The Ghosts in You (A Zak Bagans Fanfic)

Chapter 82

Later that night, Sara was on her iPad when Zak climbed into bed next to her.

"What are you watching?"

"Music videos," Sara admitted.

"Which one is this?"

"November Rain."

Zak had heard the song many times but couldn't remember seeing the video. He watched wedding and reception scenes play out, with some Slash solos taking place in a desolate patch of dirt around a church. Then rain fell, and everyone scurried about. A funeral kicked in to high gear and Zak was instantly lost. He watched the woman from the casket return to life, throw her bouquet in the air and onto her own casket, somehow, with Axl mourning over it. And in the final shot, the color drained away from the flowers. Zak was now thoroughly confused. "What happened? They were getting married and then she died? Was that in the middle of the wedding?"

Sara loved this video, and had her dissertation at the ready. "Axl was dreaming that they got married. It's really about the death of their relationship. He had everything he could ever want, materially speaking, but he couldn't have the woman he loved," Sara explained. "Sometimes it's the simplest things, like love, that are the hardest to keep."

She shut her iPad off and set it on the nightstand. She leaned over and gave him a kiss.

Zak still hadn't the faintest idea what had transpired in the video, but found that that really didn't matter to him all that much.

He got the impression that Sara was speaking from personal experience and that she related to this particular song. She relates to death a lot. The Twilight Zone episodes, What Dreams May Come. She doesn't fear death – it's like she understands it.

He put his arm around her so she could lay her head on his chest. "Sara?"

"Hmm?"

He could feel how relaxed she was in his arms. "Do you think love is hard to keep?" He wanted to understand her thoughts on what she had just shared.

"I think relationships can be complicated. Not just romantic relationships, but all relationships: family members, friends, colleagues. But I think romantic relationships, in particular, are tricky."

"How so?"

"I think the older we get and the more we've been through, the harder it is to open your heart and trust another person with it. But I also believe, that the one thing that we take with us when we die is love. The love we've given and the love we've allowed ourselves to receive." Sara gave him a kiss on his chest and closed her eyes, settling into him, ready for sleep.

"I've never thought of it that way." He kissed her forehead and shut his eyes. He couldn't turn his brain off, though. He kept seeing the end of the music video play out in his mind, with Axl standing over Stephanie Seymour's casket. In Sara, I've really found my own Stephanie Seymour. And in the nearly three weeks I've known her, I've nearly lost Sara – twice. That could have been us in that video, with me standing over Sara's casket.

Zak held Sara just a little more tightly that night.