Her shift is sprinkled with text messages from nearly all of the girls, but she's been kept busy enough that she doesn't get to read the first batch until two and a half hours into her night.

There's an entire saga from Amy waiting for her, something that could rival the great Greek epics of old, both in length and, she suspects, subject matter. By the time Beca gets to the end of it, Amy seems to have worked out the overall problem for herself and leaves Beca alone with a playfully terse, "Thanks for nothing, Short Round." She replies with a simple but effective, "I'm not Vietnamese," and decides not to acknowledge any of Amy's earlier messages for fear of further scarring.

Stacie wants to know how finalized the outfits for Worlds are, because she's seen the cutest American flag bikini-skirt combos. In terms of Stacie's vocabulary, 'cute' usually means 'obscene', as Beca can only imagine. She reminds her that the rest of the world kind of hates America as a whole, so that might not be a great crowd-pleasing choice, but tells her she can wear whatever she wants to the after party as a compromise.

There's a text from Ashley asking if Lilly is psychotic. That's all. The picture message from Lilly clears that up a bit; Beca's pretty sure it's just a close-up of Lilly's eyeball. She isn't sure what to do with either of those.

Emily sent a message a half hour ago asking how the shift is going and if Beca has heard any more about their demo, which she of course has, but hasn't told the youngest Bella yet. Partly because she forgot to and partly because she spent the first half of her day actively trying not to think about that. She immediately feels bad upon reading the message and fires off a quick text that says yes and promises to call her once she's off work.

Cynthia-Rose has sent her a link to a video of a red panda tumbling head-first off a log into what has to be the most graceful forward roll the animal kingdom has ever seen. Beca actually takes the time to watch the entire thing and then promptly adds it to her favourites.

Then, there's Chloe. Who starts with a seemingly innocuous request and quickly spirals down, down towards the gutter faster than Beca can actually read the texts.

Are there any last minute things we need for the party tomorrow? xxx

The party being the Bellas' private graduation party. Strictly Bellas only, which means that the Trebles at least are sure to gatecrash at some point during the night.

I'm pretty sure we have enough alcohol to make it through several grad nights ;P xxx

Beca hums at that, pointlessly bobbing her head once in agreement as she slides her thumb across the screen.

Oh and I made sure to double-check our supply of tequila and limes.

Beca's heart skips.

Because I definitely want a chance to return that particular favour, Becs.

The tops of Beca's legs start to numb, turn to jelly, as her eyes drink in the words on the screen.

Maybe a few others. If you're good. xxx

Do you think we'll be able to sneak away for a while?

Have a little private party of our own.

I could show you just how much I appreciate your willingness to help me out. You and your hands.

Have I told you how much I love your hands? All the things you do with them. And your mouth...

The things I want you to do with that.

Beca wants to text her back, to play and banter, to ask if Chloe's drunk. She wants to tease, to say something halfway to coherent about what Beca could do, but her fingers won't work and her eyes are fixed, fused to the screen of her phone and Chloe's final message.

Maybe I can show you? Xxx

Maybe Beca will pass out in the middle of the heat wave suddenly sweeping through the studio. 'Residual Heat' is right.

And she knows Chloe is playing her like a fiddle, knows the redhead lives for invoking these kinds of rises in Beca. Usually she's there to catch the brunt of it though and Beca isn't sure if Chloe's absence is better or not. On the one hand, the redhead isn't there to make fun of her, so that's a plus. The other hand is a bit shaky, unsure of what it's holding, but Beca feels like the opposing argument is shaping up to be something along the lines of "Chloe isn't here to help Beca work through all the pent up 'whatever' that this kind of teasing stirs up." And if that is, in fact, the argument, then no wonder the other hand is shaking. Maybe it's a good thing that Chloe isn't around.

Beca feels like she's floating in a bottomless wading pool, just waiting for the tide to turn, to sweep in and capsize her.

Or carry her away.

She isn't sure which metaphor scares her the most.

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Beca inhales and thumbs the lock button on her phone to shut off the screen. Then she slips it back into her pocket and decides to forget about it until later

Or she tries to at least. She tries really, really hard, but her boss is in a mood, which means he's pretty much exclusively yelling at Dax now and paying the rest of them zero attention. So, Beca's mind keeps trying to wander. Trying being the operative word there, because every time those baby-blues pop into her frame of thought, she mentally slaps herself. Straightens where she's sitting, or leaning, and forces herself to focus back in on what's happening around her. Problem is, it's not very enthralling. Once you've seen five Dax beat-downs, you've kind of seen them all, and so the cycle keeps starting anew.

By the time Sammy has screamed his last and left the studio in a cyclone of sarcasm and sunglasses, Beca is ready to put her brain to bed. To simply shut it off for the night and let everything rest. Of course, the chances of that happening are slimmer than slim; knowledge Beca has begrudgingly gleaned after the last three years living under the roof of Casa de Bella. Unless Beca looks like a thunderstorm is about to break out directly over her face, the girls don't let her sour expression scare them off anymore or interfere with their desire to talk to her. Overall, they've been good, and that in turn has probably been good for Beca. There's still no chance that she's slipping into the house unnoticed though. That doesn't happen unless the house is actually empty, and so she doesn't even try.

