*Note: this work is an 18 chapter novella, not a collection of shorts, best started at chapter one. Rating PG13*
"Callie, I loved your Dad," Ray tells Egon's adult daughter, sitting across from her at her kitchen table in Summerville, Oklahoma.
"Well, I'm glad someone did," Callie says and then she notices Ray's uncertain face. Exasperated, she explains, "I'm being sincere, Dr. Stantz. I am glad."
"Oh, good," says Ray, smiling. She's not a homophobe, first hurdle jumped.
"Can you not read my tone? Does everyone around here think I am being sarcastic when I'm not and completely miss it when I am?!" Callie asks the world in general.
"Tell me about it," says Janine. Sarcastically. She gets it.
"I am Autistic," Ray explains. "If that's what you're asking."
"Ha! Knew it. And, I mean that in a good way," Callie smirks and squeezes his hand. "Phoebe will be thrilled to have a kindred spirit around here. I mean, other than Dad's spirit's spirit. Whatever. Anyway. You were saying about him, Dr. Stantz?"
"Call me Ray, please," Ray continues, clearing his throat, "I fell in love with Egon the moment I saw him in 1970, but it took me 14 years to realize it. My Autism, you know? Alexithymia? Emotional blindness."
"Yep. I'm familiar with it," Callie nods. She's still gently holding his hand.
"We got married, not legally of course, because we couldn't, but we had a ceremony in 1990. On October 21st, the 20th anniversary of the first time we spoke," Ray continues.
"It was a lovely ceremony," Janine says with a sniff. She dabs her eye.
"How come I never knew you and Dad were together? It was never in the papers or anything? I googled Egon all the time after Google was invented. It was kind of a Thing I went through. For a while," Callie moves for a bottle of wine. Tea is not going to cut it for this conversation.
Ray explains, "It was the height of the AIDS crisis in New York. It was the era of 'don't ask, don't tell.' Being famous in the 1980s and 90s was like being put in a glass box. Our publicist, our management team, all said nobody wanted the Ghostbusters to be gay. Or bi. Two of us, anyway. Winston is straight. But, I mean, who knows what Venkman identifies as-"
"A slut," Janine offers mildly, smiling, not slutshaming, just factual. Ray laughs at her nonjudgmental directness and it helps break his tension. She accepts a glass of wine from Callie. "Thank you, dear."
"We had a good life together, Callie. A marriage and a business. Egon and I built Ghostbusters and published journal articles, invented all this equipment. We pioneered a whole field of science!" Ray glows a little to be talking about it again. "And it was amazing! Spengs was so smart he made me smarter. Better. Braver, too. We were really having fun there for a while. But things got weird. He changed," Ray gulps at his wine. It's not really his drink of choice but he could use one. "It was because..."
Ray chokes for a moment on the wine. Then spits it back into the glass. Egon has surged to the front and Egon hates imbibing alcohol. Always gave him a migraine.
"It was because I found out about you," Egon's voice comes out of Ray's body. He pulls his glasses out of Ray's shirt pocket and puts them on. "I became obsessed with Gozer again when I found out about you, Callie. I needed to protect you."
"Oh, that's weird," Callie startles at Ray's transformation and looks at Janine to confirm something weird is indeed happening right now. Janine nods. "Dad, um, are you inside Ray right now?"
"Yes, Raymond and I are working together again," Egon explains, as though this is a perfectly normal occurrence. "I found out about you when you were ten and Carole only told me you existed because she needed my medical records. I gave them to her in exchange for pictures and updates on you."
"Yeah, I found the pictures in your underground lab, Dad, they mean so much to me, knowing you cared about me," Callie chokes up. Egon pats her hand awkwardly. They smile at each other.
He goes on, "Your mom didn't believe in ghosts. She thought I was some kind of fraud. A grifter pulling publicity stunts, maybe even drugging people and causing mass hallucinations. She made me promise never to contact you. Callie, she believed she was protecting you from a dangerous scam artist by keeping me away."
"Carole the control freak strikes again," Callie laughs bitterly. "She was really something. Boy, am I glad she's not the parent haunting me right now. She would hate Phoebe's hair. And Gary. Oh my god, she would totally hate Gary."
Callie laughs for real. And pours another glass. Her first one went quick.
"Carole was...unhappy," Egon tells his daughter. Trying to be as kind about Carole, whom he came to despise, as he can, "She sensed I wasn't in love with her. She blamed it on distraction- on my work, on the Occult and parapsychology. But, she got fed up and left me, late winter of 1981, when Ray moved away for a while and I fell into a deep depression. I didn't know it was heartbreak, but I think Carole knew. I think she knew before I did, that Ray was a better match for me than she was. Carole was right to leave me. She was right that I was in love with Ray, it would just take me a couple more years to call it love."
"Well, she would be thrilled to know she was right about something. Being right was her favorite," Callie bitterly toasts to her Mom's memory.
"She was wrong to keep you a secret and she was wrong to keep me from you, Callie," Egon tells her and they exchange a father/daughter look. Callie has a lot of unprocessed grief that she wasted time hating him when Egon was still alive. Ray understands what that must feel like. Egon, too.
