Chapter 2 (Revised)

y'all, I had so much fun writing the Bechloe scene =) Hopefuly it'll finally give you a taste of what else is to come!

"What the hell is a riff off?"

Beca found out what a riff off was. It was all a little overwhelming at once, people jumping in and out pulling songs out of their ass. She turned to Chloe

"So we just pick any song that works?"

"Yeah, any song"

"And you just go with it? Nice."

Beca was excited, now this was getting her blood pumping. She felt the harmonies reverberating off the walls of the empty swimming pool onto her buzzing skin. Finally! She had found something exciting worth being in the Bellas for. Songs were whizzing past her, Jesse's puppy dog looks were being sent her way too. This kid really was too much, "I guess it's just the woman in you that brings out the man in me"? Beca needed to wipe that look off his face. It was time to show him what he was messing with, so she jumped in with the perfect song, a huge smile on her face.

Her rap echoed off the hard walls, she spun around looking for her back up. Everyone was just staring at her, but she went on. She looked back around at Jesse, "Go on".

So she did, she heard Fat Amy join in behind her, and Chloe brought the rest of the Bellas in. Beca's heart was pumping as the rest of the crowd joined her voice. She laughed, this was crazy. The look on Jesse's face kept pushing her—now he knew what he was messing with. She looked around the rest of the pool; all the other groups were joining in now. This was amazing. Everyone was dancing now. She brought it back around to her girls, and ended on the perfect hit-

"We out"

It sucked that they had lost, but damn, fire was coursing through Beca's blood. She had never sung like that in front of a crowd and just felt the energy of it being given back to her. She looked around at the other Bellas, was anyone else feeling what she was feeling?

"Hey guys, what we just did was great, right? "

"Calm your tits Beca, we still lost." Aubrey shot back.

"Yeah but it was spontaneous. It was awesome. We were actually listening to…" Aubrey cut off Beca again with another failed attempt to "Ahhhhh" in harmony.

Beca slinked off after that confused.

Why are we doing this crap when we could be making music like that? She felt a hand on her arm and turned around, it was Chloe with her face shining. She started to walk alongside Beca through the deserted campus.

"Beca, I just wanted to tell you that that was amazing. It's crazy, I think that's possibly the best we've sounded all year"

"Right? I don't get why Aubrey—" Chloe grabbed her hand and interjected, "Did you feel it?"

Beca halted, turned and blinked, staring into Chloe's big blue eyes, swallowing her. Her heart was pounding, "feel it?" she whispered back.

"The music" said Chloe, smiling back.

Beca looked down for a second, paused, and raising her head back up looked back at her smiling trying to ignore the ache that was settling somewhere between the bottom of her heart and the top of her stomach, "Yes."

"It's amazing isn't it? The rush, the music, just all of it washing around you." Beca's eyes flitted across Chloe's face, studying her eyes, her mouth. She paused and slowly let out a soft, "Yeah."

Beca tilted her head and opened her mouth a little, looking at Chloe, trying to see her. Her brows furrowed just the slightest before breathing through her opened mouth and said, "You really love it, the singing I mean." A huge smile broke across her face, Chloe looked back at her, with her sweet smile, "Of course," the bright blue eyes looked straight back into Beca's, "and you do too." Chloe squeezed Beca's hand and edged closer to her, bumping her shoulder against Beca's," I saw it on your face."

Beca turned her head away and began walking again, slipping her hand away to tuck a stray hair behind her ear, "I guess I do."

In that moment, she remembered Chloe's nodes and her words. Chloe skipped back next to her, grabbing her hand again, lacing their fingers swinging it back and forth. She leaned her head against Beca's shoulder, "I knew you would."

Beca sighed. They kept walking together until they reached Beca's dorm. Chloe turned to Beca, tilting her head down towards her, their faces were close. Beca could feel her heart beating, she was holding her breath as Chloe closed her eyes and smiled, "Thank you for taking a chance on the Bellas. I know that up until tonight you weren't sure why you were here, and now you know what I knew—that you belong with us."

Beca bit her lip and looked back at Chloe and softly replied through her breath, "Thanks."

The crystal blue eyes sparkled back at her and said, "Goodnight". Then she looked up, and Beca froze, holding her breath, and swallowed. Chloe smiled and squeezed her in a tight hug and kissed her on the cheek. Beca slowly let her breath out, "Goodnight to you too Chloe, thanks for everything."

She walked into her room, Kimmy Jin was on her laptop doing homework, none of the lights were on. She sat down on her bed and put her headphones on- Closest I Get by Katie Herzig. She breathed in and breathed out. Tonight was the first night that any of it, college, the Bellas had felt like anything worth wasting her time on. She closed her eyes, and the scene minutes ago replayed in her head again and again. She saw Chloe's smile. She remembered the moment she'd jumped in on Jesse and the awe in his eyes.

Beca felt a pang in her stomach

What if the closest I get to the moment is now?

What if I gave you half just to keep me whole?

She'd seen something in Chloe's eyes, a sadness. She could see the ache in her smiles, the need to feel the music, to be the music, to surround yourself in that beauty at any cost-even personal pain.

Beca glanced over at Kimmy Jin sitting with the glow of her netbook on her face. The girl was only 7 feet away from her but she felt like she was on a completely different plane of existence. Where was the struggle, the pain, the drowning under the desperation of just existing? Who knew that, who saw it, and felt it? She couldn't connect with most people, she didn't have the words to say to make them feel warm fuzzies, but tonight she had seen an entire swimming pool of people sing with her because they had felt what she had felt, and they were singing what she was singing. Music might have been the thing that kept her from everyone else, headphones, acoustical walls sealing her off from the people around her, but when she sang, she felt something connecting her to all these strangers, and in that sea of faces was Chloe, beaming at her.

Music was the only thing in her life holding her down, keeping her from floating away.

It was also the only thing pushing her to get out of this place.

It also seems like the only reason she had to hope she might walk away from this place with more than some weird memories and a tacky flight attendant outfit.

I guess those aca-people deserve a chance.

For those of you who already caught the original chapter 3, I did some shuffling last night and combined the original chapter 1&2 and made chapter 3 into chapter 2. So when I post chapter 3, it'll be a new one. Sorry this is all kind of confusing, I'm figuring out how long I want chapters to be and serializing is definitely a different process than just plain writing a story out! I hope y'all will forgive me.