#merry pitchmas 2017

[aca-esthetic]

↑ Merry (Belated) Pitchmas Gift Exchange 2017, @djsendrick! ❤ ugh, i apologize in advance for not coming up with something 💯 times better! Aca!Child Pitchmas AU: Emily stumbles upon her parents getting "r e a d y" for a holiday party. Beca and Chloe should really learn to be more careful...

[brittany-snow]

Merry Pitchmas @aliciameade!

Bechloe - Detective AU: Beca Mitchell and Chloe Beale are partners and two of Brooklyn’s finest detectives (And they may or may not be dating and living together). Their newest case finds them hunting down a serial killer who’s targeting New York cops. Things get personal for Beca when Chloe becomes his next target.

P.S. I hope we can still be friends after this absolutely horrendous gifset present. I tried to channel my inner @captainpeachperfect but I’m nowhere near as good. 

[not-so-average-fangirl]

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Merry Pitchmas @manyshipsinoneithink!! 🎁❤️🎄

I’m your Secret Santa! 🎅🏼

Hope you enjoy this little video edit. Have a nice day! ☺️

[cj-jacobs]

The Sex Elf

(Bechloe one-shot, 10k words)

Merry Pitchmas, awesome nerds! I didn’t do the official Secret Santa thing because I was so paranoid I wouldn’t get this done in time and didn’t want to disappoint anyone, but I’d like to gift it to the Bechloe fandom in general, and most especially as a surprise gift to @annakendrick4ever , because she’s been so supportive of my fics and is just an all-around sweetheart. I hope everyone who celebrates Christmas had a great holiday!

Not for the first time tonight, Beca finds herself wondering if it’s wrong to be this horny on Christmas Eve.

Because it feels wrong. Dirty, somehow. Not seasonally appropriate. After all, Christmas is supposed to be about wholesome, childlike, non-sexual things. Family things.

But then, the whole notion of family is precisely what’s put her into this situation, Beca muses, as she clumsily wields a screwdriver in an attempt to secure the wheel onto a doll stroller intended for her four-year-old daughter. Family, and the fact that in approximately five months theirs - hers and Chloe’s - is set to expand by two. And, most crucially, the fact that she’s the one carrying those two, and thus the one dealing with all the crazy, out of control hormones that pregnancy has brought in its wake.

For the ninth or tenth time in the past fifteen minutes, Beca finds her gaze drawn against her will to the other side of the master bedroom, where Chloe is wrapping presents, using their king size bed as her table. She’s got all her materials laid out on it; shopping bags full of gifts, ribbons, bows, tags, scissors and tape, boxes, and half a dozen rolls of wrapping paper, chosen specifically for color variety. But it’s not the paper or the presents that are drawing Beca’s attention, it’s Chloe herself. From here, Beca can only see her from the back. She’s dressed in a dark green romper printed with tiny red and white candy canes. In addition to this, she’s sporting fuzzy Christmas socks, dangly snowflake earrings, and a headband with a pair of perky cloth reindeer antlers. The fact that in spite of this ridiculous ensemble, Beca finds herself gazing at her lustfully says a lot about the current state of her libido.

Because no matter how hard she tries, her mind keeps sliding right back to sex. Her entire body is suffused with a kind of sensual energy like nothing she’s ever felt before, and it’s never satisfied for long. The fact that she’s already partaken of some afternoon delight today means nothing, because that was hours and hours ago, and these days the urges cycle back around continuously, with no let-up, multiple times every day.

Idly, she finds herself wondering, Is this what Stacie feels like all the time? Is that why she-

No. Picturing Stacie’s sex life is not going to help. Dolls. Strollers. Christmas. Wholesome family things. That’s what she needs to be thinking about. Focus, she commands herself.  

“How’s it goin’ over there, Mrs. Claus?” Chloe calls to her, as if sensing her distraction.

Beca surveys her work. “You know, I’m pretty sure the only reason my mom sent an unassembled toy is because the thought of me doing this in the middle of the night was hilarious to her.”

Chloe smiles. “Or,” she suggests tolerantly, “maybe it’s because that kind is cheaper, and that’s all she could afford.”

“Nah,” Beca rejects this idea. “This is payback, for all the Christmas Eves she didn’t get any sleep. See, every year she tried to get us to celebrate Hanukkah instead, and we never would take the bait. I’m telling you, this is a revenge gift. She is one sadistic woman.”

Laughing a little, Chloe reflects after a few seconds, “I think it’s just, like, a law of parenting, though, right? That we have to spend at least one Christmas Eve trying to assemble a toy?”

“Maybe. Except we aren’t assembling it. I am.”

“Hey. I’m busy over here, too,” she chides her.

Indeed she is. Beca finds herself trying and failing once again not to look as Chloe bends over the bed to cut another segment of wrapping paper, the tightness of the romper clinging to and perfectly accentuating her curves. Beca watches as she runs a pair of scissors down the middle of a sheet of glittery silver paper in a straight line. Normally this sound is one that for no particular reason grates on her nerves, like fingernails on a chalkboard. But tonight it sounds almost lewd. At the moment everything seems specifically designed to work on her hormones, not her nerves.

The funny thing is, she’d never wanted to be pregnant. In fact, until just a few months ago, she would have been adamant that it was the one life experience above all others she was determined never to go through. But then she’d changed her mind. She’s still not entirely sure why.

Because after Violet, she and Chloe had basically accepted that they’d never have another one. The pregnancy had been difficult; Chloe was sick a lot in the beginning, then the end had come abruptly, six weeks early, and Beca had spent a harrowing few days at the hospital with a premature baby and an unconscious wife, wondering if her life as she knew it was about to end. By some miracle, everything had turned out fine. Fine, that is, except for one small thing. Chloe had been warned by her doctor that another pregnancy wouldn’t be a good idea. At the time, it had seemed like a small price to pay.

But yet, here they are. Expecting not just one, but - in the most shocking news of their lives - two more.

And to everyone’s surprise, no one’s more than her own, Beca has found that pregnancy agrees with her. Not only has she not been sick, not even once, and not only is she possessed of more energy and a better mood than usual, but her sex drive has shot through the roof. Actually, one might even say it’s starting to be a bit of a problem. Needing sex so many times a day has its downsides. It’s convenient that her studio is located here on the property, which means it’s easy to duck in for a brief tryst, but having a four-year-old who’s not yet in school makes things more complicated. Violet’s three mornings a week at daycare and her daily two p.m. naptime have become blessed interludes of carnal indulgence.

Beca finds her thoughts wandering back to this afternoon’s session, her body remembering just how it had felt to be pinned under Chloe and clinging to the headboard as she…. No. That’s not going to help either. Shaking her head a little to clear the lust fog, she forces herself to focus on the damn doll stroller. It takes every ounce of her concentration to make sense out of instructions like Squeeze the metal bracket on the wheel to open it, slip the wheel onto the end of the rod, and release the bracket. She’s not even one hundred percent positive she knows what the hell a bracket is, and the words squeeze and slip look like porn in her current state of mind. But she’s doing her best.

Finally, the last wheel seems to be locked into place. “Okay. Moment of truth.” She practically holds her breath as she gives the pink stroller an experimental push forward, then pulls it back, making sure it rolls properly. “I think it’s finished. Thank God.”

“No pieces left over?” Chloe asks.

Beca looks into the box. There are approximately nine pieces left over. “Nope.” She strategically covers them with the instruction sheets. “We’re good.”

Wincing as her stiff muscles protest, she pulls herself up from the floor. “But, um, just to be on the safe side, let’s make sure we never put an actual baby in this thing.”

Chloe has also paused briefly in her assembly-line gift wrapping. She’s sipping from a glass of red wine, looking at the bed as if measuring how much is left to do. Beca approaches behind her and presses herself up against her back, wrapping her arms around her. Chloe sighs a little and leans back into her, bringing her free hand up to squeeze Beca’s arm.

Though her stomach is only just beginning to pop out, the roundness subtle enough that if she wears a baggy shirt it’s not even that noticeable, standing like this, Beca can feel the difference. Odd to think that in another few months, she won’t be able to stand like this at all. She presses herself even tighter against Chloe, to take advantage of it while she can. Nuzzling up into the spot just behind her ear, she murmurs, “Have I ever told you how sexy you look in those reindeer antlers?”

“What reindeer antlers?” Then Chloe gasps, her mouth forming an O of surprise. She suddenly reaches up and yanks the felt antlers from her head. “Oh my God, I forgot I had these on!”

Beca gives a loud laugh. “Seriously?”

“How long have I been wearing these?”

“Like, all day.”

She marvels at the antlers, amazed. “No wonder the Fed Ex guy was giving me such a weird look.” She tosses them aside, jokingly accusatory. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I thought you knew. It’s not like it’s the strangest thing you’ve ever done on Christmas Eve. Remember the year you put jingle bells in your bra?”

Chloe giggles a little at the memory as she takes another sip of wine. “That was a good Christmas.”

With her arms still wrapped around her from behind, and using the subject as an opportunity, Beca now unfastens the top few buttons of the romper and slips a hand in, wondering, “Anything in there this year? Oh, wow. Not even a bra.”

“I know what you’re trying to do, and it’s not gonna work,” Chloe informs her with a grin, although she leans back against Beca and makes no move to stop her.

“I’m trying to feel you up. And, I think it already did work.”

“You know what I mean. I’m not gonna let you distract me. Not tonight.”

“Can’t you take a break? I need you,” Beca whines, trying to make it sound like joke begging instead of actual begging, which it is.

“Babe, look at the time. Santa’s on the clock, here.”

Beca glances at the digital clock next to the bed, shocked to see that it’s almost three in the morning. “We shouldn’t have waited until the last minute to do all this,” she mutters petulantly against Chloe’s shoulder.

“I know, but everything’s been so crazy. And a lot of my spare time lately has been taken up by someone demanding sex.”

“Really?” Beca asks. “Who?”

“That would be the person whose hand is currently in my shirt.”

“Oh, her.”

“Yes, her. And she’s not gonna be too happy about this, but I have to get back to work now,” Chloe sets her wineglass aside on the trunk at the foot of the bed and delicately removes the hand from her shirt, over Beca’s sad-sounding protests. As if to compensate her for the loss, Chloe turns to kiss her.

Sensing her opportunity, Beca tries to make the most of the kiss, but she’s distracted by another, non-sexual craving.

“Mmm, I can taste the wine on your mouth,” she murmurs against Chloe’s lips.

Chloe seems bemused. “You don’t even like wine.”

“No, but I like alcohol. And I miss it.” She pulls her back in for another deep kiss. She can feel Chloe actively trying to resist letting things heat up beyond a certain level, but at the same time Chloe is such a good kisser that it’s hard for her to fight her natural instincts. Beca tries to take advantage of her internal battle, using her tongue in a precise and practiced way that draws Chloe into being the aggressor. It works for a few seconds, but then Chloe seems to realize what she’s doing, and she uses all her willpower to pull back and break the kiss.

“Really?” Beca asks.

“Really.” Then Chloe cups Beca’s face in her hands, briefly leaning forward and pressing their foreheads together. “But maybe later, okay?”

Beca sighs, apparently giving in.

But just then Chloe jumps a little, turning to glance behind her and down toward her ass. “What was that? Did you just pinch me?”

“What? No. Why would I- ?” Beca makes a face of exaggerated innocence. Then she seems to think of something. “But, oh, you know what I bet it was? I bet it was the sex elf.”

Chloe tilts her head. “The what, now?”

“You’ve… never heard of the sex elf? For real? That’s insane. I thought everyone knew about this.”

Crossing her arms, Chloe plays along, waiting for her to explain.

“The sex elf is that little creature that goes around on Christmas Eve, pinching people. And when you get pinched, you become overwhelmingly aroused. And you have to get laid, like, right then. You have no choice.”

“Really. This is fascinating.”

“I can’t believe you didn’t know about this.”