She'd sprung for a cab since Jesse was too tied up to drive her home and she hands the driver a bill, telling him to keep the change before stepping out. And she gets the strangest feeling as she starts the walk up to the front door. An almost nausea-inducing fluttering in the pit of her stomach, as if her internal organs have regressed a decade or more and think it's the first day of a new school year. She can feel her whole body buzzing and it's loud and uncomfortable. Makes her pause before unlocking the door of her own house, and makes her think on why.

Every word of Chloe's texts come back, this time accompanied by the phantom sound of her disembodied voice, and it's weird how nervous she feels. All because Chloe will probably still be awake and Beca might see her. It sounds so dumb to the rational side of Beca's brain. The other side is making sure Beca remembers exactly what happened the last time Beca lost her cool – and half of her clothes – around Chloe, which suggests that she's afraid of something similar happening again. Or that maybe, thanks in large part to those texts, she wants it to. Something that makes her no less nervous to head inside, but her brain once again reminds her how dumb that is and so she practically throws herself through the front door with an annoyed shake of her head.

Only to stop dead in the doorway, line of sight trained toward the top of the stairs, where Lilly is sitting perched like a cat – or a cougar – and looking like she's been waiting for the door to open for hours.

Hand still on the knob, Beca locks eyes with the crouched woman and deep down inside she knows that if Lilly had a tail it would be impatiently twitching back and forth. Beca opens her mouth to speak, but can't remember whether or not she's ever read anything about talking being something that sets off the big bads of the cat world. Maybe it's like waving a red sheet in front of a bull, which is apparently nothing to do with the colour but whatever. Point is, when it comes to the Bellas' star beat-boxer, no one ever knows what might set her off.

Stacie asked for help drying the dishes once and Lilly responded by trying to climb the living room curtains. Chloe had to squirt her with the spray bottle they use for the plant in the corner until she finally quit.

Unsure of how breaking eye contact might end, Beca keeps hers fixed on Lilly as she slowly closes the front door behind her and then side-steps into the kitchen. If she busies herself for a short while, maybe Lilly will be gone by the time she tries to make it up stairs.

"Is she still out there?" Beca jumps at the question, head twisting until she spots Ashley sitting behind the kitchen table looking somewhat frazzled.

"What did you do?" It isn't accusatory, but Ashley throws her hands up defensively anyway.

"I just asked if she wanted to go over some stuff for Worlds with me!" Ashley's wide-eyed panic almost pulls a laugh from Beca, but the terror on the other girl's face is very real, and so she's able to refrain.

"Minor infraction," Beca says with a wave of her hand and reaches for the hand of the fridge. "Wait it out." She grabs a bottle from inside and cracks open the top, taking a swig before continuing. "Shouldn't be too much longer."

"It's been like two hours!" Ashley's eyes somehow manage to get even wider and all Beca can offer is a sympathetic wince before she turns to leave, hoping against hope that Lilly has vacated her spot.

She hasn't.

With a deep breath, the captain and so-called 'leader' of the Bellas holds tightly to the water bottle in her hand and cautiously begins her ascent. She half expects Lilly to growl or hiss the closer she gets, but she doesn't even blink until it's time for Beca to pass. Beca very nearly lets out a scream when Lilly's dark head makes contact with the side of one short leg. A single, gentle bump, then Beca's more or less home free, all but sprinting to the top of the landing, where she doesn't even pause to risk glancing back over her shoulder. Instead, she beelines for the stairs to her room, fighting the urge to check Chloe's room all the way there and telling herself that she can always do that after she's dumped her stuff and changed if she needs to.

And that would have been a fine plan, if Chloe wasn't stretched out across Beca's bed.

Lying on her side, one foot crossed over the other at the ankle and laptop open in the spot beside her, the whole scene has Beca stopping short. Chloe's eyes are closed, her breathing even, and the glow from the screen-saver sends multicoloured hues dancing over her face. Her pretty adorable face, according to the thoughts that slip through Beca's mind in the seconds before she regains full movement of her body. She steps quietly towards her desk, slipping the strap of her bag from her shoulder before pulling out her laptop. She sets it back in its rightful place on her desk and begins shrugging out of her jacket.

"Ooh," is cooed gently, sleepily, from behind her. "Do I get a show this time?" Jacket caught at her elbows, Beca swivels her upper body around until she can see Chloe peering over at her, bleary-eyed but still beautiful. And it's not fair; Beca looks like a gorgon when she's half asleep. She manages to throw Chloe a half-smile around that thought, though the edges tremble a bit, less than confident in what she's having her mouth attempt to pull off, and turns away again to take the jacket the rest of the way off.

"I didn't get a show," Beca corrects her, draping the garment over the back of her chair, and busying herself with taking things out of her bag that haven't seen the light of day since she put them in there.

"Disappointed?" Beca actually closes her eyes at that, feeling her nerves and tendons tense and flex as her body tries to respond in a way she doesn't want to let it. And she definitely can't say yes, but she also can't say no.

