So I've had to make a few changes. I was writing this today and I've realised that, actually, what I intended for the middle is far too long (and, considering my tendency to let things get away from me, I should have planned better for this) so, this story is now in five parts, with the middle being stretched it to three. Sorry, but also, you get more stuff so... Yay?

I have a pretty good idea on the reviews I'm going to get though so please just, know I'm sorry BUT I'm now good to start updating more so the next part should be up soonish.

I love you guys, you rock. Thanks for sticking with me.

MIDDLE

It's not a walk in the park to love each other
But when our fingers interlock
Can't deny, can't deny you're worth it
Cause after all this time, I'm into you

- Still Into You, Paramore

LA is like another planet.

The sky is probably the brightest shade of blue she's ever seen, and forms the perfect backdrop to all the millions of lightly washed, eccentric buildings that tower over her (though admittedly that's not hard to do). People bustle around, always rushing here and there, diving into little coffee shops and through large, expensive rotating doors. The beach is beautiful; it's just the right level of breezy and the sand is soft under foot. Everything just seems better there. It's like she's literally living the dream; expect this version is so much better.

She has Jesse.

Admittedly, the sparkling diamond that is LA has plenty of rough edges, one of which they preside in. They're lucky enough that Donald gets them a good reference in his building, so their tiny little apartment is at least in a good-rough area, and Jesse works hard to make it theirs. In the evenings, when she returns from her waitressing gig and he gets back from the coffee shop that takes him on, they take it in turns to cook (or mostly just order in) dinner, curling up on what is most likely a third/fourth hand couch and talking about their day, Jesse watching a movie on his laptop because they can't afford a TV, while Beca makes more mixes to mail in to any number of record labels.

They survive on the bare minimum, and Jesse becomes a bit of a crazed coupon collector while Beca puts her womanly whiles to the test, flirting with the local butcher to give them a discount on offcuts. Jesse's mom sends them weekly 'care packages', and they save the generous tubs of food for the weekend, when they gorge themselves on a spare bed sheet covering the bare floorboards of the living room floor.

It's tough, and not without its difficulties on their relationship, but Beca never quits and Jesse never leaves; they keep each other happy, and that's all that really matters.

"Jesse!" she screeches over the sound of guns blazing, crawling around the bend of the obstacle that he's disappeared behind. "Jesse Swanson don't you dare leave me alone right now!"

Beca gets herself tangled in the wire of her laser gun, and she huffs in annoyance, yanking the wire from around her foot as she presses herself against the padded wall. As she tries to spot her runaway boyfriend, she hears Stacie crying out as she charges towards some of the boys with Chloe and Lily, the high pitched wow of the shots not quite enough to drown out the sound of the small group of boys falling dramatically to the ground.

It's all Jesse's fault, and she almost hates how much she's enjoying this.

Their plan had been simple; Jesse had sent out a mass text a month prior, inviting all of the acapella alumni's to LA for his 23nd birthday, just to take part in an "epic tournament of laser tag," he'd informed her when she returned home from work that night, his eyes wide before giving her a smug look and saying, "Set phasers to… Laser."

"You're such a dork," she'd told him dryly with her arms crossed, rolling her eyes as he did a drop-and-roll across their tiny living room with his hands pressed together in a gun shape, but laughing when he collided with the couch.

Point being.

They should have known.

When Jesse had announced in the queue that they would be splitting into teams of boys and girls, she'd had this inkling… Benji had looked too guilty, and Donald too smug, and Jesse's eyes were sparkling in this way that she never liked the result of – but she'd squashed her suspicions because, well, they wouldn't, would they?

They would.

Seven girls went down in that initial battle, leaving only herself, Amy, Chloe and Stacie. But, after losing the boys and taking two out themselves, they convened in the most hidden corner of the large maze, concocting their own diabolical plan.

Jesse's face pops up around another corner, his Cheshire-cat grin shining in the UV light. "This is war Beca!" She tries not to experience a flashback. "And besides, technically, we're enemies right now!"

"Oh," she says slowly, crawling closer until she's close enough to smell his cologne. "So, if I kissed you right now…" She leans in, hand over his, watching as his grin dims just enough to show her effect on him. "Then, technically… You'd be fraternising with the enemy?"

Jesse presses his lips sweetly to hers, and she smiles devilishly, raising her bulky plastic gun slowly from her lap, ready to fire –

A lazer gun goes off, a suit makes a long, whiny noise, and they both pull away; one in horror, one in glorious joy.

"You shot me!"

"I know I did!"

"You bitch!" Beca looks down at her red flashing jacket in horror. "I can't believe you shot me!"

Jesse shrugs unapologetically. "You were going to shoot me!"

"That's not the point!" she says in exasperation, punching his shoulder and making him grunt in pain. "Boys aren't supposed to shoot their girlfriends!"

Beca watches him grinning victoriously again, ruffling her hair and trying to get away, but she keeps her hand wrapped around his wrist, and he stares at her in confusion, trying to pull away, but a grin of her own is developing, and she sees him realise it half a second before the laser is fired and his jacket flashes red.

