Blurs of green and yellow fluttered past the window. Her eyes followed the fast trees along the highway, catching a glimpse of her own reflection against the window every now and then. Sweaty hands clenched tightly to the fabric of her jeans, she inhaled deeply, taking in the smell of the lemon scented car freshener. "Anyway You Want It" was blasting from the speakers as the boy driving sang along and tapped his fingers to the beat. He tilted his head at her and nudged her with his elbow, urging her to sing along. She supposed singing her heart out was one way to shake off her nervousness.

It had been 6 days since her Stats mid-term. According to the University calendar, it was now officially the week of Spring Break. She had spent the last few days watching random videos on Netflix, finishing the rest of her mid-terms, and waiting for Donald to text her. Unfortunately, the rap/beat-boxing gatherings were completely random on the places and times, so he had waited for someone to contact him before contacting Lilly. In the back of her mind, she wished they had hung out regardless of the hip-hop gatherings. However, she didn't know what Donald did on his personal time without her, and she didn't want to be the one to interrupt his day to hang out.

It was 2am on Saturday when he texted her, asking if she was free to go on Sunday around 1pm. Upon getting the text, butterflies fluttered in her stomach. Just to be clear: butterflies from being nervous about the gathering- not because she was happy to get a text from him. Why would she be happy about getting a text from that kid...

The Bella didn't know what to expect, so she spent most of the car ride mulling on her social anxiety. Being with Donald helped quell her fears, but the unknown was still the unknown. What if they got separated? What if her beat boxing wasn't any good? What if she got into a fight? Her anxiety spiked when the senior moved to exit the highway.

"How much longer?" Her voice was small, her stomach felt tight.

"Mmm... I'd say ten minutes..."

Lilly spied the clock, taking note of the time. Trying to get her mind off of her nervousness, she turned towards the window to watch super markets and family restaurants pass by. She wondered if they were going somewhere ambiguous or if it would just be like a house party.

"Aaaaand... we are just about there..." Donald stopped at a red light and clicked his right signal on. Lilly's eyes darted at the time. Eight minutes had passed. They took a few more turns before settling into a parking-lot to what looked to be a nice apartment complex.

House party setting...? Lilly thought, examining the clean, seemingly normal looking building. A sign hovered on the second floor reading "Building up for Lease". So it was an empty apartment building...?

"This is the Monkey Cage. It used to be an apartment complex, but its been abandoned for 5 some years now. The guys who are running the gathering rented the place out for the day, so we don't have to worry about breaking and entering."

Stepping out of the car, the smaller asian took note of the other cars in the parking-lot. Some looked relatively normal like Donald's, others were obviously modified or sported fancy paint jobs. Donald reached into his back seat to grab his Treblemakers string bag, slinging it onto his back as he shut and locked his door.

"Why's it called the Monkey Cage?" She softly whispered as she followed the boy to the entrance.

"..." The Treble halted, biting his lower lip. "Trust me... you don't want to know..."

They walked in to see a practically empty room with dirty broken wooden floor boards, large pieces of flimsy cardboard covering dusty windows, and graffiti sprayed on the walls. The faint sound of chatter and cheering shook the floor under their feet. Across the room from where they were standing was a hispanic-looking boy in a red hoodie sitting on a stool next to a door. His head was tilted downwards on his phone as he texted away. The boy glanced up at the sound of the entrance door closing.

" 'Ey! Donald my boy!" He jumped off his stool and met Donald halfway across the room for a bro-hug. "Glad you could make it bro, it's starting to get wild down there." He glanced over at Lilly. "And, who is this fine young lady here?"

"This is Lilly, she's a good beat box. Lilly, this is Roque, he's my rap partner."

Roque grinned and offered his hand, she shook it shyly.

"You on bouncer duty for now?" Donald asked as they began to approach the door.

"Yeh, yeh. My shifts gonna end in like an hour."

"Aw that sucks. But, yo, when you get off of your shift, you and me? Dope duo rap battle against Skinny and Tempo."

"You know it man! Gonna wreck them like we did last year."