"Kinda." Because lying to Chloe is a cardinal sin or something and, after everything that went down with the internship, Beca's done enough of that for a lifetime. There's a special lake of fire reserved for her and everyone else who has ever lied to the redhead. She cringes as she pulls a single, loose, stiff stick of gum out of one corner of her bag and bends to drop it into the trash can tucked away under her desk.

"Are you requesting one?" And Beca might as well crawl right on in along with it thanks to the mental images that comment brings to life. Even though she's sure that's Chloe's intent, she still feels that between stale gum and discarded coffee cups is where she belongs right now. She stands, clearing her throat, and takes a surreptitiously deep breath before turning again.

Chloe is still in the same spot, stretched across Beca's bed and looking exactly like that's where she's meant to be. Beca fights the urge to chew on her lip and plasters on a smile.

"You are just on a roll today, Missy." It's not what she meant to say, has no idea where it came from or why she's suddenly talking to Chloe like a southern principal might talk to a somewhat mischievous pupil. Chloe seems none the wiser either and she blinks, startled, before Beca is afforded a front row seat to the tear-jerker show of the year; The Saddening of Chloe's Expression.

It's like a time lapse video of a leaf falling from a tree. It starts off bright and full of life, just happy to be where it is. Then the seasons change, the leaf loses its regular colour and falls, spiralling down from its happy place to land amid the grass and dirt. Where it dulls and withers at the edges, and begins to slowly curl back and close in on itself.

Beca sees this, sees all of this, play across Chloe' face like a pantomime that's physically painful to witness.

"I..." Chloe stops herself and pushes a hand into the mattress to right herself. "Were the texts, were they too much? I was just," she pauses again, this time to swallow, and Beca feels the earth crack beneath her feet. She wants so desperately to stop Chloe from shrivelling away from her. "I only meant to tease. I'm sorry if-"

"No." And Beca's not sure if it's the word that stops Chloe or the fact that she's rapidly advancing on the redhead. Chloe scoots over, looking small, and Beca moves the laptop out of the way so she can sit, which she does with a sigh that's deeper than she intended. "I didn't mean for that to sound so..."

"Exasperated?" Chloe offers, making Beca wrinkle her nose up and purse her lips in remorse, because yeah. That's kind of the perfect word for it. She bobs her head.

"Yep." She sucks a breath in through her clenched teeth. "Sorry." She settles onto the bed, legs stretched out in front of her and hands resting on her stomach with her fingers laced together, the tips of her thumbs brushing back and forth over one another. "I actually meant to tease you back." Chloe relaxes at that and she lies back down beside Beca with a small smile, playfully nudging Beca's ankle with her big toe.

"It's a good thing I've been witness to your more successful attempts, then. Otherwise, I might think you were terrible." Chloe's smile grows as she speaks, reaching out towards Beca and tickling the sides of her own mouth until it does the same. She hums thoughtfully, low in her throat, and presses her thumbs together as she looks over at Chloe.

"Would have just called this whole thing off then, huh?" Beca watches as Chloe lifts a hand to brush a few stray strands of red hair away from her face, then feels that same hand come back to rest on the bed once more, only closer this time. Almost touching Beca. And it strikes her as kind of crazy that she would notice something like that. That she would even be aware of such a minuscule change in proximity.

"Mm, I don't know." And then Chloe's hand is moving across that small distance and is slipping her fingertips beneath Beca's shirt to toy with the hem of it. "You're pretty good at other stuff. Even if your flirt game was lacking," baby-blues had slipped away to the edge of Beca's shirt, presumably to inspect the craftsmanship, but they rise again now. Dancing and twinkling. "I'm sure your mouth could make up for it in other ways."

It's all Beca can do not to scream. To release some wailing sound of frustration, combined with a healthy dose of disbelief spurred on by the inability to understand how Chloe does it. Any of it. So, she laughs. Real and full, and Chloe's smile only widens at the sound of it, like that's exactly the reaction she'd been hoping for. Eyes shining as she grins up at Beca in happy silence.

"I don't," her own giggles – actual giggles – interrupt her, "I don't know what to say to that, Chloe." Beca's voice goes up at the end, an involuntary squeak that makes her sound embarrassed. Chloe just keeps on grinning, teeth visible between lips that part in preparation of speaking. And when she does, Chloe's voice doesn't change at all. It stays the same, even teasing tone, as she blatantly eyes Beca up.

"I think I was pretty clear that you don't have to say anything." It takes all the air from Beca's lungs. Just reaches in and scoops it out like someone would sand from a box, a few grains slipping away here and there affording her with an equal number of gasping breaths.

It's dumb, Beca thinks, how predictable and easy, for lack of a better and less repetitive word – it is Chloe's favourite – she's become in this whole thing. Although, that makes it sound as if there was a time where she wasn't, which isn't true. She's always been like this with Chloe and maybe she would be this way with anyone, it's just that Jesse was never really into this kind of teasing.

Not that she's comparing.

