Epilogue XXIII - The Announcement pt.1 - The Beale's
Chloe sat patiently on the little sofa in her and Beca's apartment lounge, dressed in her favourite pair of jeans and an oversized hoody that Beca had once bought her in college several years ago at a festival they and the rest of The Bella's had attended. Rested on her left thigh was her iPad, primed ready to FaceTime her parents. On her right thigh was Alba. Or more specifically Alba's head, with the rest of her little body spread out across the remainder of the small sofa.
Chloe smiled as she looked down at her snoozing puppy and stroked her velvety ears affectionately. How was her life like a fairytale? Well, her fairytale. The life she'd dreamt of and hoped for all through college. A life with Beca. They lived together, they had a dog, they both had jobs that they loved, and now they were engaged!
Chloe looked from Alba over to her left hand and stared once again at her engagement ring with a smile. Blue was never what she would've gone for. But it was perfect.
"You have no idea how relieved I am that you like that ring." Chloe looked up from her ring and beamed at her fiancée as the woman smiled and slowly walked over to the sofa, now showered and dressed, ready for the hectic remainder of the morning that would involve calling their respective parents to tell them their news. Then, of course, there was The Bella's Whatsapp to contend with..
"I adore this ring!" Chloe exclaimed, holding her left hand out in front of her face so she could inspect it further. Because she did adore it. And it still felt unusual against her skin, on her hand, but it felt right.
Alba brought her head up from Chloe's lap and looked at her other owner, giving a sleepy tail-wag in recognition, before slumping back onto the thigh she was snoozing on. But Beca had other plans, and scooped the puppy up with a small groan.
"Ugh Alba you're getting so heavy!" Beca winced as she turned them on the spot and took a seat where the white labrador had been laid out, plopping the dog on her lap. Alba scrambled a bit to get onto Chloe's lap instead and the brunette let out a heavy exhale of frustration as she looked down at her appearance and saw her once pristine black hoodie now covered in white dog hair. Why did she pick a white puppy for Chloe? Most of her wardrobe was black, dark grey, or navy…
Chloe tugged her puppy onto her lap to help Alba get settled, which in no time she did, curling up on Chloe's lap, her head resting on Chloe's stomach. The redhead heard her fiancée huff beside her and she knew that was because Alba would have undoubtedly left a mound of dog hair on the woman's black clothes. Sure enough, when Chloe turned to look at Beca, she saw her looking down at her black hoodie in dismay and it took all of Chloe's self-control not to giggle. Because their puppy was the main thing they bickered about. And laughed about. Alba was the thing that made their apartment feel like a home. This bundle of fluff that was entirely their responsibility. Who was like a child to them.
Chloe gave Beca a sympathetic smile, which elicited an unimpressed "hmm" from the petite woman, but Chloe knew Beca would forgive Alba in an instant. Because as Chloe had said a million times before, it wasn't their puppy's fault she molted, and it was Beca's choice to wear dark clothes.
"Right, are we ready?" Chloe said brightly as Beca unzipped her black hoodie, pulling it from around her to reveal a bright blue top. And Chloe couldn't believe how perfectly this outfit represented her fiancée's personality. To strangers, colleagues, and even some of their relatives, Beca was dark, serious, grumpy and brooding on the outside. But when she revealed a side of her personality to those she trusted, Beca was actually generous and funny – and towards Chloe she was also sweet, affectionate and thoughtful.
"Let's do this Beale." Beca said with a competitive tone, as though they were about to go on stage for a Bella's performance, wrapping an arm around Chloe's lower back. And Chloe leant into Beca as she took hold of her iPad, held it up, and began the FaceTime call to her parents.
Within seconds the call connected and the ever beaming face of Sue Beale shone from the screen. "Hello sweethearts!" Sue greeted cheerily and Chloe felt her heart race with excitement. She couldn't wait to tell her mother the news. But she'd wanted to tell her and her father together. And as though she'd read her daughter's mind, Sue called out past the iPad she had propped up in front of her, "Jerry! Chloe and Beca are on the iPad!" Both Chloe and Beca chuckled as they heard Jerry drop something off screen, in the next room, and dash through to the kitchen where Sue sat.
"Hello you two!" Jerry said brightly, slightly breathless, smiling into the iPad and Chloe beamed with excitement. They were going to freak when she told them. Alba's floppy ears pricked up at the sound of Jerry's voice and the Beale's chuckled, "Ah, sorry, hello you three!" Jerry added, and Alba cocked her head in confusion, staring at the screen, which caused everyone to laugh.
