Ghostbusters: Resurrection

3. Flashback to 1995: Why Did Ray and Egon Break Up?

*Note: this work is an 18 chapter novella, not a collection of shorts, best started at chapter one. Rating PG13*

The story Ray gave Phoebe over the phone when she'd called the old Ghostbusters' number from jail is not the whole story, of course. Ray isn't a great liar but he can leave a few things out of the truth.

Egon didn't just leave in 1995, Ray kicked him out. He hadn't quite meant to.

Ray had been so worried. And Egon wouldn't talk to him about it. His husband had always been intense, obsessive. But for the past two years, he had been beyond hyperfixated. Frantic. Scary.

He was working in the lab on something at night. Wouldn't sleep. Didn't always come home to their apartment. Had a lot more nonverbal episodes. Was refusing to eat actual meals. Scribbled in his notebook constantly. He was always preoccupied. Wouldn't go with Ray on the few ghost calls that still came in. When he did talk, it was about Shandor and Gozer and selenium again. It didn't seem to be wearing off, unlike other obsessive phases.

So one day when Egon was teaching at Columbia, tenure being the only reason the increasingly erratic professor hadn't been fired yet, Ray didn't go to his bookshop for the day. Instead, he'd invaded Egon's privacy.

Egon had a locked desk drawer. It had always been locked and Ray had never seen him open it. Ray didn't think anything of it. He knew Egon so well, he thought, he really didn't care what Egon had in there. Spores, most likely.

A stressed and desperate Ray picked the desk drawer lock, looking for evidence of dementia or drugs or a brain tumor or something.

Ray found something all right. Callie.

Ray had been thrown for a loop when the drawer was full of pictures of a little blonde girl, growing into a teenager. Her drawings, a couple book reports, report cards and other kid stuff. Along with some coldly worded notes from Carole, Egon's ex girlfriend who he'd dated way back in 1981, during Ray's private sector period.

Ray went to the restroom and threw up. Then he came back to the desk and read it all.

When Egon came home, Ray hadn't even tried to hide what he'd been up to all day. He was red eyed and exhausted. Furious, sad and overwhelmed. Sitting in the living room with all the evidence spread across the sofa and coffee table.

Egon stepped inside, dropped his briefcase, and started frantically scooping it all up in his arms, his overcoat flapping like a cape behind him. He looked demented. Like a stranger.

"You're not even gonna say anything?!" Ray had yelled. "Well, you've kept quiet all this time, Spengler, I guess you might as well keep shutting me out!"

He knew Egon couldn't always talk, especially when things felt too intense. Ray never held it against him. He was just over the edge himself. In meltdown, sometimes Ray said exaggerated things he didn't quite mean.

"What the hell, Egon? You're a father!"

"No, I'm not," Egon shook his head, looking down, clutching the pictures of Callie to his chest.

"That is your kid," Ray's eyes darkened with rage at the denial. "Look at her fucking smile, Egon!"

"I do have a kid. A daughter named Callie. I'm not her father. I'm nothing to her. She hates me," Egon sounded robotic. He went to his desk and reverently layed the pictures there. Began to sort them back into order.

"Egon, how long have you known about her?" Ray couldn't get his mind around this. Egon fathered a child and didn't tell him about it. How could that be the reality they were now occupying?

You'd have to know Egon very well to see how upset he was, how ashamed and scared. Ray did. He could tell Egon was cracking inside, despite his flat, calm voice as he said, "Since 1992. When she was 10, her mother, Carole, contacted me to request my medical history. Callie had autoimmune issues and they needed information. It was the only reason she ever even told me. I told Carole she could have everything she wanted to know, if she would just send me pictures. Let me learn about our daughter. She did, under the condition that I not contact Callie directly."

Egon's voice wavered, but he couldn't look at Ray, "Carole never stopped hating me for loving you instead of her, Ray. My little girl thinks I abandoned her and never cared about her."

"Three years! I can't believe you kept this from me for three years, Egon you jerk!" Ray would not let his empathy outweigh his outrage at the betrayal. Not yet. Not until it was too late. He had worked up a horrible head of steam that was exploding all over them both.

"Ray, it didn't- I just- Gozer is-" Spengler tried to find the words.

"Don't you dare mention Gozer at a time like this!" Ray slammed his fist on the desk, furious at Egon for bringing up the G word now. How dare he get back on that shit and change the subject!

"I didn't know how to tell you and then I'd kept quiet about it too long and I couldn't find a way. I just..." Egon broke. Finally he looked at Ray, tears streaming down his handsome face, "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to keep her a secret this long. I didn't know what to do! I didn't know how it would change things between us if you knew! I'm so sorry!"

Ray glared back at him. "Not acceptable."

"Ray, I-"

"I need you to get out. I'm going to go get a hotel room or something. You better not be here when I get back in the morning," Ray had said, needing space suddenly to maintain his righteous outrage. Egon had done him deeply wrong and Ray was going to stay mad for at least a couple days this time. Nevermind that he already wanted to hold him and comfort him. Egon looked shattered. Ray would cave immediately if he didn't run away right now.

So Ray stormed out in a huff. Drove all the way to Winston's place over the state line. Stayed for two days. Cried a lot. Kept Winston and Tiyah up half the night talking it out. The third day, he called home but it just rang and rang. In a panic, he'd jumped back in his car and sped back to New York.

He'd found Egon and all of their old ghost busting equipment gone.

Ray had only wanted Egon to leave their apartment for a couple days, to give Ray space to process this astounding new information. Ray wanted time to reregulate and get some perspective. He hadn't meant that he'd wanted Egon gone for good. Not forever. Not like this.

But Egon had taken him literally and left. No one heard from him for two years.

Ray was heartbroken. He never recovered. Never dated anyone else. If Egon, his soulmate, the only person who'd ever truly known him, had deceived him that way, how could he trust anyone again? Stantz closed up. Hardened. Went through life mostly alone.

Until now.

Now Ray is living with a ghost husband in his apartment, an Egon who doesn't talk, who just fills the place with a silent, intelligent presence. It isn't all that different from when he was alive, actually. A looming, sentient force that quietly keeps Ray company while he bustles around the shop. It's familiar. Comfortable. Ray feels happier than he has in many long, lonely years.

Now Dr. Raymond Stantz just has to make amends to Callie, earn the trust of Phoebe and Trevor, and become a Scientist and Ghostbuster once more. Then, he'll save the world.

No problem. He's done it lots of times already.