||Devil's Advocate||Betelgeuse x Adam x Barbara

(𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐰𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐲 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐞) Pin the Blame on the Goth

One minute, the house was calm and quiet. The next, there was the implication of a loud crashing noise coming from the second floor of the house. All four of the Maitland-Deetz adults got upstairs and to the source of the said crash - the Maitlands first, followed a few seconds later by Charles and Delia. Right in the middle of the upstairs hallway, Betelgeuse sat, his hair a mixed shade of blue and purple.

Around him were what all four of the adults assumed were what caused the crash.

Although she, like the other three, felt the slightest bit of anger, Barbara, in a confused tone of voice, was the first to speak. "What on earth happened here?"

"Hey! Don't look at me," Betelgeuse said softly, his hair quickly losing the previous shade of purple and blue and becoming a certain color that implied to all four adults that he was, in fact, lying about what happened. "It was all Lydia's fault!"

At that moment, with a look of annoyance apparent on her face, Lydia peeked her head out of her room and glanced over towards her family. "What?! No it wasn't! I had nothing to do with it!"

"Yes it was! I wasn't up here when the crash happened!" Betelgeuse shot back, turning his head and glaring over at his best friend as she stuck her tongue out at him and exited her bedroom still just as annoyed as she was earlier.

"Alright, you two! Enough!" Barbara stepped forward and came to a stop in front of the two of them with her hands on her hips and her gaze locked on them. Adam, Charles, and Delia all moved to stand beside her - all of them equally as stern and folding their arms. "Now, what exactly is going on here?!"

"Uhhh..." Lydia and Betelgeuse found themselves uttering out at the exact same time as they turned to look at one another before looking back over towards all four of the equally furious adults. Pointing accusingly over towards the other one, they both shouted out two equally as annoyed, "They did it! It wasn't me!"s at the exact same time.

Barbara let out a sigh, resting a hand against her forehead and closing her eyes for a brief few moments.

Opening them again and looking pointedly back at Lydia and Betelgeuse, Barbara went back to being stern like before. "Look, it doesn't matter right now which one of you two caused the crash. We just want to know how it happened."

It was then that they all noticed that Betelgeuse's hair had since become completely purple in color, and that he was nervously looking off to the side. Lydia went to join and stand over near the rest of the family. Still as annoyed. And now crossing her arms and glaring solidly over at Betelgeuse.

Barbara kneeled down in front of Betelgeuse, followed behind by the rest of the adults. Now calm, she put her hand under Betelgeuse's chin and lifted his head so that she was looking the demon in the eyes and took his hand in her other, free one. "Betelgeuse, was it you who caused that crash to happen?"

"Yeah," he steadily admitted after a brief and short while, though his tone of voice was still soft as before. "It was me."

His hair went from purple to blue in an instant as he turned away from them and squeezed his eyes shut tight, which left all four adults looking at him and then at each other with equal looks of worry. Equal looks of concern. Equal looks of confusion. All mixed into one.

"Don't leave me alone again! Don't hate me!" he nervously uttered out, his voice sounding a little fearful.

"What makes you think we're going to leave you alone again?" Barbara's voice was gentle and soft. Calm even. Betelgeuse opened his eyes at that and turned his attention back over towards all four adults. "You know that that's not going to happen, right? We can't keep on explaining that to you over and over again."

"Because, I was thrown backwards after snapping my fingers and ended up crashing into a nearby closet. I'm sorry for causing all of this."

"It's okay. It was just an accident. Adam and I will clean it up with our powers. If you wanted to talk, then you can go upstairs to the attic and we both can join you up there as soon as we possibly can. Sound good?"

Betelgeuse nodded in response, snapping his fingers and teleporting up to the attic.

Barbara sighed as she and Adam stood up, followed by Charles and Delia. Lydia had since retreated back into her bedroom, closing her door behind her. And soon, Charles and Delia went back to their room as well. For a little while at least. And that left just Adam and Barbara standing together on the upstairs landing - the both of them looking over at the mess that'd been caused by Betelgeuse.

"I still don't get why Betelgeuse would immediately blame that mess on Lydia," Adam said as he turned his attention over towards Barbara - who hummed in agreement. "I mean, I could immediately tell that it was him that caused that mess even before he admitted such. Since his hair color at the time was evident."

"But it sounded like he was blaming her for this mess." Barbara gestured towards the mess that was still in the middle of the upstairs landing. "Because she blamed him for a mess that she herself had caused not too long ago. Not to mention that it's far more likely that they're going to keep on blaming one another for future messes."

"You guys talking about me?" The Maitlands turned to find Lydia leaning against the doorway and looking over towards them. Their attention directed away from the mess from earlier and towards Lydia, the two ghosts moved to stand over near her - Barbara turning herself solid and leaning against the wall just outside Lydia's bedroom. "What's going on?"

"We were actually just discussing why Betelgeuse blamed you for the mess," Barbara chose to respond, causing Lydia to roll her eyes in annoyance. "I figured it had something to do with you blaming him for a mess that you yourself caused."

"C'mon, you guys. That was early last week. He wanted to eat my homework, I responded by angrily throwing my full trash can at him and it ended up all over one of my all time favorite posters. A poster of which I'm still mad that I now no longer have. So technically it's both our faults."

"I said that I was sorry that I wanted to eat your homework in the first place over a dozen times, Scarecrow!" Betelgeuse's voice sounded from above the three of them. They looked up at once to find half of his form phased through the ceiling and upside down.

"Whatever!" Lydia turned, closing her bedroom door behind her with a silent slam.

Adam and Barbara kept their attention focused solely on Betelgeuse - who remained phased through the ceiling and was now grinning down at the Maitlands. Adam, after a brief moment of silence that befell the three of them, opted to speak up. "Betelgeuse, I thought you were waiting for us in the attic."

"I was," Betelgeuse responded immediately. "And then I got bored after a while when you two never came up here to talk to me like you said you would earlier. Hey, do you guys want me to make the mess I caused a lot bigger and messier?"

"We'd rather you not," Barbara said, sounding stern as she folded her arms and scowled up at him. "Can you go back up to the attic and wait for us. Like we said earlier, we'll just clean that mess that you made up and then we'll come up to the attic."

It took a while, but Betelgeuse phased back up into the attic. The Maitlands sighed, turning their attention back down towards Betelgeuse's mess. It was certainly a lot bigger and a lot messier than it had been much earlier. Had Betelgeuse snapped his fingers and done that without either of them knowing?

"You know what?" Adam lowered his voice down to a whisper as he continued. "After we talk to Betelgeuse, how about the two of us and him have a cuddle session in the attic. It would certainly get our minds off of what happened, wouldn't it?"

A look of uncertainty immediately flashed across Barbara's face as she too lowered her voice to a whisper. "Hmmm... I dunno 'bout that, Adam."

"C'mon, Barb. Please? I know for a fact that he'd be into it."

After a brief bit of thought, Barbara finally nodded.

"Yeah. You're right. A quick cuddle session between us and Betelgeuse doesn't sound half bad. I'm in," Barbara both finally and quietly responded, quickly snapping her fingers and cleaning away the mess as if it had never been there to begin with.