Beca took a deep breath, trying to slow her heart rate down. She had been pacing nervously around the corner from Chloe's room for three minutes now. She wasn't sure how this was going to go, now that Chloe knew about her "difficulties". How was Chloe planning to teach her? She seemed enthusiastic to, but would she be able to? Nobody had ever been able to teach her before, so what made Chloe different? To be perfectly honest, Beca was only making herself more anxious than she needed to be.
She took another deep breath.
Damnit, Mitchell, you can't back out now.
Again.
Right. She needed to get a grip. Because she was now at least a minute late. Probably.
Beca wasn't too sure.
She took another deep breath.
It was time, whether she liked it or not.
With a set face, Beca practically marched towards the classroom and knocked three times. Chloe looked up from where she was sitting patiently at her piano with a large, toothy grin settling on her face. She squeaked in excitement and leapt up to open the door.
"You came!" Chloe said happily, wrapping her arms around Beca in a hug without much thought to how Beca usually reacted when she touched her.
Beca stiffened in her arms. She wasn't used to hugs, it wasn't often that she was given a hug, and it was even less often that she gave any. But, somehow, this felt right to her. So, she slowly wrapped her own arms around Chloe's midsection and held on lightly.
"I told you I would." Beca replied quietly, subtly trying to squirm out of Chloe's arms – the hug had gotten too much after only two seconds.
Chloe let go of her and sent her a beaming smile, taking her sleeve and pulling her towards the piano. They sat down together on the stool just like they had the week beforehand.
Chloe cleared her throat slightly. "So, I thought instead of trying to learn the notes by what they look like on paper, we can learn it by what they sound like. We're basically just going to go up and down the keys, and say or sing the notes as we go. I've also put the colours of the rainbow in correspondence to the notes, so red equals A, orange is B, yellow is C, green is D, blue is E, indigo is F and violet is G." Chlo explained happily, eagerly pointing to the different coloured stickers on the white keys.
Beca smiled unsurely, but she was happy that Chloe made the effort to do something different for her to understand. "Thank you."
"Sure! So, let's just go up the scale to get you used to what each sound like, and eventually you'll be able to recognise the note by its sound as well as by its colour,"
Chloe couldn't help but smile, bright-eyed, as she watched Beca get reacquainted it the piano. It was so…precious. So pure. Like watching a toddler slowly learn something new, and then once they know it, try their best to show it off with pride. Or like watching a puppy learn to run. Beca had – for once – let down her defences, and was slowly and surely moving from unsteady shyness to scintillating excitement. She was pressing the keys more frequently, mouthing or whispering the notes for most of them, her brows very slightly furrowed as she did her best to remember them as she went along, and the growing smile on her face said it all. Chloe was so, so happy that she'd given Beca the chance to finally be able to do what she wanted and obviously loved to do. And as much as she wanted to outright ask her why it was Beca hadn't ever been given this chance before, she knew that Beca wasn't the type of person to share anything. She knew she had to at least build a stronger wall of trust and friendship before opening that window to the janitor's past.
Hang on. Stronger?
Did Beca trust her already? Were they friends? Acquaintances? Or just simply co-workers helping each other out?
Did Chloe think of Beca as a friend?
Well, she wanted to.
But she barely knew anything about the girl as it was, apart from the fact that she was unusually timid and shy, and couldn't read or write. So, she couldn't really call Beca a friend, could she? Especially if the feeling wasn't mutual.
"A," Chloe said, watching as Beca started, before quickly pressing down on the right key.
"F,"
"D,"
"B,"
"G,"
"C,"
"E,"
The redhead said the keys in a random order, and Beca pressed on each key correctly.
Chloe gasped and applauded proudly. "Great, Beca, you're remembering them,"
"The colours do help." Beca admitted, not taking her hands off the piano.
"Okay. How about we play something?"
Beca's eyes grew, but for once, it wasn't out of anxiety or fear. "Really?
"Yep! Okay, so instead of making you memorise the first song you ever play, I've set up sheet music, but instead of the notes there're the colours of the notes where they would be on the stave. Do you understand?"
Beca smiled. She really couldn't believe how much trouble Chloe had gone to. She didn't have to do any of this.
