Okay, I usually don't pimp, but this author demands pimping. Her name's Opal Lynn, and oh Jesus her Beetlejuice stories. They're hilarious, well thought out, and everyone's so in character it hurts. And she is seriously not getting enough pimpage. So spread it around.

"So how long has…this been goin' on?"

Lydia pulled his jacket a little tighter around herself, ducking her head at the brisk wind. "A week or two. More or less. I mean, it was going on before, but it wasn't…bad. "

She felt him tense, felt the arm draped round her shoulders briefly freeze, then he relaxed, returning to his brisk up and down rubbing of her arm. She shivered a little, for reasons entirely separate from the cold, and he pulled her (somewhat redundantly she thought, but then maybe he knew her better than she gave him credit for) more tightly against his side.

He let out a long breath that smelled of moldy soil and something between static and ozone. "…fuck."

"Yeah," she said morosely. "I know."

They both turned their heads to contemplate the grimy pile of cloth and person lying across from them. He was twitching at regular intervals, which Lydia took as a good sign. He was definitely unconscious as fuck, but that was better than dead, because Lydia wasn't really sure what she'd do if she ended up inadvertently killing someone. Of course, he probably wasn't going to be running any marathons, seeing as Beetlejuice had broken two or so limbs and the chances of him having a big ass dent in his skull were pretty fair, buuuuut….she wasn't going to be losing any sleep over it. That was just what you got when you tried to rape people.

She had convinced Beetlejuice to let her lay him out and check him over (as in, flip him onto his back and poke his stomach to see if he would spurt blood out his ears). It had taken a lot more convincing for her to get him to cover up Darrel with his shirt (she'd threatened to take off her own, and she must have looked really cold for Beetlejuice to stop her), because she was pretty sure she'd read somewhere that cold was bad for concussions.

Also the sight of Beetlejuice standing shirtless in the snow with nothing covering his little beer belly but his loose tie was hilarious.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked, and his voice was again drenched in anger and resentment. It was still hard for her to believe herself when she came to the conclusion that she'd hurt his feelings.

Because seriously. What?

Her lips barely moved when she answered. "It wasn't your problem." That was the way it had always been, the way she'd assumed it always would be – she was her own problem.

He apparently disagreed. "You're so goddamn stupid."

She cringed away from him despite herself, and wow she really needed to work on that, this caring enough to let other people fuck over her self-esteem business. He was so – so disruptive to her life.

He paused in his rubbing to drag her back to him, which was probably his version of apologetic behavior. He tucked the top of her head under his chin and rested there. "Lyds? Come on. You know I didn't mean that."

"It was still a dick move," she muttered.

"Oh yeah? How d'you figure that?"

"Look, I didn't have any reason to trust you," she snapped, still feeling stung. "So sorry I didn't pour my black little heart out."

He snorted, and she could feel the vibrations in his throat. It was simultaneously gross and sexy, in some weird roundabout way that really had no business being arousing in the first place. "You had plenty of reasons t' trust me."

"You threatened to kill me every time I so much as breathed the wrong way! Excuse me if I took that as receiving mixed signals, but you weren't doing much to help."

"I woulda thought my intentions were pretty clear after I started groping you," he said incredulously.

"No, when you mix groping with death threats it just makes me think you want to rape me, you ass."

"…I do want to rape you."

"I meant the bad way." And the unspoken Darrel's way that hung heavy in the air was enough to throw them both into silence.

Her rear end was starting to hurt from sitting on the ground, and her back was voicing similar protests about the tree she was resting against. Plus her ass was wet with melted snow; that was uncomfortable even when it wasn't twenty degrees outside. She shifted, and felt Beetlejuice's teeth click together when she jostled his jaw. "Sorry," she apologized quickly.

"'s okay."

"What do we…do with him?"

He looked at her sideways. "Dunno. You tell me."

"What do you mean, you tell – "

"Look," he interrupted. "I'm all for drowning Johnny over there like a puppy in a sack. I just figured you'd have a problem with that – "

"Yeah, I would – "

"So that leaves me blank," he finished. "You're supposed to be all smart and stuff, aren't you?"