"Hasta la vista," Amy says theatrically, blowing on the end of her gun with a vengeful glint to her eye, "Baby."

Almost six months later, the signs begin.

Jesse gets an assistant's job – the first step on the road to his dream – and Beca is still stuck at the restaurant, but with Jesse's increased income she gets to take a few less hours to focus more on her music. Still, they are happy together – at least that's what Beca had thought.

One night, Beca goes to put Jesse's jacket away and finds a single blonde strand of hair. Shrugging it off, she picks it off and puts the jacket back in the wardrobe, closing the doors and forgetting all about it.

Except.

Two nights later, he gets in late, and there it is again – the blonde hair, clinging to the lapel of his blazer. Beca spends an hour listening to his soft snoring, watching how the hair glints in the moonlight of the bedroom.

A week later, Jesse smells of perfume that is decidedly not the scent of any of her own.

She tries not to think too much of it, and she ignores the smell and the hair and the late nights for about a month, until one evening he comes home with red lipstick on his collar and she snaps.

The plate smashes into a hundred pieces against the bare brick wall.

"Get the fuck out of my house!" she seethes dangerously low toned, holding another plate high above her head, aiming straight at him this time. He gets the message. Thirteen seconds later, the door slams shut behind him

"Beca? Beca I know you're there."

…

"Let me in. Beca. Beca."

…

"Beca, open this door!"

She sits with her feet up on the cardboard box full of his things, flicking through a music magazine and reciting the latest Muse album word for word in her head.

The noise stops an hour later, and she calmly gets up to begin dinner.

"Mitchell, it's me," a voice barks, and she turns quickly from her spot on the couch, tears tingling instantly in the corner of her eyes. "Come on, open up, lets talk."

Beca lifts herself slowly, her joints protesting as she takes a hesitant step towards her front door.

"It's okay," the voice says soothingly, a little quieter, "It's only me; I'm the only one here."

"No you're not," Beca croaks, realising she hasn't spoken a word for two days. Her palm rests against the old wood of the door, her forehead falling to press against the cool paint. "I know he's there."

"Sweetie, I swear, it's just me," Stacie says softly.

"No." Beca shakes her head, her chest aching as a tear slips down her cheek. "He's been there all weekend, and Donald's been helping him. I know he hasn't left." A smile flickers at one corner of her mouth. "That's just the kind of stupid thing he'd think is romantic or something."

Beca listens to the hushed whispers on the other side of the door and shakes her head, refusing to acknowledge the emptiness that has been inhabiting her since she saw the lipstick.

"Beca, you know I love you, and that I'm like, fifteen million percent on your side and whatever," Stacie begins slowly, "But you don't really think Jesse would do something like that, do you?"

No.

"Just because you think someone isn't capable of something, doesn't mean they're not."

A pause.

"Jesse swears on his movie collection that he's never cheated on you in any way, shape or form."

The flame in her stomach is fanned by the promise, and she bangs her hand against the door. "Is that supposed to make this all okay?" she asks bitterly. "Am I supposed to be comforted by this somehow? That doesn't mean shit to me, Jesse Swanson!" she yells in anger. "That doesn't explain the hair, the late nights, or the lipstick, or the perfume –"

"They're the Bella's!" Stacie interrupts desperately. "They're ours, not some skank from his job!"

"Stacie!" she hears him say, and the ache in her chest grows so much that she almost has to double over.

"What? You really think this is all worth losing her over?" Stacie becomes louder again. "Beca, listen to me, Jesse has been trying to organise a surprise birthday party for you but he's so incompetent that he came to us to help, and so we've been meeting up after work and I promise you, Bec, this is all just one giant misunderstanding –"

The door flies open, and Stacie almost barrels right into her.

"Are you serious?" Beca splutters, looking down at a scruffy Jesse crouched down against the wall of the hallway. There's a blanket over his lap and a mug of cold coffee beside him, and the shadows under his eyes are as dark as the five o'clock shadow around his chin. "You've been camped outside of the apartment for two days, have let me feel this shit because you didn't want to tell me about a surprise party?!"

Jesse coughs nervously, eyes flitting around as he winces. "Well, when you put it that way – Ow!" He covers his face with his arm after she successfully slaps him around the ear.

"What the hell, Jesse!"

Stacie glances between them, pointing her thumbs down the hall. "So I'm just… Going to go…"

And Stacie walks triumphantly away, as Beca falls to her knees and buries her face into Jesse's neck, muttering over and over again about just how much of an idiot he is.

To: Donald
Thanks for looking after him.

From: Donald
Was only doing what you asked. Just glad you're okay now.

To: Donald
If you tell him, I will have to kill you.

"Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse Jesse!" The door slams against the wall as she races inside, throwing her things anywhere and skidding across the floor as she searches desperately for him.

