A/N: This is a sequel to Locked Out Of Heaven so if you haven't read that read that first. You don't really have to but it references to some of the things from that. The title (and the culprit of this whole thing) is from a Plain White T's song from the album Wonders Of The Younger. It's a great album and I've been listening to pretty much that song and Body Parts from that while I write this so that's the mood that's going to prevail throughout most of this. I hope you like it and hit me up in the reviews or pm me or on tumblr if you want.

Aubrey hung up the phone with a sigh and looked out the window of her office. She didn't know if the churning in her stomach was due to excitement or fear, probably a mixture of both. She hadn't seen Stacie since they broke up, and she hadn't expected to ever see her again. She spent most of her time at the lodge and she had avoided any Bellas related event. Chloe had begged her to go to last year's finals but their breakup had been too recent.

Aubrey had been keeping up with what seemed to be the downfall of the Bellas, but she never expected Chloe would ask for her help. She had been tempted to say no, or send them with someone else, but Chloe had sounded so desperate she didn't have the heart to do it. In five days Stacie and the other Bellas would be there.

She felt that familiar pull in her heart whenever she thought about Stacie. At first it was always there, a constant dull ache that intensified every time she found something that belonged to her. Stacie had taken most of her things that night but some things were deemed too unimportant to make room for them in her suitcase. She didn't move her things for a while, thinking she deserved to hurt for driving her away. When she couldn't take it anymore, she started putting them in a box in her closet. She hadn't realized how much work it would take to extricate the remnants of Stacie from her life. Whenever she thought she had gotten rid of everything, she'd find another thing: a piece of paper covered in stars where Stacie had scribbled their names on while talking on the phone; a pair of the socks she started wearing to sleep so she wouldn't wake up Aubrey with her cold feet, forgotten at the bottom of the hamper; the photo booth pictures they took at a Bellas charity event that she was using as a bookmark. And while the 'Stacie box' started to fill up, the hole in her heart didn't seem to get smaller. She didn't feel the pain after a while, incorporating it to what normal felt like now. She could only really feel it when she thought about her.

She walked back to her desk and opened up her calendar, she would have to move some things around but she could manage giving the Bellas her full attention. Now that she had accepted to help Chloe, she wasn't going to half-ass it or hand them over to one of her employees. It was now her responsibility that the Bellas got back to their former glory, even if one of them was Stacie.

She groaned and dropped her head on her desk. How was she supposed to do her job around her ex? Her ex who she was still very much in love with. She didn't want to make it awkward for the rest of the group but she couldn't just ignore Stacie. She knew that as soon as she looked into those sparkling green eyes she would forget why she hadn't fought to get her back and she'd do something stupid. She couldn't forget or all this pain would have been for nothing.

"Aubrey, I'm leaving."

Aubrey placed her hand over the speaker. "Okay, see you later."

Stacie sighed exasperated and dropped her suitcase in front of Aubrey. "No, I'm leaving. I'm going back to Barden."

"Josh, I'm gonna have to call you back." She hung up and put away her phone. "What do you mean you're going back to Barden? I thought you were staying until Sunday."

"I thought I was too, Bree, but I can't take this anymore!" Stacie ran her hand through her hair. "I've been here two days and you've barely said a word to me. You've been on the phone or working the whole time. It's like you're not even here!"

"I'm trying to start a business."

"You've been trying to start a business for the past six months. Do you even remember what was the last conversation we had? Or the last time we had sex?"

"Of course this is about sex." Aubrey rolled her eyes.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"I'm sorry I haven't fucked you in a while, Stacie, but I've had other things in my mind more important than satiating your teenage boy libido."

"Oh my god, are you hearing yourself? It's not about sex! It's about the fact that this relationship doesn't exist anymore. You're here and I'm there and even when we're together it's like you're still in a different place. You don't even look at me."