The two shoulder bumped. Roque opened the door for them, revealing a stair case. The sound of loud beat boxing and rhymes flooded into their ears. Stepping down, the stair creaked under their step, but felt stable enough for Lilly to feel safe. The door shut behind them.

"That was Roque, we go way back."

"I can tell. I don't see you talking like that often."

She turned to look at Donald, his eyes were glued upwards as if he was embarrassed. Further down the stairs, they got a full view of the basement. From what Lilly could see from her step, the room was humungous. The walls were littered with graffiti over graffiti- it was hard to tell how it originally looked, but if one stared hard enough, they could spot that the original color was a sickly beige. The room was filled with crowds of people, but it wasn't at all jammed. It looked as though there was enough room for dancing and walking aimlessly without bumping into others. Surprisingly the people there seemed to range from 16 to possibly folks in their 50s. Some were huddled into their own small group, while others were in large circles, cheering as rap battles enraged in their center. The room was quite dim since the ceiling lights were off, the electricity in the building probably didn't work due to the building having been abandoned. Surprisingly, partcipates had brought lights ranging from portable hand held desk lights to what looked to be battery charged film set lights. Donald shrugged his bag off of his shoulder and pulled out a pack of glow stick bracelets. He snapped a few to light them up, handing the blue and white ones to Lilly. She silently noted that he'd given her Bella colors and was putting red and yellow Treble colors on himself.

"In case we get separated I have LED earrings on, so if you're looking for me, I should be the only guy with flashing red dots on his ears." Shuffling through his bag, he pulled out a withdrawn lightsaber. "And for you, Obi Wan's lightsaber. If you can't find me, then just raise this in the air, I should be able to spot it."

She happily accepted the lightsaber, holding it firmly in her hands made her feel more confident. Finally getting off the stairs, Donald was quickly intercepted by friends. There was a blur of meet and greet for Lilly. Reezy-Peezy, Supreme T, Charcoal Dust... she could barely keep up with the names. They eventually made their way towards a crowd that was circling a pair of rappers who were battling. Mesmerized by the spits and flows, the Bella was quickly swept in with the crowd, "ohh"-ing and "ahh"-ing as the battle grew intense.

Donald glimpsed at the smaller asian as she went along with the crowd, a grin on her face as if she were an amused 5-year-old seeing an amusement park for the first time. He struggled to suppress a smile and a laugh that was trying to force its way onto his lips. The smile found its way up, but he opted to go with putting his hand to his mouth to appear as if he were stroking his chin at the battle in thought.

Lilly turned to Donald after one of the rappers had pulled a ridiculous punchline about how he rapped like Yoda. The Treble had a hard look in his eyes and was resting his chin in a hand thoughtfully. Knowing him, he's probably analyzing the rap battle, she thought to herself, rolling her eyes as she brought her attention back to the rappers.

Wandering away from the rap battle, the pair found themselves observing a beat boxing session, after that they observed a free style rap game where rappers attempted to create ciphers based off of what people around them were wearing. It was then that Lilly realized how fast her heart was beating. It wasn't from nervousness or fear or social anxiety... it was from excitement.

"Alright. I'm ready." She found herself announcing to her tutor.

Donald stared at her with a confused look.

"I'm going to go wander around to find my own clique."

The boy was surprised by the amount of confidence that was spewing out of the small girl. Nodding, Donald turned his earrings on and she triggered her lightsaber to full length.

"Don't kill anyone... remember the Jedi Code."

Lilly smirked and shook her head as she turned to walk away.

"I'm serious!" A slight pang of disappointment rang in his stomach as he watched her leave his line of sight.

Wandering around Lilly found a small group beat boxing away. They were doing a game similar to the riff off where one person dropped a beat and continued until another person picked up on it to change it. They were incredible. The way they were smirking and countering beats with ease. The looks on their faces... it made her jealous. She wanted to be just as free as they were- spitting beats as if there was nothing holding them back, as if it were the easiest thing in the world. Pushing away all insecurities, she jumped in when there was a pause. Initially, the group was surprised. A small asian wielding a lightsaber would have been alarming or cutely intimidating to most, but they recovered and welcomed her warmly into the game. She was soon cut off by another person, but quickly found her way back into the beats. She was on the tips of her toes, her heart was racing, it was like her brain was trigger adrenaline to the fight-or-flight mode. She stood her ground. It was all fight.