"I don't suppose…we could just leave him at a hospital?" she asked gloomily. Yeah, that would work out fantastic. He'd probably scream her name bloody murder (he probably knew her middle one, too), and she'd get dragged in for questioning, and her parents would get suspicious, and Beetlejuice would be compromised…not to mention a rapist would be walking around free once they popped his knee back into place.

Beetlejuice snorted with laughter. "You're not even trying, are you?"

"Well excuse me for being distracted after sexual assault," she whipped out. And seeing the just-got-slapped-but-not-admitting-it tilt to his eyebrows she immediately regretted it. She scooted a little closer to him, swallowing at the utter awkwardness of the movement. "Sorry," she mumbled. "I just…weird."

"Yeah. Already said, 's okay."

She leaned a little into him, and his fingers twitched. It almost made her laugh; the idea that she made him nervous. She let out a long, tired, so tired breath. "…I'm going to take up kick-boxing."

"Oh. Yeah. That'll be fuckin' amazing, the four-foot terror."

"…you're horrible." She couldn't quite find it in her to get angry at him.

She got a flash of his pointy teeth. "Don't forget it."

They were silent for a little while longer.

"Police?" she suggested half-heartedly.

"What're you gonna say? You pulled some kung-fu shit on him?"

"…is it that unbelievable?"

She got a wheezy laugh in return, one that sounded very much like "Hehehehehehehehe – ow."

She cocked her fist threateningly when he started to open his mouth again. "I'll say I – pushed him off a building or something."

And then she'd have to explain why they were on top of a building in the first place, and why she'd pushed him, and why he probably had bits of tree bark in his skin, and why he was babbling about a crazy dude with crazy hair who made him fly through the air with a snap of his fingers – well. She might be able to pass that off with He's fucking crazy Officer, I swear, which was pretty believable, all things considering. Unless…

"Do you have fingerprints?"

He squinted at her. "…wut?"

Her head found itself dumped morosefully into her hands, and she groaned. This was so complicated. So stupidly, stupidly complicated, and was that Darrel's leg turning green?

"He's going to bleed to death," she moaned.

"Yeah, so?" She shot him a dirty look, because this was going in circles and fuck if it all wasn't so surreal, huddling in the snow with a dead man while contemplating the fate of a boy barely grown. Who had a kink for the word 'no', apparently.

She stared hard at the ground, where she could just barely make out a tiny animal track, white against white. It was amazing she hadn't scuffed it up. She curled her legs carefully around it.

She switched her gaze to the treetops, from which snow occasionally dropped down in wet clumps. She closed her eyes.

"I think I might be romantically interested in you. Just so you know."

His foot gave this spazzy little twitch, and suddenly he wasn't looking at her either. She swallowed thickly.

"…nah," he said finally. "That's the rape talking."

Her stomach jolted in her chest, and suddenly it was very very hard to get her eyes open. She paused a little at the sudden betrayal, curling in her chest like some kind of sharp-edged ribbon. For a brief second she considered just stalking off, because she didn't like that and the way it curled tighter when she tugged at it. But she didn't, because she knew him better than she liked to think she did, and there was something in what he'd said that she knew wasn't resentful, or immature, or just meant to hurt her out of retaliation.

She made him nervous.

So she straightened, feeling his arm go limp and drop away from her, and lifted her chin to stare him fully in the face. And it didn't really matter that she had no confidence whatsoever right now and the completely dispassionate, veiled look she was getting was doing all kinds of things to her nerves.

He kind of scared her. He scared her, but then he didn't, and she didn't know what to do about either situation. He was so much older than her, so foreign and sharp and confusing. And she was just her, and he was him, and none of this really made any fucking sense so what was the point in trying to figure it out?

"No," she said bluntly. "I'm pretty sure I am."