"So there was a reason we called…" Chloe said before instinctively reached out to grab Alba's collar with her left hand, to stop the puppy from leaping at the iPad, and she heard her mother gasp as the parents spied the engagement ring on their daughter's finger.
"Oh Chloe!" Sue Beale exclaimed at her daughter and Chloe held her left hand up, eliciting a small squeal.
"I know! Beca popped the question last night and I said yes!" The redhead looked adoringly at the woman beside her and Beca gave her an affectionate wink as she grinned at her, clearly just as pleased to be telling The Beale's the news.
"Well of course you did! We had no doubt that you would Twinkle." Jerry said heartily and Chloe turned back to the screen, her face widening as she processed what her father had said.
"You knew Beca was going to propose last night?"
"Well we knew Beca was going to propose sweetheart, we just didn't know when." Sue said affectionately and Chloe turned back to her fiancée.
"You asked their permission?" She asked softly.
"Of course I did. I wasn't just gonna swoop in and marry you without their permission." Beca said, rolling her eyes, and Chloe giggled slightly, nudging her affectionately with her elbow, before resuming her attention on the screen.
"So…we're getting married!" Chloe announced to her parents in a sing-song voice. She was over the moon that her parents had already known of Beca's plan to propose, and even more thrilled that the woman had asked their permission. This was what she loved about being in a relationship with Beca, she so often tried to do things the 'right way'. The traditional way. Even though their partnership wasn't deemed 'traditional' to many. Her Grandmother would definitely be one of them. Chloe wondered briefly whether her mother had mentioned anything to her Grandmother about Chloe being in a relationship with another woman…
"Well Twinkle, your brother's will be really pleased to hear your news." Jerry said to his daughter.
"Oh yes," agreed Sue, "so will the girls! Laura, Claudia, and Julia have been on 'ring-watch' for weeks!" The woman said clasping her hands together excitably, then her smile quickly dropped and she held them out towards the screen, "Not that we told them you were going to propose Beca." She quickly added, and Chloe noticed on the screen in the tiny box that had the live image of her and Beca in it that Beca's smile had waivered, "No, they just love you and love the two of you together and figured the next step after getting a puppy was a proposal."
Chloe let out a small squeal as her young nephews blew bubbles out at her from the bubble bath the two of them shared. There was a system in the Beale household, whether they were here at the Beale Family Lake House, or all together at Sue & Jerry's large family home, the kids started in the bath, then went into the shower, then to whichever bedroom they were sharing. Like a conveyor belt. It had been that way since Chloe and her brothers had been kids too.
Originally it had been the order to bathe the youngest child first, then stick them in the shower, then get them ready for bed while the next child in age went in the bath and so on. But by the time Chloe Beale had arrived into the world and started walking, the little girl had been such a wriggler, such a mischief maker, such a handful, that it became a far better idea to leave the young redhead until last, that way she had little opportunity to get filthy again. So now the order went older children to younger children: Eva, then Hunter, then Noah and Sammy, then Jack and Oliver.
"Right you two. Through to Grandma so she can wash your hair!" Chloe said firmly to them with a kind smile and the little boys whined.
"Awwwww" Oliver called out, looking sadly down at the piles of bubbles in his lap.
"No awwwww's. Come on." Chloe said with a giggle, pulling him up from under his arms and out of the now-cool bath. She wrapped him expertly in a towel and guided him towards the door where he was required to scurry through to the small shower room next door. She could hear her mother giving the little boy instructions as the shower began whirring.
"Auntie Chloe do I HAVE to get out of the bath yet?" Jack asked, his big blue eyes staring up at her sadly.
"Fraid so sweetheart." Julia answered from behind her young sister-in-law, and this was enough of an answer for Jack as he began clambering out of the bath tub, covered in bubbles. Chloe helped him with a giggle, wrapping him in a towel just as Sue Beale called out from her position by the shower in the other room.
"Jaaaack? Are you ready sweetheart?"
And the little boy scurried through to the other room with a grin to meet his grandmother, "I'm reeeeeeadyyyyy!" he said in a loud sing-song voice.
Chloe pulled the plug with a tired yet content sigh. The first mass-bath time was always a challenge whenever her family were reunited for the beginning of a break together. She was, however, somewhat concerned that she'd left Beca alone downstairs for a bit too long. With her brothers. Having only just introduced them earlier that day.
It had been a shock to her when they'd immediately known that she and Beca had begun dating. No more shocked than when they'd shown her that Instagram Live video of her announcing it while she'd been drunk on the final night of the European tour with The Barden Bellas a few days ago. But today hadn't been a heinous embarrassment for either of the young women, and to her relief, her family seemed to like Beca.
