"You two are adorable," Stacie says, dropping her bag by the door. She props her fists on her hips, eyeing them and nodding, like she's grading a diamond. Her Residual Heat Recording Studios t-shirt strains over her chest as she leans back, as if to get a better view of them. "Yeah, this will work. I can totally see it."
Chloe happily wiggles her fingers between Beca's, grinning. She doesn't have to look to know Beca is rolling her eyes. "Thanks, Stace!"
Stacie shoos them back into the living room. Beca crawls into her armchair, needing no further prompting, and Chloe and Stacie settle on the couch. "Okay, so. Let's go over this."
"Let's not," Beca mutters but Chloe ignores her, sitting up straighter, and Stacie just smiles.
"Beca," Stacie says. "How did you two meet?"
"Dude. You introduced us. You know how we met."
Chloe laughs as Stacie glares at Beca, crossing her ridiculously long legs. "Beca, you're supposed to be acting like Stacie is anyone else at the wedding. Answer like you don't know her." She smiles as Beca rocks back in her chair, crossing her arms and looking for all the world like a petulant teenager.
"Okay, fine. Well, we had a mutual friend, Stacie, who introduced us."
Stacie huffs, hands turning over palm-up in her lap. "That's it? Bec, where's the romance?"
"It wasn't romantic. You dragged me to the coffee shop and went, 'This is Chloe! Be friends!'. So we did."
"Well," Chloe says, leaning against the armrest closest to Beca's chair. Beca's gaze flickers to her, dark blue eyes narrowing. "I remember it a little different."
"Tell us!" Stacie sits forward like she's a thrilled spectator at a football game and there's seconds left on the clock. Playing the perfect enraptured family member.
"I had just gotten off a shift at the shelter and I felt sort of gross. A dog at work had been sick all over everything and I'd been working all day cleaning it up. I was so tired. And I'd just finished my first week of vet school. It was rough," she says, shaking her head. Her teacher had spent the first day simply lecturing them on how, sometimes, caring for the animals would make the job a thousand times harder so they would have to learn to compartmentalize. As if all their job would be was putting down puppies and amputating kitten legs. "I was honestly contemplating quitting. Everyone in my class seemed smarter than me and my teacher was one of those 'If you can't face the hard parts, then get out now' types so he kept throwing out words like 'euthanize' and 'unsaveable'. And that day, I was just...done." She shrugs, watching Beca's eyes follow the motion. She turns back to Stacie. "So when my friend, Stacie, texted me about coffee, I almost said no."
Stacie's eyebrows jump up and Chloe can tell the surprise is real. She'd never told anyone about thinking of quitting. It wasn't a very Chloe thing to do, so she was kind of ashamed.
"And, you know...I know I would have met Beca some way or another. You-or, Stacie, I mean-would have introduced us another day, I'm sure. But I think I was meant to meet Beca that day." She reaches out blindly, fingers curling around Beca's wrist. She can feel her pulse beneath her thumb, the rhythm steady. "I was just sitting down when Stacie came in, Beca trailing behind her and looking like she had not meant to end up there at all." She laughs. "And she was wearing that purple button-up and her black skinnies and these huge boots. Her ears were full of metal and her eyeliner was SO dark and she looked exactly like someone my father had always warned me about being friends with. I smiled at her and she grimaced. But her eyes were kind."
Beca scoffs, rolling said eyes.
Chloe pinches her wrist, wrinkling her nose at her until Beca gives in and smiles. Just a little one, but still. "And I knew right then we'd be fast friends. I could just feel it." She turns back to Stacie, catching the other girl grinning. "And we all sat down and ordered. Stacie introduced us. And she said, 'Chloe is going to school to be a vet'. I was just debating whether or not that was true, and if I should say something about the doubts I was having, when Beca looked me up and down and went-" She presses her lips together tight and shrugs, bobbing her head to the side in a perfect imitation of Beca. "'Yeah, I can see you bein' a vet.'"
Stacie laughs, probably remembering the moment.
"And just like that, I knew she was right. If this girl I'd just met could see it, I should be able to too. So I didn't quit. And after another week of school, it all seemed easier." She smiles at Beca, squeezing her wrist. "It all just settled into place."
