As promised here is the full chapter 6 though it is separated into half chapters i still think it works. I might do the rest of the updates as half chapters as its a lot less taxing. Anyway, I hope everyone enjoys this new chapter and likes the direction it's going in. Any reviews or comments will be greatly appreciated, enjoy.
Lydia woke up feeling absolutely drained. "What the hell's going on with me?" She asked herself as kicked off her bedcovers. She just lay there for a while, staring at the canopy of her four-poster bed. The room was incredibly cold; colder than it should be at this time of year. A normal person would have reached for the thermostat but Lydia actually really the feeling. She looked over to the clock with a sigh, she had a photo shoot in a few hours and she should really get going, but she was too comfortable to move from the frozen room. After 15 minutes of procrastinating she decided it was defiantly time to get up. She walked over to her closet, stripping of yesterday's slept in clothes for something a little more chic. A simple black plunge neck top would do for now and she ended up pairing it with a pair of black trousers. It wouldn't really matter what she was wearing today as it was a horror shoot. She always ended up in one of those waterproof, throwaway dust suits anyway so why bother with anything extravagant. She was just going to get covered in 'blood' anyway. She smiled as she imagined walking home covered in day worth of gore now that would certainly stir up the neighbourhood. It was only as she sat down at the dressing table that things started to seem kind of off. She applied her makeup as usual but every time she looked away she swore she could see a pair of brilliant green eyes watching her. She would look back a split second later and they were gone.
As she just about finished applying her makeup but since she started it got harder and harder to see into the mirror as it had begun to fog up. The odd thing about it was that it was pleasantly warm in the house. "It can't be that cold" she muttered to herself rubbing both her hands together before breathing into them, letting her breath warm them. She reached out with the palm of her hand to wipe away the accumulated mist. She felt that same tingling sensation she had felt last night, it was no way near as strong and was likened to a small static shock than anything else. Yet as she wiped away at the glass nothing happened. The fog just got heavier and heavier, it was almost as if it was collecting inside the mirror.
"Barbra, Adam is that you?" Lydia asked, her fingertips resting against the cold glass.
"Think again Babes. Someone less cookie cutter and more demon from your worst nightmares" a deep guttural voice growled through the mirror taking her by surprise.
Lydia couldn't help but let out a gasp. She recognized that voice, it was indeed a voice she had heard in many a nightmare and it sent a cold shiver of dread down her spine. He was back and that was an eventuality that Lydia had spent years mentally preparing for. She had hoped it would never actually happen but apparently today was the day. She remembered all the things Juno had taught her about him. She knew he fed off fear and negative reactions like only the worst kind of poltergeist's do and if she could take away that power of fear then he would have no power over her.
"Freddy Kruger is that you again? What are you doing out of my dreams sugar, I told you I would meet you in the boiler room at midnight". Lydia said cracking her most convincing fake smile. Luckily years of Delia's art exhibits and tedious 'fundraiser' dinners had made Lydia a master when it came to feigning a smile, her delivery was flawless. Hell her fake laugh was Oscar-worthy, she hated the fact she had to learn to act like this around Delia's sycophantic 'friends' but now she was oddly glad of it.
"Who the...What the grr ah who the hell is Freddy Kruger" He seemed to explode which made Lydia giggle internally. "It's me B…." he faltered not wanting to say his own name.
"I'm The Ghost with the Most babe" he finished his emerald eyes smouldering angrily through the mirror. He had no idea who this Freddy Kruger character was or why Lydia would be meeting him in a boiler room of all places. He felt a flash of jealousy run through him at the thought of her meeting up with some other guy and he wasn't exactly sure why. Had she honestly forgotten him? Did she really see so many ghosts that she had forgotten all about him? How could she forget him? They were almost married for god sake. That's when a thought occurred to him she wouldn't have a clue if they were married or not; after all the ceremony was still legally binding even if he hadn't managed to kiss her. Honestly, he didn't have a clue if they were indeed still married but it was defiantly an angle he could play to get in good with Deetz. Or in bad with her it didn't really matter at the moment. All he needed was for her to remember who he was and for her to act accordingly and he was in.
Lydia's heart began to beat a hundred miles a minute and she was silently terrified that he was back. All she wanted to do was run and hide in Adam and Barbra's room like she used to when she had a night terror. Though there was little point doing it now. First of all, there would be no hugs or sympathetic words meeting her in the deadly quiet room. Secondly, he already knew she was here and she refused to show a slither of weakness in front of him. She knew if she faltered even for a second, he would see it and he would have power over her again. Juno had spent quite a while teaching her about the psychology of predatory behaviour in the aftermath of the wedding. She had taught her about the type of scams Beetlejuice had used in the past and what he would more than likely use to worm his way back into her life. Fear! That was a big one with him, the power of fear. Once someone is scared of you, you have power over them forever. It was quite a simple philosophy but an effective one. Beetlejuice had most of the neither world terrified of him and what he could do and Lydia refused to let him get a rise out of her. She had no idea how or why he was back, but she wouldn't let him get an ounce of gratification by seeing how scared she actually was.
