A/N: I apologise for all the ass in this chapter.

'C'mon, Bellas, pick up the pace!' Aubrey calls out to the Bellas, clapping her hands. 'Visualise the ICCA trophy in front of you! Those Treblemaker jerks are right behind you, reaching for it! They're gaining on you! You can do it, Bellas, outrun them!'

She makes a few "pheep"s on her whistle for no discernible reason other than to piss them off. Perhaps she thinks that if she riles up the Bellas enough it'll make them run faster, Beca thinks as she staggers down the steps for what feels like the fiftieth time that day. If that's true, she could probably train for an Olympic sprint right now if Aubrey was her coach. As Beca passes Aubrey, she blows hard on the whistle again.

'Beca, keep your back straight! Stop slouching!'

'I'm gonna shove that whistle up her ass in a sec,' Beca pants over her shoulder to Lily, who is right behind her. Lily gasps something back to her, and Beca's not sure if it's just the breathy quality of Lily's voice, but she's pretty sure she heard something about having fireworks in her bag that she could shove up there too. She picks up her pace (if only to try and get away) passing Jessica, Denise and Ashley who are attempting to run in a three, slotting in just behind Cynthia Rose.

'Beca,' Cynthia Rose wheezes, ''sup?'

'Other than the fact I'm dying?' Beca says, pretending to be cheerful even though her lungs are screaming. 'Not much. You?'

'S-same.'

They run in companionable silence for a few minutes, their heavy breathing and the sound of running shoes pounding on the floorboard the only sounds outside of Aubrey's occasional yells and whistle blowing.

Truth be told, Beca kind of likes running, despite not being great at it. She was never one to be good at sport when at school, mostly due to her occasional clumsiness and sometimes her height (and just general not giving a fuck), so things like volleyball and tennis were lost on her. There's something about running, though, that she enjoys. Probably the solitude and only having to focus on what she's doing, not other people, so she won't get shouted at if she messes up. Yep, she decides, that sounds like a sufficiently miserable reason for her to like it. However, all this cardio is Aubrey's idea, so she still hates it on principle even if she's inwardly enjoying the burn in her legs and lungs. Is that creepy? Maybe.

'Enjoying yourself?' she asks. Typically, Cynthia Rose glares at her.

'I haven't run in years, Beca,' Cynthia Rose wheezes. 'Years. I'm more of a dancing girl. Ugh!' she says as she nearly falls over. 'Isn't exercise meant to be good for you?'

Beca snorts. 'So they always tell you, but I'm convinced it's a conspiracy.'

Cynthia Rose nods solemnly in agreement. As she looks ahead of her, her face suddenly brightens. 'Well. Hey. Looks like there is… one benefit!' She shoots a tired wink at Beca over her shoulder.

'Oh yeah?' says Beca sceptically. 'What's that?'

Wordlessly, Cynthia Rose gestures a little ahead of her, to where Stacie and Chloe are running near each other, chatting easily as they jog.

Beca's expression becomes puzzled. 'Chloe and Stacie? What about them?'

'Their clothes, Beca! Look at their clothes,' Cynthia Rose says, as they climb the steps again. The slight slowing of the pace of the two girls to move uphill allows Beca a little more time to think about it; when she realises what Cynthia Rose is talking about, she actually comes to a stop out of shock.

It's not like Beca hadn't noticed what they were wearing before - of course she had. And it's not like she wasn't wearing something similar. But she'd never really noticed, too busy trying not to fall over. Now, though, it's hard not to see it. Both are in probably the tiniest pair of shorts they could manage. Thankfully, Chloe is wearing a t-shirt instead of just a sports bra like Stacie, but even the fact she's a little more covered up doesn't do much for her when it's clinging to her with sweat and she's lifting up the bottom up to dab her face and flashing off her stomach to the rest of the Bellas. Add that to the fact that they are higher up on the steps than Beca so certain parts of them are right in her eye line – well, it doesn't take a genius for Beca to work out what Cynthia Rose is doing.

'Dude!' she hisses incredulously. 'You're checking them out?'

Cynthia Rose pauses too on the step above Beca's. She arches an eyebrow at her, wiping her forehead. 'Can you blame me?'

