"Okay," Chloe says once they're settled on the couch again. Her toes end up edging under Beca's leg under the excuse that they're cold and Beca shifts to let them wiggle their way further. "Make three true 'we' statements each. For instance, "We are both in this room feeling..."
Beca lets her hand rest over Chloe's ankle. "So now it's about us?" It sounded innocuous in her head but hearing the word "us" makes her swallow. "Okay. We...are both nerds." It makes Chloe laugh.
"We are learning a lot about each other tonight."
Beca tilts her head a little at that. "We are...two sides of the same coin."
Chloe smiles at her. "We know how to have fun."
"We…" The words Beca wants to finish with are too forward, too direct. She wants to say they are made for each other. "We are good together."
There's hesitation in Chloe's demeanor and she even pulls her lower lip between her teeth - her tell that she's thinking hard about something. "We…" She takes a breath. "We make each other really happy."
The statement flows through Beca and burns like liquor. She makes Chloe really happy. And there's no doubt Chloe makes her happy. "We do?" she asks, feeling breathless.
Chloe flashes her a smile. "Don't we?"
"Uh, yeah. Yes." She squeezes Chloe's ankle and flips to the next page of the notebook. "Okay, complete this sentence: 'I wish I had someone with whom I could share…'"
She hears Chloe take a breath. "I wish I had someone with whom I could share...my bubble baths."
It almost makes Beca laugh until she imagines sharing a bubble bath with Chloe, and her laugh comes out more like a choking snort. She has to wave off Chloe's concern and accepts the sip of bourbon offered from Chloe's glass. "Thanks. Sorry. Okay. I wish I had someone with whom I could share…"
There are a dozen or more ways she could finish the sentence but there's one that bubbles to the top.
"...my life."
She feels Chloe's toes wiggling under her thigh and then they're jerked away. It's so sudden it startles her because Chloe's in a flurry of motion. She sits up and then stands halfway to move down the couch until she's sitting on her hip, facing Beca, on the thus-far neutral middle cushion.
Her knee rests against Beca's and her arm comes to rest along the back of the couch again, but this time it's also framing Beca.
The whole thing has Beca's heart pounding and she realizes she probably looks like a deer caught in the headlights so she forces herself to blink several times, in rapid succession, as Chloe watches her with an almost invasive level of interest.
Until Chloe looks away, finds the notebook that ended up beneath her, and turns the page. "If you were going to become a close friend with your partner, please share what would be important for her to know." She looks at Beca again and Beca feels Chloe's fingertips playing at the nape of her neck and it's everything she can do to not shiver from head to toe. "Well, I think we're already way more than close friends. But it's important for you to know that I really, really hate onions."
Once again, Chloe's unexpected answer makes Beca laugh, but this time it's a welcome moment of levity. She was starting to feel like she was suffocating. "I know you hate onions, you nerd. I've watched you send back food a dozen times because they put onions on something you ordered."
"Their texture is terrible and they make your breath stink. Why would anyone willingly eat something so bad?"
"Because they add flavor?" Beca says with a laugh. She can still feel Chloe touching her and the shiver still trying to manifest but she's been able to slide it a little bit toward the back of her mind. "Don't worry; I won't ever knowingly give you onions."
"Thank you," Chloe says with earnest.
Beca shakes her head at how impassioned Chloe became over such a thing and she has to rein herself in from just jumping forward and kissing her. "It's important for you to know that I love you."
She's still thinking about the answer she wants to give when she sees Chloe's face change from serious to surprise.
"I love you, too," Chloe whispers and Beca feels fingers creep higher into her hair, sees Chloe try to shift closer.
It's only then that she hears her own words echo back to her.
She hadn't meant to say that out loud! That was one of many answers and it wasn't going to be the chosen one, and yet here she is. Suffocating. She can feel the panic boiling, the need to stammer an apology or explain it away.
But she'd been honest.
And Chloe had said it back.
Chloe had said it back!
But she probably meant it as friends. Like, she loves her as her best friend.
