Author's Note: Abundant use of parentheticals ahead, just so you're warned. I'm aware that they're there, but it works for the story, I think.
Chapter One: Before We Go Down (by Carter Hulsey)
Aubrey doesn't remember exactly how it started – this thing she has for Beca.
With Beca.
She doesn't remember who submitted to it first, or the argument that preceded it (and Aubrey is sure that there must have been an argument – there's always argument with Beca – even if she can't quite shape the memory of it in her mind). She doesn't remember the day, or the moment, or how it meticulously twined into every interaction that the two of them shared afterward. And if there was an extra flutter in her belly that didn't quite belong, or maybe a heartbeat that chimed just slightly out of rhythm with the rest of them, Aubrey doesn't remember that, either.
She really doesn't remember how it started (or where or when or why), but she remembers how it felt.
It was a hurricane.
(A clichéd description, perhaps, but still the best that Aubrey can offer.
Chloe is the creatively minded one, anyway, Aubrey cedes to herself.)
It felt like the world was drowning out around her, wind stinging across her cheeks and burning her ears and chapping her nose, made worse only by the fierce, wild rain that felt like ice slipping off the ends of her hair and slithering down her spine. It was fury and frustration, and desperately clawing for purchase against something – anything – to keep her sane. To keep her grounded.
It was a hurricane that she'd been granted no warning for, depriving her of the choice to bolt like hell from the danger zone – to just pack her bags and drive somewhere (anywhere else not there) and assess the damage that had been done only after the storm blew out, or away, on to terrorize some other hapless stranger. Aubrey hadn't had a choice; her only option had been to hunker down and wait it out.
It had been a hurricane. Followed by another, and another, and yet another, until the disaster left behind became familiar to her; comfortable, in some ways – and comforting, in most of the others. Which sometimes terrifies her, still.
(It can't be healthy to find such comfort in disaster, Aubrey thinks.)
She knows – Aubrey knows – it wasn't (couldn't have been) as sudden as it had felt. She knows that the rage that trades through their parted lips and the passion that it swiftly smolders into had not been birthed from nothingness. There was something, somewhere, that had fueled it; something must have perpetuated this slow-burning fire until they had no alternative but to let it overwhelm them.
(Aubrey thinks 'overcome' might be more appropriate, because it feels like she's possessed with want and need and lust and unquenchable avarice every time the feeling rises.)
But whatever that something was, Aubrey couldn't find it, then. And when Beca's lips roamed and caught against her throat, flaming an impatient trail down to her collar, Aubrey forgot to look for it. Aubrey always forgets to look for it.
And, after a while, Aubrey stopped caring.
They never defined it; this thing they share. If Aubrey had to guess, it had been about six months since it started. She knew, at least, that Beca had goaded her into releasing a healthy amount of tension, both sexual and academic, the night before her first exam as a Barden law student back in October, five months ago.
(Aubrey had insisted she just wanted to do well.
Beca had promptly ordered her to shut up and slammed her back against her bedroom door, breathing hot, sufficiently distracting, filthy words against her neck, the DJ's forearms supporting her weight against the door and trapping Aubrey against it with little hope or desire to escape.
Aubrey aced her civil law exam, she found out a week later.
Beca rewarded her hard work and focused efforts with several hours of more intensive stress relief.)
The closest they had come to labeling it had been three weeks ago, announcing to the skeptical, untrusting faces of their friends – the returning Bellas (and the new ones, by default), plus Chloe (a fresh Barden grad student, but somehow much busier than Aubrey, with Nazi-esque professors and daily study groups that she had to attend just to keep up) that they were 'sorta involved,' as Beca had phrased it.
(They had only mentioned it after Denise spotted a dark bruise under Aubrey's ear, and the other Bellas had spent twenty straight minutes badgering Aubrey for details.
Beca had, thankfully, sensed Aubrey's duress, and solved the issue accordingly.)
Aubrey thinks it should bother her – the lack of bold, definite lines to the edges of their relationship – and she thinks maybe that it did, for a time. But for all of her impulsivity and emotional incapacities, Beca is faithful, and honest, and she cares about Aubrey in a way that Aubrey can't grasp or understand or sometimes believe, but she mirrors it.
Aubrey cares about Beca that way, too. And it's enough.
It's more than enough.
It's everything.
But after (roughly) six months of sex before casual study sessions, and sex before a casual coffee, and strangely (definitely not casual) meaningful conversations after sex, it startles Aubrey when Beca voices her desire for something… different.
"Are we dating, Aubrey?" Beca hesitates, her fingers stilling for one, awfully telling millisecond in Aubrey's hair before she resumes combing through it with a small tremor that flicks her palm intermittently against Aubrey's scalp, just slightly.
