The next morning, Amber woke up to sunlight pouring through her open window and a chorus of birds singing good morning to the world, way too loudly. It was way too early for this, she thought grumpily, mad that she had forgotten to close the curtain last night. She shoved her head under her pillow, deafening the noisy birds and shielding her eyes from the light; she laid with them closed for a second.

Until they snapped back open.

Beca.

She sat up quickly, sending pillows and blankets flying as she scrambled out of bed, skirted around boxes, and crossed the room to the door that was cracked open. She took a steadying breath to gain composure and pulled the door open excitedly.

The living room was brightly lit but empty except for the towers of boxes scattered about. The blanket she had covered Beca with the night before lay folded on the couch with a piece of cardboard that had been stripped off one of the boxes sitting on top of it. Amber walked over, waves of disappointment crashing on her with each step.

The cardboard had a note scribbled across it; Amber picked it up gingerly and began to read in Beca's messy scrawl:

"Hey dude, sorry I crashed here last night. I appreciate you taking care of me, hope I wasn't too much of a bother. Bella's are gonna have a meeting tonight at 7 in the community hall. See ya then newbie - beca"

Amber dropped her arms to her sides, the note still grasped in her hand. After reading it, she couldn't tell if Beca remembered the tension between them from the night before or not. She sank down onto the couch, Beca's note lay on the cushion next to her while she rubbed the heels of her hands into her itchy eyes, annoyed with herself now for not taking out her contacts.

Beca hadn't been a bother; in fact, she had been the exact opposite. Amber groaned to herself as she thought about how happy she had been last night even just hanging out with Beca and how badly she wanted to hang out with her again.

After a moment's thought, she came to the conclusion that maybe it was for the best that nothing had happened between them. She had most definitely wanted something in the moment, but without Beca here, the only thoughts Amber had now were how mad Aubrey would be if something had happened.

Would she though?

As far as Amber knew, the two girls had buried the hatchet at the end of last semester, but she was sure Aubrey would still be upset if she found out her sister had gotten together with the girl she had spent the entire year hating. Amber's mind raced as she went over everything that had happened in the last 24 hours.

It felt like well over a week since she had run into the door at the auditorium and found herself face to face with Beca. There was no way it could have just been yesterday morning, so much had happened, but from the soreness in her body, there was no denying it.

She thought back to Beca's concerned face appearing over her while she laid flat on her back, and felt her face flush in embarrassment. What had she said? "Can't be embarrassed if nothing bothers you?" She rolled her eyes at herself; trust her to play it cool only to end up very bothered at the end of the day.

"Stop being such a fucking lesbian," she whined to the empty room as she leaned back on the couch. "You're not in love with everyone you meet," she told herself forcibly.

But Amber had a habit of being a little too loose with her heart sometimes, which typically resulted in some type of emotional distress after months of pining away for people who didn't really want her. She had adamantly told herself before she came to Barden that she would spend the year alone, not concerned with anyone else but herself.

This was already proving hard.

Because from the moment she had seen Beca at graduation the year before, the brunette had carved a little spot for herself in the front of Amber's brain; even if she didn't know Amber existed.

So Amber had spent the summer going back and forth with Aubrey and Chloe about whether to follow family tradition or go to NYU where she had been planning to study law. The older girls had been pushing for years for Amber to suddenly have the desire to enroll at Barden and become a Bella, but she had adamantly wanted to stay as far away from her birthright as possible. It came as a shock when Amber told her family one night at dinner that she had chosen to go to Barden after all.

"I'm not doing the Bellas," she added hastily at the excited looks on her mother's, sister's, and Chloe's faces.

Simultaneously, all three of them went from being ecstatic to looking very let down. Aubrey objected loudly, "but you said even if you went to NYU you were going to join a Capella!"

"I know, I just don't really want to have to be the follow-up to Aubrey act." Chloe stifled a laugh in her napkin and tried not to catch Aubrey's eye. "I'm just not ready to be that far from you guys yet," Amber added, "New York is just really far away."

Her comment successfully smoothed over the rest of the night, but Aubrey and Chloe hounded Amber for the last few weeks of her summer before they finally convinced her to audition for the Bella's.

