So, merry (late) Pitchmas to my wonderfully patient partner in crime here. A little Christmas fun ;)
So, this wasn't really how Beca had planned for the evening to go. There were many things that were predictable about it, yes, and she could only chastise herself for it so much before it just became a little bit nonsensical. But, whichever way she chose to look at it; she could still concede to the idea that this wasn't the course of action she'd put any kind of preparation into.
Because, come on, no one ever wants to admit that they're sauced off of rum and eggnog thanks to a Tasmanian and a buxom brunette known as Stacie throwing a festive, surprise 'last day of the Bellas being together before everyone disperses for Christmas' type thing. But, a fact is a fact. Beca is- has, she can tell- slipped down that fragile line of being just tipsy enough to feel it, to the point of no return. She comes to this revelation somewhere between staring, useless and blurry-eyed as Amy, Chloe, Stacie, and Cynthia Rose attempt to construct a gingerbread house. All hands on deck, holding the cookie walls up; or, in Chloe's case, concentrating on applying a firm, yet artistic line of frosting with so much focus that she has her tongue held between her teeth. Where it's been for the past few minutes, Beca is sure, but the redhead doesn't seem to have noticed. Beca has, which is something she idly notes she should probably reflect on later. Maybe. Probably not. What does it matter?
So, yeah. Between staring and realizing that. Beca not only realizes this, she decides to document it in the form of text.
To: Jesse.
I'm kind of fucked
Somewhere, Jessica and Ashley are singing a duet of Mariah Carey. Chloe gasps, throwing her head back in a whirl of red hair and jubilance; hands constricting around the tube of icing and setting a glob out of line. The girls surrounding her let out a mutual cry of frantic panic and disappointment. "Chloe!" Stacie whines, breaking one hand free of where she had held onto the left hand wall, to scoop the offending icing up with her finger. Rather sheepishly, Chloe turns back to the group, "Sorry. I get excited when I hear Mariah,"
"I do too," Amy's voice is a low, stern octave; the tone that gives the impression that one was explaining something rather difficult to a child, "But I don't go busting up the neighbourhood. I keep it in my pants, like a good girl,"
Her phone vibrates against Beca's thigh; not soon enough, she thinks, having not been saved from that traumatic mental image.
Jesse:
Oh? do tell becaw
And it's weird, Beca thinks, how not weird it is to be broken up with Jesse. Their interactions were, mostly, the same. Minus a kiss here and there, and, you know, she had the occasional bombardment of sex flashbacks- that usually struck at inopportune moments- but, they had remained the same people they were before. Just, they no longer had a label tying them together. There was no more 'Beca and Jesse' that strung out between them like weird, red fine print. The couple. Those words no longer applied to their two beings, which, oftentimes, seemed to cause irreparable damage between two people, but that just wasn't the case. And she was- not that she'd ever dream about telling Jesse- thankful for that. The less awkward get-togethers or run-ins Beca could potentially have with people, the better.
No, like, I mean. I'm kind of fucked up right now I think
Despite this knowledge, something in her isn't worried. There is a far-away, rational voice telling her how much she's going to loathe having a hangover tomorrow while trying to function around her dad and Sheila, but it was mostly squashed by the part of her that came alive when she was drunk. The irresponsible, 'don't-give-a-shit' monster that liked to push her to do things she regretted in her sober life. But she kept on listening to it as she picked up her drink from the living room table and sipped back on it.
Jesse:
holiday drinking without me? :(
"Easy easy easy easy," The mantra is suddenly being hissed somewhere close to her ear, as Flo has taken residence leaning over Beca's shoulder. Her eyes wide and concerned as the girls slowly lowered a ginger bread roof atop of the house.
Jesse:
I'm offended and all, but how's that a bad thing?
Beca didn't really have a lot of experience with the whole 'dating' thing before Jesse. Which meant, evidently, she didn't really have any idea how the whole 'breaking up' thing went, especially when it was as mutual and good-natured as theirs was. In a way, it would have been a hell of a lot easier on her if he had just uncharacteristically resolved on hating Beca for the rest of his life and never speaking to her again. Because that would make the boundaries perfectly clear. With their friendship still in tact, those lines were a little bit more foggy. A booze-addled brain sporadically trying to make decisions didn't make the situation any clearer for her. Not with Jesse. Not with Chloe. But he didn't know that- for the love of Jesus, she barely knew that- which meant trying to somehow convey the considerably weirder feeling in the bottom of her gut was not easy. She wasn't sure why, for a second, she hoped it would be when she sent that first text.
