Chapter Text
A college bar is the last place Beca wants to be after a killer week at the label, yet here she is, sipping on a familiar local brew in a pub down the street from Barden University. It’s Emily’s 21st birthday weekend and the Bellas — the old Bellas, not Emily’s new infant squad — wanted to have a small reunion to celebrate.
But as it turns out, only Cynthia Rose, who was in between jobs, Aubrey, who was already in Atlanta for a vacation, and the occupants of Beca’s apartment, who never seemed to have a busy weekend, were able to come down. Chloe had jumped at the chance to visit their alma mater, and it wasn’t like Fat Amy was doing anything important anyway, so the three of them had booked flights before any other Bellas had confirmed.
Beca blows out a breath and takes another swig of her beer, continuing to tune out the guy next to her who’s desperately been trying and failing to flirt. He had sidled up to her when she was ordering her drink, and while she wants to go back to where Emily and Cynthia Rose are taking turns catching cashews in their mouths, he keeps running his mouth about nothing in particular and insisting he buy her another drink. Her noncommittal answers and cold shoulder do little to discourage him, and she feels herself starting to zone out while staring at the small cup full of plastic stirrers on the counter.
It’s been a while since the Bellas were all together in the same room, let alone the same state, and being back at Barden really drags out the nostalgia. She glances over at the dart board at the far side of the bar where Flo had once chucked a beer bottle instead of a dart and got them banned for months. She hears the toilet flush in the distance, bringing back vivid memories of holding back Chloe’s hair as she heaved greasy bar food and bottom shelf tequila.
She’d be lying if she said she didn’t miss the chaotic shenanigans. Emily’s birthday had given them all an excuse to meet up, but with their new lives as working women with actual adult responsibilities, a full-Bella reunion sounds more unlikely than ever. It’s great to see Cynthia Rose and Aubrey again, sure, but Beca hasn’t seen Flo, Jessica, Ashley, or Lilly since Emily’s delayed initiation at the Bella house.
There’s nothing she could do, though. This isn’t the same as dragging them out of bed or classes for Bellas rehearsals and cardio sessions. It’s jobs, it’s grad school, it’s real life. For Emily’s sake, she wants to enjoy the weekend and treat the youngest Bella to a good 21st birthday celebration.
‘Cept for this damn stubborn hair gel frat boy who can’t take a hint.
She rolls her eyes to herself before she turns to him and cuts off his next words.
“Hey, listen, P… uh… Paulie? Pedro? What’s your name again?” she asks, feeling a lot like her old boss at Residual Heat.
He smiles, pleased at the attention. “Peter.” He pushes back his dark hair as he introduces — or re-introduces, Beca really doesn’t remember — himself, his smile more of a tilted smirk that showed off wolfish canines. He has on a dark button down and shorts despite the chilly November wind outside, and she can tell right away that he’s about to prove impossible to shake off.
“Peter,” she repeats with a nod. “Listen, I’m not really in the mood to do… whatever this is, right now, okay?” she says, waving finger between them. “I’m too old for you, kiddo. I’m really not looking to be hit on by children ton — ”
“No, you’re not,” he says with an easy laugh.
Beca reels back, plastering on a strained smile. “Excuse me?”
“What are you, a senior? Grad student? Whatever, I don't discriminate, I'm not ageist,” the kid, Peter, shrugs with a smirk, and she bristles at the cockiness of his tone. It isn’t that Beca has never had this tone used on her — males in the music industry always spoke to her and her few female colleagues like they were bumbling idiots — but she’d forgotten how it felt to have someone in her own age range talk down to her.
His observation is also obviously based on her physical stature, or lack thereof, and that only fuels her fire.
“Look bud, I don’t have to prove anything to you.”
“Sure, but that’s a pretty lame lie to get out of one little drink with me.”
She knows she shouldn’t, but she feels herself building up for fight. What the hell, right? It’s Friday night, she had a shitty week at work, Amy had snored next to her the entire flight to Atlanta, and she’s three beers in. If this cocky fucker wants to be the straw that breaks her goddamn back, so be it.
“Don’t test me, junior. I work with entitled assholes every day. I eat babyfaced dickheads like you for breakfast.”
He quirks an eyebrow, his smile growing. “Oh, yeah?”
“You really can’t take a hint, can you?”
“All of my exes tell me I’m pretty persistent.”
“Dude, that’s not a fucking — you know what? Never mind.”