Aubrey takes a moment, but she can't remember if that tremor was there before.
She keeps her head pillowed against Beca's chest, averting her gaze. She isn't sure how to respond. She isn't sure how Beca wants her to respond. So she doesn't – not right away – while she considers.
Despite whatever answer Beca's searching for, the question is an important one.
Assuming Aubrey answers affirmatively ("yes, I'd really like that"), Beca will either metaphorically pack her bags and call it quits, or stubbornly dedicate herself to taking the long haul with Aubrey; if Aubrey answers negatively ("no, I really don't think that's a good fit for us"), Beca will either sigh her abundant relief into the crown of Aubrey's head or grieve for her dashed expectations.
(The silence quickly becomes too much for Beca.
Aubrey should've known that it would be.
She really should have filled the silence with a reply, but she's shaky and a little panicked, and she can't quite figure out if it's because she's afraid of the commitment, or if she's afraid that Beca's afraid of the commitment.)
"You don't have to answer," Beca assures, her voice tight, like she doesn't really mean what she's saying, but is too anxious to wait any longer, and is offering Aubrey an out. "I just- I mean, we've been doing… this… for a while now, and it's fine – it's more than fine!" Beca amends hurriedly. "It's good, I think. But, you know, there's usually a point to these things where it stops being- enough, or whatever. And I thought that maybe I should check in and see where we're at, with that…" She pauses. "Or, like, maybe see if this is still, y'know, what you want, or something. I don't know," Beca frets helplessly, and Aubrey feels the DJ's hand – the one not currently tangled between the strands of Aubrey's hair, but its counterpart, curled loosely around Aubrey's shoulder – slip slightly up the length of her arm as the brunette shrugs beneath her.
"Is that what you want?" Aubrey manages to ask eventually.
Something foreign (or, at least, something that feels foreign, even though Aubrey's actually very familiar with this heart-stammering anticipation that will either lead to something really good, or something really, shatteringly awful) nests in the pit of her stomach while she awaits the brunette's response.
"I'm- okay with how things are," Beca hedges briefly. "But if you wanted more… I mean, I could maybe do that, too."
Perhaps they haven't exactly been 'dating' for six months (at least not conventionally), but Aubrey knows Beca. She's studied her – her reactions, and her words, and her expressions, and her music (which is unquestionably the most revealing part of Beca Mitchell, Aubrey thinks, even if no one else can decipher what it means; Aubrey feels irrationally proud of the fact that she can).
So Aubrey knows Beca. And she knows what Beca's answer – this whole conversation – really is.
This is Beca, being hopeful. It's a rare thing under any circumstances, because Beca makes it her mission in life not to 'hope' for anything. Not from people.
(Aubrey feels that part is important.
It makes Beca's high expectations for her music career more graspable to Aubrey, because it's easier to hope for success from a talent that you know you have – like Beca and her music – than it is to hope for things from others.
Other people aren't reliable.
Beca's music is.)
Beca's been disappointed too deeply, and too frequently, by far too many people to easily allow for 'hope.'
But Beca's hoping for something from Aubrey, and no matter how convoluted their relationship may be, Aubrey vowed months ago that she would never become one of those people – 'those people' being the group of individuals in Beca's life (her father, soon followed by her mother, then by her first, second, and third lovers) who Aubrey had developed a strong disdain for, and kept carefully isolated in a particularly mutinous, wrathful corner of her mind. 'Those people' habitually offered empty promises to support Beca, and to love her, and, if nothing else, they promised to stay.
But none of them did.
Aubrey had promised herself that she would never just leave Beca stranded behind somewhere with nothing but misery to hold for comfort, like so many others had done.
Aubrey thinks maybe it's that promise that encourages her response.
"You'd have to take me on a date for us to actually be 'dating,' Beca," she keeps her voice light and humorous, and it works, because, though she hadn't quite taken notice of the brunette's muscles when they'd tightened up, she could feel them relaxing, now; Beca's shoulders drop, her hand on Aubrey's arm dipping lower, softly trailing into the curve of her elbow, her foot (mingled between both of Aubrey's) gently nudging at Aubrey's ankle.
"Is there a reason that I have to initiate this date?" Beca queries dryly, but there's something else in her words, too; something warm and, Aubrey thinks, content.
Aubrey feels it, too. And maybe it wasn't the promise that she'd made to herself that drew out her blasé response, because she feels… really good about this. Happy with it, even. Like it's right. Like it's something that Aubrey had wanted for herself – for them – and hadn't quite allowed herself to acknowledge that desire.