Aubrey blows on her whistle. 'Beca! Cynthia Rose! Stop slacking!' They groan but start running again, although much slower now so they can talk. Beca says, under her breath, 'Dude, that's so perverted.'

'Don't pretend you haven't noticed,' Cynthia Rose hisses back to her. 'I saw your face when Chloe started taking off her pants. You're not as hard to read as you think you are.'

'How was I supposed to know she was wearing shorts underneath?! I thought she was gonna be running in her underwear or something.'

'Yeah, you'd like that wouldn't you?' Cynthia Rose says, smirking, which quickly falls away when Beca shoves her and she nearly stumbles down the steps they're going back down. 'Watch it! For God's sake, I don't need a broken leg.'

'Chloe and I aren't like that,' Beca growls. 'And I'm not sure I like you looking at her like that.'

'To be honest, B, my eyes weren't really on Chloe,' Cynthia Rose says, sighing.

'Good. Keep it that way.' The full implications of what Cynthia Rose was saying finally settle in. 'Wait. You and -'

She cuts Beca off quickly. 'No. You can can window shop without buying, though, right?'

'What's that supposed to mean?'

'Exactly what I said. It don't mean you want it, or that you've got the money for it, but you can still look and imagine.' The wistfulness in her tone suggests to Beca that there's something else going on, here, that they're not just discussing Cynthia Rose innocently perving on the butts of their fellow Bellas.

'Something you wanna talk about?' she asks quietly.

'Something you wanna talk about?' Cynthia Rose shoots back immediately.

'No.'

'Then me neither.' Cynthia Rose slows to a stop. 'You go ahead. Gotta tie my lace.'

Beca considers waiting for her, but Aubrey's glaring in her direction so she heads on, taking her place behind Chloe again. Stacie's run ahead somewhere, apparently having gotten bored. Chloe doesn't seem bothered by this though, simply getting on without complaint: she's a pretty steady runner, all things considered – she has a lot of stamina and doesn't seem to be lagging like the rest of them are.

(Beca immediately tries not to think too hard about Chloe's "stamina" and the inevitable places such a thought leads.)

'Alright, Bellas! Let's see some high knees, now!'

'WHY DO YOU HATE US?' Amy screams.

Beca ignores Aubrey's instruction, watching the tensing and relaxing of Chloe's leg muscles as she effortlessly transitions into doing high knees. Without conversation to ground her, Beca's thoughts inevitably go back to her conversation with Cynthia Rose. You can window shop without buying. What the heck does that mean? That she's allowed to ogle Chloe without being her girlfriend? Well, it wouldn't be the first time. Does that make her a pervert or creepy? Probably. And here she was getting at Cynthia Rose. What a hypocrite.

But hell, it's not like she's blind, Beca thinks defensively. Chloe's pretty. Really pretty. Beautiful, even, and not just in her face (Beca would know). And Beca's not so stupid and so in denial that she can't see what's happening to her here. Chloe's had a pretty solid hold on her tiny animal brain since the day she barged into Beca's shower and forced her to sing with her (naked harmony is sort of a good way to make someone attracted to you) and it's unlikely to go away soon. She's only human, and a pretty gay human, at that. That whole event in her dorm with Jesse and Chloe where she got insanely jealous then swooned like a loser when Chloe went after her kind of solidified that fact for her.

Still, none of that really matters. Because if there's one thing she knows for sure, and the one thing she can control, it's that she's not going to date Chloe. She's confident of that. Relationships suck and inevitably end in disaster, and no way is she going to drag Chloe into all that mess. Bad enough Chloe insists on being her friend when she's such a crappy one, even if she's genuinely trying to work on that. Besides, even though Chloe's bisexual and therefore could feel the same way... Well. She won't kid herself with trying to feel hopeful there.

But still. There's no harm in looking, like Cynthia Rose said… Right?

Beca – allowing herself one moment of weakness - lets her eyes drift to Chloe's backside. Just briefly, though! She's not some weirdo who makes a habit of staring at girls' asses. (She's more of a breast girl anyway. Legs are good too.)

Of course, doing this is her downfall. As was the decision to lose her concentration just as she's jogging back down the steps of the auditorium - it's not like she's the most coordinated person ever, either, so it's not surprising in the slightest that Beca just happens to lose her footing in between steps.

