Okay I lied, you'll find out what happened with Barbara and Adam on their end of things in the NEXT chapter after this one. Sorry but I liked this one just the way it was, even if it's short and not completely what I promised you. But I really, really like it, and I hope you do it.
And I don't own anything.
She landed hard on the ground, which shifted away under her and when her eyes snapped open she found herself surrounded by acres and acres of yellow sand. In the distance there were twisted red-rock mountains and a large planet with a ring just barely visible in the harsh light.
She knew this place.
She knew this place and she knew how dangerous it was. She couldn't figure out how she had come to be here and she didn't know the first thing about getting home.
This was the place that Adam and Barbara had told her about one night over popcorn. Saturn, they said, which was where Ghosts went when they tried to leave the house they were tied to for their time on Earth. Barbara and Adam had both come here when they had stumbled out one of the doors of the house, but they had just gone back in the door.
Lydia didn't know how she had come to be here, Adam and Barbara were doing everything, they were saving her from that---
The sound that came from far behind her was like nothing she had ever heard in all her life. Words could not capture it, could not capture the sheer terror that flooded through her veins. She froze, too scared to think, to terrified to even breathe. Her hands bunched in the pants she still wore and she realized that her whole body was shaking uncontrollably.
Again.
It was getting closer.
Oh!
She turned, very slowly, as though moving slowly would offer her protection even when she was out in the middle of nowhere like this. In the far distance she could see a hulking shadow drawing closer to her by great leaps and bounds. It would rise high into the air and then plummet back to the ground, vanishing, only to resurface again.
As it drew closer she could feel the shock waves sent through the ground with its every movement. Her mouth dropped open, as though she would scream, but no sound came out other than a strangled gasp as she tried with every ounce of her being to start breathing again.
She had been so certain that nothing was worse than that monster that had tortured and tormented her family.
She had been so absolutely certain that no fate was more terrible than having to be married to him for even a second longer, he who was dead and cold and powerful and twisted and cruel. And now she stood here in the middle of a strange land, wind whipping sand against her skin, and she prayed for him.
The creature was close enough that when it lifted out of the ground she could see it was covered in stripes, purple and pale lavender, and all her frazzled mind could draw together enough to think was: "How does 'til death do we part work when you're married to a man who has been dead for hundreds of years."
A tear, cold and soothing in this harsh landscape landed on the back of her hand and seemed to startle her from her shock-induced reverie. She spun on her heel and ran, her feet pounding into the sand and slipping out from under her at every last turn. Her chest was on fire and the sand was blowing into her eyes with such force that she could barely see anything at all, just a blur of blue and yellow and red.
And all she could think was Oh God! I'm going to die! I'm going to die! ImgonnadieImgonnadieImgonnadie!
She crested a dune, and the sand shifted just right and the wind blew just right and the creature hit the ground at just the right time and she slipped and tumbled down the impossibly steep hill, sand scraping her soft flesh and the air being fully and completely driven out of her lungs and she thought she couldn't be any more scared than she was already.
Then it struck her, just as she slid to a stop, the creature she hadn't a name for looming at her from the top of the hill she had just rolled down. If she could draw but one more breath into her battered body, she could call for Him.
Because in that moment little Lydia Deetze, called 'pumpkin' by her father still, grew up. She realized that there were things far more terrifying than that dead man. She realized that there was kindness in him for all the terrible things he had done to her and all the misery he had caused. He had saved the Maitlands when she asked. He had kept his promise, he hadn't even hurt anyone too badly. He had stolen her away from her family but she had agreed to that, she had promised she would in exchange for the Maitlands.
He had helped her get over whatever that illness was that struck her when she first came to his horrid little shack of a house. He had given her new clothes, and promised not to hurt her, and fed her. All he wanted was for her to stop shouting and stop crying.
He had even given her a small little room of her own, with a little bed and a tiny window—even if it didn't look anywhere. He had left her alone when she most wanted to be alone and all he asked was for her to be married to him so he could cross-over at will.
And even when the Maitlands had freed him he hadn't hurt anyone. Seriously. Her father was fine if not terrified, but he was always terrified. He hadn't hurt Delia, he'd inspired her—though that was a bit painful for Lydia but that was hardly the point of anything.
The beast crashed down the hill, it's long body twisting and thrashing and reminding her of the one time she had seen a snake eat a mouse. She was too scared to give in to her stomach's desire to empty its contents. It screamed and screeched and thrashed and ohgodohgod!
Her last thought was that he wasn't really so bad, her husband the ghost. When he smiled he even could be called...certainly not handsome but he could look kind in some of his softer moments. And he had fed her, not only fed her but what she had asked for too, he wasn't so bad and there were monsters so much worse out here in the big bad world and oh if only she had realized this just a few hours sooner.
She finally grew up, and she was going to die.
Death would have been pleasant compared to the pain that tore through her whole body. The snake-monster was as much at the mercy of the shifting sands as she was, it couldn't stop in time and the twisting jumble of muscles and scales tumbled right over her, knocking her back to the ground and crushing her.
She could almost hear her bones creaking and groaning but she was screaming too loud and she could hear the thudding and the scuffling as she and the monster rolled over and over and over again. The tip of it's tail whipped across her face and she felt a completely different kind of pain.
Sharp and burning and painful and she was wailing so loud she couldn't even catch her breath long enough to scream for help.
Betelgeuse.
She thought, screwing her eyes shut and trying to curl herself up into a small little ball, trying to protect herself with the most primal instincts she had.
Betelgeuse I'm sorry. I'm sorry, please help. I won't run away again. Please help.
Please.
Betegeuse?
But he didn't come. She couldn't utter the words aloud for all her pain and she couldn't even hardly draw breath anymore and he would never, ever come, even if he could hear her. She was a terrible person. He had promised and she had promised and when the time came to pay up she had refused and still he had tried to be kind to her, tried to make her feel at home, tried to protect her.
She couldn't blame him. She wouldn't come help her.
Hysterical she thought she could put in a good word with Juno when she crossed over because she was going to die.
Eighteen and she was going to die and she probably deserved it. He had tried in his own way. He had made no pretenses and he had tried!
As the snake stopped rolling and reared back, fangs as long as she was tall dripping in excitement, she was graced with one final image. The sight of him, reaching out to her, his face looking small and scared and helpless. 'No, don't.' He had tried to help her even then. All green eyes and fear and kindness beneath the dirt and she heard her final words to him echoing in her head like some eternal punishment, spiritual pain to match the pain her body was in still. 'I hate you so much you horrible monster!'
"I'm sorry, Betelgeuse." She managed, her eyes sliding shut, waiting for death to come and wondering who would tell her parents she was dead. Would they let her haunt their house? Would they tell her what had happened to her? That she had turned her back on someone so kind and so helpful if not coarse and gross.
Her family would mourn her, Barbara and Adam included—what would they tell Aunt Ester and Grandma?--but would he? Would Betelgeuse mourn her when she was gone?
Why did she care?
The air she managed to draw into her lungs was driven out once more as something struck her hard in the chest and drove her backwards so fast the wind screamed in her ears.
Please don't hurt me.