"Jesus, woman, where's the fire?! I'm right- oomph." Beca jumps on him the second he exits the bedroom, drying his hands on a towel that is promptly dropped as he catches her on instinct, her legs and arms around him as she squeals excitedly like a little child.

Unfortunately, the force at which she runs at him is too much, and Jesse loses his balance enough that they fall to the floor, Beca lying over his chest. She laughs, too giddy to really care all that much, and locks her gaze on Jesse as she pulls herself up just enough to shower kisses all over his face.

(She's excited, okay. She knows that Jesse is probably going to demand that whatever spirit has taken over her brain leave immediately, but she's too excited. Though remembering the discovery of Jesse's firm belief in ghosts is enough to bring her back to Earth a little.)

"Bec – Beca what are – Bec!" he splutters against her hair and she pulls back again, her smile dazzling him.

"I did it!" she tells him breathlessly. "I got the promotion!"

Jesse watches her with wide eyes, unreactive. "You… You got the job?" he whispers from underneath her. She nods with a cute little giggle. "You got the job?" he says again, louder this time, and she laughs freely.

"Yes, I got the job!"

His face lights up with a giant grin, but she doesn't see it for long because he's grabbed her head with both hands and planted a breath-stealing kiss on her lips. "You got the job!"

She hugs him tightly, laughing as he starts cheering loudly enough for the neighbours to start bashing on the walls, creating some form of ridiculous chant as he rolls them around excitedly. "You did it!" he enthuses. "Oh, Beca, I'm so proud of you!"

Beca grins at him; life can't get much sweeter than this.

"Marry me."

The grin disappears.

Her arms drop from around him.

"What?"

Jesse's face falls, like he's only just realised what he's said, and he swallows with great difficulty. Beca can't do anything but stare, until Jesse has rolled off her and gotten to his feet. "Nothing."

"That wasn't nothing," she insists (and she's surprised at just how little she's freaking out), brushing herself down as she picks herself up. "You just –"

"No I didn't."

"Jesse –"

"It doesn't matter."

"Yes it does –"

He goes quiet, his back to her so she can't tell what he's thinking, so Beca raises a trembling hand to his shoulder, silently asking him to turn around. Marriage has never been something that she's considered – outside of their conversation the night before graduation, they've never spoken about it in the three years since – but she also knows that Jesse is that kind of guy; he likes to keep moving forward, whereas she likes to stay where she's comfortable, where it's easier for her to understand. Jesse is the married type, while she's never considered herself at all suited for that kind of life.

Jesse doesn't turn around, so she breathes out one shaky word. "Yes."

It's his turn to stare at her incredulously now. "What?"

Now she's said it, now she knows she can, it's a lot easier to say. "Yes. I will marry you." Jesse is frozen under her hand, unable to process, so she continues, "I'm not saying now. I'm not saying this year or next. I'm not saying anything but that yes, I will marry you. I'm not…" She bites her lip as she struggles to think when Jesse turns ever so slowly. When his disbelieving eyes meet her own surprised ones, she continues, "I'm not ready yet; we're not ready, but I know that we will be. I will be. And I know that the person I'm going to marry, when the time comes, is you." He's still not responding, just gazing at her with a complicated cocktail of emotion swirling in his dark eyes, so she prods his shoulder. "Jesse? You in there?"

Shaking his head, he seems to come back to earth with a slowly growing smile. "Yeah, yeah, I'm here. I just… I don't – What are you saying?"

Beca rolls her eyes in exasperation, trying to think of a way to make this extra easy for him. "I'm saying, Jesse, that if you like it you should put a ring on it." His smile twitches, and her own erupts across her face as she fully understands what is going on here. "And if you like this," she continues, gesturing to herself with a sweeping hand, "Then you better put a damn ring on this."

Jesse stares at the hand she's thrust in his face, and finally, finally starts to move by placing a gentle kiss on her empty ring finger. "I don't have a ring," he confesses. "I didn't exactly… Plan this."

Beca shrugs, her hand still lying in his. "Technicality."

"So… You'll marry me?" he asks again slowly. "You'll be my wife?"

"No," she says immediately. "I will be your fiancé, your… almost wife. We're not getting married, we're just agreeing to get married someday."

Jesse bites her lip as he grins at her. "Same thing, Bec."

"Whatever, weirdo."

But she's quickly swept up in his strong arms, and she's surprised to find she's not scared at all; not even a little bit.

Somehow, being engaged really suits them.

The Swanson family erupts with the excitement and Beca is inundated with calls from members of the family, some she's never even heard of (Jesse's third cousin twice removed invites them to Malta for a family dinner). Beca's mother is happy for them, if a little sceptical, but her dad is supportive and "glad to see he's finally making an honest woman of you, Becs"; even the stepmonster is glad, sending a bunch of Beca's favourite flowers to the apartment.

Their friends, while happy, don't really respond the way she'd expected.

("Finally," Stacie says with a roll of her eyes, Lily nodding from beside her as she taps absently on the mahogany.