Janine says, "Egon, you never told me that story. It's so sad. I'm so sorry, honey."
"It was irrelevant," Egon was never one to waste time on things he can't affect change over. "I couldn't get Callie's childhood back. I couldn't learn to be a Dad. I wasn't allowed to contact her. I had Ray and Ghostbusters and my work. I went on."
Janine and Callie both make soft sounds of listening.
Egon continues. Ray feels his strength flagging. This is the most he's ever talked at once. It's probably only possible because they're in this house and all together. He says, "The data pointed to another Gozer return. My research revealed, Gozer the Gozarian is a cyclical energy parasite that is going to break through to this plane of existence again and again. They've been here many times before, each time defeated by a team of exceptional priests or warriors, and sometimes by four lucky bastards that did it on accident, but Gozer always comes back. Sometimes Gozer even won. I theorize a period of Gozer rule was responsible for the 400 years of Bubonic Plague-"
Janine interrupts, "Oh, I remember the plague hyperfixation phase. Is Gozer what that was about? Yuck! Egon, I was scared to keep anything in the firehouse fridge next to those petri dishes."
Egon tilts his head to her apologeticly, "I was rather single minded about it. I am sorry for that and many other things, Janine."
Janine is really crying now and slightly pissed about it. Blows her nose and says, "Whadda want, me to cry all day? Get on with your story, Egon."
He does get on with it, "After I left Ray, taking the equipment- equipment I designed, built, coengineered, and helped pay for, and therefore definitely did not just steal, Raymond, ahem- it took me years to find the Shandorian Mines and decades more to build my automated proton security containment system in Shandor's crypt, while setting up and maintaining the super trap at the farm. Alone."
That last word sounds a little pointed. Pointed right at Ray. Egon/Ray's face twitches with inner conflict. Callie raises her eyebrows and gulps her wine. This is capital W Weird.
"Whatever Ray is saying in there in response is probably loud," Janine says to Callie, remembering their firehouse fights from long ago.
The lights flicker. Energy surge. Egon is angry.
"Ray! You know the best choice I had was to make sure Callie, Trevor and Phoebe would have a life. It was the only thing I could give them," Egon argues back with someone they can't hear. "If you had just listened-"
"Pumpernickel!" Ray yells and he is Ray entirely again. Ray rips Egon's glasses off, flustered. Jabs them back into his pocket.
"That's probably the only way to win an argument with Egon," Janine tells Callie. She'd be eating popcorn if there was any. This is fascinating entertainment.
"Egon, you're right, okay?" Ray pants, shaking off the intense energy exchange.
"Egon's always right," Janine shrugs at Callie, "What're ya gonna do? It's very annoying."
Ray turns his focus back to Callie and jumps to the point, "He is right, as usual and I should have listened. I'm sorry I didn't. I wish I had reacted better when I found out about you, too, Callie. I blew it. But that's why I'm here now, because I am sorry and because I need help."
Ray's heterochromic eyes plead with her to understand, "To make a long story short, Egon didn't live long enough to analyze all the data, to fully solve the Gozer problem. Janine and I need to go through Egon's lab papers and find the missing pieces. I am sorry, Callie. I am worried we're all in danger and I need your family's help. Can Janine and I stay here for a while and do some research?"
"Yes, of course," Callie nods, calmly agreeing to get involved in this. She's actually kind of hard to surprise at this point in her life. She's a cool mom. She has to be.
Very chill, she says, "Have at the lab. I would help, but I can't make my way through any of the numbers. Dyscalculia, you know? But Phoebe's been out in the barn digging through Dad's lab all year. Making stuff out there with Podcast. Gadgets. Trevor knows a lot of the math stuff, too. And of course, Gary is a scientist, too. He can help."
Callie waves towards the window with her wineglass. Ray and Janine glance out the window at Gary who is riding a lawn mower across the back field. He's singing along with something in his headphones while he mows. He does not look like a brilliant scientific mind in that floppy sun hat.
Callie is about to ask exactly what kind of danger she and her children are in when she hears her youngest child behind them.
"There you guys are," Phoebe says, entering the kitchen from outside.
The screen door slams behind Podcast who shadows her, as usual. "Hi, Ray!"
"Kids, this is Ms. Janine Melnitz, Grandad Egon's friend and personal assistant," Callie makes reintroductions. "And this is Dr. Raymond Stantz, your Grandad's husband. And also, your Grandfather Egon is possessing him. So. Egon's in there, too. I think."
"Sometimes he's with me," clarifies Ray, looking at Phoebe and swallowing sudden throat prickles. He's always a bit flustered by how much this kid looks and acts like his spouse. "Egon just talked, so he'll be gone for a while."
"Husband. Possessed. Cool," says Podcast with a cheerful smile and then he flashes a thumbs up at Ray.
"I know, Mom," Phoebe says, impatient as only a 15 year old can be. She opens the screen door and gestures towards the barn with 'let's go' gesture. "Ms. Melnitz, Grandfather, Dr. Stantz. Let's get to work."