"That," Beca sputters, struggling for air as Chloe shifts beside her, "is, yeah, okay. Cool." Chloe has propped herself up on one elbow now, the movement providing a perfect excuse, not that she needs one, for her hand to slip completely under the brunette's shirt. Beca pulls in a sharp but silent breath and holds it, eyes darting to their corners to watch Chloe. The hand at her stomach smooths out already flat skin and Beca can feel the touch right down to her toes. Tingling.

"You know," Chloe's tone is musing, deceptively so, and Beca's muscles tense reflexively. "There's something about kissing you all morning that keeps me coming back to it for the rest of the day." Beca's heart jumps, chest clenching around the sudden influx of butterflies fluttering through it. Chloe's eyelids are heavy and hooded, but no longer with sleep. "Just over and over again. Thinking about you and everything I'm missing out on while you're at work." Her voice pours warmth into Beca's skin, from her feet to her cheeks and out into her hands, one of which has found its way to the top of Chloe's without conscious command. But she doesn't stop it, only rests hers over the material of her shirt, and every minuscule movement from Chloe's echoing into and off of her own. Slips through it and into Beca.

"I'm home now," Beca hears herself say, all remnants of awkward, gasping uncertainty gone for the minute, and Chloe's eyes light like fireworks. And Beca thinks maybe the bumbling ineptitude it worth it sometimes, if that's the eventual result.

She can hear her heart pounding and feel her blood rushing through her body; things that only get louder as Chloe leans up to close the scant amount of distance between them. She does this slowly though and Beca might question if such restraint is borne from her infallible need to tease or some other necessity, if she weren't so focused on keeping her heart from bursting through her ribs like something out of a late seventies sci-fi flick.

"Yeah," Chloe says, her hand stilling beneath Beca's and her voice a whisper against the brunette's lips. "I think I should probably take advantage of that." And she's so close, Beca can hardly stand it. "If you're cool with-" So, she doesn't. She doesn't even let Chloe finish what she's saying, choosing to rather let the vibrations making her body thrum carry her that tiniest bit forward instead.

It's like something pinching inside her chest, uncomfortable but not quite painful, and it's constant whenever she kisses Chloe. It wanes after a short time, but remains there like an aching reminder, or a warning. She experiences a sense of powerlessness in a way, with Chloe hovering over her like this and wielding the way she affects Beca like the weapon she knows it is – and Beca's under no illusions about that either – but it's okay. That powerlessness that can sometimes drive her crazy is, perhaps unsurprisingly, totally fine.

She's safe with Chloe. She knows Chloe isn't about to take advantage of that.

Unless Beca wants her to.

A barrage of thoughts hit her all at once then, visions of what that might entail, might look like, mixed with the reminder of how it had felt to have Chloe pin her wrists to the same wall she'd shoved Beca against the night of the Trebles' party. All of it converges in a storm that churns her stomach in the same way that anxiety does. Big rolling waves that feel like they're rearranging her insides, the rhythm of the ebb and flow matching the sweep and press of Chloe's tongue as Beca lets her in with no thought towards reluctance. It would be so simple to deny Chloe what she wants, purely for payback. Simple, but not easy, as Beca has so obviously demonstrated, time and time again.

With nothing more than a small movement of the hand still pressed to Beca, Chloe urges her to lie flat, and it's as she's giving in to that request that Beca ponders over that easy communication. How simple that tiny gesture was to understand, no words needed, not even a look. Beca had just known, and Chloe had understood exactly how to convey that message. And like that silent conversation, their movements are seamless too. Cohesive, they move as one, so that there's barely a moment where their lips are separated and that's fine.

Beca doesn't need to breathe. She doesn't care what her brain says, which isn't a lot right now anyway. It's being mostly quiet now, taking it all in. The way Chloe's lips press and part, the way her hand moves to curve perfectly around the upper portion of Beca's ribs as Beca's hand rises to lightly grip the redhead's elbow. There's no real purpose to the action, except maybe for Beca to anchor herself, but the hold isn't really tight enough for that and so maybe it's offering some kind of reassurance. Or maybe it's just a touch. Maybe it isn't anything at all, though that seems unlikely.

Everything is something with Chloe.

Chloe pulls away from the kiss, but she doesn't go far, only enough that there's a sliver of space between them. Her thumb brushes over the top of Beca's ribcage, just below her bra, and for the first time since they started kissing, Beca's brain lights up with a thought. And all it is, is a split-seconded marvel at how tender the touch is. Inexplicably reassuring, though Beca doesn't have anything to be nervous about.

Not that that's stopped her once today.

"Do you ever think about this?" Chloe asks, quiet and curious, and when Beca opens her eyes she sees that same curiosity mirrored on the redhead's face, only it's streaked with a vulnerability that isn't really present in her voice. And maybe she wouldn't have normally seen it either, but Chloe is still so close. "When you're not here? When we're not..." Too close, really, for Beca to consider her answer fully before throwing it out.

"Yeah," she confesses, breathless.

"Yeah?" Chloe echoes, looking pleased and with a small smile playing across her lips. "A lot?" Beca blinks hard as she tries to fully comprehend what's being asked and her hand leaves Chloe's elbow, automatically going to dark tresses, where her fingers end up simply scratching at her scalp when she realises she can't thread them through her hair.

