There was very little Chloe could have said to Beca after that which would have meant more to her than what she had just heard.
"Everyone else wants a brand new sweater; I just want you."
It was like Chloe understood, and for that she was grateful.
"Thank you." Beca said, after a moment of silence in which she tried to control the smile on her face, and the blush in her cheeks, and the electricity which ran through her body.
"For what?" Chloe giggled back.
"Just for being honest."
"That's okay." Chloe said sweetly. "I mean, I didn't - you said - well, Aubrey said, to be fair - but you agreed - and then I didn't think you were, I didn't think I was - but I suppose I am - and then you kissed -"
"Chloe! Stop!" Beca laughed. "I've never had a girlfriend. You know that now."
"Yes. That is precisely what I was trying to say. Thank you." Beca heard the smile on Chloe's face. "We're not very good at this are we?" she chuckled.
"Nope." Beca said, and flopped back onto her bed, still only wrapped in her towel and her hair in a damp tangle around her shoulders. "So... We're... we're all okay, then?"
"Yep." Chloe agreed. "We're great. We'll just take things as they go. No pressure."
"No pressure." Beca agreed, smiling to herself. "Oh - and less liquor!" she added as an afterthought.
"Yeah, sorry about that. That stuff is rough sometimes..." Chloe smiled, and lay back in her bed in a similar position to that of Beca's, the pair mirrored but separated by a few miles of snow and quadrangles and chattering college students she could just hear through her window who crossed campus on their way home. To Chloe though there was nobody else in the world in that moment. No walls, no snow - no Aubrey. She understood Beca's desire to be patient, to take things slow - after all, had it not been her who had been looking for Aubrey's shoulder to lean on, confused about everything that was going on, asking her to lie to people until she had her head straight again? None of that mattered anymore, and just for now, things were alright.
"Anyway," Chloe said, realising she'd been silently invested in her thoughts for a little while longer than was natural, "We still have this dress to buy!"
"Ah shit." she heard Beca say and giggled.
"Oh come on, it'll be fun."
"Like, gynecologist fun?"
"Shut up. You'll enjoy it. I'll come round tomorrow morning - be ready early!"
"Fine." Beca said, and rolled her eyes with a smile as she heard Chloe's sweet goodbye's and the click of the shutting phone in her ear. Beca was glad that Chloe understood her need for patience. She just needed to convince herself that Chloe wouldn't leave or wouldn't hurt her and she could work on letting her into her funny little life.
Beca climbed into bed and pulled her laptop from her desk down onto her knees, ignoring another text from Jesse that had flagged up whilst she'd been in the call. He wasn't going to ruin her little moment of self understanding she thought, pulling her headphones on and loading up the mixing programme onto the laptop screen. It was what she did when she needed relief from her thoughts, and within minutes she was away, enveloped into a world of thick and heavy baselines and rolling vocals that licked at her ears.
It was whilst she was in this cocoon of noise she failed to notice the knock at her door - which in all fairness sounded quietly at first - but soon, having been ignored for a few minutes, turned to a loud bang.
"Beca - answer the door!" a voice called out, and Beca, hearing something other than what was in the cans of her headphones, glanced up, muting the laptop with one tap of the keyboard. She pulled off her headphones just as another fistful of bangs punctured the air.
"Jesus wept," Beca yelped, hopping off her bed and throwing on her sweatpants and a hoody. "Give me a minute!"
She pulled the door open, and there, holding two steaming mugs and glaring with one raised eyebrow, was Jesse.
"What do you want?" She asked, pulling her hair out from the neck of her sweatshirt.
"Nice to see you too." He said, brushing past. "Mind if I..."
"Looks like you already have." Beca muttered, folded her arms and watching Jesse settle at her desk. "What do you want?" she asked again.
"I brought you soup." he said, and held one out to her, having made himself comfortable on her swivel chair facing her laptop. "You said you were sick so I brought you soup. Here." He held it out again, then pointed at the laptop screen with one free hand. "What's this?"
She walked over to him, having kicked the dorm room door shut with her heel, then reached across and flipped the lid of the laptop shut. "Mine, is what that is. And I'm not really sick." she added dejectedly, taking the cup from his still outstretched hand.
"Really?" he asked, and she scowled at his sarcastic tone.
"Yes, really." she said, hopping back onto her bed and crossing her legs beneath her. "But if you tell Jesse I swear to god I will kill you."
She was annoyed at his persistence, but damn the soup smelt good. He motioned zipping an invisible zipper shut across his lips.
"Cutting two shifts in two days. That's impressive." he smiled.
"Shut up."
"You sure you're not sick?" He asked, before taking a sip of his own steaming soup.
"Yes, why?" Beca snapped, sensing that Jesse was about to either insult or make an innappropriate pass at her - both of which she had no patience for.
"No - I just - " he waved a finger up and down in front of her. "Nice sweatpants."
"You don't half know how to make yourself at home, do you? Waltz in, hand a girl soup, then insult her. Charming." Beca said, looking into her cup.
"You're hardly the gracious host."
"I wasn't hosting - you just walked in."
"Besides," Jesse said, and turned to fiddle with some of the switches on the mixing board on Beca's desk. "The ladies love me."