I'm like, having this really weird thought i think? About things I haven't really thought about? before?
The liquor somehow made her anxious but brave, even though she felt a little weird for squirrelling into herself during Bellas Holiday Party Time. She just needed a minute. Or a few. Several, maybe, followed by some deep breathing exercises.
Beca rises from the armchair she'd been inhabiting for the past twenty minutes, taking her drink with her. By some miracle, she manages to slip away unnoticed, the alcohol sort of burning in her stomach as she vies for the second-floor bathroom as a safe space. Using her body to shut the door behind her, she fishes for the phone out of her back pocket again.
Jesse:
like what?
She can almost hear the soft concern in his voice, see the way his nose scrunches up and his eyes crinkle at the corners. Understandable, considering it wasn't exactly ordinary behaviour for her to get a little tipsy and start spilling the beans. She had never been that kind of person while intoxicated.
And here was a blurred, muddy boundary line. Would it pain him to hear it? Maybe. She spared a thought that way, maybe two. But the rum monster wreaking havoc in the intelligent (arguable) part of her brain was stronger and didn't really care otherwise.
at what point is it concerning that you feel a creepy attraction to your best friend?
Her thumb hits send before she can talk herself out of it, the blue bubble zipping through cyberspace before landing promptly in Jesse's phone. One message. Strung together in a, hopefully, semi-articulate bundle that maybe, just possibly, communicated the idea that had been barging around, slamming doors in her head. That Chloe, maybe, was who Beca should have been looking at all along. And maybe that's why things ended so well with Jesse. Because her faiths had always laid elsewhere. And, while that terrified her, it remained ever-present in the vast expanse that was her head, so.
It had to be dealt with, sooner or later.
She should have when she wasn't riddled with booze, but. You live and you learn.
Jesse:
are you talking about...?
Beca:
Chloe? yes. sorry dude
A raucous erupts downstairs and Beca wonders if the gingerbread house has just collapsed on itself. If that was the case, the girls downstairs might drink themselves stupid to forget the carnage.
Jesse:
i think it depends just how attracted you are becaw ;)
Of course she should have expected as much. Pinching the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger, she contemplates the question that rides the statement like a footnote. Just how attracted was she? Beca had managed to conclude that she was, indeed, enticed by the idea of Chloe as something that... exceeded friendship. But what did that mean? Was this what collegiate questioning felt like? Did she just want to hold Chloe's hand whenever she felt like it, or did that dive farther..? Her mind could whir over those queries, but come up with no answers.
dude! I'm serious. like, i keep thinking that maybe... i don't even know. Ugh.
I just see her and i feel all... squirmy. Happy squirmy.
Jesse:
so like, better than when i tickle your feet squirmy?
Beca:
Ugh. yes. everything is better than that
Wandering towards the sink, Beca observes herself in through the alcohol laced dizziness that skewed her features ever so slightly. She looked drunk. Anyone on the street could probably see her, pinpoint her droopy eyes and flushed cheeks and know she was drunk. Happy holidays, another bumbling idiot! She grimaces, but finishes the rest of the eggnog anyways.
Jesse:
honestly, bec, just go for it.
And what in the hell is that supposed to mean? Just go for it? When has she ever, really ever, just gone with anything in her life? Doing things on a whim gave her anxiety, especially when the outcome could be disastrous and egotistically damaging. Something Beca can't really afford anymore damage to- despite her badass appearance, and general positive momentum of the last few years. Beca Mitchell had an ego, she could admit, and it got sore and inflamed quite easily.
how?
A motion in the mirror sends Beca whirling on her heel. The bathroom door is being opened and a red-haired body is slipping inside, and then jumping with a start at the surprise of meeting Beca here; and, honestly, she must feel the same way considering how hard her heart is suddenly beating against her ribs.
"Oh!" Chloe's hand flies to rest over her own heart for a moment, before dropping just as quickly and settling back against the doorknob. "There you are!"
Beca only vaguely considers how she very well could have been pantsless on the toilet. But she wasn't, so that's a plus. That revelation is enough for a small grin to slip onto her face, the vibration of her phone against her fingers reminding her of the unseen, but present pressure that Jesse must be sending her via telepathy. "Here I am," Her voice is higher than usual, and there's a tenseness to it that she can't be a hundred percent sure Chloe doesn't catch on to.
She's going to assume not, because the girl is grinning back, giddy and unbothered as ever, as she gently presses the door shut behind her and saunters the rest of the way into the bathroom. Until she's beside Beca at the sink, face slipping into a terse, but not upset frown as she stared at a stain across the front of her shirt. Which was, by the way, adorned with Rudolph sporting a very cheery reindeer smile. The whole thing was sickeningly charming to Beca. "Construction work done down there?"