Amy frowns. "You're not married already?" When Beca slowly shakes her head, Amy shrugs. "Well you two have always acted like a married couple…"

"Oh, come on, guys," Benji expresses in disapproval, "They're getting married, be excited for them!"

"We are, it's just not that big a surprise," Donald replies. He glances between Beca and Jesse, who are sitting around the table glaring at Amy/glaring at everyone, respectively. "Congratulations, guys."

"Yeah, we really are happy for you."

"If I'm not your maid of honour, I will hunt you down.")

In fact, the only one to react predictably out of their friends is Chloe. ("You what?!" Chloe screeches over Skype, a brilliant smile engulfing her face as Beca tells her again calmly. "Oh my God Beca this is huge! Where's the ring? When are you going to do the deed? Have you picked a day yet? I was thinking a winter wedding…")

Beca doesn't care. She just really likes looking at her hand and seeing the representation of their promise to each other, sitting there comfortably. It's nice, and she can't quite resist flashing it around whenever she can.

Beca looks around her, smiling at her surroundings and the tranquillity they bring to her. The perfectly cut grass, a vivid green beneath her, is soft between her toes, almost tickling the arches of her feet as she tip toes across it, her arms spread out to help keep her balance. The pink tinged sky stretches out all around her, the setting sun warm on her skin, and the trees are so high above her, their gentle green leaves swaying in the breeze…

A buzzing ghosts in her ear and she swats at the air around her, convinced some kind of annoying wasp is trying to disrupt her little garden, but the noise is gone as quickly as it arrives, and she lets herself float back into that place again and continue looking up at the trees. Again, a few moments later, the noise is back, and she spins around, looking for its source. Behind her she is delighted to find a babbling brook, the water clean and sweet as it rushes over the rocks on the waterbed.

The noise continues though, almost like the beat of a song, two pulses, over and over, so very far away. She strains her ears, trying to find the voice – because she is sure, now, that it is someone's voice – but panics as her surroundings begin to darken, the light leaving too quickly, the sun slipping behind the distant hills until all she is surrounded by is darkness, the voice now insistent in her ear.

"Bec? Beca? Beca. Beca. Beca!"

All of her limbs feel so very heavy, and she is aware that she is no longer standing, but lying on her stomach, something strong and supportive beneath her. Groaning at the light that is burning behind her closed eyelids she lifts one lethargic arm to swing out at the source of her unwelcomed distraction, having to take a few go's before her fingers graze what feels distinctly like a face.

"Beca, don't maul me, you told me to wake you up before I left."

Something grabs her hand and she lets her muscles relax, all effort to keep it up gone, and a faint chuckle tickles at her ears. Opening her mouth a little, she tries to tell the disruption to go away, but it comes out more as a breathy, "Gnnn haphewn."

Lips graze her forehead and she sighs sleepily. "Alright, well I'm going to shower and grab anything last minute, I'll wake you up again in about an hour."

Beca is happy to return to her little happy place, but when she gets there, she is distraught to find that winter has come and the grass is covered in a thick layer of snow, the stream frozen over, the leaves from the trees long dead. Beca looks around her sadly. The sky is now grey, clouded over so the sun is hidden away, and the winter chill is harsh on her bared skin, her feet frozen from being buried in the glistening, untouched snow. Beca huffs out a large breath as the buzzing returns, and she eagerly lets herself be drawn away by it, desperate to escape the cold confinements of her winter-ruined paradise.

"Beca? Pumpkin. Sweetie? Honey-boo. Babycakes –"

"I will kill you and everyone you love," she threatens into her pillow, tightening her grip around it, feeling too unsatisfied by the lack of sleep that is settling into her bones.

"To do that you have to get up," Jesse teases, unfazed, into her ear, and when she opens an eye she finds him kneeling by her side of the bed, his trademark grin in need of being slapped away because she really doesn't want to be up at this time of the morning.

"Oh," she whispers as she realises why he's actually waking her up. "I forgot."

"I'll forgive you if you get up and say goodbye to me?" he says hopefully, and she slides a hand out from under her pillow to pull on his neck so she can lazily kiss him. "Good morning, my darling," he coos when he pulls back a little, earning him a slap on the shoulder. Jesse just continues to smile at her, stretching up to tower over her, his shirt pulling against his chest as he stretches with a content sigh.

"Did you take my sheets away?" she asks with a frown, suddenly aware of how exposed she feels to the cool air of the condo.

"No…" Jesse's guilty side-glance proves otherwise, and as he walks around the bed and disappears from view, a sharp slap is delivered to her bare backside that makes her squeak and dart up, just in time to glare at his back as he walks out of the room, sniggering with delight.

She finds Jesse few minutes later, busily leafing through his bag, checking he has everything he needs. Beca watches him with a tinge of sadness. Jesse is flying over to New York for the week in the hopes of securing a contract, has been almost vibrating with excitement over the company paid trip, yet Beca is sad to see him go. She knows he is overjoyed to be going, but the thought of being on the other side of the country to him makes something stir unpleasantly in her stomach.

