Chapter Text
It’s been three years since Beca talked to Chloe.
The USO tour that was supposed to bring all the Bellas together for one last chance to sing as a group had, technically, been good for Beca. She’d just quit her job because dear god she did not want to be associated with the sexist trash that was coming out of the artists at the place she was working, and it gave her a bit over a month to hang out with her closest friends. And, at the end, she was suddenly signed to a legitimate label with an impressive reputation.
She tried to convince them to let her stay based in New York, so she could stay with her roommates – well, Amy was leaving anyway, but Chloe – but she was a new signing and had no power over her contract. It was a contract that forced her to record and work in LA, and she so badly wanted to say no. She wasn’t ready to move out into the world and have to do it entirely by herself, but she would’ve been stupid to say no and she’d be lying if she said the six-digit number at the end of the expected earnings section wasn’t the major factor in her decision.
So, Beca had moved to LA. By herself. Every other Bella was on the east coast (until Stacie had moved to California two years after Beca did), and Chloe? Well, she wasn’t really sure where Chloe was. She knew her once best friend had got into vet school, but she forgot to ask which vet school, and two weeks after moving out of their pokey studio apartment – while Chloe was still there – Beca had made somewhat of a drastic decision and cut all contact with Chloe.
At her first meeting with the record label, Beca had been asked if she wrote songs at all, or she wanted to just use songs that other people wrote, and if so, what they should be like.
“Uh I… write sometimes? I’m not sure if it’s any good, I’ve only ever shown things I’ve produced, not written, to anyone in the industry,” she had responded, attempting to answer professionally after her original hesitation.
In response, she’d been asked to prepare an example of something she’d written in a weeks’ time for another meeting, and they’d come prepared with samples of songs other people had written that they thought would suit her. They were really rushing this album process.
Beca scrolled through, and scrapped, every song draft on her laptop hard drive. It was much easier – indeed, she had no trouble at all – to write a new song. There were a lot of thoughts spiralling around her mind in the aftermath of the USO tour and her sudden and unexpected departure from the comfortable habits she’d fallen into living with Amy and Chloe, and they flowed clearly out onto the page as she wrote away.
The problem was that it meant those thoughts were no longer contained in Beca’s mind for only her viewing. They were out in the open, where someone else could see them. Someone else that they may or may not be about, in the case of Chloe.
Chloe messaged Beca every second day asking how things were going in LA and complaining about how empty their apartment felt with just her and Amy in it – as if that tiny apartment could ever feel empty – and Beca enthusiastically responded the first few times, until suddenly she realised that this song writing thing was a part she should probably hide from Chloe. So, she didn’t say she was writing songs – just that she was waiting on them to give her songs. She assumed the label would say hers sucked and she should go with theirs instead, and then she could go back to telling Chloe everything and pretend the whole “writing more than one song about how in love with her best friend she was” thing had never happened.
Her second meeting came around, and she handed over printed copies of lyrics and approximate melodies she’d figured for two of the songs she’d written when her manager – thankfully, not Theo, after she’d threatened to formally accuse him of sexual harassment if he made a move on her again (because that’s what it was) – and the two producers sitting alongside him asked. She sat in awkward silence, watching as they glanced over them.
“These are quite good! With not too much polishing up you could definitely have a go at recording these to test out if they might feature on an album or EP release,” one of the producers had enthused after five minutes, and Beca’s heart sank.
That night, Beca had a panic attack. She used to have them more than she had in recent years – although she’d screamed at Amy about her job issues in the middle of one not long before the USO tour – but she’d kind of expected it to happen, given as soon as she stepped out of the meeting at 4:30pm her thoughts had started to spiral.
If she recorded one of those songs about Chloe, they could be released. And if they were released, there was absolutely no way that Chloe wouldn’t realise they were about her because the lyrics weren’t exactly coy.
She started to pace rhythmically back and forth across her apartment as soon as she stepped in the door, her belongings thrown straight on the bed. She hoped the pacing rhythm would enforce a similar order in her mind, but they just fuelled the racing spiral instead.
If Chloe heard one of those songs and realised they were about her – which she certainly would – it would be the end of their friendship. Chloe wouldn’t be rude or freak out about it, Beca knew that wasn’t in her nature, but she’d be kind and let Beca down gently and tell her she only thought of her as a friend. And that would destroy her even more than if Chloe freaked out at her.
