AntiqueSoul83: At this rate, this story probably will last forever bc I am the slowest writer on the planet and it's not even close to being complete.
Bechloe-4evs: Fortunately, I escaped with only trauma - which I can just pour into this story.
96itadakimasu96: And here I thought you were going to point me in the direction of quality dark content. I'm disappointed.
SunDanceQT: There will be more sweet moments to come now that they almost sorta like each other.
Lurker: Thank you so much for the lovely long review. The police and what they know and don't know will come more into play later down the line. Most of what they know is who is dead and who Aubrey/Beca claim is at fault for it, plus what they've seen for themselves investigating there afterward. The general ideas without the nitty-gritty details, if you will.
Surreal: Thanks!
Dysrhythmia
So show me hope,
And show me fear,
From your heart that's beating.
You're not alone in your tears;
Cause we're lovers fleeting,
And the world is sleeping.
I'll be, I'll be,
Your family,
When your times get hard.
And I'll see, I'll see,
You next to me,
When the road gets dark.
- Boyce Avenue
Beca's words replay themselves over and over in Aubrey's head all through the rest of the afternoon. If she's being honest, she isn't 100% sure what they mean. There's the literal sense of them, obviously (eating and drinking keep a person alive) – but being alive doesn't mean a whole lot if she's not being useful. So either Beca does think she's being useful somehow or she's just trying to get Aubrey to let the subject go.
At dinner, they sit across from each other. Aubrey eats as much as she used to prior to being poisoned and downs an entire glass of water, then refills it for later. The whole time, Beca continues to glance at her plate until it's empty. It's a relief to feel neither nauseated nor like she's starving, and she makes the most of it for herself – while also feeling like she has to prove to the rest of the table that it was an injury, not an eating disorder. They're just worried, Chloe's voice says inside her head, so she holds her tongue even though there is no longer any cause for concern when it comes to her health.
No cause of concern that she knows of, anyway.
Every time she thinks about it, it eats away at her that anything could kill her at any moment.
Or any of them, really.
She puts on a smile and adds to the conversation where she deems fit so they don't resume asking if she's okay.
She's alive, and that's what's important.
xxxxx
Howie: Can we talk?
Howie: I'm sorry.
"Aubrey, are you coming?" Beca hollers from the bathroom, "Earth's water supply is going to run out."
Aubrey takes one last look at her phone then tucks it beneath her pillow. "Be there in a sec."
"What took you so long?"
Aubrey feigns a look of confusion and stacks her pajamas on the bathroom counter.
Beca brushes it off. "Time spent in Hell aside, today was one of the most exhausting days of my life." She sinks down into the bathtub, her legs draped over the side.
"I thought you said the water supply was running out." It wasn't even a shower.
"I lied. It will get cold though."
Once the plastic covering is over her arm, Aubrey lowers herself in next to her – leaning against the back of the tub with one leg bent and the other stretched out under Beca's thighs. She's tired too, even with a nap. It wasn't that the day had dragged – everything just took so much effort. She leans her head sideways against the tiled wall and closes her eyes while her muscles make a lame attempt to relax in the warm water. "What are you doing?" she asks when she feels Beca move.
"I'm getting the duck." Beca hoists herself upward with a twist then turns back around to settle back down into the water again. "Hey, Aubrey."
Aubrey opens her eyes just in time to watch a stream of water squirt from the ducks mouth and hit her between her breasts. "Was that necessary?"
Beca dunks the duck back under the water and gives it a squeeze. "Did it ruffle your feathers?"
The duck reemerges full of water, and Aubrey slaps it out of Beca's hand. It lands bottom side up and she snatches it before Beca can. She pulls it down by its head then watches it try to decide between floating and sinking, like it can't figure out which way is up. It's a relatable feeling – which is stupid, because it's a rubber duck. She picks it up and shoots Beca in the face. "I'm quacking up now."
"Shut up." Beca grabs it back after wiping the water from her eyes. "You're not allowed to play with him anymore."
"What a shame." Aubrey pouts to show her complete and utter disappointment.
"Or make that face."
"What's wrong with my face?" Aubrey leans to the side to avoid water being flicked at it. "It's better than yours."
"My face is flawless."
"What about that?" Aubrey leans forward and extends a finger toward Beca's face, jabbing her hard on the cheek when she turns her head. She bursts into another fit of giggles when Beca falls for it and sinks back against the tub.
Beca closes her eyes with a tightly stretched smile. "You are such a…"
"What?" Aubrey asks when she stops, "Say it."
"Mother-Ducker."
"You proud of yourself for that one?"
"I am, actually," Beca replies, "For once I mean it, instead of it coming from auto-correct."
