Twisted Every Way(Phantom Of The Opera Fic)

Chapter 84: Peter

Peter looked to Gustave unsteadily, "I really can't take another lunch old sport."

"Why ever not?!" Gustave laughed, "Come now! Lukes watching Mary, this may be the only chance we have to get out." 

"I'm sorry l kept you waiting," Peter apologized.Gustaves brow furrowed in intrigue. "Why yes-Why didn't you come upstairs?"

Peter gave a chuckle.  "Honestly?"

Gustave nodded.

"l was afraid l'd meet your friends from the club."

"You would have." Gustave laughed, "It's a good thing you didn't come then."

"l have to tell you. . ." Peter chided after a moments hesitation. . .your friends bore me to death."

Gustave gave a hearty laugh, "Me too."

"But I've known them longer. " Peter noted, "So they've been boring me longer. Why that John Hanson, he's actually quite unique, he's been a bore since the age of five! All he has to do is say hello and I can barely keep my eyes open."

Gustave roared in laughter and Peter smiled timidly. How nice it was to hear his friend laugh again. It had been long enough.

"I waited for you at the cricket match last Sunday," Gustave mentioned inqustivley. "Where were you?"

"The thought of another after match lunch paraylyzed me." Peter said gravley. "Beside I was writing to an old friend. She says she knew you once."

"Oh," Gustave laughed turinging red, "Well if she says I did I must had at some point."

"Hurry," Peter said to the carriage driver urging him onward, "I have an appoinment with a heavenly creature at 1' o clock sharp."

"I'm still young aren't I Peter?" Gustave said after a moment of looking over his young companion.

"Why yes I suppose so."

"You suppose so?"

"Well there is a droll about you sometimes old chap. Maybe it's the women you go with."

"I don't go with any women."

Here Peter gave an upstart that nearly startled the horses, "Well theres your problem! You need to live again! Of course you can't live in London, or anywhere else these days, everythings exceedinly drab."

"Beg your pardon?" Gustave said in surprise.

"Well you know," Peter made a sickened face, "Paris, bleh."

Here he gave a shudder and turned his eyes upward away from Gustave.

Gustave gave a small scoff.

"I can't help it," Peter moaned, "I'm dreadfully bored."

"Bored? but look at all the captivating things there are to see! Especially in Paris!"

"Name two."

Gustave paused and thought it over, choosing his two finiest exapmles to try and corner his clever friend.

"Paris in the spring," he finally excalimed, "When everything is beautiful and glowing."

"And what color are the trees?"

Gustave gave a shrug, "green."

"What color were the last year?!" Peter prided.

Gustave gave a frown but Peter urged him on.

"Green."

"It doesn't change a bit Paris. It's dreadfully boring."

Gustave snapped his fingers, "The river sein!"

Peter rolled his eyes, "All it can do is flow for hours and hours, i'd rather like to drown in it rather than see it."

"Your getting to be a rather cross man," Gustave remarked.

-------

"Ilios!" Miss Giry scolded, "Your getting to be a rather bitter little girl."

"I can't help it," ilios moaned, "Everything we get to do is so fasinating that I can't help but want to go on ahead when you've said to stop."

"You must learn child!" Miss Giry scolded, puttting a finger to her chin and fixing it upward, "One day people, good people will be watching."

"I don't see why I have to stay after learning all this! This stuff and nonsense," Ilios huffed, "Why must I learn to smell cigars and crack lobsters. I haven't the money for lobster."

"Because," Madam Giry laughed, enlightening her. "One day you might meet a gentleman able to afford such things. And when you do, you will secure your station by things like cigars and lobsters."

Ilios blew her bangs on her forehead as Madam Giry countinued on and on about her role in society and advancment in station.

"Your Mother has expressed to me that it is your wish to live among the world above."

"Yes!" Ilios said perking up, "I would love it so."

"Then this is your only way. A girl with no name," She paused looking over Ilios school girl costum, "And questionable looks and figure has to do what she can."

"i'd Rather be painting." Ilios muttered.

Madam Giry came and sat down beside her, "One day Ilios, you will understand. Love is an art. It takes time, and practice. The greater the artist, the greater the art. And what makes an artist?"

"Cigars and jewerly?" Ilios snarked, smiling micheviously as Madam Giry turned red in the face.

"You are from another planet," She huffed shaking ehr head and leaving the room, "Carry on."

Ilios crossed her arms angrilly. "How stupid, how dumb! I could make my own way if I wanted to. A necklace is love. Ha! A ring is love?! I want so much more than they've got planned out for me."

She pushed the cigar box aside and kicked her shoes into the arpet, pretending she was leaving little gashing holes from bullets shot with the hate in her eyes.

"I don't understand Paris, so obsessed with love and romance. Ridicolus. But they seem to love it! And think highly of it! I love Eli and yet you don't see me making a fool of myself, smelling his cigars just to bleed money out of him. Stupid! Stupid people! Stupid romance! Many a perfect ngiht ruined by sonnets and flowers and dreadful chatter about love."

"I can hear you!" Madam Giry called, banging her staff on the floor.

Ilios moaned and returned to sorting cigars.

Paris, at the moment, seemed a bore.