Beca couldn’t stop pacing, now, and she couldn’t stop thinking, and she’d lost control of the speed of her breathing-
Beca wouldn’t survive Chloe softly destroying her like that. She couldn’t survive being in contact with her, or any of the Bellas, or anyone associated with that period in her life, and that was almost everyone in her life. She couldn’t live without any social contact forever and she couldn’t live in eternal misery over her best friend, and as much as she hated it, she was doing just fine holding onto her feelings for Chloe and not letting Chloe anywhere near them.
There was no way Chloe wouldn’t find out, though. She’d listen to anything Beca released. She’d listen to the songs, and then she’d figure it out. She’d let Beca down, and Beca would be destroyed. What part of that chain could she break? She couldn’t be sure they wouldn’t be released because she didn’t have that control. She couldn’t stop Chloe listening to it. She couldn’t stop her figuring it out. She couldn’t change how Chloe would respond. She couldn’t do anything-
Beca paused, suddenly, staring at her laptop bag on her bed. Could she prevent Chloe from responding?
She ripped open the zip of the bag with such force that the tab snapped, but she hardly noticed. She slammed the laptop out onto the bed so quickly it would’ve broken on any other surface. The hinges stopped the screen that she threw back, the laptop falling backwards for half a second from the force before Beca grabbed the front of the keyboard to right it, furiously tapping the internet browser.
Facebook was her homepage. She had a message from Chloe. She didn’t read it. She tried not to look at Chloe’s profile – her profile picture of the two of them in France just four weeks ago – as she hit unfriend, and block. She closed Facebook.
Twitter was next, and easier, because Chloe’s profile was relatively empty. She rarely used Twitter. Beca blocked her anyway.
She pulled up google, quickly searching “how to block a phone number iphone”. Clicking the first link, she reached for her phone, pulling open Instagram while it loaded. Block. Glancing up at the screen, it still hadn’t loaded. She opened WhatsApp. Blocked.
The tutorial loaded, and Beca glanced through it, performing the steps as she read them, not taking any notice that iMessage told her Chloe was currently typing in their conversation. Blocked.
Beca didn’t know how much she was shaking or how much her heart was racing until she placed her phone back down on the bed and felt her body start to calm down.
She had taken a shower to continue the calming process, digging out a Bluetooth speaker to bring into the bathroom with her so she could sing along to something angry and drown out any thoughts that wanted to start spiralling again.
After her shower, Beca found her phone alive with a handful of messages from other Bellas asking why Chloe was freaking out that she’d disappeared. She pulled open Facebook and made a group chat, typing out some lie about a personal disagreement and Beca deciding she needed space. She left the chat as soon as she said it, not waiting for a reaction, and then for good measure, ran through and blocked Aubrey on everything too.
She’s barely talked to any of the Bellas in three years, save for the occasional congratulations message as her career skyrocketed around her, Beca barely able to catch her breath as she watched it happen.
The first song she wrote about Chloe was her first single, and her manager had tried to hand over a phone call from Aubrey twelve hours after it was released, but she quickly clued in her whole team that she would be taking no messages from anyone named Aubrey or Chloe. It took a few days before the single gained wider attention – and a fair bit of promotional work from herself and the label – but when it did, she suddenly found everything change in an instant. Number one in America. Number one in Canada. Number one in ten countries. Number one in thirty countries-
Her album came a month later, and there was no delay before that one shot to number one too. Every song on that album was about Chloe, but Beca didn’t like to acknowledge that very often.
“You put so much emotion into so many of these songs, is there something in particular you’re drawing on?” she had been asked on many a talk show, hosts digging for gossip that’d boost their ratings up.
“There’s not really anything specific, I think these are just such an integral part of the human condition that I can draw into that… I wanted my songs to appeal to everyone-“ her answer was always the same rehearsed excuse.
Beca had celebrated her one-year anniversary of cutting contact with Chloe in Seoul, South Korea, at the start of the second leg of her world tour. She’d already covered North America, and now was on to Australasia, and then Europe, then South America and more in North America because all the first ones sold out too quickly. The problem, of course, was not where she was – it was that she remembered at all.
Beca knew her image as a public figure suffered at least a little bit because she was so withdrawn, but singing all these songs so often was draining. She was bad around people at the best of times, let alone when her mind was constantly spiralling with regret and “what ifs” and loneliness. She pulled back as much as she could, limiting her appearances to those only contractually required and keeping her (new) social media accounts purely professional.