The urge to wrap her legs around Beca's waist and pull her closer comes out of nowhere, and she does so with no warning to Beca. "Who would have thought I'd ever enjoy spending time with you?"
"Even when you're nice, you're mean!" Beca grabs the edge of the tub to avoid crashing into her too hard. "You're splashing water out of the tub."
"No, I'm not." She sits up to look anyway, and Beca takes the opportunity to wrap her arms around her mid-section.
"At the risk of continued mocking – I was serious about, you know, the whole strap thing – like, if you wanted to try that."
It takes Aubrey a moment to figure out what she's talking about, and then oh. She wouldn't even know how to obtain one of those. "What strap?"
"The, uh…the penis strap…" Beca's face turns a light shade of pink and the beads of water forming on her neck aren't from the bath.
"What penis strap?" Aubrey almost manages to keep a straight face, but her lips twitch in a strong effort to conceal the smirk that so desperately wants to be there.
"You're an ass." Beca tries to pull away from her.
"Okay."
"Okay, you're an ass?"
"No, I mean okay. I'll do it."
"Wait, seriously?" Beca looks at her dubiously. "It's hard to tell if you're mocking me sometimes, even though I should always assume the answer is yes."
"Look." Aubrey takes a breath. "We both have needs…"
Beca raises her eyebrows, being the one to smirk now.
"And I mean, people use those all the time, right? What's the harm in trying?"
"Who are you?"
Someone who doesn't want to die having never lived. "Do you want me to be reckless with you or with Howie? Howie doesn't have to go any extra steps to get it up."
"Yeah, well I'm better looking."
"Maybe if I squint…" Aubrey squints her eyes until Beca is nothing more than a blur.
"I'm about to put Howie to shame," Beca mutters as she grabs the body wash and squeezes it directly into her hand.
"I'll believe it when I see it."
xxxxx
"What are you guys doing?" Everyone is hovering around the coffee table with the air mattress propped up against the far wall when they leave the bathroom. Aubrey stands at the edge of the living room, curiously trying to see what they're up to.
"It's family game night," Conrad says like it's the most obvious thing on earth, "Remember?"
"How would I know that?"
"Because he's invited you every week since we've met," Brian states.
It sounds familiar now.
"Are you guys gonna play or get some sleep?" Julia asks.
"What are you playing?" Aubrey ventures toward the couch with Beca in tow and takes an empty space next to Julia. She settles in close to her with one arm wrapped around herself, shivering. She chalks it up to having just gotten out of the bath, but it's become difficult to tell whether the air is cold or if it's just her.
Julia grabs her blanket from where it's bunched up on top of the couch and wraps it around Aubrey's shoulders then slides both arms around her, giving her a light squeeze that she doesn't quite release all the way.
"Twister," Brian deadpans, looking through the boxes. "Left hand, Yellow. Oh, Aubrey loses."
"I still have a week I could punch you in the face with this cast," Aubrey replies.
"I have the perfect game. I've been saving it for this moment." Conrad slaps a card game down on the table then stuffs all the rest of the games in a drawer next to the TV stand. "Silicone Valley Startups."
Aubrey leans forward to look at the box.
"You have a new company," Conrad says, "And you have to sell it."
"Why do I feel like this game caters to two specific people in this room?" Beca asks.
That sounds easy… Aubrey leans back, getting cozy against the back of the couch and Julia's side. "I'm down."
"I'll be the investor," Conrad declares as he pulls the cards out of the box, "For the sake of fairness, you can't look at yours until it's your turn."
Each person has a green, blue, and pink card place in front of them. Aubrey moves hers from the table and places them face down on her lap.
"The game is simple." Conrad places an orange card in front of himself. "The green card is your company name, the blue card is your target buyers, and the pink card is the industry. Who wants to go first?"
There is a time to go first and there is a time to wait and see what one is up against. Aubrey keeps her hand down as they all look around the room at each other.
"I'll go," Noah cracks first. He clears his throat and flips over his cards – reading them once and then a second time. "Give me a common phobia."
"Kitchen demons," Conrad says.
"How many other people do you know that have that fear?" Beca asks seriously.
"I'm the investor here," Conrad answers.
"Hello, my name is Noah and my company is Glorious Kitchen Demons."
Aubrey furrows her brows. Yeah, it was a good thing she didn't go first.
"And what do you do at Glorious Kitchen Demons?" Conrad asks, "It sounds horrifying."
"It's really not. Here at Glorious Kitchen Demons, we provide submarines for beekeepers. You might be asking yourself why a beekeeper would need a submarine – but it's also because, at Glorious Kitchen Demons, we filled the ocean with underwater bees."
