Disclaimer: Beetlejuice and Co belong to Geffen. Alas that he did not choose to make further use of them.
Chapter 5: Bedtime Story
Lydia emerged from the bathroom feeling very slightly better, having taken a hot shower to wash away the rest of the ickyness that still clung to her with the cigarette smoke and the miasma of alcohol and vomit that was the oh-so-charming bouquet of the 'party.' She meandered to the mirror to brush the tangles out of her hair, when a hand on her arm surprised her. She turned to see Beetlejuice sitting on her bed, waving her comb, ten feet away.
"C'mere, babe. If I wait for you to do that, you'll be asleep before I even start." Ever aware that she was being not-so-subtly manipulated, still, she would never turn down the offer for someone else to brush out her hair. He must have known it too, the bastard. She paced dutifully over to the bed and climbed on top of the covers, presenting her back to him. He pulled her back slightly by her hips until her tailbone was pressed against his knee, and hesitantly lifted the comb, pondering where to start.
"You have done this before?" Her voice was wary.
"Um. Well, I've watched you a… few times." He grimaced, realizing he had been about to say the word 'hundred.' She reached back and took his cold hand in her warm one, moving it down toward the bottom of her hair.
"Start low. And be gentle. Don't tug. Please." She added that last as an afterthought. He wondered what he had just signed on to do—it sounded complicated. He took a strand of her hair between his fingers and just… just savored the silkiness of it. How many times had he watched her do this? A hundred had to be an understatement. And to be here now, doing this, was a little overwhelming. He tucked the comb in and pulled gently down, and to his relief, he didn't hit any snags. "I won't break," came her sleepy voice. "You can tug a little." And she snuggled back into him, relaxing at last.
He grew slightly bolder, and instantly hit a big tangle, so he sighed and got to working on it as he began his story. "I can't really tell you who I was before I died, like my name or anythin', because then you'd be, you know, tracking down my estate and diggin' up my lawn for buried treasure, and shit like that. But I was alive during the Black Plague, if that'll fix the date for you."
"Mid 14th century" Lydia mumbled drowsily.
"Round there, yep."
"So you didn't attend Julliard?"
"I did, just not as a—hey! Whose story is this?" She waved a limp wrist at him to continue, but he could feel her shoulders shaking with a giggle or two. He shook his head, and bent to a particularly difficult snarl. "Anyhoo, I actually lived through the Black Death, right up until the very end. We were all waiting for the winter, ya see, and knew that the cold would bring relief. But somehow I got… I was… oh, dammit, I wasn't going to tell you about this part. Forget it." She turned to look at him, a glimmer in her eye, and he twisted his lip at her. "Fine. I was out on the moor and fell into a bog. Happy? I'm probably still there. Bogs keep everything."
"That would be really strange if you were still there." Her voice was so soft. Her dark hair was pretty much combed through. She leaned heavily against him, and he shifted slightly so that her head dropped comfortably against his thigh, but he still continued to stroke her hair, comb forgotten. "It took me a while to figure out what I was doing. There were hundreds of us out there, all lost our way in the gloom. Lots of… well, it was an easy burial ground too, if you take my meaning, so we all just sort of milled around for 125 years, watching the frickin' grass grow and playing cards with a deck this fellow had that was missing the jack of hearts…" He trailed off. Her breathing was heavy and even. She wasn't listening to him anymore. And she hadn't put him back.