One Year: Intertwined
Chapter One - Perfection
333 Days. (October 12, Wednesday)
[Winter River, Connecticut]
Winter River was quaint, picturesque, and perfect for a hallmark card. The sun shone almost blindingly in the perfectly clear blue skies, perfectly accentuating the golden colour that the leaves on the trees were beginning to turn. What few green leaves remained seemed amplified, like little emerald jewels among the golden branches. None of these colours quite compared with the bright orange jack-o-lanterns that sat on every porch, their triangular eyes and toothy grins only frightening in the fact that each was a nearly perfect replica of the one next door, or across the street, or down the block.
Even the populace was disturbingly monochromatic; all but three residents had grown up in the town, in houses owned by their parents' parents. The homogenous mass of gently rounded and well-tanned farm girls exiting Miss Shannon's School for Girls, was broken only by the ghostly pale skin of the New York raised Lydia Deetz. Although her slim figure was well hidden under the baggy school uniform, any number of personal items would instantly betray the sharp contrast of her lifestyle. Her sketchbook was a composite of cartoon zombies, skeletal remains, demonic creatures, and flaming apocalyptic nightmare worlds. Her Denim covered journal was filled with a combination of sketches, dark poetry, rants about life and society, all shoved between mock and serious suicide notes, although the prospect of suicide was much less appealing with an afterlife of a civil servant waiting on the other end. Her photography portfolio was filled with contemporary pieces, the way the light catches in the spokes of a chair, the shadows that flit across the wall at night, and what Lydia had originally thought were the warped perversions of a middle-aged couple who'd fallen out of their individual niches.
It was discovering the true nature of that rather bizarre collection of pictures that had really changed her life. Lydia had originally thought that under those sheets was a sexually disturbed redhead artist who'd lost all inspiration and relevance, and a slightly overweight businessman who after suffering a nervous breakdown had fled the big city to relive his own farm-town childhood. What was actually under the sheets was a pair of ghosts; real ghosts; not like the occasional table-cloth over a tree branch that adorned a front lawn, although the association explained why the pair had thought that sheets would be convincing.
Lydia pedalled up the hill, followed by a local dog, a scruffy little thing, through a covered bridge, in disrepair, towards the only house that didn't fit with the town's pastoral décor. It did once, about four months ago, since then it became progressively stranger, the whole house was echoed by a like-shaped frame that sat about a foot out from the building, and a deck with a single room-styled wall at the far end shot out from the main body. Only Delia Deetz, and her personal decorator, Otho, would have any idea why the house was deliberately made to look half finished, although Lydia did not complain about this. The strange frame made the perfect base for a disturbingly haunting collection of decorations.
The strange house was actually the first to get a treatment for Halloween. Styrofoam headstones lined the path up the hill, accompanied by plastic half-rotten hands that shot out of freshly turned soil. A disturbingly accurate paper maché skeleton laid tumbling out of unearthed coffin. A scarecrow by the door was deliberately made to have realistic eyes, one of which was in the beak of a taxidermy raven; Lydia had a tape of screams ready under the hat for the upcoming night. Then there was the plethora of ghostly shapes, cobwebs, and bats that hung from the frame.
Inside the house was fairly similar to the rest of the town, going through its third remodelling in the last six months. Albeit this remodelling job was fairly similar to the state it was in before the Deetz family had moved in, their own remodelling continued to possess most of the second floor but justifying the change had been easier with two gaping holes that went from through the living room ceiling. The guests who had created those holes bodily had landed in the master bedroom, amazing they left the house unscathed physically; their mental states were a bigger question.
None of the decorations outside were quite as impressive as the decoration that currently sat in the middle of their living room, next to a miniature of the town. Sculpted and painted by Delia Deetz, it was the only decoration that made Lydia's exhilarating tingle of mild fear turn into a stomach curling knot. The giant snake with the head of man had something the rest of the decorations didn't, it had a history. It wasn't a fictional manifestation of a macabre humour. It was a perfect replica of a very disturbed man.
