Holy Ground

A Pitch Perfect Story

Disclaimer: I do not own anything familiar.

Song Recommendation: Holy Ground by Taylor Swift

Author's Note: This one is AU. Stacie didn't have a last name, so I gave her one. For this story, Barden is going to be an all-girls college in Georgia. The Treblemakers are from a different college. It is short, but I hope that you all like it. Two updates for this story in one night (sort of)! You all are very lucky! Let me know what you think!


Beca Mitchell walked into the Starbucks that was a block away from her apartment and a ten minute drive from the little two-bedroom apartment that she shared with her best friend from college, Stacie Winthrop. Stacie was outrageous and a bit of a slut, but there was something really genuine about her that Beca loved. Even though they didn't have much in common, Beca knew that she could count on Stacie when she needed her. The two of them became as thick as thieves their freshman year, and by the end of their four years in college together, they considered each other more as sisters than friends, which is why they decided to get an apartment together in LA when they both talked about moving across the country together. Stacie had plans to become an actress, and Beca had hopes to become a record producer.

She had about a half hour before she had to be at work, so after she put in her order for a coffee and a chocolate chip muffin, she sat down at a small table in the corner of the store. She pulled out her phone and began checking her email. A big smile slipped onto her face when she received an email from another old friend from her college days. Chloe Beale was older by three years, so she and Beca weren't in college together for long (just one school year), but the two girls got close after Chloe decided to jump into the shower with Beca one day. The two girls kept in touch regularly, and now that Chloe was working in New York City as a financial advisor (it was a big shock to Beca when she finally learned that Chloe was a finance and economics major in college, because the redhead was as ditsy as they come) and had shacked up with some big wig CEO for some investment company (okay, so maybe she had married him, but whatever), so she regularly invited her old friends from college out to visit over the last six and a half years since her graduation. It was easier for Beca to get out to the city to visit with Chloe and the other girls when she was still in college (the ICCAs were held in New York every year after all), but she hadn't been able to get out to the reunions hosted by Chloe in the last three years since she and Stacie had moved to LA. The first year, she was doing a lot of grunt work for the big studio executives, with a lot of late night coffee and dry cleaning runs. The second year, the reunion was being held when Beca was given the opportunity to get a little producing credit under belt (granted, she was one of many producing that track, but her name still made it into a CD jacket). The third year, the reunion fell the same weekend of a wedding she was attending with her (now) ex-boyfriend, Cole, had roped her into. According to the email, Chloe wanted to have another reunion with the girls and to tell them something big. Beca guessed that there was one of two possibilities for this little reunion: Chloe was pregnant or getting a divorce. Beca responded to the email saying that she would love to come to the reunion and that she would put in for the time off at work.

While she waited for her order to be called, Beca reminisced about the last time she had been in New York City. It was the week of the ICCAs her senior year at Barden. Normally, the girls would only go to the city for the weekend (leaving Thursday night by train and spending all day Friday, Saturday, and until late in the afternoon on Sunday in the city with Chloe and Aubrey Posen, the other older girl that Beca had become friendly with during her freshman year at Barden), but that year, the ICCAs fell the weekend before Barden's scheduled spring break. Beca, Stacie, their fellow seniors Fat Amy, Denise, Jessica, Ashley, Cynthia, and Lilly, Aubrey (who had flown in from Florida where she had moved the year after she graduated with her boyfriend, Todd), and Chloe had all decided to spend that week together. The college girls got a couple of hotel rooms, and Aubrey stayed with Chloe (and Gregory, Chloe's rich, older hubby in their fancy apartment nearby).

It was during this week that Beca met him. He was attractive, with dark eyes and hair, and a great smile. They group of them were walking through Times Square, just enjoying the atmosphere of the city on the Saturday that the ICCAs were being held. She bumped into him by mistake, because Fat Amy had pushed her out of the way to get a picture with the Naked Cowboy playing his guitar on the street in a pair of tightie-whities, a cowboy hat, and cowboy boots (so, his name didn't accurately describe his appearance, but that is what he referred to himself). She fell into his back, and she quickly turned to apologize. Their eyes locked, and they shared a smile—one that gave her butterflies. They got to talking while the rest of the girls all took turns taking pictures of varying degrees with the Naked Cowboy. She couldn't tell you now what they were talking about, but she did know that most of the time was spent staring at the way his lips moved.

"Beca? Aren't you going to join us?" Fat Amy had called out to her, snapping her out of her conversation with the handsome stranger. She smiled apologetically, telling the girls that she would be there in a moment.