Chloe narrows her eyes in mock seriousness. “Are you sure that’s not leprechauns you’re thinking of?”

“What? No.” Beca makes a disgusted face. “Gross. Leprechauns are, like, ugly little Irish dudes. Who care way too much about the color green. The sex elf is hot. And, frankly, she prefers it if you’re not wearing anything.”

“Oh, so the sex elf is female?”

“Well,” Beca shrugs. “Yeah. Obviously.”

“Obviously,” Chloe agrees. She smiles and then leans forward for one more light kiss, getting Beca’s hopes up. “Well, it was really sweet of her to pay us a visit. It’s too bad she couldn’t have stuck around to help with some of this.” She gestures at the gift-wrapping mess.

“Yeah.” Beca grimaces. “I think she’s really just… more about the sex?”

Chloe nods, amused, but then looks regretful. “Beca?”

Beca waits, giving her an expectant, somewhat pleading look.

“It’s not gonna happen,” Chloe whispers, dashing all her hopes.

Momentarily accepting defeat, Beca sighs heavily and drops onto the bed, stretching out directly on top of Chloe’s present-wrapping workshop. “Fine,” she sulks.  

“But, you know, if you’re bored, you could help me finish this up,” Chloe suggests.

“Uuhhh,” she moans. “You know I hate wrapping presents, dude. I’m carrying your children! Isn’t that enough?”

“Oh my God,” Chloe laughs at her. “Enjoy that excuse while it lasts.” But she doesn’t insist.

Beca tries to relax and coerce her body into a zone of patience, but now that she’s actually lying on the bed, the urge to touch herself is nearly overpowering. It hasn’t been this strong since she was sixteen and puberty finally slammed into her with the finesse of a car crash. She sits up again, crossing her arms and tucking her hands away to keep them out of trouble. Not that Chloe would mind. But she has a feeling that trying to get herself off while her wife ignores her and wraps presents for a four-year-old would be not so much sexy as pathetic.

Instead, she watches Chloe work, pondering the absurdity of being awake in the middle of the night wrapping gifts in paper that’s going to be torn off and thrown away in less than six hours. Being a parent is strange. But it’s pointless to question it.

Chloe has her own distinctive manner of wrapping presents, a way of folding the paper which is like nothing Beca has ever seen any human being do before. Somehow, the packages always end up looking great. But like so much else that she does, Chloe goes about it using a bizarre method she seems to have invented on her own, as if no one ever taught her the normal way to do it. Momentarily distracted from her lust, Beca finds herself watching with amused fascination as she finishes taping up the paper on one gift, then with a flourish adds a stick-on bow - not in the center, but in one corner.

Shaking her head with a fond smile, Beca mutters, “You’re so weird.”

Turning to set the package on a pile of already-wrapped boxes in a chair beside the bed, Chloe lets out a breath of relief. “There.”

Beca perks up, hopeful. “That’s it? You’re done?”

“Well, I’m not done done. I’m done with the big stuff. There’s still all the stocking stuffers.” She lifts a plastic bag from the floor near the side of the bed and turns it upside down over the comforter. Approximately thirty small items tumble out.

“What?” Beca looks at her like she’s crazy. “You’re not gonna wrap all those, are you?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Chlo, they’re stocking stuffers. The stocking is the wrapping. That’s the whole point.”

Chloe shakes her head. “No, because then when she dumps it out, she’ll be able to see all of it at once. Where’s the surprise, where’s the anticipation? I want her to have to open each one, individually.”

“Oh my God, that’s-” Beca digs her fingers into her own hair and vigorously shakes her head, making a clenched-teeth sound like “Mrrrmmm.” It’s the sound she makes when she’s trying to keep herself from saying something she’ll regret. After restraining her worst impulses, she drops her hands and settles for, “You know that’s gonna take forever, right?”

“I don’t care how long it takes,” Chloe says stubbornly. “We’ve got all day.”

Beca lifts one of the items from the pile. “You’re gonna wrap these socks?”

“Mm-hm.”

She picks up another item. “This roll of Sweetarts?”

Chloe nods. “Yep.”

“You’re gonna wrap this lip balm. This one, individual tube of lip balm.”

“That’s right,” Chloe confirms, and because there’s a slight edge to her tone now, Beca decides she should probably back off. She carefully sets the lip balm back onto the pile, suppressing an eye roll like a good girl.

While Chloe starts in on the stocking stuffers, Beca reaches over and grabs her phone off the nightstand to check her messages. There’s a handful of Merry Christmas texts from the Bellas, nothing out of the ordinary. The one from Aubrey, however, makes Beca narrow her eyes in suspicion. It reads Merry Christmas Beca! Hope this one leaves you satisfied ;) ;)

Setting the phone back on the nightstand, she ponders the meaning of this for a few seconds.

“Hey,” she says casually. “You didn’t tell Aubrey about my whole… horniness… issue, did you?”

“Of course not.” But Chloe doesn’t look at her.

“Because I just got a weird text from her. And, now that I’m thinking about it, I’m pretty sure I overheard you on the phone earlier saying something about a… what were the words? Crazy little sex fiend.”

Chloe shakes her head slightly and frowns, but still doesn’t glance up. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Beca studies her face for a few seconds, taking note of how hard she’s now trying not to laugh, and the continued lack of eye contact. “You did!” she suddenly gasps, letting her mouth fall open in pretend shock. “Dude, you told her?!”

“Beca,” Chloe protests, finally looking up at her. “Come on. Aubrey’s my best friend. I tell her everything!”

“About our love life?”

“It’s not like she’s gonna judge you. She’s been pregnant before, she knows about the hormones.”

“Okay, wow.” Beca plays up her mock outrage, a hand on her heart. “I can not believe that you would betray the sanctity of our marriage like that. Honestly? There’s only one way that you could ever make this up to me.”

“Hmm,” Chloe muses, snipping off a length of ribbon. “And what way would that be?”

“I’ll give you a hint,” Beca tells her. “It involves you taking off your clothes. Right now.”

Attempting to tie the ribbon around one of the stocking stuffers, Chloe responds only with a slightly pitying look.

“No? Damn it,” Beca mutters. “I thought the guilt trip was the way to go.” She thinks for a few seconds, trying to come up with a more effective angle. Then she suddenly asks, “Is it just me, or is it really hot in here?” As she says these words she slowly pulls off her shirt, leaving her in nothing but a pair of sweatpants and a lacy black bra.

“Nope.” Pressing her lips together to try to stifle a smile, Chloe shakes her head and concentrates on her battle with the ribbon. “I’m ignoring you.”

“Really? You can ignore this?” Beca cups her own breasts and pushes them together and up, trying to create some amplified cleavage.

As if to prove her right, Chloe glances up at her, again trying not to laugh.“Why are you wearing one of your sexy bras under your pajamas?”

“Because a girl needs to be prepared. Especially when her wife is resisting her seduction attempts.”

“Oh, is that what this is?” Chloe teases her. “A seduction? See, I didn’t get that.”

“Well, now you know.”

She snips out a small rectangle of paper, just big enough to wrap a toothbrush in. “You know what this is, Beca?” she says reflectively, pointing at her with the scissors. “It’s karma. For all those years I tried to get into your pants in college, and you wouldn’t let me.”

Beca widens her eyes with pretend dismay. “That is so twisted! For most of that time, I didn’t even think you were serious, I thought you were just messing with me.” She’s quiet for a second, as if considering how much she wants to reveal. A little awkwardly, she admits, “It’s not like I never thought about it. I had some pretty inappropriate dreams over the years.”

“Really?” Chloe looks intrigued. “You never told me that.”

Pursing her lips, Beca nods. After a pause, she adds, “First one was after the shower thing.”

“What? That was only the second time we met! Even I didn’t have a sex dream that early.”

“Yep. What can I say?” Beca shrugs. “Guess my dream self is kind of a slut.” She considers. “And, now, apparently, so is my awake self. Which could end at any time. So…” she holds her arms and gives a little shimmy of invitation, “you might want to get on this, while it lasts.”

“Well, that is hard to resist, when you put it so romantically.”

“Right?”

“But I think I’m still gonna have to finish these presents.”

Beca gives a dramatic groan at yet another failure. “You are killing me, lady.”  

After another few minutes of watching her, Beca decides to try some props.  She picks up a long tubular roll of wrapping paper and holds it so that it springs up from between her legs. “What about this? Does this do anything for ya?”

Chloe looks over at her, teasing, “If it did, it would be bad news for you.” She reaches out and snatches away the roll of paper. “Give me that, I need it.”

As it’s yanked away Beca hisses sharply and stares down at her left hand. “You bitch. You gave me a papercut!”

“Aww. Poor baby.” But she doesn’t sound particularly sympathetic.

“Ow.” Beca stares down at the shallow cut between her fingers, musing, “Why is this making me even more turned on? Am I into this? Maybe this is my kink.” She looks up at Chloe and asks in a flirtatious tone, “You want to give me another one?”

“Don’t tempt me,” she smiles, picking up her wine glass and draining what’s left of it, as though dealing with Beca’s current mood requires all the alcohol available. “Although…” she says after a few seconds, biting her bottom lip as an idea occurs to her. She sets the empty wine glass aside. “Speaking of kinks.” Now she bends forward over the bed, balancing herself with one hand on the mattress, her face coming tantalizingly close to Beca’s. She lets her voice drop into a breathy, lascivious register. “You know what would make me really, really hot right now?”

Beca watches nearly hypnotized as she approaches, staring first at her eyes and then at her mouth, only inches away. She tries to say the word “what?” but isn’t quite sure it comes out.

“The sight of you, in this bra…” Chloe coos seductively, actually running her fingertip down the bra strap and then along the edge of one of the cups as Beca follows its progress with rapt attention. Chloe pauses for dramatic effect, waiting until Beca looks up at her again, then concludes in a whisper, “Wrapping some of these stocking stuffers.” Then she leans back and straightens up, punctuating the performance with a quick wink.

“Hm.” This is the only response Beca can immediately manage as she tries to remember how to breathe. After seeming to consider the proposition, she says doubtfully, “See, I feel like that’s not one hundred percent true? I feel like I might be getting used, here.”

“Well,” Chloe tosses her a roll of tape, “guess there’s only one way to find out.”

Realizing there’s no point in continuing to fight it, Beca decides to give in and help. Even if it doesn’t actually make Chloe hot, it’ll at least mean they’ll be finished with everything sooner, which will still, hopefully, bring her closer to sex. It’s a no-brainer. So they divide the pile of remaining items up and get to work.

Wrapping things that aren’t in boxes turns out to be easier and more fun than Beca would have predicted, since it’s okay if it looks messy and there’s almost no way to get it wrong. Eventually, Chloe gets tired of standing and climbs onto the bed, sitting across from her. They trade the tape and scissors back and forth, losing them both every few minutes under the growing drift of wrapping paper scraps covering the bed.

At one point Beca seems overly amused with herself, and Chloe looks over to find her wrapping Scotch tape around the paper covering a plastic My Little Pony toy, over and over and over again, essentially mummifying the poor pony.

“What are you doing?” Chloe giggles.

“You wanted the anticipation factor. Let’s see how long it takes her to open this one.”

The piles of gifts keep diminishing until finally, finally, the very last box of sidewalk chalk is wrapped and added to the bag of finished items, ready to be crammed into the jumbo-sized stocking waiting downstairs.

Beca hardly dares to believe her own senses. “So, that’s it then? We’re done. With everything.”

Chloe looks around, considering. “What about the doll stroller?”

“Okay, we are not wrapping that,” Beca says firmly. “I’ll throw a sheet over it or something.”

“Then… yeah.” She looks back at Beca. “I guess that’s it.”

Trying and not succeeding very well at keeping her eyes from gleaming with pure lust as she stares at her, Beca offers, “Sooo, do you need like a bathroom break, or…?”

