This is in defense of Raoul. I notice a lot of people in this fandom seem to hate him. I don't see why; I sympathize with the guy. He's the nice guy who gets his feelings jerked around all the time. Takes place sometime before when Christine is spirited off the stage at the Opera.
Raoul hurts, though Christine does not see.
It's like when she would run before him through the halls of the Opera, her white dress flashing through the shadows. She would call back that when he caught her, they would get married and run away and have children and name the boy Raoul. But he could never catch her, and that was that – the facade held through the wear of one more day.
He tells himself that the ghost is a monster, that Christine hates him. But Poor Erik, she says, and he has to wonder whether she has ever smiled at the monster the way she smiled at him over her shoulder while he chased her around set-pieces and piles of rope.
He does not hate Christine, he tells himself. All his hatred, all the fire no one knows he has, the fire that makes his gut twist and his head pound, is for Erik. He would kill the ghost if he got the chance. Put a pistol to his head and tell him just how despicable he is before pulling the trigger. He thinks about it sometimes late at night.
When the corporeal ghost would crumple to the floor, would Christine run to Raoul and throw her arms about his neck in thanks? Or would she run to Erik and hold him as he died?
Raoul tries not to think of these things. He tries not to think at all these days, as his angel of music in white tugs him first one way and then another. But the fire is there, along with everything else she does not see, and someday it must burn through to the surface.