"Sorry…I gotta go." She said, jerking her thumb in the direction of her friends.

"It was nice talking to you, Beca." His smile made her stomach tumble, her heart beat faster, and her palms begin to dampen. He opened his mouth to say something further, but Aubrey grabbed her by the upper arm, reminding her of the time and telling her that they had to leave at that moment. She stood up on her toes, pressing a kiss to his cheek, rushing off with the rest of the girls. They needed to get to rehearsals at the theater where the ICCAs were being hosted. The competition was that night, and Beca was looking forward to winning.

Several hours later, Beca and the other Bellas were backstage when she realized that the handsome stranger she had been talking to earlier that afternoon was onstage, performing at that very moment. When his group finished (the Treblemakers, a truly stupid name in her opinion) and exited the stage, she tapped on his shoulder. His eyes widened in surprise, and a huge grin slipped onto his face. He pulled her into a tight hug, allowing her to smell his unique scent and feel the muscles of his back strain beneath her fingers. He made a joke about him being an aca-boy and she was an aca-girl and that it was inevitable for them to have aca-children together. She rolled her eyes at his cheesiness, trying to ignore the butterflies that she felt in her stomach. She heard the announcement that that the Bellas were going onstage next, meaning that she had to go once again.

Knowing he was there made Beca perform extra hard at during that competition, and she was relieved to see that the Bellas came in first that year, with the Treblemakers coming in second. At the end of the competition, Beca found a pen, a piece of paper, and some tape. She folded the piece of paper in half, writing the words 'it's inevitable' and her number on the inside, his name on the outside, and taped the note to the door of the practice room that the Trebles had been using during the competition. Thirty-minutes later, Beca found herself getting a text from an unknown number asking her to meet him for lunch the next day. She agreed.

It was a whirlwind romance for them for the next week. She spent most of the day with the girls, but she would always find time to sneak away to meet him for dinner or coffee or a walk around Central Park or a ride on the Ferris Wheel in the big Toys-R-Us store. It was almost as if the city was theirs. She learned during their first lunch date that his college also had spring break the same time as Barden's, which allowed them their little romantic excursion for the week. After four days of Beca sneaking off to be with him, the girls insisted that she introduce them to her new friend (she refused to call him anything other than that, considering they hadn't even kissed and didn't go to the same school). His group and her group got together at a bar, where they spent most of the night drinking and dancing the night away. With one look or a light hand graze, they knew when the other needed some time away. It was that night that Beca decided to take a leap. He was sipping his beer, chatting lazily with one of his friends (Donald? David? Daniel?) and Stacie, while Beca was trying her hardest to discreetly study the way that his throat moved as he swallowed, or the way that the corners of his eyes crinkled when he laughed particularly hard or smiled particularly wide. She leaned over, whispering quietly into his ear, "I need you," causing him to go still and glance at her. The moment his eyes locked with hers, the noise around them went still. She smiled at him, adding an, "I want you," to the end. He gripped her hand in his, and they excused themselves from the bar and their friends, making their way back to her hotel room for the night. She got several texts from her friends congratulating her on getting it on with a guy that hot.

The moment the door opened, they slipped into her room, and the door closed again, she had lost her shirt, his shoes were off, and his belt was loosened. As soon as their clothes were off, they fell into the bed and they didn't leave until the very next morning. It was something that she never did; she typically didn't fall into bed with strangers, because she had issues with tearing down the walls she always kept up around her heart. There was something about him; he was like the missing piece of her. He completed her sentences, thought the same way that she did, but still surprised her. He was charming, annoying, strange, fun, goofy, and adorable, and even though she knew that he had flaws, she thought all of them were endearing.

Beca enjoyed their time together, but in a few short days, it was time for them to say goodbye. The day before she left, she took him with her to a tattoo shop. She got the tattoo of a small red apple with the year tattooed into the green leaf in black on the top of her right foot. The tattoo would be something that she could look back on for the rest of her days with a smile, remembering the time she shared with her friends, with him. Despite how close they had gotten over that week—despite how much fun they had together—they had different lives, different plans for the future. It was heartbreaking, yet fitting at the same time. His life was destined for New York City, and hers was destined for LA. They left it open-ended, deciding to keep each other's number in their phones if they were ever in the other's city. Their goodbye kiss left Beca breathless, and she felt like she was losing a piece of her. She knew that she would always miss him and wonder what could have been, but this wasn't some fairytale romance that would last them for the rest of their days. It would be something nice to look back on when they were old and gray; it was the kind of story that they would tell their grandchildren—their serendipitous meeting; their brief romance; their tearful goodbye.