"Yes."
"Okay! So try and play it, and we'll see if you can work out which song it is, too." Chloe nudged her softly with a happy grin, placing the sheet music on the stand.
Beca's eyebrows furrowed as she did her best to focus on the colours against the lines. But the lines were overlapping and almost jumping off the page at her. She squeezed her eyes shut for a second, but then the lines were even more all over the place. Beca flushed a light pink and bit her lip, fiddling with her fingers.
"I…" she started, looking at the paper harder. It started to make her feel dizzy, so she looked away and blinked. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry, what's up?" Chloe asked her kindly, but with slight concern, having just watched Beca's struggle play out.
"N-Nothing," Beca said hesitantly, and Chloe could literally see Beca's conscious building a brick wall between them as she shrunk down a little further into the stool.
"Doesn't look like nothing. What's up?" Chloe tried again, purposefully keeping her tone light and safe.
Beca seemed to hesitate again, wringing her hands together. "Y-you're not gonna…tell me off…are you?"
Chloe frowned, looking seriously at the janitor. It upset her that that was the first thing that went to Beca's mind. "Of course not!"
"It's the…the lines." Beca squinted.
"What about them?"
Beca shook her head slightly, suddenly becoming shy. "It's all…together. I don't know. I'm probably just tired. Sorry." She looked away and her body seemed to curl up ever so slightly, more so than before.
Meeting the girl's eyes, Chloe furrowed her eyebrows. "No, no, this is important. Like, are they all overlapping each other? Are they going fuzzy?"
"Yeah. Both." Beca sighed.
Chloe was stuck at what to say.
"It's okay," she said eventually. "Loads of people get that."
"I'm sorry." Beca whispered, bowing her head. "Can I use the b-bathroom, please?"
"Sure, Beca," Chloe said gently, smiling softly at her, although she was sure the brunette could see the gears turning in her head as she thought about what had just happened.
Beca got up and shuffled out with her head still bowed down low. Chloe puffed out a little sigh, and made little popping sounds as she thought of what to do next. Should she try and deal with it herself? Or try and get Beca to agree to a test? Bearing in mind she didn't want to push the brunette out of her comfort zone. She pondered back and forth with herself for about five minutes, before she noticed Beca still wasn't back. Hoping the brunette hadn't ran away again, Chloe was fast to get up and go to the bathroom to see if she was alright.
Just as the music teacher was about to open the door, she heard a little thud, followed by a small sob. Chloe stopped dead in her tracks, pouting as she put her head to the door to listen.
"Why are you so stupid all the time?" she heard Beca say through another sob of frustration.
Chloe's heart dropped. Beca wasn't stupid, at all. The redhead could see that from the get go. She was bright. Very bright. All she needed was someone to help her switch the bulb on. To be honest with herself, Chloe doubted Beca really wanted to continue that day, so she impulsively walked into the bathroom.
"Beca?" She called.
The brunette was a fast-thinker, and she began to cough, as if she was choking, so her voice would have sounded raspy and broken. Chloe smiled softly. Yes, Beca was definitely bright.
"Y-Yeah?" she said, coughing again. "S-Sorry…I-I like, choked on not-nothing!"
Chloe made sure to play along, and giggled. "You okay?"
"Fine!" Beca said, slightly over-enthusiastically, but Chloe didn't dwell on it.
"Sorry to have to cut it a little short, but I totally spaced! I made plans to meet with my friend tonight, and I have just about enough time to go home, change, and get to the diner we're meeting at. But I think we really made some progress today, so it's not like a complete flop of a lesson, right?"
"Right," Beca said.
"So, I'll see you tomorrow?" Chloe asked.
"Yeah, sure, tomorrow,"
"Kay, thanks for letting me off the hook! Bye, Beca, have a good night!"
"Yeah – I mean, you too,"
Chloe began to make her way out of the bathroom, but suddenly remembered something.
"Hey, wait, are you nearly done?"
"Yes…" Beca said, sounding slightly cautious as she unlocked the door and stepped out, washing her hands twice.