What is surprising is that Chloe helpfully decides that moment is the best for a leisurely pause to take a swig from her drink, so when Beca goes tumbling… she takes Chloe down, too.

As they collide, bounce down the rest of the steps in a sweaty lady ball and eventually land in a painful pile right at the bottom, Beca remembers why she hates crushes. They always end in pain.

Falling right on top of Chloe knocks the wind straight out of her, and she sees stars as the places that Chloe hasn't cushioned with her body impact heavily on the wooden floors. 'Fu -' is the only expletive she has breath for to express the amount of pain she's in, and she doesn't even get to say it properly. It comes out breathless and high-pitched. She manages to summon up enough brain power to roll off Chloe's body, landing heavily and painfully on her back.

It takes a while for her brain to clear enough that she can register more than serious pain all over her body, before things begin to settle back into place and she can work out exactly which places hurt the most. A searching hand bravely ventures out, passing over her chest (breasts are still there, great. She's not so sure about her lungs) and the agonising pain mostly centred down her left side. She doesn't think she's broken anything, but it's pretty hard to tell when everything has just accumulated into a big ball of suffering. Chloe's probably not doing much better, she thinks dimly, then realises.

Shit.

Anxiety bubbles - more like froths over, actually - in her chest as she starts to panic, wondering if Chloe's seriously hurt. With difficulty, Beca manages to open her eyes.

Chloe's still just lying there where Beca left her; she panics for a second but then realises that thankfully, she isn't unconscious and Beca can see that her eyes are open. She's half rolled onto her side, clutching her left arm to her chest. Her face is ashen grey, and there are tears in her eyes.

'Fuck. Chloe,' Beca whispers with the first bit of proper oxygen she gets into her chest.

Rapid footsteps suddenly sound as all of the Bellas congregate around the two of them. Cynthia Rose, Denise and Stacie attend to Beca since Chloe already has a sizable audience, and because, Beca assumes, she doesn't look as ill as Chloe does.

'You okay?' asks Cynthia Rose quietly. Stacie and Denise help her sit up; she flinches at every movement. She nods quickly to Cynthia Rose, her eyes on Chloe.

Aubrey drops to her knees beside Chloe, cradling her face like she's dying rather than having fallen down stairs. At this point Beca can't blame her; she'd probably be doing the same if she was able to move. 'Chloe! Are you okay? Where does it hurt?'

'My arm,' Chloe says from between gritted teeth, her eyes closed in pain. 'And the rest of my body. Banged my chin.' Beca can see that – there's a watery rivulet of blood streaming down Chloe's chin where she must have accidentally bitten her lip. Ashley breaks away from the group and returns a few moments later, pressing the tissue to her face.

'Can you move your fingers?'

'I – I think so.'

Aubrey watches her wiggle them worriedly. 'Hopefully it's just a sprain and some bruises from the way you landed, but we should go get you some ice and get you checked out.'

Shit, shit, shit, Beca's chanting to herself, her wide eyes taking in every detail of Chloe's injury, from the way she's gingerly moving her arm to the bloody scrapes on her knees where they skimmed the floor. Rationally she knows that Chloe's probably just got a sprain like Aubrey said, but she's never been good with people getting injured, and keeps imagining Chloe has irreversibly injured herself, maybe even needs her arm cut off or something.

'Are your legs okay? Can you stand?'

'No problem, I've got this,' Fat Amy says, pushing people aside. 'I've lifted crocodiles bigger than Chloe. Should be a piece of cake.' Chloe lets out a pathetic whine of protest and tries to shuffle away, but her injury works against her and stops her moving away fast enough. Amy picks up Chloe with ease and smiles at the others as if to say "See?" then starts heading off towards the exit.

'Amy, be careful!' Aubrey shrieks as Amy hits Chloe's leg on the door on the way out and she lets out a moan of pain.

'Whoops! Sorry, Red.'

To Stacie's and Cynthia Rose's protests, Beca finally gets to her feet and blindly tries to follow them, but Aubrey blocks her with her arm. 'You stay here,' Aubrey snarls. 'You've done enough damage for one day.'

