Chapter Text
“I’m taking you to a special place that I found.”
“Alek, you know I hate surprises.”
“And that is precisely why I’m surprising you,” he said, with a cheeky smile spreading across his face.
“Seriously,” she grumbled, arms crossed, sporting a pout that nearly tricked Alek into believing it.
“I know you’ll love it,” he reassures, taking her hand and continuing to lead her around a bend up the hill. “Seriously, you’re going to love this surprise.”
“I don’t know about that. I never like anything that’s a surprise.”
“Well, I think that’s about to change, even for just this once. You’ll see.”
“Alek, seriously where are you taking me?” she whines practically stomping her feet in detest.
“We’re almost there,” he reassures, running a few feet ahead of her and through a clearing of tall weeds. “Just walk through and follow my voice.”
“Really? This better be something real special,” she grumbles, staring in disgust at the weeds.
“C’mon, hon. Just walk through and you’ll see what I’m seeing. And let me tell you it is quite worth a moment of walking through weeds taller than I am,” he coaxes from the other side. He hears her take a long sigh followed by a shuffling of weeds, “Alright, just a few more steps.”
“Alek, I swear if this is some,” she cuts off her words the second she steps out into the open area, her thought process instantly lost the second she sees the sky.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“It’s incredible,” she replies, simply dumbfounded by the sunset before her. The wonderful array of oranges and pink swirling through the sky above a large town.
“I knew you’d love it,” Alek responds smugly.
All she muster up in reply is a simple nod of her head and Alek takes it as a sign to stop talking and just appreciate the sunset. So he throws himself onto the hard ground and cranes his neck towards the sky. It takes another minute or two before she can do the same but eventually she makes it onto the ground next to Alek.
“Thank you for taking me here,” she says finally, Alek’s arm wrapping around her shoulder and holding her close. “It’s stunning.”
“You’re welcome. I just knew, the first time I came here, that I’d have to bring you here,” he explains with a kiss to the temple of her head.
“It really is. I’ll definitely come back here again.”
--
And come back she did.
She came back a few months after that with Alek the day he proposed to her. And again when they found out she was pregnant. Many months after that, just after Albie’s first birthday, she went again, alone this time. It was the day after Alek was hospitalized and mere hours after he was declared dead. That night she witnessed one of the most amazing sunsets she had ever seen. So many shades of pink, purple and orange were swirling through the sky, mixing in with the clouds floating by and even when the sky became dark and the stars dominated the sky, she remained.
And since that night, she made a promise to herself to bring Albie there every year, make a tradition out of it. Which she did and he loved it just as much as she did and looked forward to going there with his mother. But ever since she started to travel and forget about what her life used to be like, when she could actually be herself, she had stopped going to the lot to watch the sunset. She hadn’t been back in decades...until tonight, that is.
--
When she got in the car with Beca she didn’t even know where she was going to bring her. Subconsciously she knew it would be to the lot but she didn’t want to fully admit to herself that that’s what she was doing. She knew what bringing Beca to the lot meant to her. She was terrified of that but she let her subconscious lead her down the still familiar path, the conversation with Beca about not liking surprises, taking her back to the first time she had gone there with Alek. It was a bittersweet feeling to revisit those first moments in the lot and to be, almost, replacing them with this moment with Beca.
Deep down she knew that Alek would be so happy to see that she came back here again, this time, with someone new. Someone that, obviously, was making at least a bit of an impact on her life. She knew that he was smiling up there, wherever he is. And picturing that smile brought tears to her eyes and a smile to her face.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” Chloe says, brushing the tears from eyes with a chuckle. “I just have some really good memories here.”
“Oh,” Beca replies, turning her attention back to the sky. “It truly is beautiful here.”
“It is,” Chloe mumbles, blindly poking at her takeout container hoping to get some food between her chopsticks without having to tear her eyes away from the sky. It was one of the more stunning sunsets tonight and in a weird way, Chloe knew this was some kind of sign.
“Do you come here often?”
“Not really,” the older girl admits, then taking a bite of sesame chicken. “When I was younger, I did. But I haven’t been back in a long, long time.”
“Oh, I see,” Beca mumbles between bites of her own food. “How’d you find this place?”
“Someone very special to me brought me here long ago. Just something that he found and knew I would love,” Chloe explains, a nostalgic smile on her face as she thinks back to that night.
“So, that’s what you meant by special place?”
“Kind of,” she replies, her smile falling away. “I’ve been here a few times with him and, uh, someone else too. They loved to come watch the sunset here.”
“I can see why,” Beca cuts in, her voice soft. “It truly is beautiful.”
