Won't Forget My Name
Pairing: Arthur/Eames, Dom/Mal
Rating: PG-13 (At least for now, I'll warn if it goes up.)
Part: 1/?
Word Count: 3, 486
Warnings: None, unless you absolutely hate the Phantom of the Opera.
Summary: Who was that shape in the shadows? Whose is the face in the mask? (Phantom of the Opera AU)
(Title of fic taken from the song My Name by Charlie Winston.)
Eames had never been what you would call a normal career man. If he were honest, which he rarely was, then he would say that it had all begun with his origins. His mother had been a maid at a grand estate, who had been naïve enough to believe that the lord of the place was truly in love with her. She had been turned out the instant the wife found out about the affair, of course. When she discovered she was pregnant, she had tried to return to the lord, begging for his help, but had merely turned her away.
So his mother had wound up working about a dozen jobs just so that they could get by. Eames had always wondered why she had never resented him for putting her in such a position. She never lost her gentle demeanor, smothering him with love every chance she got.
The ever changing gray of his eyes had come from her, along with his unusually full lips, but his brown hair and stocky build had not. He had resented the parts in him that had come from his father, even though his mother assured him that she didn’t love him any less for them. He hadn’t wanted anything that could connect him back to a man he hated and still did.
It all began through Eames’ determination to be helpful. He had been tried of seeing his mother come back late at night, all of her jobs finally finished, collapsing into the bed that they shared. He had just wanted to help take the load off her shoulders, give her a chance to actually relax.
The only problem was that there weren’t many good paying jobs for minors. Except when it came to the less legal ones.
Eames had learned how to be quick with his hands, snatching things out of the pockets of people he passed by on the streets without them even noticing. Once he had gotten confident enough in his skills, he even managed to swipe food from the stalls that the vendors lined up along the Avenue des Champs-Élysées.
When he looked back on it now, he was pretty sure that his mother knew where the sudden influx of money and food had come from. She had never questioned him, however. She had just beamed over whatever he brought back to her, showing her gratitude by sweeping him up into her arms and kissing her firmly on the cheek.
It hadn’t been the best of living situations by far, but they had gotten by. All they had ever needed was each other. But then even that had been threatened by a bout of pneumonia that struck his mother without warning. He hadn’t been able to afford a proper doctor or the medicine that had been needed no matter how much money he had scrounged up. It had been horrible to just sit there, unable to do anything but wait, no matter how many times his mother had told him she didn’t blame him for any of it, that she still loved him no matter what.
She had passed away on a bitterly cold day in the heart of January. And a week after that, once the small funeral was over, the landlord had thrown out Eames onto the streets.
He had been just twelve years old without anywhere to go. So he had craved out a life for himself on the streets, determined to tough it out until he found something better.
That had been how Stephen Miles had found him.
He had been curled up on himself on a street, trying to stay warm, when a large coat had suddenly been draped across him. His head had darted up, only to find a man with a kind face smiling down at him.
“I think I might have a job for you,” he had said.
Eames had tried to wiggle out of it at first, not wanting to accept any charity work, but Miles had insisted. He had had to half drag the boy back to where he lived and worked-the Opera Populaire.
And Eames would always be grateful beyond words to him for that. If hadn’t been for Miles than he would never have had the chance to see the opera house for all its glory. Mal, Miles’ precocious daughter, had shown him every inch of the beautiful building. The two of them had often dragged along Miles’ apprentice, Dom Cobb, with them on their explorations of everything the place had to offer.
Under Miles’ watchful eye, he had received an education not just in the standard subjects, but architecture and music. He had been given the same music lessons as Mal, his tenor voice making a good match for her own soprano. And when Eames had discovered his talent for forgeries through his art lessons, Miles had encouraged him there as well.
The opera house had adored the man just like the three children he considered his did. There was never any question amongst the staff that Mal would be the one to inherit his potion as owner and manager once he decided to retire. Unfortunately, that time had come quicker than any of them had expected, just a few short weeks after Mal and Dom had gotten married.
