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Beca Mitchell could probably count all of the times that she’d been batshit terrified on one hand.
It was never from things like horror movies. Jump scares, ridiculous CGI monsters, and 1980s hockey masked killers stalking down horny teens didn’t really have much of an effect on her. Really, she eventually found a certain appreciation for scary movie nights at the Bella house; Chloe would gradually slip closer and closer to Beca until she was completely wrapped around her, squeezing tight with a little gasp at every moment that Beca found all too predictable. When the other Bellas weren’t around, Beca would take the role of ‘absolutely necessary distractor’ upon herself, because, “really, Chlo, we don’t want to have you up all night because you’re scared.” The response from Chloe would always be that slowly spreading grin across her lips, before she’d shrug, wink, and lean into Beca’s ear with some variation on, “I can think of a few other reasons I’d rather be up all night.”
And she really couldn’t claim any of the other classic phobias. Bugs weren’t a big deal (other than one incident with a particularly large cicada on the retreat), heights were avoidable, and Beca hadn’t been scared of any clowns ever since she’d kneed one in the crotch on a date to a Haunted Corn Maze that she’d been on sophomore year of high school (her date may have spent the rest of the night with his hand placed protectively over the front of his pants).
No, Beca’s fears came from nerves above anything else, quaking, shivering anticipation that left her breathless in the worst way possible. Fear of failure, fear of disappointing others, fear of mediocrity; whatever it was at the time could leave Beca feeling even smaller than her natural state alone would.
The first time had been at her Bellas audition. Beca really hated to admit it, and Chloe was the only one she’d told, but she’d gotten so damn lucky that they hadn’t heard the shaking of the cup in her hands against the floor between quick shifting movements. And her voice had almost broken a few times, some strange squeak over the simple tune, but a quick look up at those welcoming blue eyes from the audience, that hopeful, calming smile had somehow steadied her, even with their only interaction so far summed up by the phrase “lady jam.”
The second time had been nationals her freshman year. Yeah, she was a bit nervous going up on stage and during the performance, but that had completely paled in comparison to that moment in the after-party, sitting in a back hallway with Chloe after she’d listened to the other girl cry about a failed Russian Lit final. Arm around Chloe’s waist, she’d taken a deep breath and pulled her head back from its resting place on Chloe’s shoulder, turning Chloe’s head slightly with her free hand, and leaned in. Chloe frozen against her lips for a moment, the world had turned to nothing but a pounding in Beca’s ears, the sudden shake of Chloe’s body against Beca’s hand, and then, slowly, the smile breaking across Chloe’s lips before her hand had found its way to the back of Beca’s neck, drawing her in further and meeting each part of Beca’s lips with her own.
The third time had probably been the worst. Even after three years of dating, Beca Mitchell was still Beca Mitchell, and, despite all of her best efforts to be as open and welcoming in every part of her life as Chloe was to her, she still had these secrets and walls and neuroses that she tried to keep hidden. And even though she knew that her secret internship was hurting them, that every time she cancelled a date or came up with some lame excuse that Chloe clearly saw right through for why she’d sprinted out of rehearsal or been late to meet up somewhere, Chloe was constructing some elaborate explanation for what was going on that was really just that much worse than the reality. For all of her sunshine and rainbows, Chloe Beale had her own crazy streak that mostly manifested itself in her protective side. Beca was not prepared for it really come out in any other way, but she also wasn’t prepared to push any more stress or concern or thoughts of impending graduation onto Chloe with Worlds consuming enough of her headspace as it were by telling her what was going on of her own accord.
So Amy had spoken up at the retreat, and Beca had been forced to lay everything out on the line in front of all of their friends, to beg Chloe to understand even as she tried and failed to fight back tears. And Chloe had been still again for a moment, that furrow forming between her brow with her mouth dropping slightly open, and Beca was ready to sprint off across the Lodge’s campus and find some place to hide or maybe get snapped up in a bear trap if she was lucky. But that same warming smile from that first audition had returned, and Chloe had wrapped Beca up in her arms, placing kisses on her forehead until Amy started making retching sounds from behind Beca’s back. Beca had replied with a particularly unkind gesture before being turned around and swept up in a lengthy, PG-13 level kiss by Chloe.
