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Lydia carefully placed an unshelled peanut on the coffee table, right in front of Beetlejuice. "Look at it. Think of it as a beetle without a head or legs." She smiled hopefully at her best friend.
Her best friend smiled back, tentatively, but the smile faded as he turned back to the peanut. "Is it crunchy at least?" He prodded the peanut with a red-tipped finger, then pulled back hastily as the poke made it spin in place.
"Sure it's crunchy!" said Lydia enthusiastically. "And the insides are, too. Really, Beej, I think you'll like it if you'll just give it a try." She plopped down on the couch beside him and placed her hand on his arm. "Wait 'til you try peanut butter. It's all sticky and kind of slimy."
"Hmm." The pale-haired Ghost with the Most considered the peanut again. "Did I say I would do this?" His sideways glance at her was skeptical in the extreme.
Lydia sighed dramatically. "Yes. You did. You said you'd try peanuts for me. C'mon, BJ. If you don't like it you can spit it out."
"Well, at least that would be some fun," Beetlejuice grumbled. He sighed in resignation, picked up the peanut and cautiously raised it to his mouth. "The things I do for you, Lyds." He closed his eyes, tossed the peanut into his mouth, and bit down loudly.
The crunch made Lydia wince a bit, but she opened her eyes to see Beetlejuice's eyes literally light up. He crunched twice more and swallowed, then turned to her with his usual enormous grin.
"Babes! That was amazing! Do you have any more?"
Picnics were a lot easier to pack after that; Beetlejuice adored peanut butter sandwiches, even if the bread wasn't stale or moldy. Lunch, late night snacks, breakfast – peanuts ranked right up there with roaches and millipedes. Lydia got a big kick out of BJ trying to talk with a mouthful of peanut butter and he loved the way it stuck to the roof of his mouth.
Once a week, Lydia would replenish the roadhouse supply with jars of peanut butter and multiple five-pound bags of unshelled roasted peanuts. "Told you," she would say smugly.
Then, one day, after unpacking the latest delivery and storing it in the kitchen, Beetlejuice ushered Lydia to the living room couch.
"Look at it," he said, placing a beetle on the coffee table in front of her. "Think of it as a peanut with a head and legs."