A/N: "My Immortal" is copyright Evanescence. BJ belongs to Tim Burton. This story works better if you listen to the track on loop while reading.

I'm so tired of being here.
Suppressed by all my childhood fears.
And if you have to leave,
I wish that you would just leave.
Cause your presence still lingers here,
and it won't leave me alone.
These wounds won't seem to heal,
this pain is just too real,
there's just too much that time cannot erase…

He stood for a moment; not able to believe his dreams could exist in his world. Was this girl…real? Was there actually some poor girl lying in his doorway, her black hair sprayed out over the dirty floor and her pale face laying against the dusty floorboards, unconscious and weak?

Something in him screamed to be let out. It told him to ignore her, to let the feeling of familiarity pass. She was just some lost Neitherworldian; some poor lost soul that if left alone would wander out again and leave the Roadhouse.

Beetlejuice shook his head and dropped the broom. He walked over and prodded the ghost with his toe to see if she was awake. When she didn't respond, he looked around to see if anyone was with her. Nothing.

He bent down and picker her up, surprised at her lightness. Why, she was just a spirit! Not a real ghost at all, with any kind of substance. It was a stroke of luck that he could even touch her, however lightly.

Poor soul, he thought. Only Purgatory takes spirits. This kid's doomed for a long time.

When you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears,
When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears.
I held your hand through all of these years.
But you still have...
All of me…

He shook his head and carried her to a spare room. He lay her down on the rusty bed and lumpy mattress and turned away, stopping at the door to check her one last time. He'd have to call the authorities; Purgatory spirits weren't allowed in the Neitherworld. They had to be delivered to their proper afterlife.

He had barely taken half a step when he heard a sound. Beetlejuice quickly turned back and looked to the bed. She had coughed! So she wasn't completely dead to the world…

He stepped back into the room and edged a bit closer to the bed. From the very air around him, he heard a soft, sweet voice murmuring.

Remember…I have to remember…but remember what? Why does it matter any more? No more…only black…and white? Why those colors? Why…

He shook his head. Was it his voice he heard? It couldn't have been his; the voice that spoke to him only late at night in a smooth masculine voice that urged him to fall asleep and forget. This voice was clear and shimmered like water in a pond. It almost wasn't there at all.

Is it hers? Can spirits speak? He asked himself. He drifted closer, moving inch by inch towards the bed. He watched her eyebrows come together as if she were in great pain...

Well think about it! She's covered in cuts and bruises! No duh she's in pain! Beetlejuice berated his thoughts.

You used to captivate me by your resonating mind,
Now I'm bound by the life you left behind.
Your face it haunts my once pleasant dreams
Your voice has chased away all the sanity in me.
These wounds won't seem to heal,
this pain is just too real,
there's just too much that time cannot erase…

"Hello?" he ventured.

Slowly, her eyes opened. The irises and pupils were the same shade of gray, looking mistily at the ceiling. He leaned over, trying to see if she could focus on him. He waved a hand over her face. "Are you awake?"

She didn't move her lips but to slightly open them. He thought he felt a cool draft of air over his open palm; probably her breath.

Where am I? She thought into the air. Her voice sounded like wind chimes sounding in the air, but Beetlejuice heard it and understood it.

"Um, you're in the my Roadhouse. The Neitherworld," he returned, unsure.

What is that?

"Don't you remember? You must have passed through here when you…died."

I can't remember anything. Except…black. And a little bit of white. One after the other for some time…then just black. Why do I remember only this?

"It might have been the last thing you saw when you died."

No. Before the black, but after the red liquid. After the pain. Why?

"I don't know. I hate to do this, but I have to call someone to come take you to the Gateway. You're just a spirit; you have to go…there."

Where?

He paused, almost afraid to say it. "Purgatory."

But I…have been there. I am no longer there. Why not?

"You've…already been there? But…you're saying…all these wounds are from…you got out?"

Got out?

"You escaped from Purgatory? NO one gets out of Purgatory! How in Hell did you do it? Both meanings intended!"

I escaped. I fought for forever and eternity. But I…got…out.

"How?"

I…remembered something. My only memory. And now, all I have of it is this black and white. What of the black and white? What here is black and white?

Beetlejuice thought hard. What in the Neitherworld was she talking about? Black and white…jeez, the only thing he could think of was…a Neitherworldian moonset, or Saturn at night, or that ugly old suit he threw out decades ago. But that was ages past, and she was so young. Surely she couldn't have known him for that suit.

"There's not much here that's just black and white. You mentioned red?" he asked.

No, the black and white had no red. But…what is this color I see? Grass…jade…oh, what is this color?

"Green?"

Yes! Green! Some of this green. Two circles of green, around black that glimmers like ink.

Now she was getting poetical. Beetlejuice shook his head. He had to call; they'd come barging in and charge him with harboring a spirit if he didn't, and he'd get it a hundred times over if she really did escape from Purgatory! He tore himself from her side and went to the door.

"I'll be back in a minute to get you cleaned up for the trip back. If I were you, I wouldn't admit I escaped. It wouldn't go over well, and they might put you somewhere a lot worse," he offered, shuddering at the thought of dark alternatives to Purgatory.

Beetlejuice left the room, going to the kitchen to pick up the receiver of his phone and dial the main office. After informing them of the rouge spirit, he gave his address and hung up.

He grabbed a moist cloth from the sink, one that hadn't been entirely eaten away by bacteria, and proceeded back to the spare room where she rested.

He drew up a chair and tried to wipe off some of the silver-like blood that lay congealed all over her forehead and cheeks and arms. If he didn't rub as softly as he was able to, his hand would drift through her being and hit the shaggy pillow beneath. It required patience; more patience than he could bear for too long.

Finally, left with nothing more that the faintest lines of a cut on her upper left cheek, a slight bruise on her forehead, and infinite small gashes and scratches on her arms that just couldn't be hidden, he placed the cloth on the floor and sighed. She now at least just looked almost like a mortal recently dead.

"So…what's your name?" he asked, hoping she was sleeping. The phrase got out before he could stop it. Why did he want to know her name? She was going away forever. He'd never really get to know her. He didn't need the guilt that was welling up inside him. Not now; not when he was so close to forgetting her image.

She hesitated, then slightly opened her closed eyes.

I can't remember.

"Oh. Well…it happens to the best of us."

No. No it doesn't. You do not forget your name. What is it, so that I may at least have a memory of the kind soul that helped me when I go back into the nothingness?

He said the taboo with an air of a man who was just so tired, he could himself slip into nothingness easily. He knew he shouldn't tell her; he'd get reamed out later; but she was just so weak, and so pitiful…

"Beetlejuice."

When you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears,
When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears.
I held your hand through all of these years.
But you still have...
All of me…

Suddenly her eyes snapped wide open. She tried to rise from the bed and attempted to turn her head, her entire face in an expression of pure emotion.

Before Beetlejuice could react to her spasm, a team of the Neitherworld Police barged into the room and clapped the spirit's wrists in pink energy bonds. They secured her ankles as well and had her halfway out of the room before he could speak.

But she beat him to it. Her mouth moved this time to the words and spoke in a voice he had long since forgotten.

I tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone.
But though you're still with me,
I've been alone all along…

"Beetlejuice!" she screamed, struggling to reach him in the iron grip of the swat team. But he couldn't move.

"Beetlejuice!" She writhed and twisted in their hands as they tried to get her out of the house. But they were already gone from the room, leaving the ghost standing there, trying to understand.

He felt a twinge of feeling in his gut as he heard her final screams before they got her out of earshot.

Beetlejuice…


When you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears,
When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears.
I held your hand through all of these years.
But you still have...
All of me…