Aubrey looked down at her feet and took a deep breath. She knew what Stacie was saying was true, she had been pretty checked out since she started working on the lodge.

"Semifinals." Aubrey looked up confused. "That's the last time we had sex, after semifinals last month. That's also the reason I'm still here. You went there with your huge bouquet of flowers and you smiled like you used to. We had a perfect night and I thought that maybe things would go back to normal, that maybe I had you back." Stacie choked back a sob. "But you left and it was the same. You didn't talk to me all week, I kept getting your voicemail, and every time I said I love you before hanging up, my heart broke a little more. But I knew you were still there, my Aubrey, somewhere, so I thought that if I just waited we'd be okay."

Aubrey walked up to her at this and took her face in her hands, wiping away her tears with her thumbs. "I'm so sorry, baby. I never meant to hurt you. I'm so close right now, I just need a little more time."

Stacie shook her head. "I can't. It hurts too much to be with you." Stacie grabbed her bag and walked away.

"So that's it? You're not even going to let me fight for us?"

Stacie looked back at her sadly. "Do you even want to?"

Aubrey had never wanted something more than to say yes in that moment, to fight for Stacie, to run after her and beg her to forgive her but she didn't. She let her walk out and drive back to Barden. She knew that if she followed her, if she told her that she cared about her more than anything else, Stacie would take her back. And after she took her back, Aubrey was sure she would hurt her again and she couldn't live with that. Stacie was better off without her.

She didn't call or try to contact her. Whenever she'd ask Chloe how she was she'd always tell her she was okay. She didn't know if she was telling the truth but she had to believe it. If Stacie was okay, nothing else mattered. Stacie would get over her, find someone better, someone who wouldn't hurt her.

She allowed herself a moment to wonder what Stacie was feeling about seeing her again. She didn't know if Stacie was dating someone. She could ask Chloe, just to be prepared. Her stomach clenched at the thought. She knew she couldn't expect Stacie to stay single forever, she was gorgeous and smart. Maybe she'd gone back to sleeping with a different person every week. Aubrey didn't know what option made her feel worse. She lifted her head only to drop it back down with a loud thud.

Her door opened and she looked up. "Boss, there's a very loud… oh I'm sorry, are you feeling okay?"

Aubrey attempted to smile but it came out as a grimace. "I'm okay. What's the problem."

"Nothing, I can handle it. If you want to go home early, I can handle today's clients." Her door closed again and she dropped her head back on her desk.

The last thing she wanted right now was to go home. Going home only reminded her of how empty her life was without Stacie. Her least favorite moment was when she remembered she was alone, those mornings where she forgot anything had happened and she could almost feel Stacie sleeping next to her, just for a second. It hadn't happened in a while but she was sure tomorrow would be one of those days.

Aubrey swallowed. She didn't cry. She never cried. She had dived into her work, setting up the lodge, and building it up to what it was today. If there was one thing Aubrey knew was how to push her feelings down.

She grabbed her purse and walked out of her office. She didn't want to go home but she didn't want to be cooped up in there anymore and she was way too tired to join in on any of the activities happening today. Whatever happened when she saw Stacie, she couldn't allow herself to hope. Nothing was going to change in those three days. She'd do her job, hopefully help her friends, and go back to her life. Maybe seeing Stacie again would help her have closure and move on.

"Stace!" Chloe knocked on the door. "Do you have a minute?"

Fat Amy opened the door and nodded at Stacie's side of the room. She was lying on her bed, headphones on and a thick book in front of her. "Brainy here is doing some 'light' reading."

Chloe crossed the room and sat on the bed next to her. Stacie pulled her headphones down and gave her a small smile. "Hey, what's up, Chlo?"

"Amy, can you give us a minute?"

Fat Amy was sitting on her bed pretending not to pay attention to them and looked at Chloe with her eyes wide. "Ah, yeah, sure. I'll go see if Beca needs help with her umm singing."