Beca rears back, hurt beyond belief. Betraying tears jump to her eyes. Later she'd swear it was from the lingering pain in her body.

Cynthia Rose comes over to her, putting a careful arm around her shoulders. Beca half jumps away, but the other girl holds fast.

'Don't mind Aubrey, she's just worried,' Cynthia Rose asks gently. 'You okay? Looks like you went down pretty hard.'

Beca both nods and shakes her head, still staring out the door after the three that just left. Cynthia Rose frowns, confused.

'Okay. Want me to walk you back to your dorm then?'

Beca hesitates for a moment, then nods.

'C'mon then, B.'

The walk back to Beca's dorm is silent, mostly because Beca keeps her mouth clamped shut the whole time, worried if she opens it a whole torrent of thoughts about Chloe will just come spilling out. Her anxiety to find out if Chloe is okay, feeling guilty that she caused the accident, and worse, feeling even more guilty about the reason why she caused the accident. It's just better for her to keep quiet.

Cynthia Rose had shot her a few questioning looks when she saw how Beca was limping slightly and holding her arm a bit stiffly, but she'd just shaken her head. Beca's probably not that injured - she hasn't checked properly, but is assuming from the way she can still move. Plus, in general Beca doesn't have a very high threshold for pain. Coupled with all the feelings warring inside her about Chloe, she just wants to wallow and mope for a while and lick her wounds. Figuratively speaking.

As Cynthia Rose kicks a rock across the road, she glances at Beca. In an overly casual tone, she says, 'Hey, Beca?'

Beca raises her head, indicating she's listening.

'Just want you to know that… If you've got any problems and such of a certain kind… You know.' She coughs something sounds suspiciously like "female-related". 'My ears are always available. If you see what I'm saying.'

Beca's head snaps around to face the other girl sharply, her eyes narrowing a little. It's pretty obvious what she's saying, but Beca hasn't decided whether she should acknowledge it yet.

'I know what it's like. Y'know? Girls like us…' She casts a meaningful glance at their clothes. They're both wearing flannel and Converse, having changed their clothes just before they left. Beca slaps her forehead internally. 'We gotta stick together.'

It strikes Beca that perhaps she should perhaps be at the very least perturbed at how Cynthia Rose knows she likes women (Beca doesn't think she's that obvious), but instead she finds she settles for a cool, but somewhat grateful, 'Thanks.'

Cynthia Rose drops her off at her dorm, only acquiescing to Beca's request that she not stay because Kimmy Jin is there.

'No offence but your roommate scares the shit out of me. I feel like she's going to shank me if I step in your room and even look at her Bonsai plant,' Cynthia Rose confesses.

Kimmy Jin does shoot Beca a few curious glances when she limps into bed, groaning as she tries to get comfy on her unbruised side. She's exaggerating, probably making a fuss over nothing, especially when Chloe could have broken her arm for all she knows, but she's (mostly) alone now so she just lets herself wallow like she wanted to when walking with Cynthia Rose.

With her free arm, Beca calls, texts, even Facebook messages throughout the day to Chloe (and occasionally Aubrey) without much success. With every unanswered message her worry starts to build. By two thirty in the afternoon, she's gotten herself into such a toxic combination of anxiety and guilt that she begins to think her earlier worry that Chloe was having her arm amputated was more true than she thought.

She leaves yet another voice mail. 'Hey Chloe,' she says, impressed with how much she manages to make her voice sound normal even when she's trying not to cry. 'Still haven't heard from you. Please call or text when you're home, okay? I'm kinda worried. I'm sure you're fine, and it's a sprain at worst, but I... Yeah.' She swallows roughly. 'Bye.'

Beca had felt Kimmy Jin's eyes on her through the whole one-sided conversation, but as soon as she finishes the call Kimmy Jin walks straight out of the room. She sighs, leaning her head on her knees, glad for a little privacy at last.

A few minutes later she hears Kimmy Jin come back, and something hits her knee. Opening her eyes, she sees an ice pack laying on her sheets.

Beca looks up at Kimmy Jin questioningly; she just rolls her eyes. 'For God's sake, pull yourself together,' Kimmy Jin grumbles, chucking a box of Kleenex at her head. 'I can't concentrate over your blubbering.'