Chloe seems amused by this. “No, I’m good. I- “

But before she can complete this thought, Beca has pounced on her, with a kiss so forceful and bruising that both their mouths will probably be sore tomorrow. But she’s past caring. She pushes her back toward the middle of the bed, angling for the pillows, the wrapping paper crackling loudly underneath them. Chloe squeals in laughter, breaking the kiss to say, “Let me clear the bed off first!”

“Nope, it’s fine,” Beca gasps. “Leave it. We can knock this out in, like, five minutes.”

“God, that’s so sexy,” Chloe breathes against her ear. “Tell me again how fast you can be, it’s such a turn-on.”

“Shut up,” Beca laughs.

With Chloe now up against the pillows at the top of the bed, Beca climbs onto her lap, straddling her, almost undone by the instantaneous pleasure of even the light friction of this much contact. Oh God Oh God Oh God. She hasn’t even progressed as far as taking her sweatpants off yet, but even through the fabric the welcome pressure of Chloe’s body has her eyes rolling back in her head. In the past this would have been barely enough to register on her, but she’s so excruciatingly sensitive that any touch at all is already like a mini-orgasm. Immediately she begins rocking against Chloe in slow waves, trying to keep her movements sensual instead of desperate.

At the same time, she unbuttons the front of Chloe’s romper for the second time tonight and peels it off her shoulders, ducking down to return to the bare skin with her lips. She feels Chloe’s expected shiver as she tilts her head back to allow Beca easier access. Her collarbone is her secret erogenous zone, in the same way Beca’s ears are hers. It’s a surefire way to kick her passion up a few notches. As she kisses down the ridge of her shoulder and then along the top of her chest, she feels Chloe’s fingers working at the bra strap on her back. Without too much effort she unhooks it and Beca shrugs it off.

She continues working her way along Chloe’s collarbone and then back up her neck on the other side, but the fact that her breasts are now free is making her antsy, and she straightens her spine and lifts herself higher against Chloe’s body to put them nearer her mouth, hoping she gets the hint. She does.

The sensation of Chloe’s tongue tracing circles over one breast, followed not too long afterward by the enveloping warmth of her mouth clamping down on the other one sends a surge of heat blooming upwards from between Beca’s legs, and her thighs lock around Chloe’s hips in a preliminary spasm of pleasure. This in turn causes Chloe to press up against her and then to nip at her with her teeth, a feedback loop that jolts Beca with an even sharper stab of ecstasy and an increased frenzy to her writhing.

Suddenly she realizes that she’s too close. Way too close, for this early in the game. To try to slow herself down, she grasps Chloe’s head in her hands and physically pulls it up and away from her chest, signaling that she wants to kiss her. Chloe looks a little surprised, since Beca isn’t normally the type to want to go back to the preliminaries, after they’ve already gotten down to more serious business. But she happily obliges, sliding her hands up Beca’s bare back and pulling her even closer as she angles her head up and into the kiss.

As Chloe has gradually shifted further back into the pillows, Beca has worked herself lower down her body, and now Chloe’s pelvic bone is positioned directly between her legs, up against the precise spot that’s been begging for attention for hours. Still, this shouldn’t be enough contact, she knows it shouldn’t. And yet her lower body is behaving as if it is, almost as if it has a mind of its own, her squirming becoming more deliberately rhythmic, her hips rotating with purpose while her kisses gradually lose focus and then break off completely as her breathing grows more ragged.

Because it’s happening. All of a sudden she knows it’s happening, and either she can slam on the brakes completely or she can help it along and make sure it’s as satisfying as possible. She’s already past the point of no return. No sense in wasting it. So instead of fighting it she doubles down shamelessly, using every ounce of her strength to grind herself against Chloe’s lap, while Chloe assists her along by pushing herself up against her while simultaneously tugging downward on Beca’s hips.

Then she shudders and her back bows into a taut arc, her head practically upside down, and if Chloe wasn’t hanging onto her around the waist she would definitely fall over backwards. She hangs there suspended, waiting for it to spasm itself out. Every day the orgasms seem to be getting bigger, somehow. They’re more powerful, they take up more space inside her, and they last longer than she would have once thought possible. The bliss that floods through her now is so piercing that it brings actual tears to her eyes, and she has to make an effort to keep from screaming. Instead she makes a noise that probably sounds more like pain than pleasure, but it’s the most restrained she can manage.

Finally, feeling shaky and a bit lightheaded, still breathing hard, she steadies herself and rises back to vertical. The force of her grinding has pushed Chloe all the way back into a nearly reclining position, with Beca still straddling her midsection. Taking in gulps of air, mortification gradually settling in with the slowing of her pulse, Beca now looks down at her beautiful wife, at her messy hair splayed around her on the pillows, one strand caught in a snowflake earring, her lips swollen from the force of their brief but intense make-out session.

Chloe stares up at Beca, her eyes sparkling with mirth, stunned but also a little impressed. “Was that- ?”

Beca now covers her face with her hands as she realizes exactly what she just did. “Yep,” she confirms in a small voice.

“Wow. You weren’t kidding. That was fast.”

Beca only winces and shakes her head a little, hands still covering her face.

Chloe is enjoying this way too much. “I didn’t even touch you yet.”

“I know.”

“You’re still wearing your pants.”

“Oh my God, I know. Stop talking about it.”  

Chloe giggles and pulls her down, and Beca allows herself to fall against her, laughing into the side of her neck, glad to hide her burning face.

“Jesus,” she whispers. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Chloe tells her, stroking her back. “It’s sort of flattering, in a… weird way. Also kinda hot,” she admits.

Beca takes a deep, shuddering breath, releasing it and feeling most of the tension drain out of her body as her pulse finally slows down. “I really needed that.”

“I shouldn’t have made you wait so long.” Chloe’s still rubbing slow circles on her back. “You need some time to recover, before the second half?”

She hesitates, but then accepts the offer. “Maybe just a few minutes.” Shifting off Chloe and onto her side, they lie facing each other, separated by only a few feet.

“Your face is all red,” Chloe smiles. She places the back of her hand against Beca’s cheek, as if checking for fever.

“That’s the color of shame,” Beca informs her, only half joking. She likewise reaches over and carefully extracts the hair that’s tangled in Chloe’s earring, then strokes it to smooth it out.

Inching closer to her across the pillow, Chloe nuzzles into a slow, lazy kiss. For a long while she seems content to keep it at this level, as if they have all the time in the world, and from the way she’s seeking out cuddles even in the midst of what’s supposed to be sex, Beca senses that she’s not in any big hurry, physically. Waiting for her energy reserves to return, she finds herself drifting into a kind of dreamy, hazy post-orgasm euphoria as they continue making out like teenagers. Beca’s fine with letting her set the pace, she just hopes she doesn’t fall asleep before Chloe decides she’s ready to kick it into high gear.

But suddenly Chloe stiffens and raises her head, like she’s listening.

“What?” Beca asks drowsily.

“I thought I heard something. In the hallway.”

“Maybe it’s Santa. Maybe he wants to watch, that old perv.”

Chloe gives her a distracted smile.

“That didn’t turn you on, did it?”

“Beca, shh. I’m serious, I hear something.”

Beca raises her head to listen as well, and confirmation shortly follows; there’s what sounds like a faint, feeble knock at the door, almost more like a scratch than a knock. Maybe one of the cats, Beca hopes. Please let it be one of the cats.

But then they hear just outside their door the one sound that no parent ever wants to hear in the middle of the night, especially while attempting to do what they’re attempting to do.

“Mommy?”

They stare at each other.

“What the hell?” Beca hisses. “Why is she awake?” Suddenly paranoid, she asks, “I wasn’t that loud, was I?”

“No,” Chloe assures her. “Maybe she’s sick.” In a loud, upbeat voice, she calls, “Just a second, sweetheart!”

Beca sits up and searches for her shirt under all the wrapping paper on the bed, then yanks it back on, not bothering with the bra. She starts toward the door but then suddenly remembers they have a bigger problem than just incomplete sex.

“Shit, the presents,” she whispers. “What do we do?”

“Um,” Chloe casts around for a solution. “Blankets!”

As fast as they can, they tug the comforter from the bed and cover the piles of presents on the floor. Beca grabs a knitted afghan to drape over the stack of gifts in the armchair in the corner, while Chloe snatches a spare sheet from a nearby laundry basket, tossing it over the doll stroller.

“Hold on, we’re almost there!” she calls again, trying to sound normal. She looks around, asking Beca, “Is everything covered?”

Beca smirks. “Not quite everything.”

Chloe looks down at where Beca’s gesturing, realizing that she’s still topless. “Oh.” She laughs and yanks the romper back up onto her arms, and is just finishing the last button when Beca reaches the door.

Checking to make sure Chloe is ready, she pauses, then swings it open.

On the other side, waiting in the hallway, they’re confronted with the face of tragedy. Violet stands there in her brand new blue and white snowman-printed Christmas pajamas, the one gift she’d been allowed to open tonight before bed, but the expression on her face is anything but festive. She looks wretched.

“Sweetie.” Chloe’s voice is drenched in pre-emptive sympathy. “What happened?”

“Did you puke?” Beca asks, getting right to the point.

Shell-shocked, Violet stares into the middle distance as if she’s barely aware of their presence. In a quiet tone of disbelief, she says, “He didn’t come here.”

“What?” They look at each other, uncomprehending.

Repeating herself, Violet emphasizes each word for the benefit of their challenged adult brains. “He. Didn’t. Come. To. Our. House.”

“Who didn’t?” Beca demands.

Violet finally looks up at her, her mouth a tiny O of surprise, flabbergasted that her mother could be so stupid. “Santa Claus!”

“Wait, did you go downstairs?” Chloe looks dismayed. “It’s not even morning yet.”

Ignoring this question, Violet shakes her head and walks a few paces into the room, then spins around and comes back, then repeats the process, wringing her tiny hands and looking distraught.

“Uh-oh,” Beca mutters. “She’s pacing. Where have I seen this before?”

“Violet, oh my God, this is just a misunderstanding, please don’t freak out,” Chloe begs her.

Without seeming to hear her, Violet continues her pacing. “I can’t believe this!” she rants. “This is the worst Christmas of my life!”

“Oh, man,” Beca winces. “Out of all four?”

“Beca.” Chloe shoots her a warning look. Then she takes Violet by the shoulders and gently guides her over to the trunk at the foot of their bed. “Honey, come over here, and listen to me for a minute.” She sits down and pulls Violet up to sit next to her, telling her, “Santa Claus is going to be here, I promise. It’s still early, there’s plenty of time.”

“No. He’s not coming. And I know why. It’s because I did something bad.” She’s really playing up the melodrama, sticking out her bottom lip in a pout that she must have learned from a sitcom kid.

“What? No, you didn’t,” Chloe tries to comfort her. “You’ve been really good this year.”

“I wasn’t good yesterday.” Violet looks at her, saying pointedly, “You don’t know, Mommy.”

“Ohhh.” Now Chloe’s catching on. “I see.”

Beca approaches, lowering herself to the edge of the bed a few feet from Chloe. Trying to sound as if she’s taking this seriously, she offers, “Is there something you want to tell us?”

It takes only a few seconds for Violet to decide that she does want to tell them, since she’s obviously suffering from a guilty conscience. “Okay.” She hops down from the wooden chest and comes to stand in front of them both, then takes a deep breath. “Yesterday…” she stares mournfully at her socks, looking for all the world like she’s about to deliver a eulogy. “I peed in the plant.”

Chloe and Beca glance at each other, baffled.

“What plant?” Beca asks.

Violet sighs, miserable but determined to press forward with her confession now that she’s started. “The big one. In the living room. With the red flowers.”

“My poinsettia plant?” Chloe asks, her voice strained as if she’s already trying to hold back laughter.

“In the dirt,” Violet specifies. “Not the flower part.”

“Oh.” Chloe nods slowly, but then clamps a hand over her own mouth.