His lip twitched, and she could just picture the next thing that was going to come sliding out his mouth, slick and curled with acid. So she did the only logical thing she could think of, and cupped his broad face in her little hands and thrust her neck forward.

She missed, actually, and rammed their noses together, and if that wasn't humiliating enough he tried to jerk back and she had to hold him there, short nails digging into his skin. Her brain had exploded into a thousand tiny little sirens, all cringing with embarrassment. She ignored it, and the way her stomach was trying to curl in on itself and either choke her to death or just disappear, as best as she could.

She found his lips after some effort, because her eyes were closed again to ensure she didn't just die, and that was when he settled down, stopped moving and just stayed there and generally made her job a whole lot easier.

There really wouldn't be any general point in pretending she knew what the hell she was doing, so she just let herself be the awkward little girl she was, shyly brushing her lips sideways across his and back again, Eskimo touches with her breath swooshing out across his closed lips. She risked a peek at him from under her lashes and almost swallowed her own tongue when she found him staring down at her, eyes heavy and just watching her, utterly still.

"Come on," she mumbled at him, and now that her throat was working she found it was a lot easier to talk than to feel like a dirty pervert molesting someone twice her size, because he was doing this on purpose, wasn't he? And here he was accusing her of sending mixed signals, the smarmy bastard. "Come on you stupid crazy fat moldy old fart – "

"OH, if you say so."

She actually reeled back to stare at him, because one: what the fuck, and two: who the hell did he think he was sing-songing at her while she flailed in her own embarrassment he HAD been doing it on purpose the smarmy bastard.

And then he heaved her, quite happily, onto his lap like she weighed nothing and she was on his crotch and HE HAD A HARD ON what what what what – "

She let out this embarrassing squeak-squeal, and that was the last thing she got out of her mouth because it was suddenly covered by his.

And it was nothing like the way she'd kissed him, and it was nothing even like the way he'd kissed her in her bedroom, it was forceful and dominating and she couldn't keep up. His hands were fisting in her shirt and rubbing at her back and his jacket was sliding dangerously low on her shoulders and wait where the fuck was his mouth going – oh, on her neck, of course, what the fuck? Then he was back again, prying relentlessly at her lips with his tongue and oh, yeah, she remembered who kissed like this.

Her hands had flown up to his chest before she could even remember she had them, and then she was shoving at him and twisting her face around under the sudden suffocating pulse of her own panic, so strong choking her and she really hoped that wasn't her keening, really, she did. And she kind of liked it, maybe, but fuck fuck fuck, slow down –

And he stopped, and he leaned back against the tree, and he just looked at her.

And smirked a tiny bit.

She exploded.

"YOU DID THAT ON PURPOSE!"

"Yeah, and you were falling for it too – "

"I hate you!" she shrieked at him. She scrabbled off his lap and started to scoot, quite speedily, away from his general direction, and he just raised his eyebrows at her like she was doing something somewhat funny. Fucker. What, what the what? What.

"Lyyydiaaa…"

"You sick old pedophile fuck – "

"Oh COME ON, we're back to that?"

"We're back to – FUCK YOU, don't you dare touch me."

She automatically threw her arms out in front of her as a shield, and something came very close to clicking into perspective. Almost. Or maybe it was the way his face was suddenly void of all humor, because a serious Beetlejuice meant this was serious shit and he might have a point maybe.

"Get it?" he asked, none too gently, but then again none to I'M-GOING-TO-ROUGHLY-MOLEST-YOU either.

"Get what?" she half-mewled. She was going to go insane. She really was. Her mind was too open and impressionable and she was undoubtedly going to end up as a lonely old cat lady who wore stripes all the time and killed snakes with her walker, because of him.

And there he was again with his serious face and his serious mood. "That's what it's gonna be like."

"That's what what?" She was probably missing something obvious here, but, but. How was she supposed to think straight, really? "Stop – stop attacking me."

"Then stop trying to jump my bones. I'm not some kind of fucking superhero," he told her easily, and, and –

Oh – ohhh. She got it.

