With a desperate heave, Benjamin waddled up the last step and thanked fuck he hadn't even had a chance to lock the door. Pawing at the handle with a hand strangled by plastic bags, he hip checked the door wide enough to scrape through. A kick slammed it shut.

He slumped to the ground gratefully, shedding groceries as he went.

A honk outside had him sitting bolt upright. Slowly cracking the door and peering out showed him Doomie down below, headlights glowing like fireflies in the twilight. The car puttered around in a circle before shaking its tail fins and settling down like a dog. A contented little beep beep followed the ritual.

Shoving the door closed again, Joos clenched his eyes shut and thunked his forehead against it.

He patted around blindly for the whiskey. Talking Doomie into - slowly! - cruising through near the whole damn town to find the liquor store was worth it.

Hearing a rustle from inside the house, the clatter of tools, footsteps coming towards the mudroom through the kitchen, he refused to open his eyes and chugged harder. Finally gasping for breath, he shook the half-empty bottle at whoever it was, saying "Really not in the mood for murder and mayhem, ghosties 'n' ghoulies, an', an' little witchy bitc-"

"Hey!" Oh, good, it was Tweedle-dumbass.

"Hey yourself, Adam. D'ya mind? I'm in the middle a somethin' here." The loss of the whiskey bottle from his rather nerveless fingers made him finally look.

Mr. Maitland glared down disapprovingly over his glasses, crossed his arms, and said, "I can see that." The bottle dangled temptingly from one of his hands. "And you can see us."

Benjamin thought about lunging for it and his legs quivered and gave up. Turns out clinging to a car in terror is a real workout. "C'mon, have a heart," he pleaded. "Man deserves a drink when his house is haunted, his phone explodes, his car comes to life, and a cuckoo crazy cu-...er, nutjob tries to kill him."

"Uh-huh." Nonplussed, Adam stared at the live man sprawled on the floor. "Lydia's not like that."

"Oh no?" Benjamin chortled. "Look out the window. I dare ya."

Leaning over, Adam did. "What am I looking at?"

"My car!"

"It's...the same."

"Do cars normally snore? !"

The chassis gently and rhythmically lifted and lowered, letting out trilling little fweeb-fweeeb-fweeb-fweebs barely audible from here.

Mr. Maitland said, "Ah." He adjusted his glasses and stared.

Giving up on getting the booze back, Joos tugged out a melting carton of Ben and Jerry's, popped the top, and started scooping it into his mouth with his fingers. "Umph! S'good," he moaned. Food was amazing. Food was essential to life. Food was hard to obtain and eat while bouncing around in a car possessed by a demon named Lydia. Fortunately Doomie was his, down to every last buckle and bolt. They'd gotten two states over, outran a cop car, and jumped a downed bridge, but it had listened to him eventually (i.e. when Doomie'd run out of gas), and now it was sleeping in the driveway. His very own pet monster convertible.

Adam turned to ask, "And you're saying Lydia did that?"

"YESH," Benjamin slurred out around a mouthful of ice cream. He hastily swallowed. "Go look at the hole in my mattress with the crispy remains of my very expensive phone! Or just look at this!" He yanked down the neck of his ratty old t-shirt. Four ugly oval marks drew a curving line across his pectoral. Not just bruising, the very centers almost looked like burns. "It keeps getting worse," he said, grimacing.

"Lydia did that," Adam stated, not quite believing what he was seeing.

"No, it wuz th' Easter Bunny! Yes, yes, she did this!"

Adam asked sternly, "What did you do to deserve it?"

"I dunno, exist?" Joos angrily straightened his shirt and resumed stuffing his face.

"She wouldn't just... Would she?" Adam said. Blinking in puzzlement shifted to a look of slowly dawning horror as he watched the slaughter of innocent dairy products.

"Wan' sum? Iz Charry Garzia," Benjamin offered, ice cream dribbling down his chin.

Curling his mouth into a disgusted no, Adam changed his mind as the man fished another pint out of the groceries strewn on the floor. "Sure," Adam said and went to get a spoon. They hadn't been able to go shopping since the funeral.

When he sat down in the doorway to the mudroom, Benjamin Joos proceeded to bend his ear.