Chapter Text
Lydia grinned mischeiviously as she stood just down the hall from her father’s bedroom. The Maitlands stood behind her, a mixture of nervousness and excitement. Lydia took a breath and counted down. Three. Two. One. She screamed.
The high pitched noise cut through Charles and Delia’s conversation. “Hide!” the man shouted, hearing the footsteps that followed the scream. Delia dove onto the bed, bulling a bedsheet over her. Charles stood awkwardly, posing with his arm against a brass piece of modern art up on the wall, trying to look natural. “Dad!” Lydia screeched. “Dad! There are ghosts! They’re chasing me!” she added, running into the room and towards her father. “They’re chasing meeeeee!” she repeated, wrapping her arms around her father. Charles held his daughter at her sides, pushing her away a little so he could better see her face.
“What are you talking about?”
“This house!” Lydia said. Charles adjusted his grip so he was holding his daughter’s wrists. “It’s haunted!” Lydia added, pulling away from his grip. Charles’s face contorted with a mixture of confusion, frustration, and anger.
“Leave this house” Adam said, reciting his line perfectly! He walked through the wall and into the room. He was hunched over and had his arms bent and twitching as though he were doing an impression of a T-Rex that had been infected by a zombie and mostly-decapatated, but nobody had bothered to fully kill because its arms were too short and it was too injured to cause any property damage. He rolled his head around as he spoke.
“Don’t you see them?” Lydia asked, running back over to the Maitlands to point them out. Charles spun in a circle, looking around the room.
“No! See what?” he shouted.
“The ghosts!” Lydia crouched on the floor, holding her hands as if trying to shield her eyes. “They’re in the room with us.” Barbara looked as if she were trying to eat her hands. Adam bared his teeth. “And they have scorpions for teeth… and their eyes! They’re made out of the devil!” she shouted. Under the covers, Delia cowered in fear from her description. Charles marched towards his daughter.
“I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing-” he started. Lydia walked away from him, crossing to the bed where she took hold of the top sheet.
“We have to go back to New York, grab everything you can!” Lydia pulled the sheet off the bed, revealing Delia’s presence. The Maitlands stared with dumbfounded expressions. Delia looked down at her sheet, smiled slightly, then stopped. Lydia turned around. “Dad. Why is Delia in your bed?”
“I asked Delia to marry me” Charles admitted, slowly.
“What? Dad, no, you can’t do that” Lydia protested, approaching him. Her voice was soft and her face held a look of betrayal.
“Lydia, this is a good thing.” Charles pleaded, hands shaking. “I need a wife. You need a mother.”
“I have a mother!” Lydia shouted. The Maitlands inched closer together. Lydia grabbed her father’s hands. “This house is haunted. And if there’re ghosts here, then maybe Mom might still be back at our house!” Charles pulled away, crossing to the other side of the room to stand by the bed.
“Lydia, in twenty four hours Maxie Dean will be here to have dinner with our family and it is better for all of us if Delia is a part of that” He stated.
“No!” Lydia turned away, folding her arms in front of her chest. Delia climbed off the bed and walked over.
“Lydia, I know that you’re upset” she paused and looked at Charles “But maybe this is meant to be.” Lydia faced Delia with a look of disgust then walked towards her father.
“I wish I was dead” she told him, before turning to run out of the room. The Maitlands followed.
~
Charles stared at the empty door, his blood running cold with dread. “I can’t lose her.” He said. “I can’t lose her too.” He ran after his daughter. “Lydia!” he shouted, unsure of which direction she may have gone. He ran down the hall to her room and looked inside. Lydia hadn’t bothered to unpack any boxes or take off the wrap the movers had put on her chest of drawers. She wasn’t in her room. Charles went to check the bathroom but she wasn’t there either.
He heard the door to the attic creak open, but when he turned to look, he didn’t see Lydia opening it. Was the house haunted?
No. No. Lydia had just been messing with him. Other things can cause doors to open… like air pressure. If a window was open.
If an attic window was open, Lydia could get on the roof. Charles ran.
Beetlejuice watched curiously as the crying teen crouched down and wrote on the little piece of paper she had been holding. As she wrote, the tears took a break from streaming and her face fluctuated between anger and bemusement.
Beetlejuice turned, hearing the voice of a grown man shout “Lydia!”
The girl turned towards the voice too as Charles entered the roof. He ran over and pulled his daughter into a hug. The paper in her hand confirmed his fear. He took it and pocketed it. “What are you doing?” The teen asked. Lydia tried to push away and Charles held her tighter.
“What’s necessary. I can’t lose you too.” He replied.
“Let me go.” Lydia commanded as she made a fist. She hit him with it but it was no use. After a few minutes more of half-hearted fighting, Charles picked her up and carried her back inside.
Lydia expected him to finally put her down and let her go once they were inside but he didn’t. The attic door creaked open as he brought her with him down stairs.
Down to the main floor.
Out to the garage.
Into the back seat. Lydia felt her heart beating louder and faster. “Where are we going?” she demanded.
“To get you help.”
“I’m not the one who needs it.” she insisted. “Dead Mom wouldn-”
Charles let go of her to close the door and she burst out of her seat, refusing to be taken anywhere against her will.