But still –

"I didn't say I wanted to do it doggy style on the ceiling, you freak, I just stop laughing at me."

"No no no no no no, you make it too easy."

She ended up throwing her shoe at him as hard as she could, a brave decision considering she was about a second away from frostbite. It filled her with deep, deep satisfaction when it clonked him full on in the head.

"OW."

"You. You're a jerk."

He held his hands up defensively, face twisting with disbelief. "Look, I'm no therapist, but I'd say the last thing you need right now is my tongue up your – "

Her other shoe somehow found its way to its fallen comrade.

And that left her standing barefoot in ankle-deep snow, dammit. She really needed to think these things out.

In the midst of her supreme smugness she comprehended what he'd just said, and that gave her pause.

…oh. Guess he did care about her.

Huh.

…and meanwhile, Darrel bled patiently on the ground.

She blew out an exasperated breath. "Okay, our relationship aside – "

"I should tell you now that I'm allergic to commitment talks. I mean, I like you an' everything babes, but – "

"—what are we going to do with him? Seriously."

"Yes, do tell."

And the atmosphere cracked in half, and Beetlejuice bit his tongue between his teeth, and Lydia cringed like a chastised child.

Juno stared at them coldly, tobacco smoke curling in twin trails from her nostrils.

"She's been gone a long time."

Adam glanced at his wife where she resided in Lydia's window seat, legs crossed neatly and chest angled to the frosted glass. She had been staring out it for a little over an hour; she had paced for twenty minutes before that. He would have comforted her, but Barbara was the kind of woman that just became increasingly more antisocial and antitouch the higher her stress was. Adam was laid back; he wasn't insane.

So instead he shrugged a little. "It's a long ride.

Then the air abruptly burst into a million colored facets and they popped out of existence in a twist of kaleidoscope shapes and the smell of chlorine.

They came back in a tiny clearing blanketed in snow a little ways from the road, pretty and picturesque and looking like a train had exploded in it.

Adam stumbled, caught himself, and automatically held out an arm to catch Barbara. He felt a little shaken, sick; teleportation had never really agreed with him. It had something to do with dimensions twisting, he knew, but he'd never bothered to learn the specifics. He straightened a little clumsily, glancing around.

He perceived three things with quick succession.

1) There was blood on the ground, and Lydia was bleeding.

2) Juno stood plain as day across from her, the flap in her neck fluttering slightly with the volume of her enraged breath.

3) Beetlejuice was there.

…okay, he said he'd have an open mind, but no. Just no.

Barbara was three steps ahead of him.

Quite literally; she was stalking over to Beetlejuice with the clear intention to rip his spleen out through his bellybutton. Adam forgot for a moment that this man could probably brain him with his tongue and started to join her.

"Stop it," Juno snapped, almost offhandedly. She was standing with her arms crossed, crimson-tipped fingers clutching her long filtered cigarette with almost manic strength. Barbara's head snapped around towards her, mouth twisting, and Adam quickly stepped forward to restrain her before they ended up being exorcised.

And then he tripped over something, and he glanced down and his stomach nearly dropped the hell out of his body, because he'd just stepped on a young boy who looked barely Lydia's age, and some of his bones were saying hello.

He looked up, and it took his second glance at Lydia to take in the stripey jacket she was clutching around her shoulders, and that her hair was a disheveled mess, and that she and Beetlejuice were standing extremely close.

His daddy senses were tingling.

"What's going on?" Barbara demanded, head swiveling back and forth like a pendulum. "Lydia, what's going on?"

His wifey senses were tingling too, so he stepped up behind her and brushed her shoulder. She glanced at him, eyes big and hard and scared, and then tunneled back onto Juno. "You know what's going on."

"Don't start with me," Juno warned, taking a hard suck of her cigarette. "I swear you people attract legal screwups like flies."

Lydia shifted a little nervously, tiny frame dwarfed in Beetlejuice's jacket. Her teeth were chattering, lips tinted blue.

"Okay, wait," Adam started, eyeing her out of the corner of his eye. "Can we move this someplace warmer?"