[The Afterlife Waiting Room]
"Betelgeuse, party of one," Miss Argentina called across the waiting room.
"Finally," the ghost spoke in his squeaky voice, his head unnaturally small from a run in with a witch doctor. Brushing the cobwebs from his suit, he headed through the doors and inhaled sharply as he came face to face with an all too familiar sour wrinkles, the slit in her throat expelling cigarette smoke. "Hey… Juno…"
"Good to know you remember my name," the ghostly woman pulled out a piece of gum and placed in the ghost's mouth, "Chew this," she instructed flatly, unaffected by the poltergeist's glaring. Then she put her hand over the ghost's mouth, "Now blow a bubble," the glare remained, but the ghost took in oxygen through his nose, and tried to blow a bubble.
Slowly his head re-inflated, a process that gave him a splitting headache, which pretty much told him that it would have been fatal if he weren't already dead. "I'm just here to pay some parking tickets," he said with a moan, "I don't have an appointment." Betelgeuse let his usual showmanship slip, partially because of the headache, and partially because of the audience. Juno was one of only four ghosts that received this privilege, and the only ghost that received it consistently. Roughly equivalent with a sign of respect, except that Betelgeuse didn't actually respect anyone.
"You only think you don't have an appointment."
The ghost grunted, "What'd I do?"
Juno held out a picture of Lydia, the pair finding themselves in Juno's office for the suddenly personal conversation, "Remember her."
Betelgeuse would've blanched if all the blood hadn't already run out of his face, of course he remembered Lydia Deetz; he'd tried to marry her. Of course, that wasn't exactly legal on this side of the great divide, the ghost immediately fell back into his usually play-book of how to get away with things, showmanship. "Little goth chick!" he said brightly, faking the headache away, "Can't quite remember her name, bio-exorcism job."
"Can it!" Juno said, able to see through his showmanship instantly, thanks to about six hundred years of practice. That was the big problem, the bone of contention between the two, the woman, who was once his mentor, knew him too well, had too much influence over his afterlife. Conmen, proper conmen, didn't have connections like that; anyone with the chance to expose their lifestyle of debauchery had to be eliminated or disassociated from. In the afterlife that was nearly impossible for the simple fact that she was also his caseworker. "Approximately one month ago you started a contract with this girl, one that traded the safety of Barbara and Adam Maitland for her hand in marriage."
"You make it sound like I messed up. What did I do? Everything related to the enacting of a contract is the responsibility of the other party, if you have a problem, wait for Lydia Deetz to drop dead."
"It's not my problem, it's your problem. By the curse rules, all contracts made must be fulfilled in order or in the timeline specified by the contract," Betelgeuse's eyes widened, Juno wouldn't lie, not about his curse. "Additionally, contacts made with the living include exclusive rights to summoning you during the duration of the contract," he'd been around the case worker long enough to put the pieces together even before she finished, "Until further notice the only one who can summon you is Lydia Deetz."
[The Deetz/Maitland Household]
"I'm home," Lydia said warmly as she entered the door.
"Welcome home honey," the fatherly greeting came from the man leaning over the model of the town, adjusting his glasses as he painstakingly placed the miniature jack-o-lanterns on every doorstep. "How was your day Lydia?" he asked, wrapping his checker clad arms around Lydia in a chilling embrace.
"Pretty good," Lydia's voice sunk in the reply.
"Still haven't made any friends?"
"It's a really close knit town; everyone's been best friends since they were kids. It's hard to know where I fit…"
"They just don't know you yet. You'll find a friend, and you'll just click. Pretty soon you'll feel like you've belonged here your whole life."
"Is that Lydia I hear?" the motherly call came from the kitchen, the curly haired brunette stepping into the living room carrying a tray of chocolate chip cookies.
"Those smell amazing," Lydia said flatly, her mouth watering.