Beca manages to channel her panic into reaching for the notebook and turning the page with more force than necessary; it rips a third of the way down the page along the spiral binding and she reads quickly to try to move past what just happened. "Tell your partner what you like about them; be very honest this time, saying things that you might not say to someone you've just met."
Chloe's still looking at her when she finishes reading and she has her answers at the ready. "I like that you let yourself be vulnerable with me. I like that I can be vulnerable around you. I like that you don't get tired of me."
She finally notices Chloe's stopped talking, which means it's her turn. "I - I...I like how you make me feel. About myself. You make me feel like...like I'm important."
"You are important," Chloe says with big eyes and a gentle smile. "So much more than you know."
Beca watches Chloe start to lean forward and her heart threatens to leap out of her chest.
"Okay: share an embarrassing moment in your life," Chloe reads, and then laughs. "Oh, nooo!"
"Um, yeah," Beca says, mouth feeling like cotton as her pulse tries to return to normal. It's made difficult by Chloe's incessant touch. "When I was 16, my dad walked in on me...well, he walked in on me."
Chloe's brow furrows. "He walked in on you…" She gasps when she understands. "Oh, my God! He walked in on you!"
"He didn't look at me for, like, a week. And neither did I. Seriously the most embarrassing moment of my life."
Chloe's free hand covers her mouth in horror. "How much did he see?"
The entire mortifying experience plays out in her mind and she grimaces. "Enough."
"Were you at least under the covers?"
"Nope."
"Oh, God!" Chloe groans and hangs her head in sympathetic horror. "Oh, God, I would have died if that happened to me."
"Yeah, I made sure to lock my door after that. And he remembered to knock from then on, too."
"I should hope so. Oh, wow. Okay." Chloe straightens and fans her face, flushed pink. "Yours is way more embarrassing, but: I signed up for the talent show when I was in eighth grade to sing but when I got up there, I totally blanked and forgot the lyrics. My backing track kept playing and no one thought to restart it to try to help me, and no one shouted out a lyric or anything. I just stood there waiting for it to end while everyone in the audience stared at me. I cried about it for days."
"Well," Beca says as she pats Chloe's knee and leaves her hand there, "you got past it and turned into an amazing performer."
"Thank you."
"All right." Beca's finally feeling like she's not wound quite so tightly anymore. "Question 30: when did you last cry in front of another person and by yourself?"
Chloe thinks for a moment, eyelashes fluttering as she searches her memory. "The last time I cried in front of someone was last week at Trader Joe's because they were out of my dried mango slices."
"Seriously?" Beca says with a laugh. She makes note to always buy dried mango slices when she sees them.
"Shut up, they were the only reason I went and I really wanted them. As for by myself…" Chloe pauses. "Last night."
Beca opens her mouth to ask what happened; she can't handle it when Chloe's upset and she had no idea Chloe was crying last night. They'd texted until they were too tired so Beca called her and they talked until Beca fell asleep. Chloe hadn't mentioned anything being wrong. She's about to ask when Chloe shakes her head to stop her. "Okay, well, I guess, technically, the last time I cried in front of someone was...like...an hour ago?"
"You cried an hour ago?" Chloe really does move closer this time, wearing a look of concern.
"Well, uh, kind of. Yeah."
"When? Why?"
"When you...when you said I'm the rule."
Chloe's still, then. "You are."
As easy as the first time - easier, even, perhaps - tears prick her eyes again. "Oh, my God, stop it," she says with a sniffle as she rubs at her eyes. "I can't handle it. I'm ready for this quiz to be over." She doesn't know what's going to happen when it is over but she knows these questions need to end.
"Beca, we can stop, it's okay."
"No, let's just...let's just hurry up. I cried by myself two weeks ago. Go. Ask."
"Okay." She can tell Chloe's jittery now. "Tell your partner something that you like about them already. Oh, no, you're going to run out of things you like about me if we keep having to do this."
Beca gives a quick shake of her head and even dares to reach out and frame Chloe's face with her hand for a moment. "I could never run out of things I like about you. I like that you'll speak up for me if I'm too embarrassed, like at a store or restaurant or something."