“Because the Grinch was on,” Violet adds, warming to her narrative now. “And I had to go real bad. But I didn’t want to miss it, so I didn’t go yet. But then I couldn’t wait any more. So I went in the plant.”

Pressing her lips together hard, Beca glances once at Chloe and then looks quickly away before they make eye contact, certain that then they’d really lose it. Because they both know that their daughter is sensitive about being laughed at, it would be a bad idea. But this is one of those times when it’s practically torture to fight it.

Beca manages to master herself first. To buy Chloe some time to get it together, she comments, “I can see how that might be tempting. That white pot does sort of look like a toilet.”

This apparently doesn’t help Chloe, because now an odd stifled snort comes from behind the hand she’s holding over her mouth.

Beca adds, “And, I mean, who wants to leave the room when the Grinch is on, right?”

Violet nods, glad somebody gets it. “But it was still bad,” she points out.

Finally, Chloe regains her composure. She lowers her hand, saying sympathetically, “Sweetheart. That’s… I mean, yeah, okay, that’s definitely not a good thing. We don’t want to make a habit of… peeing in plants.” She’s forced to stop again, still avoiding meeting Beca’s eye. “But it’s good that you told us.”

“No,” Violet shakes her head tragically, refusing to be consoled. “It doesn’t matter. Because Santa already knows. Like in the song.” Suddenly she face plants onto the bed between them, uttering a muffled, plaintive wail. “I ruined Christmas!”

Chloe and Beca trade dumbfounded looks over her back, neither having any immediate idea of how to fix this mess. Beca still really wants to laugh, but she can read the Don’t in Chloe’s gaze as easily as if she’d said it out loud. Shutting her eyes for a second, she considers their options in this supremely ridiculous situation. She feels responsible, since if it wasn’t for her raging sex drive, they probably would have already had the presents under the tree. But there’s clearly no way to explain that to their daughter.

She opens her eyes again with an idea. It might not work, but it’s worth a shot. “All right.” She takes a deep breath. “Hey,” she nudges Violet. “Would you sit up, please? And stop being such a drama queen? There’s something we need to tell you. About Santa Claus.”

Though she drags out the process, Violet does finally pull herself up from the bed and turn around to face them, intrigued.

Chloe, however, looks confused, and more than a little concerned. She pulls Violet into her lap, as if to protect her from whatever Beca’s about to say.

“It’s a big secret,” Beca adds, “so you have to promise you’re not gonna tell any other kids.” She shoots Chloe a look over Violet’s head that she hopes conveys Trust me, but Chloe still seems nervous, obviously wondering where on earth she’s going with this.

But Violet is now hanging on every word. “I promise,” she says solemnly.

“Okay. Here it is.” She lowers her voice to a discreet level. “Santa Claus?” Here Beca takes a long pause for maximum dramatic impact, starting to enjoy herself a little. “He doesn’t actually care whether you’re good or not.”

She can sense the relief washing over Chloe as she realizes what Beca’s up to.

“Yes he does,” Violet insists petulantly.

“Nope,” Beca shakes her head. “He doesn’t. Parents just want kids to think that, so they’ll be good. But the truth is, Santa doesn’t give a crap. About anything you do. He’s gonna bring you stuff no matter what.”

“It’s true,” Chloe chimes in. “He really doesn’t care. The song is a lie.”

Mulling this over, Violet seems to want to believe them, but she’s not quite there yet.

“In fact...” Beca looks around as if she’s about to impart even more confidential information. “Did I ever tell you about the Christmas Eve when I stabbed my brother in the shoulder with a pencil?”

Violet looks shocked. “Why did you stab Uncle Chris?”

“I had to.” In her most serious tone, Beca explains, “Because he called Nicole Scherzinger a skank.”

Thinking about this, Violet wants to know, “Who’s Nicole…” she struggles to pronounce the name, “Scherrrr...zinger?”

“She was a Pussycat Doll,” Chloe supplies helpfully.

“Yeah,” Beca agrees. “Well, I mean,” she shrugs, compelled to add, “not just a Pussycat Doll.  She was, like, the lead Pussycat Doll.”

Still seeming deeply confused, Violet asks, “Who were the- ”

“You know what, that’s not important,” Beca quickly interrupts her. “The point is, she wasn’t a skank. She was a superstar. And a very important part of my childhood. And I’m pretty sure that I was trying to kill my brother with that pencil. He still has graphite lodged under his skin, to this day.”  

“He does,” Chloe confirms. “I’ve seen it.”

Looking back and forth from one to the other, Violet considers this.

Now Beca pauses, waiting until she’s sure her daughter is listening to every word. “But you know what? Santa didn’t even blink at that attempted murder. He still brought me every single thing I asked for that year.”

After processing this new information, Violet does finally seem to be reassured. But then another flicker of worry crosses her face as she glances at the clock. “But it’s almost morning. Maybe he just forgot.”

“He didn’t forget, I promise,” Chloe tells her. “Actually,” she throws out impetuously, “he’s on his way to our house, right now. We know that for sure.”

“How?” Violet demands.

“Because…” Unprepared to provide evidence, Chloe casts a desperate glance at Beca, but Beca gives her a tiny shrug; she’s all tapped out on bullshit. “Because, he just texted us!”

Beca bites the inside of her cheek, hard, just as Violet turns to her for corroboration. She nods, saying carefully, “Yep.”

“No, he didn’t,” she sulks, but it’s clear she wants them to prove her wrong.

“Yes, he did,” Chloe insists. “Right before you came in. He texted to say he’s almost here. What, you don’t believe me?”

“Let me see it.”

“You want to see the text from Santa? All right.” She seems to be racking her brain for inspiration. “Bec, give me your phone.”

Beca squints at her, dubious. “O-kayyy.” With an expression of You sure about this? she nevertheless retrieves her phone from the nightstand and hands it over.

Navigating easily to her message app, Chloe at first looks frantic as she taps through the threads, but then her face lights up with triumph as she reads something on the screen. She angles the phone toward Violet, pointing at a received message bubble in the left column. “Here it is. Right there, see it?” She reads it out loud. “It says, Almost there! Don’t give up on me ;)”

Violet studies the words for a minute, twisting a lock of her hair around her finger as she concentrates on trying to sound out the letters.

Chloe isn’t lying, this is precisely what the text says. Of course, what neither of them tells Violet is that this is actually a text from Chloe herself, sent yesterday afternoon during Violet’s nap, in response to one from Beca which reads How close are you to home? I’m in bed about to start without you.

After a few more seconds of scrutinizing, Violet reaches her verdict. “Kay,” she finally says, accepting their word for it.

“Okay?” Beca reiterates, trying not to look as relieved as she feels. “You believe us now?” She snatches the phone back before Violet can change her mind.

“See, silly? There was nothing to be worried about,” Chloe squeezes her reassuringly.

At long last, they’re rewarded by their daughter’s smile, which breaks over her face and lights it up with joy, like the proverbial rainbow after the storm. “I know,” she tells them, as if she’s been fine all along and they’re the ones who’ve been freaking out.

Unfortunately, now that her inner peace has been restored, Violet for the first time seems to notice the odd condition of her parents’ bedroom. Taking in her surroundings with perplexity as she slowly looks around her, she asks, “Why is there blankets on everything?”

“Um, because the roof was leaking,” Beca says fast, knowing that out of all the nonsense explanations they’ve cooked up in the last ten minutes this is surely the lamest. “And we didn’t want the furniture to get messed up.”

“Oh.”

To keep her from dwelling on this long enough to remember that it hasn’t rained at all in the last few weeks, Beca hurriedly changes the subject. “You know, you should probably get back to bed.  The thing is… Santa might be a total pushover when it comes to the naughty thing? But he really does want you to be asleep when he gets here.”

“Yeah, it’s true,” Chloe nods. “That part is actually pretty important. We shouldn’t take any chances.”

“Okay,” Violet agrees immediately.

But Chloe doesn’t release her just yet. “So, do you feel better about everything now?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you excited about tomorrow?” She gives her a gentle shake.

“Uh-huh.” Violet is now beginning to squirm to get out of her lap.

“You’re gonna have so much fun,” Chloe promises her. “I bet you’re gonna get every present you asked for, and probably some that you didn’t even think of.”

“Yeah. But, Mommy,” she finally runs out of patience. “I have to go.”

“Oh, okay,” Chloe laughs, finally letting go of her. “You’re right, you should go. Kiss first!”

After she accepts the kiss with barely-concealed haste, Violet starts to run right out of the room, but Beca interjects. “Ah-ah-ah! Hey. Are you forgetting something?”

With a heavy sigh, Violet turns and comes back for yet another goodnight hug and kiss. “We already did this, before,” she can’t help pointing out to Beca.

Beca laughs. “Yeah, well, if you’d stayed in bed we wouldn’t have to do it all over again.”

Violet has no desire to argue, since time is of the essence. Released from Beca’s hug, she heads back to her bedroom at a sprint. Chloe waits in their doorway while Beca follows their daughter down the hall to her room, where she watches as Violet springs into bed. Giving her a last wave and a reminder to go to sleep fast, she gently closes the door. Then she comes back toward Chloe, smiling, both hands raised in the air for a soft and soundless high-five.

Chloe hangs onto her hands and tugs her back into their bedroom. After the door is shut behind them, they both lean against it, finally allowing themselves to laugh, but not too loudly.

“Did that really just happen?” Chloe asks in a low voice. “Oh my God, I thought you were gonna tell her about Santa Claus.” She gives Beca’s shoulder a playful shove. “I would have killed you.”

“I know,” Beca smirks. “Sorry. Nice save with the text, though. We should have just started with that.”

“Oh, yeah,” Chloe says modestly. “I guess it’s a good thing she can’t read too well yet.”

Beca laughs, then both are quiet for a few seconds as they bask in the relief of pulling the whole thing off.

“So, I don’t want to sound cocky,” Beca says, sounding deliberately cocky, “but I think we’re nailing this parenting thing.”

“Totally,” Chloe concurs. Then she winces a little. “I mean, except for the part where she might be traumatized for life after seeing a Christmas tree with no presents under it.”

“Right. Except for that,” Beca agrees. She looks around the room at all the mounds covered by blankets. “We should probably get this stuff downstairs. Before she wakes up and has another existential crisis.”

Chloe nods, taking a deep breath and looking ready for action. “Let’s do it.”

It takes five trips to get everything to the living room, five excruciatingly slow trips as they tiptoe down the upstairs hallway and the stairs, trying to make as little noise as possible. Beca makes a special detour out to her backyard studio to retrieve her own presents for Chloe, because it’s the only place that’s safe to hide them from her wife’s snooping habits.

On their last trip from the upstairs bedroom, as she sets her final load of presents down on the floor, Chloe suddenly asks, “So, I have to know. Did you really stab your brother to defend Nicole Scherzinger’s honor?”

“I mean…” Beca maneuvers a large rectangular box into an armchair next to the tree and then lifts her hands in a hapless gesture. “He called her a skank. What was I supposed to do?”

“Aw, baby,” Chloe gives her a sympathetic pout. “I can’t believe you thought you were straight for so many years.”

“I know,” Beca mutters sheepishly. “I’m an idiot.”

Once all the gifts are finally unloaded in front of the tree, they work on arranging them. But every time Beca puts a present in a particular place, Chloe moves it to a different spot. So she gives up and lets her handle the fine-tuning of the visuals, standing back to watch while eating the cookies left out for Santa. She’s earned them.

Eventually, her attention drifts over to the large, nearly tree-sized poinsettia on the floor near the window, in its gleaming white pot. “I don’t think I’ll ever look at that plant the same way again.”

Chloe gives a loud laugh, remembering the cause for this assertion, then claps a hand to her mouth to stifle it. She glances toward the doorway, as if to make absolutely certain Violet is nowhere in evidence, saying in a low voice, “God, I thought I was gonna lose it. She looked so guilty.”

“I know. That’s why I was trying not to make eye contact with you, dude. I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep it together.”