The transition into the new ownership had been a bumpy one and Eames had sworn that he would do everything he could to help the newlyweds. They were his family, after all, in the only way that truly counted.
Still, when he made that oath Eames hadn’t expected for it to be called upon in quite such a manner.
The three of them were currently in the manger’s office, a place where they could be insured privacy since none of the opera staff would dare intrude on a place that held such memories. Mal was sitting in the large, plush chair behind the desk, fixing Eames with one of her most penetrating stares. Dom was standing at her side, his nerves showing through in the way his eyes lingered on everything but Eames.
Eames, meanwhile, was in one of the chairs in front of the desk, trying to make sense of what his two old friends had just asked him to do. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but did you really just-”
“Ask you to pretend to be a ghost?” Mal cut in. “Yes, we did.”
“Um, right.” Eames tried to think of something to say, but couldn’t come up with anything besides the obvious. “You do know how completely nuts that sounds, right?”
Dom sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Trust me, we do,” he said. He shot a look at his wife. “Or at least I do.”
Mal just rolled her eyes, seemingly exasperated with their inability to see things through her perspective. It was an expression that Eames had seen countless times before. “I see no reason not to be blunt here,” she said. She took a deep breath, allowing herself to appear vulnerable for one rare moment. “The Opera Populaire is losing patrons.”
“What?” Eames exclaimed. “But how can that be?” He couldn’t imagine how anyone could not want to come to the opera house. The building was one of the most magnificent feats of architecture in the city. And the music that it contained was sublime.
“The upper class doesn’t see this place like we do,” Mal said. “In our eyes it’s a glorious testament to music, to them it is only another place to mingle and gossip. And they are starting to find other places to do that.”
Eames’ hands clenched around the arms of his chair. He would never look fondly upon aristocratic class, who reminded him far too much of his father, and this was one of the reasons why. He had a feeling that none of them would notice true beauty if he were to slap them across the face with it. He took a deep breath to calm himself before he spoke. “And you think having a ghost would solve this?”
“Yes!” Mal exclaimed. “It would make the opera house stand out, give it a certain allure.”
“You wouldn’t have to do much,” Dom said. “You’re such a good actor already. Just pull a few of your usual tricks, let yourself be seen every so often then disappear through those hidden passageways you and Mal are so fond of. Just place the ideas in their heads.” He snorted. “The ballet girls will surely promote your story.”
“And you can still be our Eames,” Mal said, “without anyone being the wiser.”
Eames rubbed at his chin, brow furrowed. “You’re really serious about this then,” he said.
“We wouldn’t have come to you otherwise,” Mal said. “And, of course, it’s not as if you won’t receive anything in return. You will receive a salary once business starts to pick up-”
“That’s hardly necessary,” Eames said.
Mal arched a brow at him. “Don’t be silly,” she said. “You will be performing a service to the opera house, something for which you shall be paid. You can use it on the designs we thought up for the lagoon beneath the stage.” A small smile graced her lips. “And I was thinking of having you help me with the management, if only a little bit. It will be useful to have someone who can provide me with a second opinion on what operas should be selected and who should be given what roles.”
“And I can’t provide you with that?” Dom asked.
Mal looked up at him with an indulgent smile. “Oh, darling, I know you can appreciate it, but it is not your realm. You are much better with what goes on behind the scenes. It is what makes us such a good team.”
Eames was unable to keep a small, fond smile from his lips as he watched the two of them interact. He had never had any doubt that his friends would wind up together in the end, even if Mal had kept Dom guessing throughout their whole courtship. They shared a connection that no one else could truly understand, not even him.
He slumped back in his chair with exaggerated sigh, drawing their attention back to him. “When faced with such wonderful terms,” he said, “I suppose I shall have to accept.”