She gives her a watery smile. 'Thanks...'

'Whatever.' Kimmy Jin settles back behind her laptop, losing herself in her essay again. She doesn't look up at Beca again after that, giving her some time to blow her nose and wipe her face. Just as she's lifting her shirt to use the ice pack (why didn't she think of that? Oh yeah, she was too busy texting Chloe) she finally gets the reply she's been waiting for. She drops the ice pack to the side, scrambling for her phone and fumbling with numb fingers to unlock her phone.

It's only a short reply.

I'm home and okay. Took them ages to see me at the hospital. Just a sprain. In a fair bit of pain though

As soon as she's read it she's up and stumbling out of the door.

'Hi Aubrey.' She waves meekly when Aubrey opens the door, expecting a slap or at the very least a harsh verbal lashing. But none comes – she simply tuts irritably and storms away from the door. A slam a few seconds later seems to indicate she's gone to her bedroom. Beca cautiously steps inside, assuming she can since Aubrey left the door open.

Chloe is sat in an armchair, legs propped up on the coffee table. Thankfully, she still has her arm, and isn't even wearing a sling. Beca can't tell if she has hidden injuries since they're hidden by her clothes, but at any rate she looks much better than earlier. Beca lets out a silent sigh of relief.

She brightens a little when she sees Beca. 'Hey!'

'Hey,' she says, approaching Chloe and looking her over to see if she can spy any bruises peeking out from under her layers. Thankfully, she can't. 'How're you feeling?'

'Still pretty achey all over, but I should be okay in a little while. No dancing for a bit, which Aubrey's annoyed about... But I got lucky, it could've been way worse.' She notices the bag Beca is carrying, or rather, dragging. 'What's that?'

'Oh, yeah. Chocolate for the invalid.' She sets the bag down on the table with difficulty, next to Chloe's feet. 'Didn't know what you like, so… I kind of got a lot,' she says sheepishly. Not wanting to turn up empty handed, especially since she'd expected Aubrey to be angry, she'd pretty much bought one of each from the candy aisle in the supermarket. Alright, so she was overcompensating a little, but she can't make things and buying a card or flowers seemed stupid so this was the next best thing.

Chloe leans forward and opens the bag up, looking inside. 'Beca!' she exclaims. 'We can't eat all this. I don't even think all the Bellas combined could!'

'It doesn't matter.'

Chloe shakes her head and sets the bag back down, smiling up at her. 'You're crazy. What's all this for, anyway? Going to chocolate me back to full health?'

'An apology,' Beca says bluntly. 'I feel pretty shitty about you getting hurt because of me.'

Chloe's expression melts. 'Oh, Beca. It's just a sprain, don't worry about it.'

'It could've been worse, you said it yourself,' she argues. 'We were running on stairs, I should've been paying attention, but I got distracted.'

'What sidetracked you so much?' When Beca avoids her eyes and mumbles something, Chloe cups a hand around her ear. 'What was that?'

'It's embarrassing.' Humiliating, more like. 'I'm not saying.'

'Hmm,' says Chloe, narrowing her eyes. 'Fine. I'll leave it for now but I'll get it out of you somehow in the end. In the meantime... C'mere,' she says, patting the arm of the chair.

'Why?'

'So I can steal your soul, obviously. Seriously, Beca? I just wanted you to sit on the chair with me.'

Licking her lips nervously, Beca gazes at the chair. To sit there she would have be pressed pretty close against Chloe just to keep her balance and stop from falling off, which is a pretty bad idea. For one thing, even though Chloe's injured arm is on the opposite side, Beca's own "injury" would be on the side touching Chloe. She'd really rather Chloe didn't find out what a pussy she is about pain. For another thing, sitting next to her all innocently when the whole reason she got hurt was because she was perving on Chloe's butt and thinking inappropriate thoughts about her feels about a dozen different kinds of wrong.

'I'd rather stand, if you don't mind,' she says, wincing when Chloe pulls a face.

'How come?'

'Just would.'

'I'm asking you to sit with me, not give me an all over body massage.' Her words are light, but Beca still thinks she detects a little impatience to Chloe's tone. 'Bec, we've sat close like this together before.'