Chloe casts her a sidelong, cheeky grin. Beca isn't sure if it's just her, or if Chloe looks just as inebriated as Beca feels. "Yeah," Chloe sighs, grabbing a face cloth from the designated drawer and running it under the tap for a moment, "For now. We decorate once it's dry," And with that, she's sending Beca a wink and dabbing down at the spill.
Her heart does some kind of aerial acrobatic maneouver, and she takes the opportunity to look away, and back down at her phone.
Jesse:
figure it out
He's very helpful with his advice, as always. And, as if, once again, by telepathy, he senses her snide thought, a second message comes flitting in.
Jesse:
its not like she'd mind
And, maybe he had a point. Chloe was... physical, to put it shortly. She'd been introduced to her absolutely astounding lack of barriers the second time she'd ever seen her face- and, well, every other part of her body. And from that day forward, Beca had to get used to the fact that Chloe greeted people with her hands as often as she did verbally. She liked to give hugs- and backrubs- loop arms on walks to the ice cream place on campus, steal a coy kiss on the cheek when appropriate (or mouth; if you're Stacie or Cynthia Rose) and tickle feet, although it was somehow never as awful when she did it. So, no, she probably wouldn't mind. But that didn't stop the nagging, rebellious part of her that puffed it's chest out and silently challenged Jesse about how he could be so sure about that.
"Ideas?" She asks, quite lamely. She's pretty much trying to buy time. Because if she was ever going to convince herself to do anything about this whole situation, she needed time. Which, coincidentally, wasn't something she was always going to have an abundance of to get her life together.
Chloe purses her lips slightly, brows knitting together to form a deep crease in the middle and she's giving Beca that look. Drunk, confused Chloe look. But definitely onto something. "Is this small talk, Beca Mitchell?"
And she shrugs, because, yeah. "Well, we're in a bathroom. What do you want from me?"
"Good point." She concedes, after a moment of thoughtful silence. The girl turns back to her sweater, dabbing at the soiled part a few more times before sighing, and throwing the cloth into the dirty laundry hamper. She hasn't questioned why Beca hasn't left yet, though, which could be a good sign because it would be a pretty good question. One that Beca would stumble over to answer. The idea of that scenario worries her.
"So," Beca hedges, before Chloe could beat her to it. Take the bull by his horns, she supposes, or at least die trying. Chloe turns back to her, baby-blues swimming in and out of Beca's focus for a split second, before she finally manages to catch them and hang on. She's looking at her really expectantly, full-attention, which gives Beca something she could only relate to with stage fright. Hands clamping against the phone in her palm like a vice, and her legs getting that jittery feeling. It was no or never. How she approached this topic next could possible make or break the whole situation.
No pressure.
She just had to find the perfect words real quick.
"I need to..." She gets that far, before her words dumbly fall flat and all of the sudden her entire knowledge of the English language is up in flames, replaced only with the beat of Dr. John's 'Right Place Wrong Time' which, you know, really doesn't help anything at all.
Chloe's eyes search her. Probe. Dig. Whatever word appropriate for the way they're darting back and forth, looking at Beca through a layer of both curiosity and puzzlement. Notice the way Beca's brain shuts down, no doubt. Recognizes the look Beca gets when she's struggling with something. And then they're softening, the confusion melting away into realization and her eyes flit to the door, in a way that makes Beca's heart sink.
"Oh," Chloe takes a few steps towards the exit, "do you need to go to the washroom? I'm sorry, I'll-"
"What? No," And here was her chance, slipping. "No, no," Taking a step forwards, she curls her fingers around Chloe's wrist before she can take a second to think about what she's doing, only to have a moment of far-off consideration about how soft Chloe's skin is and how warm it was under her own. "I don't need to go to the bathroom. I, um. I need to talk to you."
It sounds desperate, and like it's bad news. But, at least it's something. Chloe blinks at her a few times, glancing down at where her wrist met Beca's fingers, before stepping back into the brunette's space. "Yeah," It's soft, and only a little bit clouded with worry. "Sure, Becs. Yeah."