Coming to stand beside her and examining the plant, Chloe muses, “I guess I should probably change the potting soil tomorrow. But I mean, it could have been worse, right? At least she didn’t poop in it.”

They both stare at the flowers for a few seconds in silence.

“We have a weird kid,” Beca remarks.

Chloe smiles, nodding a little. “True. But I wouldn’t want any other kind.”

Unconsciously, Beca rests a hand on her stomach. Only after she’s noted her own gesture does her mind catch up, and she finds herself wondering what these two will be like, whether they’ll resemble Violet or whether they’ll have totally different personalities from their big sister, or even from each other. Wondering what kind of trouble they’ll inevitably get into, what they’ll be afraid of, what they’ll love, what kind of people they’ll become. Thinking about it makes her feel dizzy and out of her depth, so she stops herself. One day at a time.

She looks over to find Chloe watching her, a soft, thoughtful expression on her face, as if her mind is on the same track.

After a few seconds Chloe looks around, making sure the job is totally done. “Oh, hey, come over here a minute.” She draws Beca toward the doorway, positioning her so that she’s facing the room. “This is the best part.” Then she turns the lights out, leaving only the Christmas tree lights on.

Chloe comes back to stand beside her, and they look out at the room.

“Wow,” Beca breathes.

They gaze silently at the spectacle of their own living room transformed, the presents spilling out from under the tree, covering a large section of the floor, even stacked in the chairs nearest the tree. Violet’s stocking is too heavy to hang on the mantel, so it’s laid in front of the gifts, bulging and overflowing, some of the items scattered on the floor around it because they literally wouldn’t fit inside. Near the fireplace is the doll stroller, which Chloe has covered with a Christmas-themed tablecloth, so it mostly blends in with the other wrapped gifts. The effect of the entire room is impressive, to say the least. It looks like something from a magazine.

“Isn’t it pretty?”

“It’s beautiful,” Beca says in all sincerity. “She’s gonna freak out when she sees all this.”

“That’s the idea.” Chloe smiles with excitement. “Don’t let me forget to take some pictures, before she rips into everything.”

“You have to admit, though,” Beca can’t help pointing out, “that’s a lot of stuff for a four-year-old.”

“Some of it’s for us, too,” Chloe offers in her defense. “It’s not all hers. But yeah,” she acknowledges, “most of it.”

“You don’t think we’re spoiling her too much?”

“I hope not.” She concedes, “I know I might have gone a little overboard. But I just really wanted this Christmas to be special, for her. Because...” Chloe hesitates, almost as if she’s not sure she wants to say the next words out loud, or maybe she just needs a second to get her emotions under control. “Because it’s the last one with just the three of us.”

Somehow, as implausible as it seems, this is the first time such an obvious fact has occurred to Beca. Maybe, on some unconscious level, she’s been avoiding thinking about it. Staring at the Christmas tree, she’s stunned into poignant silence by the emotion that hits her as she contemplates this truth.

Chloe continues in a quiet voice. “Next year is gonna be so different. We’ll have a five-year-old, and two infants.” Noticing that Beca still hasn’t said anything, she adds quickly, “And it’s not that I’m not excited. I am. So beyond excited, and, just, over the moon. But at the same time…” she pauses. “It won’t ever be like this again. You know?”

“Yeah. I guess that’s true,” Beca admits softly, marveling, “She’s not gonna be the baby anymore.” Struggling to find the right words, she adds, “I mean, she’ll always be… our baby.  But…”

“I know. I know what you mean.” Chloe takes a slightly shaky breath and lets it out. “So, anyway, that’s why I maybe overdid it, a little. I just wanted this one to be special.”

Beca finally looks over at her, then reaches out and takes her hand, lacing their fingers together and squeezing hard. “It will be.”

Chloe raises Beca’s hand and presses a kiss to the back of it, her eyes bright with unshed tears, thanking her without needing to say the words.

Looking back at the tree again, Beca shakes her head, just a bit overwhelmed. “God, it really is gonna be crazy, isn’t it? To go from one kid to three.”

Chloe starts to speak, stops herself, then forges ahead. “Are you scared?”

Not entirely sure how to answer, Beca thinks about it. She wants to be honest, but she can also feel a kind of vulnerability radiating from Chloe as she waits for her reply, as if she needs something from her.

“Nah,” Beca finally says, looking over at her. “We got this.”

The grateful, beautiful smile which lights up Chloe’s face pierces straight into Beca’s heart, and somehow makes her believe in the absolute truth of the words she’d just uttered.

“Yeah,” Chloe agrees, sounding as if she believes it too.

Drawn by an impulse too powerful to fight, Beca turns to her and pulls her close, holding her face with a reverent touch as she moves in and presses their lips together, slowly and softly. This time it’s not a lustful kiss, but one of pure love. They’ve been together long enough that Chloe instinctively knows the difference, and she lets herself melt into it with her eyes closed. There’s no mistletoe in this particular doorway, but they don’t need it.

After a few seconds Beca tastes salt, and realizes with mild surprise that Chloe is crying. She pulls back a little. “Hey.” Reaching up, she uses her thumbs to smudge away a few of the tears. “I’m the one with the hormones, here.”

“Sorry.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. That’s just it.” She looks down and places her palms over the subtle roundness of Beca’s stomach, in the same reverent way Beca had just touched her face. “I’ve never been this happy in my entire life, Beca. After last time, I honestly didn’t think we’d ever be doing this again.” She looks up and meets her gaze, but doesn’t move her hands. “I hope you know this is the best Christmas present you could ever possibly give me.”

As usual, this level of emotion makes Beca a bit uncomfortable. “Well, good,” she jokes with a little shrug. “Because I didn’t get you anything else.”

Chloe leans closer, grinning. “I know that’s not true, but even if it was? I wouldn’t care.”

Beca smiles too, wrinkling her nose into another kiss.

“I love you,” Chloe mumbles against her lips.

Now, as if her hormones are indeed living up to her comment from a minute ago, Beca feels an unexpected surge of emotion. She wraps her arms around Chloe and pulls her into a hug, since that at least allows her to hide her face. Waiting a few seconds until she trusts her voice not to break, she speaks directly against her ear. “I love you too. So, so, so much.” She swallows hard against the knot in her throat. “Like, it’s honestly disgusting, how much I love you.”

Over her shoulder Chloe makes a sound that’s halfway between a laugh and a sob, and squeezes her tighter. They hold each other like that for a while, barely moving except for hands stroking over backs or kisses pressed into hair.

Leaning her head against Chloe’s shoulder and closing her eyes, Beca loses track of time. She’s drifting in a pleasantly euphoric trance state, wishing they could somehow just teleport straight to their room and go to sleep, without actually having to walk up the stairs. She summons the energy to mutter, “We should get to bed.”

“Good idea,” Chloe agrees, sounding sleepy as well.

But then suddenly, out of nowhere, Beca feels a tiny but sharp twinge of pain on the bottom of her ass. “Ah,” she jerks a little. “What the hell was that?” Finally they separate, and she leans back and peers at Chloe. “Did you pinch me?”

“What?” Chloe’s face is the picture of innocence. “No.”

At first Beca’s genuinely confused. But then Chloe adds, as if just thinking of it, “Oh, you know what I bet it was? I bet it was that sex elf, again.”

A slow grin now replaces Beca’s puzzlement. “Really? You saw her?”

“Does she look a little bit like a miniature Pussycat Doll?”

“That’s her,” Beca widens her eyes. “Oh my God, you did see her.”

“Then, yep. She was here.” Chloe bends closer and whispers, “And I bet I know why.”

“You think?”

“Mm-hm. I bet she’s a little miffed that we didn’t quite... finish the job, earlier.”

The erotic tone of Chloe’s voice acts as a trigger, and in an instant Beca’s libido wakes from near-slumber and she’s flooded once again with a tidal wave of desire. It hits her with such unexpected force that she feels her toes clench on the rug under her feet. The orgasm from half an hour ago is suddenly as irrelevant as if it never happened. So much for going straight to sleep.

“Wow, those pinches really work,” she murmurs.

Chloe giggles and kisses her again. “I’m counting on it.” Now she takes Beca’s left hand and lifts it, staring down at it and turning it over, palm up, as she strokes a spot between her fingers contemplatively. “You know, I was just thinking, maybe I could get into that whole papercut kink of yours.”

Beca smiles, but then pulls back a bit and regards her with a curious look. “You do know I was kidding about that, right?”

Chloe only raises an eyebrow mysteriously and kisses the precise spot where the papercut had occurred, then turns in a seductive manner and begins leading her toward the stairs.

“Right?” Beca repeats, allowing herself to be pulled along.

Still no answer, aside from a coy smirk.  

Beca teases, “Okay, see, now you’re scaring me a little.”

Chloe laughs as they start up the stairs, and then laughs even harder when Beca admits, “Still really turned on, though.”

[aliciameade]

The Great Beca Bake-Off - Merry Pitchmas 2017

A Very Merry Pitchmas to @tinyolsen from your Secret Santa! 🎅🏼 I hope you enjoy this bit of holiday fluff.

“Do you have everything you need?”

Beca surveys the stock of supplies Chloe and she picked up at the store earlier in the week in preparation for her Christmas baking marathon.

Beca knows she’s not a whiz in the kitchen. It’s no secret that she can barely boil water to make macaroni and cheese without burning it.

However, there’s something about baking that clicks for her. Her mom taught her when she was a kid; they baked cookies together every Christmas for 11 years until Beca’s teen attitude brought it to an end.

She hadn’t set foot in a kitchen for purposes of baking since. It never felt right doing it without her mom, and when she was ready to go back to it…it was too late.

Her mother was gone.

Then last year, something happened.

She was watching “The Great British Bake-Off” in what she thought was the privacy of her room and was too busy yelling at her laptop screen about a choice a contestant had made to use vinegar instead of cream of tartar (though it was an acceptable substitute in a pinch, Beca knew it was available if they would have taken three more seconds to look for it) to notice Chloe watching her from the doorway in disbelief.

“You know what cream of tartar is?” Chloe had asked.

“Yeah. I mean, it’s kind of like baking soda or whatever,” Beca had answered with an embarrassed shrug.

“But you can’t even make toast. How do you know that?”

Two hours later, Beca was in the kitchen with Chloe by her side making her first batch of chocolate chip cookies since she was a kid.

She had offered to make gingersnaps and Chloe had giggled excitedly, but they lacked 75% of the ingredients to make them and settled on a different classic instead.

“It’s not that big of a deal,” Beca said as she cracked an egg one-handed and dropped it into the bowl.

“I feel like I’m looking at a different person,” Chloe said quietly from her spot at the counter a respectful distance from the action.

Beca asked why she was sitting abnormally far away and Chloe had almost whispered that she didn’t want to get in the way.

But it felt weird. Chloe was always stuck to her like glue. “Can you hand me the vanilla? It’s in the spice cabinet.” That would get her closer again.

“We have a spice cabinet?”

“Where the salt is, babe,” Beca said with a nod toward the cupboard next to the fridge.

If she’d kept watching, she’d have noticed Chloe blushing. “This?” Chloe asked with a smile when she returned with a little brown bottle.

“Yep.” She caught it when Chloe slid it across the counter to her. “Now stop being weird and come over here.”

“I’m not being weird.” Chloe’s voice pitched up and her head twitched. Liar. “Over where?”

Beca knocked the mixing bowl against the counter a couple times. “Here. You’re supposed to be my helper, remember?”

Beca had cried twice that evening. The first time it snuck up on her, a sudden wave of emotion that made her burst into tears over a bowl of cookie dough. Chloe had gathered her up and let her cry and didn’t ask her what was wrong or insist everything would be okay. It wasn’t until her hiccuping sobs subsided that Chloe cautiously asked what was wrong and Beca, without even second-guessing herself, told Chloe about her Christmas baking tradition with her mother who had passed away three years ago and how she hadn’t baked a single cookie since her stupid younger self thought she was too cool to bake with her mom.

