Disclaimer: I don't own. Blah, blah, blah you've heard it all before
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Beca steeled her nerves. While she had enjoyed seeing the Bellas and her friends for lunch, she, Kat, and Tessa had to return to the real world where they were booked for the day. Despite it being two days until it was time to ring in the New Year, Los Angeles was bustling. Not that it ever stopped. Kat had managed to sneak in some last minute studio session work with her backup band for the charity benefit she'd be singing at New Years Day. Tessa was in the middle of keeping CC Hale out of a media shit storm with this latest performance. And Beca was up to her neck making sure everything at TSR and 7-OnUp would go over smoothly on New Year's Eve.
It took a surprising amount of coordination between the club, the bouncers, the opening DJs and everyone else involved with the club to keep things running smoothly. For example, before the doors to the club opened, and usually weeks upon weeks in advance, Beca had to put down absolutely anything and everything she could think of for the club host to use. Everything from what drink she would be drinking up in the booth for the night (water with an occasional jack and coke) to what songs she'd most likely be playing (it was basically five hundred or so songs and mashups that Beca would rotate to depending on the mood the crowd was giving her). No detail was overlooked. Honestly, she was catered to like visiting royalty anytime she was up in a DJ booth.
And of course Tessa was working her ass off so that no one knows that Beca was really CC Hale. Frankly, it was a miracle that no one had ever recognized her before. Or, if they had, she'd been too unapproachable to be bothered. Both options pleased Beca greatly.
While she was incredibly grateful to everyone who enjoyed what she did and fully acknowledged that without them she'd still be back in Georgia making mixes in her dorm room, there was a line.
She'd seen and heard enough horror stories about stalking, paparazzi, and tabloid columns to last her a life time. Los Angeles may be the city of dreams, but one day you were in and the next you were out. The only thing Beca had found that worked without fail is to not get involved in the first place. It was a great idea in theory but in practice it was a hell of a lot harder. It involved an unholy amount of binding secrecy contracts and numerous identity hindrances.
For example, CC Hale was never seen without some form of sunglasses covering her face and a hat covering her hair. She also tended to wear high heels to hinder height estimates, long sleeves that always went down to her wrists, and never, ever plaid. Whereas Beca Mitchell only wore sunglasses when it was absolutely necessary, had her long and curly brown hair always woven into some intricate up do or cascading around her shoulders, wouldn't get caught dead in heels, had tattoos on her forearms that she showed off frequently, and loved her some plaid. It was a simple yet effective illusion. And Beca hoped like hell that it would hold up the test of time.
CC Hale had been hailed as one of the greatest artists in the modern music scene in quite some time. According to her critics, she had taken generic and auto-tuned pop music and breathed life back into it. Her music was popular, thus in the pop genre, but it was lasting. It was innovative, refreshing, and revitalizing.
To Beca, it was just music. Beca wasn't picky with any music, she never had been. From a young age, she had soaked up whatever music was playing loudly in the apartments surrounding her. Some days it was the only fella down the hall blasting Duke Elliot and the next Dubstep was rocking and quaking the walls. To Beca, it was all music and it was all glorious. So when it came time to record her own, it only seemed natural that she incorporate any and every type of music she could. There were jazz-like runs, Dubstep bass drops, and country story lines weaved into her songs. If it was music, Beca utilized it. Simple as that.
Such appreciation for all forms of music was a rarity now, and as such she drew massive amounts of attention. And that attention had culminated into numerous musical awards, (she had four Grammies in a trophy case), artists clambering to work with her more weeks than there were in a year, (note to self, return Taylor Swift's call), and the public going wild for more information about her (creepers, the lot of them).
CC Hale had no Facebook, Twitter, and Tessa's whole life purpose was to release only the information that was wanted. Beca Mitchell's life was a little more open. She did have a Facebook that was armed to the teeth with privacy settings and the same with her Twitter. She was careful to not mention anything about her job or who she worked with and both accounts were regularly monitored by Tessa. Everything down to where her phone was pinged was monitored. At first it was unnerving, but Beca had learned to live with it.
Beca stretched quickly, cracked her knuckles, and picked up her ringing phone. "Hey Leila. Yup, I'm ready. So about tonight, I was thinking that maybe…"
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"Hola bitchacho," a loud and cheerful voice rang out from Beca's doorway. Beca, who was facing the opposite direction and looking out her window, threw her hand up in the air with a certain finger raised. "Hey now, that wasn't nice," Manny said with a pout as he moved into the office and settled into a chair opposite the small woman's desk. He saw that her iPhone was resting on her desk and was indicating that Beca was currently taking a call.
