A/N: This is a very dark and bleak story. Christine is underage. Erik is manipulative and abusive. Many people will read this and tell me things are OOC but I likely will not agree. Many people will read this and say that it is romanticizing domestic abuse and violence. Keep in mind that we are reading through the perspective of the victim and perpetrator. This is a modern AU with Kay and Leroux influences. It deals with mental illness, abuse (both mental and physical), drug abuse and coercion. This story is not something I would ever want to happen in real life but it is very real. Things like this happen every single day around the world. I feel that this is a very important story to tell and it is not told enough for fear of backlash. I am aware of the critiques this will receive and that it will absolutely not be everyone's cup of tea. It will make people uncomfortable. It should. If you are in an abusive situation, be it romantic partners, familial or roommates, please reach out. There is help available even in what seems like a hopeless situation and I will gladly help you find local resources. It is never too late to seek help and you are worth so much more than your situation. This will move up to an M rating.

Christine Daae was the girl that was always picked last in gym. Sometimes she thought that if he wasn't contractually obligated to remember then even the teacher would forget about her. It wasn't because she was bad at sports or mean or annoying she just - was.

Her blond hair was frizzy and her eyes were a plain ole blue. She was quiet and pale and all of the things that didn't really make a whole lot of friends.

And maybe she wasn't great at sports, now that she really thought about it. The asthma didn't help and she was nearsighted. Or farsighted. She couldn't really remember which one - whichever one meant she had to hold her book real close to read it. She was pretty short, too. She still thought she was pretty good at dodgeball, though, so she wasn't really sure why no one wanted her, but they didn't.

That was a pretty common theme in her life. No one wanting her.

Mom ran out pretty quick once she was born. She didn't want a kid and a husband and Christine guessed maybe she just realized that a little late. The only one that ever really wanted her was her dad and he was dead so she thought maybe it was better if no one wanted her because maybe she was a little bit cursed like the crazy lady that slept in the cardboard box said.

Christine was pretty smart, though. She thought she was. She just couldn't see the board. The teachers kept putting her in the back of the class and she spent more time doodling in her notebook then she did actually learning. Her grades were okay. She wasn't failing but she definitely wasn't honor roll material.

Today it was geometry. She was squinting at her book, her head almost all the way on her desk as she stared at the fuzzy numbers. Sometimes Mr Gondell accused her of sleeping in class and said that was why she wasn't doing great but Christine didn't ever sleep in class. It was just really hard to follow along with his lessons. The numbers he wrote on the board were a blur to her and a lot of times the division sign looked too much like a plus sign. Christine hated that he used examples that weren't in the book because the book was the only thing close enough for her to actually see. So she tried her best to understand, even though the book said five and he said eight and he used z when the book said y. Mostly she tried to spend a lot of time on the homework - the answers for the even numbers were in the back of her book and sometimes she had to start at the answer and work her way backwards to figure out how to do things.

Today she decided that following along with the lesson was a wasted effort - he was talking too fast and his writing was sloppy - so she flipped to the practice questions at the end of the chapter and wrote out number one in her notebook. She wasn't sure what would be assigned but she usually did all of them. She needed it anyway, even if sometimes Mr Gondell teased her for that. "I'm not just giving you extra credit just because you decided to do more work, Miss Daae. You can stop trying that now."

Christine still did all of the questions. She just recopied the ones that were assigned and turned them in. No one checked her work so she wasn't really sure if she was doing it right or not but even when she turned the extra ones in he wouldn't check them, he would just make fun of her and she would turn that ugly red color that she hated. So she just quietly did them and hoped the practice helped, even if maybe she didn't get the right answers.

"Miss Daae, are you still with us?"

Christine jumped. She always did when her name was called. Mr Gondell was the only teacher that seemed to really notice her. Maybe she should have appreciated that but it just seemed like he liked to embarrass her sometimes. That was really why Christine hated geometry. She hadn't really ever been bullied, just ignored and she didn't really mind being ignored that much. They stared at each other for a long time.

Mr Gondell was pretty short, too. He had a thin nose and thin lips and his hair was just brown, kind of like Christine's eyes were just blue. She wondered if maybe he kinda saw himself a little bit when he looked at her and that was why he was mean. She hoped that she wouldn't be mean like him when she got older. But he had a ring and someone married him so Christine thought maybe that wasn't really all it was.

"... and apparently we've gone mute again," Mr Gondell sighed, clapping his hands together. "Alright, well. Class is almost over, odd questions one through twenty five due at the beginning of class tomorrow."

There were groans from around the room and Christine slid further down in her chair. She could feel the heat in her ears and forehead and knew she was bright red.

"That is one through twenty five, Miss Daae. Not one through thirty eight. And only the odd ones." He was staring straight at her.