Chloe let out a little yawn, smiling at her sisters-in-law, all three of whom were stood in the doorway. Laura and Claudia had been in charge of getting the kids dressed into their pyjamas and drinking their nighttime milks, which indicated to Chloe that Jack was probably the final child to get ready for bed. Then he'll be joining his brother and cousins for story time, which Chloe always traditionally read to them. Chloe noticed her three sisters in law looking at her with beaming wide smiles.
"What?" Chloe asked curiously as she curled the wet towels up and placed them in the linen basket beside the three women. She stepped back but they remained silent, still grinning, so Chloe let out a giggle, "Come on, what?"
"We love Beca!" Laura burst, and the women either side of her nodded enthusiastically in agreement.
"We do, we really do!" Claudia agreed.
"We all do!" Julia said, "Even the boys" and Chloe beamed. Because she loved Beca too.
"She's so sweet and calm and polite and funny and so SO good for you Chlo!" Laura gushed, waving her hands excitably which made Chloe feel slightly giddy. Because these were the aspects of Beca that Chloe saw and knew and loved. It thrilled her that her family could recognise those qualities in her girlfriend too and so early on. Perhaps it was because she was a far cry from any of the previous boys she'd brought home before.
"We've been saying all day how we've never seen you this happy before!" Julia said
"And we've known you a long time." Claudia added, because she'd known Chloe some eighteen years.
"Not as long as me," Sue Beale said with a smile as she joined the women of her family, "and I would have to agree with them sweetheart. You really haven't looked as happy as you do now when you're with Beca."
And Chloe heaved a huge deep breath, hardly able to believe that all the happiness and contentment she felt was so obvious in her facial expressions.
"I can honestly see you two spending the rest of your lives together!" Laura dared to exclaim excitably. And although Chloe brought her hands to her cheeks in embarrassment, she had to agree with her youngest sister in law. She could see herself spending the rest of her life with Beca too.
"Actually I think it was Laura who said that a puppy was practically a proposal!" Jerry said with a chuckle.
An hour later and Chloe had described in great detail exactly how the proposal happened, turning to Beca every so often to give her the opportunity to add to their story. But Beca had declined, being perfectly happy to sit and listen to Chloe describe exactly how it had been for her. How it had felt. And Beca was so relieved that it really had been the perfect proposal for her fiancée.
"So what are you two going to be up to now?" Jerry asked, "Anything nice?" and he received a gentle swipe from his wife, "Ow. Why was that the wrong question?" He asked raising his eyebrows innocently.
Beca found herself trying to hide her grin as she watched her in-laws-to-be have an exchange of looks. If only her parents had 'bickered' this way when she'd been growing up, maybe she wouldn't have turned out to be as messed up as she was. Though Chloe always insisted she wasn't messed up. Beca adjusted the angle that she held her head at, as she held it in her left hand, her left arm leant on the back of the small sofa behind Chloe. Her right hand was absently playing with one of Alba's velvety ears as the puppy snoozed on Chloe's lap.
"Jerry!" Sue hissed, with a warning expression, "You cant go asking them what they'll be doing with their day!" she said under her breath.
"Why not? You always ask our kids that question towards the end of any FaceTime!" Jerry replied in a low voice, unable to work out where he'd gone wrong.
"Because remember what we did the day we got engaged?" Sue gave Jerry a pointed look.
"DO I…" The man said in a flirtatious tone, grinning and giving his wife a wink. "Bobby stayed guard outside the front of the house, reading his newspaper, just in case Mom and Dad got home early." He recalled with a chuckle, but then his expression fell as he saw his wife looking at him with her eyebrows raised as if to say 'do you not see where I'm going with this?'
Beca had felt her stomach drop as Jerry had spoken, and she'd pulled her arm from the back of the sofa, trying to distance herself a tiny bit from Chloe as her fiancée whispered in disbelief "Uncle Bobby?". Because she had a feeling that what Sue, and in a moment Jerry, figured they'd be doing with the rest of their day would be to have sex…
"Oh. Oh! No, don't…" Jerry seemed to get rather uncomfortable as he turned back to his daughter on the screen, "I don't need to know what you're doing with the rest of your day. You don't…we don't need to know."
Beca cleared her throat uncomfortably at the same time as Jerry, while Sue Beale simply rolled her eyes. Chloe, however, felt a need to clear the air, much to Beca's horror, "Oh…no we're not…we won't be doing that today. No. We…um…well Beca has to call her Dad?"
