"Are you out of your mind?" Aubrey demanded the minute she and Chloe were alone, closing the glass doors between the patio and the kitchen behind them, an act that psychologically more than physically prevented the rest of the Bellas from following. "Those are people I work with!"
"That's not a denial." Chloe pointed out, pulling her arm away from Aubrey's grip. She walked a few steps away before she spun to point at Aubrey. "And proves Stacie right about worrying you and that liaison."
Aubrey wanted to tear her hair out and wishing more than anything that she had never been acquainted with Kathryn or even the word liaison. "I try to stay friends with my exes, Chloe. You know that."
"So Jill is an ex?" Chloe asked. "So it's even worse than—"
"What? No." Aubrey shook her head. She ran her hand through her hair in frustration. "Why is everyone so quick to believe I would do anything to hurt Stacie? That I'm that willing to risk my relationship with her?"
To that, Chloe didn't have a counterargument, because she knew how she had acted, and she knew a lot of the Bellas had similar reservations about the Stacie and Aubrey relationship.
"If everyone feels that way about our relationship – about me – why did any of you even come to the party?" Aubrey asked. "Nobody was forcing you."
"Actually—" Chloe started, and then stopped.
Aubrey arched an eyebrow.
"Beca and Stacie kind of did," Chloe admitted.
Aubrey directed her gaze heavenward, as if pleading for strength.
"And maybe I was a little out of line—"
"A little?" Aubrey interrupted, unable to contain her incredulity. "You asked my friend to her face on whether or not we're sleeping together."
"Your friend?" Chloe repeated. "I know what you're like around people you like, Aubrey, and you're more than friendly with that Jill girl."
"That's none of your concern!"
"It is when I've been defending you to anyone who would listen!" Chloe argued. "I'm telling everyone that you love Stacie and this is a rough patch, but it's a little harder to sell that when you're practically attached to someone else!"
"I'm her guest. And she wants me to work with her on—"
"Oh, I bet she wants you to work with her on something." Chloe snarked. "I'm on your side no matter what, but you have to realize how it looks."
"So Stacie and I are a little on the outs, and I'm not allowed to be friends with anyone else right now?"
"Friends?" Chloe repeated. "You were hanging out with her when Stacie – remember her? Your actual, current, girlfriend? – was right there." Chloe pointed out.
"Our relationship isn't exactly in a good state right now, if you haven't noticed," Aubrey remarked sarcastically, as if neither she nor Chloe had been repeating the sentiment.
"Or you're pretending your relationship is non-existent to all those people at the party." Chloe countered.
"And the possibility that I might not want my relationship to be fodder for gossip with people I barely know never crossed your mind?" Aubrey asked.
"Your ex-gi—"
"I slept with her twice; that's not a relationship." Aubrey snapped. "We're friends who got drunk on too much champagne twice, and that was over a year ago."
"You just called her an ex."
"Oh my God." Aubrey groaned, throwing her hands up in both aggravation and frustration, knowing there was no way she was going to win this argument, simply because she and Chloe were having two totally different arguments. She was annoyed by how Chloe had been especially rude to Jill at the party, while Chloe was resentful of the fact that Aubrey was not cutting through the flak and just making up with Stacie already.
"Bree, I'm trying to be understanding about this, I swear," Chloe started, and hating the skeptical look Aubrey briefly shot in her direction, but soldiered on. "But I know you've changed since you left Barden, and I don't know what all those changes are. And maybe you believe you couldn't hurt Stacie, and I want to believe it, too, but Stacie thought it. Stacie. The one person who seems to know exactly what you've been through since I last saw you. I know you would do your best not to hurt her, but…"
And that, right there, was exactly why Aubrey believed she and Stacie needed to break up.
But what Chloe said next stopped that thought from running away from her. "But maybe you both needed this to happen."
Aubrey paused, and looked at her in confusion.
Chloe sat down on one of the pool chairs, and sighed heavily. "It's her first relationship, so she doesn't know how hard things are. How hard things can really get. How often you and the relationship can't be the thing that demands the most time or effort or even importance." She looked up at Aubrey. "And you need to decide if your job is worth losing her over."
"I've had the job for two years." Aubrey reminded. "I had the job when I had nothing, Chloe. Stacie…"
"Loves you." Chloe cut in. She shook her head in disbelief. "You're in love with someone who loves you back, and has seen you at your worst, and you want to let that go? Are you insane?"
Aubrey scoffed. "I doubt she's seen me at—"
"You were terrible during our senior year, Bree." Chloe reminded.
"I was driven." Aubrey corrected.
"You were an extreme aca-bitch." Chloe corrected. "And Stacie saw all of that, even when you kicked Beca out of the team and turned against the one person who never gave up on you; she was there, and she still thought to herself: 'Her. I want her.' And you're just willing to walk away from that?"
Aubrey's shoulders sagged, allowing herself to feel the defeat she could already feel permeating through her bones, acknowledging the one thing she hadn't allowed herself to think about before, the truth that helped her believe that while it would hurt her to the very depths of her soul, she and Stacie would survive a breakup: they had walked away from each other before. From the start, through every stop and start, before their relationship had morphed into its current existence, they had always been willing to take what they had at present and leave it at that.
