Hello!

I'm trying something new here: publishing the stories I've been working on for livejournal here to get some feedback on them... They'll mostly be EC, but some RC might sneak in every now and again, sorry!

Disclaimer: Many people have claimed to own 'the Phantom of the Opera'. I have never been that brave. . . or that stupid. It still belongs to Monsieur Gaston Leroux, who doesn't really care what we do with his characters since he's dead.

Hopefully more to come.

Prompt: #11B (never really mine).

"Christine," he began. "Two things. Christine?"

"Yes, my dear," she said absently to the mirror. Raoul turned and jerked her to face him.

"Two things, and then we will not have to see each other for another month. Understood?" He knew, subconsciously, that she did not understand; that she never would. Poor, insane Christine: locked in the depths of her own mind and getting madder every day.

Why was always the wife that got to go insane and be locked, safe and sound, in the attic?

"Two things, and then I will let you be. The children are home tomorrow."

"Whose children would that be?" she asked brightly. His palm itched to slap her. His head knew she couldn't help being like this, but at times like this his breaking heart found it hard to listen.

"Yours, my dear Madame, yours," he said tightly. "Antoine and Mael will be home tomorrow. I trust they will not have to see their mother acting like a lunatic in front of polite society?" Clarity entered her eyes, more grey than blue, for a moment.

"Honestly, Raoul, you don't have to treat me like I'm mad," she snipped at him. He breathed deep; God save him from his wife.

"You are, the majority of the time," he said quietly, but she had already drifted back into her dreamscape. "The second thing, wife of mine, is that you will not ignore the help or our guests any longer. You are the scandal of Paris, and all are whispering, when is he finally going to lock the madwoman wife away for good?" Christine stared dreamily at the mirror.

"Yes, Raoul," she twittered happily. "I understand." He heaved a breath.

"All right, then," he whispered. "All right, Christine," because even if she was mad and nothing like the blonde, free spirited girl he had married, he still loved her, and he would never, ever, lock her away in some horrible dark room like the dungeons of the Phantom.

Even if that sun-gilded hair was grey with time – though it had been fifteen years at the most – and the darkness, and the blue eyes were just as faded, she was still his Christine.

Raoul turned and glared at the mirror his wife stared vaguely into. "Damn you," he hissed, his words extended over time, and turned to leave the room.

I told you, boy. She was never meant to be yours.

He whirled, expecting a dark masked figure and a pair of burning, possessive amber eyes accessorizing a black mask with a catgut noose. But there was only his mad, sad wife; languishing among the dust and ashes from burnt roses, the pretty but bland furniture (much like that in the opera house dormitories) and the empty cognac bottles, and he wasn't sure whether that feeling in his gut was relief or disappointment. He walked out of the door, ignoring the black mask hanging over the doorframe like a gypsy curse, and he heard his wife begin to sing, her voice a fragile croak.

Angel of music, do not shun me…

I could say the same thing to you, he thought grimly, and shut the door, leaving his wife to the ghost of her past.

Please review.