Aubrey looks at Beca then at Brian, trying to gauge the competition. Beca has an eyebrow raised at Noah and Brian is slouched in the armchair, fairly expressionless. Neither looks particularly worried about their own upcoming turn. She draws her legs up to sit cross-legged and looks down at the backs of her own cards. She can do this. It's like a riff-off but for businesses…sort of. She might feel better if she'd ever won a riff-off to begin with. It's probably too late to suggest Monopoly.
"And tell me," Conrad says, looking at his card, "How does sadism and masochism factor into this?"
"I think you just made that up," Brian comments and sits up to look at the card.
"Hey, hey, hey!" Conrad holds the card out of his reach, "I know how to read. I can't help it if I pull cards like a tarot reader. Now, like I was saying: submarines, bees, sadomasochism."
"…now you have nowhere to escape the bees?" Noah gives it his best shot.
"Wonderful." Conrad turns to Brian. "Since you're so eager to speak – next."
"Thank you." Brian stands up and straightens his shirt. "Give me a metal."
"Beryllium," Conrad says then addresses the group, "It's one of my favorite Elements because 4 Be sounds like Furby."
"I'd like to speak to you about my company: Beryllium Bottom."
Conrad sighs. "I'm bored already. Maybe you should try Tantalum Top."
"At Beryllium Bottom, we offer a special kind of service for a special kind of person. You seem like a special kind of person."
"Thank you."
"Is your dungeon in disrepair?" Brian inquires.
"I can say for a fact that it's not, actually," Conrad answers.
"Because I'd like to educate you and everyone else with decrepit, atrophying dungeons-"
"Excuse me?"
"-about Beryllium. Beryllium is stiff and hard and-"
"Creates no spark," Conrad fills in then flips another orange card, "Talk to me about how your company plans to approached Ethical Dilemmas."
"I can show you," Brian offers.
Aubrey is starting to get the feeling dungeon may be may be a euphemism.
"No thank you. I don't want a brittle product that will shatter under pressure in my dungeon. Next. Beca."
"Can I go last?" Beca tries.
"No."
Beca flips over all three cards at once and spreads them out in her hand. "I want new cards," she demands, "Aubrey rigged the game."
"What?" Aubrey sits straight up. "How? I've barely been out of your sight."
"I don't need to know how to know you did it."
"I didn't even know we were going to play a game."
"Well either you did it or Chloe's consciousness is here and trying to torment me." Beca reaches for new cards then pulls back when both Conrad and Aubrey move to slap her hand away. "You know what – fine. At least you gave me something I can sell." She adjusts her cards in her hand. "I need a music genre."
"I didn't give you anything." Aubrey glances back when Julia's hand finds her shoulder and reluctantly allows herself to be pull back.
Conrad rubs his chin. "Gay Club Remixes."
"I'm not sure that's considered a real genre," Beca mumbles, "But okay. Hi, my name is Beca. My company is Real Gay Club Remixes…" She stops in a long drawn out pause, not looking up from her cards. "…and I sell cups to people who hate everything."
After weeks of bad luck, today actually seems to be leaning in Aubrey's favor in a few ways. "Oh, you don't want to invest in that," she interrupts, "Been there, done that."
"It's not your turn, Aubrey," Beca points out, "And also, I actually achieve what I came to do."
"But at what cost?" Aubrey sits up again and turns to Conrad, "It's a good investment if all you care about out is the endgame. However, I'd suggest a different company if you want to remain in charge. Previous experience with this particular person indicates that investing in such a company would be a liability and compromise your leadership. Your hard work will be invisible to the public eye and Beca will be the main face of everything you do. Do you really want to be a background player?"
"I think you may be blowing that just a little out of proportion," Beca says.
Conrad pulls an orange card. "How does auto-tune play into her company?"
"Dude! You guys are cheating!"
"Or you're just a shit salesman," Brian says.
"Think less Cher's Believe and more the X-factor admitting to using auto-tune to make their contestants sound better."
"Fuck off. You do this for a living; I think that's an unfair advantage and I'd like to object. Aubrey's statement should be disregarded on account that she's cheating and spinning the story to her own advantage."
"Overruled. Aubrey, what are you pitching?"
Aubrey flips her cards and stares at them in disdain and regret. She licks her lips, rubs the cards together between her thumb and fingers, and considers maybe it was Beca who rigged the game. In that case, Aubrey is going to have to destroy her – even with the worst of cards. The corner of her lip twitches as she looks up and says, "Tell me the name of a sticky substance."
Lucifer himself rises from the floorboards and possesses Conrad's body with the evilest of grins.