"Uh huh, nope that all sounds good to me. Yeah. If I think of anything I'll call you. Uh huh. Right. Yeah. Bye now." With a groan, Beca spun around and pulled the headset she'd been using to talk wirelessly off her ears. "Holy shit, I think that woman talks more than you."
Manny merely grinned and settled back into the chair and asked in a surprisingly serious tone of voice, "Everything okay with the club?"
Beca nodded once. While she knew that Manny sported a reputation of being an over-exuberant bouncing ball of curly hair, he could be surprisingly serious. When the talk was about work and nothing else, Manny's twinkling eyes would harden and his grin would flatten out. It was a sight few ever got to see and Beca considered herself incredibly lucky to be on the receiving end of what she referred to as Manny's 'Cut the shit and do the business' look. Beca liked that look. It kind of made her think of a three year old pouting and trying to get their way.
"Leila still as fiery as ever?" Manny said as he settled back into the chair he was seated in. While he could be serious when the need called for it, it wasn't quite his forte.
"Oh you know it," Beca answered easily. "A little on edge and ready for the New Year to come in showers of champagne and poorly timed hookups." Manny grinned goofily and Beca rolled her eyes. "Next time my club contact needs to schedule some beloved foreplay with her favorite afro man, tell her to cut out the middleman and go straight to the hairy source, would you," she teased with her eyes glinting mischievously. Manny mock scowled at his prize DJ before shaking his head in exasperation.
"You have many talents love, match making is not one of them," he said with a scowl. Beca just grinned and let Manny divert her attention to the files he had clutched in his hand. She nodded along and would occasionally point out an irregularity but other than that, their impromptu meeting was short and to the point.
Forty five minutes later, Beca waved Manny out of her office and she let her face drop into her supported hands. She had managed to procure the necessary VIP passes to get all the Bellas, Jesse, and Benji into the club. Fortunately, Kat just had to show up, flash her dimples and she was in the doors. Tessa had a bit more difficulty. She had to actually dig the TSR badge out of her pocket and be discreet about slipping in the back door. Beca's was the hardest. She had to show up early and actually physically lift the door open. Very strenuous work, she assured everyone. Honestly, juggling the Bellas and keeping her identity secret wasn't anything more than what she was used to now a days.
Beca groaned and stood up with her car keys in her hand. She had a club spot to stake out and a club owner to schmooze. Sigh. It was going to be a long afternoon.
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Chloe Beale sighed to herself and looked around the apartment she was in. Beca's apartment, she reminded herself. It was weird to see Beca again she felt no shame in admitting. She couldn't delude herself into thinking that she could stick around or that Beca would even want to, but she liked to close her eyes and pretend. For now she could lean back on Beca's expensive sofa and just breathe the smells of the apartment in. There were faint scents of wood polish, the ever present smell of fabric cleaner or possibly Febreeze, and something that was so uniquely Beca. Perfume or deodorant or just her natural scent, it was there.
Chloe leaned back and inhaled deeply. For just a brief moment it was so easy to imagine what would have happened if the incident five years ago had never happened. If she had never let Aubrey walk all over herself and Beca. If her happily ever after had had the decency to work itself out.
Chloe groaned and laid her head down on her folded arms that were propped on the textbook in front of her. The words were just swimming in and out of her brain. Honestly, she felt like her brain was like an over-saturated sponge. Anything new just bounced right off.
Suddenly, a pair of small hands was laid on her shoulders and thumbs were probing gently at the knots that caused a valley of tension between the ginger's shoulders. Chloe moaned in absolute bliss as the magic fingers undid stress caused by hours of being hunched over medical textbooks and attempting to cram definition after definition in every crevice of her brain. A soft pair of lips was suddenly in the spot just below her ear and they lingered deliciously. Chloe tilted her head to the side and sighed again.
There was a deep breath and then a soft exhale right by her ear before the girl breathed, "Hiya Red." Chloe's lips twisted unbidden into a hapless smile. Honestly, she couldn't even help her reaction anymore. Five years together and Chloe was still complete putty in her girlfriend's hands.
"Hey babe," Chloe whispered breathlessly. "How was your meeting?"
"Fine," her girlfriend's throaty chuckle reverberated pleasantly along Chloe's neck. "Although I think Manny might have finally snapped. Something about milkshakes and the boys in the yard?"
