Our Ghost Adventures

It was surprising how quickly our break went by. I hadn’t really realized it until it was about a week before Christmas. I had spent Thanksgiving with Aidan’s parents back in Ireland. Even though they didn’t officially celebrate it there, it was one of those things that he’d gotten them to do. Aidan’s parents had become like my own. They were great people and since my dad had past away when I was young and my mom past away two years ago, I spent most holidays with Carlin and Daren. They were older, in there mid 60’s but still so funny. Daren had been the one to walk me down the isle when I married Aidan.

But anyway, it was a week before Christmas and I got a last minute phone call from none other than Zak. We’d talked on the phone a lot between Nevada and Ohio. We had agreed to kind of stay in our own houses for a while so that we could test the ‘long distance’ portion of our relationship. I had a feeling that when we met up again…we wouldn’t be apart for a while.

I had answered the phone call of course-he usually didn’t text me anyway, he had claimed that it was too impersonal, so I didn’t find it odd that he was calling me.

“Hello?” I said.

“Hey baby,” I could tell that he was smiling, his tone was flirtatious and sweet.

“Hey there honey,” I chuckled softly, feeling like a teenage girl. As I pushed my cart through the grocery store I almost started twisting my hair around my finger. I was here for one thing and one thing only. Hair dye.

“So I was wondering-Shut up, Aaron!” I heard a bit of commotion in the back ground which I could only assume was Zak slapping Aaron in the head. It followed by Aaron’s giggling. “No Vlog right now!”

“Yes Vlog!” Aaron shouted. I think I may’ve been on speaker phone. The phone was echoing weird.

“What were you wondering, Zak?” I asked.

“Oh right! So I was wondering if you want to come to Vegas for Christmas, to spend it with me.”

“Oh, you were?” I bit my lip nervously. It wasn’t like I had any other plans-other than drinking Irished-up apple cider-so much so that it wasn’t even really apple cider anymore, just so that I could forget the cursed holiday. “Okay, I’ll have to get a plane ticket.” I could hear more commotion in the back ground. Was Zak dancing now?

“Awesome. I just have to warn you to bring something dressy,” he said quickly. “Okay bye-”

“Bagans don’t you dare hang up. Why the hell do I need to bring something ‘dressy’?”

“Well…” he said nervously. “It’s at my mom’s house.”

“What? You want me to meet your mom? Zak!”

“Aw, Adri’s whining!” Aaron called.

“Shut up Aaron!” I said. “This is a big deal, Zak…I don’t know if I should be meeting your mom…We’ve only been one date!”

“I’ll take you on another one here,” he said.

“Well aren’t you cocky. How do you know that I’ll say yes?” I asked.

“Because you like me too much,” he said, sounding as confident as ever.

“Nah, I think you like me too much. Maybe I’ll just stay here,” I walked down the hair dye isle and looked at the different colors. Yeah, I dyed my own hair. I had gotten used to it and I dyed it so much that I didn’t want to have to make an appointment at a hair salon. Plus, I didn’t trust any of the people there.

“You wouldn’t dare,” he said. “You know you can’t stand being away from me.”

“Who called who today? And yesterday?”

“Oo, Zak just got burned!” Aaron said. When Zak spoke again it wasn’t as echo sounding and I couldn’t hear Aaron at all.

“Okay, fine, I like you too much and I miss you. I want you to come here!” He exclaimed.

“Okay Zak, I’ll catch the next flight, but it might be hell getting out of here…since Christmas is in a few days.

“Alright baby girl, I’ll see you in a few days.”

I give a subtle laugh. “Yeah. I’ll see you then.”

“Hey-Wait!” I paused. “Why don’t you bring Muffin? I wanna meet him in person.”

I had nearly forgotten that we had facetimed and we let Muffin and Gracie do the same. They had just kind of looked at each other and were confused as to why we had a little box that had another dog inside of it. Gracie seemed happy enough to see me though, she barked and I think she did recognize me.