They'd been toeing the edges of something deeper for months, crossing the lines often, and refusing to retreat to safer places until too many days later, only to start all over again.
Aubrey hadn't felt like they'd been missing anything; she and Beca spoke often (and shared more than they'd planned or sometimes wanted), and they made it a point to see each other almost daily, even just to hangout without sex (which happened very infrequently, Aubrey notes, satisfied); they cuddled (after some strong initial hesitations from each of them that fell to the wayside about a month or two into their arrangement, in favor of physical need and comfort), and they soothed one another after particularly terrible days.
Everything was fine between them. Good, she thinks, just like Beca had said.
But, though Aubrey had previously fought hard against the notion, this promise for something more feels even better. It feels like something has slotted into place, like everything that they'd put on 'pause' now has free permission to progress as it pleases, without doubt or hesitation or hiccup.
"I'm not the one who was unexpectedly bitten by the relationship bug," Aubrey teases, drawing a vague pattern against Beca's bare thigh. "I'll take date number two."
Beca rolls her eyes, and pulls sharply against a strand of Aubrey's hair in reprimand for the quip. Aubrey finally lifts her chin from Beca's chest to glower up at her, but it swiftly dissolves into something fond, instead. Beca's expression is soft, and pleased, and she looks down at Aubrey with gleaming, happy eyes as she sighs affectionately, "You're so high-maintenance, Posen. I really should have taken that under higher consideration before I asked you to date me."
"You didn't ask me to date you," Aubrey plays along with a snort. "All you did was skirt around a question. Very suave, Beca. Really," she jibes.
"It worked, didn't it?" Beca huffs instantly. "Plus, you skirted around an answer, so you're no better."
Aubrey wants to tell Beca that she is better, purely off of competitive instinct, and not for any true, solid reason (especially since Aubrey really believes that, if anything, it's actually the other way around), but she thinks that could probably turn into a pretty heated debate, pretty (disconcertingly) quickly.
Instead, she allows the quiet of the room to answer for her, because they don't do any real arguing in bed; it's their one rule, and aside from fucking out the anger that those arguments were derived from – which they've collectively decided does not technically count as 'arguing' – they adhere to it very strictly.
"It's okay," Beca says quietly, a careful smile lifting at the corners of her mouth. "I like you this way."
Aubrey thinks her heart puddles into some cavity in her ribs, where it definitely doesn't belong. It should probably concern her a little more than it does, but it feels nice – like a hot cup of coffee in the middle of winter, or the heat blasting in the car with the windows down in early spring (which Beca does all the time, in spite of Aubrey's ample protests to the blatant squandering of natural resources).
"You're okay," Aubrey shrugs nonchalantly instead, offering an affectionate smile to communicate the true meaning of her words.
(Something that would probably be verbally expressed as, "I think you're incredible," or "I might sometimes be in love with you, like maybe right now.")
Beca chuckles and ducks her head, pleating a gentle kiss across Aubrey's forehead.
Aubrey thinks she swoons a little, but that's both undignified and absurdly, overly sentimental, so she buries the reaction as much as she can, until there's nothing left of it but for the gentle scrape of her nails over Beca's naked hip, and a fierce desire to kiss that tender little smile that she thinks is temporarily stapled into Beca's face.
Aubrey allows herself to cave under that desire, raising her palm to stroke cool fingers against Beca's heated cheek, and arching upward to trace the brunette's lips with her own.
It's Friday night that they go on their date, and, as Aubrey has become accustomed to, Chloe isn't home when Beca knocks on their door at nine.
(Aubrey catches glimpses of the redhead, mostly from the corners of her eyes as Chloe sprints around the apartment in search of her textbooks; they share greetings and a weekly catch-up session on Sunday afternoons, but Chloe's rarely around unless it's planned and fits snugly into her hectic schedule.
Aubrey thinks that must be why Chloe is still so dubious about the relationship that she and Beca share together. Chloe's never really there to see it. But most of the time, Aubrey's pretty sure that Chloe (and Cynthia-Rose, and Fat Amy, and Stacie, and voiceless Lily, and – well, essentially everyone they know) thought that it was a bad joke when she and Beca had confessed to it.
She idly wonders what they'll think when they realize what it's grown into.)
Beca takes her to a nice restaurant – a classy place, with white tablecloths and steak, expensive wines, and soft, classical music echoing mutedly from hidden speakers – but Aubrey can't appreciate it. Not really.
And it's not even her fault.
Beca's wearing a teal number, strapless, with a teasing sweetheart neckline that doesn't quite show anything, but definitely displays what Beca has available to show, and Aubrey thinks it's distracting; only slightly more distracting than the dress' length. The hem falls a few inches above Beca's knees, but 'falls' is really a generous word, because Aubrey doesn't think it does much of that at all; it mostly just clings, and shapes around thighs that Aubrey is now distinctly remembering being hugged around her hips the night before.
