Opening night had come to Garnier High School, and the entire musical cast and crew seemed to be buzzing with excitement even though there were some tense feelings hidden right underneath the surface. Without a doubt, the Auditorium Ghost would be attending this performance. All throughout the day at school, the students couldn't focus on their work. The two directors found their thoughts getting wound up and tangled with the musical.

Christine wished that she didn't have to think about it, that it would all just go away. Her life had turned so sour so quickly, but now she had no choice. Everyone had forced her to go on with playing Clara and performing all of the Phantom's added parts on stage. 

But the performance part of her hadn't disappeared. No, she still felt the performance buzz starting to get to her, even though it felt more like anxiety than excitement. She promised herself to give the best performance that she could give - the audience didn't care if her life was falling apart.

In fact, the audience was likely the only thing that kept her together. She reminded herself that the whole purpose of her performance was to put on a good show for those who bought their tickets to get in. Christine just closed her eyes and thought about the audience.

Her lips curled into a soft smile as she remembered how she had flown out into the crowd right after she had been Cinderella. There was that enchanted little girl - Lucy was her name. Christine needed to put on a show so that she could be there for Lucy or some other little girl.

She needed to get herself into the zone in order to be prepared for the performance. If she didn't make sure to do that, then the entire performance on her side would just end up being a complete mess. She didn't want to be responsible for that.

But of course, Christine simply ended up just standing there in the middle of the backstage hallway with her eyes closed, wondering if anyone was going to come along and end up seeing her there. Everyone was likely getting ready, but that also meant they had to come out to go to green room.

She just had to wait until someone came out - then she might end up getting ready and heading to green room. It would just be a matter of her getting a cue for what was going on, except for it would be in real life.

"Christy!" 

Christine's eyes flew open to see a blonde bouncing over to her. Oh, Meg. Meg and her undying energy and always happy demeanor. If anyone could bring Christine up, it would end up being her.

"It's opening night!" Meg said, her voice breathy with excitement.

"I know," Christine said with a nod, looking over to her best friend with a smile. "I've known for a long time. I mean, everyone has been talking about it for so long."

"Aren't you excited?" Meg squealed. "I can't wait, I've got butterflies in my stomach but it just makes me feel like I've been drinking too much coffee!"

"Of course," Christine said - but her voice sounded tired, completely uninspired. 

"Of course you are," Meg said. "You know, maybe we need to find you some coffee and help you to be more energetic."

"No, caffeine isn't good for your vocal cords. I wouldn't want to ruin my voice right before opening night. Just think about that for a moment..."

"Come on," Meg said. "Do some jumping jacks with me. It'll be fun. Get you all energetic and help to wear me down. Look, everyone wins!"

"We'll be doing all sorts of energy building exercises when it comes to us going to green room," Christine replied, shaking her head. "It should be coming up any time now."

"Christy, you're playing the lead," Meg said with a frown. "I thought you might actually be excited about all of this, but apparently not."

"Listen, I have to go get changed."

"And so do I, but who cares?" Meg asked. "We still have quite a long time until greenroom comes up, so you have quite a long time to get up and do some jumping jacks with me."

"I'm going to get changed," Christine said, making it seem more definite. There was no possibility in her voice for her to just simply stop and do what Meg said. 

"Okay, okay," Meg sighed. "I'll see you in green room. I expect for you to come along and sit next to me within a few minutes. You don't have that much to put on."

Despite her sinking feeling in her stomach, Christine made sure to give Meg a smile as she bounded away.

Christine walked into the dressing room to find that the only other person inside was Carly. She immediately felt her stomach dropping - there were a handful of people she simply did not want to talk to at the moment, and the girl in front of her was towards the top part of the list.

When she walked in, Carly didn't even acknowledge her existence at first. Even though she tried to cover it up, she got out of Christine's way so that they could avoid any sort of conflict for the moment. Several times they had to reach across the other and avoid running into one another, and this they did silently.

Christine decided she'd be better off facing the wall as she changed. Part of her found this to be somewhat uncomfortable - this was the same wall she heard her Angel of Music's voice from, the same wall she sang into in order to learn from him. But now she had to think of it as a simple wall if she wanted to get through this performance.

After her dress was on and zipped up (Christine considered for several moments about asking Carly to help her with the zipper before deciding she could just do it herself), Christine walked over to the mirror in order to begin working on her hair and makeup.

She could see Carly standing there behind her, making her feel somewhat uncomfortable. Christine attempted to ignore it, but to no avail. She ended up getting up and trying to walk right past her, but of course Carly didn't end up letting that go bye. She was stopped right in her cracks.