The fourth time had been in the back recording room of the Residual Heat studio, Emily on one side and Chloe on the other. Not that Chloe had really needed to come along on this trip, other than the fact that it was her car that they were using, but Beca couldn’t complain every time that she glanced up from the soundboard and saw her fuzzy reflection in the glass that separated the booth and the main room. And Chloe was just calmly sitting there, hands in her lap in a chair against the back wall of the room. It was as if she somehow could sense every time Beca needed her, every time she glanced up and searched for those blue eyes whose luminosity could not even be diminished by the murky reflection in the glass, and Chloe would put down her phone or the magazine she’d found or stop whatever she was doing and just be there. A little half-grin, a nod, or even a kiss on Beca’s cheek after the brunette had raked her fingers through her hair in frustration for about the fifteenth time in a minute.
And so of course she’d stayed for Sammy’s opinion on ‘Flashlight,’ slipping her fingers between Beca’s as the younger girl chewed her lip while Emily fidgeted to her right. Beca’s thumb rubbed anxious circles against Chloe’s while Sammy sat, stone faced with the headphones over his ears. She squeezed Chloe’s hand with force akin to that of a woman in labor at his eventual negative declaration before nearly collapsing against her side when he promised to send it on to the studio in LA.
So clearly, there was a common, redheaded theme in all of Beca’s most terrified moments, the cause of many and the savior of all with that wordless presence that reminded Beca of sweatshirts on crisp Autumn days, warm cider by a campfire, watching the first snowfall from a window seat inside. Warmth, love, safety, Chloe. For three years of college and two after, Chloe had been there for every moment where Beca became even mildly irritated, when she was mildly stumped for even half a second on a song. All it took was Chloe, and nothing could go wrong.
And really, in the end, that made the current situation that much harder, because it was a bit challenging to try to plan a proposal and keep it secret while scared out of your mind when the calming force in your life was the one from whom it had to be kept the most. Beca was fully aware of the fact that she’d been jumping like a terrified squirrel every time Chloe rounded the corner of their apartment just a bit too quickly while Beca was on the secret Pinterest board she was endlessly embarrassed to possess.
The truly challenging part had been convincing Chloe that she and Aubrey were just going to get coffee to “catch up” when she’d visited because they’d just missed each other “that much.” The eyebrow furrow had returned again, combined with that little quirk of Chloe’s mouth as she looked the two grinning idiots up and down before shrugging and waving them off as she returned to her lesson plans. The fact that they’d returned bickering at a level reminiscent of Beca’s freshman year had probably only made things worse, but it really didn’t matter as Beca snuck the ring box into the drawer of wires and miscellaneous mixing equipment that Chloe didn’t even dare to venture near for, as she’d put it, “fear of being sucked into musical Narnia without a good winter coat.”
There were three notebooks full of drafts of engagement plans, color coded by location, any necessary involved parties, by whom they’d been suggested; all that normal stuff. If Beca couldn’t turn to Chloe to calm that endless quaking in her stomach, she’d have to do her best with contingency plans. But of course that all fell apart due to opportunity and, as Aubrey called it, the “Mitchell need to improvise.”
Chloe had been asked by her school to represent them at some huge national teaching conference in New York, apparently a huge honor that she couldn’t turn down, and would be out of town for three nights. It was probably some combination of not wanting to write Proposal Draft 472 (because that was precisely how crazy Beca had gotten) and the tugging in her chest every time that she even opened a Snapchat from Chloe that sealed the deal for her, and so Beca took off work early on the night of Chloe’s return, backing out of the door with a mock bow and a jaunty wave to the round of applause that followed her.
So she almost wrecked the car four different times on the way home, drumming her fingers impatiently as Chloe’s ‘1989’ CD blasted through the speakers, but, a couple of quick stops at the grocery store and florist later, Beca went into action. Rose petals were spread across the bed (because this fluffy romance shit was normally Chloe’s job and Beca only had movies to really rely upon in this case), she checked for the ring in her pocket at least fifteen times, and posted up by the door after setting the oven to preheat. Maybe it wasn’t as classy to pick up dinner from the store when proposing, but Beca figured that Chloe would prefer their apartment to not be burned down by any attempts at cooking, even considering a red-hot romance and all.