It isn't like they hadn't spent time apart before. All throughout college, there had been weeks where she'd be staying with her mother and he'd be with his family, an expanse of land between them; or trips with their various acapella groups that took them to different places; there was that period freshman year where they didn't even talk to each other, and then the few times after where push had come to shove and they'd gotten tired of each other and taken a well-needed break…

But this time is different. This time, there are no problems between them, no enforced breaks. Since moving to LA together a few years before, they haven't really gone anywhere without the other. They live together, travel together when visiting family and friends, they are never apart for more than the odd night – and yet now, here they are, about to say goodbye to each other for a whole week.

"There's a pot of coffee ready for you," he tells her absently, checking his plane tickets. When she doesn't respond, he glances up at her, taking in her clasped hands and pursed lips. "You alright, baby?"

Beca presses her lips together harder to stop a smile at another of his teasing pet names for the morning and steps into his arms when he holds them out to her for a hug. She burrows her nose in his shirt and lets her eyes close as he keeps a tight grip around her.

"It's only a week, Bec, we can totally manage that," he says quietly, his fingers running through her hair.

"Oh I'll be fine." She pulls back enough to look up at him with a playful smirk. "My secret lover is waiting just down the hall."

"Is that so?" He smirks back, his hands pressing into the small of her back. "So that means I can now tell you the true nature of my trip is actually to whisk my mistress away somewhere nice where she doesn't have to run down the fire escape every time you're home early from work."

"Don't feel you have to sneak around for my sake."

"I'm a respectful cheater, Bec, I don't want you to walk in and get jealous of her."

Beca can feel herself breaking, but fights hard to keep her composure. "Jealous? Why would I be jealous? There's no way she could be anymore awesome than me." Beca shrugs a shoulder at his raised eyebrows. "You're already punching above your own weight with me; no way you could pull someone even close to all this."

The corners of his lips twitch for a moment before he breaks and laughs, shaking his head at the victorious smile that spreads across her face. "Fair enough, Becakins."

Beca pulls away from his lips. "Becakins? Really?"

"Really really," he says with a mischievous smile, kissing her again sweetly.

"Alright, come on, you're going to miss check in if you don't get out of here," she tells him after a few minutes, patting his chest and gently prying his arms from around her. He pouts and she pulls on his chin to kiss him again quickly before opening his bag and checking the contents herself, making sure he has everything he needs.

"Are you sure you can't come with me?" he whines behind her.

"I can't, you know I've already used up my vacation days this year." Beca turns around to his disappointed face and offers him a small smile. "Besides, like you said; it's only a week, we'll be fine."

Jesse just sighs, checking his watch and sighing again when he sees the time. "I have to get going."

"You'll call when you land?"

"Of course." Jesse's arms wrap around her again for one last hug, his face in her hair, and she lets herself get lost in the warmth of body heat, the scent of his cologne, the feel of his arms as he holds her oh so close. Beca won't have it for seven whole days, so she tries to memorise everything about the moment, hoping that maybe, if she tries hard enough, her senses will remember him well enough that she can feel him and smell him and sense him until he can come home and take back over.

"Come on, let's not drag this out." Beca kisses him one last time and pulls away reluctantly, smiling at him. "I'll talk to you later."

Jesse grips the handle of his bag, his eyes lingering on her with an edge to his gaze. "I love you, Bec."

"I know." Beca holds the door open as he walks through it, but he turns again to give her a giant grin, his excitement returning at the fact he is getting to go to New York City – somewhere he has been begging her to go with him to for almost as long as she's known him. "Get out of here!" she insists.

"Bye, sugar-pea."

Beca rolls her eyes at his retreating figure, but just as he reaches the staircase to retreat down to the lobby, she calls out to him. Brown eyes meet blue as she bites her lip softly. "I love you too."

Jesse winks, smugly saying, "I know," before disappearing out of view.

The apartment is lonely without him, so she spends the week doing anything she can to avoid being there.

Coffee carts, music stores, book shops, the mall, her record label… Beca is suddenly a lot more present in the city of her dreams.

When that stops helping, she grabs a bag and knocks hesitantly on the pale yellow door. Aubrey doesn't even need to ask; she just smiles as she rubs a hand over her swollen belly, opening the door further for Beca to enter.

Meanwhile, at work, Beca is mortified to discover a new present each morning. Without fail, every time she walks through the door, there is some ridiculous gift. A giant teddy bear ('for you to hug at night while I'm not there for you to cling to'. Getting that home had been the most embarrassing experience of her life), a picnic basket full of her favourite foods, a record she had been trying to track for months…

Each time, her text is the same:

I hate you.

And his reply will always say:

I miss you too.

"See? I knew you'd get through the week easily enough," he says as he kisses her neck, and she presses herself into him, overjoyed that he's finally home. She hasn't mentioned her temporary living situation with Aubrey and her husband over the past four days, though she doubts he's not aware of it.