Aubrey's outfitted pretty nicely, too – a black halter dress, with a respectable, but plunging neckline, that ends somewhere around her own knees, and it's significantly looser around the skirt than her lover's, with a subtle bow tied across the front with the ribbon of material that belts around her waist – but, even as confident as she feels about her appearance (because she'd worked at it for hours that afternoon), Aubrey feels like nothing could hold a candle to Beca tonight.
She's pretty sure of that, until after their drinks arrive, and her gaze trails sluggishly up from Beca's throat (Aubrey wants to mark it, badly), and meets with her date's.
(Aubrey withholds a Chloe-like squeal when she mentally celebrates the notion that, yes, Beca Mitchell is her date for the evening.)
Beca's looking at her bashfully, a dull, pink flush coloring her cheeks, but she smiles, slow and soft (a smile that Aubrey knows only she is privy to), and her eyes twinkle like nothing outside of a Disney movie ever has a right to as she earnestly murmurs, just above a whisper, "You know you look amazing, right?"
"Thank you," Aubrey blushes, but ignores it as well as she can manage. "You look… beautiful, Beca."
It's true. She's told Beca before, with the brunette naked, lying pliantly beneath her (a rare occurrence), while Aubrey ghosts muted fingers across hot, desperate skin, on nights where the line between 'friend' and 'dedicated lover' had inescapably, irrefutably been breached; but Aubrey hasn't ever told Beca how stunning she thinks she is outside of the bedroom.
Beca grins nervously, and flits her fingers absently at the waist of her dress. "Yeah? Not too much?"
"If anything," Aubrey finds herself purring in a voice she isn't actually sure that she's ever used before, and hadn't previously been aware that she possessed, "it's too little."
(Aubrey means it.
All that skin made available for her viewing pleasure makes it hard for Aubrey to breathe, let alone converse.)
Beca swallows thickly. "Don't do that, Posen," she glares. "We're making it through this dinner even if it kills us."
Feeling bold, Aubrey replies flirtatiously, "If you insist. But I have a few other- appetites that I'd be happy to let you satisfy, instead."
Beca frowns.
Aubrey's startled by it, because she'd expected… something else, even if she wasn't exactly sure what it was. Maybe something dirty, or teasing, or promising, but something that Aubrey knows was not a frown.
"Do you want to leave?" Beca asks, gesturing vaguely toward the exit. "We can, if you want," she rushes, her cheeks turning dark with what Aubrey can now identify as severe embarrassment.
"Oh, Beca," Aubrey says soothingly, reaching out her palm to rub softly against Beca's forearm, now resting tensely against the table. "No. I'm happy that we're doing this."
"You're sure?" Beca asks, lifting her brows.
(Aubrey does not feel her heart ache when Beca's eyes flit searchingly across her face for any hint of deception.
But maybe she does, just a little, because it does actually break her heart some. She knows that Beca's asking because that would be exactly the kind of back-and-forth, up-and-down, there-then-absent behavior that Beca has learnt from the people who have claimed feelings for her in the past, and Beca's become accustomed to accommodating it.
Aubrey hates them, in that moment.
… More than usual.)
"Let's be honest, Beca," Aubrey tries for a smile, trailing her fingers lightly down to Beca's wrist, "we've been half-dating for months now. If I didn't want to be here with you, I would've stopped spending time with you a long time ago."
Beca evaluates her for another moment, then smirks confidently (Aubrey doesn't understand the mercurial nature of Beca's emotions, but she's happy enough to be able to pick them out, even if she can't comprehend the quickness with which they descend) and says, "Good. Because after dinner," she leans closer – and, by instinct, Aubrey does, too – to whisper, "I fully intend to tear that dress off and satisfy every appetite you can think of."
Aubrey blinks. Twice.
That was what she'd expected, before – but Beca was always really good at exceeding expectations. And maybe the words were anticipated, but the hardly-stifled desire behind them surprises Aubrey, and the brunette's breath, coasting along her cheek, feels heavy and warm, and everything around her feels so much thicker.
"I look forward to that," Aubrey says, trying to keep her tone easy and coquettish, but she can hear the crack that hitches midway through, and if the deepening smirk on Beca's face is anything to go by, her date could hear it, also.
Conversation thereafter is easy and fluid, and kept on a tight, PG-13 leash, because Aubrey's now determined to make it through dinner for Beca, and if she's faced with any more flirting like that, she's pretty positive that she'll be compromising those intentions.
