Thanks for the follows and reviews! I am glad you guys are enjoying this story and I hope you guys continue to like it! I wanted to get Chloe's processing of everything out while it was still fresh in my head so this is a quicker update but shorter chapter.
Let me know what you guys think as I find Chloe much harder to write than Beca and I want to be true to the character :)
Thanks again everyone and please please review and tell me your thoughts and any suggestions for improvements or ideas!
Chloe found herself being pulled out of a deep sleep by the incessant nagging of her full bladder and after a few moments of trying to ignore the call of nature she let it slowly drag her into consciousness. As she began to wake she notices that something is different. She is not alone. In fact she was being held tight by a soft arm around her waist and a warm body pressed to her back. It took a second for her to piece it all together and remember that she was not in her own bed, she was in Beca's. And it must be Beca's arm who is wrapped around her right now.
She slowly opens her eyes and looks down at the hand tucked under her ribs and smiles to herself. Beca may claim to not like touching and cuddling but never did anyone hold her as often or as tightly as she did when they would share a bed. Pulling her own hand from under her pillow she began to lightly trace her fingers up and down Beca's forearm. Even in sleep Chloe's touch seemed to create goosebumps.
Cursing nature for interrupting this moment she began to slowly pull Beca's hand from under her ribs and her arm from around her waist but paused instantly when she heard Beca mumble just behind her ear. Whatever it was was unintelligible so she started to move her body away from her as she very gently places Beca's arm on her own hip. Not sure if it was the cool air hitting them as they parted or if she just jostled too much but whatever it was woke Beca enough to speak in semi-complete words this time and she felt Beca's arm shoot out around her waist again as she tried to sit up.
"Where — goin?" came the muffled voice as Beca buried her face into Chloe's hair and neck.
Rubbing Beca's arm she smiles and leans back slightly to speak softly over her shoulder, "I'm just going to the bathroom."
"M'kay," she said, though making no move to let go of Chloe.
"Honey, you're going to have to let me go so I can get up," patting lightly on the arm still gripping her tightly.
"M'kay," and though Beca still doesn't move she does feel her grip loosen. Just as she is sitting halfway up and is attempting to remove the limp arm around her, Beca's head pops up a few inches from the pillow. "-ou comin back?" her voice, a little louder this time, carries a hint of concern as her hand grips at Chloe's shirt.
She looks down and notices Beca's eyes are still closed in spite of her raised head and she chuckles, "Yes, sweetie, I'm coming back."
"Good," and just like that her grip loosens and her head drops back to the pillow, breathing easy once again.
God, she is in love with this little adorable goofball, she thinks to herself, picking up Beca's hand and kissing the back of it before placing it next to her and leaving for the bathroom.
Having emptied the offending bladder she tiptoes into the room before slipping quietly back into bed next to her friend. She had just lain down on her back when the warm body next to her reaches out to close the distance between the two, startling her slightly, "Oh!"
"Mmmm, -ur back," hums Beca as she throws her arm around Chloe's middle before she can get settled, forcing Chloe to wrap her arm around Beca's back rather than have it squished between the two.
Chloe laughs softly, giving Beca a light squeeze as the younger girl situates herself more firmly into her side, "I told you I would come back, silly."
"-ou -mell nice," nuzzling her face into Chloe's chest as her head rested on her shoulder.
"Thank you," she says, looking down at Beca's tucked head and smiling.
"Mmm -ur cold," she mumbles disapprovingly, moving her leg over Chloe's pelvic area and tucking her foot between Chloe's legs.
"Not for long," and she feels her whole body shiver, though not at all from the cold. Sure, Beca was asleep but that didn't make the way she was holding Chloe right now any less intoxicating.
She listened as Beca's breathing became more steady having fallen back asleep and she thinks back on yesterday's events. Chloe was always flirting with Beca, this wasn't new, but like she thought earlier that night, Beca's behavior in response to Chloe was new. Normally Beca would either blush furiously and ignore her teasing or she would have some sarcastic remark she would throw back with an eye roll and a straight face.
However, these last few months Beca had grown steadily less blaze about Chloe's flirting and appeared to be growing bolder. Not to say that she would go so far as to call Beca a flirt, but there were times when Beca would flirt back, or at the very least, not brush off Chloe's flirtations. Yesterday, though. Yesterday, Beca had not backed down from any of Chloe's flirting but instead seemed to challenge her further, tossing the gauntlet, so to speak. And Chloe had pushed back attempting to call Beca on her bluffs, only it seemed that Beca was not bluffing this time.
She thought for a moment about the kiss she had so chastely given Beca before turning over to go to sleep. Although the kiss had been more of a teasing joke on the surface, she could not deny that it had shaken something inside of her. Shaken her to her core. Beca's lips had been so soft, so perfectly molded against her own, that her breath hitches just at the memory.