Mal flashed him an enormous smile. “I knew you would,” she said.
Dom only chuckled, moving forward to shake his hand firmly. “Thank you for this, old friend,” he said. “You won’t regret it.”
“Oh, I don’t think I shall,” Eames grinned. “I only hope it works.”
***
And, as fate would have it, it did work.
Eames had made sure to look the part, heading down to the costume department to nick a few of the things that wouldn’t be missed. He had loved the dark cape the instant he saw it. Mal had said later that it was because of his taste for dramatics, which was probably true. All he knew was that he adored the effect it had, swishing around him as he walked.
The mask had been chosen more on a whim, really. It had just been lying there on one of the tables he passed by, quite the unassuming thing. Even he would have expected himself to go with something elaborate, perhaps done up in some shocking color. This mask had been just a simple thing, fashioned out of white porcelain and intended to cover the upper half of a person’s face.
But Eames had found himself unable to get it out of his mind. So he had gone back and tried it on, only to find that it fit his face perfectly. And that had been that.
He had followed Dom’s advice after that. He had stalked around the scaffolding that hung above the stage and in the back corridors nears the dressing rooms. He would always wait until someone had caught sight of him then whip the cape around him before disappearing through a concealed trapdoor or unknown passageway.
It hadn’t taken long for tongues to start to wag. It started with the ballet girls, of course, who were always eager for any form of gossip. Their vivid imagination had magnified everything and he made sure to fan the flames. He had pulled some of the same tricks he had as a child, making things disappear or replacing necessary objects with something else. Soon, if anything had gone wrong around the opera house, it was blamed on the opera ghost.
After that everyone had had a story about the ghost. Eames’ favorite ones, however, had come to be about his appearance. He had related the details to Dom and Mal over supper, reducing them both into heaps of laughter. He had been said to wander around always in a dress suit, like a man of fashion. His eyes supposedly burned with a fire straight from hell itself. Everyone had been warned to stay on their guard unless they wanted to be caught with his “magical lasso.”
Eames had insisted that the incident with the ropes had only happened one time. The stage hand had had it coming anyway from how he was hassling that poor chorus girl. Still, he had taken care to don a dress suit and lasso whenever he went out to play the ghost from then on.
It hadn’t taken long for word to spread throughout the rest of Paris. People had begun to flock in like mad then, all wanting to catch a glimpse of this mysterious apparition.
And Eames had been made sure they weren’t disappointed. He had targeted the people in box five, which had always been his favorite one on the tier. It had begun with minor nuisances, such as strange sounds and missing belongings that had then escalated into random prods and hissing whispers. In the end, Eames wound up with the box to himself and from then on box five was known as the opera ghost’s personal box.
Life continued on in that manner for a few years. Eames settled into a comfortable routine as the resident ghost and there was rarely an empty seat in the opera house.
And then Arthur had come.
***
Arthur entered the opera house with little more than the clothes on his back, looking as though he was in need of more than a few good meals. The soft planes of his face made him appear much younger than he was, but his eyes held all the maturity of a person twice his age.
None of this, however, was particularly surprising once one learned about his background.
He was the son of Charles Moss, a talented, yet eccentric, violinist. His mother had died in childbirth, leaving the boy to be raised solely by his father. The two had shared an extremely close bond, being the only ones truly there for each other throughout their lives. It was no secret that the death of his father had left Arthur crushed; one only had to look at the boy’s face to see it.
The small family had never done well in terms of finances so, after the lose of his father, Arthur had found himself with nowhere to go. He had come to the opera house to appeal for a place to stay since his father had been an old friend of Miles and he remembered the man’s daughter and apprentice from his youth. He swore that he would do any form of work, anything at all, so long as he could stay.
Eames had known that the boy wouldn’t be turned away when Mal responded to his plea with soft eyes and Dom had slung an arm around his shoulders. There was no way that either of the opera house’s owners would turn such a boy out on the street, old connections or no.
