Green light flashed on and off, creating an ominous aura tat emanated from room to room. The air seemed saturated with a stuffy dead stench, however, it was a warm saturation in which filled the pits of an empty soul's chest. Everyone was in the same dilemma, feeling the same feeling of 'help'. The bodies sat next to each other compactly, as if they were still in coffins, their putrid pop comic colored skin rubbed irritatingly against its neighbors, and their feet sat side by side on the turquoise floor as papers scattered in from the other room collected around these silently nonmoving appendages- but again, they were all there, feeling the same feeling; they were used to this familiar hardship of waiting.
There was one body however, a mentally different body, in which was restless. His feet tapped and kicked at the annoying accumulation of papers on the ground, and his yellowed eyes glanced around anxiously at the others.
One billion trillion forty nine million.
The sign above their heads read the red glowing numbers. The restless body of a soul looked down upon the foot long scrolled ticket in his stark pale, yet sickly yellow tinged hands. He was next, he was next! The ghoul grinned to his relieved amusement and suddenly the sign changed its glowing red numbers to: one billion trillion fifty million.
"One billion fifty million! …a mister Beetlejuice!" announced the pungently blue skinned receptionist, sliding her dividing shade to the side.
The restless ghoul jumped out of this sunken sofa chair (having been sandwiched between a man with a shrunken head, and a man with an arrow through his throat and chest) excitedly, holding up his scroll pf a ticket high in the air like it was a trophy. "HA! Suckers!" he grinned, waving the slip around in their faces, "I'm next! Suck on that!"
Dusting off his tattered burgundy suit, the ghoul marched out of the waiting rom and straight through the operating room of workers typing on rows upon rows of desks, passing right by the flattened ran over man- who usually guided the lost souls- that was hanging from the ceiling; he knew exactly where he was going.
"Sit down."
An old woman commanded once the ghoul strode on into her dimmed office. He actually did as he was told, and grinned a mischievous grin at her. "Now what the hell do you want?" she asked, taking a slow puff from her cigarette; the smoke poured out of the slit in her throat.
"Well ya know," he replied, shrugging nonchalantly, "wanted to get my shit together. Just got eaten by a sandworm…you know they went up thirteen percent since last year?"
"I've heard." The woman said emotionlessly.
She was Juno, his caseworker. However, the two of them shared a history unlike any other of the 'help' yearning bodies waiting in the other room: he was once her case working assistant.
"Beetlejuice," she went on, slipping out his name that was uncommonly mentioned because of the three time jinx. "If you want to get your shit together then I suggest you finally try to take my advice." Juno jabbed her cigarette in his direction. Beetlejuice stared blankly at her.
She rolled her eyes but continued, "You almost killed the Deetz. And, you almost married their daughter! You have been way off your rocker, Beetlejuice. You have a bad reputation. And no one likes that. That's why you never have any customers! Try helping for once, and forget about 'what's in it for you'."
In response, Beetlejuice placed a hand to his chest in an offended manor, with a flaunted gasp. "That's just the way I roll, Junes baby! You're asking me to stop being me!" he paused then said with a sly smirk, "yeah that Deetz girl was smokin' hot by the way."
Juno looked at him with disgust as he simply smiled a yellow toothy smile in return.
"But that's not you." She replied, "You weren't this bat-shit crazy when I first employed you. What happened to you?"
The room suddenly became thick with seriousness, and Beetlejuice was strangely quiet for once. The silence wasn't awkward, but it was long. However, the ghoul shook his head and smiled again, snapping his slender fingers to appear back in his usual black and white striped suit, replacing his red battered tux. "Well, that's who I am now!"
"Alright, listen, if you ever want to turn things around, here's my direct contact number." Juno handed him a small slip of paper and he took it, shoving it into his pocket before getting up and leaned over the desk to place a huge smooch on the old woman's forehead. "Thanks a whole lot Junes, ya old bitch." He winked at her before disappearing into thin air, leaving the image of his troublemaker grin stained before her eyes.