She thinks she sees Chloe's eyes starting to shimmer.
"I like that you don't expect me to be happy all the time."
Beca nods and glances down at the notebook. "What, if anything, is too serious to be joked about?"
"Rape. Anything non-consensual. Sexual or otherwise."
"Yeah, same, same. Go." Beca felt something shift between them when they discussed the last times they shed tears. It's crackling in her bones and singing in her veins.
Chloe's hands are restless; the one that's been idly playing at her neck is starting to comb repeatedly through Beca's hair like she's searching for the perfect spot to rest. The other is on Beca's knee and it keeps gliding back and forth along the length of her thigh and Beca's confident if she was wearing shorts, she'd cease to exist at the contact. "If you were to die this evening with no opportunity to communicate with anyone," Chloe reads, "what would you most regret not having told someone? Why haven't you told them yet?"
Chloe stares at her.
And Beca stares right back.
She already told Chloe she loves her. She's told her she's held back from something in favor of not risking a good thing. Chloe's watched her tear up at her declaration that Beca's the baseline for all love and affection in her life.
Fuck it.
"That I've been in love with you for so long I can't remember what it's like to not be in love with you and I didn't want to tell you because if you don't feel the same way the I just ruined the most amazing friendship I've ever had. But I can't. I can't not tell you. If I die tonight and you didn't know that...it would kill me all over again. I'm in love with you, Chloe. I'm in love with you."
She feels like she might pass out; she's lightheaded and seeing stars, or maybe it's the light reflecting in the tears that are on Chloe's cheeks. Her body threatens to give out, to crumple in on itself, but Chloe's hand leaps to her shoulder to keep her upright.
"What about you?" Beca says with a watery laugh. "No regrets?"
Chloe's mouth seems to struggle to move, opening in closing in silence until she closes it and nods. "I love you, too," she says with a deep breath. "I'm so, so, in love with you."
Absolute joy floods Beca and she's well aware she's crying for real. "Okay, fuck this stupid quiz," she says as she shoves the notebook to the floor.
She sees the unspoken agreement pass over Chloe's face and she pushes forward, ready to finally kiss her best friend like she's dreamt of doing for nearly a decade.
"Wait, wait," Chloe says, though, with a stiff arm to stop Beca's advance.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Beca says, immediately going into panic mode. "I thought -"
"No! No, no. I mean, yes. You're...yes. I want to. Just...we don't have to do the last three questions but I really want us to do the last thing."
Part of Beca wants to scream in agony. They haven't even kissed and she's never felt as wound up as she does now. "What's the last thing?"
"Look into each other's eyes for four minutes without talking."
"Seriously?" Beca snaps but her impatience only serves to make Chloe smile and run her hand down and back up Beca's arm until both her hands are holding her neck.
"Please?"
Chloe's already looking into her eyes and Beca's ability to reject her request is nonexistent. "Set a timer or something." She doesn't want to wait one more second than necessary.
She watches Chloe set the countdown on her phone and notices the way Chloe's hands are unsteady as she does so. As soon as Chloe sets it down Beca catches her hands with her own and holds both of them tightly. She shifts in her spot so she can better face Chloe. "I can't believe you're -"
"Shhh." Chloe's hands are warm but her eyes are warmer as they settle on Beca's.
Staring at each other for four minutes didn't seem like a big task when it was requested. What're four minutes? It's the length of one song. It's how long it takes Beca to walk from her apartment to the convenience store down the street and the number of minutes she has to microwave her frozen macaroni and cheese dinner. Four minutes is not a long time.
Until she has to spend it staring into Chloe's eyes in absolute silence for each and every one of the 240 seconds.
It feels like a lifetime ago now that she showed up at Chloe's apartment for dinner. When she left her home, she expected nothing more than a usual evening spent with her best friend.
She didn't expect a quiz, and definitely not one that forced them to open up to one another in ways they rarely did. And not because they didn't want to, but that they rarely had cause to reach so deeply.
And the absolute last thing she anticipated was confessing her deep, dark secret of being in love with her best friend - and having the sentiment returned.