"Yeah, well, would have been nice if you stayed away a little longer," she says despondently, pulling his arm tighter around her as she tries not to grin at how good it feels to have him back, peppering kisses along her shoulder and neck. "I was really enjoying spending time with my secret lover."

Jesse bites down hard enough to make her gasp. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah, he was really great, you'd – " her breathing hitches as his hand starts trailing up her thigh "-You'd like him. Total nerd, like you. Kept sending me all these ridiculous things."

"I don't know," Jesse mumbles casually, "He sounds like a pretty amazing guy."

"So you won't mind if I chuck you for him?"

"Sure." His hand, by this point, has disappeared under her shirt, and her back arches a little as it continues its journey over her ribs. "Right after this."

Beca laughs giddily as in one swift move, he rolls her under him and hovers over her, his lips stealing anything else she has to say as he kisses her ardently. They get so wrapped up in each other that they seem to forget how close they are to edge of the mattress, until Beca tries to roll him over and they tumble over the side, landing in a heap of limbs and crumpled sheets on the cold, bare floor. Beca laughs loudly as Jesse grunts, having taken most of the impact, and kisses him around her giggles in a wordless apology.

Yes, she has definitely missed him, and boy is it good to have him home.

He's lost. 100% completely and utterly lost.

She can see it in him, how today has been such a drain on him that he has no idea what to do, where to go, or how to cope. There is a dull ache in her chest that she doesn't know how to get rid of, because she doesn't know how to soothe his own pain' he just sits there, staring at the arrangements of flowers that make up people's tributes to his dead grandfather.

There's one shaped into a dollar sign – his dad's idea of a joke, aimed towards his own father's occupation because the two had rarely gotten along and his dad knew very little else that could represent him well enough – and one arranged in a large circle from his grandma. Beca glances over to her, seeing her press a tissue to her wet cheeks as she pretends not to be falling apart inside at having lost the other half of herself after 58 years of marriage.

Beca stops the thought that stems from this before it has a chance to fully form. She doesn't need to be thinking that way now.

There's many bunches of roses and arrangements of flowers she doesn't know the name of, and the cold wind in the crematorium is cutting through her coat. She watches him shivering, keeping herself hidden behind a group of mourners. Jesse's hand reaches out to an arrangement – small and simple and made up of pure white flowers – and she can see him staring, worrying his lip as he reaches out to the card she knows is blank.

Beca knows she probably isn't really wanted here; he'd made it quite clear last time they spoke, but as she eases herself through the crowd, she can see that he doesn't look all that surprised – that he knows the flowers are from her, and knowing she's here isn't as unexpected as she thought it would be. Jesse looks around at the quiet chaos of shaking hands and accepting condolences, trying to find her, but she ducks behind a tree until he's back to staring at the newest plague, his grandfather's engraved there in shining bronze.

"Hey, weirdo."

Looking over his shoulder in surprise, he sees her standing a few feet away. Wrapped tightly in a large coat with another over her arm, she keeps her eyes gentle and tries to smile.

"Beca," he breathes as he seems to registers that she's actually there, in front of him, watching him cautiously. "You're really here."

"Of course I am." She walks towards him and drapes his coats over his shoulders, leaving an arm around his shoulders as she bends down next him. He's cold and he leans towards her unconsciously. Having him this close makes her feel better and worse all at the same time.

"Jesse," she says softly, rubbing her hand over his shoulder. "Jesse I'm so sorry."

"Please don't apologise," he whispers, his voice trembling with held back emotion. "You're not the one who walked out, you're not the one who broke it off –"

"I don't care about any of that." Her head falls onto his shoulder and he rests his on top, staring at her flowers. "I only care about you. The rest is just… Technicalities."

He lifts his head to look at her, and she smiles sadly. "I don't want to lose you," he confesses brokenly, and her warm hand is there to catch the tear that falls to his cheek as she kisses him fiercely. He kisses her back, and she knows with dead certainty that they'll be okay; that he'll be okay, with time.

"You don't have to worry about that," she promises when she pulls away a little, "I'm not going anywhere."

"And I'll never leave again, I swear." He places his hand over the one on his cheek and tries to show her how serious he is. "I was an idiot and I didn't mean any of it."

"Jesse you just found out your grandfather died, I think you're allowed to go a little crazy."

"Not at you. Never at you." He kisses her again, softly this time. "You mean too much to me."

Beca holds up her left hand and he looks relieved to see his ring still on her finger, glittering despite the overcast sky above them. "A little crazy isn't enough to scare me off, okay? I'm in this for the long haul whether you like it or not, so let's forget about what happened and instead maybe find somewhere a little warmer?"

They straighten up and he holds her hand tightly as they finally walk back towards the crowds of people. Jesse's mom looks over the moon at the sight of them together again. He only lets go of her hand once for the rest of the day – to pull on the coat she had bought for him, because she knows how easily he forgets the most basic things when he's upset (he confesses later, in the dark of the Swanson home, how embarrassed he is that one of those things is how much he loves her).

"Beca?"