During her North American tour, she had happened to be back in LA for awards season. Her manager claimed it wasn’t planned – she still didn’t believe him – and, reluctantly, she’d attended the shows. She got all dressed up (she didn’t entirely hate that part because her stylist was fantastic) and she walked the red carpet alone and politely answered the dubiously appropriate outfit and relationship questions from the reporters.
She won a Billboard award she didn’t remember the category name of, a VMA, a GRAMMY. She had just enough alcohol at each show to enjoy the night and still be coherent for a thank-you speech – thanking her team, her fans, and without names, her “friends and family” – and the compulsory press afterwards.
She liked being on the road, because it kept her busy and it kept her mind off things. At least, it probably would have had all her music not been about the thing she was trying to forget. She took solace in a strange conversation she’d had with Pink backstage at the Billboard awards, where Pink – “call me Alecia” – had asked if the stuff about ‘no particular inspiration’ was bullshit, and Beca had reluctantly admitted that yeah, it was.
“If it’s any solace,” Alecia had started, with a reassuring smile, “I find that by the end of a touring cycle, I’ve usually worked through all the issues that got covered in that album.”
The two-year anniversary of Beca cutting contact with Chloe came not far from the end of her tour cycle, when Beca was settling back in to a quiet and reclusive life in a much larger LA apartment than she had been in before her album was released, and immediately disproved that theory. She still wasn’t over it.
Beca didn’t ask for time off, but she was given it. Six months that she had no idea what to do with. She took an online Spanish course and taught herself to cook a little more than the basics she already knew, because it felt like self-improvement, and it was a decent distraction.
For her second album, they allotted a full six months of production time, and she wondered why until she entered her first meeting with the now-familiar team she’d worked with last time after her break and was surprised to see one of the producers missing. They usually had the same number for each album, or so she’d been told.
“You get to help produce this time,” her manager had revealed, and Beca couldn’t help but genuinely smile. This was what she wanted to do.
They took their time with the second album, no release date or singles set even five months into the project. It had been only two weeks ago when Beca had suddenly felt a wave of desire to do something about Chloe wash over her. She wrote another song, because it was all she knew how to do, and immediately told her team that this would be the first single.
To her surprise, they didn’t fight. They helped her polish, record and produce the song in ten days, and convince the label to let her do a surprise drop and only promote it after it was released.
Beca hasn’t talked to Chloe for three years, and she’s about to release a song admitting that was a mistake. A song basically begging Chloe to tell her where they stand, even if it’s that Chloe hates her guts now.
Beca doesn’t have to do anything for the release. Someone else who has joint control over all her social media is handling the announcement at 6pm on a Sunday, a stupid time to release a song, but almost exactly three years since she had almost broken her old laptop in her haste to cut contact with Chloe.
In hindsight, she was bloody lucky she didn’t break anything, given she hadn’t been in the financial position to be able to replace that laptop with something good enough for her job until a year later when she’d finally seen some of the money her music was making.
She tries to occupy her mind with useless shit like that all evening, to not go online. She cooks a rather elaborate meal and convinces herself to clean the kitchen properly after she finishes eating it, although she has cleaners that do her apartment every two weeks anyway. It’s after nine by the time she finishes, which isn’t nearly late enough.
She has a shower, does a face mask, washes her hair, hoping anything will relax her enough to go to sleep.
She’s too agitated. She can’t do it.
At 9am the next morning, she walks in to the studio she’s been working at, head down and way more makeup than usual on to hide the rather obvious signs of her sleepless night. There’s a few paparazzi around as always but they aren’t too pushy.
“There’s someone waiting in your office for you,” the receptionist calls out as Beca walks through, and she nods and gives her a smile in acknowledgement. She gets the same message from her almost every morning and without fail it is always her manager. He’s punctual, if anything.
She’s confused when she runs into him in the hallway between the elevator and her office.
“Oh, hi Beca, song’s going great!” he enthuses, and Beca forces a smile – she is happy, just tired – and nods.
“That’s good, good. Do we want to keep working on promotional aspects for the album today?” she asks, hoping he says yes. Stupid arguments about colours are much more her speed today than anything serious.
“Um, we’ll see how things go, but sure,” he answers, and Beca shrugs, too tired to think any further of his demeanour.
Her head is down when she enters her office, fiddling with her keys, one having got tangled in a stupid keyring one of the producers had given her a while ago as it often does, not remembering there was someone in her office until she spies a pair of shoes ahead of her, causing her eyes to snap up.
“Beca-“ Chloe starts, and Beca immediately lets go of the door handle, letting it slam shut behind her as she takes a step to the side, crumpling into a heap on the couch beside the door, burying her face in her hands as she starts to shake, tears pooling against her cheeks where her hands are trapping them.