'I know, but… I just don't feel comfortable right now.'

'Beca.' There's a definite something in her voice, now. It's not angry, she knows, disappointed or even threatening, but Chloe does sound pretty exasperated. Possibly even bordering on irritated. But maybe that's her imagination. 'After what I've been through today, isn't the least I deserve a hug?' She is smiling, so maybe Beca's being paranoid after all.

'Oh, so now you want a hug as well? I thought I was just sitting with you,' she jokes weakly.

'You were until you started being silly, and now I require a hug for you to make it better.' She pats the arm of the chair again, looking at her pointedly. 'Now come here, Rebecca Jolene Mitchell, and give me one of your special awkward hugs that I love.'

Beca gives up and makes her way over to Chloe. 'How in the world did you find out my middle name?'

'It was on your information form from the auditions, I found it lying around,' Chloe answers, looking proud of her snooping. 'I didn't even know you gave Aubrey one, since you were late.'

'Yeah, Aubrey made me fill it in.' She perches herself cautiously on the very edge of the arm – so cautiously that Chloe snorts and loops her arm around Beca's waist, pulling her closer. Beca lets out a yelp as she nearly falls on top of Chloe. It's very, very uncomfortable sitting like this, having to hold herself upright on her weak arm on the backrest of the chair since her legs aren't quite reaching the floor anymore. Her whole body is on edge, which only makes her side hurt more.

Chloe looks unhappy with the positioning, too. 'Okay, new plan,' she says, 'you're sitting in my lap.'

Beca's eyes widen and she tries to squirm away. 'Okay, no way.' Chloe pouts when she starts doing this and tries to stop her escaping her grasp, but she manages to extricate herself and stands up again. 'Chloe, don't.'

'Why are you being so off with me today?' says Chloe, looking put out. 'I thought you were doing better with all this stuff.'

'I am! But Jesus, Chloe, you can't just spring things without warning. I thought you were doing better at that stuff,' she shoots back.

At this, Chloe looks ashamed and stares down at her lap. 'Sorry,' she mutters. 'I didn't mean to push you. I just…' She shuts her eyes, huffing out a breath as she leans her head back on the chair. 'This has been a really, really sucky day.'

Beca puts a tentative hand to Chloe's hair. Well done, Mitchell, she thinks wryly, pat the girl like a dog. That'll endear you to her. She tries to turn it into a kind of stroking motion but it feels weird, so she lets her hand fall back to her side. 'Because of the fall? Or something else?'

Chloe looks offended. 'Do you not even know?'

'What?' Beca starts to panic, thinking Chloe's actually more injured than she thought.

But Chloe just goes on, speaking very deliberately, 'Beca, you didn't even come with me while I was getting checked out. I didn't notice at first, but then when I realised I asked Amy and she said you must've stayed behind, she didn't see you at all.'

'Hey! I wanted to come, but…' Beca trails off. If Aubrey hasn't told Chloe that she was the one that made her stay behind, dropping her in it would probably be a bad move.

'But what?' Chloe interrupts scornfully. 'It's kind of your fault I got hurt in the first place, y'know.' Beca flinches at the uncharacteristically cutting remark. 'All because of some reason you won't even tell me.'

'It's not like you'd want to know, even if I did.'

'I don't know that though, do I? You don't tell me anything…' Chloe slouches in her seat, staring broodingly at the floor. Beca's never really seen Chloe act so sullen before. It's probably just the stress of the day and the fact she still thinks Beca stayed behind of her own accord, but she can't help but feel like she's being personally attacked.

'I get the idea we're not talking about earlier anymore?' When Chloe doesn't answer, Beca lets out an aggravated breath and sits on the coffee table, picking up Chloe's socked feet so she can put them in her lap. 'Can you not do that, please?'

'Do what?'

'Act like this, so glum and irritable. It's weird, you should be all cheery and stuff.' It's meant to be light-hearted, but Chloe just looks even more upset.

'I'm not a robot,' Chloe says softly, pulling at a loose thread on her yoga pants. 'I don't have my setting on "happy" 24/7.'

