Author's Note: Thank you to all that have read it so far, and a special thanks to my first ever reviewer Zim's-Best-Friend. :D I hope that the rest of the story is to your liking. If not, I'm open to constructive criticism and suggestions. This next chapter was not at all what I expected, the story pretty much slapped me in the face and said "Sit back woman, you might learn something." It's definitely not as dark as I wanted it to be and I'm a teensy bit self-conscious about it, but it was fun and that's what really matters! (: Hope you enjoy.

Chapter Two: Changes

Lydia walked down the familiar road to her home, bouncing a yo-yo up and down, Beetlejuice walking by her side with the usual smirk on his face. She sighed heavily, and he looked at her in concern. "I miss the Maitlands," she said in answer to the unspoken query on his face.

"They should be back soon, Lyds. They've been gone, what, 4 or 5 years now? I mean, they just went to go see Juno, right? Really long lines and all, it can't take that much longer." Satisfied with the answer, she slipped her arm around his and continued down the path to her house. She inhaled the scent of trees as the wind caressed her hair like a soft spider web. It was such a perfect fall day.

They arrived at her home, and he went invisible. Lydia stopped in her tracks. Something just wasn't right…. Something seemed…. Off.

"Ya comin', Lyds?"

She stumbled forward warily.

In the house, she was almost tackled to the floor.

"Lydia! Oh, Lydia how you've grown! We've missed you soooo much! Oh Adam, come see how tall our Lydia is."

"Barbara?" Lydia gasped in disbelief and grasped onto the older woman, breathing in the linen scent of her curly hair and flowered dress. Tears leaked out of her eyes. "Barbara don't ever leave again I've missed you so much…," She croaked quickly and tearfully.

Beetlejuice was watching in comic jealousy as Adam, too, walked over and grabbed her into a gripping hug. "And Adam, too! I've missed you guys! You have no idea; I have so much to tell you about!" They both sat back and grinned at her sheepishly.

Then, reality changed, and everything took an unnatural shift into shadows. "Beej? What's going on?" Lydia stepped back, but nobody else had moved. They all just stood there, smiling shyly, frozen like manikins.

Now panicking, Lydia turned and began to run through the house. "MOM! DAD!" Turning a corner, she skidded to a halt and came face to palm with a giant hand. Gasping so hard that she could barely move, Lydia backed into a wall.

It wasn't that the hand itself was dark; it just seemed as though it were made of a solid wall of shadow. Dangling from its pinkie by ropes were her parents. Lydia barely could scream from the tightness of her throat. Blinded by her tears, she ran back in the hallway towards the front door.

"Barb, Adam, Beej! Come ON!" She tugged at them with all of her strength, but to no avail. They simply stood, eyes empty as dolls, with those sickeningly sweet smiles on their faces.

"Please, please, God help me! Help me!" Lydia ran to the door as the hand, slowly and calmly, scooped up Adam and Barbara, another string appearing to dangle them from its thumb. The hand turned towards Beetlejuice.

"NO!" Lydia felt adrenaline course through her veins as she ran towards her best friend. She latched her body around him like a spider monkey. "You're not taking him! You can't have him!"

The hand moved towards her. Slowly. Calmly. The bodies of her loved ones dangled, the smiles still etched lifelessly on their faces.

The hand reached her and its index finger began to tug at Beetlejuice. She grasped on tighter. "No…. No…." she whimpered weakly, feeling innumerous bodies bouncing off of an innumerous number of dangling strings…. "No…. No….."

Ever since he had brought Lydia home earlier that night, and she had fallen asleep, Beetlejuice had been reclining mid-air next to her bed, planning what he was going to do later the next day. It was, after all, a very important day. Or at least it was important to Lydia, which in turn, made it important to him as well. He never would understand the grasp that the damn little breather had on his priorities. Lost in thought, the poltergeist almost missed the whimpering noises coming from the girl's bed.

"She must be havin' a nightmare again…. Huh. This really isn't like her." He floated onto her bed and rested his hand on her shoulder. What he really wanted to do was wake her, but the poor girl (correction: woman) really needed her sleep. She had a big day ahead of her, if all went according to plan. So instead, he tried a different approach. "Shh. Come on, babes. It's just a dream. I'm right here babes; I won't let anythin' hurt ya. Promise."

Her grip on Beetlejuice was failing; the bodies all around her making her wanna gag and give up. Then, out of nowhere, Lydia felt a gentle pressure on her shoulder. The blackness of the dream, along with the monstrous hand, began to fold unto itself, until it faded away into a different black—the black of night time in the Neitherworld. Her surroundings abruptly changed. 'I'm on the outskirts of the Neitherwoods,' she thought to herself. The pressure was still on her shoulder, and she fearfully turned her body to confront what would certainly be another dangling, smiling body. Nothing happened. She slowly opened her eyes.

"Shh. Come on, babes. It's just a dream. I'm right here babes, I wont let anythin' hurt ya. Promise."

Lydia's eyes watered in relief. She had been expecting another monster, and while Beetlejuice was considered by many to be such, the scruffy blonde hair and the piercing emerald eyes only meant one thing to Lydia.

Security.

Lydia calmed down in her sleep immediately, and sighed contently. Bj breathed in relief, astonished that it had actually worked. Then something unusual happened. Let me just say that for the poltergeist to be caught off guard by anything was something, being that he had been around the block a few times now and generally knew how things worked. He felt an overwhelming sense of exhaustion, something he couldn't recall ever happening in his Afterlife. It weighed upon him so much so that it felt almost as if he were being pulled forcefully into sleep, rather than just drifting.

"Oh, Beej. I'm so glad you're here." Lydia snuggled into her best friend as closely as she could.