“I’ll try. I don’t know how I feel about putting him on the plane...What if they lose him?”

“Babe, that’s a good point. But, Gracie has traveled with me before and she was okay.”

“Maybe. We’ll see. I’m at the store right now, hon. I’ll call you back, okay?”

“Okay,” he agreed.

***
“C’mon Muffin,” I said to the dog. I was walking up the sidewalk to Zak’s house. I was able to get a flight the day after I had spoken to Zak and now I was going to surprise him. It was early, around 5am-which made it 8 in Ohio, but it was the first flight I could take, the next one wasn’t leaving until the 23rd and I would have jetlag, but right now I was awake as could be. Since I didn’t have a key, I rang the doorbell-feeling kind of bad for waking him. I heard Gracie bark and Muffin barked in response. I was kind of surprised at how cold it was outside. We were in the middle of Nevada desert and yet it was cold! Stupid weather.

“Who the hell’s here this early, do you know, Grace?” I heard Zak ask from the other side of the door. I hid from the peep hole so that he could see me. Soon the wooden door opened and a very sleepy looked Zak stood on the other side. When he finally looked up at me, his face lit up and pulled me into a tight hug before kissing my lips tightly. “Oh my God, I’ve fucking missed you!” He kissed me again and pulled me closer to him.

“I’ve missed you too!”

“What are you doing here? Why didn’t you call me? I would’ve picked you up at the airport!”

“I wanted to surprise you,” I gave him another kiss and he looked into my eyes and returned it after we’d pulled away.

“C’mon in out of the cold.”

After we’d been in the house awhile, we were sitting on the couch and Gracie jumped up on my lap. She kicked my cheek and I giggled.

“Hold on, I want a picture,” Zak said. He pulled out his phone and snapped a photo of Gracie and me.

“I probably look awful,” I said.

“No, you look gorgeous.”

My phone beeped in my pocket and I pulled it out. It was something from twitter, I could check it later, but I had a sneaking suspicion that Zak had been the one to put something on there. And, I was right.

Zak Bagans @Zak_Bagans
My two girls: Gracie and @AdriMM

And then it had the photo beneath it.

“Aww, well aren’t you the sweetest,” I said. I hadn’t realized that we were telling the people though. But, oh well. I didn’t care, he made me so happy.

“I am,” he smiled.

“So when’s the party?”

“Christmas Eve, Aaron’s going, so you’ll know somebody other than me-Oh so is Steph.”

“Good,” I said. “I’m already worried to meet your mom…”

“Don’t be she’ll love you. Plus, I’m sure that Steph has told her about you, and Steph loved meeting you.”

“But Zak…I’m worried, I’m not good around new people-usually.”

“What about when you met us?”

“I was scared out of my wits! Same with everybody else that I’ve met.”

“You’ll be fine, I promise.”

***
Christmas Eve came quicker than I thought that it would. I was nervous as I stood next to Zak on the doorstep of his mother’s lavish house in my modest red dress. I didn’t want to make a bad impression on his mother so I wore something that didn’t reveal too much. Zak didn’t like it that much, but I really didn’t care.

“Zachary!” another dark haired woman that resembled both Zak and Stephanie stood and hugged him. “Oh, you must be Adrina,” she hugged me too.

“Hi Mrs-”

“Please, call me Elise,” she said.

“What a lovely name,” I gave her a genuine smile, I really did love that name.

“Thank you sweetie, I like your name too. Please come in!”

Zak wrapped his arm around my waist as we walked over the threshold into the house.

“Mom, this place looks great,” Zak marveled, looking up at the Christmas decorations and the huge ten foot tree.

“Thanks sweetie. Adrina, can I talk to you for a minute?” she asked me.

“Um…” I looked up at Zak and he gave me an encouraging look I was so nervous! My hands were shaking and my knees felt as if they would buckle. “Sure.”