Though she felt like screaming Lydia sat very still and concentrated on regulating her breathing. She refused to be yet another person he walked over in his quest for power, money or whatever that hell it was that motivated him. That was something she had never quite figured out and it niggled at the back of her mind especially during the quiet hours of the night. She had spent so many sleepless nights thinking about the Ghost with the Most and exactly what fueled his mad behaviour. That it had made him something of an enigma to her. It was like studying the aftermath of Jack the Ripper there were tiny indications here and there, but the whole thing was a huge mystery. For some reason, she felt compelled to find the reasons behind his actions. Not that she would ever let on that she had spent so much of her time thinking about him. Hell, she wouldn't even let on that she had even thought about him for a second.
Lydia smiled at the mirror playing out her poker face flawlessly. "Sorry honey it's not ringing a bell," she said flatly; refusing to look into the bright emerald eyes that glared at her from inside the glass. She quickly glanced over to her curtains, they would easily cover the mirror and hopefully, that would break any connection he had.
"Sorry B.." she coughed to cover up her little mistake and hoped to hell that he hadn't picked up on it. She wasn't sure why but she felt such a strong urge to talk to him. To say his name and let him free from wherever he actually was. But she chalked that up to whatever sorcery that made his name so powerful. After all she had tried the whole saying the name three times thing with other ghosts but all that ever did was make them think she was crazy.
"Sorry man the connections really bad here I think you've got the wrong mirror," She said flatly. Trying to keep any and all emotion from her voice, even though inside she was panicking and her blood pressure had skyrocketed to an all-time high.
"Wrong connection, you dumb bitch I…" he was cut off as Lydia, with one fluid motion flicked the corner of the curtain over the mirror, covering it completely.
Beetlejuice said something but whatever it had been was muffled by the curtain. She could have sworn she heard him screaming but as she numbly got up from the dresser his muffled obscenities became nothing more than a whisper.
"Well at least that thing has a short-range" she whispered to herself. Relief washing over her like a cool tide on a mid-summer day. She tried to ignore the fact her heart was still hammering in her chest and the stabbing pain it brought her. She had to fight to steady herself as the familiar feeling of dizziness and nausea overtook her. She stumbled as her legs felt like jelly and she ended up slumped down on the floor with a thud having missed her bed my mere inches. "Come on you can do this" she reminded herself as the pain in her chest got stronger and he breathing hitched. It was getting harder and harder to breath as Lydia put a hand over her heart. She fought back the big river of tears that threatened to spring forth with each and every stab of pain. She sat there silently cursing herself for about ten minutes until the episode subsided and her heart beat returned to normal.
She was late for work, but she didn't care. She had a demon living in her mirror and she had no idea what she was going to do about it. But what was more worrying was the fact she felt so compelled to talk to him. Not just say his name but to actually talk to him, it was one of the strongest things she had ever felt and it confused her deeply. After sitting and pondering her situation for a little while, she remembered Juno had left a card; just in case Beetlejuice ever did decide to come back. She quickly ran to her bedside table and began to rummage around in the drawer filled with business cards. Cards of every colour and design threw through the air; as if a small hurricane had tackled a residential street full of card houses. Eventually, she found Juno's business card; it was plain black and quite unremarkable. She turned it over in her hand a mixture of confusion and frustrating filling her as she stared at it. There was absolutely nothing helpful on the card. No phone number, no words to summon her with; nothing was there just a plain black business card. But as she concentrated on it, she could have sworn she noted a splash of colour breaking up the black. She turned it over again and lo and behold the name "Juno" was written in a flame orange ink.
"Yeah useful, thanks for that" Lydia said sarcastically before pocketing the strange card. She desperately wanted to call in sick to work, but she knew that being alone in the house would just make things worse. Anyway, she would just be counting the seconds until she could talk to Adam, Barbra or Juno. Work would be difficult, but it would provide a well-needed distraction So Miss Deetz slipped on her jacket and headed out the door for what would be a very bizarre day of work.