"Just say it."
"Which version of the word do you prefer?" Conrad inquires.
The version where Aubrey makes him eat her cards and he's too busy chewing paper to say anything at all. "The technical term-"
"Cum."
"Why even ask me?"
"I just wanted to know." Conrad leans back. "So, who are you? What's the name of your business?"
"Don't worry," Noah tries to reassure her, "We're all adults."
"I'm aware." Aubrey slowly turns to face him and decides to go out on a limb. "Did you tell Conrad about Beca's audition for the Bellas?" she asks curiously. No doubt Chloe would have shared it with him at one point.
Noah rubs the back of his neck. "It may have come up in passing at some point."
It makes sense now why Conrad would choose a game better suited for her and Brian, and why he would want to be the investor instead of putting some of that unrestrained creativity to go use. Aubrey nods her understanding to herself as she stands up. "I'm sorry, but Cum Karma has experienced some unexpected setbacks – such as the name of the company falling under someone else's copyright. So I would like to pitch to you the same company, but under its new name – Paradigm Shift. We will, however, continue with our mission to provide musical data analytics to people who like to sue a lot."
"Sounds like a very self-serving company," Beca comments, "How do artists of this century come into play?"
"Shut up."
"You know what? I don't think I'm very interested in this company anymore," Conrad claims, "Next."
"Good." Aubrey sits back down. "I don't sell to cozeners."
"I guess I'm the only one who hasn't gone," Julia says and turns over her cards.
Aubrey stares Conrad down – unblinkingly.
"Tell me a verb," Julia says.
"Thinking," Aubrey deadpans, getting a look at her card from the corner of her eye.
"Thinking," Conrad smartly agrees.
Julia draws in her lips between her teeth and smiles. "My name is Julia," she introduces herself, "And my company is called Critical Thinking. Here at Critical Thinking, we provide Disaster Relief to Drag Queens."
…he even rigged someone to win if it all went haywire with everyone else. That mother-ducker.
Conrad slowly flips the next orange card. "How does Disruption play into this?" he whispers.
After a look in Beca's then Aubrey's direction, Julia confidentially answers, "It doesn't."
"I declare a winner."
"And you're never choosing a game night game again." Brian throws his cards at the table. "Want to play again sometime without him?" he asks Aubrey.
"Definitely. No Beca either."
"What? Why?" Beca throws her cards on top the others.
"No reason. I just don't like you." Aubrey settles smugly against the back of the couch. She may not have won the game, but at least she beat the competition by a landslide.
"Well, on that note," Beca replies, "I'm going to bed. Are you staying out here or are you coming with me?"
Aubrey isn't quite sure if she means the literal sense or the dirtier one… Either way. She shrugs the blanket off her right shoulder then pulls the rest of it off her left.
"Goodnight." Julia reaches for a hug.
"Night." Aubrey turns to kiss her cheek then allow herself to be hugged.
"Goodnight, Beca," Julia says, still squeezing Aubrey.
"Night," Beca responds somewhat flatly, watching them from the corner of her eye.
"Alright, my turn," Noah says when Julia finally releases Aubrey and allows her to stand up, "Bring it in."
Aubrey doesn't mean the way her muscles stiffen when he stands up and hugs her. The reaction is almost instinctive, and she finds herself taking more note of it now than any of the previous times he's hugged her. He has to notice the second he touches her she transforms from a person to a steel rod. But he just kisses her head then sends her on her way.
"Night, Beca." Noah raises his hand for a fist bump. "Don't leave me hangin'," he says when Beca doesn't budge, "Fist me." The expressions in the room suddenly range from confusion to cringing. "In the other sense of the word."
Beca slowly raises her fist and touches knuckles with him.
"What about me?" Conrad turns in Aubrey's direction and points to his cheek – and Aubrey makes sure to flick it on her way past him.
"Hey." Brian catches her by the arm. "Goodnight."
"Maybe tomorrow night, we should all form a sportsmanship line," Beca suggests when Conrad and Brian attempt good nights at her as well, "Everyone can choose a goodnight hug or goodnight fisting."
"I know what I'm choosing," Conrad replies.
"You know you like it," Aubrey comments when they reach the bedroom.
"Being fisted by your dad?" Beca plays dumb.
"Everyone caring. And he wanted to be fisted, not the other way around."
"Everyone here cares about me because they feel bad for me," Beca says.
"That's not true." Aubrey sits down on the edge of bed. "No one here is showering you in pity. Why is it so hard to believe they care about you?"
"Why is it so hard for you?" Beca questions back.
Touché. "Ever think Chloe is right and we are more alike than we think?"