Beca's eyes are a little wider than normal, her brow furrowed like it always is when she "has emotion-y things", as she calls it. The corner of her lips is turned up just enough to be a smile and her eyes, so much darker blue than Chloe's, flicker down to where they're still touching, Chloe's fingers lying along her pulse, thumb rubbing back and forth.
"Okay, wow." Stacie's voice cuts through the moment. "You two missed your calling in Hollywood. That was awesome! This is gonna be a cakewalk."
Beca's hand pulls back and Chloe's fingertips feel cold. She tucks her hands together between her knees, smiling as Stacie launches into travel plans and the other things they need to cover before they head out.
Chloe watches Stacie inhale an eggroll, shaking her head. As thin and toned as she is, Stacie can sure put away some food.
"And, of course, kissing-"
"Wait, what?" Beca looks up from her takeout, blinking rapidly. Stacie is paused mid-sentence, eyebrows up. "What did you say?"
"Kissing?" Stacie shrugs. "You'll have to, you know. It's a thing couples do. A lot. Especially ones that are happy to be at a wedding for their friends. Chloe?"
Chloe nods, rolling her lips together and releasing them with a "pop". "She's right, Bec. My family knows I'm affectionate. It would be weird if there weren't some...intimacy."
She wrinkles her nose at the word. "But. I mean, what if you just tell them I'm not really that into PDA?"
"Beca, have we met?" Chloe leans forward. She gives Beca her best playful wink.
Beca sighs. "Okay, good point. But still."
"Still what?" Stacie settles deeper into the couch, a plate of the Chinese they'd ordered balanced on her cleavage. "Get to smoochin'!"
"Dude, no!" Beca shakes her head violently, turning to Chloe for help, eyes wide.
It's hard to stop laughing, but she does when she meets Beca's eyes, covering her grin with her fist. "Okay, Stace. Down, girl. That's something Beca and I will discuss more later on."
Stacie whines, like they've just told her Christmas isn't happening this year. "You guys are killing my fantasies here."
Beca gags. "Oh, gross. Please don't fantasize about me in any capacity."
"You're my boss, Beca." She tugs at her t-shirt, stretching the "R" in "Residual". "It's like a rule that I have to have at least one fantasy about you."
"That's not a thing. It's not. Stop nodding-"
By the time they manage to make Stacie stop recounting every possible fantasy she could have about Beca (there are so many) and the smaller brunette's stopped blushing, Chloe's cheeks hurt from laughing. She nibbles on an eggroll, happily soaking in the easy companionship as an episode of "Reign" plays. Stacie and Chloe have both already seen it and Beca isn't really a huge fan of TV (except, inexplicably, the dumb shows on ID), so none of them are really paying attention to it. Instead they chat about the shelter, about how things are going at Residual Heat, about the construction around the corner that keeps making them late to everything. And Chloe catches herself wondering if she can get away with crawling into Beca's recliner with her.
It really is a very comfy chair and Beca's allowed it before, with a lot of complaining. It's getting late and she can see Beca's eyes drooping every now and then. And Sleepy Beca is very different from Awake Beca. So, while Stacie tells them about one of the techs she'd hooked up with ("Outside of work, Bec, of course. Not in the studio...anymore."), Chloe sticks a foot out and nudges Beca's knee with her toes.
Beca looks up, blinking a few times quickly. Chloe lifts her eyebrows, rocking forward a bit and staring pointedly at the small space that Beca has curled her legs up into. It takes a second, but Beca rolls her eyes and shuffles a bit, nodding. She reaches down and flips the lever, kicking the legs up. Chloe happily snatches a blanket from the back of the couch, hops up, and climbs right in, settling half on top of Beca and half tucked between her and the chair arm. Beca tucks her arms in across her chest, a somewhat stiff, pouting body pillow as Chloe drapes the blanket over them both.
Stacie smiles, pausing her story. "You two make me sick. If I'd known you were going to be the gross kinda friends that everyone hates, I wouldn't have introduced you."
"Shut up," Chloe giggles. "You love us. Besides, we're girlfriends now." She winks dramatically.
"Oh, true." Stacie stretches out across the now empty couch, her head propped on one arm, her feet on the other. "Sorry, continue being gooey. Now, where was I? Oh, so he had his pants around his ankles and the lights in the parking lot just suddenly come on."
Beca groans, shaking her head and closing her eyes, as if that will block out the story.
At some point between Stacie detailing their run from security and her switching to talking about the other tech she'd gone out with, Beca falls asleep.