"Jesse, it's 3am, is this really important?"

"Yes."

"Fine, what is it?"

"Let's get married."

"We are."

"No, I mean, properly. Let's commit to it. Pick a date, start looking at cake and dresses and venues and stuff."

"If I say yes, will you let me go back to sleep?"

"Probably not."

"…Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay."

The call comes one quiet windy night in the middle of August.

Donald drives her, because her entire body is trembling too much and she doesn't have the car anyway, and he picks up a rumpled Stacie on the way from a club, her make up smeared from dried tears she's keeping at bay for Beca's sake as she lets her wrap herself around Stacie's form, her hand rubbing Beca's arm as they sit impatiently in the backseat, Donald grumbling about the late night traffic from the driver's seat.

Distantly, she remembers hearing the Spice Girls on the radio, and maybe a bit of Justin Beiber, and she starts thinking about Donald's Guilty Pleasures mix CD that she gave him for his birthday ages ago, as Stacie and Donald loop their arms around her, walking her into the hospital in a haze of paralyzing shock. He'd loved that CD so much, which was weird since it had been a joke present…

"Oh my God, Beca!" Benji rushes towards them, butterfly stitches across his forehead and his arm cast and in a sling; his eyes wild and his mouth downturned. Beca flinches, clinging a little harder to Stacie's hand. "Beca, I'm so sorry-"

"Where is he?" Donald asks for her. "What's happening?"

Benji glances up at him, tears filling his eyes. "I- I don't- They took him to surgery, I think he – Oh God, Beca I'm so sorry."

She just stares back at him, her face – her entire being – devoid of emotion apart from the persistent shaking.

"Surgery? Why surgery?" asks Stacie nervously.

Benji falters, glancing between the trio nervously, the silence stretching out between them in the waiting room, until Beca realises why Benji won't talk; because he can't say it, not in front of her.

Jesse's going to die. Jesse's going to die. Jesse's going to die.

She doesn't know what to think, how to react, how to feel, so she stumbles away from the scaffolding her friends give her and instead slumps into a standard grade waiting chair, head in her hands as she thinks about how many people have sat here before her, waiting for news on their loved ones. How many people have given good news in this chair? Bad news? How many people's lives have fallen apart in this chair; the next?

A few minutes later, there is a disturbance beside her, and the rough skin of Donald's hands presses against her own, pulling them softly away until she's looking into his dark, guarded eyes. "Hey," he whispers. Beca watches him closely, looking for a tell on what he's about to say. "Everything's going to be okay, yeah? I promise you, Jesse is going to pull through."

Beca doesn't believe him, so keeps quiet.

"Benji told me what happened," he continues in his most gentle voice. His hands lay on top of hers, like somehow it will make this all okay. "I'm going to be honest with you, Bec; apparently he was pretty beat up. Benji didn't hear much and there's no definitive news yet, so we don't know just how bad this is, but if there's one thing I know, it's that Jesse is strong; he's a fighter." A smile flickers dimly across his face. "I think the guy could be beheaded and still somehow be alive."

The joke is supposed to make her laugh, to get some form of reaction out of her, but it just echoes around her hollow insides, her emotionless expression staying put.

"He's not going to leave you, and until he can tell you that himself, neither will we. We're all here for you; we'll do anything you need. Just say the word."

Beca knows she should respond, should do anything to show she's still here, still present in the moment, but nightmare images of a ghostly pale Jesse are scorching her vision; his beat up and broken body on a bloody operating table imprinting into the backs of her eyelids.

"So."

"So?"

"You roped in the Treble."

Beca does a double take at the blinking, expectant eyes of Stacie, sitting a row above in the Bella's rehearsal space (just so it's known, she is a Bella not be choice, but by necessity). "Excuse me?"

"That Jesse guy, from Hood Night last week. I'm impressed, Beca, you hooked a good one early on in the game."

Beca just stares up at her in dumbfounded shock. (There's a blush heating up her cheeks, but she swears it's just the memory of Jesse embarrassing himself drunkenly and nothing to do with the way he spent most of the night with his arm around her, rambling on about anything that came to mind.) "I… I didn't… No, no, Jesse is just…"

Stacie, undeterred, just winks at her, whispering, "It's okay, I won't tell. Those being secretly Treble-boned must stick together."

Stacie holds her little finger out as Aubrey calls their break to an end, and Beca is too stunned by the strange conversation to notice that she's wrapped her own little finger around Stacie's.

There's a carefully manicured hand in hers when a doctor finally comes to see them.

"Miss Mitchell? Hi, I'm Dr Torres." A dark haired woman with a friendly face is in front of her, the right amount of empathy and distance in her expression that is supposed to set their patient's families at ease without getting too close. She holds her hand out towards Beca, but she's forgotten how to move again.

"I'm sorry," Stacie says from beside her. "She's not spoken since she found out."

"That's okay." A faint smile crosses the doctor's face. "He woke up on the way to surgery, kept asking for "my Beca". He said you'd rip my head off if I let anything happen to him without you being here to kill him yourself for writing the car off."

