Chapter Twenty

Lydia's celebrity career was over.
In fact, it had been over almost immediately after her live music video, but the release of the following mornings' newspapers made her, well, yesterdays news. The front page of the Daily Tomb and The Afterlife featured the truth about Lydia's relationship with her 'manager', and this revelation had dismayed her fans.

Reading through one of these newspaper articles now with an amused grin, Lydia was sat on the couch in the Roadhouse's living room. She didn't think she could feel more ecstatic – her contract was finished with, Monitor had received his just-desserts, and, whilst Beetlejuice had spent his share of the money already, she had plenty of Neitherworldian dollars under her belt.

She glanced across the room at Beetlejuice now. He was speaking into his yellophone tiredly, kneading the bridge of his nose as he tried to explain for the umpteenth time to his distressed mother that she had nothing to worry about. The Juices had read the morning headlines, and weren't sure whether the papers were running a false story.
"Yes, Ma. No, it's not- no, don't pass me to Dad, you called me. Yeah, it's true. Ye-es…"

Beetlejuice was beginning to look irritated and was endlessly circling his hand, silently pleading for the end of the phone call to come soon.
Lydia extended a hand to help him out. "Want me to talk to her?" She offered.
Beetlejuice caught her eye.
Grateful for the reprieve, he rapidly began to wind up his end of the conversation. "No, Mom. Look… Look, talk to Lyds,"

Lydia walked over and accepted the cup-shaped receiver from him with a great deal of enthusiasm, leaning close to the wall-mounted transmitter. "Hi, Mrs Ju— sorry! Sorry! Bea. Hmm?" Bea was pressing about suing the papers for false publication. Lydia's eyes widened. "No! No, that's not necessary, the papers aren't lying,"
Beetlejuice snorted. "For once,"

"Yes. No, really, we are. No, it's not an invasion of privacy, Bea– Hm? Oh, I'm sure he wouldn't mind a visit–"
"What?"
"– but we have plans this afternoon."
Beetlejuice sagged with relief, wiping his brow. "Phew…" Then, he stopped. Wait… we do?

Lydia nodded in acknowledgement to what she was hearing, even though Beetlejuice's mother couldn't see. Humming in confirmation a few more times, she finally straightened, both hands cupping the receiver as she prepared to hang it back on its hook. "O-kay. Speak soon. Bye ma'am," She ended the call, half-exhaling and half-whistling in one breath.
Beside the couch, Beetlejuice folded his arms and frowned. "Oh sure, she listens to you,"

The young woman shrugged her shoulders and made her way over to him, picking up the newspaper she'd been reading to fold it in half. "She invited us over for dinner," She mentioned as though on an afterthought.
The ghost flinched. "Please tell me you didn't agree,"
"Okay, I won't tell you,"
"Lydia!"

She rolled her eyes, lightly hitting him with the folded paper. "Come on, Beej, let's go,"
His frown vanished. Instead he regarded her with suspicion. "Go where, babes?" He asked, an eyebrow raised.

At this, Lydia flashed him a dazzling smile. "Slimeballing," She said, frankly. "You, sir, owe me a date,"

It was about one-thirty in the afternoon, and the Neitherwoods was filled with the sound of popping guns and hysterical laughter.
A half-day tournament was in progress, and the current game of Capture the Flag was drawing to an end with the red team in the lead.

Having scared his opponent to literal pieces, Beetlejuice snatched the flag from the clattering pile of bones Jacques had become.
"Oh, yeah!" He cried, making a break for it and covering his retreat with a few poorly placed shots in the direction of offensive fire.

Lydia, holding a defensive position on the turret of a 'base' shaped like Frankenstein's lab-tower, picked up the slack, gunning at the Sappy Face Ghouls as the trio cackled madly at the crest of the hill.
"Beej! Get the flag back here!" She cried.