It seemed that all night the two had danced around a kiss and so when the opportunity presented itself again, even though the moment had been more teasing than sexually charged like earlier in the evening, she felt it was "now or never." The thing that stuck out the most to her was that Beca hadn't protested. She hadn't pulled back or had grand exclamations of disapproval. Granted, she did take her off guard but Beca is not a fool.
Beca is strong in both will and mind, and no one can make her do anything she doesn't want to do. Not really. And though she may bitch and complain about movie nights or doing "cliche girly things" with her when she would drag Beca along with her places, they both knew that if Beca really didn't want to do something there was nothing that could make her.
Beca seemed to enjoy Chloe's flirting lately, if anything, and this brought up all kinds of questions for Chloe. She thinks about the last year with Beca: she and Jesse split and deciding to be just friends—to which Beca still has yet to elaborate on with Chloe—and soon after becomes more open to Chloe's teasing both physically and verbally, and even begins to flirt back instead of reacting in only blushes and sarcasm. She has grown closer to Chloe in the last few months in that there are far more sleepovers and outings with just the two of them, which Chloe is exceptionally pleased with if she had to admit. And last, but certainly not least, Beca has taken to flirting back.
Chloe is not stupid, despite what people think after hearing she has failed Russian Lit three times. In fact, she has perfect grades aside from that one class which everyone now knows she failed just so she could stay a Bella. Though she is fairly certain Beca, and probably the rest of the girls, knew that she was failing on purpose because she was afraid to leave what had come to be the best years of her life. That being said, she really is a rather intelligent person overall, so figuring out "where to from here" with Beca should not be as difficult as she is making it.
If she looks at it logically, then the only real conclusion she can think of based on the evidence at hand, is that Beca has feelings for her too. Knowing Beca the way she does, which is to say probably better than anyone else, she would hazard to guess that Beca is more than likely terrified of putting herself out there and getting hurt. Chloe isn't a violent person by nature but she has been tempted, on more than one occasion, to throttle Beca's father for the number he did on her emotions and outlook on life and the people around her.
Like a movie reel-to-reel, images of Beca and her over the last 3 years played out in memories in her mind, overloading her with emotions and clarity. Every touch, every laugh, every note, every smile and every tear was like a roadmap to the truth. It was in that moment, in the wee hours of the morning lying with Beca wrapped around her that she is struck with the realization that her best friend, with whom she has been in love with for years now, is in love with her too.
Feeling a tear roll down her cheek she reaches up to brush it away with a wry smile. If someone would have told her three years ago that the alt-girl with ear monstrosities she met briefly at a school activities fair would capture her heart and change her world in such a big way, she would have laughed at them. But here she is, holding that girl in her arms and she is the happiest she has ever been.
Reaching her free hand up, she tucks a few wayward strands of hair behind Beca's ear and kisses her forehead. She closes her eyes and lets her lips linger for a few moments before laying her head back down and placing her hand on Beca's thigh laying across her, giving it a gentle squeeze.
It is not long after that Chloe feels Beca begin to stir against her, clearly starting to wake up a little. She decides to stay still and let her wake up without knowing she too was awake so she could gage Beca's reaction to their current position. Beca let out a sigh as she moved to stretch her muscles a bit but tensed almost immediately. She must have just realized how they were laying. Chloe still just waits quietly.
There is a brief moment where Beca doesn't move and Chloe is quite certain she is panicking and over-thinking like she usually does, so when she feels Beca sigh and start to remove herself from the embrace, she speaks. "Quit over-thinking and go back to sleep."
Her voice startles Beca as she feels her jerk slightly and Chloe holds her closer with her arm, trying to soothe her with a gentle caress of her thigh with her thumb and she feels Beca relax against her. They lay there a moment in silence when Chloe starts to caress Beca's side with her fingers, hoping to lull her back to sleep. Beca twitches at her touch and for a second she is afraid that she overstepped before she hears the sleepy voice explain, "If you want me to go back to sleep then you need to not tickle me.
She could hear the smile in Beca's voice as she took Chloe's fingers in her hand to stop the the tickling sensation and she chuckled softly, "Fair enough." Then thinking that this was a good opportunity to seize the moment she twisted her finger around in Beca's grip so that she could lace them together. She didn't know she was even holding her breath until she felt Beca's hand move hesitantly around from her chest to behind her ribs where Beca squeezes gently and Chloe releases a sigh of contentment.
Chloe listens as Beca's breathing once again starts to find a steady pattern as she drifts off into sleep and once again she leans down to place a soft kiss on her forehead before she too falls back to sleep.