"Be careful, I just pulled them out of the oven," she pulled one of the cookies from the tray and handed it to Lydia, immediately watching the dark haired girl recoil in pain. "Oh no," she put the tray down. Lydia switched hands, licking the dab of melted chocolate, the more direct source of the pain from her palm. "I didn't realize they were so hot," bare fingers replaced the burn with a cold tingle.
"Barbara, I'm fine," Lydia assured, "Adam…" she batted her big brown eyes at the man.
"I'm sure she's fine," Adam reassured his wife. "Oh Lydia, I found something while you were at school today, go grab your camera."
Lydia brightened, heading down into the basement which served as a dark room for when she wasn't using her instant developing camera. Instant pictures were great, and useful, but self developing led to so many artistic options. Adam and Barbara Maitland had progressively changed her life, from the first time she'd spied them in the attic window, even more so when she'd found them attempting to scare her family under a pair of sheets. They were the closest things to perfect. The pair were loving, supportive, down to Earth, and capable of some of the greatest feats of macabre humour imaginable. It was both fascinating and petrifying when they did something horrifying for the sake of entertaining Lydia. The ghostly pair were the reference for most of Lydia's artist gore, Adam himself being the reference for the human skeleton, Barbara modelled the scarecrow's eyes, both had helped with construction even if Lydia had to be responsible for the set-up, seeing as how they were permanently bound to the house.
"I've got my camera, where are we going?"
"Up to the attic, come on," Adam prompted. The trio bounded up the stairs with delight, passing from classic country décor to a stone gray modernism on the second floor, and then back to classic country in the attic, the space refurbished as a bedroom and living space for Adam and Barbara although 'living space' was undoubtedly a politically incorrect term. They slept less and less as the days went by, and ate less and less as they accustomed themselves to their total lack of physical needs. "Here it is," Adam referred Lydia to the corner, a silvery web dangled across the insulation-less boards. In the middle stood a very large spider, its abdomen was the color of a pancake, with speckles of a more raw dough colour. Its eight golden legs had tufts of black hairs at the joints. Its head was stone grey, almost the same shade as the second floor.
"Nephila clavipes, a female golden orb-web spider. Adam, she's beautiful," Lydia stared at the arachnid that stood right in the middle of her creation. Lydia's camera flickered, ten exposures before she lowered her camera again, and turned throwing her arms around both Adam and Barbara. The icy tingle travelled all the way down her spine, far surpassing the cold that gripped the room. Even if there had been insulation it wouldn't have held the heat in with the Maitlands around, and even if it could the Maitlands would always feel the chill of death. "We're so far north for this species, she'll probably freeze if she stays up here," Lydia released Adam and Barbara looking back to the spider almost sadly, "Do you think I can keep her?"
"You should probably ask your parents," Barbara replied.
Parents, it was not a term Lydia was quite comfortable with. Her relationship with her step-mother had always been dicey; the woman had never really got the hang of motherhood. Delia was moody, controlling, high maintenance, all things that Lydia had striven to correct in herself after seeing the extremity of Delia. Then there was her biological father, Charles, the pair had never bared any family resemblance, or shared interests, or anything but the same roof and some acquaintances. Between work, Delia, and a number of mental breakdown escapist mid-life crisis episodes, there never seemed to be any time left for the father and daughter to find any sort of mutual ground. Adam and Barbara were more like her parents in her mind.
The problem was that ghosts couldn't own property, at least not legally since people who could see them were few and far between. So the Deetz's owned the house, and once the Maitlands had settled into having their bizarre extended family around, their behaviour was considerably more conservative. Lydia had supposed it was somehow related to a fear of change, the two seemed programmed to avoid upheavals.
There was one advantage to keeping her parents emotionally distant, typically they had no idea what she was talking about, and so would agree readily to almost anything depending on how she phrased the question. This was what Lydia kept in mind as she went careening down the attic steps, slowing to approach the open room where Delia was working clay. The woman had been highly inspired for the past month, already planning her big gala return to the word of art.