The second time hadn’t overwhelmed her like the first. The second was a slow, quiet welling of tears once the whole batch of treats was cooling on the countertop and Chloe had sidled up beside her, wrapped an arm around her shoulders, tilted her head to rest against Beca’s, and said, “Thank you for sharing this with me.”

It grew within her until she turned and pressed her face to Chloe’s shoulder and all but asked to be held as she quietly cried.

She’d slept with Chloe that night.

(Not like that.)

They’d gone their separate ways for bed and after 30 minutes of tossing and turning Beca rolled out of bed, went downstairs, and tiptoed into Chloe’s room to try not to wake her.

Only for Chloe to toss back the blankets and mumble a, “Hurry up.”

Beca clambered onto Chloe’s bed and climbed over her to plop down in the empty space behind her and turn so they were back to back.

She’d barely stilled before Chloe was stirring and then warmth pressed against her from behind and an arm slipped around her waist and tugged her back closer.

“Love you,” Chloe whispered with a kiss to Beca’s shoulder.

She’d said it before - daily, on average, but that night, it made Beca feel warm and cozy and it was the first time in a very, very long time that she felt at home anywhere.

“You, too,” she’d whispered back with a squeeze to Chloe’s hand resting against the butterflies in her stomach.

She’d been coerced into baking a few things in the year since that night after the Bellas caught wind of her skill. Each time it got easier, and each time Chloe was by her side as her helper to fetch and return ingredients as requested and help to clean up after - and taste-test along the way.

A year has passed since Chloe (for the umpteenth time over four years of friendship), accidentally upturned Beca’s life to get her back in front of an oven where she found almost as much catharsis as she did wearing a pair of headphones. And Chloe’s been there every time holding her hand - figuratively and literally - encouraging her and nudging her if she got choked up or felt like she was maybe betraying her mother by baking with someone else.

But then Chloe would hug her and kiss her cheek and hand her what was dubbed her “cookie spoon,” (a heavy-duty wooden spoon Chloe gifted her a few weeks after their chocolate chip cookie awakening) and give her a little, “Goooo, Beca!” cheer and the butterflies would swirl in Beca’s stomach and she’d feel at home once again. And every time it happened, Beca would go to bed and stare at the ceiling until she tiptoed to Chloe’s room to curl up with her and tell Chloe she loves her, too.

The third time, Beca was the one to snuggle into Chloe without prompting and it took physical effort to not lean closer and kiss her when Chloe said, “I love you, Becs.” She looks over the supplies on the counter one more time and reaches for the flour to sift it into a mixing bowl.

“What are we making first?” Chloe asks with an excited rubbing of her palms together as she bumps Beca’s hip with her own.

“Gingersnaps,” she says with a smirk and a glance at Chloe. Her attention is back on measuring flour and working the sifter but she can still feel Chloe’s response in the level of vibrating energy pouring off her that leads to a peal of laughter and an excited hop.

“They your favorite or something?” Beca asks with feigned ignorance.

“I’ve never had them,” Chloe whispers it like it’s scandalous. “But I know I’m going to love them because you’re making them and I love everything you make. Are you sure you have everything you need? I don’t know what gingersnaps need.”

Beca tries not to laugh; she couldn’t have asked for a better setup than Chloe gave her. She sets down the sifter. “Actually, I need one more thing.”

Chloe’s eyes are so bright with excitement Beca’s reminded of how she looks Christmas morning, but that’s not until tomorrow. “What is it? I’ll grab it.”

She starts to head for the supply cupboards so Beca darts her hand out and catches her by the wrist to give her a yank and pull her back in. “It’s okay.” Chloe yelps a little in surprise when Beca uses the momentum to pull her all the way until she has her held around the waist, close enough to be nose to nose. “I can grab it myself.”

For what Beca thinks is the first time she’s ever witnessed it, Chloe looks thrown. Her eyes are wide with uncertainty and they make Beca want to get lost in them forever and her hands are on Beca’s waist but they aren’t settling; instead, they’re acting like they aren’t sure if they’re supposed to be there. “What?” Chloe asks with a nervous giggle.

Beca smiles because she knows why Chloe’s nervous, and the fact that she knows why Chloe’s nervous makes Beca calmer. She knows Chloe’s nervous because she knows how Chloe feels about her; she might have been slow on the initial uptake but once her own feelings started bubbling to the surface, she recognized them in Chloe with ease. Her finger finds the flour in her mixing bowl and bops the tip of Chloe’s nose to leave a white dot on it.

Chloe’s giggle this time is genuine and not nervous and that’s when Beca decides to lean in and touch her lips to Chloe’s.

She hears Chloe’s surprise in the way her giggle cuts off and her breath catches and how her whole body jerks. She doesn’t linger; she wants to let Chloe process and react so she only kisses her for two short seconds and when she re-opens her eyes, Chloe’s staring at her with less uncertainty than before and more shock with a little something else laced with it. But then Chloe relaxes, all the surprise and uncertainty melting away and a warm smile slides into place. “Now do you have everything you need?”

Beca gives her a tug with her hold around Chloe’s waist and they kiss again, this time coordinated, if jittery from the newness, and Beca feels like she’s found one more place that feels like home.

“Yeah,” she says when they part. “I’m good now.”

[merry-pitchmas]

‘Tis The Season For Bechloe

Fa la la la la, fa la la

Come one, come all, to the third annual Merry Pitchmas Gift Exchange!!!

Full disclosure, I was not planning on doing this this year. However, my brain took it upon itself to remind me that what with Pitch Perfect 3 coming out over the holiday season and the fact that this could very well be the last, this is the year I should be doing this!

So, although I’m a little late getting started, I do hope that some of you out there will be able to participate. Now, let’s go over some important points:

How does this work? 

Well, if you wish to take part in the gift exchange, please REPLY to this post. Reblog all you want, but you won’t be included unless you reply. That’s just the easiest way to keep track of people. I’ll let this post circulate for one week, giving people until Saturday the 9th of December to tell me they want in. After that, I’ll throw all the names into a hat and randomly assign Secret Santas. Once you have your person, feel free to contact them (anonymously - this is supposed to be a secret) and ask any questions about what they might like in a gift. Which brings me to another biggie: to anyone who enters, please change your ask settings to allow anonymous questions. Otherwise this won’t work. 

Normally, the due date for these things is December 25th, and ideally I’d like to keep it there. Since i’m starting this a little later though, I’ll extend it until December 31st. But if you have yours don’t prior to that - thought not before the 25th - please feel free to post. Once you decide to post, nothing is a secret anymore, so post your creation on your blog and @/tag the person you did it for. Also, please tag your entry with #merry pitchmas 2017 so that i can find them all and combine them into a master post. 

But I don’t have any money!

You don’t need money for this! Nay, all you need is some time and your imagination. You see, this exchange is all about getting creative. Your gifts can be fanfiction, fanart, gifsets, manips, and anything else that falls under the header of fanworks. 

What pairings are accepted?

I’m not about to ostracise anyone. All pairings are welcome. However, please make a point of contacting your giftee if you aren’t sure which pairings they enjoy. 

In closing.

This is all about having fun. You know what isn’t fun? Putting time and effort into giving someone a gift, only to not receive one yourself. Both times I’ve done this previously, people who have said yes to doing this have gotten their gift and then not followed through giving theirs. Refused to reply to messages and left someone without anything. Luckily, there are some lovely people who offer to help out and dedicate even more of their time to coming up with something for those people. PLEASE DO NOT SAY YES IF YOU AREN’T PLANNING ON HOLDING UP YOUR END OF THIS. It’s not fair. 

If you aren’t going to be able to finish your gift in time, or at all, please let me know. That way i can contact the person you have and let them know it’ll be late or arrange for something else to be done for that. Which reminds me... once again, I’ll be looking for volunteers I can hit up in the event that some people get missed and need replacement gifts. If you’re interested, shoot me a message at this blog. I’ll love you forever. 

Remember

This is all about having fun!! I started this so that everyone could have a good time in the fandom around the holiday season. So that people who might not get gifts elsewhere, will have something to look forward to and something to work on during what can either be a really great or really tough time of the year. 

I think I got everything in here. If you have questions, feel free to ask! Now, go forth! Spread the word! And let’s make this the best Pitchmas event yet!

~ Redlance

[lespetitesmortsde]

Happy Pitchmas!

For @ali4822.

The Bellas house was eerily quiet for Christmas morning. Beca had set her alarm for nine, expecting to be woken up much earlier by nine excessively energetic women. Only… it didn’t happen. And it wasn’t as if they would have spontaneously gone back home when they’d stopped the festivities sometime after one a.m.

Chloe’s the unofficial reason they all stayed on campus for Christmas. Back in September, before their first official Bellas meeting, Chloe had gathered all the girls in the living room and gotten sentimental about how this was their last year together.

Stacie then suggested that everyone stay over Christmas, so they could have one big Christmas together before going off into the world on their own. Chloe latched onto the idea, crying on the couch, as the rest of the Bellas traded looks across the room.

“Yeah, sure, let’s do it,” Beca said, knowing how hard Chloe’s year was going to be since she had finally decided to graduate. The other girls started chiming in with plans and ideas while Chloe sobbed happily on the couch, Stacie stroking her arm.

Beca decided to take charge. “Okay, girls, Barden Bellas Family Christmas. We’re gonna, like, bond or whatever. So everyone has to plan an activity. I’ll figure out who gets which day.”

All the Bellas, minus Chloe who was still smiling at the turn of events, gaped at Beca in surprise. Their captain had never before seemed invested in Christmas or in attending bonding activities, let alone planning them. Beca glared at them with a subtle nod at Chloe.

“Yeah, screw it, I didn’t want to go back to Australia anyway,” Fat Amy shouted.

Jessica chimed in next, with Ashley nodding along, “This is going to be aca-awesome guys!”

They spent the rest of the day being spontaneously pulled into hugs by Chloe, and planning for “the most aca-mazing Christmas ever.”

But back to Christmas morning, the house was quiet and Beca was on high alert. A quiet Bella house meant trouble. She peeked into Chloe’s room first, but she wasn’t there. Then she checked the rest of the bedrooms, but everyone was gone.

This wasn’t the plan at all. Beca had specifically chosen Christmas day as her day to plan something for the Bellas, and they’d all disappeared? Sulkily, she made her way down through the living room to the kitchen, but still there was no sign of anyone.

Not expecting much, Beca headed over to the coffee machine, intent on making a pot, but there was already some made and a note stuck to the handle.

Hey Becs!

We’ll probably be back before your grumpy butt gets out of bed, but if you find this, we left you some coffee and we’ll be back soon!

Love,

Chlo

Beca read the note again and sighed. She poured herself a cup of coffee and wandered out to the living room. She’d gotten really randomly into the spirit this Christmas and woke up around three a.m. to stuff everyone’s stockings with her extra gifts and lay them around the room according to where each Bella usually sat.

If the Bellas were all here, she would’ve suggested they go and open their stockings before breakfast, but with them out, Beca couldn’t think of a reason why she shouldn’t start cooking while the house was empty.

Honestly, it was a lot easier to feed ten women when those women were nowhere near the war zone.

When Beca planned out breakfast a couple weeks prior, she thought about making waffles or pancakes or something else that required a little effort, but not a ton. She ended up nixing them all though because they ate those pretty regularly. One night, she’d been lying in bed thinking about her childhood and how her dad would always make Eggs Benedict on Christmas morning. When he left, Beca made it for a couple of years after, but then with her mom working so much, it was just another tradition that fell by the wayside.

Call it sentimentality since they would all be leaving each other soon, but nothing has ever made Christmas feel more like Christmas than homemade Eggs Benedict. Now, Beca wasn’t very talented in the kitchen, but after watching her dad make it throughout her childhood, and after making it herself for a couple of years, she wasn’t half-bad at it.