Beca drops her chin to her chest, trying to chase a few of the thoughts that were zipping around in her head. Fragments of sentences, tainted ever-so-slighty by the text message conversation she had with Jesse, and distracted the same amount by Amy yelling something indistinguishable somewhere in the Bella house. And she can feel Chloe's eyes on her, patiently- and good God how did the Beale parents ever raise anyone so patient?- but she's a little concerned the girl is going to remark something about her being drunk. Because yes, she was, thank you very much. But Beca was pretty sure that had nothing to do with the confession that was begging to slip off of her tongue- liquid courage aside.
"I," It's a non-commital start that drags out with uncertainty, and she cringes. "Um."
"Bec," It's firm. It's stable. It's patient and it's soft and musical and it's everything that Chloe is, conveyed in one syllable of her name. "Are you okay?"
And it takes her off guard a little.
"Yeah." The word is forced out alongside a breathy chuckle, as she waves her hand dismissively in the air, as though to shoo away any of the redhead's concerns. "Yeah, fine. Just, um. Nervous, I guess."
"Okay," Chloe's hands are suddenly are her arms, giving her a reassuring squeeze and a look that evolves into something even more gentle than it was a moment before. Beca could drown in it. Maybe she does, when the silence sits around them a little too long and she's suddenly watching as something shifts behind them, and one eyebrow lowers inquisitively, as though to punctuate an unsaid question. "Oh my God," the girl breathes, straightening up, "Beca, are you pregnant?"
Once again thrown by Chloe's misinterpretation of the state of affairs, Beca baulks for a moment. Just enough to pull herself out of the pool of the girl's eyes. "What? No! Dude, no! Oh God," She shakes her head, rather furiously. Even the thought of hosting Jesse's offspring was making her want to upchuck all of the evenings rum and eggnog over the linoleum.
Chloe throws her head back in a peel of laughter, "Oh good," Genuine relief shines through her voice as she drops her hands from Beca's arms. "Well, what is it, you weirdo?" She punctuates the question by coming back with a shove at Beca's shoulder, "You're freaking me out."
Indignantly, she squeaks; thrown lopsided a fair bit easier than she would be in a clear state of mind. She catches herself before anything embarrassing can happen, though. That's a plus, too. And, the way Chloe is looking at her; it's warm, but Beca knows the wry grin on her face doesn't mean that she's any less there for her than she was a moment before. And Jesse had said to figure it out. Maybe, under different circumstances, she could 'figure it out' with words but even when she was without liquor in her system, her disclosure of this realization would be less than eloquent. Beca had known herself for quite some time now, and she had never been good with words unless she was trying to blend them over a bass line.
Which is why she only stands there for another, brief moment, before she takes a breath and dives in.
Chloe is startled, to say the least. Beca is less than graceful, to say the least. But it maybe, sort of works; the way she can grab onto Chloe's Rudolph sweater in one hand as a grounding leverage, and even it out with the other around the back of her neck, angling the girl's face towards her own and pressing their lips together. She tastes like Ginger Ale and fireball whiskey, which is kind of perfect that Chloe would taste like cinnamon hearts, she thinks, because Chloe was just as appealing. And maybe, it sort of works; she grasps the idea of that when the other girl's shock dissipates after a few, stiff moments, and she comes to life. One hand tentatively raises to Beca's cheek, while the other comes to rest against the curve of her hip; both of which are barely sparks compared to the supernova explosion that bursts somewhere within her when Chloe's mouth begins to move against her own, and Oh my God- they were kissing. And it was great. It maybe, sort of worked out.
With that concept in mind, Beca pulls herself away, blinking up at the girl- the electric response sobering her up pretty quickly. Or, at least, fooling her so.
Chloe looks the same. Dazed, but pleased, nonetheless.
"Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?" She asks, just breathless enough to make Beca want to repeat the process again. She refrains. For now.
"Yeah."
Chloe's beam is enough to rival Rudolph's nose. She leans forward, scooping Beca into a hug that has her body and mind reeling; a few more moments, she'd wager, before the smug satisfaction of her boldness would catch up with her. And, wow; the world hadn't imploded.
Christmas was shaping up after all.
"Are we going to do it again later?" Chloe urges then, close to Beca's ear and downright coquettish in delivery. Hopefully, she doesn't notice the way it sort of shoots a line of fire up Beca's spine.
"Um. Okay? Yeah, I mean, if you want," Something she hadn't wagered on was the forwardness of Chloe. Which, really, she should have expected. But she wasn't unhappy about it, that's for damn sure.
Chloe pulls away, bottom lip snared between her teeth. "Oh yeah," She says conspiratorily. As if this was a secret shared between the two of them and- holy shit, it sort of was? Which is... fun? "I want to."
And then Beca is thinking about a sentence she doesn't think often; thank God for Jesse.