"Delia, I'll be keeping my new photography subject in my room if that's okay with you?"
"Of course it is, you never know when inspiration may strike," Delia replied airily, paying more attention to her sculpture than the teen.
With a smile, Lydia continued, making her way to the study, her father's major getaway, a very earthy room with lots of wood and the lingering earthy smell of pipe smoke. "Hey Dad, I'm keeping an orb-weaver, Delia's already approved."
"That's nice dear," he replied, staring out the window with his binoculars which meant the man was either bird watching or spying on the neighbours.
Easy as pie, Lydia raced from the office, down to the kitchen, retrieving an empty jam jar, before bursting back into the attic. "Permission granted," she said simply, bring the jar close to the web and gently tapping the she-spider in. "If she's joining the scrapbook gang, she'll need a name," Lydia looked upon her adoptive family, "what do you think?"
"Goldie," Adam replied and immediately got Lydia's sarcastically flat expression.
"I don't know Lydia, she looks almost exotic," Barbara puzzled.
"Nefertiti, like the Egyptian queen," Lydia said with some satisfaction, giving Adam and Barbara one more chilling embrace before she headed for her bedroom. Adam had built the shelf upon discovering Lydia's affection for insect life, and the wide range of jam jars that Barbara had stashed in the garage provided temporary homes, but the centerpiece of her collection was kept in a fish-tank with a variety of branches.
"How are you doing Celeste?" Lydia asked, peering through the glass at the dangling chrysalis, "I hope you won't mind being a smaller container for winter," carefully Lydia lifted the twig from the tank. "I want Nefertiti to have some room, and I just don't think you two would get along very well." The spider was jiggled out of the jar into the tank, before the chrysalis took the container and a spot along the shelf. Her fingers running along the shelf along the shelf, grabbing a jar labelled 'Marion' along with a big scrapbook and her camera. "Time to go Marion. Sorry Julian, it looks like you're going to be the only beetle for a while," she said to another jar before she started down the stairs.
Taking the door out of the kitchen Lydia made her way to the back yard, sitting in the grass and opening her scrapbook, each page was a plethora of pictures of various insects each named and dated for both release and capture. Lydia filled in the release date for Marion before turning the jar open and sitting it in the grass with her camera poised for pictures. "Well Marion, this is it, it was fun having you around but I'm afraid I'm just no good at catching aphids for you. Besides, you'll need to get yourself someplace warm with lots of friends to hibernate soon." The shutter clicked as Lydia snapped the Twice-Stabbed Ladybug exiting the glass jar from every angle. "You know Marion, I think everyone would be a lot happier if we were more like you insects. You guys don't want for anything beyond the necessities, and when a spider moves in next door you don't cower from her presence. You know that the only time you have to worry about a spider is when you get caught in their web." Suddenly the Ladybug took flight, Lydia's camera clicking with the pictures, "You're not like this town, where the only locals that don't look at me like I'm about to suck their blood are already dead."
Lydia sunk, emptying the can of twigs and leaves before heading back inside with her scrapbook. She couldn't live as perfect as the insects, without want, because despite the potential to have almost anything she wanted in the town, she wanted to be normal, but the most abnormal thing in her life was the only thing that kept her sane. Even if she wasn't totally accepted in New York, there were enough strange and unusual people to keep her company, here there were only two, and then it was only their existence that made them strange and usual.
"You know what though, even if my life is strange and usual, its perfect for me," Lydia said to boost her own confidence, heading inside as Marion turned into a speck in the distance.
[Chapter One: End]
A/N: Each of the bugs has significance in their name, Nefertiti was named after her scientific name, as is Celeste, a celastrina ladon, Julian is named for his discovery, being a June Bug that Lydia found in July, this being before she'd met Beetlejuice or the Maitlands, while Marion is a Twice-stabbed Ladybeetle named after Marion Crane, the victim in Hitchcock's film Psycho.