...

The beat boxing group paused as a loud announcer-like-voice rang atop their heads.

"Ladies and gentlemen! It's the time for that dope duo rap battle we wait for every year!"

Lilly recalled Donald's discussion with Roque. An hour of beat boxing must have passed , as Roque was now off his bouncer duty shift.

The announcer's voice interrupted her train of thought. "Our best rappers are pairing up to go face to face again! In one corner we've got the challengers, the man who wields a scepter in one hand and the hopes and dreams of all us in the other, our one, our only underground king... Tempo! Teamed up with the king is the dynamic spitter with dancing feet that defy gravity... Skinny!" The crowd went wild, chanting the names.

"Why is he called the underground king?" Lilly asked a near-by beat boxer.

"Tempo has been pretty popular underground for a while. He's one of those guys we know is gonna make it far- kid's just 17, already gettin signed to a label. Tempo's a home boy, so he ain't gonna forget about us, gonna come back rich and successful, and we'll throw 'em a party fit for a king."

The announcer waited for the crowd to settle before continuing. "In the other corner, rockin the blood red and royal gold, last year's winners... the Portuguese boy that everyone knows and loves, the hard balling, tough spittin, Roque! By his side is his and everyone's long time bro, the genius with an IQ over 9000... Donald!"

Lilly squirmed as she made her way through the crowd. It would be her first time seeing Donald free style, she wouldn't miss it for the world. Getting a glimpse of the players she noticed just how young Tempo looked and just how not skinny Skinny looked. The announcer flipped a coin and the battle was on.

They were good. Ridiculously good. The punch lines and puns were swirling through her head, one after another, she couldn't keep up. At one point Donald looked over in her direction. Noticing her, he smiled widely, and turned his still glowing LED earrings off. Her tutor surprisingly fit in a ton of big fancy words into his free style like "genocide, aphrodisiac, incessant", he was even able to rhyme "it is" with "incubus". Lilly and the crowd all "wow"-ed when he was able to rock in the term "Bermuda triangles". The Treble was definitely living up to his status as a "genius with an IQ over 9000". She wondered how big his IQ was- he was smart, but she was pretty sure he wasn't going to solve all the problems and mysteries of the universe.

Although it was close, Roque and Donald ended up winning the battle. There were bro-hugs all around, much love, no resentment.

That was how the next few days of their spring break went. Donald would pick her up some time around noon, they'd end up at some ambiguous setting (sometimes lit, sometimes not, Donald always had the glow stick bracelets in his bag), and they'd beat box and rap to their hearts content. It was enthralling. Like nothing Lilly had ever experienced before.

One day as they drove back to the university from an abandoned pool, Donald noticed his quiet friend slouched in her seat, deep in thought. She was a quiet girl, but today she was too quiet.

"What'cha thinking about so hard?"

"Hmmm it's just... I've never tried freestyle rapping before...It seems fun..."

"Oh yeah? It is pretty fun. You should try it out." He grinned at the thought of her rapping. He'd never heard her rap before and he was pretty sure she'd be too embarrassed to attempt to rap in front of him.

"... How... how do I even start...?"

Donald's eyebrows shot up. Was she really going to attempt it?

The Bella mumbled, but the boy didn't hear a breath.

"L-let me tell you... um... Let me tell you 'bout what I'm gonna do..." She trailed off into thought.

"That's good. That's a good way to start."

"Ah... Let me tell you 'bout what I'm gonna do... I'm gonna rip... gonna rip your verses up... like... like scissors... ripping paper up..."

The Treble couldn't hold back a laugh that bursted through his lips.

"Shut up! I'm trying!" Lilly's face was consumed in red. "I'm- I'm gonna blow your verses up! Like fireworks! Blowing your verses up!"