It had hurt to leave each time, but they had survived. Aubrey was almost certain they would survive this time, as well.
When Chloe spoke again, it was softer, almost broken: "How can you just walk away from someone you love?"
Because they've done it before. Because it was the only way Aubrey knew how to preserve whatever was left of Stacie's feelings for her, knowing how badly she could still screw things up. She had a whole litany of reasons why breaking up would be better, but faced with the one person who had never given up on her, whose steadfast loyalty had been her main source of support through most of her college life, Aubrey couldn't lie. "I don't want to."
"Then why…?"
"Because this is not who we are!" Aubrey almost yelled in frustration. "It's not who I want to be, who I want us to be. I want to be someone who promises to be somewhere and actually be there. I want to be where she is. I want her to have fun, to be the girl she is and the woman she still can be, and still feel like she's in an actual relationship where she's not waiting for me to be available for her. She should be able to dance with whomever she wants to and not worry how I feel about it. I want her to be confident enough to know that just because I can't answer a call doesn't mean I've completely forgotten her existence. And when we make plans, she deserves someone who can actually follow through on that." She shook her head. "So this? This relationship we're both struggling to keep intact? I'm never around and I don't see how that can change. And she deserves better than this. We both do."
"So make changes!" Chloe insisted. "You just said this isn't who you want to be, then change that."
"I'm not pressing pause on my entire career and future the way you did for a crush, Chloe!" Aubrey snapped.
Chloe recoiled, reacting to Aubrey's verbal attack as if it had been physical. "That's not—"
"No," Aubrey cut in, because after momentarily faltering and showing weakness by confessing that her personal beliefs regarding her relationship clashed with what she actually wanted, she needed to gain equilibrium back, and Chloe was the likeliest target. So instead she changed tack. "I love her. But this is my job, Chloe. My entire life depends on this. People took a chance on me and I owe them the opportunity to prove they were right. My boss took a chance on me and gave me a career; I love Stacie, I do, but between her and the job, I—" she looked away quickly, bringing the back of her hand to her mouth, stopping more than just her words from escaping.
Chloe frowned, both in disappointment at the point Aubrey was clearly trying to make, and in confusion in the way Aubrey faltered at actually saying it out loud, the way her hand had come up in a way reminiscent of a younger Aubrey Posen, when her nerves tended to show. It took her a moment, but Chloe realized what was happening. "You can't even say it."
Aubrey glanced at her, hand still pressed to her mouth, because her company had spent a lot of money in creating Aubrey Posen, Oversight Committee Junior Executive, and she had no idea why the reflex would suddenly show up now.
Chloe pointed at her. "You talk a big game but you can't bring yourself to actually say it."
Aubrey bit down on the bile she could almost taste and managed to choke out, "So?"
Chloe shook her head, because while she knew she was right, she couldn't exactly say what any of it meant.
Realizing Chloe wasn't going to push the issue, Aubrey's shoulders sagged, both in relief and concession, because there was a reason why she valued Chloe's friendship as much as she did, even when they were estranged or at odds, and the way Chloe knew when to push and when to retreat was one of the biggest reasons. "I'm sorry."
Chloe lifted an eyebrow.
"What I said. Earlier." Aubrey said. She sighed. "I know it's more than just staying for a crush; I didn't mean to…" except she didn't know exactly what she'd hoped to accomplish by bringing up Chloe's extended stay in college, other than to divert the conversation from her own shortcomings.
Chloe smiled wryly. "Yeah, you kinda did."
"But I shouldn't have—"
"Bree." Chloe cut in gently, raising her hand in a stop gesture. "Stop. We both know how we feel about it, it's done. It doesn't fix anything."
Aubrey sighed again. "How the hell did we end up here?"
Chloe shrugged, because she had no idea, either. So instead she went with levity. "Fat Amy had tickets."
Aubrey wanted to smile, but her own answer was the original cause for the confrontation, and she didn't know how much she could really disclose to Chloe without getting her best friend upset again. But still she felt she needed to be honest. "Jill wanted me to meet her friends whose indie label is trying to be bought by two major companies." She glanced at Chloe, who looked up at her. "That guy Todd's one of them; Jill used to intern at a major record company until she started doing events, so she wanted us to work together on how her friends can get the best possible deal." She smiled faintly. "It's not middle management in a multinational conglomerate, and they can't really pay me much or anything, but it'll be something unrelated to my job and puts my name out there; if it works out, it's something I can put on my resumé."
Chloe winced, realizing now why Aubrey had been especially furious about how she'd acted at the party when she had interrupted Aubrey's conversation with Jill and some guy who had looked unnaturally happy to be talking to both Jill and Aubrey. Her protective instincts had kicked in – the part that wanted to protect Stacie from having to witness Aubrey's casual disregard of their relationship by being so overtly friendly with a woman who was clearly an ex, and the part that had always steered Aubrey away from inevitable self-destruction – and now she was being told she had badly misread the situation. "I'm sorry."