Still, Eames was a bit surprised when Mal insisted on having Arthur audition for them. He watched from his usual place up in box five as the boy stood there on the stage, fidgeting under the glare of the lights.
“Is this really necessary?” Arthur asked. “I can do something backstage. Or I could manage the books? I’m really good with numbers.”
“I’m sure you are,” Mal said, “but I remember what your voice was like as a child. I bet under a man such as your father it has grown even better from what it was like back then.”
Arthur ducked his head, although Eames couldn’t be sure if it was from embarrassment or sadness brought on by the reminder of his father. Either way, the boy raised his head a minute later, face screwed up in determination, and began to sing.
Eames found himself snapping to attention in his seat, unaware of how his fingers were digging into the arms of the chair. That voice! He had never heard anything like it! The pitch was spot on, there was no weakness in either register, and the tone never once faltered.
Yet there was something curial missing-emotion. There was literally nothing there. It was a voice without any soul.
Eames felt like his heart was being constricted by the most exquisite pain. The boy needed to learn how to bring life into his voice, but that wasn’t something one picked up on their own. But where would he find a proper one?
He was drawn out of his thoughts with a jolt as the song came to an end. Mal heaved a heavy sigh then, looking up at Arthur with a soft, sad smile.
“The chorus it is then.”
***
Eames paced across the floor of the manger’s office that evening, unable to keep still, while Mal watched him from behind the desk.
“It’s so cruel,” he said. “The boy has such talent…and it’s all going to waste!”
“Don’t you think I know that?” Mal said. “But what can we do? It’s like his inspiration died with his father.”
“He needs a teacher,” Eames said.
“That is obvious,” Mal said, “but none of the ones here are a good match for him. All of them keep producing the same results.
Eames stopped in the center of the carpet, staring off into space. “He needs a better teacher then,” he murmured. “Someone who can give his voice the proper assistance…”
Mal eyed him warily “Eames,” she said, “please tell me your not thinking-”
“Why not?” Eames turned towards her with a grin. “You know I would do better with teaching him than any of the others you’ve thrown at him so far.”
Mal narrowed her eyes at him, her suspicion plain. “But who will you teach him as?” she asked. “Yourself or the ghost?”
Eames never lost his smile. “We’ll just have to see which he’s more comfortable with, won’t we?”
***
It seemed like an incredible stroke of luck that Arthur had been given the dressing room that contained the huge, elegant mirror that hid one of Eames’ favorite passageways. The person on the other side would see a reflective surface where he would see a mirror. And he had never been more grateful for that than now.
Arthur was sitting before his dressing table, his arms wrapped around himself as he cried. It was the first time Eames had seen him display any powerful emotion. The boy always managed to keep himself in check in front of everyone else, never losing his composure. What could have happened to make that change?
Arthur sucked in a short, raspy breath. “Oh, Father,” he whispered, “why did you lie? You told me that I could sing, that I was brilliant at it. But that wasn’t true was it? You were just too blinded by paternal bias to see it.” The chocked laugh he let out, without any traces of humor in it, broke Eames’ heart just a bit. “It’s like the Angel of Music. Just a silly fairy tale.”
Eames’ mind came alive at that. He had planned to present himself to Arthur as the ghost or himself after he could be certain which would be better received. But now it seemed like neither would be particularly well received. In fact, it seemed like the only person Arthur wanted to guide him was an “Angel of Music.”
And Eames could be that for him.
He began to sing a hymn, softly at first, letting his voice become steadily louder until it seemed to fill the room beyond the mirror.
Arthur stopped clutching at himself, his eyes darting around the room. “Who’s there?” he demanded.
Eames brought his voice down a few octaves, letting it come out in a slow, breathy rumble. “I am your Angel of Music,” he said.
Arthur’s eyes went wide at that, his mouth falling open. “My Angel of Music?” he breathed.
“Yes,” Eames said. “And I have come to teach you.”