Chloe threw her head back and laughed before turning in her chair to take in the site of her girlfriend. She opened her arms invitingly and the small woman in front other wasted no time in sitting on her lap. She settled with her legs on either side of Chloe's hips, her body pressed along every inch of Chloe, her nose almost touching Chloe's and her breath fanning gently across Chloe's face.
"That's not nice Beca," Chloe chided gently. Beca's grin was downright mischievous and her eyes twinkling with mirth.
"But it's true," Beca pointed out with a slight snigger and a smirk. Chloe rolled her eyes. She opened her mouth to reprimand her slightly childish girlfriend when she was unceremoniously cut off by a firm kiss. Chloe rolled her eyes, huffed slightly, and sunk into the kiss. She wrapped her arms around Beca's slim waist and pulled the tiny brunette flush against her. After a few long moments and some finalizing pecks, the ginger pulled away.
"Much as I appreciate the distraction babe, I really have to finish studying."
"Hey you'll be fine," Beca said with an encouraging grin. "How about we order Chinese food, watch Grey's Anatomy, and make out a little more?"
"Always a charmer Mitchell," Chloe said with another eye roll in response to Beca's pointed eyebrow wiggles and she eased the tiny girl off her lap. "Always a charmer." Beca's response was a slow and sexy smirk that was full of dark and dirty promises. Beca leaned forward, making sure to arch her back as she did so, and put her mouth right by Chloe's ear.
With a dramatic sigh she said, "I try Doctor Beale. I really, really try." Chloe shuddered ever so slightly and Beca walked away smugly, an extra swing in her hips, and she started dialing their favorite Chinese place.
"Chloe!" Chloe was brought out of her enticing day dream by a firm hand shaking her shoulder roughly.
"Aubrey? What?" Chloe was confused.
"Must have been some day dream," Aubrey remarked dryly. "I've been calling your name for a solid thirty seconds. What's going on in that ginger head of yours?" Chloe tried to smile at the affectionate nickname but it brought her back to that wondrous dream she'd just been drawn out of and she sobered immediately.
"Beca," Chloe admitted with a lofty sigh. Aubrey rolled her eyes and settled on the couch next to her best friend.
"What about the hobbit now?" Chloe did actually smile at Aubrey's nearly affectionate nickname for their ex-alt girl. Chloe shrugged helplessly in response to Aubrey's query.
"I'm not really sure," she admitted softly. "Just thinking about what it would be like if I hadn't made some choices that I've made."
Aubrey smiled tightly and said knowingly, "Semifinals?"
Chloe nodded. "Semifinals," she agreed.
Aubrey sighed and ran her hand in a very non-Posen fashion through her blonde tresses. She was silent for several moments as she tried to sort through her thoughts. This was a sensitive topic and she sure as hell was going to at least try to use tact and not blunder her way through this conversation.
She finally spoke softly and slowly, choosing her words deliberately and enunciating them as if she was in a court room, "Yes you made some rotten choices, Chloe. We all did, me more than most. I walked all over you, the other girls, and Beca." Aubrey held up a hand as Chloe started to protest almost as if she was reading a script. This was an old argument and Aubrey had no desire to rehash the same damn points they'd been bickering over for five years now.
"Don't start with me Chloe. We all made mistakes, you, me, the other girls, and frankly so did Beca. We should have fought more for her, tried to get a hold of her sooner, or at least looked in on her a hell of a lot sooner than we did. But, at the end of the day, Beca left. She decided that the friendships she'd spent so many months cultivating weren't worth fighting for and she left. Looking at where she is now and the situation she left us all in, it makes sense of course, but that doesn't change the fact that she had no problem just up and leaving."
Here, Aubrey paused and seemed to be having an internal debate that evidently she won because she continued on cautiously. "I just… I don't want to see you hurt again Chloe. I saw what Beca leaving the first time did to you and frankly I don't know if I, as your best friend, can in good faith go through that again. I know you look at Beca and all you see is an old friend, flame, or whatever the hell you two were. But it's been five years. None of us are the same people we were back in college, especially not Beca. Just… just don't invest too much in this, alright? Go in with a clear head and all that crap and remember Chicago is waiting for you."
Chloe pursed her lips and nodded tersely. While she appreciated Aubrey's speech and on some internal level acknowledged every point that the blonde lawyer made, it still stung. After all, who really wants to hear from their best friend that they didn't think that they couldn't handle something?