Chloe’s flight was supposed to land at 5:02, and, with LA rush hour traffic, she’d probably make it home around 6:30. Beca’s ass had fallen asleep by 6:15 after two hours of staring, stock still at the door, fingers drumming on the edge of the kitchen counter and jerking at every slight movement from outside. She pushed herself off the stool at 6:28, pacing around the couch in the living room and muttering that speech she’d memorized and tweaked about thirty times over the last month.
At 6:45, she was convinced she was getting dumped, and was lying on the couch with her hand over her eyes analyzing everything she’d ever done wrong. Around the time that she’d decided that Chloe had been secretly in love with Jesse and flown out to New York to elope with him, she was startled out of her melodramatic reverie by the sound of a key in the lock.
Bolting up, Beca leapt over the back of the couch, gracelessly crashing forwards into the stool by the counter as Chloe shut the door behind her. “Well, I knew you were a fan of superhero movies, Becs,” Chloe said slowly, dropping her suitcase by the door. “But hardcore parkour seems a bit out of character.”
Pasting a cheesy smile onto her face, Beca brushed her hair out of her eyes and squared her shoulders. “Sorry,” she replied sheepishly. “I was napping. Got a bit surprised.”
Chloe hummed in response as she dropped her keys on the counter. “I would think you would’ve gotten more sleep over the past few nights without me here.”
And there was the hitch in the plan, as Bedroom Eyes Beale made her way around the counter, fingers lazily running along the corner as Beca swallowed heavily. “I—um, I missed you?” Beca managed weakly, Chloe’s hand finding purchase on her waist.
“I feel like I should be offended at the question there.” Chloe’s eyes called Beca’s upwards, hooded and blazing as she trapped her bottom lip between her teeth, waiting for any response from Beca, who suddenly found her mouth to dry to form any sort of approximation of a word. “But, they say that actions speak louder than words, so—“
Chloe’s lips pressed against Beca’s, needy and pulling. She took advantage from that initial gasp that always seemed to escape Beca’s mouth in these moments, even after five years, to slip her tongue in between Beca’s lips, hands moving to drag her girlfriend in closer by the front of her jacket. She pushed Beca towards the back of the couch, hoisting her up onto the edge as Beca’s arms wrapped around her back, fingers twisting in the fabric of Chloe’s shirt.
It was in the brief moment where Chloe paused in her path down Beca’s neck to start fighting with the buttons of her shirt that Beca’s brain slightly reengaged, even as her libido felt it necessary to remind her of Draft Suggestion 6A, “Proposal In the Moment,” courtesy of Stacie Conrad. She pulled back, shaking her head briefly as she suppressed a gasp at the feeling of Chloe’s fingers against the bare skin of her abdomen as she conquered the first button.
“Chlo?” Her voice was small and weak, and Chloe looked up at her with a distinctly amused grin as her fingers stilled against Beca’s body.
“Something you needed, babe?”
Beca pushed herself off the edge of the couch, Chloe taking a few careful steps backwards as Beca smoothed out the edge of her jacket. “Um, yeah,” Beca said. “I…I wanted to talk to you about something. Or…ask you about something.”
Chloe nodded, eyebrows rising as she leaned against the counter behind her. “Okay. Yeah.” Beca realized she was just spouting random syllables at this point in an attempt to reengage her verbal functions, even while Chloe visually shifted from horny to concerned girlfriend as Beca squirmed in front of her. “So you’re my girlfriend.”
“Forgot that after three days already?” Chloe asked with a giggle. “Clearly I’m doing something wrong.”
“No, just…okay but like you are,” Beca continued, fists clenching and unclenching against her sides. “And that’s pretty awesome. Kind of amazing, actually. Like I’m a big fan.”
“Always good to have one of those.”
But despite Chloe’s jokes, Beca knew she was starting to hit her stride, that improvisational rhythm once she’d moved beyond the idea for a song, beyond those first notes that were weirdly just that much harder to reach, that moment where it flowed and the basic details and necessary human functions ran on autopilot, some direct line forming from Beca’s brain or ears or soul or whatever to the music. It was that point where she had no choice but to forge on, and she could recognize it even in words.