Beca winced slightly as she caught her fiancée's eye, Chloe giving her a brief apologetic smile. The brunette took a deep breath and turned back to the screen, "Yeah, I have to call my Dad. Lord knows how that's gonna go."
"He's still in denial huh?" Jerry asked calmly, Beca's upcoming reality becoming a sobering thought for all The Beale's. Jerry Beale didn't like Cal Mitchell. Not that he'd ever met the man. Not that Beca ever spoke about him much. But when Beca had turned up on their doorstep on Christmas Eve that had been the icing on the cake for Jerry. He despised how unsupportive the man was of his daughter and her decisions. And both Jerry and Sue Beale could see how Beca may have turned out the way she had when they'd first met her. Awkward, quiet, moody, distant. They'd been proud of their own daughter for fighting for the love she'd had for the petite woman throughout college. For standing her ground. For being so patient, even if it had made her miserable at times. Because it had all paid off. Seven long years, but it was worth it. Chloe had got her girl and her parents had been supportive throughout.
"Well he hasn't spoken to me since the Spring so what does that tell you?" Beca said in a deadpan voice to show how unimpressed she was with her father.
"You still get emails from Sheila though, right?" Sue Beale asked kindly, leaning slightly closer to the screen.
"Uh…yeah." Beca said, trying not to sound too surprised that Chloe's mother had mentioned her step-mother. It was no secret that since a serendipitous meeting on a course a couple of weeks back the two women had been in contact with one another quite regularly. Beca could only imagine Sue kept Sheila up to date with her and Chloe's life, Chloe calling her parents at least once a week to update them herself. And Beca still didn't know what to make of the blossoming friendship...
The room had fallen silent and Beca noticed that Chloe had turned to look at her, trying to gauge her body language and facial expression. Trying to work out how uncomfortable this conversation may have become. So the redhead turned to her parents with a bright smile.
"Okay so we'll see you in a couple of weeks when you come up to visit?" Chloe chimed, and Mr & Mrs Beale, who had sensed the change in atmosphere, beamed back at their daughter.
"Yes sweetheart absolutely!" Sue exclaimed, "We have Ellie that week but we'll bring her along with us so she can have cuddles with her favourite Aunts."
Chloe let out an excitable squeal, thrilled to know she'll be seeing her youngest niece. Beca simply grinned at her fiancée's reaction. Then chuckled at Jerry's "We do?" and Sue's "Yes darling."
What she wouldn't give for the upcoming 'conversation' with her father to be a little like this.
Thanks for the reviews guys! Ok, you call the shots: in the next chapter would you like me to post The Bellas reactions or The Mitchell's reactions?
(I will be uploading both, but you pick which one you'd like to read first!)
Let me know in the review/comments section.
lincky13 - ahh you're too kind :) so pleased it made your day!
Mystery guest - I know, but he won't be an ass forever. I gots plans for the grumpy guy.. (ha, I can't wait for Jerry to meet him!) Thanks so much for the thanks and for reading and leaving a comment buddy :) hope you liked this new update!
glugalde - holy guacamole dude, what an awesomely long review! You're so totally brilliant for writing all that so thank you! And it made me laugh heaps haha! YES to Sue & Jerry - I flipping love them. And the Bellas' Whatsapp was so fun to write. I'm gonna do another for 'their' announcement chapter :) I will endeavour to include more Emily where possible. And I'm not sure what you mean by "more S"? And I'm pleased you like the songs, I'll try to come up with some more song recs in the coming chapters.
Now this whole Bellas/Bella's thing.. no need to apologise. I totes get it! The problem is because I write this fic mostly on my phone, Bellas gets autocorrected to Bella's every timeand by the time I get to the end of the 3,000/5,000/8,000 word chapter I'm kinda too exhausted to go through the whole thing and try to correct it. It's a strategic nightmare on the phone! So, sorry - lazy author!
Zombiekiller1013 - hehe Beca's Mom has been mentioned only once, on purpose. And Im sure you're the only one to ask about her ;) she will be addressed in a little more detail during the 'Mitchell' announcement chapter though, because Cal Mitchell will want to know if Beca will be telling her mother about the engagement. So watch this space :)
laco0417 - ahh buddy hey there again! Glad you liked the update. I do have a Tumblr and am a super active Bechloe one-shot writer on there but don't tell anyone ;) I'll msg you the link as I've written a couple of 'm' rated one-shots on there.. so pleased you appreciate the replies to the reviews :) I think it's important for followers to have some acknowledgement from the author!
Thanks again guys! Next update will probably be another couple of days :)
As always, comments and reviews really appreciated xx