Why I Hate the Phantom, or some kind of metaphor, or whatever

There's a matter I need to handle, before the situation gets any worse.

What is love? What is love? It's been defined so often that everyone with a pen thinks they know.

I know this post is titled why I hate the Phantom, but I lied. I'm going to talk about love.

First of all, you need to make it to Paris.

I made it to Paris. Yeah, your home town. I took it like a sucker punch to the gut. You had something to say to me, one last thing to say after all the times I tore you down. With my mouth closed in a tight line, I took it as metaphor after metaphor pounded at my sandcastle walls. My hard shell softened; I started to forgive.

"You betrayed me." I said, keeping a tight fist on my anger because it was the only rope keeping me from falling. "You closed the door on me and I'm done with you."

I think you understood, because you stared at me with so much sadness, such staggering tenderness that the image of your face now haunts the darkness in my eyelids. But my venom didn't stop you. To this day, I think you were just trying to get me to understand your reasons.

Have you ever loved someone so much, you can feel it in your bones? You feel it in the joints of your elbows, up your arms and down your spine. Like you were meant to go together. I guess that's what you felt for her.

But really, how different are we? After all, we're both doomed to want something that doesn't want us back. I don't want to be like you, and I don't want to be reminded of you, but it's hard to leave you behind when I see your face in the artists on the street. In the writers and their poems. In the music and the lyrics. Paris, Paris, Paris.

And to the people of the world, the Phantom's real freaking name is Erik.

I read the book version once, and in it, the Phantom dies of a broken heart. In the movie, I'd like to think his heart was shattered like those mirrors. One hit for when she stopped listening. One hit for the time they kissed. One hit for the friendship that died. I flinch every time he takes a swing.

Your thoughts taste like chocolate, but the photographs and memories have the aftertaste of poison. I guess that's why they call this feeling bittersweet.

She loved you, but she feared you. Phantom, there's no fear in true love. You go forward, holding nothing back, even though it's scary--you go forward because you don't care. You don't care that everything you do is in permanent ink now. It's a risk, an airplane you have to dive out of. Who cares if there's a parachute?

I'm done with using people as a means to an end. With love, you're silent together and that's okay. It's okay to sit still. Love doesn't want or fear anything. Love is in the selfless mothers and fathers. Love is bleeding so someone can walk away untouched.






But then again, you did let her go in the end, so I guess that counts for something.



P.S. Raoul is a bag of crap.