She lets out an audible sob when she feels the other side of the couch dip and notices the familiar scent of Chloe’s perfume waft over her.
She’s not quite sure how she responds when Chloe wraps an arm around her, because her brain shuts down and all logical thought disappears. Chloe is here. Chloe is in her office. Chloe is holding her.
“Why are you here?” Beca asks, five minutes later, between sobs. She still can’t bring herself to look up at Chloe again, but she can feel her crying against her shoulder.
“Because you asked me to be, and I will go anywhere for you,” Chloe answers, her voice choked.
“I only released that song fifteen hours ago.”
“Stacie had contact details for the label,” Chloe responds, as an explanation.
“Where do you even live?”
“Florida.”
“How are you here?” Beca asks, her mind still stuttering, struggling to process everything that’s happening.
“It was surprisingly easy to get to your manager, and I asked him if he could at least pass on a message for me or give me your current number or something… and he said he knew who I was and that he could give me your address, if I wanted it. That felt like too much. I asked him if you’d be working today and he said yes so I booked a flight and… here I am.”
“Why are you here?” Beca repeats her earlier question, softer, her crying starting to calm down as she finally looks up and, as Chloe pulls back slightly, meets her eyes.
“Why did you cut contact with me, Beca?” Chloe questions in return. Beca sighs, trying to find the words to explain.
“In that first week they asked me to write songs… and I did, and they were all about you, and when they said they were good I freaked out because if they were going to be released – and they were – you’d know they were about you and you’d have to tell me you’d only ever like me as a friend and I didn’t think I could take that. I panicked. It was the only way I knew how to deal with it.”
“I tried to convince myself they weren’t about me. That someone else wrote them and it was all just a coincidence but I… knew it was you. And I wanted to contact you, because I needed to tell you how much I love you, but I couldn’t. And I tried to be mad at you, but I couldn’t…” Chloe trails off, and Beca stares at her, not believing she just heard what she did. Thankfully, Chloe repeats it, “I’m in love with you, Beca. I always have been. If you still want me- if you still want something between us, I’m here so that could happen. And I’m not leaving. I’ll move to California today.”
“What about vet school?” Beca asks, not able to process anything else.
“I overloaded my courses to occupy my time and stop thinking about you. I have one course left and I can finish it online.”
“You’re moving to California? For me?”
“Yes, Beca.”
“I love you so much,” Beca rushes out, her mind finally catching up as she throws herself against Chloe, arms wrapping tightly around her, tears forming around her eyes again but this time in happiness. “I love you so much and I’m so happy you’re here and I never want to be away from you again.”
“Your people told me you can have today off. Can we go back to your place and talk? We have three years of catching up to do and I want to hear everything,” Chloe’s response is soft and affectionate and Beca feels like she is melting into a pile of happiness.
“Yeah… I should clean up my face,” Beca reluctantly pulls back from her, gesturing to the lines of makeup that have run down her cheeks, scowling when Chloe giggles. “I still don’t usually wear this much, but I didn’t sleep last night.”
It doesn’t surprise Beca when Chloe stands up, walks over to her bag lying beside Beca’s desk and pulls out a pack of makeup remover wipes, quickly moving back over to sit beside Beca. It also doesn’t surprise her when Chloe cups one hand under Beca’s chin and starts tidying her makeup for her.
“Wait,” Beca says, and Chloe recoils quickly, clearly worried she crossed a line. “No, not that…” Beca trails off, before mumbling, “it’s just that your hands on my face is making me cry happy tears again.”
Chloe visibly relaxes, smiling softly as she hands the makeup wipe over to Beca and stands up again, walking over and picking up her bag.
“Did you like… bring a suitcase or something?” Beca asks, awkwardly, as she pulls out her phone to use as a mirror as she finishes at least kind of wiping the mascara from around her eyes. She really should use waterproof like… all the time.
“Nope. I figured if it didn’t go well I’d fly home again, and if it did I’ll just steal some of your stuff.”
“Oh you haven’t changed then,” Beca grins, Chloe just laughing and shaking her head as she watches Beca scrunch up the makeup wipe and throw it into a bin beside the couch, standing up and shoving her phone back in her pocket. “Come on, let’s go to my place.”