Juno glared at him for the sheer audacity of directly addressing her. "Usually I'd decline just to see you squirm, but we do need someplace more private." She threw a contemptuous glance at Lydia. "Not that a group of adults and two mangled children in the woods is suspicious."

"Um," Lydia started. "My room's pretty…"

Juno snapped her fingers before the words were halfway out her mouth.

When his body was done twisting itself in half Adam found himself on Lydia's carpet, ass over head. A quick headcount assured him that everyone was accounted for. He quickly sat up, absently snapping his ankle back into place.

The boy had been dumped unceremoniously into Lydia's desk chair, neck lolling limply over the back. Barbara was picking herself up from the ground beside him, shooting venom across to the room to Juno with her eyes. Lydia looked around at them all silently for a moment, legs bloody and shirt torn and generally just looking exhausted, then shrugged and headed over to her bed. She burrowed underneath her bedspread and wrapped it around herself, leaving her head free to peek out at the world. Adam tried very, very hard not to notice that Beetlejuice floated after her, hovering lazily by her elbow.

"…put a shirt on," Barbara said finally.

Beetlejuice looked at her, a slimy grin already unfurling. "Now why would I deprive a lovely gal like you of such a fine display of pure, unadulterated man?"

Lydia elbowed the underside of his thigh.

…shit.

"Everyone shut up," Juno commanded, rubbing at her eyes. When she was done she fixed her molten gaze on Lydia. "You."

"We should really do something about Darrel," she said, appearing utterly unfazed. "Just saying."

Juno glanced at him, tongue hanging limply from the side of his mouth and supplying a solid line of drool down his chin.

"He's fine," she said dismissively, waving a hand in his direction. "I've temporarily stopped time for his body. You, on the other hand. What is wrong with you, you silly girl?"

Lydia blinked. "Well, there's a good chance I have tourettes."

Adam stared at her in bewilderment as Beetlejuice guffawed. The girl he knew would never purposefully backtalk someone with so much apparent power.

"Can someone make him put a shirt on?" Barbara demanded frustratedly. Lydia and Beetlejuice's proximity seemed too distracting for her to handle.

"Hey, if you're tryin' to tell me something – "

"Shut up," Lydia and Juno snapped in perfect synchronization.

Adam closed his eyes, and wondered why he still got headaches even though he was dead. Surely dead people weren't supposed to get headaches.

"Who's this kid?" he asked, pointing at…Darien, whatever his name was.

"Darrel," Lydia said offhandedly, examining one scraped ankle with interest.

"It doesn't matter who he is!" Juno bellowed. "Do any of you realize the repercussions of this?"

"We don't know what 'this' is!" Barbara shrieked back. She was so pretty when she went all rabid. "I want an explanation, now!"

Juno ignored her entirely. "So much paperwork, you stupid asshole, there are legal. Ways. To watch after mortals, you can't just decide to step in every time one of them gets raped – "

"What?"

"We have contracts, you moron, and why the hell are you even out in the first place?"

"No, WHAT?"

"Hey, if anyone's interested, Lyds is bleeding an' shit," Beetlejuice yawned, peering at his filthy fingernails.

"What was that about rape?"

"Mrs. Maitland, stop screaming, or I'll put you on probation."

"Why is Lydia bleeding?" Adam asked blankly.

Beetlejuice looked lazily up at him, green eyes level and gleaming, then tilted his head in Darrel's direction. "Ask Sunshine over there."

Juno threw up her arms as Adam opened his mouth, clearly incensed. "I don't have time for this," she snarled and, before anyone could move, snagged the cuff of Beetlejuice's pants.

There was a crack, and a hissed whirlwind of spitted curses via the captured, and then the air-pressure suddenly skyrocketed and Adam automatically dropped onto his knees, one hand reaching blindly for Barbara as his eyes were involuntarily forced shut.

And then suddenly it lifted, and everyone lifted their heads cautiously, and it couldn't have been more apparent that Juno had left and taken Beetlejuice with her.