She can see it now, in Chloe's eyes. She's not sure how she never noticed it before, but the love is there, clear as day as they hold each other's gaze.
It makes Beca squirm, the intensity. She itches to look away because being faced with what she's wanted and somehow also feared for so long is almost overwhelming. Chloe's hands tighten on hers and it calms Beca.
She wonders how much time has passed. How much time is remaining. How many more seconds have to tick by until she can finally pull Chloe in and kiss her until they're gasping for breath.
She finds, though, as the seconds tick by, that though her anticipation grows and grows, her impatience begins to fade.
There's something peaceful, serene even, about this shared moment of silence. It feels like she and Chloe are of one mind, exchanging and giving and taking as they sit. She can see Chloe's eyes focus and refocus and knows when her thoughts have changed from one thing to another. She catches the moment they begin to tear up, only to be blinked away with a shy smile. She hears the steady cadence of Chloe's breathing and the way it increases infinitesimally when Beca tightens the hold she has on Chloe's hands and wets her lips.
It was an innocuous action, one of absent-minded necessity and not meant to tease, but she sees the effect it has on Chloe and she can't help but do it again, even going so far as to catch the corner of her bottom lip between her teeth.
They're supposed to be looking into each other's eyes but Chloe's have drifted down to watch Beca do it so Beca watches Chloe's and the way they react, mimicking the movements as though she's thinking about licking Beca's lips.
And having that thought pulls Beca out of the moment of serenity and right into one of longing and need.
She wonders if she made some type of a noise because Chloe's eyes snap up to hers as though she did.
She feels the shift before she sees it. Chloe's hands break out of her grip. They land on Beca's thighs and she feels the pressure of Chloe using her for leverage as she pushes herself forward.
Beca closes her eyes.
The timer hasn't sounded but she's giving up; she can't wait one more second and she can feel Chloe's advance, can sense her energy and feel her warmth growing until her quick breaths drift across Beca's lips.
"Open your eyes." Chloe's words wash over her as the hand that's been playing and caressing her hair returns, sliding with a calm ease along her neck until fingers weave through Beca's hair.
She forces them open and though she knew to expect it, nothing could have prepared her for Chloe to be as close as she is, cheeks pink and eyes dark as she hovers so close, almost too close for Beca to be able to see her clearly.
The ringtone on Chloe's phone marking the end of four minutes cuts through the silence.
Time seems to stop, then. The racing of her heart is the only way Beca knows it hasn't truly stopped.
Everything hangs in the air around them. The hours of confessions and stories. Of shared fears and likes and dislikes. Years of experiences and laughter and tears. All of it swirling around them until, with a quiet breath from Chloe that makes Beca take one of her own, it all drops out of the air to crash down around them as Chloe brings their lips together.
Beca's eyes close. She doesn't need to see anymore. She only needs to feel and listen to the way Chloe sighs as Beca's hands reach for her, to slide into her hair and control the angle of their first kiss. To the way Chloe's body is malleable beneath her touch as Beca presses forward, a nudge to her shoulder and a tug at her hip until Chloe's on her back and Beca's lying over her.
She only needs to hear the whimper that escapes Chloe when Beca slips her tongue along her lips and the groan that follows it when her lips part and their tongues meet.
"What the fuck was that quiz?" Beca asks after a few minutes. She needs a breather and assumes Chloe could use one as well. She doesn't stop altogether, though; she can't at this point. Her lips graze Chloe's as she asks the question and she peppers kisses to her cheeks and nose and along her jaw until she's inching down her neck.
A whine escapes Chloe and Beca can't believe she can have that effect on Chloe. "36 Questions to Fall in Love. Why did you stop?"
Beca lifts her head at that. "You invited me over to take a quiz that's supposed to make you fall in love with each other?"
"Well...it worked, didn't it?" Chloe says with big innocent eyes.
Beca just laughs and shakes her head before kissing her again. "I didn't need a quiz to fall in love with you."
She feels Chloe's arms embrace her. "Neither did I."