Beca sighs. 'I know, I know. I shouldn't have said that.' She looks down at Chloe's feet, drumming her fingers along her ankle. She's wearing socks with little bunnies on them, which makes her smile unconsciously. 'Look, I'm sorry I upset you and stuff. Can I make it up to you?'

'I don't know.' Beca nods, her face falling, but then Chloe adds, sounding both teasing and apologetic at the same time, 'I think I might need more chocolate. Did you raid every supermarket in the area or something?' Chloe gives her a joking tap on the ribs with her foot.

It barely even catches Beca's bruises, but it still catches her off-guard and her wince shows clearly on her face before she can stop it.

Chloe narrows her eyes at the slight tensing in her face. 'What?'

'Nothing.' Apparently she's about as good at lying as Jesse is, at least to Chloe.

'Beca…' Chloe raises her foot warningly as though she's going to give her another kick, and when Beca flinches away she sits up, putting her feet back to the ground. 'Okay, now I know something's wrong. Are you okay? Have you hurt your -' She suddenly cuts off. Her eyes widen in realisation, a hand flying up to cover her mouth. 'Oh my God. I'm such a moron,' she whispers. 'I was so caught up in being angry at you for not coming with me I didn't even check to see if you were okay!'

'I'm fine,' she assures her hurriedly. 'Just some bruises. Barely even hurts.'

'Bruises?!' Chloe wails suddenly, flailing her arms about. 'Oh my God! I'm a horrible friend! I'm the worst friend that's ever existed, ever!'

Aubrey bursts out of her room, attracted by the noise Chloe's making. 'What are you guys doing?' Seeing Chloe's distraught face and that she's nearly in tears, she immediately shouts, 'Beca, what did you do?!'

'Nothing!' Beca answers defensively.

'Beca was hurt and we didn't even think to check on her!' Chloe bawls.

Aubrey, to her credit, looks mildly guilty at this. 'Oh. Oops.'

'Is it bad? Do you need to go the hospital? No, show me, I won't believe you even if you say no,' Chloe asks, her fingers scrabbling at the edge of her t-shirt. Beca grabs her hand to stop her, grimacing.

'Chloe stop, that hurts.'

Chloe immediately retreats. 'Sorry,' she says, sounding distressed. 'Can I still see though? We should make sure you're okay. Idiot, idiot, idiot,' she berates herself under her breath.

Beca hesitates. She hasn't even looked at her side herself yet, not having had time on her own to examine the damage done to body. But Chloe's gazing at her so imploringly, and Aubrey's watching too, a small frown on her face.

She lifts her shirt and looks down. There's a bruise peeking out of the waist band of her jeans, where her hip hit the floor, and a second one near her ribs below her bra. It's actually not as bad as Beca thought – they're not even big bruises. Given the soreness she was starting to think she'd probably cracked a rib and broken her hip bone, but no. Turns out she really does have a low threshold for pain.

Nonetheless, Chloe's eyes are filling with tears. 'Oh Beca. I'm so sorry.'

'Calm down, Chloe,' says Aubrey, a tad disdainfully. 'She barely got a scratch. Looks like you took all the damage for her.'

'Are there any more?'

'No,' Beca says, hurriedly pulling her top down. Actually her knee's been sore for a while, but her jeans are way too tight to get the leg that high and no way is she showing Aubrey and Chloe her underwear.

'Why didn't you come with us to the hospital if you were hurt?'

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees Aubrey's head whip around to face them. Beca simply shrugs. 'I don't really like them, they make me nervous. Besides, Cynthia Rose helped me out anyway so it's all good.'

'Cynthia Rose?' Beca nods. 'At least you had someone, then. I'll have to thank her.' Chloe lets out a sigh, looking morose. 'I'm so sorry I didn't even think about whether you were hurt until now. No wonder you didn't want to sit with me.'

'It's okay. Really.'

Chloe beams at her; she smiles back, until Aubrey coughs loudly and she remembers where she is. 'Uh, I should get going.'

'You don't have to,' Chloe says hopefully, 'you could stay here. We were going to watch reruns of Friends until our heads exploded. That's fun, right?'

'I've never in my life watched Friends, so I think I'll pass.'