The Treble fell into an eruption of giggle fits as the Bella continued to attempt to freestyle.

"Then I'm gonna put shame to your reputation like you're losing a baseball game!"

"Stop!" Donald croaked in between a laugh. "I'm cramping up from laughing too hard!" He tried to catch his breath, but the rhymes that had spewed out of the girl's mouth kept making him crack up.

Still red faced, Lilly punched him as he continued to laugh, swearing he was just as bad when he had first started.

On Thursday they were at an underpass of a bridge. Lilly was beat boxing with a group she had become familiar with while Donald was off to the side rapping with Roque. During a break in lines, Donald glanced over to see how the Bella was doing. She was smiling and dancing to the flow of the beats. He found himself staring at her expression. That smile. She looked satisfied. Happy. This was where she belonged, beat boxing to her hearts content.

Lilly felt her phone vibrate madly in her pocket- which was a shock since people normally didn't call her. The name of the caller shocked her even more.

Aubrey?

She clicked the green button. "Hello?" Her voice came out as a whisper.

"Hey Lilly! So, I know I probably won't be able to hear you respond, but guess what!" (She didn't wait for a response.) "The Bellas are back in the ICCAs! We are going to have to rehearse, rehearse, rehearse! I'll see you after spring break! Bye!" Click. Aubrey hung up.

Wide eyed, Lilly was stunned. They made it into the finals? But how? She was happy but... then she thought of how much they would have to rehearse. Aubrey was going to kill them to win, they were going to have to do whatever it took...

"Hey, what's up?" Donald had seen her drift away from the beat boxing group, a look of concern was on his face. She wondered if she looked mortified.

"Aubrey just called...The Bellas are in the finals..."

His eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Wow! That's awesome!" The Treble smiled at her as if waiting for a response. When there was none, he raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you excited?"

"I'm not really looking forward to Aubrey's hellish rehearsals..."

"Yo, why don't you just show her your mad beats? I'm sure it will be more fun if you got to beat box for the group."

But would Aubrey let her beat box for the group...?

Saturday was the last day of the gatherings. Lilly was going to miss this. She had made sure to exchange numbers with her new beat boxing friends, determined to stay in contact with them. They had taught her so much- she felt utterly thankful. Unfortunately, they had wrapped up the beat-boxing early as most of them were heading back out to travel to their campuses or homes. It was on her way to Donald that she had bumped shoulders with someone else. She quickly apologized and tried to scramble away.

"Whoa wait! I know you."

Lilly turned to see a somewhat familiar boy pointing his finger at her. "You're a Bella, right?" She nodded. He pointed a thumb at himself, "I'm a Footnote."

Suddenly, Lilly did recognize him. She remembered seeing him dance at the semi-finals.

"Yo, I just heard my team go kicked outta the ICCA's. Congrats to you."

"Thanks...?" She was unsure on how to react in this kind of situation.

"It's completely unfair though. You guys kinda sucked and we kinda rocked."

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me. The. Bellas. Suck."

Before Lilly could retaliate, Donald stepped in from out of nowhere. "Calm down man. It's just accapella."

"Aca-scuse me? Just accapella?" The Footnote suddenly took a step back, taking a better look at Donald. "Wait, wait wait, hold up. Ain't you one of those Treblemakers?"

"Yeah. So?"

"Just accapella? You have no right to say that to me. You Treblemakers always win the ICCAs, always beating us Footnotes. Girls are always falling all over the Trebles. You know what son, I've always wanted to do this against you and your aca-rapping ass. Let's brawl!" The Footnote threw his jacket off onto the floor.

"Donald!" Lilly grabbed his arm, pulling the Treble back. She couldn't let Donald fight, especially since it was her fault.

"It's okay, I've got this." The easy-going Donald had a deadly set of serious in his eyes, something Lilly had never seen before.

"But you're not good at taking pain!"

"Pain?" The dark-skinned boy furrowed his eyebrows then keeled over laughing. The Bella decided that he was going insane. "Lilly... don't worry. We aren't going fist to fist, it's a rap battle."