Pairing: Arthur/Eames, Dom/Mal
Rating: PG-13 (At least for now, I'll warn if it goes up.)
Part: 1/?
Word Count: 3, 486
Warnings: None, unless you absolutely hate the Phantom of the Opera.
Summary: Who was that shape in the shadows? Whose is the face in the mask? (Phantom of the Opera AU)
(Title of fic taken from the song My Name by Charlie Winston.)
Eames had never been what you would call a normal career man. If he were honest, which he rarely was, then he would say that it had all begun with his origins. His mother had been a maid at a grand estate, who had been naïve enough to believe that the lord of the place was truly in love with her. She had been turned out the instant the wife found out about the affair, of course. When she discovered she was pregnant, she had tried to return to the lord, begging for his help, but had merely turned her away.
So his mother had wound up working about a dozen jobs just so that they could get by. Eames had always wondered why she had never resented him for putting her in such a position. She never lost her gentle demeanor, smothering him with love every chance she got.
The ever changing gray of his eyes had come from her, along with his unusually full lips, but his brown hair and stocky build had not. He had resented the parts in him that had come from his father, even though his mother assured him that she didn’t love him any less for them. He hadn’t wanted anything that could connect him back to a man he hated and still did.
It all began through Eames’ determination to be helpful. He had been tried of seeing his mother come back late at night, all of her jobs finally finished, collapsing into the bed that they shared. He had just wanted to help take the load off her shoulders, give her a chance to actually relax.
The only problem was that there weren’t many good paying jobs for minors. Except when it came to the less legal ones.
Eames had learned how to be quick with his hands, snatching things out of the pockets of people he passed by on the streets without them even noticing. Once he had gotten confident enough in his skills, he even managed to swipe food from the stalls that the vendors lined up along the Avenue des Champs-Élysées.
When he looked back on it now, he was pretty sure that his mother knew where the sudden influx of money and food had come from. She had never questioned him, however. She had just beamed over whatever he brought back to her, showing her gratitude by sweeping him up into her arms and kissing her firmly on the cheek.
It hadn’t been the best of living situations by far, but they had gotten by. All they had ever needed was each other. But then even that had been threatened by a bout of pneumonia that struck his mother without warning. He hadn’t been able to afford a proper doctor or the medicine that had been needed no matter how much money he had scrounged up. It had been horrible to just sit there, unable to do anything but wait, no matter how many times his mother had told him she didn’t blame him for any of it, that she still loved him no matter what.
She had passed away on a bitterly cold day in the heart of January. And a week after that, once the small funeral was over, the landlord had thrown out Eames onto the streets.
He had been just twelve years old without anywhere to go. So he had craved out a life for himself on the streets, determined to tough it out until he found something better.
That had been how Stephen Miles had found him.
He had been curled up on himself on a street, trying to stay warm, when a large coat had suddenly been draped across him. His head had darted up, only to find a man with a kind face smiling down at him.
“I think I might have a job for you,” he had said.
Eames had tried to wiggle out of it at first, not wanting to accept any charity work, but Miles had insisted. He had had to half drag the boy back to where he lived and worked-the Opera Populaire.
And Eames would always be grateful beyond words to him for that. If hadn’t been for Miles than he would never have had the chance to see the opera house for all its glory. Mal, Miles’ precocious daughter, had shown him every inch of the beautiful building. The two of them had often dragged along Miles’ apprentice, Dom Cobb, with them on their explorations of everything the place had to offer.
Under Miles’ watchful eye, he had received an education not just in the standard subjects, but architecture and music. He had been given the same music lessons as Mal, his tenor voice making a good match for her own soprano. And when Eames had discovered his talent for forgeries through his art lessons, Miles had encouraged him there as well.
The opera house had adored the man just like the three children he considered his did. There was never any question amongst the staff that Mal would be the one to inherit his potion as owner and manager once he decided to retire. Unfortunately, that time had come quicker than any of them had expected, just a few short weeks after Mal and Dom had gotten married.
