Work Text:
"I have heard that drowning is the most peaceful way to die."
Erik peered at her from across the room, perched so carefully on that straight-backed chair that it seemed he had spent a millennia in. Always, he sat there. Some nights, he didn't even come to bed.
Music no longer filled their dark home. Often, she found herself cast into complete darkness, even when she begged him to light a candle. Even when she reminded him of her fear of the darkness.
He gazed at her with pity, but he made no move to alleviate her suffering.
"It isn't," he answered after a long moment.
His voice still made her shiver, but it was all that seemed left of him. Every day he seemed a little… less. It was difficult for her to explain, hard to put her finger on, but it was clear in her aching chest. Little by little, he was drifting away from her.
It hadn't always been this way.
Or perhaps it had, and she had simply forgotten. Her memory was hazy, but she recalled something more. Beautiful music, the warmth of his voice as he read to her by the fire.
Warmth.
It had been so long since she felt warm.
She shivered, turning her gaze to the empty fireplace. "Won't you fetch some firewood, Erik? It's been so dreadfully long since we've had a fire."
"Of course," he murmured. "I promise."
Christine stared at him, and he made no movement. It was a lie. She knew that it was, because he had promised her the same several times before.
She could only recall him attempting once. He had gone above for a time and returned empty handed with a puzzled look, muttering something under his breath about rebar. The truth was, she hadn't thought much of it. He had always been prone to rambling.
One night not long after, he burst into her bedchamber in a panic in the middle of the night. He smashed the hand mirror that lived on her vanity with purpose, sparing her only a glance and no explanation before he fled the room.
There had never been many mirrors in the strange tomb of a home, but there were certainly none at all now.
She could not recall the last time she had seen her own face.
He watched her wearily as she approached him. The way that he looked at her, now, was strange.
At first it had been fascination, as though he simply couldn't believe that she existed. Often, he had touched her cheek like he had to reassure himself that she was actually there, solid, breathing.
It had turned nearly to fear in the time since, and Christine couldn't parse out why exactly it was. He was a gentle husband. She had long since forgiven him for so many of the demons haunting them.
Of course she had forgiven. She could no longer remember what they were; only that they had been there. Once, she had been afraid of him.
She couldn't recall why. Erik was all that she had, now, all that she knew, and perhaps that was why his apathy hurt so terribly.
When she sank to her knees before his seat, he didn't recoil. Instead he stared at her with a cloudy gaze, seemingly mesmerized.
His hand was cold, so much colder than she recalled it being, but she drew it to her chest anyway, pressing his palm over her heart.
"Don't you love me anymore?" she whispered, hoping the desperation she felt quaking in her core came out in her voice.
He closed his eyes, and when he opened them his gaze was much brighter, nearly shining in the darkness. "I love you," he answered, his voice a thin, reedy thing that she had never heard before. "God, I love you. Forgive me, Christine. Forgive me."
"Touch me," she begged softly.
Cold fingers ghosted along her cheek. They traced her ear, curled, so gently, in her hair.
"Sometimes I don't feel real," she admitted, the words soft.
He made a strange, strangled sound. Leaning closer, he buried his noseless face against the crown of her head.
He wept. She could hear it. She could feel it in the shake of his body so close to hers, but there were no tears to accompany the gasp of his cool breath against her scalp.
"I have to let go," he wept brokenly. "You have to let go, Christine."
"No," she soothed gently. "No. I'm right here, Erik. Don't you feel me?"
He was moving, then. Standing from the chair that she hadn't seen him leave for days. He hauled her up by her arm, dragging her purposefully toward the front door. "I can't tell you," he muttered. "You have to see. I have to show you."
Her feet followed along, but there was a strange lump in her throat. "You're frightening me."
He paused, and the look that he gave her was so full of love that for just the briefest second, she actually felt warm. "I have to show you," he said gently. "Indulge me, Christine. Just for a moment."
She nodded, and he led her through the front door, his step just a bit less hurried as he released her from his tight grasp.
It had been so long since she stepped through that door that for a moment, she felt lost. Her eyes trailed over gray stone, the muddy ledge of the lake.
She didn't remember. Not really. She felt it more than she remembered, something tickling at the back of her mind as she stared at the still water.
"Look," he insisted, kneeling beside the placid water of the lake.
When she made no movement to obey, he reached one hand out toward her.
"Please, Christine," he rasped. "You have to look."
With something heavy in her chest, she took the hand that he offered, kneeling at his side. "I don't like this," she admitted quietly. "You're frightening me."
Instead of pleading, he touched her. One hand against her upper arm, one against her head he pressed her toward the water with his chest.
For a long moment, all that she could do was stare.
There was a ripple across the surface of the water. Her mind was playing horrid tricks on her.
"Stop," she gasped, staring in horror at the jawless, mottled face that stared back at her from the water. "You're frightening me, Erik. Why are you frightening me?"
His fingers trembled against her arm, but his grip was steady. "The Grasshopper hopped," he murmured cryptically. "It hopped, Christine. We have to let go."
"Let go," she whispered, trying to shake out of his grasp. "Let go, let go, let go, let-"
It wasn't the splash that she heard when he forced her face-first into the biting cold of the lake. Instead it was the wailing, mournful sob that he gave.
She thrashed. She wanted to beg him for answers but she couldn't. Water splashed as she fought his impossible grip, her lungs burning fiercely in her chest.
His knee dug against her back, pinning her down, and above the sloshing of water she heard the strangest whimpers.
Tired.
So tired.
She drifted into the cold.
When Christine woke, the first breath of air that she took burned in her lungs. Cold. Everything was always so cold. So cold, now, that the stone floor against her bare feet hardly even registered.
She frowned at the empty space in the bed beside her, pulling her dressing gown a bit tighter as she ventured out through the cobwebbed hallways of their once immaculate home.
Her husband sat in that same straight backed chair that he always did, staring into the empty fireplace blankly.
The strangest thought came to her just then, as she stared at his tense shoulders.
"I have heard that drowning is the most peaceful way to die," she said absently.
He doubled in against himself as he took his torn face between his trembling hands. "It isn't," he gasped.
Christine frowned at her strange husband, shivering as she glanced toward the empty fireplace.