Christine had honestly believed that freshman year would be the worst. That's what all of the popular media seemed to say - that's what Mrs Valerius told her when she came home crying one day. It only took three months for her to decide it was a lie. Sophomore year had been its own special kind of Hell, mostly thanks to the maths teacher that couldn't seem to keep himself from calling her out loudly. And she didn't do anything wrong, that was what really got her. She never did anything but sit quietly and do her work. "I understand," she squeaked out nervously.

The bell ringing was her only relief. She shoved her books into her raggedy black backpack, hanging the strap that wasn't worn through over her shoulder as she bowed her head and scurried quickly out of the classroom. If she lingered, Mr Gondell would find something else to say to her. She had learned that pretty quickly.

Choir was her last class of the day. Sometimes she thought that was the only thing that kept her from having a mental breakdown. Music calmed her. The class didn't go much different than any other - she was quiet and minded her own business - but even in the back row of the second sopranos she felt a calmness. The fact that she couldn't see very well didn't hinder her - she could hear the notes played on a piano and emulate them perfectly. She read somewhere that it was called perfect pitch. It was probably the only perfect thing about her but she was okay with that.

In choir she could hide in the back, she could listen to the music, and even though the girl she had to sit next to was usually off key she didn't really sing all that much anyway, just moved her lips and pretended to. Christine thought maybe she knew she wasn't very good and that's why she did it.

Passing time was always longer than Christine needed it to be. She usually loaded up all of her books in her bag - she hadn't been to her locker since the first day of school and she honestly wasn't even sure that she remembered the combination - and she didn't really have anyone to loiter around and talk to in the hallways. She was the first one in every class except for Mr Gondell's - she had timed the walk from the bathroom to his classroom and she always found somewhere to hide until she absolutely had to go in.

Christine quietly walked into the classroom, making her way up the choir risers and tucking her backpack under the hard plastic blue chair in the back row.

"Christine," Mr Gabriel, the young chipper and seemingly genuinely kind choir instructor, said from somewhere toward his desk. She hadn't even seen him there when she walked in. "I'm glad you're early, I was hoping to give you a heads up -"

"What?" she asked, standing awkwardly between the chairs. He was standing and moving toward her, likely knowing that she wasn't going to come toward him.

"We are having a guest in class on Friday," he said. "A very accomplished musician. The entire class is expected to prepare a solo pieces. Only a few measures. I just hoped to catch you before class so I didn't blindside you."

"Oh," she said softly. Christine has never once gone up for a solo. She loved music, she loved singing, but she wasn't too confident in her own abilities. She hated being watched. "Do I have to -"

"It's expected," he said with a tense smile. "Don't let it overwhelm you. If you need help picking something you can see me after class. It's only a few seconds. I promise it won't be too painful, even for you."

Every day that Christine survived the bus ride she counted as a blessing. Everyone was loud and rowdy and she usually sat all the way in the front, directly behind the driver. It was her safest bet to get a seat to herself and to be left alone.

Christine, being the oldest in the small house that was her temporary domain, was always the first home out of the children old enough to be sent off to school. Mrs Valerius was always happy to see her. Christine knew that, despite her less-than-enthusiastic welcoming.

Christine knew because the kind old woman would be waiting near the door for her and almost as soon as her backpack was off her arms would be filled with whichever struggling infant had been the most difficult that day.

There were six of them in the house. Up until about a month before there had only been four. Christine was the oldest, going nearly on sixteen. She was followed by Cindy, 12, Jackson, 10, and Samantha, 6. Jackson, being the only boy, was the only one lucky enough to have a bedroom to himself. Christine, Cindy and Samantha were expected to divide the space in theirs. Christine was only glad that they did get on well or it would be much more miserable.

She would still take sharing a bedroom with a six and twelve year old over the few weeks she had spent in the group home. That, that had been pure Hell on earth and she did her best to forget those few weeks.

The newest addition was a set of twins, one boy and one girl. Mrs Valerius told Christine that their mom hadn't been ready for babies; she was still not over her partying and that's why they were so small. Christine didn't really understand what she meant, all she knew was that Nicole cried a lot and Bradley hardly ever even opened his eyes.

Christine cooed at the rosy-cheeked, wailing baby in her arms and rocked her gently. Mrs Valerius had disappeared already and Christine assumed it was to get some sort of break before her husband came home.

Mrs Valerius was a nice lady. She was just tired. She and Mr Valerius didn't have a whole lot of money and she was disabled in one way or another - Christine wasn't sure how exactly - and that was why they took on foster kids. The extra little bit of money left over after food and thrift shops and hand-me-downs helped a lot.

Mr Valerius wasn't very nice. Christine has seen him hit his wife on more than one occasion. He was haughty and mean and he liked quiet too much to have so many kids in the house. They usually ate their dinner before he got home and then they would disappear into their bedrooms around the time he came in.

Still, it was preferable to the group home. He never did anything outright mean to the kids - just gruffed and grumped - and Christine was okay with that much. She could handle that.

It wasn't like she thought he wanted her anyway. No one did.