Several hour filled with blood, gore and ink passed before Lydia had a chance to stop and think about what she would be returning home too. She was absentmindedly eating half a sandwich with some sort of mystery filling. It reminded her of Delia's cooking and she couldn't quite decide if she liked it or not when she was approached by one of the models. The woman was dressed as a decaying, almost zombified Bettie page. The left side of her jaw was reduced to blood splattered bone and teeth. As the model leaned over the seated form of Lydia a chunk of the fake carnage dripped down onto the sandwich, ruining it with latex and faux blood.
She was a strange character, not only with the striking and raw looking makeup but her skin was practically spilling over with ink. Her flesh was a canvas of beautiful dark sketches that were shrines to the gods of horror. One of her more unusual tattoos was rather deceptive. It was a black border circle similar to something you would find on a painting but with an almost blank centre. A few tendrils of black had crept into the centre, but there seemed to be no reason for them until you stood back a little. On close inspection, the Tattoo looked like chaos but once you stepped back you could see that it was, in fact, an inverted cameo-style portrait of Edgar Allan Poe. The features of the man was penned in with the black shadows of the border, the rest of his face; the negative space seemed to be almost comprised of the natural light that was, in fact, the pail woman's skin. Over the shadow portrait of Poe sat two beautiful and stoic ravens. This was just one of the many pieces that covered her skin. It was something the woman liked to call "living ink" as it incorporated her flesh as a focal point. This was a stark contrast to usual tattooing methods which covered the flesh to create an image. It was a strange idea but then again looking at the woman it seemed to fit with her.
"I've seen that look before, who died"? The model asked before taking the seat opposite Lydia. There was a distinctive southern twang to the woman's voice so Lydia didn't even need to look up to know who had spoken.
"You apparently," Lydia said with a smirk before adding "Living dead girl" with a smile as she tossed the now contaminated sandwich aside. "You know you should have that on your business card: Raven Zydrate professional Living Dead girl," Lydia said with a grin.
"Ooh I like that, but don't you think the 'professional' part makes me sound a little like some three dollar zombie whore?" Raven asked.
"Since when has that stopped you before"? Lydia replied playfully.
"Ah, rude!" raven replied, playfully pretending to be offended by her friends jibes.
After a few moments the zombified girls brows seemed to knit together in worry, there had been something wrong with Lydia all day. She was distracted by something and that meant things were serious. No matter how bad things had been with Lydia's personal life in the past she always managed to leave it at the door but something was really bugging her today and Raven was determined to find out what it was.
"Come on Lydia I know something's up. You have been nursing that paste sandwich for half an hour besides you look like you have just been sentenced to death or something. Last time I saw you like this Delia set you up with that dude, what was his name again Doctor Doom? Doctor Death?" the girl asked warmly
"Oh god that guy!" Lydia exclaimed giggling at the thought of the ridiculous guy her step mother had once introduced her to, in the hopes they would date. "He liked being called Doctor Pain! That dude was more than delusional, plus by the looks of him I think he had seen Little Shop of Horrors a few times too many times" Lydia scoffed. "You know his real name was Eugene Painimire and he was a librarian. I honestly don't know where Delia finds those losers, but no it's not anything like that. It hasn't been 6 months since the last one so I'm still good on that front." Lydia said before her smile quickly faded and her look of sadness and confusion filled her. She sighed deeply, she wanted to tell her friend she honestly did but where to start. She had been friends with the woman for many years and they had gone through a lot together, but she didn't think she could confide in her friends. Lydia desperately wanted to tell someone, anyone about the ghostly parasite living in her mother's mirror, but she knew no one living would understand. Even if she could tell Raven and explain the gravity of the situation she wouldn't know where to begin.
"It's him isn't it… he's back again isn't he?" Raven asked breaking Lydia out of her cloud of confusion.
"Him?" she enquired, confusion etched across her face.
"Yeah him. That stalker dude that kidnapped you when you were 16 and tried to force you into marrying him. You know HIM" Raven said almost aggressively "The dude who you refuse to talk about, the guy who you refuse to discuss" She added giving her friend a pitying look.
Lydia sighed and forced a weak smile onto her face. "How is it you always manage to read me like a book?" Lydia asked softly. "Yeah he's back and I don't know what to do about it. When he tried to make me marry him I was so young and inexperienced at…well everything. I hated that everything was so out of my control, but there was nothing I could do about it" Lydia said bleakly. "A part of me, deep down always knew he would be back, but I hoped it wouldn't be for a very long time. I thought that by the time I had to deal with him I would be practically ancient and tough as an old boot, so I could deal with his shit. I didn't think it would be so soon" Lydia said monotonously.
"Can't you call the police or something? Isn't he breaking his parole or something like that just by contacting you?" Raven asked, feeling outraged that her best friend was having to go through hell yet again at the hands of some lecherous creep.