But even without the flirting, this is different than any of the 'first' dates that Aubrey's been on, because this really isn't their first; it's probably their thousandth.
Aubrey already knows Beca. And, though it had made her uneasy to realize it a couple months prior, Aubrey had eventually settled herself comfortably with the fact that Beca knows her.
They aren't testing the waters or feeling each other out; they're here because they know each other, deeply, and in ways that few others do, and they want more. More definition, more clarity, more freedom to act without having to filter every motion through whatever it was that determined whether or not their behaviors would be misinterpreted or unwelcome, given the vague status of their relationship.
This is Aubrey and Beca, in their most open form, sharing company with each other.
Aubrey tries not to let that thought get away from her, but she can't really help that it makes her smile. She wasn't lying; she's truly, honestly happy, right here with Beca, and she can't actually remember ever enjoying herself so much.
When the waiter takes their plates away some time later, Beca asks if Aubrey wants dessert.
(But Aubrey's been eyeing the fold of Beca's mouth around her water glass all evening, and that taunting cut of her dress hasn't gotten any more modest, despite that it's appropriate attire for the establishment.
Aubrey doesn't care.
It captures her interest, anyway, and she's had a really hard time keeping her eyes on Beca's face, tonight.
She's had a drastically more difficult time keeping her mind from venturing into thoughts about all that exposed flesh, and what she wants to do to it.
Aubrey definitely doesn't want dessert.)
"I have other things I'd rather be doing right now, Beca," Aubrey confesses quietly. "Not that this hasn't been wonderful, but- I'm really ready to go home," she says meaningfully, momentarily immobilizing Beca with a heavy look that Aubrey knows is dark and needy.
Beca takes the check before Aubrey can even spot it being lowered to the table.
(Aubrey wonders for a second how much money Beca is shelling out for this, and falls a little further for the brunette, because she knows it can't be cheap, with the Pinot Noir and the shrimp appetizers – Aubrey carefully avoided the garlic dipping sauce, and, she noted with amusement, Beca did, too – and the crab cakes that Aubrey had ordered, after deciding that she was really feeling the seafood vibe.
She probably should've taken Beca's bank account into consideration when she'd ordered, Aubrey thinks sheepishly, but it hadn't occurred to her before.)
Aubrey's eyes hone in on Beca's when the brunette's lips part to speak, but Aubrey isn't prepared for what she says.
"You have no idea what I want to do to you right now, Aubrey," Beca whispers, like it's a surprise to her, too, how desperately she wants Aubrey, right then.
Aubrey can't respond. She wants to (really, really wants to), but she can't fight through the arousal that shocks through her body long enough to actually find the words that she needs.
She's fortunate that the waiter returns, then, with Beca's receipt, and the DJ quickly signs it, not bothering to properly calculate a tip and scribbling a hefty, exorbitant sum on the empty line that will definitely make their waiter's night.
(Yes, Aubrey can see the meal's total, now – and she wonders how the two of them could possibly have consumed over a hundred dollars worth of food in one sitting.)
Beca's fingers slot comfortably, but unfamiliarly into the gaps between Aubrey's, and she squeezes once, glancing up at Aubrey with a look that essentially asks, "Is this okay?" before Beca can even voice it aloud.
But when she does, Aubrey smiles, and nods shyly. "I guess we're dating now, right?" She laughs airily. "Which makes hand-holding acceptable."
"I mean, I did take you out. That was the deal, right?" Beca chuckles.
"Mm," Aubrey hums as Beca's cheek tucks, just for a moment, against her uncovered shoulder (it was an unusually warm night, for March). "It was. And now that we're going home," she husks, tipping her head sideways just slightly to tickle her next words into Beca's ear, "I'd really like to fuck my girlfriend."
Beca inhales sharply through her nose and jerks her head away, pulling her fingers from Aubrey's with almost startling force.
(Aubrey tries very hard not to mimic Beca's all-but-trademarked smirk.)
Beca doesn't say anything until they get to the car, snapping her keys from her silver clutch and wrenching the passenger door open in a way that actually makes Aubrey feel satisfied with the sturdiness of the door's hinges.
"Get in the damn car, Aubrey," Beca says impatiently. "I'm taking you home."
It sounds almost angry, but Aubrey knows this tone; it comes right before some really intense bedroom endeavors, and Aubrey's learned to feel shameless, lustful anticipation as soon as she hears it.
Author's Note (Part Deux): Let me know what you think, guys. This is going to be short (I mean it, this time; three, maybe four chapters – and I've already finished the second and most of the third), because I'm working on Sixteen Days, too, and I'm kind of too in love with that story to escape writing the next chapter, soon.