“I’ll see you in a minute, Babe,” he said, kissing my head. I was kind of glad he didn’t kiss me on the lips because I didn’t want to do that in front of his mom. She led me through a crowd of people into a quieter room that had books lined up on every wall. This must be her library.

“I’ll be completely honest with you,” she said, pacing through the library. “Stephanie told me a lot about you. She told me how much Zak liked you, and I want you to know that you better not hurt my son-ever. If you don’t do that, we won’t have any problems-okay?” I looked at her wide eyed. Was she really threatening me? She was really intimidating!

“I don’t plan on hurting Zak. I really like him-honest. I wouldn’t do anything to hurt him.”

“Well honey, you need to make sure that he knows all about your past.”

***Zak’s POV***

“So where’s your better half?” Stephanie snorted. She was drunk. I could tell just by listening to her speak.

“Steph, how are you already drunk? The party started like an hour ago!”

“I’m not drunk! But where’s Adrina?”

“Mom’s talking to her.”

“Uh oh,” she giggled. “You let your mom talk to your girlfriend?”

In hindsight maybe it wasn’t such a good idea, but seconds later I felt Adrina’s fingers lace with mine. I felt her rest her head against my shoulder, I wrapped my arm around.

“You okay, babe?” I asked, all the while Stephanie slipped away from the area.

“Yeah, I’m just feeling tired.” Something about her voice betrayed her.

“Are you sure? Did my mom do something?”

“No,” she said right away. “Maybe I should just sit down for a minute.”

“We can leave, if you want,” I offered, concerned for her wellbeing.

“No, we just got here. I’ll just go sit down.”

“Sweetheart, c’mere,” I led her to the living room area and she sat down of the couch. “Do you want anything to drink? Wine? Water?”

“Water, if you wouldn’t mind.”

I went to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle from the fridge. When I walked in there, Aaron was standing there talking idly to my aunt. “Hey!” he exclaimed. “Where’s your better half?”

“She’s in the living room, she’s not feeling well.”

“Zachary, I didn’t realize that you were dating anyone,” my aunt Alison said. “Who is she?”

“You can meet her, if you like,” I said.

“Oh, can I?”

“Yeah, c’mon,” I said. I led my aunt to where Adrina was sitting. When she noticed that someone was standing with me, Adri stood nervously.

“Adri, this is my aunt Alison. Aunt Alison, this is Adrina.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Adrina said, even in the dimly lit area, I could see that her cheeks were a little puffy.

“You too, honey. Just make my little nephew happy!” she exclaimed.

“I will try my very hardest…” the conversation between the two of them kind of faded as I watched her wipe her cheek.

“Adri, can I talk to you a minute?” I asked, I didn’t care that I had interrupted her conversation with Alison. This was important.

“Um, yeah,” she said, trying to run her hands through her hair, even though it was curled and she had put hair spray in it.

“Follow me,” I led her out to the patio, it was nice that Vegas wasn’t cold-well not really this time of year. “Okay, no what’s the matter, why were you crying?”

“I wasn’t,” she said.

“Babe, you don’t need to lie to me,” I put my hands on either side of her face and used my thumbs to caress under her eyes. She closed her beautiful eyes and seemed to relax under my touch.

“I’m fine, Zak, really.”

“You don’t seem fine.”

“I’m okay. You don’t need to worry so much about me. Have fun with your family.”

“I only worry because I love you,” I murmured. I decided to admit it. I knew it was true and it had been for quiet a while. She did need to know.

“You love me?” her eyes widened and she looked up at me with shock gracing her features.

“Yeah, I love you,” it felt good to finally say it. I didn’t want to stop saying it.

“Zak, you can’t love me.”

“Why not?”

“I haven’t even been honest with you!”

“What haven’t you been honest about?” I asked.

“Lots of stuff. And if you want to know-I’ll tell you. And after, if you still love me, then we can talk.”

“Nothing’s going to keep me from loving you.”

“We’ll see.”