is it possible to do another beetlelands week for 2023? im dying here. if not i will honest to god use the 2020 prompts :)
Hi,
There's been no discussion about another Beetlelands Week as far as I'm aware. The last I had heard, the one in 2020 was going to be the only one.
But feel free to use the prompts that already exist! It's always nice to have more Beetlelands art, even if the event isn't happening🖤🤍💚
Lawrence Bernard-Joshua Deetz is New England’s leading (and only) Psychic for Hire, specializing in seances, communing with deceased family members, exorcisms, and basically whatever else a man glean from a decade-useless Bachelor of Performing Arts.
But when he finds the new home his recently-widowed Uncle Charles is “haunted”, it’ll take more than a fake possession act and spiritual scepticism to worm his way out of this mess.
((IM A COUPLE HOURS LATE BUT I DID IT!!! My final piece for Beetlelands Week is a role-swap au! I originally made concepts for this au waaaaay back in 2019, so I went back and touched it up a little! I might post more later if anyone is interested in more content? But for now I rest! So much art in one week.... @@))
Beej is having the time of his afterlife, finally being wed to his two favorite ghosts. Though he is not exactly alive this time around, he feels and looks more alive than he has in his entire afterlife.
I went around, researched, and received feedback for this post so that I could do the culture justice. This piece went through many revisions to get to this result. I wanted to keep with my theme of the cartoon’s style, but I did not want to make it seem as if I were making mockery of Jewish culture. The end result became true to my goal, and also was accompanied by a lovely story. I hope everyone else likes it as much as I do.
Adam and Barb’s outfits are also loosely based off of the wedding outfits of their movie counterparts. I tried to bring a lot of elements into this piece. :>
@beetlelandsweek
I might’ve strayed a little bit from the prompt, but you know what, whatever. Anyways, there’s also a short story to go with thus under the cut. Enjoy!
Barbara stepped through the privacy curtains hung up to keep their bedroom private from the rest of the attic, freshened up and ready to sleep for the night, and smiled upon seeing that two people were waiting for her, rather than the usual one. Beetlejuice had been jumpy about staying the night with them, instead often opting to retreat to his own bedroom down on the second floor when the two ghosts began to consider turning in for the night. It took a lot on Adam and Barbara’s part to remind the demon that they in fact did enjoy his company and would love to spend a night with him and that he did have permission to stay if he’d liked. So it was cause to pause and appreciate the times when Beetlejuice seemed brave enough to stay and sleep with them for the night. It helped that the demon was adorably clinging onto Adam’s leg in some strange form of cuddling, his green hair bristling over Adam’s arm curled around his back.
“You know, I don’t think one bed is gonna be big enough for the three of us in the long run,” Barbara hummed, eyeing the way Beetlejuice’s back hung over the side of the bed.
Adam looked up from his book with a chuckle. “Yeah, I’m a little scared to let him go,” he wiggled his hand resting between Beetlejuice’s shoulder blades, which really did seem to be the only thing keeping the demon on the bed still.
Beetlejuice snuffled, burrowing his head deeper into Adam’s side with a sigh. Adam looked down to him with a wide, loving grin while Barbara pressed her hands to her mouth to keep her adoring squeak from escaping. She tiptoed over to the two, hovering above Beetlejuice for a moment as she studied the sleeping demon. He looked decades younger without a manic grin stretching across his face, his round cheeks looking oh-so pinchable. Barbara resisted that urge, instead placing a gentle kiss on Beetlejuice’s head, his hair smelling faintly of fallen leaves in autumn, a scent that seemed to stay no matter how much he showered.
He stiffened, and Barbara and Adam froze. Beetlejuice cracked an eye open and shot Barbara a half-heartedly annoyed, one eyed glare. “Sorry, Bee. Just couldn’t resist,” Barbara smiled apologetically.
Beetlejuice burrowed deeper into bed, his hair flushing pink. “You stop that. ‘M too tired for that adorable shit,” sleep slurred his speech, but his grip on Adam’s leg tightened with no problem. A third arm and leg appeared, wrapping further around Adam.
The ghost couple giggled at that. “Alright I’ll leave you be,” Barbara promised, turning her gaze on Adam. Before he could realize that he was being watched, Barbara launched a multitude of feather light kisses on Adam’s cheek, making him gasp and wriggle away from the tickling brush of lips while trying to stifle his laughter.
Unfortunately, in his bid to get away, Adam forgot that he was the one keeping gravity from fully affecting Beetlejuice. With a yelp, Beetlejuice unexpectedly tumbled off the bed, hitting the floor with a heavy thump. Barbara gasped and immediately crouched to the demon’s side, checking him over for injury.
Adam practically tossed his book aside in his haste to hurry down to the two, panic filling his eyes. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry! I’m so, so, so sorry, I completely forgot, I got so caught up, I didn’t think-“ he said, his hands helplessly fluttering over Beetlejuice, who lay on the floor looking like a ruffled cat.
Beetlejuice lurched up into a sitting position, his head twisted at an awkward angle that would be worrying if he were alive. He grabbed the sides of his head and cracked his neck bones back into place with a loud snap, making the ghost couple flinch back, now certain that they’d just ruined their night and had fully insulted Beetlejuice. “Not the worst way I’d been kicked out of bed before, I’ll admit. One time ended with me being kicked out the window and ending up impaled on the bird spikes on their wall. Now those take forever to pull out, lemme tell ya,” he shrugged.