“I mean, we all know you’re pretty much flawless.” Beca held up a finger as Chloe opened her mouth. “No, but really. Like, for starters, you look like that, which, I mean that’s awesome. You’re the most loyal friend anyone could ever have, you genuinely like human beings for some strange reason, you’re amazing with kids and dogs and probably even dragons if we ever found one. You’re this Southern Belle who sings like an angel and is incredibly hot in those rare moments when you swear. And you put up with me.”
“I’m not gonna get dramatic because I’m talking about you, not me, but I’m kind of an asshole sometimes. And I don’t really want to let people get close because of that. But,” and she broke with a chuckle here, “we kind of started out close, showering together and all? And somehow you just saw everything—don’t get gross on me, Beale—but it seemed to make you only want to get closer.”
“And that ended up being best for me too.” Chloe’s mouth quirked at the edge as Beca took a step forwards. “Every time I get nervous or scared or anything, you’re there. You get the best and the worst of me and at least pretend to like them equally. And you make me better, because I know I’ll be safe and protected no matter what, so I can go do crazy shit and jump into the unknown and—“
Beca remembered that there was a moment in proposals where one was supposed to get onto one knee (even if one was wearing skinny jeans), and so she slowly, awkwardly clambered to the ground as Chloe’s eyes widened. “So I guess this kind of falls into the category of me doing crazy shit,” Beca said. “And I was kind of hoping you’d be willing to do it with me another time.”
Tears in her eyes, Chloe stepped up and took Beca’s hands, both trembling as Beca took a deep breath. “Chloe Beale, will you marry me?”
Chloe dropped into a crouch to meet Beca’s line of sight, slinging her arms around Beca’s shoulders as she placed a light kiss on her lips. She broke only slightly to rest her forehead against Beca’s, tips of their noses side by side.
“So…is that a yes?” Beca’s lips brushed against Chloe’s as she spoke, and she felt the huff of Chloe’s breath against her skin as she laughed.
“Yes, you giant dork,” Chloe murmured, closing the space with a distinctly more searing kiss that ended with Beca falling back onto the floor with Chloe above her.
As Chloe moved to swing her hips over Beca’s body, Beca placed a hand against her leg to slow her, ignoring the pout as best she could while she sat up. “Wait just one second,” Beca said, scrambling into a crouch. “I think we forgot the whole ring part of the engagement?” She reached into her pocket, only to find it distinctly empty, turning to Chloe with wide, panicked eyes. “Okay, I swear there is one.”
Chloe rolled her eyes. “I trust you, Becs. I mean, I had other things on my mind, so that could probably wait a bit?”
Beca shook her head vigorously, jumping to her feet. “No. I planned this thing to a T and then completely forgot all of it but I am not leaving this out.” She scampered around the apartment as Chloe got to her feet, and was digging through the refrigerator when Chloe let out a distinct cough.
Spinning on her heel, Beca turned to see Chloe with one hand on the back of the couch, the ring box held out between the fingers of her other hand. “Parkour just a bit too hardcore there?”
Beca barely managed to snatch the box from Chloe before she opened it, fumbling with the clasp and turning it towards her now-fiancee. Chloe’s eyes lit up, a gasp catching in her throat as Beca took her hand from the back of the couch, kissing the space over the ring finger. “Does that work for you?” Beca asked.
Chloe nodded as Beca slid the ring onto her finger before leaning back against the couch next to her as Chloe held her hand out for both of them to admire. “So that’s why you and Aubrey were so squirrely last month?”
“Jesus, Beale,” Beca groaned. “Nothing really gets by you, does it?”
Placing a kiss against Beca’s temple, Chloe shrugged. “Must come along with being pretty much flawless.” Her arms wrapped around Beca’s waist as she pulled the smaller girl to rest in between her legs. “But I love it. And I love you.”
They were still for a minute or so, Beca’s head against Chloe’s chest until Chloe’s fingers began to drum against the back of Beca’s jacket. “Something you needed, babe?” Beca asked dryly.
“Well,” Chloe said, lips opening with a pop. “You lost the ring in the couch, right?” Beca nodded slowly, that familiar sense of anticipation building. “Want to see you if you can lose any other items of clothing?”