"I mean..." she almost wishes Chloe would sit back, give Beca some room to think. She lets her hand lie flat against the top of her head and tries to focus. "Define a lot?" In a roundabout way, she's stalling for time so that her mouth doesn't run away without permission, and they both know it.

"Well, on a scale of one to ten." Chloe does lean back then, but the wicked grin on her face does very little in the way of helping Beca focus her thoughts. And then Chloe's moving, bending her right leg and gracefully sliding it over Beca's body, and even though she does it without making contact, Beca's sure she feels it. When Chloe stills again, she's straddling Beca at the waist, hands pressed to the brunette's abdomen and one still nestled beneath her shirt. "One being hardly ever," red hair slips over her shoulder as she leans forward, "five being occasionally," hands running parallel to one another up over Beca's stomach. "And ten being enough," her fingertips linger on the bare skin over Beca's ribs, dancing and tickling until Beca's forced to take her hand from her head and lay it over the redhead's again, this time forcing it to still. She throws Chloe a glare that's even less than half-hearted. "To significantly," and Chloe's eyes twinkle and burn in a way that shouldn't be possible, "distract you." With those last two words, Chloe's dropping down again, bracing her weight on the free hand she now has pressed into the bed beside Beca's shoulder. She hangs there, very purposefully just out of reach and Beca feels her body straining to reach for her without moving. The hair on her arms stands at attention, stretching toward Chloe, and her chest rises and falls with extra effort, pushing it to within almost grazing distance of Chloe's.

"I feel," and Beca pauses there, her brain tripping over the double meaning, "like I probably shouldn't reveal all my cards so early in the game."

"Early?" Chloe scoffs, inches from Beca's face. "I feel like we've been doing this forever already." It's a moment of stark honesty, however charged it may be with coy flirtation, and Beca's mind immediately goes to work trying to figure out what exactly Chloe means by it. Because while the truth of the statement is undeniable, there are a number of different connotations it could be carrying, and the possibilities fill Beca's head with water balloons. Full and heavy, and ready to pop; the biggest of all being an unavoidable bright red, with the word "sex" crudely scrawled across it in black marker.

It is, probably thanks in large part to recent happenings, the first place her mind goes and her face must betray her because suddenly Chloe's lips are splitting into a smirk above her.

"Where did your mind just go?" She asks and Beca frowns, or she thinks she does. She can't really feel her face. "You're blushing like I just propositioned you." Which explains why she can't feel that. She makes an effort to roll her eyes and tries not to worry about whether or not she pulls it off.

"Maybe," she sweeps her tongue across the front of her teeth before baring them in an overly sarcastic grin, "that's because you usually are." Chloe sits back and hums, high and short, like she's considering Beca's words. The hand at her stomach has been relinquished and it moves with Chloe, drawn backwards down the trail it had mapped only a minute or so before. It drags a shiver down Beca's spine and all she can do is hope that the bed absorbs most of it.

"Then you should really try to be less adorable when I do," Chloe muses, matter-of-factly. "And maybe I wouldn't do it so much." And Beca thinks she has about as much chance of controlling her reactions as Chloe does. And Chloe, as Beca knows and has known for a long time now, can't help herself. Beca's not about to tell her to back off though. For all the blushing and griping she does, Beca likes it. "You never answered my question." And like a beacon of light splitting the clouds, Beca's easy out is suddenly right there at the forefront of her mind.

"Well, speaking of scales and, say," she heaves a sigh, blowing the air out between her lips in a way that makes them audibly vibrate, "grades." It's Chloe's turn to roll her eyes then, and laugh, and likely consider the fact that she should have seen this coming. "I think I've been waiting for my answer longer." With a shake of her head, Chloe slips off of Beca with a sigh of her own, once more settling in beside the brunette in a way that maintains their closeness but still manages to leave Beca feeling somewhat empty.

"If you don't know by now." Chloe clicks her tongue with a distinct lack of sympathy and leaves it at that. Beca twists her lips together in mild agitation.

"If I wanted to hear it from me, I'd have given myself an answer a long time ago." Because really, she wants to hear it from Chloe's mouth. She is, after all, the expert here. But Chloe only hums and shrugs her shoulders, smiling like her lips are locked and Beca has no hope of finding the key.

So, resigned to her immediate fate, Beca sits up and lumbers forward until she has Chloe's laptop in her hands. Then she lies back, opening the screen as she goes and watches it come to life.

"What are we watching?"


"What am I looking at?" Beca stops in the archway of the 'formal' living room and rubs at her eyes, partly due to still being tired and partly in the hope that the action will somehow make everything in front of her make sense. From where she's perched on the middle rung of the Bellas' stepladder – the ownership of which you can tell by the blue spray paint that's been applied, not to mention the bright yellow letters screaming the groups' name down the side of it – Stacie turns to glance over her shoulder and throws Beca a wide smile.

"Sleeping Beauty is finally awake."

"Dude," Beca bristles, brow furrowing, "it's like ten o'clock."

"Early bird catches the tequila worm," Fat Amy quips over top of an armful of bright blue material that almost matches the ladder in shade, as she zips by Beca without a second glance.