"Literally never. You?"
Aubrey smiles and shakes her head. "Not once."
xxxxx
The room is too dark. Too quiet. Too still. Beca's hand stopped rubbing her back thirty minutes prior, and Aubrey's sense of calm stopped with it. It might be like this forever, she realizes – terror in the place of sleep. It's easier to sleep during the day when she's so exhausted from being restless the night before that she just passes out. It helps that the world still feels like it's moving and will still be there when she wakes up during the day. At night, even in a house full of people, she's alone. It gives her too much time to think about Chloe, about the inevitability of death for all of them – about how she could wake up in the morning to find her whole world is gone, or about how she could just not wake up at all. Both grip her with terror at the same time – one fear clasping onto her heart while the other squeezes her lungs. Morning is hours away; she has to get up.
Careful not to wake Beca, she eases herself out from under her hand and slides off the bed to the floor where Chloe's laptop is. There is a pair of earphones nearby and she jams them into the jack. No more unexpected surprises.
"Go to bed," Beca mumbles when the screen casts a dim light across the room.
"In a minute."
Beca rolls over, muttering something, and tucks her face into her arm.
Maybe this isn't the best location. Like hell she's going back into that closet though. She closes the laptop halfway and chews on the inside of her cheek while she thinks. The laptop is fully charged, so it isn't like she needs to be near an outlet. The vape pen on the edge of the nightstand catches her eye and she suddenly knows where to go. Tilting her head to peer around the screen, she stares at Beca until she's sure she's asleep, then grabs the vape and carries the laptop to the window. She just needs to get outside without making any noise.
It's probably cold, so she places her things on the floor and wrestles on a jacket, then slowly, very slowly, slides open the window to the fire escape. Just one week until she has both hands, she reminds herself as she picks up the laptop then has to put it back down in order to close the window again. Beca had better not lock her out.
Being outside alone isn't much better than being inside with everyone sleeping; if anything, it might be worse. She creeps down the stairs and tries to take comfort in the never-ending sound of traffic in the city that never sleeps. It gives her a new appreciation for impatient New Yorkers and their car horns – and one more reason to ignore Chloe's looks when she becomes one herself. If Chloe ever looks at her like that again. She even misses the way Chloe would smack her in the arm as a sign to turn her aggression down a notch – somehow productively fighting fire with fire. Now she has Beca who very unproductively fights Aubrey's fires with gasoline.
She's actually starting to have faith that they'll get the hang of each other soon enough. Contrary to what she said, she's starting to see Chloe's point about them being similar. She might even dare believe had they met under different circumstances, without Chloe in the middle, they might have even been friends… Good friends. God, the more she thinks about it, the more she would have loved to see Beca and Alice interact.
There is just enough light outside to see the footholds on Noah's boat. She slides the laptop across the floor then hoists herself up behind it in an awkward, one-handed manner.
"Finally," Noah comments from the captain's seat, and Aubrey's startled heart skips a beat, "I was starting to think you gave me up for another all-inclusive trip to The Bermuda Triangle."
"The Bahamas," Aubrey corrects him.
"Aren't they the same?"
"Not even remotely." Who would even think that?
"Huh. Doesn't explain why my first wife never came back then…" He laughs enough at his own joke for both of them. "Well, don't mind me. Do whatever it is you came up here to do. Want me to leave?"
"No." The word comes out far to rushed for Aubrey's liking. She shrugs it off by casually adding, "It's your boat."
"Alrighty." Noah turns his chair facing forward and props his feet up next to the wheel. "Figured I'd sit out here and admire the smog for awhile. You can't see smog like this everywhere, you know?"
Aubrey nods, only half paying attention, and sinks down next to her alligator print. She rests her hand over it for a moment, wondering how time passed so quickly, then drags the laptop over and reopens it. How can seconds feel like they pass like hours but years feel like they pass like minutes? One day her entire life will have passed in what will feel like a blink… She looks around for the end of the earbuds, somewhat frazzled by the internal panic, then tucks them in her ears before opening up Chloe's folder about her.
"…wish I had some company to look at the smog with me," Noah muses, "Sure is awful lonely."
"What happened to your second wife?" Aubrey replies.
"Left me for my sister. The third is sleeping."
Aubrey changes the view of the folder so it's showing thumbnails of Chloe's face instead of mp4 symbols. "Maybe next you should try a husband."
Noah chuckles. "If it comes down to it, I'm sure the two handsome fellas upstairs will hook me up. Or hook up with me."