The transition into the new ownership had been a bumpy one and Eames had sworn that he would do everything he could to help the newlyweds. They were his family, after all, in the only way that truly counted.
Still, when he made that oath Eames hadn’t expected for it to be called upon in quite such a manner.
The three of them were currently in the manger’s office, a place where they could be insured privacy since none of the opera staff would dare intrude on a place that held such memories. Mal was sitting in the large, plush chair behind the desk, fixing Eames with one of her most penetrating stares. Dom was standing at her side, his nerves showing through in the way his eyes lingered on everything but Eames.
Eames, meanwhile, was in one of the chairs in front of the desk, trying to make sense of what his two old friends had just asked him to do. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but did you really just-”
“Ask you to pretend to be a ghost?” Mal cut in. “Yes, we did.”
“Um, right.” Eames tried to think of something to say, but couldn’t come up with anything besides the obvious. “You do know how completely nuts that sounds, right?”
Dom sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Trust me, we do,” he said. He shot a look at his wife. “Or at least I do.”
Mal just rolled her eyes, seemingly exasperated with their inability to see things through her perspective. It was an expression that Eames had seen countless times before. “I see no reason not to be blunt here,” she said. She took a deep breath, allowing herself to appear vulnerable for one rare moment. “The Opera Populaire is losing patrons.”
“What?” Eames exclaimed. “But how can that be?” He couldn’t imagine how anyone could not want to come to the opera house. The building was one of the most magnificent feats of architecture in the city. And the music that it contained was sublime.
“The upper class doesn’t see this place like we do,” Mal said. “In our eyes it’s a glorious testament to music, to them it is only another place to mingle and gossip. And they are starting to find other places to do that.”
Eames’ hands clenched around the arms of his chair. He would never look fondly upon aristocratic class, who reminded him far too much of his father, and this was one of the reasons why. He had a feeling that none of them would notice true beauty if he were to slap them across the face with it. He took a deep breath to calm himself before he spoke. “And you think having a ghost would solve this?”
“Yes!” Mal exclaimed. “It would make the opera house stand out, give it a certain allure.”
“You wouldn’t have to do much,” Dom said. “You’re such a good actor already. Just pull a few of your usual tricks, let yourself be seen every so often then disappear through those hidden passageways you and Mal are so fond of. Just place the ideas in their heads.” He snorted. “The ballet girls will surely promote your story.”
“And you can still be our Eames,” Mal said, “without anyone being the wiser.”
Eames rubbed at his chin, brow furrowed. “You’re really serious about this then,” he said.
“We wouldn’t have come to you otherwise,” Mal said. “And, of course, it’s not as if you won’t receive anything in return. You will receive a salary once business starts to pick up-”
“That’s hardly necessary,” Eames said.
Mal arched a brow at him. “Don’t be silly,” she said. “You will be performing a service to the opera house, something for which you shall be paid. You can use it on the designs we thought up for the lagoon beneath the stage.” A small smile graced her lips. “And I was thinking of having you help me with the management, if only a little bit. It will be useful to have someone who can provide me with a second opinion on what operas should be selected and who should be given what roles.”
“And I can’t provide you with that?” Dom asked.
Mal looked up at him with an indulgent smile. “Oh, darling, I know you can appreciate it, but it is not your realm. You are much better with what goes on behind the scenes. It is what makes us such a good team.”
Eames was unable to keep a small, fond smile from his lips as he watched the two of them interact. He had never had any doubt that his friends would wind up together in the end, even if Mal had kept Dom guessing throughout their whole courtship. They shared a connection that no one else could truly understand, not even him.
He slumped back in his chair with exaggerated sigh, drawing their attention back to him. “When faced with such wonderful terms,” he said, “I suppose I shall have to accept.”
Mal flashed him an enormous smile. “I knew you would,” she said.