“Yeah,” Chloe mumbles, looking back out to the sky with teary eyes. Immediately Beca leans back onto the hood of the car, having abandoned her carton of food, leaning into Chloe just enough so that they were touching. And they remained like that, watching the sunset, until the sun could no longer be seen and the stars were slowly making their way to being visible.
--
“So, will I see you again or are you just going to disappear on me again?” Beca asks as she pulls the car over in front of Chloe’s apartment building. “I mean, you did show me where you live, so you’ll be much easier to track down this time.”
“I hardly think that will be necessary,” Chloe giggles. “But it’s good to know you won’t let me go that easy.”
“Yeah,” Beca mumbles, her smile fading slightly. “Thank you for tonight.”
“It was my pleasure. I should be thanking you for trusting me to begin with,” Chloe responds, looking off into the dark.
“Maybe I’ll see you soon?”
“Um, actually, if you’d like, you could drive around the corner up there,” the older girl says pointing up ahead. Beca shifts her attention from the redhead to the road and oddly feels the need to comply. “And another right here.”
“Apparently me trusting you comes really easily,” Beca chuckles as Chloe guides her into a parking lot. “But where exactly are we?”
“I figured we could use a drink,” Chloe replies simply, hopping out of the car before Beca has even turned off the ignition.
“There’s no bars around here,” Beca comments dumbly, instantly realizing her mistake. “Yeah, I know, I’m an idiot.”
Chloe beams back at her, “Well, you’re an adorable idiot so I think it’s okay.”
“I’d hope so,” Beca says, following closely next to Chloe as she leads them through the dark lot and towards the back of her building.
“Now, don’t be totally dumbfounded when we get to my floor, okay?”
“Why would I be totally dumbfounded?” Beca asks as they step into the elevator. She watches as the older girl hits the button for the top floor and, she can’t lie, her eyebrow shoots up a little bit.
“I just have a feeling,” Chloe says, her gaze fixed on the elevator doors as they make their way up. All the way up. And when the doors open to a bland hallway with two doors, Beca isn’t sure why she would be so dumbfounded.
“And I’m waiting to prove this feeling wrong,” Beca laughs, trailing behind her as she makes her way toward the door, key in hand.
“Well, good luck,” Chloe replies as she throws the door open and leads the younger girl inside.
Before Beca has even made her way fully through the doorway her jaw is already dropping. The second she realizes this, however, she closes her mouth shut and nervously fixes her hair to cover up her shock. As if that would really work in the slightest. Chloe closes the door and leans against it as Beca makes her way around the very spacious apartment. The far wall is an overlook onto the city and, to put it simply, stunning and awe worthy. The living room is a mass of beautiful leather furniture and a large flat screen against the wall. The rest of the apartment is adorned with photographs from around the world and if Beca didn’t know any better she would think that they were taken by Chloe herself. It simply would take far too much time for one person to travel to all of these places, not to mention that some of these photos seemed to have been taken generations ago. If she had to admit one thing it’s that Chloe has great taste.
“Are you done ogling at my decor and ready for wine?” Chloe asks hesitantly from where she’s sat on the couch, two glasses of wine in hand, one already half empty.
“Oh, right,” Beca replies quickly scampering over to the other girl and ungracefully plopping down next to her.
“Such grace for someone so small,” Chloe chuckles.
“Hey!” Beca yelps, “I take offense to that. And you’re only a couple inches taller than me!”
“Those couple inches sure make the difference. Far more grace than you, Becs,” Chloe replies, taking another sip of wine.
“If you weren’t so cute and honest I would fight you on this. But you’re offering me wine so I have to be nice,” Beca grumbles taking a large, of course ungraceful, sip of wine. “And you have good taste in wine, great.”
“Hmm?”
“Right, I said that aloud,” Beca whispers, clearly backtracking her thoughts. “You have a wonderful taste in wine and well, decor and travel, too. And basically everything.”
“Thank you,” Chloe smiles. “Someone gets awfully chatty after wine.”
“Please, I’ve only had one sip. You haven’t seen anything yet,” Beca smirks.
“If I didn’t know any better I’d think you’re insisting on getting drunk and seeing who can hold their liquor better,” Chloe insinuates, a smirk growing on her face, because let’s be real that wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen.
“I mean, I already have ingested alcohol, so it would be totally irresponsible of you to let me drive home,” Beca coaxes, taking another sip of wine.
“I would never be irresponsible like that,” Chloe insists, throwing her arms up pretending to take offense to such an accusation.
“But you would be irresponsible enough to get drunk with me in the middle of the week?”
“Oh, definitely.”
“You don’t know what you’ve gotten yourself into, Chlo,” Beca tsks pouring her another glass of wine and topping off her own. “I think I could drink you under a table.”
“Oh, you’re so on, Mitchell.”