AN: So this sprawling opus that you are about to read started off as a little oneshot, based on a tumblr prompt I saw awhile back. When I started writing it I had planned on it being a few thousand words and a very quick project, now almost thirty thousand words and quite a few months later, it's finally done!
I'm breaking it up into a few chapters because it gets pretty heavy and angsty in the middle and I think it will be easier to digest this way, but fear not, the entire story is written and I'll be posting a chapter every couple of days or so.
Now like I said this does get seriously angsty around the middle-ish, but stick with me and I think, in the end, it will all be worthwhile.
Also I'm waiting to post the prompt because it kind of gives the entire story away.
So… without further ado…
Submitted for your approval…
Disclaimer: I do not own Pitch Perfect 1 or 2 or any of the characters therein. I also do not own any trademarked or copyrighted places or things that are mentioned.
Beca was sitting on the floor in her office when she heard the landline telephone ring. Without much thought at all, she decided to ignore it. After a few rings the answering machine clicked on and the message began to play. Chloe's bright voice filled the room.
"Hi you've reached Chloe and Beca we're not home right now, but leave us a message and we'll get back to you as soon as we can."
Beca heard the beep and then a beat of silence before Stacie's voice rang out into the small room.
"Hi Beca, it's Stace. Are you really not home or are you just screening…? If you are home, please pick up."
Beca sat staring blankly at the blue flashing light on the machine, that indicated there was a message being recorded, but made no move to do anything about it.
After waiting a moment, Stacie, having done this enough times to know that Beca wouldn't pick up even if she was home, continued.
"OK I guess you're not there. Anyway, give me a call when you get this. We're all worried about you. Please just call and let us know you're alright, ok? Ok, Bye… Call me."
The room fell silent as the line went dead and Beca saw the blinking light on the machine turn from blue to red, indicating that there was now a new message waiting to be played. She sighed. She knew she should get up and shower, leave the house, see her friends, or at the very least grab the phone and call Stacie back, but as much as she tried to will her legs to stand, or her arms to reach for the phone, they simply would not.
She sighed again, frustrated at her own inability, and looked back down to the block of sticky notes sitting in front of her. She picked it up and wrote 'sparkling eyes' on the top note, before putting her pen down, peeling the note she had just written off the block and sticking it to the wall in front of her.
One year earlier
Two weeks after winning world's, Beca was sitting at the kitchen island in the Bella house, staring down at her phone, rereading the email she had just received.
"Beca!"
Beca jumped at the sound of her name being shouted and looked up from her phone to see Chloe standing by the fridge with a bottle of water in her hand, looking slightly annoyed.
"Huh? What? Sorry." Beca said still in a bit of a daze.
Chloe put both hands on her hips and stared pointedly at Beca. "Seriously Becs? I've been standing here talking to you for five minutes. Is Facebook really that important?"
Beca chuckled "No, Chlo, it wasn't Facebook. I was reading an email. Sorry, what's up?"
"Eh, don't worry about it. It wasn't important anyway." Chloe waved the question off as she climbed up on the bar stool across the island from Beca, "Who was the email from? A secret admirer?" Chloe asked with a wink.
Beca, being mostly used to Chloe's flirting at this point, laughed and answered, "Not hardly. It's from my boss at Residual Heat."
"Uh oh." Chloe said with a grimace before picking up the wooden spoon that was laying on the counter in front of her and waving it like a fairy wand, asking in a high pitched voice "Are you a good email or a bad email?"
The Wizard of OZ was one of the few movies that Beca actually liked and she laughed at the cheesy reference, earning a bright smile from Chloe.
"Um. It's a good email actually." Beca said returning Chloe's smile with a shy one of her own.
Chloe, always Beca's biggest cheerleader, beamed at the woman sitting across from her. "Well? What's the news?" She finally asked when Beca didn't elaborate.
"Remember that demo that Legacy and I recorded?" Beca asked and waited for a response. When Chloe nodded her head vigorously, indicating that she did, Beca continued. "Well it seems that it got sent to Katy Perry and she loved it."
Beca was sure that the high pitched squeal that came out of Chloe, should have shattered every piece of glassware in the entire neighborhood, in addition to liquefying part of her own brain, but the pain in her ears was quickly forgotten as Chloe jumped up, rounded the island and threw her arms around Beca pulling her close. Beca wrapped her arms around Chloe's waist and gave her a light squeeze as Chloe whispered into her hair.
"Becs, that is so amazing! I knew you could do it."
Beca felt her grin threaten to split her face in two as she pulled back slightly so she could look at Chloe.
"Thank you, but that's not even the best part."
