Chapter Text
Until Saturday, March 28, at 3:02am, Beca Mitchell hated working at Cafe Crisp. In fact, the word “hate” didn’t and couldn’t begin to describe the thin, burning cold layer of disgust that spread right under the surface of her skin every time she had to pull open the door despite the fact that it confidently instructed it’s patrons to push. Of her six shifts a week, she was always seven and a half minutes late, and she knew this because she carefully calculated just how much time could pass between when her shift started and when she had to be present without getting scolded - once she landed on seven a half minutes, she sat in the car, listening to the engine hum idly, cleaning the CDs scattered under her seats or twisting her hair into braids or watching the fog build up on the windshield. She hated the way she felt her clothes become heavier under the weight of the grease in the air, and the way she seemed to be incapable of wiping away the ever-present black gunk that was squished between every button on the cash register. She hated her perfume of bacon and fries and ketchup and “cleaner” (which was just a few droplets of bleach and a bottle full of water, but no one was about to address that). She hated that the restaurant refused to put the proper accent on Cafe, and she hated that they called themselves a cafe at all.
But most of all, she hated the closing shift - watching the other workers slowly filter out, rushing to finish their closing tasks haphazardly and leaving Beca to re-mop the back kitchen or inspect the dishes a final time.
That’s a lie, actually. Because most of all, she hated the closing shift on Saturday nights, because any other night, she managed to do these tasks in comfortable silence, singing through the hours and ignoring the terrible Cinderella images she knew she was living out. On Saturday nights, though, her singing was always interrupted by the one or two (or three or four or five) drunk, stoned, or burnt-out-to-the-point-of-insanity college students knocking on the glass. They sang their own song - some variation of begging, giggling, mumbling to beg her to open up because they were, very clearly, dying of starvation. Sure, she never let them in, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t an inconvenience to have to listen to their idiocy for the better half of fifteen minutes.
On this night, though, there was something different to the idiocy.
“Cleaning” the take-out window one more time, because, somehow, there was a thin skin of grease even on that, she jumped when she swiped her hand to find bright blue eyes greeting her behind the rag.
“Fuck!” she spat out, clutching her chest and immediately regretting pressing the damp rag to her bare skin. The woman on the other side of the window just bit her lip, giggling. She pressed her nose to the window, letting puffs of her breath create tiny fog clouds on the glass. “What the fuck are you doing?”
The redhead didn’t appear to be affected at all by the sharp tone Beca had taken on, just smiling wider and pointing to the glass in a way of asking for it to be opened.
Beca wasn’t entirely sure why she did it, knowing that it went against her typical Saturday night protocol - and, just generally, against her basic instincts to not get mugged or kidnapped or killed - but she pulled her keys from her back pocket and unlocked the window, nudging it open with a squeak. “We’re closed,” she said shortly, her fingers curling over the black window frame as she leaned outside. The air was chilly, and she saw that it bit at the other woman’s nose, turning it a bright pink that seemed to match her cheeks.
“I know, silly,” the other woman said, taking advantage of the way Beca had leaned out by putting her hands on the walls of the building and drawing herself closer to the girl. “But I’m hungry.”
She said it with a pout that would’ve - should’ve - been unbearably annoying in all of it’s intoxication, but Beca found herself grinning from the corner of her mouth, her eyebrows raised. Quickly, she wiped the expression away in favor of the stern line of her lips and an eyeroll. “Yeah, well, tough luck,” she said, shivering slightly at the March chill, “I’m tired, but you don’t see me complaining.”
“Becaaaaaa,” the woman said, leaning over the window to rest her elbows on the ledge. Beca looked down at her name badge, crossing her arms over it quickly when she noticed the woman looking at it. “Don’t be a spoil-sport.”
“I’m not a–,” Beca had to stomp her foot to cut herself off, and shaking her head. “It’s not important. We’re closed. Get your munchies somewhere else.”
The other woman snorted, starting to trace the windowsill with a bright pink nail, “I’m notstoned, goof, I’m just drunk.”
“Yay you,” Beca muttered under her breath, turning towards the monitor to wipe it off and, for some strange pull, resisting the urge to close the window again.
The other woman laughed again, standing on her tiptoes to push nearly half of her torso through the window. “Like realllyyy drunk.”
“Great,” Beca said with a tight, fake smile, “Your parents must be so proud. But I’m trying to work here, and dealing with drunk bimbos isn’t exactly in my job description.”
Scoffing incredulously, the other woman didn’t scoot away. Though there was a touch of water lining her eyes, and the way her mouth sat in an “O” implied there was some kind of drunken pain caused by Beca’s words. “I am not a bimbo,” she said, though her confident tone didn’t match the way her face seemed to deflate. “Don’t say that,” she added, quieter, with the corners of her mouth curving down.
And Beca wasn’t sure what it was, because she hated Saturday night shift, and she was already working a double, and typically she would’ve thrown who ever was at the window a friendly middle finger before working in the back until they left - but the redhead’s look was so hurt, growing with every moment that passed with the word hanging in the air, and her eyes were already so big, but they seemed to grow, almost lighting up the dark corner of the restaurant. So Beca threw down her rag, sighing and putting her hands on her hip.
“Fine. No bimbo,” she said, looking at the poster that was hung over the window that said “A Good Job is A Happy Customer” instead of at the face of the woman practically hanging from the window. “It’s cold,” she continued, her voice softer when she noticed the tank top that the other woman was wearing, “You should be home.”
“First, I forgive you,” the other woman said, biting her lip again, and Beca couldn’t shake the feeling that she only ever did that when she felt like she was winning. Winning what, though, Beca wasn’t sure. “Second, I’m not home. I’m here.”
“I see that,” Beca said slowly, daring to walk closer to the window. “But I can’t help you.”
She wasn’t sure why or how she ended up a few inches away from the redhead, close enough to count the freckles on her nose (eight, and covered by a foundation that had just a droplet of glitter, it seemed), but she would later confidently claim that it was due to the other woman’s incredible ability to push herself as far into the window as possible.
The other woman squinched her nose, her smile spreading slowly this time as she watched Beca’s lips bounce from her stare to her lips and back. “I,” she said, lowering her voice into just a breath, “Beg to differ, Assistant Manager Beca.”