Now here she was, sitting in her chaotic apartment at Barden University, one of the newest members of the Bella's. Her sister really had gotten her wish after all, so it couldn't possibly kill her if something were to happen between Amber and the new Bella captain.

It had definitely seemed like Beca had been into her, but come to think of it, she didn't even know if Beca liked girls. The image of Jesse lifting her up over his shoulder last year replayed in Amber's head on repeat, and she felt her heart sink.

It wasn't a girl Beca had run to.

She decided she was just grasping at straws and that it was pointless to keep thinking about it, choosing to instead tell herself once again that it was for the better that nothing happened.

She sighed while she looked around her crowded apartment; she was really going to need to get this handled.

The second Beca cracked her eyes open, her head started throbbing uncontrollably. She groaned into her pillow, pulled her blanket tighter around herself, and rolled over, hoping to fall back asleep. She was pretty sure she had smoked more weed last night than she had ever even seen in front of her her whole life.

And then she realized where she was.

Amber.

She sat up and looked around the living room she was so familiar with, but that looked so different now. The sunlight was so bright she wasn't sure how she had managed to sleep, but as she peered around the boxes, there was no sign of her.

Stretching her arms out, she finally got up; as soon as she was standing, she noticed Aubrey's door was cracked and knew that's where Amber must be. She paused for a second as memories from the night before slowly flooded back into her tired brain; the more she remembered, the wider her eyes grew.

She had had an amazing night, she couldn't lie, much better than her first initiation night, and maybe any other time she'd gone to a party her whole life.

Seconds ticked by, and Beca remained paused in the middle of the living room, her mind going 1000 miles an hour. If she was remembering correctly, she had spoken more about her life last night than she ever had with anyone else. Ever.

And then there was… no, she couldn't be remembering that correctly, right? Her eyebrows scrunched together as she stared at the door in front of her, her stomach gave a nasty lurch. "Oh my god," she whispered finally.

Before she could stop herself, she made her way to the door and pushed it open a little wider. Amber was fast asleep, the sun throwing her face into light; Beca felt the lurch in her stomach again and withdrew her head from the room quickly.

"Fuck," she whispered as she searched around Amber's still-packed possessions, looking for a piece of paper to no avail. Finally, she decided to rip one of the flaps off a box, found an eyeliner in the bathroom, and scribbled a note hastily on the cardboard.

That was casual, right?

She read it over again and groaned, "I don't know what I'm doing," while she folded the blanket she had used quickly and deposited it on Amber's orange couch, sticking the note on top of it. She grabbed their abandoned waffle plates off the floor and stuck them in the sink as quietly as she could.

"Okay, you're fine, this is fine," she was trying her best to stay calm. Glancing back at the living room one more time, Beca silently let herself out the front door, locking the handle as she went. She wouldn't want anyone to come and murder Amber, after all.

Once she was outside the apartment, she pulled her phone from her pocket, seeing it was only 7:30; she heaved a big sigh. She was up way earlier than she normally would be two days in a row now. Deciding it would be best to go get in her bed, Beca made her way out of the building and began a slow journey back across campus to her dorm.

It was a really nice day out so far; the campus was still and quiet, no one else seemed to have gotten up besides her yet. Beca was enjoying her walk and a bit of time to herself when she got a text from Chloe asking how last night had gone.

She almost smacked her hand to her forehead; Chloe was exactly the person she wanted to talk to right now. Without hesitating, Beca clicked FaceTime and waited for the former Bella to answer.

Chloe's smiling face answered immediately. "Beca! You're up early! Am I getting to witness a walk of shame right now?" She had clearly seen Beca was making her way through campus.

Beca rolled her eyes, "not exactly--oh, hi, Aubrey." Aubrey, clutching a mug of coffee, had appeared behind Chloe. She didn't feel much like talking about her night with Aubrey present; the older girl had already given her enough hell last year about Jesse, she was sure she would have a lot to say about Beca's evening with Amber.

"Good morning, Beca," Aubrey responded stiffly. Beca looked at her curiously; what could she possibly have done to bother her already?

Thankfully Chloe seemed to pick up that Beca didn't want to discuss her night with Aubrey there, "so tell us about the girls you picked!"

