AN: This is just a brief little inner monologue that I had while watching the movie version of the phantom of the opera. I want it known that I am an actual 'phan' almost to the point of needing mental help. I have see nteh broadway show, read the books, watched several movie versions, and I went to london when LND opened. So please...no bashing the movie version. It floats some people's boats and it sinks other's ships. To each their own and all that jazz. Enjoy!

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Christine's lips felt warm against Erik's own ruined ones. they moved with him, hesitant at first, and then more sure. He could feel a change...and then suddenly it was gone. Her lips were gone. He opened his eyes slowly in confusion and saw Christine's warm brown orbs looking back at him. She was searching, but Erik couldn't dare break her gaze, not even for a split second. He felt more exposed now than he ever had before and with one glance she could make or break him. He fought the urge to look away and laid himself bare. She must have found what she was looking for because her lips returned to his, hungry and demanding. He gave her all that he had to give, daring to lock a hand in the silky heaven of her hair.

When he found the strength to pull away he saw her face. There wasn't disgust, anger, or the loathing she said she felt. Though Erik knew he deserved all three. More than all of that, there wasn't pity. She was looking on his ruined face with wonder...and if he was bold...affection. He had waited his whole miserable existence to see just a glimpse of that on anyone's face. To bask in that glow. He could have stayed there forever. But Erik knew he couldn't do that. His angel deserved better, a life of light and of warmth. Of sprawling babies and flowering gardens. He couldn't give that to her. The whelp could. The boy could give her the security she deserved and the romance she craved. It would never be the fire that burned and scorched, the passion that was all consuming. No. Only he had that for her, but his angel would be happy without it.

With him she would only suffer darkness, madness, and misery. She could never walk down the streets on an afternoon arm and arm with him. Never. More importantly, that look of awe? It was forced by his hand. He could see splotches on her arms where he had gripped her and drug her down into his darkness. Erik could barely stomach them, let alone know that he had caused them.

With no small amount of self loathing, Erik staggered away, dropping his rope with disgust. He told her to leave, told them both to. They would keep his secret. Of that he was sure. No one would want to talk of their time with the devil's spawn.

He walked in a daze, past his piano. He had no muse...no melodies dancing across his brain, no lyrics bursting from his chest waiting to be written. His muse had left him alone in his hell.

Erik somehow stumbled into his room and there he sat down, not on the bed, but on the damp cavern floor, his music box a comforting friend, looking at him with a bright smile, no judgement. At least it could still play it's ever constant tune.

Erik pulled the little box to him and sang along with the tune in a voice ruined by his sorrow and tears, barely above a whisper. He had on a whimsical smile...almost amused if it were not for the tears blurring his vision.

He could have been there for seconds, minutes, or hours and he wouldn't have known. Time held no meaning for Erik anymore. A shadow came over his vision and he looked up. Christine was standing before him, unsure and reluctant...but that didn't matter to Erik because he was there. She was lovlier than any hallucination he could conjure, nor would he sully her by trying.

For the briefest of seconds, Erik had hope. He saw a future flickering and swaying before him like candles with a gentle music behind them.

He saw Christine lounging in his home, her singing his works in the greatest of opera houses...she deserved no less, he saw her shun wave after wave of suitors because she was his and she was proud of it.

He saw an even more tantalizing dream. A chateau somewhere secluded, pine trees nestling it, keeping it safe, ivy climbing up the side and Christine chasing children around the yard. They were perfect in every way. Their laughter echoed through the clearing and their curls were all a tumble, rosy cheeked and a little fat limbed they ran from their mother and into his arms with cries of 'father' and kisses freely given to a marred face.

He was so overwhelmed by this that he had to tell Christine one last time...tell her how much she meant in a last effort to win her love.

"Christine I love you." He said reverently, even pleadingly.

Without warning, the flames of the future sputtered and died, and the music in his heart stopped and went cold. His whole world went pitch black with one action from Christine.

She was looking at him apologetically, and she was taking off his ring and putting it in his palm. The metal was heavy and cold in his palm. Without another word she left him and he was once again alone. He could hear Christine and Raoul's protestations of love as they pulled away and he ached.

It was a love that could never be. He would hold it in his heart until the day he died. Never love another, never care for another, never open up for another. Erik had ceased to exist. With a bitter glance he looked at his face and in agony smashed the shattered remains of the man that Christine had left behind, leaving them with the candlestick holder and the shards of glass and embraced the darkness that consumed him.