Well, another new story. Pffft, Change was a bit of a drag. Might get back to that one before the turn of the century. This new story is a Phantom of the Opera one, a very favorite canon of mine. However, the plot is very OC, including a new female character. The storyline occurs much before that of Webber's musical, as stated. This is intended to be the first in a possible series of vignettes in non-chapter form. Chapters seem to... burn me out.

Enjoy, doves! R & R is as always immensely appreciated!!

~Cat

Her skin was like porcelain, he noted. It was a pure, off-white color, offset by slightly wavy straw-colored hair. Eyes were a beautiful blue, shimmery with a gleeful pride as her voice rang out like the lament of a wounded angel. Oh, yes, he remembered rather absentmindedly, drifting away with her song. This is why I told the Managers of the Opera to send for the new soprano, a new principal. Not just because the replacement had been, oh, what was the word... Aged? Riper than old cheese?

No, his thoughts interjected. Because her angelic voice matched his. The mysterious man wondered if her beauty would be a foil to his ugliness, likewise.

Flashing back to nearly four months ago, the Paris Opera's phantom vividly remembered the sound. He had been headed home through the Market District on the lower-class end of the French Lady. His route cut solely through back alleys, and dark, lampless sidestreets. The man in all his hideousness took to a roundabout run in order to escape the stupid people of the slums who would question the fine clothing he wore, the hat he'd donned, that ivory mask that sheathed his deformities...

And then, in a house he'd never bothered to look twice at, a musical sound so reverberating and spine-tingling came from a broken window. The voices of the cherubs mingled into one heart-rending tone. The musicality of the unseen voice almost broke the ears and heart of the Phantom. Following a rather stupid and uncharacteristic ruse, he climbed up on a rusty rubbish bin to peer in a slit between the yellowing curtains. The sight almost caused him to sob in surprise and wont. Inside was a beautiful young woman, no more than twenty years of age. Perhaps more childlike that that, he ventured.

A woman, wizened and batlike, sat perched upon a threadbare armchair across the room. She ran a hand through her greying hair. "Sing it again, Mirelle. Your vibrato was much too tense and shaky. It sounded as though you were about to cry." A look of angry disapproval and impatience wrinkled the crone's forehead and the sides of her mouth. It was a very ugly expression, one that made her look like a mirror image of the top half of the Phantom's face. He cringed.

"I believe, Grandmother, that I am in love with music." The way she said it, flat-out and serious, stopped the peeping man's steady tempo of breathing. "The second movement is my favo-"

The old woman interjected. "Mirelle! You have no time to be in love with this thing that you are doing. You simply do it, and we eat. Simple." The young woman called Mirelle simply lifted her eyes skyward, as if asking the celestial guardians what her caretaker was thinking. She slipped back into the second movement of the song she'd been singing before. The Phantom drowsed into the song, caring not if an unassuming townsperson would stumble upon him. He would kill them if the approached, inebriated with the mere music that permeated the frosty, late-winter air.

In the present, the man's facial expression was quite the same. If someone were to place a hushed knock on the door to Box Five, the noose would be down faster than a round of thirty-second notes in cut time. It seemed as though a small piece of heaven had found its way down to Hell here in the Phantom's opera house. He reveled in the sounds, and wished that some how, some way, he could be upon that stage with her. Perhaps, one day, in different circumstances, he would. Maybe that day would come when his Don Juan Triumphant finally found the proper inspiration to emerge from the grotto, in his hand.

Lost in the slow section of Piae Cantiones, ears dripping with alleliuas galore, Paris's Phantom fell in love for the first time. His heart wrenched at the second recalling of the first memory of Mirelle D'Patri. The wintry air from Lent's days seemed to wrap him in a blanket again despite the heavy air of the velvety box. The notes from the first song melted into a sweet combination with this one, the backup of the chorus singers an accompaniment to his heart's thaw. The hard, merciless shell fell from his heart in gooey pieces, leaving him vulnerable to this girl's every ministration. If she came to acknowledge him, the masked man feared his very heart would break.