The door slammed against her arm. They each heard a snap. Followed by a shreik of pain before Lydia could contemplate what had happened.
Charles pulled the door back open. Lydia stared at her left forearm, which now definitely had a bend in it. Her face contorted from the pain. Charles’s heart sank from her expression and accusing eyes. Lydia inched away from him in her seat, tenderly holding the broken limb.
Charles paused, then after double checking that the way was clear, closed the car door. Lydia let him.
~
The ride was silent for the first ten minutes. Lydia coddled her arm. Charles ‘focused on driving’, while checking on her in the rear-view mirror at least three times a minute. She glared as he met her eyes. “You’re not telling them about the roof.” she decided.
“You don’t get to decide that honey. Its for you’re own good.”
“Yes I do. Because you don’t want the staff finding out about how you broke my arm.” Lydia gave a cunning smile, "If you say one thing, it's Mutually Assured Destruction."
“They’ll understand that it was just an accident” Charles mumbled.
“I’m pretty sure that’s what all the fathers who break their daughters’ arms say.” His daughter remarked. Charles groaned. Meeting his eyes in the mirror again, Lydia added, now with a softer tone “I don’t want them keeping me there.” Charles pulled over.
“Do you promise never to go up there - or even think about doing that - again?” He asked. Lydia decided it wasn’t the time to point out how he couldn’t actually enforce the latter half. Or that the idea of thought crime was stupid and cruel.
“Do you promise not to tell?”
“I promise.” Charles answered. Lydia nodded her response. “I want to hear you say it.”
“I promise”
~
Lydia stared at a spider on the blue plastic chair next to her. The emergency room seemed pretty busy. It had been almost an hour since they’d arrived and she had yet to be seen. She imagined how she’d take its picture. What angle? What lens? How far away? The ibuprofen her father had given her earlier wasn’t as great at killing the pain as she’d wished.
“Lydia Deetz?” A nurse called. He looked bored as he read off her name. Lydia and her father stood up and made their way over. “Hi, I’m Nurse Smith, this is Dr. Georgeson” the nurse directing the two to a doctor who led them out of the waiting room.
“What seems to be the issue?” Dr. Georgeson asked., observing the gothy teen and her well dressed father. The kid’s dress was terrible . Given the unnecessary bend in the girl’s forearm, she probably didn’t need to ask the question
“I broke my arm.” Lydia answered. Obviously , thought Dr. Georgeson. She scribbled down a short note about the situation.
“And how did you do that?” she asked, boredly. She still had another three hours until her shift was over. Dr. Georgeson glanced at the clock, wishing it could tick any faster.
“Does it matter?” the teen asked dryly. Dr. Georgeson shifted her gaze from the teen’s dress and haircut, past the eccentric safety pins, to her eyes. They were desperite. Maybe it was just the pain, but there was always the possibility it was something more. Dr. Georgeson pulled out a pager and sent out a short message before turning back to Lydia.
“Alright, I’m going to take you to radiology,” she said, then led Lydia out of the room.
~
Charles sat, waiting for Lydia to be brought back. His mind ran through the days events and the possibilities for the future. Conventional wisdom would have him tell the hospital about what Lydia had nearly done. Not doing so would allow him to keep his word to Lydia and make sure she was home in time for a picturesque dinner with Maxie Dean. But was it too much of a risk?
He perked up as the door opened. It wasn’t Lydia. “Hello, I’m Sheryl and I work in social work.” The woman introduced herself in a light tone. It was calm and caught somewhere between joyful and serious. She wore a formal skirt and blouse with her blond hair held in a tight bun. “I’d like to ask you a few questions about why your daughter is here.” Sheryl explained. Charles stiffened.
“Well, like she said, she broke her arm.” He spoke nervously, feeling the sweat in his palms.
“And how did that happen?” Sheryl asked. Charles face reddened from guilt. After a moment of not answering, the woman chimed “Mr. Deetz?” Charles took a breath.
“I was trying to get her in the car” he started “I didn’t see that she had started to get up, so when I went to close the door…” Sheryl nodded, watching Charles’s pleading expression. “I did not mean to hurt my daughter”
“I believe you” she stated. “We have no reason to think this is anything but an accident. We just have to get these questions answered. Just in case.” she reassured him. Charles let out a sigh of relief. “Would you mind telling me where you and Lydia were intending to go?” Sheryl asked.
Charles looked down at his hands, turning one over, then the other. He could lie and keep his word to Lydia. Say they were going to a library… Charles noticed the impression the paper he had taken from Lydia was making through his pants. He hadn’t bothered to read it yet, but he knew he wouldn’t like what it said. Charles moved a hand to the pocket and ran a finger along the folded sheet. No. He couldn’t risk letting Lydia…
Charles couldn’t make himself think the words. Either way: if Sheryl understood that it was an accident, he had no need to keep his word to Lydia. There was no threat of mutually assured destruction.
“Here.” He said. Sheryl looked up, confused. “She said she wished she were dead . I was taking her here to get help .” Sheryl nodded, looking gravely serious as she took note.