A/N: Just a short drabble about friendship and an idea for Beca's story. As always, no copyright infringement intended on either characters or songs mentioned.
Beca entered their rehearsal space and was greeted by a few soft notes from the piano that usually just stood ignored among chairs and a blackboard Aubrey liked to sketch their 'way to victory' on. She looked over at the one occupant in the room, Chloe, who sat at the instrument, brows furrowed in concentration. She played a couple of notes and Beca thought she recognized the song. It was one of her mother's favorites.
"Hey," the brunette greeted her friend and came over.
"Hey, Becs. You're early," Chloe said and smiled at the younger woman before looking back at the keys of the piano.
"So are you. Where's Aubrey, isn't she usually the first one here?"
"She's still in class. One of her professors is doing a double-session today because he won't be there next week... darn, I can't get this song together. I knew it by heart," she then cursed. Beca smiled a small smile and sat down next to the redhead.
"Is it this one?" she asked and then expertly pressed the keys to the melody she had recognized earlier. Chloe's face broke into an instant smile, she beamed at Beca whose concentration was on the instrument now.
"How do you know it?" the redhead asked.
"I used to play it with my mom - and for my mom."
"I didn't know you could play," Chloe said, watching Beca intently before taking over for Beca's left. They played together until Chloe played a wrong note, cursing again:
"Damn, I just... I can't get it together anymore. It's been so long since I played."
"Why have you given it up?" Beca asked and stopped playing also.
"My parents were really proud of me and had me play for their friends on every party they gave... and my parents love to give parties... well, that's not really something a 15 year-old wants to do - miss out on time with her own friends so that she can play for a bunch of old folks... okay, they weren't really that old. But I was fifteen, everybody is old when you're 15..." Chloe smiled.
"I guess," the brunette answered, not overly familiar with a lifestyle where your parents gave fancy cocktail parties - or where you had your own instrument to play on. She herself had learned playing with a teacher in high school on the school instrument and only because her music instructor could spare the time and loved doing it. She had taught Beca a lot about music and life - something she couldn't say for a lot of her instructors, then or now.
"Did your mom teach you?" Chloe asked her friend. Beca shook her head, resuming to play some notes, slow, melancholy ones. She looked deep in thought and Chloe watched her for a few moments. "Are you okay?" the redhead asked and the younger woman looked up. Chloe saw tears in those dark blue orbs and by instinct reached out and grabbed Beca's left arm.
"I..." Beca tried a small smile but it failed to materialize as the tears started running down her cheeks. "I had forgotten about this song. My mom loved it," she said, her right hand now resting lightly on the keys while her left clutched Chloe's hand.
"Loved?" Chloe asked, unsure if she should deepen this conversation if it pained her friend.
"She lost her taste in music - and life," Beca said. She heaved a deep sigh and looked at the instrument for a moment. She seemed to debate whether to continue this conversation or not. "My mom's... she's in a mental institution. She has been for almost a year now," she then said. She felt Chloe's hand squeeze her own harder then letting go. But she didn't cease the contact and pulled away like many people would have done - Beca knew this from experience, people were often shocked by a revelation like this. Instead Chloe's hand ran up her arm to her shoulder - caressing, comforting - until it came to rest on her back, pulling Beca into a hug she only accepted reluctantly.
"I'm so sorry," the senior whispered compassionately.
Beca closed her eyes, let herself move forward into a slightly awkward, one-armed embrace. It was still comforting. Chloe seemed to read her body language perfectly, knew just what to do and what to say to make people feel better. Beca had observed this in the past few months with almost every single Bella. The redhead was the one people turned to with their problems and Chloe always had an open ear and two open arms to comfort. Beca had never thought that she herself would fall into them this willingly and over something she hadn't voluntarily told anybody.
Beca was the one ending the hug as she pulled out of it and Chloe let her arm fall away from her back only to come around to capture her hand again.
"Thank you," the younger woman said in a low voice. Chloe only nodded, looking at Beca intently, waiting for her friend to tell her more, anything she wanted to talk about. And for the first time since she had found her mother lying on her bed - comatose from an overdose of sleeping pills - she felt like talking about it.
"She tried to kill herself with sleeping pills. It wasn't the first time either. She's never been... stable, I guess you could say. When my dad left eight years ago, she got worse but was still able to pull herself out of her slumps most of the time. She had a boyfriend, Jason. He was good to her but... being with a bipolar person can be taxing and... he left her, too. It was too much for my mom and..." Beca shook her head, fighting another flood of tears. Successfully this time. "It has never been this bad. And the place where they put her back home... it was a dreary place, something you would imagine a mental hospital in the 70s to be, you know. So, my dad suggested we come down here, both of us. I could study for free and my mom would be in a more cheerful place where I could visit."
"Is she getting better?" Beca shook her head.
"If she is I'm not seeing it. At first, I would play the piano for her and she would listen. But not anymore. I don't even know what's happening. She's clinically depressed, she tries to hurt herself, she... it seems that she only held it together until I was of age to... completely fall apart. I don't know..."
"Shhhh," Chloe made and once again pulled Beca to her. She used both her arms now, encircling the defeated posture of a young woman who always seemed so strong to her. It had just been an act, Beca was hurting and it was not surprising that she kept her feelings bottled up inside: she had probably been taking care of her mother more than the other way around. With her father gone there had been no one to take care of her. Now she clung to Chloe like she was a lifeline, and maybe she was.
And Chloe held her, told her to let go, to trust, to fall. She would be there.
Beca pulled away after awhile, rubbing at her tears, straightening her back.
"I'm okay," she said and it didn't take a rocket scientist to see that she was not. But Chloe could tell it was a safety mechanism for the younger woman who couldn't allow herself to fall apart. She nodded.
"Would you... show me how to play that song from earlier. I would like to re-learn it," Chloe said after a few moments she gave Beca to compose herself.
"Yeah, sure. Here... this is the beginning." Beca placed her hands on the keys and played the first few bars. She let Chloe repeat them - almost without mistake. They kept doing it and the smile and confidence slowly returned to Beca. Chloe was a quick study and before half and hour had passed, they played the song together in its entirety.
"You must have been quite the virtuoso. You play beautifully," Beca said.
"Thank you. I liked playing but I never loved it as much as singing," Chloe told her.
"I know the feeling."
They smiled at each other. Beca played a few bars of another melody with her left hand. It was a more cheerful song.
"You're really good, too." Chloe said.
"I pick it up easily but my fingerwork is that of a peasant," the younger woman admitted. Chloe laughed.
"A peasant?" Beca joined Chloe in her laughter.
"Yeah, well. I never had a kind of formal education. My instructor was my high school teacher. She was good but... well, she was a high school teacher." Chloe nodded. Her own teachers had been concert pianists.
Beca's hands stilled on the keys.
"You won't tell anyone... about my mom. Right?" She then asked, looking up at her friend with pleading eyes.
"Of course not."
"No one, not even Aubrey." Chloe shook her head.
"I won't tell, I promise. Not even Aubrey," the redhead swore. Beca nodded.
"Thank you."
They sat silent for a moment. Then they heard voices from outside and some of their friends entered the auditorium, chatting animatedly and chasing away the last remnants of Beca's shadowed life until she was singing and laughing once again. Chloe marvelled at her strength, admired her talent and vowed to herself that she would always be Beca's friend.
Song: Thank You for the Music by ABBA