"It's not that simple Rave's," Lydia said with exasperation in her voice. "My parent they never pressed any charges against the guy, they couldn't. As far as the law was concerned I was 16 I could have eloped to get married to him and just not told my parents, but he did end up going to prison in fuck knows where. All I know is that he got out, I don't know how or why; all I know is he is back and I don't know what to do. I thought I would be ready for it but…" she trailed off and threw her arms up in anger at the situation which defied words.
Raven got up from her chair and embraced Lydia warmly. "I'm so sorry honey, do you want me to come home with you? It might make you feel a little safer" she asked as she began mentally packing her bags for the move into Lydia's place.
"No!" Lydia exclaimed practically peeling her friend off her before she gave her a small kiss on her non-zombified cheek. "Raven I love you, you know that. But this is something I have to do myself. If you come round then I'm just delaying the inevitable and it will be so much worse when I do have to deal with him because it will have grown into this huge monster of a thing". Lydia said which was true, but she also didn't want to have to explain about the Maitland's and everything that led up to her current situation. She knew she could keep things vague at work but if she invited Raven home then it would be putting her in danger. She shuddered as she imagined Beetlejuice getting his slimy hands on her best friend. Though Raven was one tough and could hold her own in almost any situation she doubted she could handle a freelance Bio-exorcist with a grudge.
"I have to do this on my own because if I don't do it now then what? I live the rest of my life living in fear of this guy. Fuck that, it's no way to live your life and I'm not going to run and hide. I'm not a kid anymore, I can deal with it Rave's" Lydia said sharply before adding in a softer tone "Don't worry I will keep you on speed dial just in case".
"You better," Raven said sternly before hugging her friend once again. "I will be there in a flash if you need me," she said though logistically it would take her closer to an hour to find her way to Lydia's place.
Lunch was soon over and Lydia found that she could think a little clearer now that she had got things out in the open to a degree. She knew she could never really fill anyone in on the whole reality of the situation but sharing even a quarter of the truth was a huge load off her mind. She had moved from the lunch table and has begun to make her way across to the main stage where the models were being repositioned. A few of them Raven included were having layers of fake blood topped up to give their gore an extra Juicy look. Lydia breathed in deeply as she looked at the set. There were coffins, gravestones and a whole graveyard in front of her. It was beautiful and almost decadent as the coffins were lined with the same silk as the outfits the models were wearing. Some of them were wearing outfits that would make a goddess of horror jealous as they were a Victorian romantic style and had a softness to them. The others were wearing corsets, stockings and garters all of which had strong burlesque style to them which was almost the polar opposite to the soft and modest Victorian style. Raven was in the latter category clothing wise though it wasn't much of a surprise considering the woman used to be a professional Burlesque dancer.
Lydia was about to make her way across to the stage so they could start the second part of the photo shoot when she was hit by an odd feeling. She felt hot all of a sudden but only in one place, her right hip felt as if it was one fire. "Fucking lighter" Lydia muttered to herself as she began to rifle through her pockets. The lighter she currently had was an old one, the mechanism on it was loose due to years of wear abuse which meant that the smallest friction could set it off. She had almost set her clothes of fire several times already and she had made the decision to keep the lighter in a little metal tin. That way it couldn't set itself off, but she must have forgotten to put it in the tin before she left the house this morning. Yet as she searched she quickly found the lighter and it was in fact in its tin. The metal was cool under her fingertips so she was baffled at what was causing the burning sensation. She continued to search for the source of the heat, throwing he condense of her pocket onto the floor until she had her hand upon what felt like a piece of card. She quickly took it out of her pocket and noted that it was a business card. Her skin seemed to sizzle as it touched the surface of the card and small wisps of smoke could be seen trailing from her fingertips. Lydia quickly realised that the black card was Juno's business card and she quickly turned it over in her hand until the side with the woman's name was sitting face up. The bright orange piece of text glowed brightly and flickered like a flame, she brushed a finger against the text and cursed under her breath; I was defiantly the source of the heat.
Something strange seemed to happen as she touched the burning words. The room became incredibly silent and still as Lydia was plunged into silence. She looked around and realised that everything was frozen in place, one of the models was frozen in a very awkward position as she was in the process of being "re-bloodied". The blood was paused in a wave halfway out of the bucket as SFX crew had been about to splash blood across the woman. As she looked around the more Lydia got the feeling as if she had somehow slipped into a bad science fiction movie things didn't make much sense but hell nothing in the world really made sense if you thought about it enough. So Lydia grabbed one of the nicer sandwiches at the lunch table and waited for Juno to arrive. She presumed that was the reason for the fact that everything but her was frozen in place. She placed the card facing upwards on the lunch table as she sat back down in the chair she had taken earlier. She munched on the sandwich as she waited, but nothing happened for what seemed to be a long time. She debated about getting something else to eat and was on the verge of getting up as the chair across the other side of the table began to move.
