This is a story I post only after much thought and contemplation. It's not a story I expect to be as well taken as some others, considering the heavy feature of an original character and the setting, but regardless, it's a story I and Suni have poured a lot into, especially myself as of late, being the one to transcribe the ideas to paper…er...screen. So, liked or not, I present.

Full summary- After his death on Judgement Day, Jizabel can't bare to move on. The afterlife terrifies him, and leaving Cassian is too painful a thought. But as Cassian falls apart and eventually takes his own life, Jizabel ends up left behind, alone for a century.

A history professor purchases the home Cassian grew up in, the home Jizabel followed him to. Intent on flipping the house and restoring its historical value, Down-to-earth Cooper is a perfect skeptic, never believing the ghost stories these homes have. Until, that is, he finds the oddities of the house unexplainable, and terrifying. Even more unsettleing, whatever is haunting these halls seems not to want him gone, as he originally thought, but to stay there with it. And frankly after a while, Cooper isn't sure who's more scared.

)o(

Jizabel had never been here before, to this tiny little town on the very outer reaches of London. Whether it was a village with its own name, or merely served as the city's border, he couldn't say. He didn't know the lives of the people behind the pretty but outdated glass windows, nor could he name any of the streets Cassian tread down. Certainly he didn't know his way through them.

Cassian did, though; it was obvious by the sure way his feet took him down the stone roads. He never even looked up, at least, not often. When he did, it wasn't to check landmarks or signs; no, he seemed to know this town better than Jizabel knew his own home. Instead, any flickering of dark eyes was only to check that no one else was crossing their way. Jizabel found his suspicious nature highly unusual for Cassian, let alone unnecessary; it was well past sundown, but nowhere near dawn. In a sleepy suburb such as this, he doubted anyone would be awake.

Still, Cassian kept close watch, taking only backstreets and seedy alleyways, though Jizabel suspected for a child who grew up as Cassian had, such places weren't unfamiliar.

Behind him, Cassian pulled a sizeable cart, the sort Jizabel often saw vendors and merchants use. He didn't know exactly what was inside, but he suspected it wasn't fine pottery or potatoes to be roasted. What he could see was a hodgepodge of russacks, a few expensive looking embroidered linens, and a good sized trunk.

For some reason, Jizabel got a sick feeling every time he glanced at the trunk. There was something inside of it that he knew he didn't want to see. He'd like to ask Cassian, could probably command him to tell, but Cassian didn't seem to be in a talking mood. He hadn't spoken a word to Jizabel the entire night.

Jizabel thought it had been maybe three hours since they'd set out, but time seemed very vague within the deepest hours of darkness. He guessed, though, that the night wasn't the only thing throwing him off.

The house they stopped before was a nice one, back behind the town itself, but it was obviously not in its prime. It stood very empty, with not a single of it's many windows left intact. Probably one of Cassian's new hangouts, since he'd been living on the streets. Was he planning on returning home now? Jizabel couldn't blame him. This was much nicer than Delilah. Of course, that option wasn't around anymore. For either of them.

Jizabel wondered fleetingly if Cassian would invite him to stay as well, but the idea never even had time to take root before he remembered that such a thing was now unnecessary. One had no real need for a bed to sleep in when they were well and dead.

He supposed he should have come upon this realization in a state of panic, but really it was more a bemused daze than anything so far. He'd come to like a fevered patient awaking from a long sleep, groggy, heavy, and being only slightly aware of the world outside dreams at first. He supposed he could recall Cassian carrying him from a collapsing building, and stealing a cart to run away, but he couldn't be sure if this was memory, or just his mind filing in the gaps on what he supposed happened. Truthfully, he first became truly aware on the long trip here on the mud soaked roads that took them to this town.

It was on this path that it occurred to him that he was dead. It didn't happen like a gaslight being lit, or a bell rung. Instead, it was something he seemed to instantly know, rather like how one never really had a memory of being told that fire burned, they just knew it. So it had crossed his mind that he couldn't feel the cobblestones he trod upon, nor the chilled evening breeze that forced Cassian under so many grungy layers.

Somehow, he was ok with that. He supposed he should have been filled with panic, but all things considered, this wasn't as bad as it could be. Being dead could certainly have its upside. In fact, he was more in shock over the final moments of life than his first hours of death.

Cassian…that man had returned for him. How long had he been planning? He'd been gone so many months…had he wanted to return all that time? Most importantly...what now?

He supposed his current condition of being deceased spared him from that particular decision, but it still left him puzzled. Why did Cassian come back? Well, not quite…he could see that Cassian had, somehow, formed a closeness to him, some sort of connection, one that even Jizabel felt, however faintly it had shown before this night. As Cassian held him, berated him for his foolishness (and a fool he was) he'd felt an almost painful longing, as though Cassian couldn't possibly hold him close enough, tight enough, or with enough tenderness. Though, having this feeling, that Cassian felt the same, seemed to make up for it. Cassian wanted to be there. No one was making him, he had nothing to gain by it, and it was certainly an unpleasant thing at the time, but he did it nonetheless.

Was it because he loved him? Jizabel wasn't sure he could fathom that. Not yet. He'd taken one last glance at Cassian before his world grew dark, and knew, instantly, that this is the man Alexis should have been. Or, more correctly, the man Jizabel should have followed as he'd followed Alexis. Cassians tender embrace, his soft shushing as he saw Jizabel's pain, those were the things he'd hoped Alexis would do, felt he ought to do but never did. Yet here was a man who had no need, acting as the father Jizabel had never knew.