Dom only chuckled, moving forward to shake his hand firmly. “Thank you for this, old friend,” he said. “You won’t regret it.”
“Oh, I don’t think I shall,” Eames grinned. “I only hope it works.”
***
And, as fate would have it, it did work.
Eames had made sure to look the part, heading down to the costume department to nick a few of the things that wouldn’t be missed. He had loved the dark cape the instant he saw it. Mal had said later that it was because of his taste for dramatics, which was probably true. All he knew was that he adored the effect it had, swishing around him as he walked.
The mask had been chosen more on a whim, really. It had just been lying there on one of the tables he passed by, quite the unassuming thing. Even he would have expected himself to go with something elaborate, perhaps done up in some shocking color. This mask had been just a simple thing, fashioned out of white porcelain and intended to cover the upper half of a person’s face.
But Eames had found himself unable to get it out of his mind. So he had gone back and tried it on, only to find that it fit his face perfectly. And that had been that.
He had followed Dom’s advice after that. He had stalked around the scaffolding that hung above the stage and in the back corridors nears the dressing rooms. He would always wait until someone had caught sight of him then whip the cape around him before disappearing through a concealed trapdoor or unknown passageway.
It hadn’t taken long for tongues to start to wag. It started with the ballet girls, of course, who were always eager for any form of gossip. Their vivid imagination had magnified everything and he made sure to fan the flames. He had pulled some of the same tricks he had as a child, making things disappear or replacing necessary objects with something else. Soon, if anything had gone wrong around the opera house, it was blamed on the opera ghost.
After that everyone had had a story about the ghost. Eames’ favorite ones, however, had come to be about his appearance. He had related the details to Dom and Mal over supper, reducing them both into heaps of laughter. He had been said to wander around always in a dress suit, like a man of fashion. His eyes supposedly burned with a fire straight from hell itself. Everyone had been warned to stay on their guard unless they wanted to be caught with his “magical lasso.”
Eames had insisted that the incident with the ropes had only happened one time. The stage hand had had it coming anyway from how he was hassling that poor chorus girl. Still, he had taken care to don a dress suit and lasso whenever he went out to play the ghost from then on.
It hadn’t taken long for word to spread throughout the rest of Paris. People had begun to flock in like mad then, all wanting to catch a glimpse of this mysterious apparition.
And Eames had been made sure they weren’t disappointed. He had targeted the people in box five, which had always been his favorite one on the tier. It had begun with minor nuisances, such as strange sounds and missing belongings that had then escalated into random prods and hissing whispers. In the end, Eames wound up with the box to himself and from then on box five was known as the opera ghost’s personal box.
Life continued on in that manner for a few years. Eames settled into a comfortable routine as the resident ghost and there was rarely an empty seat in the opera house.
And then Arthur had come.
***
Arthur entered the opera house with little more than the clothes on his back, looking as though he was in need of more than a few good meals. The soft planes of his face made him appear much younger than he was, but his eyes held all the maturity of a person twice his age.
None of this, however, was particularly surprising once one learned about his background.
He was the son of Charles Moss, a talented, yet eccentric, violinist. His mother had died in childbirth, leaving the boy to be raised solely by his father. The two had shared an extremely close bond, being the only ones truly there for each other throughout their lives. It was no secret that the death of his father had left Arthur crushed; one only had to look at the boy’s face to see it.
The small family had never done well in terms of finances so, after the lose of his father, Arthur had found himself with nowhere to go. He had come to the opera house to appeal for a place to stay since his father had been an old friend of Miles and he remembered the man’s daughter and apprentice from his youth. He swore that he would do any form of work, anything at all, so long as he could stay.
Eames had known that the boy wouldn’t be turned away when Mal responded to his plea with soft eyes and Dom had slung an arm around his shoulders. There was no way that either of the opera house’s owners would turn such a boy out on the street, old connections or no.