Aubrey nodded, but didn't offer words, and Chloe could understand: she had overstepped, and it was likely Aubrey would pay the price; and it was likely Aubrey couldn't say anything reassuring or tell Chloe it was fine until she knew if it really was.
Chloe exhaled, and ran her hands through her hair, trying to relieve some of the tension she felt. "God, what time is it?"
Aubrey checked her phone, and reported, "Eleven."
Chloe looked up at her. "Want to go back to the party? I'll even apologize and stuff."
Aubrey gave her a grateful smile, but shook her head. "I think I'll go back to the grounds."
"Want some company?"
"I'd like that."
Chloe got to her feet, and walked with Aubrey towards the path at the side of the house, earning herself a curious look. She shrugged in response. "It's not like I'm leaving with a total stranger."
From inside the house, Stacie watched as Aubrey and Chloe linked their arms together as they left, as if their fight mere minutes ago was already ancient history, envying Chloe for so easily being able to get past Aubrey's defenses and getting her to open up and get past whatever it was they had been fighting about.
Okay, it was pointless to pretend she didn't know what Aubrey and Chloe were fighting about, since she had been right beside Chloe when Jill had leaned in close to say something into Aubrey's ear and had probably set off some kind of alarm in Chloe's brain. She had tried to dissuade Chloe from doing anything because Stacie knew Aubrey was unlikely to resort to that kind of petty behavior and wouldn't have invited Stacie or Chloe or any of the other Bellas if she and Jill were doing anything untoward, but then Chloe had called in reinforcements in the form of Lilly and Fat Amy, and the minute Stacie had been distracted, had slipped away to go and say something to Aubrey.
Stacie hadn't seen much of that confrontation – her attention had been on preventing Fat Amy from taking pictures of some of the celebrity partygoers, because they were there on Aubrey's invitation and the last thing Aubrey needed was to get in trouble because the Bellas had no self-control – but the next thing she knew, Aubrey had been escorting Chloe out of the party, making the Bellas scramble after them.
The car ride back to the house had been filled with tense silence, with both Aubrey and Chloe shooting murderous looks at each other, and the car had barely come to a full stop when the two girls had practically jumped out of the car to pursue their fight.
Fat Amy had been the first one to try and follow them – shoving both Beca and Stacie out of her way so she could get out of the car first – and it had taken considerable effort from both Beca and Stacie, as well as the other Bellas, to prevent Amy from opening those patio doors and joining in on the fight.
She wasn't naïve. She knew how it looked. She knew some of the Bellas had come to the same conclusion Chloe had, and she knew they were looking to her on how to react, what to do next, if they were going to give Jill hell for daring to fall into bed with Aubrey at one point.
Except Stacie had realized earlier at the party that this must be how Aubrey felt at Barden, being in a room full of people and wondering how many of them Stacie had slept with at one point or another. Stacie was being monogamous now and hadn't slept with anyone since she and Aubrey became a real thing, but Stacie hadn't always been. And there had even been a time when Aubrey had been right there, watching Stacie flirt and flounce her way through people, all while believing that she would never be an option to Stacie.
And it would be easy – too easy – to do it again, to look for someone to flirt with and parade around Aubrey. But things with Aubrey were already fragile enough without resorting to truly damaging behavior.
Bseca made noise about wanting to watch one of the last shows, and everyone agreed that they had come to California for the music, which was why they ended up walking to the concert grounds.
As they had done the whole day, the Bellas split into separate groups, not agreeing on a single stage they all wanted to see. On her way to join the edge of the crowd at her chosen stage, Stacie's attention was caught by a lone figure standing just off the edge of the crowd, near the VIP area.
Aubrey didn't see her coming, but when she noticed someone standing beside her, Aubrey turned to check her identity, looking at Stacie for a long moment before looking away quickly.
Stacie couldn't even take offense in that reaction, because she imagine she would have felt the same, had their roles been reversed.
They stood together, watching the band and letting the music flood their senses, all while being acutely aware of each other's presence beside them.
That awareness was probably the only reason why Stacie didn't jolt in surprise when the casual brush of their hands together inevitably resulted in Aubrey tentatively slipping her hand in Stacie's. The hold was light, and if Stacie wanted to, she could easily slip her hand right back out. Instead, she tightened their hold, and glanced over at Aubrey to gauge her reaction.
Aubrey met her gaze, and for a moment Stacie almost forgot everything happening between them.
Almost.
But Stacie was getting clarity and a thorough understanding of why people described being in love by saying that all the songs made sense.
Because they do.
And she is.
And Aubrey holds her hand like she's the only anchor she has left.
A few more songs later – none of which Stacie can exactly recall – and she turns her head to face Aubrey, whose intense gaze informs Stacie that she had been looking at her for a while now. There's something in Aubrey's expression that emboldens her, and Stacie takes the words right out of the blonde's mouth.
"We need to talk."