"Hello?"
"Huh?" He felt out of it. This was one of his favorite spots. This was one of his favorite dancers. She even flung her panies in his face. "Hmm."
"You are always one of my best customers," she whined. "What's it saying about me that you ain't even interested?" She looked like she was about to cry.
Well? He gave her some money. "Is there a ghost midlife crisis?" What was wrong with him? He loved that place, but nothing was doing it anymore. When he did try and shout and have a good time, he felt icky. He didn't get why. He didn't care about ick, he never did! What was wrong with him?
He got up and headed outside. He waved a little as he saw another frequent customer.
"Yo, Man?" he asked. "You don't seem to have your old . . . groove. Like, you used to be an energy bar, bouncing all over the place. What's up with you?"
Yeah. "Wish I knew." Yeah, his groove was off. He was still able to perform his jobs though. Hell, he seemed to get even more jobs now. Other people were starting to even take risks like him, trying to get rid of the living.
He looked over in the corner of the whore house and saw Lydia crying again. He was still connected to her. He walked over to her. "So? I know you can't hear me." Hmm. "There must be something I can do though. I mean, you are really reaking havoc on me. My energy is getting whacked. I'm losing parts of what made me, me. So?"
He knew he couldn't touch her. She wasn't really there. He literally killed people for a living, why did this one living being have to crawl so deep into him? He looked around. "Okay. You're feeling down. Some . . . party?" Felt like a party. "A guy." Yeah. He could almost hear something in the background. "A guy is teasing you, he found out you can see ghosts. You liked that guy." Yeah, that would maybe put her in a corner. "Oh." He sat down. "Tell him to fuck off. He's nothing. You aren't weird, it's a cool power to have. I didn't have it when I was alive. No one gets it. He's nothing." Absolutely nothing.
He watched her rub her eyes and stand up. She took a deep breath.
Right. He watched her fade away. Can't reach with words, but it looked like he could reach with the spirit of the words. Well, it was something.
"Hey, these are kind of cool." He picked some roses he turned black. He went over toward her form that was just in a desk, writing and wiping her tears. He had no idea what she was writing about, but maybe these will help. "Hey. Yo. You're annoying," he said to her. "How about these?" He placed them next to her. "They are flowers. You probably like those. Okay, you can't see them. Or smell them." Ugh. "Look, life is shitty. Someone probably hurt your feelings again or whatever. Right? So. Maybe try a prank. I like pranks." He snorted a little. "I really do like pranks. Just imagine the whatever idiot at the end of a hook. Fling it in the water and watch them squirm."
He watched her start to smile. She even bit her lip and then she disappeared.
"Great." He picked up the roses again. "Really hope this whole thing is working."
"No, no, no." Beetlejuice held his head on his lap, trying to comfort himself. "It's not fair! Bioexorcist was my thing." He looked back at the title in the newspaper. Bioexorcists left and right were getting his work now.
It was his. He got cursed for it. Did he get any recognition for it? No! Nothing, not one mention of his name. He was even the one who came up with the name. "It was mine."
He felt warm. Strange. Like there was a giant blanket over him in the middle of a snowstorm. What was that? He looked around. He was real upset, but for some reason, he sort of felt better too. "What is that?" He placed his head back on and looked around.
He saw Lydia, lying on the ground with a happy expression.
"Hm." He went toward her. "Are you making me feel better?" Was her good mood, reaching him? "This tie between us." Huh. "I guess . . ." He looked back at the paper. "I don't feel so ignored now."
"I hate this."
His waiter looked very upset. "You have been eating that for two years straight. If you are tired of it, stop ordering it."
"I usually love this." There was a reason he didn't like it. "I hate it now." He moved the spaghetti around and watched the beetles scatter around in it.
He had started to talk to her too much. He was seeing her more happy than sad. He told her the dumbest jokes, shared his daily findings, and those feelings, they were reaching her.
Her feelings were reaching him too, and he was starting to see why he stopped bothering women as much. He already had one. Even though she wasn't there, he couldn't touch her, and she wasn't dead, she was his. Not officially, but she was there. They were tied. When he was feeling down, she could feel him too.
When he was excited, she felt that too.
But this? This was absolutely disgusting. "If I get the chance to kill this guy. I will." She took the feelings that they had in their connection, and misinterpreted it. For someone she was dating! She thought she was in love with that idiot. She married that idiot, and he just found out that she had a baby.
Looking back on it, he could see it. "How do you just feel love and not pin it to a source?" He looked at the next customer over. "I mean, you don't just feel love and warm and better, and not have it come from somewhere." He poked at his food. "You think, 'hey, it's gotta be this'. Then, you know, all that psychological mumbo jumbo shit gets involved and it gets pinned to whatever the hell you think it is 'cause that's how pscyhological mumbo jumbo shit works." He looked at the person trying to ignore him that he kept bugging. "It's what she did. Science behind it. She isn't thinking 'hey, I'm tied to the supernatural, maybe my almost husband is the one behind this. Nah, nah. Guy you are currently dating is the one. You know I hate it."