Beca led the conversation, talking about Flo, she was the easier of the two for her to go into detail about. "I think she'll help a lot with choreography since you're gone now, Chlo--"

"No one," Chloe responded very seriously, "will ever replace me." Her face broke into a smile, "but ya know she can do her best."

"What about the other girl?" Aubrey had finally spoken again, and she looked more interested this time.

"Yeah," Beca said slowly, "her name's Amber. She's actually pretty great." She paused for a second, considering what she should say next; both girls were looking at her expectantly over the phone. "Um, but she seems really talented; she has a great voice, she seems really cool, and listen to this, guys. She lives in your old apartment!"

"What? No way," Chloe and Aubrey said almost at the exact same time. Both of them sounded as if they were feigning surprise, and Beca raised an eyebrow at them.

"That is wild," Aubrey drawled.

"Yeah," Beca said uncertainly; this was a weirder reaction than she had expected. "Chloe, I think you'd love her, but I think Aubrey might hate her."

Chloe ducked away from the camera for a second, leaving Aubrey tight-lipped in the frame. When Chloe reappeared, her face was slightly red, "sorry, had to sneeze," she said apologetically. "So why do you think Aubrey would hate her exactly?"

Aubrey continued to look moody in the background, "well, you guys are just sort of polar opposites. Like I remember how you felt about me last year, and I just think Amber might be even worse for you," she laughed lightly. "Plus you would have died when she lit a blunt in the kitch--"

"She did what?" Aubrey snapped, actually looking upset for the first time.

"Oh come on, Aubrey, you don't even live there anymore," Beca insisted. She looked pointedly at Chloe before saying dully, "See? Knew she would hate her."

"She sounds trashy," Aubrey deadpanned before excusing herself to go shower, leaving Beca alone with Chloe at last, right as she reached her dorm. She knew her roommate would be asleep, so she sat down on a wall outside the building to continue her conversation in the shade.

"Okay, spill," Chloe commanded as soon as Beca was situated and the shower was running in her bathroom, ensuring Aubrey was out of earshot.

"Chloe, I almost kissed her--" Chloe's eyes grew wide in excitement. "Amber. I literally almost kissed her last night. But she got a call, and then I sort of passed out…" Beca trailed off uncertainly. She could tell Chloe was bursting at the seams.

"This is so exciting," the redhead couldn't keep the smile off her face. "I knew you were into girls--"

"Well, I don't even know--" Beca hadn't been able to decide if maybe it had just been the weed and good conversation or if she had actually been finding herself wanting to kiss Amber. Maybe it was a combination of both.

Chloe made a funny face, "Well," she drew the word out for as long as she could. "I tried to help you figure that out last year, but you wouldn't let me."

Beca rolled her eyes. Chloe was right; she had spent a good portion of the year trying to get Beca to sleep with her to no avail. The two of them really did have an odd relationship, but maybe that was just it; if she didn't want to sleep with Chloe, then she wasn't gay, right? It had to have just been the weed.

She suggested this to Chloe, who laughed out loud this time. "Oh, baby girl, while I am flattered that you think your sexuality rests solely on my shoulders, I just don't think that's true." Beca groaned in response, but Chloe's usage of "baby girl" caught her attention; now two people had called her that in less than 12 hours.

"I think you should just let things play out," Chloe said knowingly. "Plus, you have the Bellas to focus on."

Beca knew that Chloe was right, but she couldn't get the thought of Amber out of her head. She tried to rationalize this by telling herself that since Amber was a Bella now, it was totally fine for her to think about her nonstop this morning, but that seemed like a stretch.

Chloe saw the look on Beca's face and knew what she was thinking. "It's okay to not know," she said kindly. "Just make sure no one's feelings get hurt, and everything will be okay."

"Thanks, Chlo, I appreciate you." Chloe smiled brightly back at her in response. "Listen, could you not mention anything to Aubrey? I don't want to give her another reason to think I'm a shitty captain."

"Of course," Chloe promised her.

"Okay, I gotta plan our first meeting, but I'm gonna go back to bed first. I'll talk to you later, okay?"

"You better," Chloe joked before adding, "you're gonna do great, Becs."

Beca smiled, bade her goodbye, hung up, and climbed the steps to her dorm; she was asleep again before she even hit the pillow.