PROMPT: Can we have a continue on from when Beca finds out about Chloe being a werewolf where Aubrey confronts Beca about it because Chloe has started to distance herself from everyone including Aubrey?
She traced the rim of the mug with her thumb, not minding the scolding hold surface and the steam that sprouted into the air with each passing moment. It created a smog in her lungs, a smog that was soothing and got caught in her throat. A distraction.
That's exactly what Beca Mitchell needed at this moment. She needed something to take her mind off of the piercing blue eyes that struggled to keep their own focus. She wasn't really sure where Chloe had intended to look. Her focus had shifted from the girl in front of her to the barista behind the counter, even to the vintage metal signs.
Beca looked like she was swallowed up in the large hoodie that Chloe had slid onto her about an hour before in the library. The woman had folded under the pressure in the library, not saying a word- not speaking as the redhead ushered her into the nearby coffee shop, cautious not to take things too fast, or not fast enough. Her face was pale, eyes a dull grey. She was smaller than Chloe had ever seen her.
The young brunette wasn't just questioning herself, but her world. The world that had been created for her since the second she had entered it. In no way had it ever been safe, in no aspect had she had a normal and cohesive journey- but she never doubted the facts. She never questioned that there were humans and there were animals in this world. Never a combination of both. Never such an alluring one that sat right in front of her.
A slight chime rang through the nearly empty coffee house, snapping the younger girl out of it as she drew in a sharp breath and flashed her stare past Chloe's shoulder, an internal dread forcing the woman to hold off rolling her eyes. It was late, Aubrey Posen looking disheveled and annoyed as she shifted her bag on her shoulder.
"You called Aubrey?" Beca shifted forward, a deep hiss in her voice as Chloe flinched at the sharp tone, that and Beca actually utilizing her vocal cords for the last time in the past hour, her fingers curling around the mug until her knuckles turned white.
"What else was she supposed to do?" The blonde spoke, Beca's pale gaze shifting to the blonde as she pulled a chair over to the small table. The metal legs were angry against the tile, Beca tensing as she shifted a bit in her seat, reluctantly giving the girl more room to sit. "You're both clearly not up to the whole talking thing right now."
Chloe let out a drawn breath, pulling her coffee cup up to her lips as she blinked a few times at the brunette across the table. Not once in their strained relationship had they dealt with something like this. Sure, they slept around once or twice, leaving Beca with the scratches to prove it. The tension between the two forever strained after the dog attack.
Aubrey shifted uncomfortably, staring at the girl to her right. "Chlo, am I supposed to dictate a debate between you two or?"
"I don't know," Chloe sounded out simply, setting the cup back down on the table. Beca still being unusually quiet compared to her usual spunky self. It even threw the blonde off as she leaned back into her seat. "You're the only one I've ever told, and you didn't' go mute."
"Oh, what a blessing," Beca growled under her breath, Aubrey amused despite herself, eyebrows raising slightly. The brunette snapping her colored orbs back to Chloe. "I am not mute, Beale. I am not in shock. I am thinking. Alright?"
"Okay," Chloe whispered.
There was another round of thick silence. Aubrey grasping Chloe's cup as she downed about half of the scalding coffee. She barely even flinched as the steam warmed her cheeks and filled her throat. Chloe knitting her eyebrows together as the dysfunctional girl gave her a half-hearted shrug.
Beca tapped her thumb against the corner of the table, drawing in a breath as she shifted with discomfort. "I have some questions."
"Understandably." Chloe nodded in contention.
"Will you," Beca drew in a breath "Have you ever… okay, how did this happen?"
Chloe swallowed thickly, not exactly sure how to explain this. It was a simple cut line of action that happened when she was younger. Something that she's had to adapt to and learn every single second of the day. It didn't' bother her to quell the side effects anymore. What bothered her was the sharp and unforgiving memory. Something she knew Beca needed to hear.
"You said you were sixteen," Beca whispered carefully, "That's young."
"It is, isn't it?" Chloe said softly before taking a few moments to compose herself. Beca didn't' push the subject, hell, she just sat there with that dark gaze on her face, trying to keep her heart rate in check so she wouldn't panic. Panic was something she had a constant supply of these past few months. "It happened at School."
Aubrey sat back, new to this story herself. She knew that Chloe trusted her, but this was something she was urged never to bring up. If the girl was giving her story away to Beca- then it was really something. That ache that Chloe felt had its warrants.
"I wish I could say it was some creepy janitor or the school bully. Because they're the people that are supposed to have the anger issues, right?" She scoffed quickly, waving her hand dismissively at her own words. "It was my math teacher. Geometry I think, it's been so long."
There was a slight pause as she gulped down another long edge of coffee, probably wishing it was something stronger, her other hand fiddling with the rolled up ball of paper from a straw someone had discarded earlier, palm facing the table.
"I wasn't the best at math, so I often stayed behind after class, maybe for an hour or so. She would close the door and we would work on whatever I needed extra help on. I guess it kind of turned into a system of trust between the two of us.
"I didn't' want to go home, and she had nothing else to do besides grade papers, so we fell into a pattern. And everything was good for a while- but she started to ask me weird questions… like why I didn't want to be in my house, and if I felt like I was safe with her."
Chloe shook her head slightly, forcing the memories forward. Her home life had never been the best, a single mother and two younger sisters that had no concept of how much trouble they were always in. The girl had picked up more than one job to pay her way through college and out of the trailer park.
"I did feel safe with her," Chloe flashed her stare towards Beca, eyes full of emotion. "And there was one night, just one night where we stayed a lot later than usual, to the point where it was dark outside, you know? It was only the two of us in the whole entire building."
Aubrey leaned back in her chair, wincing as it creaked. It didn't' pull the woman's stare away from Beca. It was almost as if she was staring through her.
"She started to ask me those questions again, and her voice was dark. Darker than I had ever heard it before… She asked me if I wanted to be apart of something bigger. If I wanted to be a part of a family that could actually provide for me so I could have a real life. An actual life that meant something." Chloe breathed in painfully. "I said yes."
Beca ran her finger across the clay edge of the mug, her coffee still untouched as they sat in a quiet lull.
Chloe cracked an uncharacteristic smile, causing the brunette to glance sparingly at Aubrey who was entranced herself, staring at Chloe with her lips parted and breathing shallow.
"It sounds a lot like a cult, doesn't' it?" The redhead scratched her collar softly. "It sounded like one then too, but she was… she was so convincing. And I said yes because her eyes were kind and her words were calm. Even when she rolled my sleeve up, and even when she dug her teeth into my arm until it crushed bone, I didn't' question. Her."
Chloe drew in a shaky breath, finger still rolling that small piece of paper around between them. It was the smallest it could be at this point, the girl nervous beyond anything.
"It hurts me, every single day that I willingly invited this into my life." She said, voice watery. "I could have said no, and I could have gone home, but I didn't-"
Her voice cracked, composure falling apart at the stitch. Beca did something unexpected then, something that was done without thought or contemplation. Her hand folded over Chloe's fingers curling around the girls as the paper fell away completely. Her fear of the young girl seeming to dissipate as distress wracked Chloe's features. The brunettes pure concern leaking past every other emotion.
"I didn't uh," Chloe shook her head, flashing her stare between the two girls. "I didn't tell anyone else because I ran." She gulped "From my hometown, and from that woman, and… and the others."
Aubrey parted her lips as if to ask something more but settled for this. For the shared silence that the three women had created. Beca staring at Chloe with nothing but admiration, the fear that was evidently on her mind dripping away like venom.