Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters from The Phantom of the Opera, and the lyriclines belong to Charles Hart and Richard Stilgoe.

Author's notes: Yes, I know, this has taken really long, once again.This chapter almost killed me, I didn't get any inspiration. It might, if you ask me,be a little boring, as most of the chaptershave beenlately, but I promise some action soon lol

And I can't believe my luck. I got four reviews on the last chapter, which is more than I'vegotten in a long time. So, over to the thank you:s.

EriksIngenue: You're right, I do care for this story, I love it, it's my baby. Which I feel like killing sometimes, but don't worry, I won't. I'll keep it up 'till the end lol And I hope you like my choice of opera, I do, it fitted the story.

Whatanoddgirl: I'm not in the mood of abandoning this story right now, in fact, I can assure you that won't ever happen. I hate it when other authors do that to me, so I won't do it to my readers.

Kittyhiime: That was what I had in mind when I posted this story in the beginning, to write something that hadn't been done...so many times. And this far I think it's worked. Glad you like the story lol

Eruliss: Won't you ever tire of reviewing? Please, don't. When everybody else abandons me, I need you lol I'm happy to hear that things are getting clearer for you, even though it's nice to confuse people sometimes.

Thanks once again to everybody, and I hope you like this chap that took me two weeks to write.

Enjoy!

Part IX

The managers weren't in their offices, and since Raoul had thing to discuss with them, he had no choice but to wait untill the meeting in the auditorium.

Patience wasn't Raoul's strong side, and he irritably paced the corridors of the Opera, waiting for the meeting to start.

An hour can sometimes seem very short, sometimes very long. In Raoul's case, it was the latter. He couldn't think of anything to do except walk down the unfamiliar halls, towards an unexcisting goal.

As he walked, he remembered last time he'd walked like this. That was a little over three weeks ago. He'd been here to talk to Messieurs André and Firmin that time too, and afterwards he'd walked through the corridors, thinking about Christine. The wounds from her leaving had been very new then, and he hadn't even been able to think her name without feeling the need to cry.

Raoul thought about Christine now too, but without feeling the immediate pain in his chest, and it confused him. She'd been his fiancé, they'd loved each other. Was he starting to forget her, get over her? Wasn't that the same thing as stop loving her? And wasn't that betrayal?

Raoul had, in his mindless walking, reached the entrance to the chapel. It had been one of Christine's favourite spots in the Opera, you'd always been able to find her there when you'd been looking for her.

Raoul walked down the stonesteps and entered the small room. It still looked the same, with the big window in front of him, and the painting of angels on his right, and he wondered how that could be. His whole life had changed in one night, how could everthing else remain the way it had always been?

He sat down in the window and lent his head against the wall. There was still a candle where Christine had used to light one for her father. No-one had removed it, and somehow, Raoul found that very sad.

As he sat there in the window, watching but not seeing that candle, Raoul expected memories of his lost love to come crashing down upon him, pains to rip his mind apart, but nothing happened. He just heared her voice in his head, an echo from the past.

Past the point of no return, the final threshold. The bridge is crossed so stand and watch it burn. We've passed the point of no return.

And it just made him tired.

All trough the meeting, Raoul stood in the back of the auditorium, listening to what the managers said. As he'd feared, they'd chosen Carmen.

They went throught the cast-list, which had been settled beforehand, without auditions. Raoul couldn't say he'd heared of any of the singers before, only the ones who'd been at the Opera before the fire. La Carlotta was not to perform at all, a mezzo-soprano from the chorus was to sing Carmen, and as expected, Meg didn't have a major part. She was a dancer, not a singer, so she'd been given the part as a factoryworker.

After the meeting, Raoul waited untill the auditorium was empty before he approached the managers. They had lingered to discuss the Opera with Monsieur Reyer, who was still conducting the orchestra.

"Messieurs, a minute of your time, if you please," Raoul said when the conductor left.

"My dear Vicomte, I thought I saw you in the back." Monsieur Firmin shoke his hand. "How do you like our choice of Opera?"

"That was what I needed to talk to you about." Raoul sat down in a chair, and the managers followed his example. "Do you really think this is a suitable piece to perform?" The men in front of him wore identical puzzled expressions. Raoul restrained a sigh. "Do you not think it is too...bold? I suppose you know what happened at the Comique?"

Monsieur André nodded. "Yes, of course we do, we are in the opera business, Monsieur. And the happenings at the Comique is one of the reasons we chose this opera. People have heared about it, it is free publicity."

Raoul shoke his head in disbelief. "But, Messsieurs, you cannot be serious. Performing Carmen will cause another scandal, and this time we can't afford that." Raoul tried to stay calm, but it was hard. He was growing frustrated because he had to make them understand. But it seemed they were just as determined to make him see their point.

"We do not think it will, sir," Monsieur André answered in a very calm voice, which was unusual for him. "You forget about the time we are living in. People love a freakshow. At the very least, this whole Phantom-story is proof of that."

"Indeed it is," Monsieur Firmin continued. "The seats were sold out twice as fast as usual when people heared that The Phantom himself had written that terrible Don Juan Triumphant. And therefor we think Carmen is a very wise decision, Monsieur."