This was a form of torture. "Probably. I mean it's probably what happened." He waited 'til the guy ignoring him, slightly glanced at him. "She didn't actually find love with this guy, did she?" He stared at him.
They just shrugged and tried to eat themselves since their food came two minutes ago on their date with whoever was on the other end.
It wasn't. It wasn't a different love. It was their love, right? They connected. She was his. She made him better. He made her better. This, this was not supposed to happen! "This pasta is terrible, how can you sell this schlock?" Of course, that really upset everyone and he headed off.
As he left, he saw her outside. She was rocking her little girl.
"So freaking happy," he groaned. "Look at you. Perfect little life. Feel invincible, don't you? Yeah, the big bad demon that wanted to marry you, not even in the picture of your mind." He turned into a giant snake. She couldn't see or hear, but if feelings came across so well?
Yep. Her happiness changed into something new. She hugged her daughter closer to her.
Good. Good! "Right. So stop bothering me!" He yelled at her. "Go live on with your stupid husband and your stupid family. I don't need those either. I had a wife. Worst mistake of my life. Actually, ended my life," he admitted. "So you don't get any sympathy from me. I'm the Ghost with the Most!" Yeah.
But, she was more than afraid. She was like twice as afraid? How was that possible? Her new baby was crying too now. "No way." If he was connected through some dumb soulmate thing like Juno said, then why was he tied to the kid too?! "You've gotta be kidding me." He came closer to it. "Hey?" Only one way to know for sure. "I didn't mean to scare you, I was just angry at your mom. She's an idiot." He juiced up a rattle and shook it next to her. Yeah, the fear had started to go down halfway. "What dumb name did she give you again?" Oh yeah. "Astrid."
Ooh. He had to check in with Juno again. Someone was telling him more about what was going on here.
"Hey!" He refused to leave. "I am a valued person, who demands to see someone about this." The answer had to be in the back. The answers were always in the back. It's how he learned how to navigate through the systems so well in the first place. He slammed his hand down. "I've been waiting four months."
"Trust me, I know," the secretary said to him. "Juno's time is up. There's no caseworker assigned to you. Sorry." Oh, she wasn't one bit sorry. "You have to wait for another one. That'll be at least another three months."
Yeah, he bitterly left and came back in another three months. New person in charge. Fresh meat was easier to deal with. "Hey! How ya doin' today?" He grabbed her hand and shook it. "I've just got one big question that I need an answer too, and you can go about your lovely day."
"Um?" She didn't know what to think of him. "What is your question?"
"So, I've been seeing this human on this side. My last caseworker, she said that she was a soulmate. We tied together," he said. "Except, she just had a kid. And I can tell, that I'm connected to it to. So. That's not soulmate crap. What the fuck is this shit?"
"Ooh." She didn't like the roughness. Too bad, he was trying. "I've never heard of this. I need to look into this."
"No. No, no, no. I've been waiting seven months to know this," he demanded. "We are going to go into the back room, and figure this shit out. Give me caseworker team power for just a little while. I'll find it."
It took some finagling. Some coercing. Finally some bribing before the new idiot in charge let him through.
"Do not touch anything else of anybody else's. I was warned about you," they said to him.
Whatever. "Apparitions. Visualizations." The place didn't change much. "Ah." He found it. "Visualizations of humans." There, he had it. He opened up the file and looked at it. It averaged happening about ten times in ten thousand years. Yeah. It tended to happen with . . . "It's not a soulmate, it's a botched ceremony?" Wait. "If she's mine, then why am I not free?!"
The caseworker looked at the file. "You were missing one word. Wife."
"Yeah." Which is why he thought it didn't work. "Am I married or not?" Was he freed or not? "Oh, I'm about to start seeing some heads rolling if I don't find out -" His head rolled off in his anger- "What the hell is going on!"
"You are thinking too hard," she said. "The word wasn't said out loud. We think before we speak."
Think before they speak. "The padre. He though the word wife, but didn't say it." It botched the wedding, but tied them together. Now he finally understood it. He went and picked his head back up, placing it on his body. "That makes a hell of a lot more sense." Still. "The kid though."
The caseworker looked at the files. "I don't see the answer to this one."
Ugh. He took the folder back. Only two of those cases applied. "Statements, statements." There must be statements.
Then, he had it. He knew it. "Family." Family. "I gotta say. I feel like shit. I'm not just saying it either, I feel like a gigantic, massive piece of turd right now."
Yeah, the caseworker definitely made a stink over what his juice did next. "Get out, get out! That's disgusting!"
"No. This is disgusting." He slowly walked out while the new person just pushed. It was more like a back massage than anything. He didn't care.
Lydia and his feelings, that she botched up for the other guy? It created Astrid. Physically, her husband did all the work. He got all the fun parts. But, spiritually or emotionally or whatever the fucking tie was called between them. Just like a botched up ceremony that didn't go through caused the connection?
A botched up spiritual session created Astrid's connection to him. If there was a doubt in his mind that the love for her hub wasn't what she felt from himself? His connection with Astrid just proved it!
He was back out in the waiting room. "Hey." He looked at a guy whose leg was sliced clean off with half his face gone. "Your day's going better than mine."