Beca and Chloe had been arguing for weeks now, and Beca was tired. Not just of the arguing, she was tired in general. Beca had been banished from their bed, and was forced to sleep on the couch, not that she got much sleep anyway. She had been too tired and depressed to bother with her make-up, so everyone noticed the dark circles under her eyes. She was tired of trying to explain why she looked like shit every day. She was tired of the looks on her children's faces when she and Chloe argued. She was just allover tired.
She wasn't ready to give up though. And so it happened that she hatched a plan with Aubrey and Jesse who were also tired of listening to the pair. Not that they minded; they were after all their best friends, but even best friends have a limit on how much they can take before they have to take charge.
"You need to talk to her," Aubrey had said. Beca tried to argue that she'd been trying to talk to Chloe for weeks now. "No," Aubrey had said. "You need to have an honest to God conversation with her, not a screaming match. Jesse has the younger kids, and I'm picking up all the older kids and we're going to have some fun. Call me when you two have sorted out your shit."
It was Jesse, ironically, who had told Beca what Chloe had said to Aubrey.
Beca had seen them all off, promising her kids and her best friends that everything was going to be okay, and that she would sort things out with Chloe. They wouldn't tell her where they were taking the kids, but then, Beca figured, that was the point.
Beca went home, smiling when she heard Chloe singing. She found Chloe in the kitchen, she was just starting to cook.
"We need to talk," Beca said.
"Not now," Chloe said. "I've got to cook dinner and Clay needs –"
"No," Beca said. "Aubrey and Jesse have kidnapped our children until we, as Aubrey so eloquently put it 'stop traumatizing your children and sort your shit out.' So we are going to talk now. I'm tired of arguing and we have yet to have a real conversation about all of this and how it's affecting us and the kids. And I don't know about you, but I want my kids back, and I'm sure Aubrey won't let them come home until we agree on something."
"You let them kidnap our kids!" Chloe yelled.
"Jesus Christ Chloe!" Beca said. "That's all you got out of that."
"You let them kidnap our children!"
"It's our best friends," Beca said. "Our children are safe, we leave them with Aubrey and Jesse while we're working or when we have date nights, they are fine. And you know that, too. Now you're just looking for reason to argue."
"I am not!" Chloe argued.
Beca sighed. This was going nowhere fast.
"Okay, look. I've always been better at expressing my feelings through songs, and you know that, so I've got a song to sing, and it's how I feel, so will you please just, listen?" Beca asked.
Chloe softened. "Okay," she said gently.
Beca went and grabbed one of her guitars. She had several these days, but she had grabbed the old acoustic guitar that Chloe had given her for her birthday the first year they were together. She hadn't actually played that guitar in several years, but this was the only one she would use for this. If she could only keep one guitar, it would be this one.
She sat down on one end of the couch, and Chloe sat on the other end. It took a few minutes to tune the guitar, but when it was ready to go, Beca took a deep breath and began playing.
"I got a piece of land, out in the countryside. Lay back and smell the sun; warm up the Georgia pine. Feels so good to be taking it easy. Why would I ever leave? 'Cause I know I got some good friends that live down the street, got a good looking woman with her arms 'round me. Here in a small town where it feels like home I got everything I need and nothing that I don't. Homegrown, Homegrown."
Beca noticed Chloe had begun silently crying. She wasn't sure if that was a good sign or a bad sign.
"We got a fire going down by the riverside, sip whiskey out the bottle, livin' like we'll never die. Come on and stay a while if you don't believe me. Why would I ever leave? 'Cause I know I got some good friends that live down the street, got a good looking woman with her arms 'round me. Here in a small town where it feels like home I got everything I need and nothing that I don't. Homegrown, Homegrown. Homegrown, Homegrown."
Beca's mind was reeling, trying to figure out what Chloe was thinking. She idly wondered if she should have sang a song that expressed how she was feeling now. Like the rug had been pulled from underneath her. Like the earth had swallowed her whole. Like her whole world had been turned upside down.
"I got some good friends that live down the street, got a good looking woman with her arms 'round me. Here in a small town where it feels like home I got everything I need. Homegrown. And nothing that I don't. Homegrown. Everything I need. Homegrown. And nothing that I don't. Homegrown. It's the weight that you carry from the things you think you want. It's the weight that you carry from the things you want. It's the weight that you carry from the things you think you want. It's the weight that you carry from the things you think you want. I got everything I need, nothing that I don't. Everything I need, nothing that I don't. Everything I need, nothing that I don't. Everything I need, and nothing that I don't."
Beca looked at Chloe. She was still unsure where Chloe stood with her.
"That's how I've felt living my life with you Chloe. My life with you, with our family, it's everything I need."
Chloe sniffled.
"Aubrey told you," she said.
"No," Beca said. "Aubrey refused to, but Jesse told me when Aubrey wasn't listening."
"So much for the best friend code," Chloe huffed weakly.
"I don't understand why you didn't just talk to me, Chlo –" Beca said. "I know I'm not the best with talking about feelings and stuff, but I've gotten better. We've always been able to talk to each other and figure things out, so I don't understand why you just shut me out."
"I don't know," Chloe said. "I guess I just thought that if you thought I didn't want you, you'd find the courage to follow your dreams."
Beca groaned into her hands. "There are so many things wrong with that," she said. She looked up and locked eyes with Chloe.
"First of all, it's not my dream anymore. It was at one point, but it's not anymore. Futhermore, even if it was still my dream, I still wouldn't leave. I couldn't leave you, regardless of whether or not you wanted me, and I couldn't leave our kids. If it was something I still wanted, I would have talked to you, and we would have discussed whether or not we wanted to move and if it would work for all of us. But baby, I've been living my dream with you for years now."
"I just thought I was holding you back," Chloe said.
"You could never hold me back, Chloe. Sure at one point I wanted to be a famous music producer in LA. I wanted to change lives through music, but I do that here. I show kids the power and the magic and the beauty of music, and it helps them. I've got an amazing beautiful wife, and the best kids. My best friends are just up the road. Life for me couldn't get any better. This is exactly where I want to be. If I wasn't happy, I would tell you."
"But," Chloe started.
"No," Beca said. "You have always been the one to lift me up. You got past all my walls when no one else could. You believed in me when no one else did. You helped me when no one else would. You loved me when I thought there was nothing in me to love. You saw me when everyone else saw my eyeliner and my piercings and tattoos. You are everything to me, don't you know that by now?"
"I'm sorry," Chloe said. She was openly sobbing now. "I'm so sorry."
"It's okay," Beca said. "Just talk to me. Tell me what's going on in the pretty head of yours."
Chloe said nothing. Her eyes were still trained on the floor.
"Chloe, we've been happily married for nearly fifteen years. Or at least I thought we were happy. Were you unhappy?"
Chloe shook her head. Beca sighed in relief.
"So we've been happily married for nearly fifteen years, do you really want to end that? Are we really over?" Beca asked. Her voice got smaller as she went on. Her voice was just a whisper when she said, "Are you really going to leave me?"
Chloe's big baby blue eyes met Beca's navy blue ones. Both eyes were now filled with tears, but Beca could see everything she needed to know in Chloe's eyes.
What do you think?
This is the last chapter. Only the Epilogue left.