Chloe can feel the second it happens, because Beca's whole body relaxes and her head lolls until her breath is fanning across Chloe's temple. It makes her smile. A year ago, when they'd gotten the apartment, Beca had avoided any and all contact almost. They'd been friends for a few months by then and Beca had started allowing small touches in public, but when they all hung out-usually at Stacie's apartment or Chloe's old place-Beca would commandeer a corner of the couch and tensed up whenever anyone came close. So when they moved in together, Chloe had expected much of the same. She'd been correct. The first time Chloe came home from school and gave her a quick hug, Beca had stiffened, stuttered something about work, and ducked into her bedroom for two days.
It had started a long careful game of push and pull-everything from tiny brushes of the hand to the one time she'd literally held Beca down through an episode of Great British Baking Show and forced her to cuddle.
She'd come away with a bruise on her arm from Beca's swinging elbow, but it had been worth it. The next morning, when Chloe had ducked in for her quick hug goodbye, Beca had barely flinched. And then it was like a switch had flipped and Chloe found Beca didn't shy from her touch almost at all anymore. Sometimes she protested, but it never seemed to have that same adamant fire behind it that she'd gotten used to. Maybe she was just resigned to her fate or had decided that allowing all the little cuddles meant she could avoid another episode of GBBS pressed face-first into the couch cushions with the redhead sprawled across her back.
Beca's still a little like a cat with everyone else, in that she has to be in the mood to be touched or you'll get clawed, but she's considerably more open to Chloe's lack of personal space. She even lets Stacie hug her sometimes. And when Beca initiates any kind of touch? It's Chloe's favorite. It feels like what she imagines winning the lottery would feel like. Shocking, thrilling, and like she needs to find a witness immediately. Like she wants to run into the street, yelling, "Beca Mitchell touched my arm while I was cooking! Can you believe?"
She really likes winning.
But when she's asleep, Beca is a different entity. One night, while they were sitting at separate ends of the couch, Chloe's legs up in the distance between them, Beca had fallen asleep while reading. One second, Chloe was watching So You Think You Can Dance and the next, Beca was stretched across the couch, arms wrapped around Chloe's legs and her face nuzzled into her thigh.
Chloe's back had hurt like crazy the next day, but she'd refused to move and instead slept sitting up, one hand rested lightly on the back of Beca's neck.
And it's the same now. As Stacie and Chloe quietly chat, Beca twists a bit, her face resting against the crown of Chloe's head, her hand snaring a bit of Chloe's t-shirt.
"You guys are getting a little too convincing now," Stacie says as she stands and stretches. All of the takeout is long gone and it's dark outside. "You're sure you're not secretly married?"
Chloe rolls her eyes. Stacie asks once every few months and it's turned into a running gag. She's started to call them Mom and Dad behind Beca's back and Chloe can't wait for her to slip up and let the smaller brunette hear that. "No, Stacie. She's just my bestie." She squeezes Beca a little and the smaller girl huffs in her sleep. Stacie laughs and twists to crack her back, then bends to gather her phone and keys from the table. Chloe leans back as far as Beca's grip on her t-shirt will allow. "You can stay, you know. It's late. It's New York."
"I know, thanks. But I have someone coming over to the apartment early tomorrow to buy my table. Then I'm going pick up that cool one at the antique store. Gotta get home. I'll text you as soon as I make it." She plucks Chloe's phone from the arm of the couch where she'd left it and passes it to her.
Chloe tucks it between her and Beca so she can grab Stacie's hand. "Good. Be safe, Stace." She tries to sit up to walk her out, but Stacie pats her shoulder.
"No worries. I'll lock the door. Night."
"Night." She turns her head to smile at Stacie one last time as she steps out.
The door shuts and she settles back into Beca's side.
It's nice, when Beca lets her close. For a while, she'd been scared that they would never get to that point. For Chloe, touch is a huge part of all her relationships, friendly or otherwise. There's just something about feeling someone's laugh in their chest when they hug you or their pulse tapping under your fingers. Everything always means more when there's warm skin against her own. She is, admittedly, a lot more touchy with Beca than anyone else, but that's just because she'd spent so long getting Beca to let her close. She's got time to make up for, right?
So she happily shuffles closer, tucking her face into the crook of Beca's neck and tangling their legs together. Beca always smells like lavender.