"... aca-scuse me?"

The Bella couldn't believe it. Had they suddenly been sucked into a musical?

A crowd gathered around them chanting, "Rap Battle! Rap Battle!"

"Yeah, the way the rules work here is that there is zero tolerance to physical violence. So instead, everything is settled by rap battles."

"Oh.. makes sense, I was wondering why there wasn't as much shanking going on..."

Donald could only grin at her.

The Footnote stepped up to the center of the rap battle field surrounded by the crowd.

"Look at this nerd with his glasses and mathematical degree, being fake, trying to live it up against me. I'd welcome you to the neighborhood by running circles around your rhymes, but my homies would hold me back cuz beating you would be a hate crime."

Donald grinned, stroking his chin as the Footnote fist bumped his friends. They nodded at the Treble, telling him to go. Lilly wanted to wish him good luck, but his face looked so concentrated, she didn't want to break it.

"Your rhyme schemes of crime themes, is like a painful dose of diuretic, to a man's dream. Son, I'll pay for your CD but pay no attention, to your lyrical descension for physical possessions."

"Damn son!" A few people behind Donald praised him and patted his back.

"Big words... smart guy..." The Footnote and his crew nodded in approval, ready to go again.

"Let me make the beat drop, I'm coming from the life of hip-hop, while you're coming from the beauty shop. Been practicing my spits for a battle plan, yo your flows can't harm me man, they're just garbage man."

"Garbage?" Donald didn't wait to give the audience the chance to applaud, going in with a tight flow. "Yo, you best believe that when I'm on the mic, I'm popping ear blockage. I've been doing this since college. I've got an ass for brains, so even when I take a shit, I'm dropping knowledge."

"OOOOOHHHHH!" The crowd cheered as the Footnote backed away with a shocked face and raised hands. He didn't think he could beat the Treble.

Donald earned pats on the back and multiple bro hugs. Despite the love, the Treble and Bella made a quick leave. They both sensed that the tension was still in the air, the Footnote was bitter. Lilly had wanted to stay longer, but her friends had already left and it was starting to die down anyways...

Spring break was one of the best weeks of her life. Getting to meet all those people, beat boxing until her throat was dry, hanging out with Donald... heck she even found out she'd gotten a B on her mid-term... It was as if the air was suddenly lighter and her brain was trigger endorphins uncontrollably... she glanced at the boy who was driving, then back at her window contemplating a feeling in her chest. She wondered if the sunflower seeds she'd eaten for lunch were blooming a garden in her stomach. It was a feeling she'd never felt before... a feeling like she had a reason to live.

Before she knew it, it was Monday. The fun was all over. Aubrey had arranged the rehearsal schedule from hell. It was endless rehearsals day in and day out. The small asian had attempted to show Aubrey her beat boxing, but the blonde had ignored her and anyone else who tried to approach her with changes. The Bella leader had demanded everyone to drop their social life, grades, and anything and everything that wasn't acapella. Lilly tried her best to study at night or during lunch or even in the bathroom. She still went to her classes, but even then she was falling asleep in all of them. She hadn't seen Donald at all since spring break. That feeling she had felt in the car was long forgotten. She didn't have the time for it, but she yearned to feel it again. Without him, she felt... off...Rehearsals felt off. But, that was because Beca had yet to show up to any of them and Aubrey was getting frustrated each day, not because of something silly like not being able to see that treblesome boy. But she...

... well shit.

She was staring at the latest Stats test that had just gotten passed back. A 64%. Fantastic.

End of chapter.

Author's notes:

Holy shit writing rap lyrics is hard. I referenced Epik High's "Free Music" a lot for help with the lyrics...

I don't know why, but this was the toughest chapter to write. I feel like my struggle to input words onto a page was super obvious this chapter. If so, I'm terribly sorry for my horrible writing.

Going back to school this week, got a super busy schedule. I'm going to try my hardest to continue to update. Don't know when I'll be able to update, but I can guarantee that next Saturday will be the latest!

Thank you all for the reviews and favorites and follows! I love you all~