He blinked a few times, seemingly in surprise, and wrapped his arms around her. "Of course, babes. Ya know I'll always be around when you need me."

Lydia giggled. Of course he would be this serious and sentimental; this was, after all, HER dream. She looked up at him and smiled mischievously, "Of course you will be…. IN MY DREAMS," she laughed at her sarcasm, and he laughed too, if only in a more subdued manner.

That withdrawn laughter of his made her look him in the eyes. "Beej…. What's wrong?"

He shrugged. "Nothin' babes. Just was thinkin' that this really is a strange dream."

It really wasn't all that funny, but for some reason, they just couldn't stop laughing at that. The Neitherworld moonlight was doing something to their brains and casting a weird light upon the scene.

Lydia was thinking that his eyes had never before glowed so bright and gorgeous, when those eyes got closer and her best friend was kissing her in the middle of their giggling. She sucked in a gasp and her knees started to tremble. All rational thinking flew away, replaced by a mind numbing joy that she had never experienced before. She couldn't say for sure what the kiss itself felt like, because she had never kissed anyone before, and this was her dream. But she did, however, feel her knees getting weak and her blood rush to her head; he had to hold her up by pressing her closer, and she wrapped her arms around his neck. She kissed him back enthusiastically, never wanting this newfound joy to go away, feeling her heart pound so loudly that all of the Neitherworld must surely hear its drumming pulse….

Then everything went black for a full minute, before….

"Ding Ding Ding! Time to shake a wing! Rise and shine birthday girl!" Beetlejuice had possessed her Dracula alarm and was now a bat, souring through her room.

She huffed in irritation and pulled her covers over her head. "No thanks, Beej; I'm taking a rain check for the day."

He plopped down on her bed and pulled her covers back. His proximity made her heart pound in her ears. She needed some time to think….

"But babes! It's your birthday! You're…. How old again? Thirty?" He raised an eyebrow, trying sincerely to look serious, but failing. Lydia couldn't help but laugh at the sight. How could he always make her laugh, even with her mind in turmoil?

"I'm 17 today Beej. 17." She sat up and put her hands on her hips, mimicking his raised eyebrow and serious expression.

"Ah to be 17 again," he donned a refined air, refined clothes, and a snobby accent. "To have the 1 and the 7 together in symbiotic harmony. That lonely 1 and that cannibalistic 7 that ate 9, which symbolizes…."

She socked him in the arm and he popped back into his black and white striped suit and his less than civilized manner. "Just sayin' babes! You only turn 17 once! Unless you're reborn when you go to the Neitherworld, and then you do it twice but…."

"Beej, don't you have something to be doing?"

"Oh, fish and chips, you're right! B words, babes, I gotta go home for a bit."

She rolled her eyes. She hadn't really known that he had something to do, but figured that it would work. "Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice." And he was gone.

Sighing heavily, she stood up and walked to her mirror, checking out her reflection. She didn't feel any older, but she certainly felt different in a way that had nothing to do with her birthday. She sized herself up. Her body had changed from the time she had first met her best friend. Her boobs had grown, not too big, not too small, and her hips had widened slightly, though her waist was still stick-thin, almost too thin, and her butt was too big. She had allowed her hair to grow out, but only slightly past her shoulders; it was too thick to let it get too long without it being a burden. Other than her appearance, she hadn't changed much. She was slightly more mature, slightly more knowledgeable. Yet, she was still fascinated by the macabre, by the strange and unusual. She had never kissed a boy and was, compared to everyone else her age at school, still childlike in her innocence. She couldn't blame it on Beetlejuice; gawd knows he was never much of a good influence. If anything, she was the exact opposite from him in that respect. She blamed it on her disdain for society, on her outcasted feelings. Her morals were high and she held them close to her heart like a life coat, keeping her floating above the waters that would pull her down and make her no better than the likes of people such as Claire "I'm, like, better than yoooou" Brewster.

She shuddered. Claire hadn't changed much, either. She was rail thin all over, and rumor had it that she was planning on going to get a boob job so that she could become an actress and a model. Lydia snorted. Acting was the last thing that girl would EVER succeed at, given past experience, but Lydia had little doubt that the girl would become a model. Lydia had asked Beetlejuice one day if he thought that she was pretty. Much to Lydia's relief, he had hocked a lugy and grimaced in disgust. "Ha! Pretty ugly. Girl has no figure and a plain face. Looks like every other whore that dies and comes to the Neitherworld."

Lydia sighed again. After patronizing him about calling Claire such an ugly word, she had asked him what he did consider pretty.

"Well shucks babes, you are of course! Could you pass me that cockroach over there? I'm starvin'."

Lydia looked down at her feet, and back up to her reflection. Beetlejuice….. What had that dream been all about? Where had that come from? It had been so strange…. Strange enough that it completely blew thoughts of her other dream completely out of the water. She had, of course, harbored a bit of a crush on him from the time that they had started to become friends, but it was never anything serious, and she had barely spared it a thought. More often than not, she would forget that she even had a crush on the guy. The only time that the feeling came up was when he surprised her by coming through on saving her life, or on doing something good and listening to her. Other than that, it was nothing to write home about or anything.

But now? After that dream? She put her hand over her heart, still thumping a thousand beats a second. She couldn't forget the way that it made her blood rush, or the burning feeling in the pit of her stomach that she got just from thinking about it. What was she gonna do? She had to talk to someone, but who would understand?

"Ginger." She ran to brush her teeth and throw her hair up into a high ponytail before bounding into her mirror.

A/N: I wanted to add more, but it just seemed like it would be redundant to do so. Yes, the whole dream thing, including the part with Beetlejuice falling asleep, will have later significance, so keep it under yer hat!