Chloe's blue eyes seem to stare directly at her in the thumbnail of the next video. Even looking at just a partial picture of her, Aubrey knows she's dressed in full Bellas uniform, and she's grinning wider than seems possible. It makes Aubrey smile too. They were so small and full of such big dreams. And if it hadn't been for Jesse, they would be living those dreams right now. Chloe would still be smiling. If Chloe dies, Aubrey will kill him – even if it means a lifetime of repercussions. And if he's already dead, she'll figure out a way to kill him again.
It all hurts too much. She closes the laptop then pulls out the vape and pretends to be overly-focused on the mechanics of it. She removes the cartridge. Replaces it. Presses the button a few times. He took everything from her – and all she had ever done to keep him apart from Beca was tell The Bellas they couldn't date Trebles. She didn't even put that much effort into making it so! A few glares in Jesse's direction here and there were the extent of upholding that rule. If anything, she helped him – trying to keep Beca away from The Bellas, being madly in love with Chloe even if it only came out in the form of jealousy.
"You're going to break it," Noah says.
Aubrey looks at him and then down at the vape. It looks like she's trying to snap it in half with just one hand. She loosens her grip on it and rests it on her lap. The rage still lingers, trapped inside like a tiger pacing around in a too small cage. If she releases it, it will attack everything it comes into contact with. She licks her lips then lifts the vape pen to them as she stares off at the side of the boat. Depression medication is one thing. What she needs right now is emotional Lidocaine.
"Do me a favor?" Noah asks, "I got a pack of cigarettes in that drawer over there. Grab 'em for me?"
The idea of either of Chloe's parents smoking comes as a shock – though she isn't quite sure why after learning they were just fine smoking weed. She pushes the laptop off her lap then struggles to her feet.
"You'll need the key. Gotta keep it locked so my wife don't stumble on them." The drawer is so close, he could lean over and open it without even standing up. Instead, he reaches into his pocket and offers out his keyring. "It's the one with the jellyfish." All of his keys have rubber covers over them. And all of them are a different kind of marine animal. Part of Aubrey thinks they may have been a gift from Chloe. The other part is sure he shops for himself on Etsy. It would explain a lot of the fish knickknacks around his house – especially the set of fish figurines wearing cowboy hats that sit next to his Western novels.
"There's nothing in here," Aubrey mumbles, the vape pen balanced between her lips. Nothing except a motion activated light, the cheap battery powered kind from Dollar General, and a photograph. She picks it up like an entire pack of cigarettes might be hiding underneath and doesn't actually look at it until she puts it back down. It strikes her as odd that it isn't in one of his albums. Instead, he carries a single picture of a baby, maybe a few days old, in his boat's glove compartment. She puts it back and shuts the door.
"Look again."
Aubrey looks. At him. Incredulously. Fine. She reopens it and looks again at the same empty compartment. "Nothing. Maybe you smoked them all?"
"Keep looking." He sounds like her father now – setting her up for failure.
"The only thing in there is this." Aubrey picks up the photograph and shows it to him. It isn't dated, but she can tell from the yellowing border that it has been aging in there for awhile.
"Lemme see." Noah motions her to hand it over before she can put it away. He looks at it for a moment with the same sad expression Aubrey has seen him stare at Chloe in here hospital bed with, then he holds it up next to his face.
The photo is older, but not nearly old enough to be a photo of him. Still, beyond just the dark skin, there is a similarity between the two of them.
"It's the nose and the caterpillar eyebrows." Noah motions between his own face and the child's.
They are bushy eyebrows, for a baby, and sometimes Noah's eyebrows look like they want to crawl off his face and spin a cocoon. "Is that your brother?" Aubrey guesses.
"I'm an only child. Just pullin' your leg with the whole second wife leaving me for my sister thing. It was actually my aunt." He turns the photograph around to look at it again. "I didn't fill albums back then. Didn't even carry a camera. This is one of the only photos I have. I have to use my memory if I want to see him crinkle his nose every time he yawned again. It was my favorite face." He laughs. "It was like he was rubbing it in, saying how exhausting it was to do absolutely nothing but eat, sleep, and pee on good ol' Dad who had never changed a diaper before. I take pictures now. Started taking even more of them after my mother-in-law got dementia. Too many special moments I'm scared to forget if that ever happened to me."
None of what he is saying makes any sense. "Mom told me she never had her own kids. She said she didn't want to experience being pregnant."
"Why do you think she told you that?" Noah asks, "Really think about it."
There is only one reason that comes to mind – the pain. But it doesn't fit. You don't love someone and then just pretend they never existed once they're gone – especially not your own child. It may not be a talking point over dinner, but it isn't something you outright lie about. Unless there is a reason you don't want people to know, so you never bring it up… Because you don't want it used against you. Rubbed in your face. "Daniel. That's why he said I'm a replacement."