The girls would nominally complain about the calories, but Beca knew that as soon as she offered to put them through extra cardio at their next practice, they’d all shut up about it.

So she pulled out her phone and started her almost-Christmasy playlist to try and get her more in the festive spirit. Beca got a bunch of butter from the freezer and the three dozen eggs she’d bought for the occasion from the fridge, and started melting the butter in a pot.

She danced along a bit to “Feliz Navidad” as she put Canadian bacon on a baking sheet and popped it in the oven to cook. Next, she split a couple bags’ worth of English muffins onto a couple of trays and buttered them with the melting butter.

As the playlist moved on to “Santa Stole My Girlfriend” by The Maine, Beca sang along as she cracked eggs and separated them. She placed the yolks into a large bowl and the whites into a different bowl. The yolks would serve as the base for her Hollandaise sauce and the whites will be used for Chloe’s portion. The redhead wasn’t a fan of yolks, and honestly, Beca couldn’t blame her.

Next, she put a pot of water on to boil and added vinegar. Her dad didn’t help her out all that much, in terms of how to be an adult human being, but he knew how to poach eggs. The vinegar would help set the egg whites so they wouldn’t fly away all over the pot, but rather stay mostly with the yolk and look almost egg-like.

The song transitioned into “Freedom ‘90” from George Michael and Beca got really groovy with it, letting her hips do a lot of the dance-work as she wound her way through the kitchen.

She added lemon juice, Tabasco, dry mustard, salt, and a pinch of sugar to the egg yolks. Then she ground in a bunch of fresh black pepper, and whisked it all together, belting “Take back your picture in a frame, take back your singing in the rain. I just hope you understand sometimes the clothes do not make the man!”

Beca hopped over to the oven, pulling out the pan of bacon and giving the slices a flip. She slipped the pan back in and brought the muffin trays over to sit on top of the stove. She gave the butter a stir before letting her fancy footwork take her over to the cabinet so she could pull plates out.

After setting them out on the long back counter, Beca placed a damp cloth on the main counter and put the bowl of yolk mixture on top of it to keep the bowl stable. She hummed along to “Silent Night” when it came on, deciding that it could stay even though it was kind of slow for the mood.

Beca got the pot of butter from the stove and went back to the bowl of egg yolks. While she whisked, she slowly poured the butter in and grinned in satisfaction as the liquid slowly thickened into a sauce. A couple extra stirs after she’d run out of butter, and then she dipped her finger in to taste test.

“Damn, I’m good,” she muttered, and added a little more ground pepper. Beca shuffled over to the oven to pull out the bacon and slide in the English muffins. The song switched again and after a little chuckle, Beca took up the tune.

“I really can’t stay,” she sang, doing some slow body rolls as she went over to the pot of poaching liquid.

“Baby, it’s cold outside.”

Beca spun around in shock, an egg in each hand, to see Chloe, grinning, with her nose a little red from the cold.

“Jesus, Chlo, you scared me,” Beca said gruffly, turning back to the stove.

“Aww, sorry Becs,” Chloe said and Beca heard her approach. “It smells aca-awesome in here though.”

Beca shrugged and started cracking eggs into the pot. “I’m making breakfast.”

Chloe laughed. “I can see that.” She peered over Beca’s shoulder. “And what is for breakfast?”

Lightly, Beca pushed Chloe out of the way so she could give the pot a soft stir to keep the eggs from sinking and sticking to the bottom.

“You’ll have to wait like five minutes to find out,” Beca told her, gesturing for Chloe to go out to the dining room. Beca heard the rest of the girls come into the house. “And keep them out of here until I’m done.”

Chloe smiled before turning playfully serious, “Aye aye, Captain!” She gave Beca a mock salute before going out to meet the girls. Beca rolled her eyes and turned back to the stove. She pulled the now toasted English muffins out of the oven and sorted them onto plates. As she stacked the now empty trays into the kitchen sink, she started humming along to “Love Me Harder.”

Beca could hear Stacie complaining about being locked out of the kitchen because she wanted some juice. Once she heard Chloe deal with the situation, though, Beca tuned out, opting instead to grab the Hollandaise and put a small spoonful on each muffin half. Then she grabbed the back bacon and placed a slice of that on each as well.

She followed the bacon with another small dollop of sauce before going to the pot of eggs and removing them one by one onto a towel to drain off the vinegar water. Then she added those to the muffin stacks and topped every one with even more Hollandaise.

This breakfast was not for the faint of heart.

She took the first two plates out, Emily’s and Flo’s, and couldn’t help but smile indulgently at the mischief they’d all gotten into. Currently, it looked like they were all throwing their mittens at each other.

Beca set the plates down on the table and called loudly, “Hey nerds!”

Almost instantaneously, they all froze in place, some with a mitten balled up in hand.

“Go get beverages while I finish bringing plates,” Beca instructed as she looked each of them in the eye to make sure they didn’t try to take the opportunity to carry on with their shenanigans.

They all seemed to be waiting for something, so Beca sighed and said (only a little bit begrudgingly), “Merry Christmas, dudes.”

The girls cheered and Chloe instigated a group hug.

“No, Chlo, no, we talked about this. The hugging, no.” But shortly Beca gave up and just let it happen.

After a couple of minutes, she got impatient though because breakfast was getting cold.

“Unless you guys want cold food, let’s go!”

Mercifully, some deity must have granted her wish for an easy time getting them all to the table without too much delay.

“Yo Beca,” Cynthia-Rose said, leaning against the back of her chair and looking down at her plate. “Is this Eggs Benedict?”

The girls muttered amongst themselves, some of them sitting, while Beca came back into the room with the last two plates for Chloe and herself.

“Yeah.” Beca sat down and looked meaningfully at the last couple of girls who hadn’t yet sat down.

“Um,” Cynthia-Rose hesitated, “where did it come from?”

Beca sighed deeply. “I made it.”

At least six different voices spoke over each other. Beca could only pick out snippets of each, but the general tone was surprise and skepticism.

Beca looked over at Chloe and slumped a little before pulling her eyes back to her own plate.

“Hey, this is awesome that Beca’s cooked for us, isn’t it?” She asked the room at large in her excited, yet rhetorical voice.

“It’s fine, Chlo, I know I’m not much of a cook,” Beca mumbled towards her co-captain. She spoke a little louder to address them all. “You guys don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to. I won’t be offended.”

She stared at her plate, and took a large gulp of coffee.

“Actually, though, it smells really good,” Fat Amy offered, picking up her utensils.

Beca sent her a weak smile. “Thanks, Aimes.”

“It really does, Becs,” Chloe agreed, taking a bite. Her face lit up. “Guys, it’s soooo good!”

She didn’t want it to bother her, really she didn’t, but it did a little bit. The lack of faith stung. Once they all actually had a bite though, they were all singing her praises, asking why she’d never made this for them before, and being a generally rambunctious group.

Chloe, of course, was the only one who actually worked to get an answer out of Beca regarding the sudden unveiling of talent. Surprisingly, Beca didn’t feel any sort of reluctance in telling Chloe about her childhood and the role Eggs Benedict had played.

Underneath the table, Chloe reached over to hold Beca’s hand. Beca tried not to blush and hoped none of the other girls noticed.

When they’d all finished eating, and after the Bellas had both apologized for the lack of trust in Beca and gotten her to agree to make it for them at least once more before graduation, they moved into the living room.

Each woman walked over to her seat and started going through their stockings. Amy was already three-quarters through hers, having uncovered condoms, gift cards to the Cheesecake Factory, and other trinkets.

Beca worked hard at the stockings this year. It was something her mother had always taken seriously. She’d always give everyone a few scratch and win lottery tickets, some kind of pick-me-up like chocolate for her dad or a new CD for Beca, some small useful items like external battery packs or extra memory sticks, and one or two bigger things ranging from pajamas to movies or a new wallet.

Beca’s mom was basically the best at Christmas stockings, and Beca had tried to do right by her this year for the family she would soon be leaving. So everyone got two scratch and wins, their favourite kind of chocolate or candy bar, a keychain with the Bellas logo on it, and one get-out-of-cardio-free card. She made sure to tuck that one down into the bottoms of all the stockings, just in case no one found them and it wouldn’t be a big deal.

They’d done Secret Santa this year already, which explained the ninja stars she’d gotten from Lilly. Beca had gotten Cynthia-Rose and gave her a bottle of the hair dye she hadn’t been able to find for the past couple of years.

But, today she’d be giving a few extra gifts, in addition to the stockings. She just needed Chloe to know that she was important, particularly to Beca. So Beca made up a gift bag with a few mixes that she knew Chloe would love, a package of sheet mask facials because Chloe loves at-home spa days, a wireless shower speaker so Chloe can have duets by herself in the shower, and a card.

The card may have taken weeks to write, be four pages long, and contain a declaration of Beca’s undying love, but it is still technically just a card.

Beca got a bunch of new USB drives, a new cable for her phone charger, a couple of CDs, and some snacks. All the girls knew she wasn’t super into chocolate.

So they spend a few hours just hanging out, playing or discussing their gifts, and taking turns to step out of the room to call their families or other friends or significant others. Aside from a short phone call to her father and a text message to her mom, Beca stayed put on her part of the couch the entire time.

It was nice to just watch everyone else enjoy themselves and have fun. Being in a room full of positivity can be surprisingly uplifting.

When the energy started to die down in the afternoon, Beca finally remembered to ask Chloe about the morning.

“Hey, Chlo,” Beca caught her attention.

“Yeah Becs?” Chloe turned to her.

“Where’d you all go this morning?” Beca asked, nodding at the rest of the group.

“Oh,” Chloe mumbled. “It’s a surprise.”

Beca perked up in shock. “A surprise for what?”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “For you, silly!”

“Then what is it?”

“Can’t tell you.”

“Fine. When do I get to find out?”

“Later.”

“When’s later?”

“Yeesh, Becs, you’ll find out when you find out.”

Beca pouted. “Not cool, Beale.”

Chloe laughed. “Too bad, Beca Mitchell.” Chloe gave her a once-over and then took her by the hand and stood up. “Come with me.”

Beca got up, confused. “Where are we going?”

Chloe lowered her voice. “I have a Christmas gift for you, let’s go to my room.”

“Okay,” Beca agreed and the two left the rest of the Bellas to socialize. Once they got upstairs, Beca let go of Chloe’s hand. “Sorry, I have something for you, too, I just need to grab it.” She ran into her room and pulled out the bag of Chloe’s gifts. When she got back to the hallway, Chloe was waiting for her. The redhead took her hand again and they went to Chloe’s room.

After closing the door behind them, Chloe knelt down and reached under her bed. She pulled out a flat box about the size of laptop. She popped back up, sat on her bed, and held the box out to Beca.

“Merry Christmas, Becs,” Chloe said softly, smiling. Beca held out the bag of Chloe’s presents to her, too.

“Merry Christmas, Chlo,” and they swapped gifts.

They both just kind of sat there, fiddling with the edges of a piece of tape or the handles of a gift bag.

“You first,” they each said at the same time and then laughed.

“Seriously, you first,” Chloe said, nodding at the gift in Beca’s hands.

Beca didn’t really want to go first, but she also wanted to be able to dart out of Chloe’s room quickly if things with the card went south, so she bit the bullet and tore the paper off.

Inside the box was a large, fuzzy blanket with cartoon dogs on it and “We should probably cuddle now” written in large letters, framing the pups.

Trying to fight the moisture that suddenly accumulated in her eyes, Beca laughed. “Thanks, Chlo, this is awesome. Our cuddles will be extra cozy now.”

Chloe’s eyes were huge and bright, and Beca had never felt more loved than when she was hit with Chloe’s caring stare.

“Okay,” Beca said, folding the blanket into her lap and hanging tightly onto it. “Your turn.”

Chloe looked down at the bag and then pushed her hand into it, clearly searching for something. She pulled out the card and Beca’s heart started racing faster. When it was clear that Chloe was going to open the card first, Beca’s mind flew into high gear.