He supposed with death came a sadness, that he would never get to feel that again. He followed Cassian now with the trust of a small child walking after their parent, for at the moment, Jizabel had never felt such an assured connection between that word and the person he could attribute it to. Mother, she left him, father was a monster, but Cassian was…how could it be that this man would show him such innocent affection, where his own parents had abandoned him?

He imagined the inside to be as chilled as the outside, but still and far more musty smelling. However, as Cassian lit an oil lamp, he could see it wasn't quite as gloomy as he'd thought. Though filled with broken bits and shambled furniture, it was cleaner than such a building should be, as though someone had been tending to the ruins. Through a cracked doorway, he could even see a makeshift bedroom, with two hay mattresses spread on the floor, waiting for guests. Somehow, the image of the two separate, secure beds gave him a sense of peace, affirming that Cassian's motives were not all selfish or wrongly ordered, that he expected nothing of that sort from Jizabel.

He couldn't he sure, with the dim light, but the books lining the far wall looked suspiciously like a few tomes he'd noticed he'd…misplaced…these past weeks. And were those his one spare pair of glasses on a makeshift nightstand?

Cassian didn't seem interested in going in there; in fact, as he neared it, he ducked his head lower still and hunched his shoulders, as though something about the room pained him. Could it be that now, there was only need for a single bed?

The house itself seemed to not be Cassian's current destination. Instead, he merely dumped the bags from the cart into the dining room, and rushed back outside to where the cart, and the trunk and linens still lay.

Carefully rooting through thick vines and brush, Cassian heaved the cart to the secluded backyard, so overgrown it was hard to tell where the property ended and the dense woods behind the house began.

Silently, marveling vaguely at how he needn't struggle as Cassian did, he followed, wondering if Cassian could see anything of him, a glimmer perhaps? He followed deep into the woods, a good ten minutes, till Cassian seemed to decide something. Cassian threw off the outer and most burdensome of his layers, including his hat, and for the first time, Jizabel could fully see his face. It was ashen, and seemed lined with worry, and exhaustion. At the same time, it was stoic, as though Cassian wasn't allowing himself to feel much of anything right now. And Jizabel had to wonder…was he truly mourning for him?

Out from the cart came the fancy linens. Where Cassian stole them, he had no idea, but they were beautiful. Heavy tablecloths, it looked, with delicate silk embroidery. Nothing Cassian could have bought, for sure.

Underneath them, aside from the trunk, lay a spade and a sizeable shovel, and Jizabel wasn't particularly pleased to see them unveiled. He already had a horrible suspicion on what lay in that trunk, but disbelief was shielding him from acknowledging it.

The spade broke the topsoil with ease, allowing for fairly easy digging, for someone with Cassian's strong, new body.

For hours he labored, panting and grunting with exertion but not seeming to truly tire. His task was surely an important one, as the pit he dug grew deeper and wider with each fling of the shovel.

The sky above the trees was starting to show the faintest pink stain before he finally climbed out, filthy and sweating but still not seeming to have any particular feeling. Instead, he merely strode over to the cart and, in turn, to the trunk lifting its creaking lid.

Where Cassian's movements before were all deliberate, strong, confident and powerful, now he moved much more softly. He held himself different, as though whatever he was scooping from the trunk was something very precious to him.

Jizabel didn't want to look, he really didn't. He wanted to fling his eyes closed and turn away, wishing he could pull himself from Cassian and flee, but it was too late. He wasn't quick enough to avoid seeing a long tumble of ash blonde hair draping over Cassian's arm. By then, he couldn't' force his eyes to avert.

He looked…horrible not like sleeping. Not at all. His skin had grown pale from the loss of blood, which now caked his hair. His clothes too were saturated with now brown fluid, not the pretty color Jizabel usually loved. At his throat he saw the true reason he'd had no chance to live; he hadn't realized how deeply he'd gashed, and his throat now actually hung somewhat open, as did his mouth and clouded eyes.

Finally he could see Cassians composure breaking, as he brushed stiff locks of hair from Jizabel's face. His own featured pinched as he did so.

"Damn it, Jizabel," he whispered hoarsely, as though his throat ached. "Of all the times of your life to finally have a fucking mind of your own!"

All the same, his actions were as soft as his voice was rough. From a deep pocket he withdrew a rag and a flask of water, and began to scrub at the dried blood. His chest was far too filthy to try, but his face and hands were tenderly wiped clean, closing his eyes as he did so.

Jizabel stood rooted where he was, trying to will himself to move. He wasn't quite as horrified as he would have thought, seeing his own corpse laid in front of him. Perhaps the mask of death was so familiar to him now, that even his own body couldn't disgust him. He saw beauty in death, after all. Not in the mangled corpse as much as just the stillness of a quiet heart.

The fancy linens were to serve as his shroud, he could now see, as Cassian laid him in the soft fabric, taking the most tender care on wrapping him. He folded his arms gently across his chest, and, as Jizabel watched, cupped his face and laid a soft kiss on his forehead. He could see his lips moving, quivering, as he pulled away and covered his face, but he could hear no words.

Jizabel knew, though. A day ago he wouldn't have believed his first guess, and even now he couldn't convince himself completely that Cassian would say such a thing, but somehow, he knew.

Though Cassian would not hear, though there was no one to hear him ever again, Jizabel responded anyway, in a whispers as soft as the wind. Because though he was sure the word didn't mean the same to him as it did to everyone else, because although he wasn't sure he'd ever truly felt it in his life, though he wasn't sure he could tell it from obsession or admiration or a need to be dependant on another, he liked to think he loved him, too.

)o(

All comments are loved.