Every now and again, Beca thought she sees his face in a crowd. Part of her hoped that it is him, because maybe they could start up where they left off—this time in the same city with the same goals and plans—but then she realized that that would mean that he didn't text her or call her when he got to her city, like they agreed. But, it has been over three years since they last saw each other, and she certainly didn't have the same phone (but she did keep all of her old contacts, including his number), so maybe he had lost her number. A huge part of her was itching to call him or text him, just to check in with him, to see how he is. She wondered if he ever thought about her and their time together the same way that she did. Did he wonder what it would have been like if he had gone to LA, too, or if she had gone to New York? Did he ever wonder what she was doing at that moment? Did he ever wonder if she had achieved her dreams? She wondered all of those things about him, and she could only hope that he did the same about her.


Two days later, Stacie announced that she and Beca were going to go to the club with one of her friends on the show that she was starring in. Normally, clubbing wasn't Beca's thing, but they were celebrating the fact that Stacie was getting a small part in some movie, so Beca did her duty as the best friend to drink, dance, and potentially hold the hair of her best friend at the end of the night. While they were dancing, Beca thought that she saw the familiar head of hair, the familiar butt, the familiar way of moving in a man across the club, but she waved it off. She focused her attention on Stacie and their small group. She closed her eyes, rocking her hips to the music, dancing along the body of one of the men that Stacie's friend, Patty, had brought with her. She pretended that he was in the room. She pretended that it was him that she was dancing with. Beca scoffed internally at how silly she was for thinking those thoughts, because it had been so long since they saw each other last. She was a distant memory to him, even if he wasn't a distant memory to her. She felt stupid, because she had never let herself get so hung up on a guy like she had let herself get hung up on this one.

Beca found herself getting thirsty. She excused herself from her friends and made her way over to the bar, climbing into one of the chairs, and ordered a martini. She crossed her legs, watching as her heel hung precariously from her right foot, sipping her drink and leaning her back against the bar. She watched her friends make complete fools out of themselves as they danced the night away. She finished her drink and turned back around to order another, readjusting her shoe back onto her foot before doing so. When the bartender set the martini down in front of her, a hand slapped a twenty dollar bill down in front of her. "Nice tattoo." The voice was familiar, as was the hand, she was sure. Beca's eyes followed the hand up the rather muscular arm to a very familiar shoulder, neck, and then face. Her jaw dropped open in surprise when her eyes landed on him.

"Jesse?" She asked in shock, hoping out of the chair to wrap her arms around his neck to hug him hello. His smell was just as amazing as it was all those years ago, and his body was even more fit than it had been when she had seen him last. His face was more matured—a little more weathered, with laugh lines permanently etched into the skin around his eyes. He looked good for his twenty-six years of age. She smiled broadly when she pulled back, climbing back up into the seat she had momentarily vacated.

"Hey, Beca," he said warmly, sitting down in the chair beside her, ordering a beer from the bartender. "How have you been?" Jesse asked her, taking a sip of the beer from the bottle when it had arrived.

"I have been good. Busy, but good," she told him, tucking a loose lock of hair behind her ear. He grinned, studying her face. "You?"

"I have been great. I just moved to LA last week," he told her. "I got hired to score a new movie. I came out to the bar to celebrate with my new coworkers." He licked his bottom lip. "I've been meaning to call…like we agreed…but, I...uh, I wasn't sure if you would have wanted me to."

Beca smiled shyly at Jesse, nodding her head. "I would have wanted you, too."

"Well, I am glad that I ran into you, then. You look great, Beca." She told him that he, too, looked great. They chatted for awhile, until Beca heard Stacie calling her to come back to the dance floor. Beca bit her lip, looking from Stacie to Jesse, wondering who she should choose. After a moment, it came to her. She didn't have to choose one or the other—one life over the other. Both lives were coming together, and it was her job to further assimilate one into the other.

"Want to dance?" She asked him, jerking her thumb over her shoulder towards her friends. "I came here with my friend, Stacie. Remember her?" He nodded, following where she had indicated, his eyes landing on the busty brunette who currently performing moves that would make a stripper blush on the dance floor.

"Yeah, I remember her." He finished his beer and stood up, extending a hand to Beca. "I would love to dance, Beca." She tossed back the last of her drink, placing her hand in his and allowing him to pull her toward the dance floor.

So, maybe this was some epic romance after all.