"Mhm," Beca landed heavily on her bed and buried her face in one of the pillows.
"Hey, you alright?" Chloe asked, suprised that Beca seemed so exhausted all of a sudden. "You wanna do this another time?"
"No," Beca turned but didn't sit up. Chloe sat down next to her and put her hand on Beca's stomach.
"You seem tired," she said and tenderly rubbed the brunette's belly.
Beca stared at Chloe's hand for a moment, then put her own hand over Chloe's to stop the movement. The redhead looked at her questioningly? Beca tried a smile but it didn't convince her friend. Beca sighed and got up from the bed. She went over to her laptop and started some music.
"You okay, Beca?" Chloe asked.
"Yeah," the DJ brushed her off and looked intently at the beats jumping up and down on her desktop. A little like her heartrate at the moment. She didn't even notice Chloe walking up behind her until she put her hands on Beca's shoulders and started kneading. Beca jumped up so quickly, she pushed her headphones from her desk. They fell to the floor.
"You're always doing that," Beca snapped at Chloe and regretted it the next moment when she saw confusion and a glimmer of hurt in Chloe's clear blue eyes.
"I'm doing what?" she asked.
"Touching me," Beca murmured and pushed her hands into the sleeves of her shirt.
"It's what I do," Chloe said sheepishly. She folded her arms across her chest, obviously to keep them from straying anywhere Beca didn't want them.
"I'm sorry, Chloe," Beca said. She felt bad about making Chloe ashamed of something that was just a part of her, something she herself had rarely found intrusive or unpleasant. It was just that... her mother had made her aware... of things. And when Chloe had rubbed her belly just now... she had felt... something.
Beca took two steps toward Chloe and unfolded her arms, holding her hands in her own.
"Why does you mom's visit stress you out?" Chloe asked as she looked deeply into Beca's eyes.
"Why do you think it's about my mom?" Beca asked and a copper eyebrow rose at the question. Beca smiled slightly. "I love my mom, she's... she's the most important person in my life and nobody knows me the way she does and... nobody knows me the way she does," Beca repeated.
"And that's a bad thing?"
"Sometimes," Beca said. "She.. she had a theory... about me," the DJ started haltingly. She pulled Chloe over to her bed and they both sat down.
"What kind of theory?" Chloe encouraged Beca to go on.
"She thinks... I like women," the brunette confessed.
"Duh, of course you like women. A whole bunch of them, they're called the Bellas," Chloe said and it made her friend laugh for a moment. Then she sobered:
"She thinks I dig women... that I'm attracted to them."
"To them all?" Chloe teased and Beca finally looked up at her because she's been saying all this in a shameful murmur to their combined hands.
"No, dude... just..." Chloe grinned at her and Beca had to laugh. "Take this serious, please?" She said but still smiled.
"Beca, it doesn't matter," the redhead told her.
"It doesn't matter? I have an identity crises and you tell me it doesn't matter?"
"You're not having an identity crises, Becs!" Chloe told her. "You know exactly who you are. You're Beca Mitchell, DJ extraordinaire, Bella, a brilliant singer, the cutest little button..." Beca had to laugh, she couldn't help it and Chloe joined her easily. They lay back on Beca's bed like they had so often done, Chloe holding the smaller woman. "Sexuality doesn't define us. It may be a part of us but not even the most important part. Look at CR - she's always been just who she is, she never made a big deal out of being a lesbian. I like girls and guys and that's okay, too. Stacie... she owns her sexuality. We all do. And if you're undecided whether you like guys or girls or both or even people who don't fall into the standard gender categories... it doesn't matter because we'll all still love you. You will always have a safe place with the Bellas," Chloe told her and Beca shut her eyes. She breathed in deeply. In this moment she felt completely safe and loved. She put her head against Chloe''s.
"You're the best," she told her.
"The best what?" Chloe gave back.
"The best everything."
They lay like this for some time, awake but reluctant to move out of their embrace.
"Beca?" There was a loud knock at the door and the girls shot up from their reclined position as it opened and Jesse came into the room. "Guess what...," he already talked when he turned to the bed. He saw the two girls sitting there, very close, wide-eyed.