"Instead of having to go looking around school for each other, I was wondering if you had a phone? Then I could just text or call you and it would be so much easier." The redhead smiled hopefully at the smaller girl, and Beca looked away for a second, before nodding.
"I have a phone," she reached into her pocket and pulled out an iPhone 7.
"Oh wow, really?" Chloe asked before she could stop herself. "Sorry, that sounded rude. I'm not trying to be rude or anything, but how do you use it? You know, cause…"
"Speech assist. And Siri," Beca chuckled, seemingly relaxed and even a little happy that Chloe seemed so awestruck and interested.
"How does it work?"
Beca smiled brightly, and Chloe felt giddy that she was the one who had caused it, and tapped her home button.
"Hi, Beca," came a virtual voice.
"Oh my god! That's so cool! So, does it do everything for you so you never have to type or read anything?" Chloe's eyes widened and she almost squealed in excitement and surprise.
"Pretty much. I mean, I'm pretty sure I use it more for its functions as a phone than most people, but it does what I need it to."
"Can you show me?" Chloe asked, still in amazement.
"Can you put in your number?" Beca asked her, unlocking the phone with her thumb print and handing it to Chloe.
Chloe swiped across looking for the contact app, and saw that Beca was right – she didn't really have any other apps apart from the apps given to every phone. The redhead smiled softly as she saw that Beca's background was a red panda in snow. She was fast to type in her number and label the contact "Chloe Beale", before handing Beca back her phone.
Beca held down her home button before speaking clearly. "Text Chloe Beale."
"What would you like to say?" the virtual voice asked.
"Go home before you're late, thanks for the lesson, Beca."
A moment later, a ding came from Chloe's phone, and she looked at it in excitement as it lit up with a text from an unknown number. "That's so cool!"
Beca blushed softly and shrugged – it was the first time anyone had taken such an interest in her. "I guess…"
"It is really cool, Beca." Chloe told her, almost fiercely. "Anyways, thanks for showing me! I've got to run, have a good night,"
"Have fun with your friend." Beca replied calmly.
Chloe sent her a smile, before leaving the bathroom. Beca leant back on the counter. She was calm. She was so, so calm. After having cried less than five minutes ago. She couldn't figure out how Chloe managed to have that effect on her, how she managed to get her so calm so quickly. Furthermore, she was happy. Happy Chloe continued to take interest in her despite the many obvious mistakes she kept making, mistakes only she would be dumb enough to make. Nothing other than music had ever made her happy before.
It was definitely a change.
A good change.
Once again, I'm unsure beyond unsureness about how this chapter was. Good, bad, ugly, vague, too much? Was it a bit of a let down? I'll totally rewrite it if it was…
Also, how would you guys feel if I added in more characters as teachers and/or friends from pitch perfect? We can totally keep it just Beca and Chloe but I feel like a tiny bit of variety in characters is needed hahaha
Anyways, I want to thank all of you who have reviewed or favourited or liked or reblogged or WHATEVER on the last chapter in the past few months, thank you for being so consistently supportive and motivating! And I'm sorry I can't give you updates once a week. My life is getting busier and busier by the minute, but I'm trying my best to give you guys the most perfect chapters you deserve! Thank you for believing in me :) It really does make a difference when I get such amazing feedback!
UnfamiliarSky: Aw, you're welcome dude! Thank you so so much, you have no idea how happy that makes me! I'm sorry for the long wait and I'm legit praying that it was worth the wait, and that you enjoy it! Haha yeah, life works in mysteriously conspiring ways, but tattysecondhandbook: 1, Life:0! I'm slowly and surely ploughing my way through the fic! I know I just said this but I really hope you like this chapter!
bechloeorbhloe: Awww thank you so much! Also I'm loving the username ;) And I can't wait to write that part too! Next chapter ;)
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until its gone: Thank you so so so much! I've never had people say they're intrigued so that meant a lot! Hope it's still intriguing for you dude!
Guest: Aw that means a lot, thank you! I hope this was as incredible for you as the last! Thanks for the review :)
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You guys make me SO happy.
Also: THE NEW TRAILER! AHHHH!
Also also: Was this a bit short? I'm worried it was slightly too short...
AHH so many worries!