It pushed itself out from under the table as if someone was about to sit down and as she watched a shimmery form began to materialise. Small wisps of smoke began to form the image of Juno and within a few seconds she was fully formed. The short old woman looked exactly the same as the last time Lydia had seen her, but then again in the ghost community cosmetic changes aren't really that big of a thing so why would she have changed? Lydia sometimes forgot that just because she had grown up didn't mean that the living impaired had also changed.
"I presume you called me for a good reason," Juno said crossly as she lit a cigarette she always seemed to be puffing; the smoke curling up in small wafts from the gaping knife wound in her throat. "Were all backed up at the office, there's some strange shit going on and I do have other clients to see" Juno stated before even looking up. As she looked up and saw who she was addressing, she seemed to soften for a little bit.
"You've grown up a lot since I last saw you," Juno said with an iota of kindness in her voice.
"Yeah that tends to happen to humans, especially teenagers," Lydia said with a half-smile. She forgot how dry and crass Juno could be but underneath it, she knew that the old woman was looking out for her.
"Wait, Deetz you're not dead are you?" Juno said in earnest as her eyes raked over Lydia's form. Juno was so used to seeing gore and bloodied bodies that she had been desensitised to raw carnage that it took her a moment to fogure out something was wrong. It finally clicked when Lydia mentioned about being human and Juno remembered that blood and guts generally are a feature of the recently deceased.
"I'm your case worker aren't I, no wonder things have been so mixed up. Adding your file to the already outdated system must have caused some sort of overload" Juno said quickly and it was oddly endearing seeing the panic in her eyes she genuinely seemed to care about Lydia but why did she think she was dead?
It was then that Lydia looked down at herself, she hadn't realised, but she was caked in half a day's worth of gore which even to a trained professional looked highly realistic.
"No, no I'm fine look," Lydia said wiping a bit of blood off with her finger only to taste it, the faux blood mix tasted oddly of fruit and sugar. "It's fake. I'm a photographer look I was half way through a photo shoot" Lydia said gesturing to the models, the makeup artists and the lighting director all of which were frozen in space and time.
"Not bad, not bad" Juno admitted, "You had me going for a minute there, send me some of your prints sometime Deetz you have talent," Juno said with a small smile which was practically a Cheshire cat grin for the woman.
"You should see my stuff when I'm really trying and I'm not distracted," Lydia said fidgeting with her hands awkwardly for a moment. Juno finished her cigarette and as she lit a new one she offered one to Lydia who happily took her up on the offer. "He's back!" Lydia said after taking a long deep draw on the cigarette. She only smoked when she was really stressed so today seemed like a perfect day to start up again. Though she didn't like Juno's brand they tasted stale and tasted of rot. Though what did she really expect from a dead woman, anyway beggars can't be choosers.
Juno sighed deeply "I expected as much, I suppose it was only a matter of time". She said taking a drag of her cigarette, the smoke billowed up from the gouge in her throat.
"You remember when I first started working with you after that sham of a marriage," Juno said flicking ash across the table.
"How could I forget, it's not every day a girl get forced into marriage, only to have her 'fiancé' eaten by a sandworm," Lydia said numbly.
"Well, you should know something about that. The Maitland's made a decision that you were too young at the time to know and they thought it would upset you too much but Be.." she trailed off catching herself before she could utter his name. "He was trapped in that sandworm for quite a while, we all though it killed him, but he escaped somehow. He came to the house and he was out for blood. We had to do something, we had to trap him again. Barbra was convinced he would come after you so we did all we could. We bound him to something, it took every trick in the book, but we managed to do it" Juno said sombrely.
"Well, whatever you did to him it's stopped working. He's back and seems madder than ever" Lydia said with venom in her voice, a pillar of ash quickly accumulating on her forgotten cigarette.
"That's not right, he shouldn't have been able to get free, not where we sent him," Juno said with a hint of anxiety in her voice. She took another big drag of her cigarette before snuffing it out on the table. "I need to take you back to the house, see if I can figure out how and where he escaped from" Juno said firmly. Lydia had been about to protest, but she was suddenly gripped with a feeling of extreme nausea. Her mind was filled with a strange foggy feeling, it made thinking incredibly difficult and her whole head hurt. Just trying to grasp a logical thought, to even talk felt like she was wading waist height through a lake of congealing porridge. When she looked up the image of the attic begun to swim into view.