Chloe waited for her to close the door before she turned back to Stacie. She had gone back to reading and wasn't paying much attention to Chloe. "Stace, you know that retreat we're going to?"

"Yeah…" She twirled her highlighter absentmindedly a couple of times before it stopped and fell from her hand. She looked up at Chloe, her eyes wide with dread. "No."

"Stacie, come on, we need her."

Stacie got up and started walking backwards away from the bed shaking her head. "No, no, no, no, I can't, I won't, no. I'm not going."

"Please, Stacie. We need to win worlds."

"There has to be another way! Please Chloe, I can't." Stacie looked at her, her eyes shining with unshed tears.

"Okay, you don't have to come." Chloe nodded. "She's gonna know you're not there because of her."

Stacie shook her head. "She doesn't care."

Chloe rolled her eyes. "I refuse to have this conversation with you anymore." She got up. "I just came here to let you know. Come, don't come, it's your choice. But we need you." She squeezed Stacie's shoulder and walked out of the room.

Stacie stood there for a while trying to collect herself. She felt a tear roll down her cheek and she wiped it away angrily. She had promised herself she wouldn't cry about Aubrey anymore.

She looked at the book on her bed. Trying to study now would be pointless. She grabbed the jacket from the back of a chair and walked out, almost running over Emily on her way to the door. She slammed the front door and jumped into her car. She didn't know where she was going but she had to get away and clear her head.

She turned up the music to drown the noise in her head and drove without thinking about where she was going. She didn't realize where she was headed until she was driving up the hill. She sat on her parked car for a minute before getting out and walking up the gravel path to the clearing overlooking the city. She walked up to the edge and sat down on the grass, hugging her legs and resting her chin on her knees.

Stacie sighed as she thought about the first time she had been there: her first date with Aubrey. They had returned several times after that, they'd lay on a blanket, Aubrey tucked to her side, or they would sit looking down over the city, her back pressed against Aubrey's front, the blonde's arms wrapped tightly around her. She didn't believe in soulmates or 'The One' but she didn't think she would ever love someone as much as she loved Aubrey. No matter how hard she had tried to hate her, she still loved her just as much.

Breaking up with Aubrey had been hard, but learning to live without her had been worse. She had been a mess when she got back to the Bella house after driving back from Aubrey's. She went straight to her room and got into bed, not moving to eat, change or shower for the next three days. Chloe had tried to get her to eat a couple of times but she wouldn't even look at her. It wasn't until Beca, with the help of Fat Amy and CR, had carried her to the bathroom and thrown her into the shower with her clothes on that the feelings she had been avoiding hit her full force. She slid down to the floor and curled up crying. Beca jumped into the shower in her clothes and wrapped her arms around her, letting her cry on her shoulder until the water got cold.

After that, she had focused on her school work. Whenever she wasn't at Bellas rehearsal, she was studying. Beca was relieved she hadn't spiraled back into her self destructive cycle like the last time she and Aubrey had broken up, but anyone who knew Stacie before could immediately notice there was something different with her. She had lost her happy, carefree attitude. There were times when she seemed to be back to her old self, cracking jokes and making inappropriate comments, but there was always something off in the way her smile never really seemed to reach her eyes and the noticeable tension in her shoulders.

All her hard work had led to her being accepted in the Planetary Sciences graduate program at MIT and, while she was happy about it, Stacie couldn't shake the feeling that something was missing. The worst thing was that she knew exactly where to find that missing piece of her, but she couldn't go back.

That's why she couldn't go to the retreat, she couldn't see Aubrey again. She knew she'd take Aubrey back the second she asked. Not that she thought she would, but it would be too hard to be in the same place, breathe the same air, and not feel like she was whole again. If Aubrey touched her, she would be lost. On the other hand, if she acted like she didn't care it would break her heart all over again, and Stacie wasn't sure she would be able to study through it again. No, she just had to finish the school year and she'd be gone. Maybe then she would be able to move on.