"Babes, I got it all under contro-" A slime grenade caught him full in the face, silencing him prematurely. Beetlejuice could have avoided this fate had he not raised his protective visor to prank Jacques.
Lydia winced, took the rickety back staircase down to the forest floor and dashed over to the 'wounded' recruit.
Beetlejuice handed her the flag wordlessly, just as she handed him a handkerchief. "Lick that slime off and I won't kiss you for a week," She warned, only half-teasing.
Wiping his face clean, Beetlejuice glanced heavenwards, smirking. "Shucks, babes, you know me so well,"

Just as the Sappy Face Ghouls came close enough to pounce, Lydia tucked the flag under one arm, slimeshooter in hand, and grabbed Slimy, whilst Beetlejuice 'juiced up a cage, trapping the two boys. Slimy disappeared from Lydia's arms and reappeared a split-second later in the cage, scowling.
"Play time's over, kiddies," Beetlejuice taunted, sticking out his tongue at the captives.

"You can't beetlejuice us! It's a slimeballing tournament!" One of the boys objected, grabbing onto the iron bars and giving them a shake.
Lydia brandished the flag mockingly. "Hey, all's fair." She grinned, before Jacques, who'd hastily put himself back together, drew her attention, beginning to advance on their position. Lydia ducked in case a shot was coming and began to dash towards the Frankenstein tower. "Come on, B. J., let's get back to the base!"
"I'm right behind ya, babes!" He cried, floating after her.

As soon as they climbed up to the 'battlement' area of the tower, Lydia untied the red sash from around her wrist and began to wave it furiously.

The marshal blew firmly on his whistle before raising his loudspeaker. "The red team wins the Capture the Flag round! Let's mix up the teams. Huddle up!"

At his command, Beetlejuice, Lydia, Jacques and the Sappy Face Ghouls gathered around him, soon followed by the other ghouls taking part in the tournament.
The marshal stood authoritatively, back straight, chest out, instructing them as though they were draftees for the army. "Right, last game. Girls versus boys. It's slayer mode- last team standing!"

Lydia smirked. Swinging her slimeshooter and raising it to eye-level, she appraised Beetlejuice in wordless challenge. He swallowed anxiously; Lydia was a mean shot, she'd wipe the floor with him if they were one-on-one.

"You have thirty seconds to disband. Girls, start at the tower. Boys, graveyard. You have the entire field at your disposal. No shots are to be fired until I give the signal. Now- go!"

Without a backwards glance, Lydia sprinted in the direction of the replica, scaled-down tower, just as Beetlejuice hovered after Jacques towards the cemetery.
The Sappy Face Ghouls weren't used to being split up. The two boys dashed after Beetlejuice, pumping their little legs as fast as they could. "Hey, Beetlejuice, wait up!" They squealed.

The girls had been given an unfair advantage – their area of the field provided a lot more cover, the woodland was much thicker there. But then again, the boys had an unfair advantage too: they had Beetlejuice, and no anti-beetlejuicing rules had been established thus far.

Not a second after everyone had so much as stepped into their appropriate zones, the marshal blew on his whistle. The final game began.

Those that were too tired to play a fully tactical game dashed out, guns blazing, acting heroes. Lydia and Slimy picked them off one by one from the tower's battlements.
It was difficult for Lydia to tell who it was she was shooting at – the players were all wearing khaki jumpsuits and protective headgear – but then, out of the corner of her eye, she thought she saw a figure advance from the graveyard with messy, long blond hair. He was heading for the thick of the woods, away from the stalemate confrontation as though planning on circling around and gunning the girls from behind, a strategic move that would ensure they were pinned down on all sides.

Not today, B. J., Lydia thought confidently.

"Slimy, I'm going it alone. They've sent an assassin,"
"Gotcha," The young girl acknowledged in her raspy voice, still firing off shots.

Lydia raced down the small flight of steps at the back of the tower and took off in the direction she thought Beetlejuice had headed, gun primed just in case she'd misjudged his position.
It wasn't long before she thought she heard his voice coming from the northwest, mumbling to himself. "Slip away from the main group unnoticed? Check. Circle round to the fort… to the fort… uh… where is the fort?"