"That's my fault. He had been doin' so good for awhile. I thought we were finally getting through. Julia told me not to introduce them to my mom. I shoulda listened. But she needed a ride to church and I couldn't leave Daniel home alone. Julia and Chloe were off on a mother/daughter day. I figured what's the harm in a fifteen minute car ride? She said God was punishing us by taking Darius away and the least we could do was not replace him with a stray – right while he was sitting there in the backseat. All that progress, gone in a fifteen minute car ride. I thought she was going to leave me. I wouldn't have even blamed her."
"How did you keep him from telling Chloe?"
"With the same thing that's going to keep you from telling Chloe. Love. Let me tell you something though, we would have taken those two no matter what. I knew from the second I saw them that those were my kids, and if that would have made us a family of five, then so be it. Bringing them home had nothing to do with what we had lost."
"Why are you telling me this?"
"Because I'm angry. I'm downright pissed off. No one knew shit back then. They gave you your baby and sent you home from the hospital with nothing more than a 'good luck'. There weren't all these classes or books. Sometimes, you put your baby to bed at night and they never woke up again – it was just a thing that happened, doctors didn't know why. You'd think in the late 80s/early 90s they'd've stopped blaming premarital sex and biracial relationships, but no. Instead, your neighbors blame melanin and a baby's innate ability to know whether it was conceived before or after marriage. The church says God gave it to you then decided to take it back.
Then you fall in love again. And, again, it feels meant to be. But not everyone believes that. And so you end up with a son who hates you and a secret that you don't want to keep, but if keeping it protects your daughter, you will.
Eventually, you settle into life as it is, and all these studies start being released on something called SIDS. And you can't for the life of you remember who put the baby to bed that night. Maybe it was me. Maybe I put him to sleep on his stomach. Or too close to a blanket. Maybe one little change and it all could have been different.
Maybe one little change and it all would have been different for Chloe. I never talked to her about you or Beca. I figured if she wanted advice, she'd ask. And your mother and I agreed that we weren't going to put pressure on her. We didn't want loving you to make her feel like she needed to make your relationship work if it wasn't. But maybe if we'd talked, this never would have happened.
So I'm angry, and I don't know what to do with it? What do we do with it, Aubrey?"
It's a whirlwind of information to process and so many questions beg to be asked, but he asks her one instead. One that she doesn't know the answer to. She could yell, fight, punch holes through a thousand walls – and, in the end, she's sure she would still be just as angry. "If you figure it out, let me know."
"I will. Until then, we can be angry together."
They're all active volcanoes. Her. Beca. Chloe's dad. Maybe even her mom. "I'm sorry. About your son." About all his kids really. How the universe could gift her own unloving parents three kids while tearing three away from people who really deserve them, she'll never understand. It pisses her off more than she already was.
"I won't hold it against you if you tell your mom you know, but-"
"I understand." He doesn't need to say anything else for Aubrey to know it's another secret to keep locked away. "I won't tell Chloe either." Oddly, the person she really wants to tell is Beca. It doesn't help them. There is no reason Aubrey needs to tell her. And yet she can't come up with any reason why she shouldn't.
They fall into silence, and Aubrey doesn't quite know how to fill it, but it feels like it needs to be filled. She pulls the vape back out as an excuse for a few moments to think and looks up at the sky. For a fraction of a second, she's almost sure she sees a star – until it blinks and reveals itself to be an airplane. "The smog is thick tonight…"
Noah laughs a full belly laugh. "Doesn't get much thicker than this, does it?"
Aubrey regrets to inform him, "It does, actually." There are some nights where the entire night sky and everything in it are covered in such a thick blanket of pollution, it might as well be considered another layer of the atmosphere. And when Chloe squints up at the sky, looking for any sign of the moon, it makes Aubrey wonder how much she really wants to be here.
"Well, shit. Ah well. I'm sure if I dig through Chloe's things, I'll find a few packs of those glow-in-the-dark stars."
"Doubtful. What didn't fit on the ceiling is on the walls – and in various places throughout my room." Aubrey would offer him hers, but the thought of giving them up brings in a whole new wave of grief. "Do you really want to look like a ten year old girl from the nineties anyway?"
"You don't think I could pull off that aesthetic?"
Aubrey looks from his argyle sweater to the matching argyle socks sticking out from above his shoes. He looks like he could pass for a Brooks Brothers mannequin. Not that that's a bad thing. It's just one of the furthest things from a 90s preteen that she can think of.
"I think I'd look hella fly. All that and a bag of chips."