"It's ten o'clock," Beca reiterates, firmly this time, and in the best 'captain voice' she can muster so early in her morning. Stacie laughs and grabs one end of what Beca can now see is a banner from Amy, turning back to the wall she's parked in front of to watch as she hoists it above her head.

"Need some help?" Beca briefly wonders if it's weird that she smells Chloe before she hears or sees her. She breezes by Beca with a smile that seems knowing, though what exactly it knows is beyond her, and she bends to pick up the footstool on her way over to the others.

"If you want to risk life and limb, be my guest." Amy steps aside, still holding the majority of the banner, and lets Chloe set the footstool down.

"Amy, it's two feet off the ground." And to show how very non life-threatening that is, Chloe hops up onto it with both feet and Amy lets out a noise that's half-shriek, half gasp, utterly ignoring the flourish with which Chloe sticks the landing. It makes her look like a wannabe gymnast.

Ever since her mishap at the Kennedy Centre, Amy has developed a rather dramatic fear of heights. Getting her to jump off the tower and onto the giant floating water cushion at the retreat had been a team effort, aided by the promise of a chocolatey treat once she was back on dry land. Likewise, her accidental ensnaring in the bear trap had been eased by the smell of s'mores. So it never got too out of hand, so long as a culinary security blanket was somewhere near by.

"Take this," Amy barks, shoving her half of the banner into Chloe's waiting hands. "I need a Pop-Tart." She passes by Beca with a shudder and heads for the kitchen.

"You just going to stand there and look pretty, Becs?" Chloe chides, drawing Beca over to her with little more than her regular gravitational pull it seems, until the brunette is standing before her, somewhat doe-eyed. "You take this." She carefully hands off the banner again, keeping hold of one end. "Now feed it to me a bit at a time." Beca wordlessly does as she's told, looking back to check on Stacie as her long, lithe form stretches toward the ceiling.

"Up on your toes, Red." Stacie's extended as far as she can go, which is a height to which Chloe can't possibly match, but as Beca turns her head back, she gets to watch Chloe laugh and try anyway.

Now, Beca has never really considered herself to be a creeper. Someone who stares until the object of that leering gaze has been made to feel thoroughly uncomfortable. In fact, she's kind of more known for avoiding looking at people altogether, but it's well known that Chloe had surpassed the rank of 'people' quite some time ago.

At first, she doesn't even realise she's doing it. What begins as an observation transitions so smoothly into what is, quite frankly, ogling, that she doesn't register the way her eyes drift from Chloe's hands, down over her torso and to the strip of skin that's been steadily revealed as the redhead tries to get the banner as high as possible. It's only once Chloe's shirt has ridden up enough to expose taut stomach muscles that Beca's brain catches up with the rest of her body and that's thanks in large part to the way her stomach seems to flip right off its axis and plummet down between her feet at the sight. It's enough to physically jolt her, make her hands clench into involuntary fists, and her heart starts to work overtime, presumably to correct her blood flow to its regularly scheduled course.

"Beca?" Chloe's voice cuts through to her like an air raid siren and Beca's head snaps back up toward her friend's face. A face that's painted with a small, knowing, slightly surprised smirk that had Beca's stomach somersaulting, more or less, back into place. There's a heartbeat that feels like it lasts forever in which Chloe's gaze manages to travel down over Beca's body and back up again and the smirk on her lips grows infinitesimally in size. "You going to give it to me?" And Beca almost gawks, open mouthed, like a cartoon coyote, before Chloe gives the banner a tug for extra emphasis.

"Uh." It comes out as an uncertain squeak and she stops to clear her throat before trying again. "Yep." Not that it makes much of a difference, but she does manage to ease her grip on the banner. She looks away from Chloe, down at the material rapidly rising from her hands, and feels her cheeks warm.

And she wonders how irrevocably mortifying being caught checking out your best friend is. She supposes she'll find out soon enough. Although, if the shoe were on the other foot, and it has been, Chloe likely wouldn't be embarrassed at all. She'd just own it and move on. Maybe Beca should try doing the same.

They finally get the banner hung between them – purple and yellow letters outlined with a thick rim of glitter jump off the bright blue background and spell out Bellas' Bon Voyage Bash – and Chloe claps triumphantly before hopping down, needlessly grabbing onto Beca's shoulders in order to steady her already very steady self in the process. And when Chloe's as close as she can get without actively brushing her nose to Beca's, she flashes the brunette a wink before stepping back to admire their handiwork.

"Are you straight over there?" Stacie's question has Beca inhaling so sharply that she almost startles herself into a coughing fit. She snaps her head around to stare at Stacie and finds their leggy friend pointing one long, perfectly manicured finger at Chloe's end of the banner. Chloe tilts her head and studies it for a second.

"Yeah," she nods, "more or less." And Beca pinches the bridge of her nose, silently begging for coffee, and strongly debates going back to bed.