"You're sure about that?" Beca smirked.
"Yup." Jesse nodded. "You love me."
Beca laughed, out of pity more than anything. "You're ridiculous."
"Nope." Jesse said, and then lifted the lid again on Beca's laptop. "What were you doing on here anyway?"
"Jesse, that's mine-"
"I only wanted to see!" he said, and reached out to stop Beca's hand, grabbing it before she had a chance to shut the computer off again. "Were you mixing?"
Beca folded her arms, but Jesse just looked up at her with expectant eyes. "Yes. I was mixing." she said, rolling her own eyes.
"I didn't know you were into that." he said, looking back at the screen as the software loaded back into view.
"What, you thought my main musical ambition in life was to be an expert shelf stacker? Good work." Beca said, and pushed his hand from the mouse, hitting save before he had a chance to 'accidentally' delete anything.
"Show me." he said, and looked up at her again. "Show me how you do it."
Beca sighed, looking away from him, but he kept watching her, smiling - knowing he had won.
"Then you leave." she said stoutly.
"Deal."
She leant across him and pulled up a blank track. He scooched sideways in the chair and grinned at her as if to suggest she should sit, but she only glared condescendingly and turned back to the screen.
"Ouch. Cold." he said.
"Do you want to see this or not?" she snapped, and he put a finger to his mouth.
"Right, basically all I do - in the simplest terms - is pull in a baseline over here -" she indicated with her finger then dropped a track onto one side of the screen with the mouse "- then pull in the top end of the track - or the lead - over here-" she said, dragging another to the opposite side of the screen. "Then we put vocals on - which are usually mine -but we don't need to hear those-"
"Yeah we do!" Jesse said, and pushed Beca's hand from the mouse. He somehow managed to grip both of her wrists - which struggled fiercely - into one of his own hands, as the other scrolled through the files on the computer. "Where are they?"
"Jesse- we're not- get off!" she said, and pulled away with a final tug. "You're a pain, you know that right?"
"Play them," he said, with another begging look. She shook her head defiantly. Jesse though had noticed a file on the screen titled 'vocals' and with two swift taps of the keyboard had managed to load in one of her tracks.
"You're a dick!" she yelled as her voice came through the headphones which lay abandoned on the floor. The pair of them reached to grab them, Jesse leaning off his seat and Beca scrambling from her perch on her bed, but both of their fighting hands bumped together and knocked the headphones out of reach. Jesse reached out to steady himself, grabbing Beca quite forcefully, and the strength in his arms managed to pull them both to the floor beside her bed. His arms were still pressed to her shoulders as they hit the floor with a thump, he managing to straddle her and pin her down to the floor.
"That wasn't fair," he said quietly. Their faces were close, but the wind had been knocked out of Beca quite hard and she grimaced, finding herself unable to push his strong frame off. She struggled for a second and then lay there.
"You weren't listening to me sing." she said. "Now get off."
"The Bella's get to hear you sing." he said, but stayed where he was.
"Jesse get off, you're hurting me." she said, and tried to look away from him. His face was close, and she couldn't help but glance up into his eyes, watching her intently. She took a deep breath, trying to regain composure. His body was warm and heavy pressed to hers; so different to that of Chloe's.
"Jesse..." she said quietly.
Instead of moving upwards though, he shifted his head down, slowly at first, but quick enough that it caught Beca unawares. He pressed his lips to hers, his breath heavy and warm on her face. With a flick of his tongue he tried to prise open her mouth, but it was then she realised what was happening, and squirmed, pulling her head away.
"No!" she yelled, wriggling under his grip. "Jesse, get off now!"
He slackened his grip on her wrists and pulled back his head, but did not move entirely from his position straddling her.
"I thought this was what you wanted?" he asked.
"When the hell did I say that? Get off, or I swear to god I will kick you where it hurts."
He laughed, then pushed himself up off the ground. "I guess I was mistaken."
"Damn right you were mistaken!" Beca shouted, flinging herself up from the ground. "What the hell do you think you were doing?"
"You just fell at my feet, what did you think I was going to do?"
"Er, not pin me down and be weird and try and kiss me would have been a good start?" Beca snapped, flinging the door open. "Get out!"
"Are you serious?" He asked, genuinely looking concerned. "Maybe you banged your-"
"Jesse, get out!"
"I was only trying to help." he said softly, and looked away from her.
"I don't-" her voice faltered and her gaze dropped to the floor as he walked towards her; she didn't even have the ability to stay angry for long. "I don't need your help." she said quietly, looking back up. He was back close again now, but this time his face looked genuinely hurt. "I'm sorry." she said. "I just don't... I don't need you to do that for me."
He sighed, and walked past, lingering in front of her for longer than she was comfortable with.
"I'll go then." he said, standing in the corridor. Beca turned to face him, but before she allowed herself - or him for that matter - the chance to say anything else, she nodded and pushed the door firmly shut, before turning and flopping against it. She closed her eyes and pressed her cool hands to her forehead.
"What is it with some people!" she muttered, and fell back to her bed, where her voice still came soft and quietly from her headphones, intertwined with Jesse's primeval mix as if to tease her in the most inappropriate of ways.