Chloe's bright blue eyes widened, as she looked at Beca expectantly. Her arms still resting on the younger woman's shoulders.
"Capitol Records, who is the parent company of Katy's new label…" Chloe nodded, obviously wanting Beca to get to the good part "Offered me a job!" Beca finally finished with a little excited squeak that if ever asked about, by anyone other than Chloe, she would firmly deny.
Chloe let loose another squeal, this one, Beca was sure, was half a step away from only being audible to dogs, before pulling Beca tight against her chest again. They held each other for a few moments before Chloe finally pulled back just enough to see Beca's face and looked deeply into her dark blue eyes.
"I knew you could do it." She repeated softly.
Beca returned Chloe's smile, but she noticed that something wasn't quite right. The glowing smile on the redhead's face was genuine, but there was a tightness around her eyes that was unusual and hadn't been there a moment ago. Beca didn't have time to think much about what it meant before Amy came bursting into the kitchen with Cynthia Rose and Stacie following closely behind.
Amy took one look at Beca and Chloe and turned to the two girls behind her. "You guys owe me ten bucks each. I told you that was the sound of them finally getting it on. Lesbi-honest."
Cynthia Rose and Stacie laughed, as Beca and Chloe both rolled their eyes and Chloe pulled away, rounding the island to sit back on the bar stool where she had started the conversation.
"No Amy, we were not getting it on. Beca just got some great news and was telling me about it."
"Is that what the kids are calling it these days?" Amy quickly came back, earning a snicker from Stacie and another eye roll from Beca and Chloe. "But seriously Shortstack, what's the news?"
Beca waited a second for Chloe to jump in and squeal out the announcement, like she had been doing consistently for the last four years, but after a moment of silence and a quick glance over to see Chloe sitting there watching her, with the same smile and tightness around her eyes that had been there a few minutes before, Beca made a quick mental note to ask Chloe about it later and said simply, "I got a job offer from Capitol Records."
"What? That's amazing! Congrats Shorty!" Amy said as she walked over and pulled Beca in for a rib crushing bear hug.
As soon as Amy let Beca go, Stacie pulled her in for a quick one arm hug and Cynthia Rose gave her a playful punch to the shoulder. Both of them congratulating her at the same time.
"This calls for a celebration!" Amy said happily before yelling "Assemble the minions!" and walking out of the kitchen, with Stacie and Cynthia Rose once again close behind her.
Beca laughed and shook her head. "You know, before I met Amy I never knew the word celebration could sound so ominous."
Chloe nodded absently and chuckled softly.
Beca, getting more concerned by the second, reached over and put her hand on top of Chloe's. "Chlo are you ok?"
"Yeah, of course Becs. Why?" Chloe came back a little too quickly to be believable.
"I dunno, you just seem a little off, I guess."
Chloe smiled the same tight smile and reached over, with her free hand, and patted Beca's hand. "I'm fine Becs. Really. Now come on let's go get ready for whatever Amy is planning."
Beca nodded, deciding not to press the issue for the moment. Chloe got up and made her way out of the kitchen, leaving Beca to a few moments alone with her thoughts.
Amy's idea of a celebration, was just like everything else that Amy did. Epic. She had taken all of them out to a little bar, close to campus called The Outback, that claimed to have dingo wrestling. In reality it was just random people wrestling with a large stuffed dog, in something that looked like a ball pit at a fast food playground, but the drinks were strong and after a few of them, the spectacle actually became quite entertaining.
A few hours later and all the Bella's were tucked snug in their beds, contentedly sleeping off the alcohol. Except for Beca, who was laying in her bed, wide awake, tossing and turning, trying to figure out what was going on with Chloe.
Chloe had gone out with all of them, and had talked and laughed just like always, but there was a stiffness to everything she did that Beca had never seen before. She thought back over the day, trying to find something that might have upset Chloe, but for the life of her she couldn't come up with anything. She knew it had started after she had told Chloe about the job offer, but there was nothing about that that should have upset the redhead.
Beca was startled out of her thoughts by the sound of somebody walking up the steps to her and Amy's attic room. She squinted into the darkness to try to see who it was. A moment later she saw a familiar silhouette that was clearly her favorite redhead.
"Hey Chlo. Everything ok?" Beca whispered, doing her best not to wake Amy.
"Yeah. I'm ok. Do you mind if I crash with you tonight?"
"No, I don't mind at all." Beca responded automatically, as she pulled the blankets back and scooted over to make room for Chloe. It wasn't the first time that they had shared a bed, or even the first time one of them had gone to the other's room in the middle of the night seeking the comfort the other offered.
