Okay...I refuse to apologize for this chapter. I love what I did and if you kill me I can't post the next chapter. Now pardon my happy Jig as I have figured out how to make lines. Bow to my greatness.
Fanfiction eats the code I tried to post here to tell you how to get your lines too, so if you want to know, or even care. Just say so in your review and when I respond to it I'll add the directions at the bottom.
If your computer deletes the responses as spam I'll post the directions in...well I dunno my LJ I guess is the only place other than here. There's a link in my profile.
She woke slowly, her head ached and her whole body felt stiff. Her movements were sluggish, and when she at long last tried to move she found herself firmly held in place.
She twisted her head and found those green eyes she had become so addicted to watching her closely, inspecting her as though she were something entirely new. "Beetlejuice?" Her voice was a jagged whisper and even soft it made her head throb. The hand not still curled around her shoulders rose slowly and smoothed over her forehead, it was cool and she closed her eyes for a moment, enjoying the sensation.
Though the touch of cool did help her headache that was not what she was enjoying so much.
She was enjoying the gentleness of the touch he was bestowing on her. For a moment in time she could believe that he wasn't using her. In this moment he cared about her, at least a little, and he wanted to help her. That was more precious than relief from the pain. More precious than anything.
Her eyes fluttered open when the touch left and she inspected him carefully in the pale light of dawn. His skin had always been pale but now she could see that he wasn't just pale his skin was white and when the light hit it just right it glittered as though he had diamond-dust spread over him.
"You stayed with me." She whispered, startling him. Everything had been so quiet and still for so long, it was strange to hear her speaking. "You could have gone, escaped, probably and been miles away by now. But you stayed." She explained, and he could only blink at her.
When she had fallen asleep he had been ready to leave. She was drunk there was no way he would wake her. But he had stayed. He'd stayed with her all curled up against him, breathing slowly and being all warm even though she wasn't supposed to be. He'd sat here for hours watching her breathe and sigh and shift in her sleep.
And before the sun had risen he had come to the realization that he couldn't doom her to the Hell he suffered. He couldn't let that happen to her. She had broken her promise to him, that was true, but she was scared and he hadn't given her another choice. He knew she didn't understand the rules, he knew there were other ways she would try before coming to him, and he knew that most of them wouldn't work in the short amount of time she had to save the Maitlands.
He knew that she cared for them and would have done anything for them and he'd taken advantage of that, and in the years of suffering in the horrible prison of the watch he had latched onto his hate because it was the only thing he had. He had kept it up and planned what he would do if she ever let him out.
He wasn't used to caring in general what happened to the people and ghosts around him. He wasn't used to doing anything but blaming other people and getting what he wanted. But Lydia was different, she was the first person to care what had happened to him so long ago. She was the first person to call what he'd done sacrifice.
At the time he had just been doing his duty. He had only wanted power, that was why he had gone into the administration, and there too he had to listen to others tell him what to do. He hadn't had choices in his life and now in his death it seemed he didn't have choices either and that had been too much. So he had taken what power he could and escaped, and when you didn't care for the rules and repercussions you could achieve so much and he had been so powerful and then a little girl and her stupid friends had doomed him to something more terrible.
And he wanted nothing more than revenge. It kept him going when he wanted to give up.
He wanted to give up but he knew that he couldn't there was no way too give up, he was doomed for eternity in that dark place and the only way out was to let her suffer in his place and now he couldn't even do that.
Now she was awake and staring at him and wondering at why he hadn't left her when he had the chance.
He didn't think there was any way to tell her. He couldn't tell her that he cared about her, it was still tender and difficult to admit to himself; so new a feeling. "Thank you."
Before he thought he'd been startled by her small, soft voice, but now he was startled and confused. Why did she have to have this power over him. He didn't mind when she had the Watch, it wasn't his fault he obeyed her then, but when she whispered things like that in her smoky voice he hated the effect it had on him and there was nothing he could blame it on but the heart that wasn't supposed to have moved in six hundred years.
And even prior to his death women had been things, you didn't care about them. You took care of them or you used them, there was not this in-between where you wanted to help and you wanted to keep them by your side and you wanted to see them look up at you and smile like that every morning. That thought scared him most of all. Scared him more than Juno and Sandworms and whatever fresh Hell they could come up with after this one.
He tried to talk but only a rough grunt came out, mumbled into her hair as she tucked her head against his shoulder. He couldn't have thought of anything to say even if his tongue would work properly. "I know you could have killed my father that night on the stairs." She whispered after a long silence and she looked up at him through her lashes.
He was certain that if his heart was beating that it would have skipped a beat, or maybe stopped completely.