Still, Eames was a bit surprised when Mal insisted on having Arthur audition for them. He watched from his usual place up in box five as the boy stood there on the stage, fidgeting under the glare of the lights.
“Is this really necessary?” Arthur asked. “I can do something backstage. Or I could manage the books? I’m really good with numbers.”
“I’m sure you are,” Mal said, “but I remember what your voice was like as a child. I bet under a man such as your father it has grown even better from what it was like back then.”
Arthur ducked his head, although Eames couldn’t be sure if it was from embarrassment or sadness brought on by the reminder of his father. Either way, the boy raised his head a minute later, face screwed up in determination, and began to sing.
Eames found himself snapping to attention in his seat, unaware of how his fingers were digging into the arms of the chair. That voice! He had never heard anything like it! The pitch was spot on, there was no weakness in either register, and the tone never once faltered.
Yet there was something curial missing-emotion. There was literally nothing there. It was a voice without any soul.
Eames felt like his heart was being constricted by the most exquisite pain. The boy needed to learn how to bring life into his voice, but that wasn’t something one picked up on their own. But where would he find a proper one?
He was drawn out of his thoughts with a jolt as the song came to an end. Mal heaved a heavy sigh then, looking up at Arthur with a soft, sad smile.
“The chorus it is then.”
***
Eames paced across the floor of the manger’s office that evening, unable to keep still, while Mal watched him from behind the desk.
“It’s so cruel,” he said. “The boy has such talent…and it’s all going to waste!”
“Don’t you think I know that?” Mal said. “But what can we do? It’s like his inspiration died with his father.”
“He needs a teacher,” Eames said.
“That is obvious,” Mal said, “but none of the ones here are a good match for him. All of them keep producing the same results.
Eames stopped in the center of the carpet, staring off into space. “He needs a better teacher then,” he murmured. “Someone who can give his voice the proper assistance…”
Mal eyed him warily “Eames,” she said, “please tell me your not thinking-”
“Why not?” Eames turned towards her with a grin. “You know I would do better with teaching him than any of the others you’ve thrown at him so far.”
Mal narrowed her eyes at him, her suspicion plain. “But who will you teach him as?” she asked. “Yourself or the ghost?”
Eames never lost his smile. “We’ll just have to see which he’s more comfortable with, won’t we?”
***
It seemed like an incredible stroke of luck that Arthur had been given the dressing room that contained the huge, elegant mirror that hid one of Eames’ favorite passageways. The person on the other side would see a reflective surface where he would see a mirror. And he had never been more grateful for that than now.
Arthur was sitting before his dressing table, his arms wrapped around himself as he cried. It was the first time Eames had seen him display any powerful emotion. The boy always managed to keep himself in check in front of everyone else, never losing his composure. What could have happened to make that change?
Arthur sucked in a short, raspy breath. “Oh, Father,” he whispered, “why did you lie? You told me that I could sing, that I was brilliant at it. But that wasn’t true was it? You were just too blinded by paternal bias to see it.” The chocked laugh he let out, without any traces of humor in it, broke Eames’ heart just a bit. “It’s like the Angel of Music. Just a silly fairy tale.”
Eames’ mind came alive at that. He had planned to present himself to Arthur as the ghost or himself after he could be certain which would be better received. But now it seemed like neither would be particularly well received. In fact, it seemed like the only person Arthur wanted to guide him was an “Angel of Music.”
And Eames could be that for him.
He began to sing a hymn, softly at first, letting his voice become steadily louder until it seemed to fill the room beyond the mirror.
Arthur stopped clutching at himself, his eyes darting around the room. “Who’s there?” he demanded.
Eames brought his voice down a few octaves, letting it come out in a slow, breathy rumble. “I am your Angel of Music,” he said.
Arthur’s eyes went wide at that, his mouth falling open. “My Angel of Music?” he breathed.
“Yes,” Eames said. “And I have come to teach you.”