Hold It Together

Neitherworld

Lydia watched them, unphased. In the beginning, she felt a little confused, and maybe feverish. As the week progressed though, there was something besides being sick. They had one week together, and even though they were having fun, something had been tying everyone at the Roadhouse back. Everyone had acted so different. Even now.

It seemed normal. It seemed like something BJ would pull, but it was different.

"Whatcha think, Babe?" BJ asked her as he stepped in the shower. "Got optional settings. Mud water or swamp water." He showed off the mud bath letting it cover him. He shook it off some, but twisted the swamp water handle which took the majority of the mud off. "Babe? What's wrong?"

What was wrong? What was wrong?! Lydia went over to his new installed shower. "Mud. Swamp. What's that one?" There was a third handle she pulled. Cold water flooded over BJ.

"Yikes!" BJ tried to move out of the way. "That was close. I almost got clean." He looked toward the handle. "That's the default choice. Not too bad though, now you can bathe and smell bad or good."

No. "No more kidding around, Beetlejuice," Lydia warned him. She started tapping her feet. "I could buy that I was sick for a little while, but this just isn't right." She looked around his place. "You've been getting actual edible food in here. You have a bath with clean water. You made me pick most of your new remodeling furnishings. You've been caging off your bugs and rodents and putting food that isn't in your fridge, inside of plastic bags." None of it was him.

He never cared about any of that. Hygiene? Pleh, he hated the word. Lydia never minded before, so why was he getting that way? Was it really her health? If it was, then why the redecorating? And the biggest one of all. "Tell me what's going on, BJ."

"What do you mean?" He asked.

"Why can't I go home?" She'd tried to more than once. Sure, he wanted her to stay but she still wanted to return too. To her bed. To her fridge. He didn't need to worry about stocking for her, why didn't he just return home? Her bedding and her sheets and her pillows. The mail, it would keep coming. And especially missing the chance to see her other friends. "Bertha and Prudence haven't seen me for four days, they must be worried."

"Uh."

"BJ," Lydia warned him. "I want to go home. Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice!" She said his name three times but nothing happened? What? "Home, home, home?" What was going on?

"Really trying to get to the end of the week before this, Lyds," BJ said. Yeah, he was outwardly admitting now that something was wrong. "A couple more days," he encouraged her, "and I'll tell you why you can't go home. Yet."

"Beetlejuice." Lydia was a calm person usually. You had to, in order to be a friend to Beetlejuice, but even she had her limits.

"Two days, Lyd," he insisted again. "Gotta wait two more. Just two."

"Beetle-"

"It's not a request!" He said firmly to her. "You have to wait two days."

Did he just yell at her? It's not a request? What in the world was he hiding?

"Okay, no way are we fightin', Lyds, not right now." He groaned. "Gonna have to do something." He snapped his fingers and disappeared for a minute. When he came back, he pointed toward the entrance to his place.

Lydia watched Ginger come by. "Hi." She waved two of her legs on the same side. "Lydia? Uh? You're kind of worried about something Beetlejuice might be hiding?"

Oooh. No. He asked for help? He'd never do that, BJ would never do that. What would cause him to do that?

"It's? You really need to wait for two days," Ginger insisted. "Please? Don't get mad at him, or us. This is really hard, no one's used to it."

"Two days." Lydia looked back toward Beetlejuice. "Fine, two more days."

Two Days Later.

So many things went through Lydia's mind about what it might be, and the top thing it could possibly be? It just, it still didn't fit. I just want to know. I just need to know! The only thing she could even possibly think of was that the trip was like, a last resort thing to a divorce. They'd always loved each other though. But her dad, the way he talked to her? The fact that her mom never talked to her?

"Okay." BJ took several deep breaths, moving around the room. "Alright. Okay." He exhaled. "Lyd? Something happened that changed . . . the way you go up."

The way she went up? "I don't mind," Lydia said. "I just need to know what's wrong. Please?" He was rubbing his hands around so much.

"As in . . ."

Wow. He was lost for words. Lydia sat down on his couch and squeezed where her hands laid. She felt a few bugs and beetles come out, but didn't think about it. She still didn't know, but BJ being lost for words? The whole week?

"As in . . ." BJ tried again. "As in you can't. Not for at least 125 years. Rules." His voice was thick. "Rules for uh." He had his hands out, squeezing them in and out. "Rules for the newly dead, Babe."

Uh? Lydia stopped squeezing the couch. She was expecting to hear something about her family. Why was he . . . he was supposed . . . "You were supposed to say something about my family or. Or. Or. Something. Why, are you." Why was he? What? Newly dead. Newly dead. "What's newly dead?"

BJ gestured toward her.

Lydia blinked a few times. She looked at Beetlejuice. At the couch. At the bug that was crawling on the side of the couch that was slowly leaving her eyesight. She didn't want it to leave her eyesight. It was something to stare at so she didn't have to think about what he just . . . "I'm newly dead?" But? "But my dad!" No, no, this was a cruel joke. A joke he had taken way too far. "I talked to my dad!"

"When you die, you get a few little twisting on the rules," BJ answered her. "I revealed my real self to him, so he could say goodbye."