For the first time since she got the call five hours beforehand, Beca wants to smile. Or cry. Or scream. Or anything, really, as long as it's something other than this.

Dr Torres plays with a loose thread of her scrubs as she gets back to business. "Jesse made it through surgery, and he's in a stable condition. The impact of the car broke a few ribs, his knee and shattered his left shoulder, but the surgery went well and I'm confident he'll regain most of his function. We've done a CT scan to check his brain for any swelling, and there's some but it should only be temporary."

"But he's okay?" Benji asks frantically. "He'll wake up and be himself again?"

"I've done a consult over his scans with our best neurosurgeon, and he's pretty confident there won't be any lasting brain damage. We won't know for sure until Jesse comes round, but if there are any problems, well, we'll cross that bridge when we get to it."

"Thank you so much, doctor," Stacie gushes. "When can Beca see him?"

"I imagine very soon, once the nurses have got him settled in his room. Someone will be by to take you to him."

That's everything Beca needs to here; Jesse is alive, and she gets to see him in his living state. Everything else is just semantics; they can deal with his injuries and the health insurance and the car later. Right now, all she cares about is that Jesse is still with her.

Beca stands in the doorway for an immeasurable amount of time, just staring and processing and trying to keep in mind what the doctor had told her.

It looks far worse than it is.

It's strange to see Jesse looking so… Small. He makes fun of her for her height, but right now, seeing him lying there surrounded by tubes and machines, with the bruises and the cuts and the bandages… It's like staring at the child version of him. It's like he's so vulnerable, completely defenceless against the world… And he looks at peace with it.

That's what hurts the most.

Beca wishes she could see his eyes. She loves his eyes. Maybe if she could see them, she could better convince herself of what the doctors and the machines are telling her; Jesse is still alive; somewhere in that head of his, he's still existing.

"Why hasn't he woken up yet? Surely the drugs must have worn off by now!"

"I understand why you think this is worrying, Miss –"

"No, don't give me that. His fiancé is standing there waiting for him to wake up like you promised he would!" Stacie's voice continues to rise from outside the room. "It's been too long for this to not be serious."

"Jesse's body has undergone a trauma," Dr Torres says kindly. "The human body varies in its responses; sometimes it stays in a state like this to better heal. He'll wake up in his own time, but I'm afraid for now we are all going to have to wait."

26 hours after she receives the call, Beca lets herself sit by his bedside.

Close up, he looks so much worse, but she realises that right now, he needs her just as much as she needs him. Jesse can't see her to know she's with him, so she eases herself into the chair and continues to listen to the heart monitor.

Beep-beep. Beep-beep. Beep-beep.

Three hours later, she finds the courage to bring up a shaking hand and lay it on top of his bandaged knuckles. Chloe's hand squeezes her shoulder, and she closes her eyes to try and pretend that it is his.

The hand is too small, too light, but for just a second, there is a hint of comfort. It's chased away by gnawing fear of losing the man that her whole life is built around.

Jesse? It's me. It's Beca.

I'm here.

Wake the fuck up, you selfish son of a bitch.

This isn't how things were supposed to go. We were looking at wedding cakes and arguing over your best man and how religious we should make the ceremony for your mother. She's here, you know. I think I heard your dad telling Benji that she's sleeping in the waiting room, but she's here. We're all here. We're all here for you.

I know that people die all the time, and I know that it's a sad but inevitable part of life… But you always said we were inevitable. Remember? All those years ago, back when you were just this nerdy weirdo and I was too proud to realise how much I needed good people in my life. You said we were inevitable, Jesse. And I didn't let you in – let myself love you – just for you to fade away from me now.

The doctors keep saying you'll wake up soon, that you're just healing. But you can heal just fine with your eyes open. I need you to open your eyes.

If you don't open wake up right now, I will break all of your DVDs.

I will smash your new keyboard.

Oh God. Jesse, please, wake up. Do it for me. Wake up for me. If you love me, you'll stay with me.

I can't lose you.

I'm so mad at you. You know that Benji sucks at driving; why would you let him behind the wheel of our car? I know he's your best friend, I know he's important… But right now all I care about is that you're lying in a hospital bed, and that you've had surgery and brain scans and you collided with those stupid lights that you always said were going to get someone killed…

I never thought it might be you.

Stacie says I should stay positive, but you know me. The pessimist of the relationship. I keep trying to tell myself you'll wake up any minute now… But the seconds are ticking by and so far, there's nothing.

Well, almost nothing. Your heart rate jumps everytime I stroke my finger over your wrist… Just like that. Do you know? Can you feel it? It's me, Jesse. It's Beca.

I will never forgive you for this.

I love you.

References: Los Angeles, I'm Yours by Jack E. Pearce, How I Met Your Mother, Star Trek, The Incredibles, Man That Can't Be Moved - The Script, Shrek, Caffeine Boost by theasbofive, Greys Anatomy And probably a bunch of other crap.