“So, is that a yes?”
Beca’s fingers tighten over her bottle, and all she wants to do is take a leaf out of Flo’s book and throw it as hard as she could at the dart board. Or at Peter’s head. “What part of that sounded like a yes?” she asks in a false cheery voice, giving him the death glare that usually chased away small children and mall kiosk workers.
It doesn’t work on him. “Come on, just one —”
“I’m here with someone,” she settles. “A date.” She mentally curses herself as soon as the words are out of her mouth, already anticipating his skepticism; that line never works unless there’s proof.
“Yeah? I don’t see anyone else with you.”
Beca immediately pushes away the cliche thought of picking a random male stranger to play the role of her pretend-date. Knowing her shitty luck, the guy’ll feel entitled to some kind of reward or payment, and the cycle will never end.
Girl. She needs a girl. They’re infinitely more understanding and never expect anything in return; besides, it kills two birds with one stone in terms of rejection. Chloe and Stacie are the first ones to come to mind. They could make a fake relationship sound more real than their actual ones, and they had the right amount of confidence to chase away any unwanted attention. But Stacie isn’t here and Chloe is visibly flirting with a group of guys on the other end of the bar. Fat Amy is nowhere to be found, not that Beca would ever want her to be her pretend date. She looks over to the cashew-catching duo, but Cynthia Rose had disappeared, probably to use the restroom. Emily sits alone at the bar, smiling at something on her phone.
“Right over there,” Beca says, pointing at her. As soon as Peter turns to look at Emily, Beca quickly takes out her phone and shoots over a text.
‘SOS come here and pretend to be my girlfriend’
She manages to add a quick ‘please’ before Peter faces her again.
“The tall girl? With the blue shirt? Doesn’t seem like she even knows you,” he says. “Look, I’m just asking for one drink. You don’t have to make up a girlfriend for that, do you?”
“Well, here she comes now, let’s ask her, huh?” She shoots him the biggest smirk she can manage, and waves over his shoulder at Emily. She waves back tentatively as she approaches, looking incredibly uncertain and nervous.
“Hey babe,” Beca says casually, channeling her inner Chloe. She knows she made the wrong choice in picking Emily when she turns bright red and stares at her, wide-eyed.
“He-hey,” she stutters, “Ba-…Bec-…? B-uh…b-beautiful?”
Beca almost spits out her drink at Emily’s flustered confusion. She’s absolutely adorable, just as clumsy and awkward as she was freshmen year, and Beca feels her heart warming at old memories again. It’s clear that they’re not about to fool Peter, not with Emily’s emotional transparency, but all of a sudden Beca doesn’t care about that anymore. Rejecting sleazy frat boys at the bar, having Chloe and Stacie be each Bellas’ “fake dates” to chase them away, laughing about it together the next morning… it was a fond memory with the girls that Beca realizes Emily never got to experience.
Between her internship senior year and their grade difference, they never really had any bonding moments outside of music. They’d never hung out at the mall or went out to frat parties or studied for exams together like she had with the other girls. Emily was the Bella they left behind, the one who never had a chance to grow with them as a family.
Fuck it, it’s her birthday weekend. Beca wants to have some fun teasing her, the frat boy be damned.
“So Peter right here wants me to get a drink with him,” she drawls, pulling Emily closer by the hem of her shirt and sliding an arm around her waist, now channeling Stacie. Emily tenses at Beca’s touch, and only after a noticeable hesitation does she relax.
“Uh… oh. Is that… I-is that so?”
“Yeah, he seems utterly unconvinced that we’re dating.”
“Mmm, yes. Yes, we are. Dating.” Emily laughs nervously. “We’re dating. Been dating. Yup. It’s been… months. Years, even. We’re totally in love.”
Beca bites the inside of her cheek, hard, so the smile doesn’t show on her face. She slowly exhales a low and shaky laugh so Peter won’t hear. “See, there you have it,” she tells him, thankful that her voice sounds cool and indifferent. “We’re, like, totally in love.”
“You sure?” He looks Emily up and down, and Beca’s humorous attitude vanishes, suddenly pissed again. “You don’t seem like the type who can handle this feisty little wildcat,” he scoffs. Now Beca’s had enough and is ready to throw some punches, maybe after dropping a witty one-liner or something, even if it gets them banned from the bar again.
But shockingly, it’s Emily who speaks up first.
“O-oh yeah? Well then.”
