I sadly don't own the Phantom or any other characters created by G. Leroux, S. Kay and A. L. Webber, but they always have a place in my heart.
THE FACE
Her eyes widened and her mouth opened in a silent scream. She had never seen anything like the face of this stranger she had just asked to take her hand in marriage. Even the warm dim light of the church's candles could not embellish his horrid appearance.
His left side was unmarred, but the skin had a yellowish tint to it. The right side though was twisted and scarred. The side of the nose was elongated towards the cheek, the cheekbone higher than usual, the eye sunken in, and its lid smaller than on the other side, which gave the eye the impression of a constant glare. Where the skin wasn't tainted red as if infected, it had the same yellowish tint to it than the other side, but the skin seemed thinner, with some veins showing through.
The deformation spread into the hairline and back to his ear which amazingly was only a bit crooked on the top. The hair itself was thin and of a greyish brown. The whole right side was bumped and twisted, and the contrast to his unblemished left side made it look even worse.
Horrified she took a few steps back until she collided with the table the candles were standing upon. A strangled sob escaped her lips. She raised her handkerchief to wipe away the tears and stifle the sound. Though she hadn't screamed, her reaction was more or less what the Phantom thought it would be. It was clear to see that now that she knew whom she had begged to marry her she would rethink her offer.
He had known what was to happen, but still, a rejection hurt, no matter that there had been numerous others before that one. He started to take a step back to be once more reclaimed by the shadows when her hand shot forward, begging him to stop.
"No, wait" she said. "I…you…you're the Phantom of the Opera," she stammered.
At her words his hands reached instinctively for the lasso, but he had left it back in the vaults of the opera. He therefore had to come up close to a person to inflict harm, and that was the least thing he wanted. With his face bare like this, he would always be recognised for what he was, an outcast, a monster and a murderer, he realised. Defeated, he turned once more to leave.
"Please, stay," she begged.
The woman did not immediately run in fear from him as she should be, and he wondered why. In fact, she was currently asking herself the same thing. 'I'm too curious for my own good,' she told herself, deciding to find out more about this mystified men she just had encountered.
'And I am running out of time, so maybe...' she pondered, daring to look at him again.
"I passed the burning opera on my way here, and heard people gossiping about what happened," she continued.
"Then leave, quickly. Don't you know I am a murderer?" he sneered.
The Phantom suddenly advanced on her, making her step back to the right only to find herself cornered. He was now only inches from her, threatening her with his tall frame. She cast her eyes to the floor, but he put a hand under her chin and forced her to look at him, his disfigured face close her own. Aggression radiated off him, with his lips turned upward in a smirk, his golden eyes sparkling like those of a dangerous cat waiting for its strike. She wanted to shrink further back in the corner, but his hand held her in place.
"Now tell me, do you still want me to marry you?"