'Oh, okay.' Chloe looks extremely disappointed; Beca considers staying after all, but doing so would mean being in a room with Aubrey for more than five minutes. And she likes Chloe, she does, but not enough to volunteer to spend more time with another annoying roommate - she has one of her own. Although Kimmy Jin had been pretty cool today, she reminds herself, remembering the ice pack and Kleenex. 'I'll see you at practice, then?'

'Yep.' Beca bites her lip. She's unsure whether to try and hug Chloe now. It's become a normal thing for them to do when they leave, but Beca's still not quite got around to initiating it herself. She knows it's being built up her mind as a bigger issue than it actually is and that it's a lot easier than her brain is making it out to be but that doesn't make it any easier for her.

As if reading her thoughts, Chloe holds her arm out to Beca. 'You still owe me one.'

Beca chuckles and leans down to hug her, thankful for the segue into doing it. Chloe reaches up with her one good arm to pull her down. It's a little uncomfortable since she's bent right over, her face is kind of smooshed into the back of the armchair and they're both being too gentle so as not to hurt each other, but she'll take what she can get. Briefly she wonders when she started becoming the person who would ever "take what she could get" with physical contact. She has clearly been spending too much time with Chloe.

'I'm sorry about earlier, I didn't realise,' she breathes in Beca's ear. 'But don't you ever hide something like that from me again.'

'Jeez, Chloe, it was a couple of bruises. Little kids get worse than that just playing in the street.'

'I don't care, for all I knew it could've been worse.' At least Beca isn't the only one prone to paranoia. 'Promise me, Beca.'

'Okay, okay. I promise.'

'Good,' says Chloe sweetly. When Beca pulls back and goes to get her coat, she blows her a kiss from her chair. 'Now scoot on home, so I can eat a load of this chocolate and blame it on Aubrey.'

Beca laughs, catching the unreadable eye of Chloe's roommate who has been watching them carefully the entire time. 'I'm sure she'll love that. Later, Chloe.'

When she walks to the door, the aforementioned roommate follows her outside and slams the door behind both of them. Beca jumps, not realising Aubrey had come out into the hallway with her.

'Oh great. I was wondering when this part of the evening would come,' says Beca, letting out a disgruntled noise. She stretches out her arms in a mocking pose, putting on the most martyred face she can manage. 'Go on then. Give me your best.'

'Why didn't you tell her I made you stay behind?' asks Aubrey.

Beca is taken aback at the unexpected question. She blinks. 'I dunno. Didn't want to start an argument between you guys, I suppose.'

'She wanted you there, you know,' Aubrey says abruptly. 'You were all she could talk about when we left.'

'Yeah, she was pretty mad at me for not coming.'

'So... you let her be mad at you but not me?'

'When you put it like that, it was a pretty stupid idea...' Aubrey takes in a breath, letting it out through her nose, looking like she's trying to calm herself down. Beca takes a frightened step back, holding her hands up. 'Woah, don't puke on me. I like these jeans.'

'Shut up,' Aubrey snaps, 'I'm trying to be nice here.'

'Oh.' She drops her hands. 'Continue.'

'Well now you've just made it awkward.' Aubrey rolls her eyes. Then she says, reluctantly, 'Thanks. And I'm sorry I forget to check if you were okay. It was nice of you to come anyway and bring her chocolate.'

Beca shoves her hands into the pockets of her jeans, trying not to smirk at how much it's paining Aubrey to say those things to her. Maybe they do have something in common. 'It was the least I could do.'

'Indeed.' Aubrey regards her stonily for a few moments, her mouth set in a straight line. 'You're still on my list, Mitchell. But,' she adds grudgingly, 'it's good to see someone actually making an effort for Chloe for once, even a mediocre one. I'll tell her it was me that made you stay behind. See you at practice tomorrow.'

She opens the door and shuts it behind her, leaving a stunned Beca in the hallway.

A/N: This was originally longer. The reason being that I cut a scene out here with Benji… And a guinea pig. Yeah, it's about as random as it sounds. It was a tough decision to cut it, but it had to be done. I just love Benji, okay?! But he deserves better than to be forced into a random scene. Haha.

Won't be updating 'til some time next week, dudes, doing birthday stuff. Sorry! Less than three? :P