Beca takes Chloe’s hand as she pushes open the door of her office and they both walk out into the hallway, and she doesn’t let go. Not when they stop by her manager’s office so Beca can say she’s taking the day off – she chooses to ignore the sly grin he gives in response -, not when they sneak out a side door to Beca’s car. Briefly, to get in the car, but Beca quickly joins their hands again after she’s on the road, silently thanking her past self for sticking with an automatic so she doesn’t need to change gears.
To Beca’s surprise, Chloe doesn’t comment on the car, and when they arrive at her apartment she doesn’t comment on the presence of security guards around the car park entrance, or the fact that the elevator opens directly into what is evidently a large penthouse apartment. Beca sees Chloe glance at the awards shelf off to the side of the entry – as out of the way as Beca could justify putting it without hiding them – but she doesn’t comment.
“Why aren’t you saying anything about all the… weird fancy shit?” Beca asks, cautiously, after they’ve stepped into her open-plan living area.
“I’m going to need like, half an hour to properly tell you how proud of you I am for the awards and evidently earning enough money for all of this but I… you’re still Beca. I know that car cost a shitton, but it’s not the slightest bit externally flashy and it’s so you. I feel bad for commenting on your apartment, though, because of what I want to say…” she trails off.
“Just say it,” Beca answers, softly, knowing what it will be, because she feels it too.
“It’s beautiful, but it’s… empty. It doesn’t look like you live here.”
“I don’t know what to do with this much space when it’s just me. I don’t exactly have many… friends. Stacie’s been here, she was kind of bugging me to hang out when she moved to San Francisco and she’s fun so I couldn’t say no. But I’m alone a lot, and I’ve just kind of made my bedroom look like mine and left everything else as… whatever. I use the kitchen a bit though.”
“You know who you’re reminding me of?” Chloe asks, rhetorically, wandering further into the apartment and across to the kitchen. “Damn, I’d love to cook here.”
“It’s good. I taught myself to cook properly when I had six months off earlier this year.”
“You better cook something amazing for me sometime soon, then.”
“I definitely will. Who am I reminding you of?”
“Freshman Beca.”
Beca watches Chloe turn back to face her, and she nods, sighing.
“I am a bit, yeah, but… I know I shouldn’t be, this time. And I’m about to do something that will probably surprise you and that freshman Beca certainly wouldn’t do…”
Chloe raises an eyebrow, indicating for Beca to continue.
“I am extremely tired, I am overwhelmed, and I want nothing more than to lie down with you and talk about everything like we used to in New York. Come on,” Beca requests, softly, holding out a hand that Chloe quickly takes, allowing herself to be lead into Beca’s bedroom, immediately noticing that it is way more Beca than the rest of the house.
“Are you going to fall asleep on me?” Chloe asks, smiling lightly as Beca falls down on the bed with a long, tired sigh.
“No, I’m going to cuddle you and make you tell me about vet school.”
“Really? Not telling me about your crazy life, just my boring vet school?” Chloe asks, a teasing lilt to her voice as she takes off her shoes and settles down on the bed, lying on her side and facing Beca. “How do you still have a terrible mattress?”
“We can do both, if you’d like, but my life is actually very boring and repetitive. And I can’t answer that without sounding pathetic,” Beca’s response is light, but there’s a tone under it that makes Chloe push closer.
“Tell me?” she whispers, as Beca curls against her.
“You were always the one that wanted a softer mattress for our crappy fold-out bed, and I couldn’t bear to get one without you being involved somehow. I still feel like you haven’t realised how obsessively in love with you I am and when you do you’ll get creeped out and leave…” Beca trails off.
“Beca, did you not hear me say I am uprooting my life and moving across the country for you with absolutely no planning or preparation? That I’ve been in love with you forever? I really do mean forever. I mean since I’ve met you. I’ve been in love with you for ten years. I’m still in love with you. I’ll always be in love with you…” Chloe trails off, pulling Beca closer to her.
“Move in with me. I know it’s too soon. I know I haven’t even asked you to be my girlfriend yet, but… move in with me, and we’ll buy a proper mattress, and we can make this apartment our home,” Beca’s voice is determined, but Chloe can feel her shaking slightly with nerves.
“Okay,” Chloe answers, simply, before moving her arm as if indicating for Beca to turn to face her. “And I want you to be my girlfriend. Yeah, we have a lot of catching up to do. But we’re us. We don’t need to wait.”
“Okay,” Beca answers much the same, smiling widely as Chloe tentatively shifts her face closer. When Chloe’s nose brushes against Beca’s, her face only a breath away, Beca quickly bites her lip to control her smile before she closes the remaining space between them and presses her lips against Chloe’s for the first time.