Chapter Text
"Delia and I will be home after ten," Charles said, him and Delia stood with their backs to the front doors. "Lydia's currently out at a friend's house and will be overnight. You guys don't need to stay down here—"
"Charles, we can assure you that everything's gonna be fine!" Barbara reassured the living male. She and Adam stepped forward, the latter snapping his fingers to open the house’s front doors for the Deetzes. With a warm and soft smile, Barbara continued. "You guys can go out and have your fun. You both need and deserve it."
Charles turned his head and glanced over at Delia, and she gave him a knowing look.
"She's right, you know," Delia said, exuberantly. "Let's go have our fun."
Before Charles could even think of a way to respond, Delia grabbed a hold of his hand and yanked him out the right door. After he and Barbara said their goodbyes, Adam snapped his fingers again. Closing the front doors as he turned to Barbara.
"So?" he asked, as he and Barbara turned and made their way back into the main part of the house. "What should we do now?"
A few minutes, or a half hour, or a hour later found the Maitlands upstairs in the attic. Adam started working on his miniature model of their home town that he had begun in the weeks following Beetlejuice's departure. Barbara sat in a plush chair, reading as much as she could of a book that she liked and couldn't quite finish before she died.
Levitating up a mini house to be painted later, Adam turned his attention to Barbara. Cocking his head when he noticed a lonely look in her eyes. "Barbara?" He set it down, floating over to her. "What's wrong?"
"I dunno." She bookmarked her book, levitating it over onto the coffee table beside her plush chair and glancing at Adam. "I guess it's sad knowing the Deetzes can go out places and — and...." She trailed off and fell silent, wiping a few faint ghostly tears away from her eyes as they formed. Adam took her hand in his and looked her in the eyes.
"And you miss it, huh?" he had to guess, with a knowing smile flashing across his face. "You miss being able to go out places since we're dead?"
"Yeah," she mumbled out, wiping away a few more ghostly tears. "I guess... if only we can still do stuff like that—"
"What's going on!" Beetlejuice's voice reverberated around the room. The Maitlands glanced around. He was nowhere in sight, which only made things a bit more funnier. Their attention snapped to one corner of the attic as Beetlejuice popped in. "What's with the long faces you guys...?"
Adam and Barbara shared a glance, then looked back at Beetlejuice. Barbara spoke up.
"Oh, with the Deetzes all out, I guess we felt a little bit... lonely? As we always do..."
Beetlejuice's hair turned a shade of gray as he looked between the Maitlands. "But... the Deetzes are almost always out. And you're usually never that lonely?"
"You never show up when they're all out though..." Barbara muttered, shifting and burying her head in Adam's chest. Adam wrapped his arms around her, holding her close. "Well.... up until now that is..."
Beetlejuice moved to levitate in midair, and in a sitting position no less. "Well... you guys aren't lonely right now, are you? You've at least got each other. And me..."
Adam and Barbara shared a brief glance. Beetlejuice was right about one thing. They did have each other, and him. Adam’s attention flicked back to Beetlejuice, followed behind by Barbara. A deafening silence befell the room before Adam spoke up.
“I thought you weren’t going to be back here until a week from now…”
“Eh.” Beetlejuice shrugged with a multitude of arms, all of which disappeared in the span of a few seconds. “I said that a week ago in living time, sexy. So why are the Deetzes out?”
“Lydia’s staying overnight at a friend’s house and Charles and Delia are currently out on a date night—” Barbara started to say, before she was cut off by an excitable Beetlejuice as he floated back down towards the attic floor and looked between them.
“You know what’d be even better?” Beetlejuice chipped out, literally bouncing in place. “If all three of us went out on a date night of our own…”
Adam and Barbara glanced at one another, matching looks of uncertainty and confusion in their eyes. They didn’t know what to even think, or even how to tell Beetlejuice otherwise. Yet another silence befell the room, broken when a deadpan Adam and Barbara turned back to Beetlejuice. Barbara spoke up first.
“Bug, you know we can’t go out regardless. We’re dead, remember—”
Beetlejuice shook his head frantically, some yellow sifting into his hair. “Oh, no…no. What I meant to say was, why don’t we just have a date night in the Netherworld… just the three of us… it’ll be like all those date nights you had back when you were alive…”
Adam and Barbara, as they turned to glance at one another again, didn’t seem to hear that last part. For a while, neither of them could even think of anything to say.
Beetlejuice, the pink and yellow coloring of his hair darkening in shade, was only brimming with a sense of even more excitement and hopefulness as his attention flicked from Adam to Barbara and back. Eventually, their attention flicked back to Beetlejuice.
“Isn’t the Netherworld still… like… dangerous though?” Barbara asked, cocking her head to the side with a look of confusion.
The pink and yellow shades of Beetlejuice’s hair color shifted to a full on gray as his attention flicked to her. “Dangerous? Uh…. Not anymore. Since I had that Sandworm of mine eat my ma, the whole of the Netherworld has been a bit of a better place. There are still those who don’t like the changes. But that’s not important to this story….”
Adam and Barbara looked at one another, confused, then glanced back at Beetlejuice.
“What story…”
Beetlejuice ignored that, summoning a chalk and stepping towards the nearest wall. “So, you guys ready for a date night?”
“We never even agreed to that!” a frantic Adam stressed out, before Barbara rested a hand on his shoulder and kept her attention focused on Beetlejuice. At that, Adam fell silent and looked at her before he turned his attention back to Beetlejuice as well.
“Actually, a date night in the Netherworld doesn’t sound that bad. As long as we’re all home before the Deetzes themselves are home… the last thing I know we want is for Charles and Delia to come back to an empty house and we’re not—…”
She didn’t even get a chance to finish. Beetlejuice snapped his fingers, teleporting the both of them over to him in the span of a few seconds.
“You guys are never gonna regret this!” a once again pink haired Beetlejuice spurted out in excitement as he pulled a stunned Adam and Barbara alongside him through the open door to the Netherworld.