Angst warning. Enjoy, you masochists.
The apartment they'd shared for five years is nearly empty, stripped of most its amenities.
Beca looks around, shocked at the few possessions she owns. Moving from their – her – bedroom, she takes stock. The bed is Beca's, but the sheets Chloe's, so those are gone. The vase in the hall is gone, its flowers left to die on the table. A toothbrush is missing from the bathroom, as is most everything else. Most of the kitchen things are Chloe's, so Beca is left with a pan, a strainer, and some bent silverware. The couch is absent, as is the TV stand. The TV is placed pathetically on the floor, lacking its DVD player and the majority of its movies.
The photos remain, most showing her and Chloe.
Chloe doesn't want any of those.
Beca moves to the open front door, the pain in her chest throbbing with each step she takes. Her limbs are numb, her head pounds, and her mouth tastes awful. She is hollow, someone having scraped out her insides with a spoon. The black hole in her chest swirls, attempting to suck everything in. She wonders vaguely if she's about to go into cardiac arrest; the ache radiates down her left arm, but she knows there's nothing medically wrong with her.
That's the worst part. She's in agony without having any physical reason.
She reaches the front door and stops there, unable to continue. Her surroundings are blurred, dimly colored. It feels like she's in a dream. She desperately wants it to be a dream.
She looks outside and winces, the ache in her chest maturing to a stab. Then another. Then another. She is impaled in time with Chloe's footsteps as she walks steadily to her car, packed with the last of her things. Chloe walks away from their life together. Chloe walks away from Beca.
Everyone always walks away.
This one just took longer. And that makes it so, so much worse.
"Why?" Beca's voice breaks over the single syllable, a moment of weakness she'd sworn she wouldn't let escape.
Chloe glances back at her, sadness in her eyes, but not one bit of regret. "Because I don't love you anymore."
Beca's heart screams in anguish as it leaps from her chest, leaving a gaping hole of misery behind. It's all she can do to keep herself upright, clutching the doorframe for support.
The stranger in Chloe's skin opens her car door and climbs in, plunging the keys into the ignition as she'd plunged the knife in Beca's soul. The car stars, and she pulls away without another glance.
She doesn't look back.
She doesn't see Beca fall to her knees on the front stoop.
She doesn't see Beca break, crumble, disintegrate into nothing as wave after wave of pain crashes over her.
She doesn't see Beca drown.