She showers instead, staying under the stream much longer than strictly necessary and filling the small space with so much steam that it's hard for her to see when she initially pulls back the curtain. She only gets out once her fingers have pruned to a place several steps beyond recognition and it's with reluctance even then. There's something about having boiling hot water rain down over you that leaves you feeling like all your sins have been scorched away. And Beca's sin counter is climbing higher and higher with every passing day, sometimes multiple times a day, but there's only so many showers a girl can take. The fact that this is becoming an issue is another matter entirely.

Begrudgingly, Beca had eventually vacated her small slice of steamy heaven and proceeded to slowly get clothed and ready before heading back up the stairs in a pair of sweats and an old band t-shirt from her high school days. She's never been a fan of getting ready before she absolutely has to and while she doesn't doubt that some of the Bellas will go all out for the evening's festivities, Beca's decided she'll probably only put in minimal effort. After all, it's just the girls. They see her first thing in the morning all the time and compared to that, most things look 'dressy' on her.

She doesn't think there's much of a set time for the party's kick off, but she thinks she probably has a few hours, at least, before someone tries to get the ball rolling early. She has a feeling that, despite multiple reminders that they have to get up somewhat early the next day and be in relatively good shape in order to actually graduate, they're all going to drink far too much and stay up far too late anyway. She attempts to console herself by remembering that this only happens once, so they should all go out with a bang.

She sits down in front of her laptop and wakes it up, resolving to work on Chloe's mix for a while so that she can hopefully give it to her before she flies home after Worlds. Ideally, she'll have it done before then, but she keeps finding herself getting hung up on the most minuscule aspects of the whole thing, so it's taking longer than she had anticipated. She just wants it to be as close to perfect as she can make it, so that she thinks it is, not Chloe. Chloe will love whatever Beca gives her just because it's from her and she'll especially love this because of the subject matter. It's kind of a built in given. So Beca has to push herself in order to ensure it's really great, and not just an emotional great.

It's over two hours before she gets her first disturbance in the shape of dark hair rising above the banister that her desk is in front of. She starts, still surprised by the slow, cautious-like approach, and pulls her headphones back from where they're pumping music into her ears.

"Sorry." Emily looks apologetic as she throws Beca a small wave and then jabs a thumb back in the direction she'd just come. "I called up but," she crinkles up her nose and throws out a wince of a smile. "You're busy. I'll come back." And she turns to leave.

"Hey, ah, ah. No." Beca's aware she sounds a bit like a reproachful crow. "I'm just," Beca tilts her head, "it's a personal thing. It's cool. Stay. Talk." Emily flashes her a smile and Beca motions for the girl to take a seat on the bed and it's as Emily does when Beca realises why her successor might be here. "Crap." Emily looks up from where she'd been checking out the bedspread, smile dropping off her face.

"Did you change your mind?" And she's standing again. "We can talk later, or tomorrow, or-"

"No. No, no." Beca shakes her head, pushing a sigh out through teeth that are clenched in agitation aimed solely at herself. "I just remembered I was supposed to call you."

There are a number of things that flicker across Emily's face in that moment, all converging in an expression that somehow manages to quite adequately convey, "Yes you were and while that's definitely the reason I'm here, I don't want you to feel bad for forgetting, so I'll act like I just remembered too."

"Oh! Oh, yeah! No, no worries." Emily laughs it off with a dismissive, slightly overly dramatic flick of her hand. Like she's batting a very large, invisible bug across the room. "No big deal!" It's kind of almost convincing.

"Sorry. I was totally going to when I got home last night and then," interestingly, Beca's saliva catches in her throat just then, physically preventing her from continuing for a few seconds. And though she wasn't about to tell Emily she spent a decent portion of her immediate post-work evening lounging beneath Chloe, she wonders if that wasn't her brain's self-preservation defences kicking in for once. Good to know they still work. "I got distracted." She leaves it at that and watches Emily shake her head so vigorously, Beca's eyes feel the burn of whiplash.

"It's fine, totally fine, aca-fine!" Emily cringes, regretting that last one the second it leaves her lips. "Or, just, you know. Regular fine." Beca's guilt melts a little; it's hard for a person to feel any kind of negativity when in close proximity to the newest Bella. She's kind of like a mini Chloe in the sunshine radiation department.

"Okay," she concedes, hoping that'll be enough to let Emily off the hook she's trying to hang herself from. "I actually got an email from my boss yesterday." Rather than repeat it verbatim, Beca picks up her phone and swipes through screens until she has the email up, then rises from her chair to hand it over to Emily, who takes the phone and reads with wide, shining eyes. When she's done, she looks back up at Beca, a huge grin stretching along the length of her mouth.

"Beca!" She gasps, and the tiny deejay in question tenses like she's sitting in the first row at a SeaWorld show. "This is so, freaking, awesome!" Her voice gets louder with each consecutive word, until she's very close to yelling, and her excitement propels her off the bed and onto Beca. Beca's chair rolls back, creaking under the force of the contact, and she expels a quiet 'oof' against the curtain of hair that her face disappears into. "I can't believe it! I mean, I can, obviously. Of course I can." In the middle of Emily's glowing tirade, Beca reaches one arm around to awkwardly pat the taller girl on the back, hoping that will be enough to signal Beca's slight inability to breathe, but Emily just keeps on squeezing, awkwardly bent over as she is. "You're like, super talented. They'd be crazy not to want you. I'm just, I'm so happy. I'm so glad they see how great you are.