Sensing the quiet ending to the choral piece, and with it, the presentation, he joined with the shadows. He sprinted away, into a far corner near the Diva's personal dressing room. None saw him as they began to pass by after the show, too concerned with drinking some water, or removing this tutu or tiresome costume. His heart remained full, no impatience tainting him. Now that it seemed he had found his love after waiting in Hell for an eternity, the Phantom of the Opera could afford to wait another eternity or two.

Moving gracefully and fluidly, flanked by none, Mirelle faded through the crowd. The man's heart leapt, beating wildly, into his pale throat. He searched his archive of suave phrases, his most poetic of greetings, and found none that would suffice. He reserved himself to speaking off the top of his head, for this moment could never have been rehearsed properly. With some bemusement, he thought of an old phrase: Ad Lib, Actor's Last Measure and Wit's Greatest Pleasure. And so, with the resulting smirk, the newly-reborn Phantom stepped forward.

"Good evening, Miss D'Patri." His voice was warm and velvetly, and there was a vague hint of natural seduction. "Your performance tonight was enchanting, to say the very least. Wherever did you learn how to bend your voice in such a fashion?" The cravat around his throat seemed to tighten uncomfortably, and he began to feel vulnerable amongst the actors and chorus people that jostled him. Would none of them recognize him...? Suspect there was something amiss with a masked fellow speaking to the new soprano?

The blonde looked at him with an inquisitive stare. There was an appearance of raw childhood in her eyes, as though someone had stopped her mentality's growth but spurred on her physical maturity. The innocence in those eyes made him feel as though he were speaking to a girl trapped in a woman's body. She ignored the question he'd asked and moved straight onto formality. "Who might you be, sir?" The rebuttal almost made the flushing man choke.

"I ..." He smiled in that endearing way, no teeth bared; the way that made innocent passerby faint with infatuation. Infatuation before a lion that would undoubtedly eat them. "You may call me Angel. Your Angel." He brushed a stray strand of oiled hair back to reveal his amber eyes, startling with an unnameable emotion. Mirelle's chest heaved just slightly, and the Phantom could not be sure whether she was reacting to him or the tightness of her corset.

There was a slight look of disbelief upon the young lady's face. His heart beat like a thousand hammers upon iron anvils, and then - the expression softened. "M-my Angel, sir? You must be mistaken... If I had an Angel, surely I would have had a more pleasant life before this. But, life here at the Opera d'Paris does treat me well..." She trailed off to stare up into those golden orbs of his, swallowing raggedly. Perfect, he thought.

"My dear, I was sent to bring you out of your suffering. I was the one to bring you to this haven of song and dance, with my own hand." As if Shakespeare wrote a monologue into his head, the Phantom continued in his beautiful tenor. "I hold all jurisdiction over this Opera House, as instructed by my Lord, Above." A stab of reverence entered his voice, making him frighteningly believable. Perhaps he really was an angel.

The blonde fooled with an intricately-tooled lace sleeve that made her skin crawl. "Are you really- I mean, can you- will you-"

"I will, as best within my power. Just remember one thing..." He murmured huskily, taking one hand in his, "I will always be watching you." The masked man placed a perfect, thornless red rose within her hand, a length of black velvet hanging off of the stem. Mirelle D'Patri looked at the man with wide eyes, disbelief returning to her. She said nothing, only stared as he placed a single chaste kiss upon the crown of her upturned forehead. The moment lasted for what seemed like swiftly-passing eons.

A forward gesture, surely, but the girl found it most appropriate despite the circumstances. "Goodbye, my Angel," the tenor said once before she blacked out and hit the stone floor.

As she sagged, the Phantom of the Opera laid her down gently and sprinted off to find sanctuary far beyond the backstage of the Opera. There was fire in his veins, fire and passion, seated mainly in his lips. They tingled, and he could not help but sing loudly, conspicuously, joyously,

"Say you'll share with me one love, one lifetime

Lead me, save me from my solitude

Say you'll want me with you here

Beside you...

Anywhere you go, let me go too,

My Angel, that's all I ask of you."

The echoes were infectious. That night, the novice soprano believed she had truly been visited by an Angel, and a new story began.

Fin.