"Sorry, did I...," the words 'interrupt anything' came to his mind but he discarded them. "... scare you, or something?"
"No," Beca said.
"A little," Chloe said.
"Sorry, I... I just have great news: Professor Robbins, he signed me up for this internship... it's for the summer and it is in... Hollywood," he bursted out and grinned excitedly.
"That's awesome, Jesse! I... wow," Beca said and got off the bed to hug her boyfriend. "That's so great, J... I don't know what to say. You deserve it."
"Yeah, I know, right?" He laughed and pulled Beca up for a kiss. It was just that, a simple kiss between boy- and girlfriend. But Beca blushed furiously, she felt completely flustered.
"You alright?" Jesse asked.
"Yeah, I... I have news, too. Not as great as yours, naturally. My mom's in town. She would like to meet you, I mean... not like, you know... officially meet the boyfriend, everybody uncomfortable or something... just... if you've got some time these next few days, we could have lunch together, or something?" It wasn't at all like Beca to rattle on like this, to be flustered or uncomfortable like this. She seemed nervous and he didn't know if it was about him meeting her mom or about... something else.
"Yeah, sure, I would like to meet her. That would be great," he said.
"Great," Beca said. "Great." She turned to Chloe for a second and smiled at her then she turned back to Jesse and looked up at him.
"I'm sorry that I just burst in here like that...," Jesse apologized, though why he wasn't sure. He felt like he had indeed interrupted something. But that couldn't be because... Beca was his girlfriend and Chloe was her best friend. Maybe he had interrupted a girl-talk, or something? "Erm, should I...go?" He asked.
"Oh, no. No, no, no. I should go. You two probably want to... talk about your internship. Congratulations, by the way," Chloe got up from Beca's bed and gave him a small kiss on the cheek. "I'm happy for you," she said.
"Thank you, Chloe," he said and grinned again. Yeah, this was his moment. He'd done good. He smiled at Beca and she smiled, too, but there was still something off with her. He couldn't put his finger on it, though. Chloe slipped into her sneakers and jacket.
"Well, I'll see you..."
"I just come... I'll be right back, Jesse. Get comfortable," she told him and he watched the two women leave the room.
Beca closed the door behind her.
"I'm sorry," she said.
"Whatever for, Becs?" Chloe asked and looked at her. She was just her usual self, all sweet, all good. Nothing wrong. But Beca felt that there was something wrong, there was something terribly wrong here because she didn't want Chloe to leave, she had wanted Jesse to leave again. And that was wrong. "It's okay, we talk some other time, really. I mean... we were just... talking," she said but that was also wrong. They weren't just talking, they were...
It had been like an echo in the room. Of something someone had once said. Beca couldn't understand the words but... she had felt them. And she was sure Chloe had felt them, too. Maybe they would have said them, maybe they would have heard them at some point - had they just been able to keep lying in each other's arms, listening.
Beca shook her head.
"Alright, I'll see you... tomorrow?"
"Maybe, I... I need to hand in that last paper and I want to... read over it once more. I think there was a footnote, that was kinda wong," Chloe rambled.
'A footnote that was kinda wrong?' Beca shook her head some more. How weird this felt, how utterly wrong it felt. Wrong footnote, was that it?
"Okay, but text me if you're free, okay? I..." 'want to see you' were the words she wanted to say but they were wrong also.
"I'll text you," Chloe agreed. She waved her hand at her friend though they were standing right beside each other and Chloe would always rather touch than wave.
"Bye," Beca said as she watched her friend walk down the hall, not even looking back like she usually did whenever they parted. But it was just another things that was wrong.
Chloe walked into the apartment she shared with Aubrey not even noticing her friend who sat on the couch in the living room. She just locked the front door, slipped out of her shoes and jacket and was about to open the door to her room when Aubrey said:
"Chloe?" The redhead looked up.
"Bree, hey, I... is everything all right?" It wasn't like Aubrey to just sit somewhere and wait. She was always busy doing something and the fact that now she didn't even have a book cracked open or a magazine was strange. Chloe walked over into the open space of the living room and sank onto the couch next to her friend. She reached out her hand and lay it on Aubrey's, she squeezed.