With no build-up and absolutely no warning, she whirls on Beca, grabs her by the collar of her jacket, and pulls her up into a kiss.
K, this is totally not what I signed up for are the words that flash repeatedly like a neon sign in Beca’s mind as she’s forced onto her tiptoes. Emily had pulled Beca up pretty roughly, but her lips are soft and infuriatingly light on hers. Melting out of her initial shock, Beca puts one hand on Emily’s shoulder to steady herself and the other around the back of her neck to pull her closer and deepen the kiss. It’s to make it more convincing. To make it look more real, she tells herself frantically when Emily makes a small sound of surprise. Fuck. I’m enjoying this. Oh, fuck fuck fu-
She notices the empty air next to them and opens one eye to see that Peter is nowhere to be seen.
Although every last cell in her body is telling her not to, she gently pulls at Emily’s wrists until they break apart. They lock eyes for a moment, cheeks bright red, and Emily lets out a nervous huff of laughter. Her breath smells like the strawberry daiquiri she had been drinking, and Beca’s knees suddenly go weak.
Holy shitballs, I just made out with the legacy.
Emily gasps as soon as she sees that Peter’s no longer there to hassle them. She abruptly releases and jumps away from Beca, more or less dropping her to the ground.
“Oh, my gosh. I’m so sorry, Beca.” She looks like she’s about to cry. “I-I don’t know what came over me, I just… and he was just… and then you were just…you know? And I didn’t know what to do, I’ve never been a fake girlfriend, I don’t know how to chase someone away like Stacie, I just did what she might have done, and… and —”
“Hey, hey. Breathe. It’s cool.”
“— and oh, god. I can’t believe I just…and you also just…I’m so, so sorry Beca.”
“Em.” She grabs Emily’s shoulders and forces her to look at her. “Hey. I said it’s cool, okay? Seriously, you did…well, it wasn’t the most Oscar-worthy performance, but it worked, didn’t it?”
Beca doesn’t mention how amazing it was, how pulling her closer had nothing to do with rejecting a frat boy, or how much her flustered reaction makes her want to kiss her again. Because the poor girl looks mortified enough as it is, nodding stiffly as if she barely hears any of Beca’s reassuring words.
“Legacy and Beca, sitting in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N — eugh.” Amy’s singing is cut off when Beca jabs an elbow into her ribs.
Cynthia Rose and Aubrey follow close behind, smirking knowingly, and Chloe bounds over from her male entourage with a gigantic sunshine of a smile to throw her arms around both of them.
“Ohh, I’m so happy for you two,” she says genuinely, and Beca backpedals with panic.
“Whoa, whoa. Guys. We were just trying to get some creepy dude off my back, it’s not a big deal.” She rests a hand on Emily’s arm when she starts doing her nervous bounce. “Legacy made a brave sacrifice here, don’t make it weird.”
“I dunno, girl.” Cynthia Rose is shaking her head and flipping through something on her phone. “If you ask me, y’all were enjoying yourselves,” she says, turning her screen. It’s a picture of Beca and Emily, and they’re kissing with what could only be described as genuine passion. Peter is nowhere in the frame, and Beca feels a blush creeping up her neck. Fat Amy reaches over and swipes to the next photo, where the two of them are looking longingly into each others’ eyes.
Out of context, it totally looks like they’re making out for no reason. And knowing Fat Amy’s ability to drastically change the innocence of a photo with a well-worded caption, the rest of the Bellas are probably going to blow up the group chat as soon as she posts it.
Emily looks like she’s about to faint.
“Delete those,” Beca says instinctively.
“No way! You guys are adorable!” Chloe snatches the phone away and swipes back and forth between the photos, Aubrey looking over her shoulder and awww’ing with her.
Beca knows there’s no winning with this group. The best she can do is compromise, at least for Emily’s sake.
“Fine. But no posting on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or Snapchat.” She gives Amy a piercing glare, and unlike Peter, the blonde actually takes it seriously and snaps to attention. “These photos don’t leave the Bella’s chat. Got it?”
“Yes, sir,” Chloe, Amy, and Cynthia Rose say in unison.
“No one said they’re being posted on the Bella’s group chat, Beca.” Aubrey points out with a shit-eating grin that clearly says you done fucked up. “So, thanks for your permission.”
Emily groans and leans heavily against the bar for support, and Beca joins her with a long sigh as everyone’s phones starts to ring with group chat notifications.