"But would it make me a terrible person if I liked you all the same?" It wasn't a direct confession of feelings that ran a lot deeper than "like" could possibly describe, but it was as good as one for the two people in the room.
Even a few hours ago he would have pushed the point. He would have had his freedom within seconds, but now everything had been turned end-over-end and he didn't know what to do. So he looked away and made another rough noise in his throat, shrugging his shoulders and trying to act like he didn't care.
"No one likes me Lydia. You've a life ahead of you. Don't waste it on me." If that was as close to a confession as she would make, that was as close to warning he would give. He was dangerous to care about for more than a few reasons and he was confused about what he felt for this living girl, but he wasn't going to let her suffer for him. Not any longer.
His life was about making himself happy and for whatever reason, the idea of her suffering made him unhappy.
"It wouldn't be a waste." She whispered, and he didn't dare look in her eyes, he was too frightened by what he may see there. He had a very good idea what he may see, and he could not face it.
"There's a lot you don't know about me Babes." He tried to move his arm, to escape from her inexplicable warmth, but she held him in place with a strength that really shouldn't have surprised him.
"I would like to know." She assured him, wondering why he wouldn't face her. The last time she had been with him he had been on the verge of jumping her, albeit for his own reasons and agendas but still, she could not comprehend what had changed.
Still, the rejection hurt.
"No you wouldn't." He whispered huskily.
"Look at me." He couldn't deny her even though he tried. He was still bound to that God-awful watch and he still had to obey her every command. He fought it, feeling the flickering fire of power struggling against the chains that forced him into action.
Her eyes were large and dark and even without a need for air he found himself drowning. Her tiny hands curled in his shirt and she lifted up onto her knees so they were nearly nose to nose. Scared of what might come next he arched his back, pulling his face as far from hers as he could manage. He could feel her heart hammering against his hollow chest and he gulped.
What was he supposed to do? He cared for the brat who'd screwed him over so long ago, he more than cared for her even if he wasn't about to admit it aloud. He was trying to do the right thing here and still it seemed the fates were conspiring to make him the villain.
"Beetlejuice."
If he didn't know what would happen he would have had her in that second. His name low and breathy on her lips made his chest clench painfully and for a moment there was a roaring in his ears and all he wanted was in this mortal who—compared to him—was just a child.
Memories of burning cold and dark and hate filled his mind and he could not damn her to that no matter how much he wanted her, craved her. He could not say when this switch occurred, he could not say if it really happened as he watched dawn play across her face or if it happened when she was a child, staring at him with a lost look and whispering that she wanted to be dead.
He had never understood that, never understood any of the people who committed suicide or prayed for death.
Slightly untrue, he could understand the sickly people, like Miss Argentina's supervisor. He had died of some horribly debilitating cancer and in the last few months not even a double dose of pain medication even dulled the agony he was in as his body died around him.
But Lydia hadn't been in physical pain, she hadn't even been in that severe of emotional pain like Anna who had lost her entire family in the Holocaust and had survived only barely after watching her baby son die in her arms.
Lydia had been a confused young child who had made friends who ghosts, ghosts who seemed to care for her almost better than her own parents. He could understand how she was confused but he still had trouble understanding why she would choose death over life. There were problems in the afterlife all the same, but the difference was there was no escape from those.
He had covered his confusion quickly enough, no use mocking what would help him. Sure he could bring her to the other side, sure he could help her find Barbara and Adam, she had to let him out though, if she did that he could do anything.
He was the Ghost with the Most, he could do whatever she dreamed of.
And somewhere along the way he lost all of his drive and purpose in the small features and deep eyes of a mortal little girl.
He looked away. He was going to suffer in that watch forever. His only way out had been with those eyes and that beating heart and he couldn't do it, he couldn't damn her no matter how she had ruined his afterlife, and continued to ruin his afterlife without even knowing it.
And everyone called him destructive.
"Beej."
His heart stuttered in his chest and he was certain for a moment that it may start again.
"Lydia," He gulped her name, trying to gain enough control over himself. This revelation only hurt him more, because if he cared for her this much he could never touch her, never have her. He was proud of himself for making a decision that benifieted someone else, he was in pain from her being so near, and he could feel her heartbeat echoing through his hollow chest. The next two words would have killed him.
"Kiss me."
She didn't even realize it was a command, she merely whispered it as she craned her neck upwards, her lips parted and her breath hot. And all Beetlejuice could think was that he was going to lose her to that horrid hell.
It's so awkward not talking to my reviewers down here, but really I do, I PM most of you just because you're all so fabulous I just end up wanting to say so much!
I try to respond to all of you but if I forget someone, as I am wont to do, please feel free to beat me with a shovel. Not too hard or you'll never learn what happens next!