"Careful," an all too familiar voice warns, "she'll never make it down for the party with a head that big." Emily straightens and steps back to reveal a smug-looking Chloe standing with one hand on the banister, watching them with a smile that's lost somewhere between fond and imperious, and Beca can just imagine the crap she's going to get later for Chloe catching this interaction. It doesn't help that Emily looks a bit flushed, probably from the excitement of the news, and Beca makes the mistake of catching Chloe's eye. Just the once, but it's enough. The glint in them pulls a thrill of uneasy anticipation through her.

She shifts uncomfortably in her seat.

"You heard about the demo?" Emily asks, fit to burst with excited energy, and she's twisting her arms in front of her just to expel some of it. Chloe's demeanour changes a little at the questions, softening to something a few pegs back from teasing. "Isn't it great?" Something that looks a bit like pride, maybe.

Beca shifts again.

"Yeah, it is," Chloe nods. "It's really, really great." She glances askance at Beca, who had been using Chloe's shift in attention to Emily to study the redhead's profile. Something that she, once again, only notices she's doing once she's been caught. She really hopes that isn't going to become a trend. That could make things super awkward for her, and an unbearable amount of fun for Chloe. "Not surprising," Chloe amends, and Beca's eyes dart elsewhere. "But awesome. Aca-awesome." Beca pulls a face, Emily brightens at the vindication.

"Okay, as much as I'm enjoying this little fan club meeting," Beca twists in the chair, finally remembering what she has open on her laptop and closing the lid. "All this praise is making me really uncomfortable." Because candid truth from Beca is almost always awkwardly amusing and a great way to put an end to something.

"Better get used to it," Chloe offers with a shrug and Emily bobs her head in agreement, smile still in place.

"Have they set up a time for the interview yet?" Emily asks, dropping back onto the end of Beca's bed with a bounce.

"Not yet." Beca lifts a hand to scratch at her forehead and then slips her headphones the rest of the way off, placing them carefully on top of her desk. "I think it'll probably be after Worlds. You'll be around right? Do you want to, like, maybe sit in or something?" Emily looks like she might fall right off the edge of the bed.

"Are you for real?" It's very nearly a shriek. "You think they'd let me? That would be so cool! I'd even sit in the back and I'd be so quiet, you wouldn't even know I was there. I just love being a part of this whole process, you know? Gosh, do you think-"

"Legacy." The nickname stops Emily in her tracks and she blinks eyes the size of saucers at Beca. "Breathe. You won't be going anywhere if you hyperventilate yourself into a coma." Emily shrinks a little, sheepish, but smile still in place. Beca's sure all that extra height is just storage for her boundless enthusiasm. "I'll totally ask, though. It'd be nice to have someone there."

Because after Worlds, everyone else will be gone.

An almost tangible cold front rolls in around her in the wake of her words and Beca might think it was all in her head if not for the expression on Chloe's face. The one that makes Beca wonder if the redhead had simultaneously arrived at a similar thought. She looks sad and Beca hates that, not least of all because it reminds her how difficult it's going to be saying goodbye to every one of the girls. Emily too, when the time comes.

Prior to deciding to stay on to finish her internship, she hadn't thought about how she'd be saying goodbye to them one by one as they all leave. At least if she'd decided to head for Los Angeles right after Worlds she would have been able to bid them farewell as a group, more or less. She could have gotten the tears and hugs over and done with all at once. Beca doesn't actually handle goodbyes and similar sentimentally-riddled moments all that well, so this whole experience is going to go over about as well as a dust storm in the desert. It's going to be blind chaos.

"I will be there with bells on," Emily firmly insists, pointing sternly at nothing in particular and jolting Beca from her brief reverie.

Chloe still looks sad, but Beca can see she's trying to smile through it. Typical Chloe.

Beca gives the youngest Bella a thumbs up.

"So," Chloe begins after a moment, clapping her hands together and trying, Beca can tell, to muster as much cheeriness as possible. "Stacie is threatening to invite the boys over to give her something," she lifts both hands to make air quotations with her fingers, "to do if we don't all 'start congregating' soon. Her words."

"If we start drinking now, I'll be asleep by six," Beca points out, eyebrows raised, and Chloe chuckles.

"I think she's feeling the impending break up. Apparently she just wants everyone on the same floor. No drinking necessary. Not yet, anyway." Chloe gestures to Beca's laptop. "Can you work downstairs?" Beca half turns in the chair, then changes her mind and turns back, a little panicked by Chloe unwittingly referencing her own gift.

"What? No. It's not," she shakes her head, "It's just a thing. It's fine, no rush. Let's, we can just..." She stands, motioning towards the stairs. "Wouldn't want Stacie getting so bored she ends up treating us all to a live sex show."

"No," Chloe muses aloud, as Beca walks around her to the top of the stairs. "Wouldn't want that." It's her tone of voice that tells Beca all she needs to know about the sincerity of that statement and, not having the faintest idea what to say to it, she just keeps on walking.