"You better be happy about what you've gotten," Carly said, crossing her arms. "I mean, it's almost like your parents bought you the role. But obviously it's not a parent, so..."

"I'm just doing my best, trying to fit into what's going on..."

"Apparently your friend thinks that you fit in very well," Carly replied. "He wouldn't have given you the lead role and countless extra songs if he didn't think so, would he?"

"I...I don't know. I don't know what the Phantom wants. If you don't mind, I'm going to go to the greenroom now. We need to warm ups, anyways, and I think that if you want to sound brilliant for your solo number you should come along-"

"I always sound brilliant, you little...!" Carly caught herself before she said anything that she might end up regretting. Of course, she still had to expel her excess energy, so she closed her eyes and clenched her fists as hard as she possibly could.

"Just remember that my boyfriend and I are on the lookout for your little Phantom."

"What can you do to him, really?" Christine asked, moving so sharply her hat nearly fell off. "I'm being perfectly honest here - I can't think of anything, anything you could do."

"I wouldn't be too sure," Carly sighed, giving a shrug. "I'm sure Ian would end up being the one to put up a fight."

"He'll lose," Christine said. "I'm not-" Her voice began to crack, but she started her sentence again. "He'll lose. He won't be able to do anything - I'm not trying to say anything bad, I'm just trying to warn you-"

"Just trying to scare me into having a bad performance. As long as I don't croak, I don't care."

"Fine," Christine finally said, nodding her head. "If that's what you believe is best, so be it. I tried...I tried to warn you."

She turned away, heaving an enormous sigh. Even if the Phantom hadn't done any violent acts as of late, she was still thoroughly convinced that he was capable of doing them and so much more. As much as she loathed Carly and Ian, she didn't want anyone getting hurt. 

"We should head to green room now," Christine said. "I mean..."

"Why do you feel the need to scoot around the subject? Do you have something to hide?"

"No, no, no," Christine replied, shaking her head. "No. I just want to go to green room. Goodbye, Carly. Break a leg, if I don't get to tell you before the show begins-"

"You better be happy, Christine Daae!" Carly said, letting out a snarl. "I don't know what sort of games you're up to, but you should be happy that they're working even this much. You've got so much to be thankful for, so you better be happy."

The scowl plastered across Carly's face made Christine's chest curl up in an even tighter knot. The last thing she needed was another obstacle, but surely enough there was a new one being provided.

"I am...I am happy," she said. 

"Which is why you always seem to have tears in your eyes whenever you come around to rehearsals. Yeah, that makes complete sense to me. Come on. Stop feeling so sorry for yourself!"

"Why...why..." Christine stuttered, unsure of how to speak what was her mind without offending Carly.

"Why what?" Carly said. "Spit it out. I need to head to green room. I don't know if you're too busy with your little ghost friend, but you probably should head over there some time as well."

"Am I interrupting something?"

Jane entered the dressing room, immediately stopping the conversation between the two girls. Christine's many years of dancing along with the girl had ended up turning out very well for her. Carly made one final scowl and then walked out with her nose up in the air.

"Listen, Christine..." Jane said with a sigh as soon as Carly was out of earshot. "You shouldn't listen to her. She's just jealous of everything. I guess she feels like you've taken all of her roles, even though you definitely deserve them more than she does."

"She's a senior, I'm just a sophmore-" Christine began.

"And you're also a way better person. I didn't go through years of dance class with you to miss out on that."

"But...what if she's right?" Christine said. "Everything she said, I-"

"Don't listen to it. You've got a show to focus on. Green room is about to start, by the way. They sent me out to come get you in the first place, but Carly ended up being there too."

"Fine," Christine said. "I'll be over there in one minute. I just need one minute alone. That's okay, right?"

"Of course," Jane said, putting on a symphatetic smile. "But I do expect to see you there, okay? Put on a great show, Christine Daae."

Christine watched as Jane walked out and then immediately leaned against the wall for support. What was she going to do?

Christine Daae, who had somehow gotten herself a lead role and extra songs and scenes out of nowhere. Christine Daae, who the infamous Auditorium Ghost seemed to be trying to help. Christine Daae, who had gone completely insane.

Christine didn't want to think about it, even though she knew that it was certainly what everyone else thought of her. At least, she was sure that Carly believed she was mad. But of course, it didn't matter what other people thought at the end of the day.

All that really mattered was whether or not Christine herself believed it. 

The frightening part was, she believed almost every last word of it herself.

A/N Look at this wonderfulness. I'm so excited because there are so many wonderful things to happen. I mean, it is the first scene of the final act. Just a few more weeks, and this entire thing is going to be done! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Okay.