"What do you think of Beca's mom?" the blonde finally asked.
"Beca's mom? I think... well, she seems great. She's really nice and open and... I think, Beca's really lucky to have her," she added. "Why do you ask?" Aubrey seemed to think about the answer, she sighed deeply.
"Are you and Beca involved?" She then asked her own question and looked at her friend earnestly.
"What? No, we... Bree, you know that Beca's with Jesse. We're not... I...," her voice faltered as did her conviction that nothing was going on between her and Beca. There had been something going on earlier and she had been very aware of it and by how Beca had behaved before she left so was she.
"What's going on? Talk to me," Aubrey asked of her friend.
"There's nothing going on, Bree. I... I was foolish once again and... I may have feelings for Beca but she's with Jesse, so... what does that have to do with Grace?"
"Why didn't you talk to me about your feelings for Beca?" the older woman once again ignored Chloe's direct question to pose one of her own. Chloe looked up at her, into her eyes.
"You know why," she simply said. Aubrey took a deep breath.
"Just because... of what happened between us that doesn't mean you can't talk to me, Chloe. I screwed this up and I.. I want you to be happy. You know that," she told her friend. She didn't look at her anymore but was instead staring intently at their hands which held one another, like they so often did.
"I know just... I can't say I'm particularly happy. I mean... Beca's with Jesse and... not with me."
"Then she's an idiot," Aubrey told Chloe blankly. "Not as big an idiot as I am but still." She smiled at Chloe and the redhead answered in kind. She could never be depressed when one of her friends made an effort to cheer her up.
"You're not an idiot and neither is Beca. You had your reasons, and so does Beca now. I just fall for the wrong people... well, not wrong... I just fall for the loveliest people around and it hurts a little when they don't feel the same."
"You know that was not true in my case, I just... I couldn't come out..." Aubrey's mood faltered so quickly, Chloe didn't have any chance to keep her from falling but she did the only thing she could do to catch her: she pulled her in a tight embrace.
"It's okay, Bree. You know I don't blame you for it," she soothed as Aubrey clung to her for a moment. Then the blonde breathed deeply - the way she always dealt with stress, breathing in and out, letting go of whatever was bothering her, pushing it to the back of her mind - and sat back up straight. She nodded.
"Yes, I know... but... this is not about us. It's about you and Beca."
"There is no Beca and I," Chloe repeated.
"Her mother thinks there is," the blonde finally came full circle.
"Grace thinks that... Beca and I are... what? Together?" To this question Aubrey shrugged.
"I'm not sure but she certainly caught onto somthing. I tried to divert her because she didn't seem too thrilled about the idea. I told her you were friends..."
"I don't think Grace would have a problem with Beca and I... that's not..." Chloe thought about this. She didn't want to tell Aubrey about what Beca had said earlier that evening, that was Beca's secret and not for Chloe to share. She simply shook her head.
"Well, she was asking questions and she said she was worried about Beca. At first I thought it was because of Jesse but then she started asking about the two of you. I thought it better to tell her you were just friends," she explained to Chloe.
"That's what we are," the redhead confirmed.
"Really? Just friends? I think there's something else going on between the two of you - I have thought so for some time, actually," she told her friend.
"Why would you think that?" Chloe asked.
"Because. You. Have a toner for Beca. And I think she's got one for you," Bree just blurted out.
"I... we... she..."
"And you can't deny it. So, what's going on?" Chloe shook her head at the question.
"I don't know," she said. "I can't tell you because I really don't know." She tried to smile at Aubrey but it wasn't convincing at all. The blonde put her arms around her friend.
"You will have to figure it out, though," she told Chloe. "Because those toners are far too obvious to overlook. Soon all the Bellas will notice - if they haven't already - and that oblivious boyfriend of Beca's will, too. And then it's gonna get ugly." Chloe sighed.
"Maybe they will just go away again," she pouted.
"When have you ever seen toners just go away?" The answer was, never.
