A/N: I was bored in Music Appreciation one day (the only good thing about that class is that there's a full page photo of Michael Crawford as Erik that we should be studying soon), so I came up with Luann. The only non-rabid phangirl to time warp. No relation to the comic. Be forewarned, I am a redneck from a town somewhere in Alabama. I have no idea if there even is a 43rd in New York, much less whether it's within walking distance of any house or if there's a pothole.

Disclaimer: It's not mine, ok! Those clueless jerks at the copyright office will be first against the wall when the revolution comes!

Falling…falling…falling… Thud. Oof. Thud.

"Who are you, where did you come from, and what are you doing here?"

"I could ask the same of you."

"No, you could not."

"Why?"

"Because this is my house, on my lake, in my Opera."

"So?"

This was the first interaction between Luann Summers and the infamous Phantom of the Opera.

Many of their future conversations would go something along these lines.

Luann had—once again—had a screaming match with her mother, Ilane. As was customary, they both went on walks to cool down, in opposite directions.

That pothole on 43rd was a doozy.

"So?" Luann asked.

"If you had built this, you could demand things of me, but you did not."

"So?" Luann asked again.

Erik could already tell that this was a girl who would grate on his nerves constantly. As he stared at her, the insolent look on the 14-year-old blonde's face confirmed that.

"Are you a smelly hobo?" she asked.

"Excuse me?" inquired Erik with a raised eyebrow.

"You know, a smelly hobo. A person, usually a man—the girls are called smelly hoes—without a home who skulks somewhere, down an alley, on an abandoned railcar, or other places not fit for the inhabitation of humans."

"What do you call this around you?" Erik asked. "I have a home. And even if I were one of those…hobos…I would not be…smelly."

"This looks like the inside of a pothole to me."

Erik resolved to put the strange appearance and vocabulary out of his mind, and find the facts, then kick her out. "What is your name?"

"Luann. Luann Summers. Why do you care?"

"Have you ever heard of the Phantom of the Opera?" the Phantom of the Opera asked, trying to instill some terror in this remarkably terror-free girl.

"Yes. That movie that came out last year. A couple of my friends went to see it, and spent the weeks afterward trying to convince the entire school that Gerard Butler was hotter than Patrick Wilson (A/N: In my rough draft I accidentally put Patrick Stewart. Hehe)."

"What does the body temperature of this Gerard Butler have to do with anything?"

"The price of peas in Persopolis is six copper bits a pound."

"Excuse me?"

"Have you never read Tamora Pierce?" cried Luann in exasperation.

"Who is Tamora Pierce?" Erik felt at a distinct loss—this girl held all the cards.

"Only the best living fantasy author ever. Many say her works are only surpassed by J.R.R. Tolkien, and that's just 'cause she hasn't made up languages yet!"

"You are saying that this Tamora Pierce is an author?"

"Yes."

"Women do not write books!"

"Welcome to the twenty-first century, man! Women do everything men do and then some!"

"It is not the twenty-first century. It is 1881."

"No it's not. It's 2005."

"Mademoiselle, I am a genius. I would know the year."

Luann seemed a tad bit in doubt of this fact. "You're a smelly hobo who lives in a hollowed out pothole."

Erik was about to answer nastily when another girl—brunette this time—fell through the ceiling onto his organ—just like Luann did. The new girl sat up on his organ bench, rubbing her head. "That pothole on 43rd is a doozy," she said with a moan, feeling a large bump on her head.

"Ari!" shouted Luann.

"Oh, lovely. One of your friends."

Ari whirled to look at Erik. She, unlike Luann, had seen the movie and read the book and was, in fact, a full-fledged rabid phangirl. She gaped. She stared. She made incomprehensible noises. She put her head near Luann's and whispered frantically with the girl.

With a grand flourish, Luann indicated the girl still sitting on the bench. "Erik, may I present to you Armand Freyja LenoreElizabeth Smith, commonly known as Ari."

Ari glared at her friend. "You were supposed to say Ari, not Armand."

"Armand seems an odd name for a female," said Erik, more to himself than to either of the girls.

"Ya think?" Ari asked, using a tagline from Stargate: SG-1.

"Ari's mom's friend Kim draws awesome anime," explained Luann.

"One of her characters is named Armand," said Ari morosely.

"Armand is a guy, but Ari's mom was so fixated on that name when she got pregnant…"

"That she said she'd name me Armand no matter whether I was a boy or girl."

"So she's Ari."

"And we're here to stay, Erik," said Ari firmly. She looked at the satchel that had followed her through the ceiling of Erik's lair. "So where can I put my stuff?"

"You will be 'putting your stuff' nowhere, as you are leaving right now," said Erik coldly.

"There's no need to be so unfriendly," pouted Ari. "We're just trying to be little rays of sunshine in your dreary existence."

Erik gritted his teeth and pretended that he did not hear that remark.

"So, Erik," said Luann, "Where does Ari put her stuff?"

"Nowhere."

"The Louis-Philippe bedroom's over here, Lu. Let's go," said Ari, grabbing her satchel and exiting with Luann

"How do you know your way around my house?" Erik called after their retreating figures. He thought he saw Luann shake with laughter at something Ari whispered to her.

"So this guy really is the idol you've been obsessing over forever?" asked Luann, wanting to clarify. "He's really not a smelly hobo?"

Ari's face had become dreamlike as she looked around the room. "He's really not a smelly hobo."

"Good."

A/N: This gives me ideas for long phics, because of it's utter lack of plot, it has a plot!