Aubrey remembers that slang from the nineties. The main thing she remembers about it is that is wasn't being used by the 'cool girls' on the playground – or any of the girls at all really. It came from the mouths of boys who would later have greasy hair and no knowledge on how deodorant worked but still thought they were god's gift to females. It was slang he had probably picked up from his son… She feels a little guilty thinking that now, knowing what she knows. Still, people made choices regardless of their upbringing. Many of the wrong ones, but they were choices none-the-less. She would know.
"Aubrey." Noah snaps his fingers together, pulling her out of a trance, "You're doing the thing. Maybe it's time for bed."
The thing. Every time she spaces out, all she can think of when she returns back to reality is Chloe standing in that bathroom, staring – there, but somewhere else completely.
"Aubrey."
"I actually think I'm going to stay up for awhile." Just the thought of lying there with nothing to do but think removes the oxygen from her lungs, one molecule at a time. She sits back down next to the laptop and opens it up again. Chloe's face greets her again, stilling grinning like it never had the laptop slammed shut on it. She presses the earbuds into her ears one at a time then double clicks on the next video. Chloe goes from just a picture to a fully animated person – rambling about school and The Bellas and how she's sure Aubrey is the most beautiful person to walk the planet. It hits different hearing her say it to her laptop rather than to her face; it's far more believable that Chloe Beale is deeply, madly, and kinda creepily in love with her.
xxxxx
"Your hands are cold."
"Sorry," Aubrey whispers and slides into bed. It doesn't stop her from keeping her hand resting on Beca's arm. The intent had been to wake her up. "Can we talk?"
Beca rolls onto her back and looks between Aubrey and the glowing numbers on the digital clock. "Right now?"
Everything Aubrey learned can wait until morning. Aubrey, however, can't. No secrets, right? She finally moves her hand to pull the blankets up over her body then freezes Beca with her feet instead – purposely pressing them against her legs.
"Oh my god, I'm about to shove you off the bed."
"Chloe's mom lied. They had a baby."
"What?" Beca absently kicks Aubrey's feet away from her, more focused on her words now.
Aubrey adjusts her pillow then, much to Beca's clear displeasure, entangles their legs together to warm her own back up. They both turn onto their sides to face each other, only separated by Aubrey's cast. It's so much different than being in bed next to Chloe. Instead of tackling her onto her back and wrapping her entire body around her, Beca rests a hand on her waist. It's not as warm as being cocooned by Chloe, but it's warm none-the-less.
"You're just going to drop that on me and then say nothing else?" Beca is awake now. Even in the dark, Aubrey can see her eyes are wide open and she's ready for whatever Aubrey has to tell her. "Spill."
It takes her a moment to say anything. She gets caught up on her other conversation with Noah – about being a preteen girl in the nineties. Lying in bed every weekend alone, this was exactly what ten year old Aubrey imagined sleepovers were like – when she allowed herself to think those things. Sharing a single bed, whispering deep, dark secrets in the middle of the night, trying to be quiet so parents in the next room wouldn't overhear. She wondered how people made friends like that. Then she met Chloe. Chloe – her best friend who she is also in love with. Chloe – who comes with giddiness and feelings. (Not that Beca doesn't invoke some pretty passionate feelings; they just range from mild irritation to full on outrage.) Chloe blew every expectation she had out of the park. Beca is directly on top of that expectation line, slapping her in the side (literally). Maybe they really could have been friends…
"Dude, come on."
Aubrey peeks over the blanket at the door, double checking that it's closed. All clear. She sinks back down and gets as comfortable as she can. If it was Chloe across from her, so close Aubrey could feel her breath, every cell in Aubrey's body would be screaming 'kiss her' – the fact that no part of her is demanding she kiss Beca is just one more reason Chloe's plan for them would have never worked. Being able to freely feel however the hell she wants about Beca is such a weight off that she's honestly happy Beca's here. She hates to think that Chloe did far more damage than good in trying to force them to be friends and then lovers, but…
"Au-Brey."
"If you'd shut up for a second, I'd be able to tell you." God, she's the single most annoying person on earth.
Beca raises her eyebrows so high that, in the dark with shadows, they seem to reach her hairline.
It's difficult to push thoughts of Chloe aside, but she has to in order to gather her thoughts in other areas. She begins with not being able to sleep and wanting watch Chloe's videos without waking her, so Beca doesn't ask what she was doing outside, then tells her everything from the moment she stepped out the window until she arrived back in bed.
And after that, because she feels so badly about waking Beca up (not really), she bores her back to sleep with another story about the World's Fair.
And when the sun peaks inside from behind the curtain, she's still awake, trying to make sense of new knowledge and this whole new life.