Raoul was about to argue them,but then he hesitated, and instead lent back in his seat to think about what the managers had said. They could actually be right. In fact, he knew they were. How reluctant he might be to admit it, people did love freakshows. Not that Carmen was a freakshow, it was a masterpiece, but a very bold one. But that might just be what the Opéra Populaire needed.

Still, he had to ask, "What are you planning to do if this does not work out?"

The managers looked ateach other, and then Monsieur Firmin answered, "That, Monsieur, is something we hope won't happen."

Raoul nodded. Not what he wanted to hear, but what he'd expected. He rose from his chair, and the managers did the same.

"Gentlemen, I trust you to make the right decision. I can garantee you that you have my family's support in this question." He nodded towards them. "Good day."

He hurridly left the auditorium. He had to keep in mind that he was just financially supporting this place. It was the Messieurs André and Firmin's Opera, and it was their decisions to make. If Raoul didn't approve, all he could do was tell them, and hope they listened. But it was not his Opera!

He almost ran down the stairs in his hurry to get away, a hurry he couldn't quite explain. But when he reached the foot of the stairs, he heared someone call his name. He turned around and saw Meg standing at the top of the stairs.

"I saw you at the meeting," she said when she'ddescended the stairs andreached him. "Has anything happened?"

Raoul shoke his head. "No, I just had to talk to the managers about their choice of opera."

Meg raised an eyebrow. "You do not approve?"

"I did not, I thought it was too bold to perform such a piece as Carmen, but they made me change my mind."

"Too bold?"

Raoul looked at his watch, and then back at Meg. "I have to go home, Meg, but if you have the time, you could walk with me."

Meg nodded. "Will you wait here, while I get my cloak?"

Raoul shoke his head and draped his coat over her shoulders. "Borrow this."

"But do you not need it yourself?" Meg tried to protest.

Raoul shoke his head. "Not more than you."

Meg smiled. "Allright then." She took his arm. "Now tell me about Carmen."

Raoul told a valet to send his carriage back home, and he and Meg walked out the front doors and down the steps.

"About six years ago, Carmen was performed for the first time ever at the Opéra-Comique," Raoul began, "And it did not go very well." He hesitated. "Do you know what Carmen is about?"

Meg shoke her head.

"Then I have to tell you, very briefly though. Carmen is a gypsy-woman who falls in love with a soldier called don José. He leaves his fiancé and deserts the army for her, but then Carmen falls in love with another man instead. Don José returns to his fiancé, but when he meets Carmen again, he tries to make her come back to him. When she refuses, he kills her."

Meg gasped. "Oh, that is so sad, and so beautiful." Raoul smiled. Meg really had a sense for the dramatic. She continued, "And I think I can see what is so bold about it."

"You can?" Raoul asked as they turned a corner and entered the finer quarters of Paris.

"Yes. I cannot see anything wrong about Carmen's actions, because if she does not love this don José she should not be with him, but it is not very appropriate to act like that, is it?"

"No, it isn't," Raoul agreed. "And do you understand why I did not want this performed at the Populaire?"

Meg nodded. "Yes, but I do not think it will be quite as bad as you think."

"Thought," Raoul interrupted. "I agreed to it."

"But that does not mean you had to change your mind, does it?" Meg said with a smile.

Raoul laughed. "You saw right through me. Yes, I am still very hesitant about it, but it is not my opera."

"No, it isn't," Meg said and squeezed his arm. "Shall we talk about something else, before this gives you a headache?"

The walk to his home was far too short, Raoul thought. He could have walked around with Meg for hours, but by the time they reached his house, he was shivering from the cold, and much to his chagrin, Meg noticed.

"You should have told me you were cold," she said and handed him his coat. "We could have taken turns using this on the way."

Raoul laughed. "As a gentleman, it was my duty to lend you my coat, my lady," he said as he held the front door for her.

"And I thought you did it because you wanted to." Meg looked around the hall. "Do you live here alone?" she asked.

"Yes." Raoul handed his coat to a maid. "It is my parents' house but they almost never leave their country house, so I live here alone most of the time." He hesitated. Would it seem too straightforward to ask her to stay for dinner? He asked her anyway.

"Is it that late?" Meg threw a glance at the clock on the table, and then she shoke her head. "I would really like to, but I have to get back, before Maman misses me."

Raoul nodded. "I shall have my carriage drive you back, then."

"No, I can walk, it is no far," Meg protested, but Raoul had already given the order.

"I can't have you walk back without a coat, you would catch a cold in time for the performance, and we can't have that, can we?" He held the door for her again, and they walked out on the front steps. "How about dinner tomorrow than?"

Meg thought about this for a moment, and then she nodded. "I would like that very much." The carriage pulled up in front of them, and Raoul opened the door for her.

"I will pick you up at the Opera at seven then," Raoul said through the window when he'd closed the door behind her. "Goodnight, Meg."

"Goodnight."

Raoul watched the carriage disappear down the street, and then he went inside again. That night he didn't have nightmares about The Phantom killing him, just about Meg on the bench in his parents' garden.

Author's notes: I had a thought. If I wrote a cliffhanger, do you think I'd get more reviews? But that won't happen, cliffies aren't my thing. I'll just have to beg instead. Please review, so I know what you think, and what I can make better.