"B-but." Her mouth opened but no words came out, only half understandable sounds, until it hit her. "The." Her eyes fell back toward BJ. "Sick?" She felt herself falling backward into the couch, getting consumed by the stuffing of it. She felt Beetlejuice's hand and realized she hadn't moved at all.

He pulled her up into a hug. "It's not so bad here," he said, trying to sound positive. "I mean, hey, I'm here. Lived here all my life. Lot of freedom down here. You know? You can start here at the Roadhouse and if you want, you can move out and upward. I mean, you know? Schools and jobs and all that."

He kept trying to talk, and he wasn't even using his juice accidentally, but it just didn't. I'm dead. The pneumonia. She never got better. She never got over being sick. She couldn't say anything and her eyes just wouldn't stop watering. Her mom. Her dad. Her friends. Her life. Everything she knew. Where she grew up. Her world. Gone. Forever.

When she was younger, a couple of times, she had dreams about it. Some strange dreams where she just woke up and they all threw a party because she could stay forever. All her Neitherworld friends were there with cake and ice cream and assorted other Neitherworld food. It was a happy dream, but it was just one of those dreams. Like, waking up and finding yourself alone on an island, where you could just scream as loud as you want and run as much as you want. No consequences. No thinking things through.

Those were dreams. Those were just stupid, silly dreams. She clung tightly to his back. "Beej'."

"Gotcha, Lyds, forever, it's okay."

Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Dead.

Beetlejuice wasn't surprised by the ear piercing scream she let out. He knew it wouldn't be easy. Everything she ever lived for was gone. No family, a few friends, no schooling, no nothing, just him and his Roadhouse. She only visited the Neitherworld. To ever say it was home. To say that she was dead. That she'd never see any of the living people she'd loved again? Alive?

He wasn't a bit surprised she started to fall into the couch. The Neitherworld was a world of feeling, of magic, and Lydia held a lot of feeling right now. He had to make sure he didn't lose her to any of it. If it took all his juice, he'd keep her tender self safe through it all. There was a reason it took 125 years in a place of safety before they could come out to the Neitherworld.

It was an open interpretation to all feelings. But it was either there with him, where he could watch her and know what could happen, or back with more newly deads who wouldn't know the first thing to do if she started falling into even just a couch. He let her cry on him for several more minutes, getting out a lot of her sorrow. He could feel himself getting so drenched, she was almost starting to clean him now.

She was starting to shout and squeeze him, telling him over and over she couldn't be dead. To prove it to her. That she was fine. But, it was just her ranting and venting. Beetlejuice knew that, he did it all the time. Before this.

She cried on him a good fifteen minutes before she had any concept of time. "I." Her first word in a while. "I don't wanna be dead." She sniffled and wiped her eye.

He looked down into those sad, miserable big eyes. Eyes he always hated to see. Eyes he always tried to prevent as much as he could. "I've always been a ghost," he said to her. "Born one. Got my annoying family here forever to bother me. This has always been home." He tried to wipe his tears. "But if this world was taken from me, I know I'd be feeling like you right now. I may never have been alive, but I know losing all of it's not easy, Babe."

She hugged him even tighter. "I don't even know what to do."

"Nothin'. Right now, don't gotta do a single thing," he assured her. "Better if you don't."

"Yeah. Magic. Neitherworld." She was speaking, but it sounded like she was long since tired. "No one ever again." Her whole body started to collapse against him. The squeezing from before was all but gone, now she couldn't seem to even hold on.

Beetlejuice picked her up and sat down on the bed. Right now, she was tender to all of the Neitherworld's strange magic. As long as she slept, he'd hold onto her. He watched as Ginger crept by. "She's out."

"Oh." Ginger dabbed her eyes, but tried really hard not to make another sound. She just shook her head behind her and then moved away. 

Jacques looked in. "If you need anything, a break or anything, let us know, Beattlejuice?"

"I got her." Not going anywhere. Not yet. Lyd was priority uno. Until he could trust she wasn't going to fall into the abyss of the Neitherworld, his second priority had to stay off the table. Time would move though. It always moved. Bertha and Prudence just had their last day of school that day. Both of them would be pulling up stake and leaving Peaceful Pines shortly for their new life and new colleges. By then, Lydia would be recovered enough to trust to get away a little bit, letting one of the others watch over her a small amount of time.

And then. Priority two. Until then, all those murderers could just lie down. Have sweet dreams. Think they got away with it all.

While they could.

"Beattlejuice?" Jacques interrupted him one more time. "Uh? Ginger and all of us? We really just want to remind you that-"

"Beat it."

"Yes, I know, and it is justified. You have to do what you have to do. That's fine, just don't? Don't lose yourself in the process of what you need to do."

"Just beat it."

"It would do no good for her to get used to everything to have you completely changed. Just remember that. Revenge is a tricky thing." Jacques left.

Beetlejuice knew what he was talking about. He didn't really care what he was saying. Whatever it took. Whatever it took to guarantee she never had to see them again. Whatever it took, to make them feel what she felt. But, he felt himself calming down again as she moved slightly in his arms. You'll be okay. I promise. Promise, promise, promise, Lydia.

Promise.