Chloe gave a soft sigh and said, "I'll keep that in mind Bree." Aubrey nodded and stood up to leave her ginger friend to deal with her chaotic thoughts.
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"Hey Becs!" a voice from down the hall called out to Beca. The brunette DJ paused with her key still in the lock of her office door. When she saw the wide afro wiggling its way towards her, she rolled her eyes and made her way inside. She had just spent the past four hours talking with the club owner and the Head Floor Runner of 7-OnUP and to be frank she was exhausted. There was only so much groveling Beca could handle in a given time frame and this past meeting had far exceeded every quota she'd ever set.
"What Manny?" Beca snapped, though her words lacked any real sting in them to anyone who knew her well. Manny smiled at her, impervious as usual to the DJ's scathing attitude that burned anyone who got too close.
"I was just wondering how you were doing," Manny said with an innocent smile. While Manny was impervious to Beca's snark, Beca was impervious to Manny's smile. After all, the last time she'd seen it, he was trying to sweet talk his way out of felony charges involving firecrackers and a school bus at the last company Fourth of July picnic.
"Why?" she asked suspiciously. While she was certainly closer and got along a lot better with Manny than most people were with their bosses, Beca wasn't sure she'd classify Manny as a 'Spill Your Guts Over A Bottle Of Wine' type of friend. He was more along the lines of, 'I Might Get You Arrested But Damn This Will Make A Good Story' type of buddy. He and Fat Amy were quite alike in that regard and Beca made a mental note never to introduce the two. The results would no doubt be catastrophic.
Manny's grin sobered ever so slightly. "I just wanted to make sure that everything was going okay with that old singing group of yours back in town and staying at your place," he admitted with a worried look on his face. Beca couldn't help the eye roll, she really couldn't. It was honestly like a reflex.
"I'm fine Manwell," Beca said with a dramatic sigh. "And how'd you find out anyway? Tessa? Kat? Jesse?"
"Benji actually," Manny told her. "I was trying to figure out why you, who has requested an astounding three VIP passes the entire five years you've worked for me, suddenly needed eleven on the busiest night of the year. He was the only one who picked up the phone."
Beca nodded at his explanation. Benji was reliable like that. Still, she was less than thrilled with one of her friends spilling details about her personal life with Manny. That had been one of the things she had been less than impressed with about TurnStyle. They tended to take an incredibly hands on approach in every aspect to every employee, especially the big ticket ones such as Beca, or CC Hale she supposed.
Beca massaged the bridge of her nose and said in exasperation, "I'm sorry if the request was an inconvenience to you Manny. You should have just said something."
"Oh no," Manny was quick to placate his star. "Nothing of the sort Pint-Size. I was just curious. And I'm worried about you. I've known you for five years darling, I'm allowed to be worried," he said with a slight pout at the glare Beca shot him.
"But in all seriousness Beca," Manny straightened up and with his massive afro, he actually cut an almost impressive figure. "I've seen you at your highest highs and some of your lowest lows. For heaven's sake, I met you at one of your lowest lows and it was brought on by that group of women. Excuse me for being just a weary about your game getting thrown off."
Beca smirked and shook her head as she replied, "My game will be just fine. And besides, I'm all sorts of on-guard now with them around Manny. No worries there." Manny shot her a searching gaze before he quirked an eyebrow and nodded in satisfaction in whatever he found there. With a quick goodbye and an over-enthusiastic wave, Manny was bouncing away, off to his next assignment no doubt.
Beca sat at her desk chair and raked her fingers through her hair twice as a calming mechanism. Truth be told, she was just as worried about the Bellas being in town as Manny was. Well, honestly it was just one Bella that had her guard up at all times. Aubrey, Fat Amy, and Cynthia Rose may well have thought they had Beca successfully pegged back in their time at Barden and at some point they may have once been right. Nowadays though, they were just old acquaintances who would share stories and catch up on all times and that was it.
No, the real danger was in Chloe Beale. Five years ago she had torn down every wall Beca had ever erected with a simple, "That song really builds," and some truly impressive bathroom harmonizing. It had been so quick and painless (though mildly awkward) to have all her walls stripped away in one foul swoop, and Chloe made it seem so effortless. And if she could do it once, Beca was under no illusions that she couldn't do it again.
So until Chloe Beale's ginger ass was back on a plane to the Windy City, Beca had to remain constantly vigilant and on her toes at all times.
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A/N
TAAA DAAAA. I'm not dead. Whoop whoop