"What is this?"

He asked this, though the words scarcely came out of his mouth.

Ruby just smiled at him, holding his hand tightly, and at the same time softly, in hers.

The old lion somehow knew what he was looking at, he just couldn't believe he was seeing these images, nearly heavenly dreams before his very old and sad blue eyes.

"What is it to you...?" His angelic wife asked and he swallowed weakly, looking on bravely at the sight. Him... meeting her.

He had been so young, just passing twenty-one. And Ruby... the moment he laid eyes on her, he felt his heart pounding in love.

Yes, it was love at first sight. The young Ruby, he knew the second that he saw her... she, she was it.

It was so hard to explain to anyone that he knew he was going to marry this young lioness. So he never told anyone that he loved her the moment their eyes met.

But did she feel the same?

He was in college, learning music theory... and she? She was doing acting for theatre.

She was young, gorgeous and just so full of life but with a deep air of humbleness around her.

He had almost stumbled over himself as he nervously approached her. She was just drinking coffee at a food station where many college students went to have lunch in between lectures.

He gulped the moment he said the words in his heavy smooth voice.

"H-hey..."

Ruby blinked her eyes, turning her gaze up a little cheekily to him and replied, placing her coffee cup on the small table she was sitting at.

"Hello,"

"I'm Clay,"

"Lovely to meet you," She replied with such a warm smile, it was magnetic pulling him closer to her as he took the seat opposite hers and she smiled wider, adding, "I'm Ruby."

"That's a beautiful name," He said, not able to keep his words in. But he didn't want to keep it in. This may be the only time he'd get to know this lioness. This could be his only chance to ask her... ask her out.

"Thanks," She said with a small grin and picked up her coffee cup again, sipping it gently before peering back into his eyes and adding with a wink, "I was born with it."

Calloway couldn't hold in his laughter, so he didn't. He laughed at her joke, and slowly took a deep breath in as he asked, "Would you... like to..."

"Go out sometime?" She finished for him, making him feel the biggest relief ever, and he nodded his head quickly in agreement, "Yeah," She finally answered with no big build-up or anything, "I'd like that..."

"I'd like that too."

The old Calloway was standing away, invisible to the scene and moment that had taken place in time, and he felt the ghostly Ruby squeeze his hand gently.

He said the words that hurt his heart to say.

"I just... I knew then you were the one..."

She smiled softly at him, nodding her head and he sighed heavily.

"I thought we'd have forever... we didn't even have more than a few years."

"But we had each other," Ruby reminded him with her kind welcoming voice, "And we have the memories..."

"Don't show me this," Calloway said. Begged would be the better word, but he saw himself above the motion, that motion of begging.

"Close your eyes, Clay."

He sighed heavily, but obeyed like before and soon he felt the world and universe spin around him. When he heard Ruby whisper, "Open them," He did what was commanded and looked before him, seeing himself at the top of the altar.

He was wearing a black tuxedo, his mane brushed back and a happy smile pasted on his mouth.

He was looking down the aisle at the hundreds of guests that had gotten together here for this day of celebration.

Marriage... love... a perfect wedding.

But he wasn't looking down the aisle at anyone. No, he was looking at THE ONE.

Ruby was walking the white carpeted floor, pink rose petals sprinkled around it. Her dress dragged behind her, having golden lace and a long veil that hung from behind her head, and also covered up her face.

The old Calloway just stood there silently, looking at his younger self – his naive self – waiting for the love of his life to say the words.

"I do."

And for him to say them back.

The old Calloway was standing beside his younger self, and closed his eyes in pain, tears rolling down his cheeks and he told his past self in gentle words.

"Just make her happy... because you won't have her for as long as you think."

"Just make her happy."

"But I was happy, Clay." Ruby said to him as she stood across the way to where her young self stood, the two young versions of themselves meeting at the top of the temple.

"I know," Calloway said back to her, his hands fisting in tense inner pain at this realization, but not because it hurt. Because it was true, "I know Ruby."

"I do."

The two of them, the old lion and his ghost wife, stepped back a little as their young selves said the defining words that would link them together for the rest of their lives... for the rest of Ruby's life.

"Take me away from this." The old Clay begged and Ruby looked at him. There was a sadness in her eyes, but also a deep hidden joy that could not be shaken off her ghostly self.

She took his hand one last time and whispered the words she had said so many times in this meeting, "Close your eyes."

Clay only huffed a weak pathetic laugh and nodded, his eyes closing once more and just like that, the memories changed and formed new memories of the past.

"Open them."

He obeyed once again, but if he knew what he was going to see this time, he would've nailed his eyes shut forever.

There, before him was Ruby in the hospital bed, her past vibrant eyes, looking so tired and weak now. Her life energy so dull and fading from her fast.

And there was his own memory self, kneeling beside the bed and just holding her hands tightly in his, tears streaming from his eyes and his wife resting back on the pillow, not able to lift herself up anymore.

"I know this memory..." Calloway said fearfully, gulping and trembling there at what he was witnessing before him, "This is where you-"

"Where I what...Clay?"

He didn't want to say the word. The word that had haunted him for years to come.

"Die..."

Ruby looked gently at him, and squeezed his hand in her ghostly one, the two looking at their past selves and the utter pain the two held between one another.

"Clay,"

His past self looked into Ruby's weakening eyes, and he nodded his head back at her, almost all strength gone from him as well.

"I want you to promise me something," She said and he nodded his head, eager to do anything he could to relieve her pain.

"Promise that you'll never stop singing... promise you'll keep on doing it for me."

"B-but... but Ruby!" He cried, he begged and held her hands tighter but her own grip had weakened evermore, "All I sing, all my songs are for you!"

"Then keep me alive through them," She whispered with the softest saddest smile possible, "When I go... let it carry you... your songs are more than just for me... SING clay. SING for the world."

After that, Ruby felt her breath shorten, and in moments her grip was completely gone, as she collapsed back against the pillow and her eyes shut, never to be open again.

Clay was in bits at what was happening just before him. He began to break down heavily, hugging his dead wife close as he begged to her, "No, NO, NO!"

The old lion stood away from this scene, but tears were flooding from his eyes. He slowly looked at Ruby who still had that sad smile on her ghostly angelic lips and she held Clay softly in a hug, whispering to him.

"Please, Clay... close your eyes."

"What more can you show me that won't make me more distraught?"

He asked this, demanding to know the answer, "What more can you do?"

His deceased wife held him close, whispering once again, "Close them,"

He had no other real options then. So he closed his red-veined eyes and wanted to keep them shut forever.

But forever wasn't long enough and soon he could feel the cold again in the air, hitting all around him and chilling his bones.

"Open your eyes, Clay."

He slowly did just as she asked, and as he opened his eyes, he saw there was that same pile of snow that was in a chilly pile in the centre of his room because of the hole in the roof. The hole he had created himself.

"Ruby?" He asked her, but when he turned to look at her, she was gone.

His jaw hung open slightly in surprise and shock, as he quickly scanned the room with his eyes but found not a soul... not a ghost, not even an angel.

"RUBY?!" He screamed for, but alas... he was alone...

But he really wasn't alone... was he?

Soon he heard his grandfather clock ding donging in the living room, and he hurried out of his room, reaching the living room quickly and seeing the clock knelling out the time.

It was passed midnight... it was six in the morning... and it was then he realized.

"It's Christmas..."

He held still, as this realization hit him hard and his old eyes slowly turned to the box of presents that were against the wall... the gifts Ash had left him.

"Ash..." He whispered to himself, and approached the gifts slowly.

He picked up the box, placed it on the coffee table and closed his eyes, tears falling.

"Thank you... thank you."