“No, no! I did not mean it like that, I’m so sorry, Bee, I-“ a new surge of apologies burst from Adam, but before he could continue babbling, Beetlejuice leaned forward and silenced Adam with a long, drawn out kiss.
“You are adorable,” Beetlejuice snickered when he pulled away, leaving Adam gaping red faced, his eyes owlishly peering out from his crooked reading glasses. Beetlejuice then sleepily slumped into Barbara, nuzzling her exposed neck.
Barbara wrapped her arms around the demon in return, the earlier tension leaving the air. “Sorry Bee, I forgot how ticklish Adam gets,” Barbara said, running a hand through Beetlejuice’s green hair. He basically purred from her petting.
“Stop apologizing, nerds. You can make it up to Daddy later,” Beetlejuice smirked salaciously, his eyebrows bouncing up and down pointedly.
Barbara shot him a pointed look. “You just fell off the bed, and you think it can fit us all for that?”
“I would be too worried about knocking you off again to think about that,” Adam agreed, leaning back against the bed while his shoulders unwound with relief.
“Then we get creative! The roof is pretty cozy, Scarecrow and I have found the perfect spot for hiding out and throwing rocks at cars up there, after all,” Beetlejuice replied.
“First off, we’re going to have a talk about how dangerous that is in the morning with Lydia, secondly, we are not having sex on the roof of all places,” Barbara said.
“Why not? It’s not like anyone can see us. Public sex is hot when you’re a ghost and don’t have to worry about being caught,” Beetlejuice pouted.
“We have a perfectly good, flat bed right here. We just need to… expand it,” Adam patted their mattress thoughtfully. He seemed to already be thinking up new ideas for their future bed frame, his eyes growing distant as he worked out measurements in his head.
“Though I don’t know how we’ll get a bigger mattress up here,” Barbara hummed thoughtfully.
“Oh my god, you guys are such nerds. We were so close to an orgy and now you’ve ruined the mood with all your weird domestic bed talk, it’s like being boring is a lifestyle fetish for you two,” Beetlejuice groaned, flopping back onto the floor. Barbara and Adam exchanged an amused look. Despite his words, Beetlejuice’s hair had turned a lovely mix of green, pink, and magenta.
“Well, if that’s the case, then let’s go ahead and call it a night. C’mon Bug,” Barbara patted Beetlejuice’s hip twice before getting up to her feet, crawling over the bed to her preferred side.
Adam stood after, and Beetlejuice simply appeared next to Barbara, smack dab in the middle. He shot the ghosts a smirk, as if he were causing some kind of trouble. The smirk promptly disappeared when Adam easily slid into bed next to him, pulling the covers up over them. “Definitely need a bigger bed,” Adam noted, eyeing how close they had to squish together to fit.
“We’ll figure it out tomorrow,” Barbara yawned. She nestled closer to Beetlejuice, and slid her arms around his torso. “This okay?” She asked.
“Uh… h-hold on,” Beetlejuice stammered, the slightest tint of color emerging on his cheeks. He eyed the second pillow Adam had been using for a backrest earlier and pulled it under the covers with him, clutching it tightly against his middle. He settled under the covers, his eyes stubbornly fixed on the sheets as he readjusted for a moment. Then, quietly, so quietly only the dead could hear, he whispered, “Makes me feel safer…”
“You don’t have to explain, Bee,” Adam reassured the demon, Barbara nodding in agreement. Adam stretched out, encircling his partners with his arms, pulling them closer together still. “Good?” He checked.
Barbara carefully wiggled a hand around Beetlejuice to intertwine her fingers with Adam’s and nodded. “Yup.”
Beetlejuice’s eyes darted between the two before he slowly moved one arm away from the pillow, turned onto his side and wrapped it around Adam’s waist. Then a third arm appeared from… somewhere on his person and curled around Barbara’s. “It’s weird, but… it’s nice,” he mumbled. Barbara buried her face into Beetlejuice’s hair, and he could feel her wide smile.
“It is,” she agreed, relaxing further.
Adam looked over the two before him with such loving eyes, all Beetlejuice could do was duck his face into Adam’s dorky flannel shirt to avoid that overwhelming green gaze. “You two still owe me make-up sex. All these tropey ‘there was only one bed’ shenanigans aren’t gonna get you outta that,” he huffed.
“Course,” Barbara hummed.
“We will definitely christen the new bed when we get it ready,” Adam pressed a kiss to Beetlejuice’s forehead.
That made the demon purr. “Oh, I will be doing so much more to you than christening some damn bed when the time comes. Trust me.” Even with the sleep weighing their bodies, Adam and Barbara still felt a shiver of excitement run down their spines at the baritone hum Beetlejuice’s voice reached. “Alright, good night!” Beetlejuice gleefully chirped, closing his eyes.
“Bee! You tease!” Barbara squealed.
“You can’t just do that when we’re trying to sleep!” Adam said, his hips shifting away unconsciously.
Beetlejuice grinned wider, hugging the pillow tighter to his chest. “Now we’re even! Sweet dreams!”
The lamp then clicked off, leaving the room dim, save for a weak filtering of moonlight in the windows. The ghosts settled in, their legs tangling together in one final act to be as close as possible to one another as they finally started to sleep.