Chloe climbed into bed and turned on her side facing Beca. In the dim light Beca could just make out the shape of Chloe's face and if the fact that she was here to begin with didn't tip Beca off that there was something wrong, the tense set of the redhead's jaw would have.
"Chlo?"
"Becs?"
"Are you sure you're ok?"
Chloe brought her hand up to rest on top of Beca's and gave it a quick squeeze.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Goodnight."
Chloe usually wore her emotions on her sleeve for all the world to see, and was always more than happy to talk about them. This new closed off thing was really throwing Beca for a loop. So she did the only thing she could think of. She laced their fingers together and said "Goodnight Chlo. Sleep tight."
Beca felt, more than saw Chloe smile, as she said "You too, Becs."
Three hours later Beca woke up to a soft noise she couldn't quite place. She saw Chloe laying on her side facing the opposite direction and was just about to brush the noise off as 'one of those noises that just happens when you live in a house with nine other girls' when she noticed Chloe's shoulders shaking slightly and realized the noise was sniffling. Chloe was crying.
Beca was still for a moment. She didn't quite know what to do. Sure she had seen Chloe cry in the past, a few of those times she was even able to move past her natural awkwardness and comfort her like a normal person, but all of those times Beca had at least some idea of why she was crying. Could have at least traced it back to one of a few things, but this time she was at a total loss.
After a brief moment of internal debate, she went with the one thing she knew. The one thing that was a surefire way to cure anything that ailed one Chloe Eliza Beale. Cuddles.
Beca slowly scooted the very small distance between them and wrapped her arm around Chloe's waist, holding her tight. Chloe, startled by the movement, jumped, before whispering into the darkness as she relaxed back against Beca.
"I hope I didn't wake you. I'm sorry if I did."
"Hey, it's ok. I don't know what woke me honestly."
Seeming happy with the answer, Chloe snuggled in tighter to Beca.
After a few moments of lying there holding her friend, Beca broke the silence.
"Chloe, will you please tell me what's wrong? And don't say that you're fine again. You've been saying that all day and it's obviously not true." Beca said as she brought the arm that had been wrapped around Chloe, up to the redhead's cheek and wiped a tear away with the pad of her thumb.
Chloe sighed deeply. "No, I'm not ok."
Beca waited for Chloe to continue and when she didn't, said "You know you can talk to me about anything right?"
"I know." Chloe said with a small sad smile "It's just really hard."
"What is?" Beca asked.
"It's just your whole job thing."
"What about it?" The longer this conversation went on, the more lost Beca was getting.
Chloe sighed again. Beca had come leaps and bounds from the closed off girl she had been freshmen year, but sometimes she still needed thing spelled out for her.
"I dunno. I guess, ever since I met you, I just always pictured us living close to each other and being really involved in each other's lives, but now you're moving to LA to follow your dreams. Which is totes great, don't get me wrong, but I'm staying here and I guess I just wish I was going to be there to see your success happen first hand."
Beca blew out the breath she had been holding. Everything had been happening so fast, she hadn't really had time to stop and think. Any time she thought about her future she had always seen Chloe right there by her side. In fact, she couldn't actually think of any good scenario where Chloe wasn't there.
"Come with me."
Beca jumped at the sound of her own voice, she hadn't meant to say anything.
"What?" Chloe asked as she rolled over onto her back, so she could look at Beca with wide eyes.
"Come with me to LA." She said again, quickly realizing that even though she hadn't meant to say it, she did actually mean it. Maybe more than she had ever meant anything in her whole life.
"Beca." Chloe said, her voice taking on a stern tone, "Now is not the time to joke with me."
"No, Chloe I'm serious. Come with me. Move to LA with me. We can share a place until you find a teaching job, and even after that if you want. The studio will be paying for my house for the first two years of my contract, so that'll give us time to get on our feet." Beca said like it was the simplest concept in the world, which when she thought about it, it kind of was.
Chloe looked at Beca hard for a solid minute, as if trying to make sure she could really believe what she was hearing.
"Beca, you haven't even had time to think about this." Chloe said, finally breaking the silence.
"What's to think about?" Beca came back immediately.
"You're sure this is what you want?" Chloe asked, the first hesitant notes of hope, sounding in her voice.
"My God woman!" Beca said in mock exasperation, but with a smile on her face. "Yes Chloe, I'm sure. Please come to LA with me." Beca took a deep breath before adding, her voice much softer, the teasing tone she had had a moment before gone. "It just wouldn't be right without you there anyway."
Chloe, having apparently heard what she needed to make her decision, squealed in excitement and pulled Beca in tight against her chest in a bone crushing hug.
Beca laughed while shushing Chloe, as excited as she herself was about the decision, she did not want to have to deal with a cranky, freshly woken Australian this late at night.