Lydia narrowed her eyes, a wicked smirk playing its way across her face.
There.
Tracking him down to a clearing, she moved stealthily and quietly, trailing the sound of his voice.

"Ah, boy… maybe I ought'a just zap myself back to the cemetery…"

Reaching the thickest tree that fringed the glade, Lydia hid behind its trunk, focusing completely. She raised her slimeshooter, ready to aim and catch Beetlejuice off-guard, dead sure he was behind it, dead sure that she'd get a shot in.
Then, just as she tipped her head to glance around the tree trunk, she heard the click of a gun being cocked behind her. Every fine hair lining her arms and the back of her neck stood on end. Funny, the slimeshooters didn't need to be cocked.
A familiar voice began chuckling before she had time to feel threatened. Reason would normally suggest that it would have been impossible for the direction of this voice to switch so rapidly from north-west to south, but this was Beetlejuice, and reason no longer existed.
'Learn to throw your voice. Fool your friends. Fun at parties.' Damn. She'd been had.

Beetlejuice grinned. His caginess had pulled off after all. "D'ya feel lucky? Well? Do ya, babes?"
Lydia played along, throwing her arms up in the air without a fight. "I yield!" She gasped without turning.

"Hmph. So much for Dead-Eye Deetz,"
"Even you can hit me at point-blank range, Beej,"
"That's ri-ight." He grinned, thoroughly amused. "I've got you right in my sights,"

Lydia, cool as anything, fixed her ponytailed dark hair and turned to face him, smiling seductively. "And what are you going to do about it?"
Beetlejuice lowered his slimeshooter and popped his face-visor up, closing the gap between them before lifting her visor too.
They kissed, cupping each other's slime-smeared cheeks.

Finally coming up for air, both out of breath from laughter, exertion and simple joy, Beetlejuice began subconsciously rubbing his thumb back and forth along the line of her jaw.
"From now on, it's just you an' me, babes," He promised. It was funny; whenever he said something that would normally be considered romantic it came out almost lecherous.
Lydia arched an eyebrow. She'd heard him say that to her before. "But... mostly you?" She prompted.

Beetlejuice's brows knotted together. "Hey, I'm bein' serious here!" He objected, to which Lydia rolled her eyes. "Well, there's a first time for everything..." Then, she pressed her forehead to his, thinking.

"Beetlejuice?"
"Yeah, Lyds?"
"We'll… work something out. About college, I mean. About still seeing each other. Everything is going to be okay,"

Upon hearing this, the ghost's face broke into a boyish grin. "Really?"
"Really, really," Lydia agreed.
Without another word, Beetlejuice slipped an arm around her shoulders, and together they began to walk back towards their groups, a temporary truce in place between them.

"Y'know what, babes?" Beetlejuice eventually said with a smile. "I think this year is gonna be a very good year,"

Lydia looked up at him, cheeks flushed, face radiant.

She knew then, in that moment, that this was where she needed to be, this was where she belonged. She didn't care about what potential life she could lead without him, didn't care what opportunities she'd be missing. As far as she was concerned, her life would never be complete without him.

Leaning into his side, she wrapped her free arm around his waist. "Yeah? Well… I think they're all gonna be,"

They wouldn't be able to 'spend their lives together'. They wouldn't even be able to 'grow old together'. What did those clichés matter anyway? They would simply be together. Always. In her life, and his afterlife.

Looking at each other, Beetlejuice and Lydia grinned.

Neither would have it any other way.

END

A/N: :3 Eeeee. Sorry for the short chapter but I didn't think much more needed to be said. c: It's nice to finish on such an even number, and that wasn't even planned!
Thank you to my readers for sticking with this story to the end, it's really meant a lot to me. I'm so glad to have this finished, though I also feel kind of sad to see it end. So... you know what that means? Sequel!