“Chlo, what are you doing? Open the gifts first,” Beca suggested, trying to make the wrapped objects sound more appealing than the card..

But Chloe just shook her head. “No way, Becs, it’s only polite to open the card first and I am nothing if not polite,” Chloe explained.

Beca scoffed, “Says the woman who burst into my shower naked, while I was also naked, in order to demand I join her singing group?”

Chloe just smiled toothily. “Exactly.”

Beca gulped. “Seriously, Chlo, open it last.” She waited a second. “Please.”

For a moment, it looked liked Chloe was going to put the card down, but instead, she held it against her thigh to help rip open the envelope.

It probably only took three minutes for Chloe to read the card, but God, it felt like a millenium as Beca sat there on the edge of the bed, staring down at her socks because she couldn’t bear to look Chloe in the eye.

“Becs,” Chloe said softly, voice barely more than a whisper.

Beca wouldn’t move her gaze. “Yeah Chlo?”

“Look at me.”

Shaking her head, Beca murmured, “I’d rather not.”

“Please?” And the way Chloe said it, so small and pleading, Beca couldn’t resist. She looked up. Chloe was holding a plant in her hands.

“What’s that?” Beca asked.

“Mistletoe.”

Beca just stared at her. “Why do you have that?”

Chloe sighed. “That’s what the girls and I were doing this morning. We went and mistletoed every place we could think of between here and our practice room because they wanted to give us a chance.”

She tried so hard to find something to say, but Beca was at a loss.

Chloe continued, “They’ve known, all of them except Emily, that, well, for years I’ve been kind-of-in-love-with-you.” Chloe rushed through the last part of her sentence. “And they wanted to give us the chance to, kiss, I guess, to make sure we weren’t missing out.”

Beca couldn’t even blink. What was happening right now?

“Jessica used to watch The O.C. and she said that what I needed, or what we needed, was a Chrismukkah miracle. And they decided that the miracle should be us kissing in the hopes that, you know, you’d love me back and stuff,” Chloe fidgeted with the mistletoe in her hands.

Wait, Beca thought, love her back? Does that mean-

“Beca, I’m in love with you,” Chloe finally said.

Beca shifted her gaze between Chloe and the mistletoe. She reached over and plucked the sprig right out of Chloe’s hands, and held it only just above their heads. Shaking it lightly, Beca said, “You know, you have to kiss someone when you’re under mistletoe together.”

Chloe leaned in, but Beca dove to meet her, pressing their lips together soundly. It was chaste, but they could feel the years of build-up that went into the kiss.

Chloe gingerly placed her hands at Beca’s waist and they broke apart.

“I’m in love with you, too,” Beca said, a little breathlessly.

Chuckling, Chloe said, “I-that card, it was beautiful, Becs. I’m so glad you felt you could tell me.”

Beca nodded, but didn’t really want to get into it now. She’d said what she’d said, but right now she had a gorgeous woman in her arms who loved her back. So she tossed the mistletoe to the side of the room, “Just kiss me, Beale,” and wrapped her arms around Chloe’s neck.

When they finally went back downstairs almost an hour later, it was obvious from their expressions that they’d been making out. All the Bellas were happy for them, although Amy grumbled about the effort she wasted on vertical cardio in helping place mistletoe everywhere that morning.

[incredibeale-archive]

Well, it’s officially Christmas over where I am. (2:06 AM) So, merry Christmas everyone! And merry Christmas to my Secret Santa giftee, @freaking-isadorkable !! I’ve had a blast with this, and I do hope you like your gift. (:

I know originally, you wanted something from here, one of the last three and at first, I was totally going to do that! But then I read the 8th one down, and suddenly I had images floating in my head.

So, the original prompt is: You’re the mall Santa that made my kid cry, but I can’t be mad at you because I’m being distracted by your face au || but I may have... took some liberties there and changed it up. Anyway, I hope you like this little oneshot. :3 (perhaps in the future there will be more parts to it)

Chloe has been standing in line for almost two hours now. All just for her little girl to meet Santa. Though her feet hurt and she's tired and hungry, the wait hasn't been so bad, what with her best friend, Aubrey there with her to help keep both her and her four year old entertained.

At this moment, though, Aubrey is off somewhere in the mall, having volunteered to get snacks and drinks. Thank god, Chloe thinks, because she's pretty sure her stomach is trying to eat itself.

“Mommy! We’re next!” Chloe is pulled from her thoughts as a tiny hand tugs on her own. She looks down to her daughter and grins brightly.

“I see that, Ella-Bella!” She says, kneeling to fix a pretty green bow in neatly curled red locks.

The last kid slides off of Santa’s lap and hurries to his parents and Ella is ushered in by an ‘elf’. Chloe only has time to give them a glance because her phone goes off at that same moment. She answers it when she realizes it's Aubrey calling.

“Hey, we’re finally next. Are you on your way?”

“Yeah, I was calling to check on the line status. I've got snacks and water. I'm almost there, though so I’ll see you in a few.” Aubrey says through the phone.

Chloe goes to reply when the unmistakable sound of her daughter crying cuts her off. She turns in time to see ‘Santa’ with his beard off and getting ready to stand and a tiny brunette woman -- apparently the ‘elf’ from before -- shoves him back into his seat only to slap him upside the head. “DUDE!” She starts angrily. “You could have waited until the kid wasn't here!” This part is whispered harshly through gritted teeth

“Aubrey, I gotta go.” Chloe hangs up before Aubrey can reply and stands there half in amusement and half in shock. (There's some anger mixed in there, too because they've been here forever and this asshole probably ruined Santa for her kid!)

“Ow! What the fu--” Santa goes to say, but the elf girl slaps him upside the head again. “Hey! Stop that! It's 6 pm, my shift is over!”

“I’ll stop when you stop being an inconsiderate d-bag. What was one more kid? Whatever, just leave.” The girl snaps, shaking her head

When the elf turns to Ella, it's enough to break Chloe out of her frozen stupor and get her moving. Only as she's about to head over and console her probably scarred for life little girl, the elf girl (who is freaking adorable by the way, with her rosy, sparkly cheeks) kneels down in front of Ella. “Hey, kid. It's okay. I'm sorry about him. He's--” she falters, looking a little panicked. “He wasn't the real Santa.”

Ella sniffs, little brow furrowing. “Who was he? Where's Santa?”

Elf girl scratches the back of her neck, clearly stalling. “He's-- uh--” She chews on her lower lip before her eyes light up. “Oh! He's just like a substitute Santa, ‘cause the real one is extra busy getting things ready for Christmas.

“See the substitute Santa is supposed to report back to the real Santa and tell him what everyone asked for and tell him about all the good little boys and girls. But that substitute Santa was a bad dude. I'm gonna let the real Santa know personally what he did to you and he’ll be sure to give him a stern talking to.”

Ella stares at the elf girl for a long moment before she seems to accept this. Her face contorts into a frown though as she comes to some sort of realization. “How will the real Santa know what I want?”

The woman smiles something soft and reassuring and places a gentle hand on Ella’s arm. “No worries, little dude. You can tell me and I’ll tell him myself.”

It's this moment that Chloe decides to finally interrupt. “So, since we've been waiting for almost two hours, maybe Ella can get a picture with one of Santa’s elves?” Chloe’s lips quirk up into a smirk as the elf-girl looks up at her wide-eyed. “And she can tell you what she wants for Christmas?”

“Wha? I--” She scrambles to her pointy little shoed feet, straightening her short, green skirt.

Now that Chloe is close enough, she has to hide her chuckle of amusement, because the girl looks absolutely adorable in her costume. She's got actual little elf ears on, her cheeks rosy and lightly glittered. The small brunette is also wearing green and white striped thigh-high stockings. The bottom of her green skirt is white and fluffy, while she wears a red and white striped blouse with a button up green vest on her top half. Her wavy brown hair is curled lightly, part of it pinned up to the side with a mistletoe topped pin.

“Please?” Ella tugs at the woman’s hand, causing her to look down.

Chloe grins, knowing her daughter’s puppy dog eyes were hard to resist.

“Yeah, please uh--”  Chloe almost loses it as she spots the woman’s name tag. “-Sparkles…” She bites her lip hard on a wide smile.

‘Sparkles’ narrows her eyes as her cheeks seem to get that much more pinker. “Let me just… ask--” She moves to look over Chloe’s shoulder, so the redhead turns around to see a much taller brunette in a similar outfit (it's somehow a little more revealing than ‘Sparkles’’ costume), standing in front of a camera and smirking over at them, though mostly at Sparkles the elf. “Uh-- St--” The taller woman quirks a brow and ‘Sparkles’ rolls her eyes. “I mean Tinsel, think we can make that happen?”

‘Tinsel’ smiles brightly and nods. “Totally. On the house. Especially if you introduce me to blondie over there.” The leggy brunette nods her head toward the gated entrance of ‘Santa’s workshop’ and Chloe follows her gaze to see Aubrey making her way towards it, her arms laden with snacks and her face full of concern.

Grinning, Chloe nods. “Oh, totes! But how did you know--”

“You don't want her to answer that, dude.” ‘Sparkles’ interrupts, eyeing the taller brunette with what Chloe thinks is a mixture of exasperation and amusement.

Chloe chuckles. “Alright… well, I can make that happen.” Aubrey would either kill her or thank her, but as ‘Tinsel’ sends her a saucy wink, Chloe thinks Aubrey will totally thank her.

‘Tinsel’ brings her attention to ‘Sparkles’,  motioning her to the big chair that Santa once occupied. “Alright, B. Go on, then.”

Chloe wonders what ‘B’ is short for, but she doesn't have time to dwell on that as Aubrey comes up beside her. “What's going on?” She asks in confusion.

They both watch as Sparkles leads Ella to the large chair where she sits and Ella climbs into her lap. “It's kind of a long story, but I'm pretty sure I scored you a date with the photographer.”

“Excuse me?” Aubrey brings her attention to Chloe who offers a sheepish little smile in return.

“What? Look at her, she's hot!” Chloe watches as Aubrey finally manages to look over at Tinsel. “Plus, I'm getting these photos for free for introducing you guys, so suck it up.” But Chloe thinks that Aubrey is suddenly not as upset anymore as her eyes seem to drink up the leggy brunette.

Smirking Chloe brings her attention back to her daughter. She's smiling brightly as Sparkles whispers something into her ear.

After a few more snaps, the woman helps Ella down and points to a box full of little toys and tells her to pick something out. After a moment the two are walking back over, Ella holding up a small stuffed puppy. “Look, mommy! Look aunt Bree!”

“That's awesome, baby!” Chloe says, bending to press a kiss to Ella’s forehead.

Aubrey smiles down at the little girl. “Wow! You must have been especially good if they're letting you pick something out early.”

Ella nods, grinning brightly before she brings her attention back to her new toy, talking to it softly.

“Here you go. On the house.” Chloe turns her head to see the leggy brunette standing next to the smaller one, holding out a white folder. “There's something extra in there for you.”

“We’re real sorry about--” Sparkles glances down at Ella then back at Chloe. “Well, you know. We’ll be telling our boss about it.” She reassures.

Chloe opens the folder and smiles softly at the pictures. The something extra is apparently a few shots of Sparkles consoling Ella, her hand resting on the little girl’s arm and her gaze soft while the hint of a smile is visible on Ella’s little face. “It's okay. She seems fine.” Chloe says, closing the folder. “So, I'm not one to break promises-- Aubrey, this is-- I'm assuming your name isn't actually Tinsel.”

The taller woman laughs softly. “No. It's Stacie. Stacie Conrad.” She shoves her friend forward a little. “And Sparkles is actually Beca.”

The smaller woman-- Beca blushes and shoots Stacie a glare before smiling shyly at Chloe.

“I'm Chloe, by the way.” The redhead adds, realizing she has yet to properly introduce herself.

“Pleased to meet you both.” Aubrey says politely, though her gaze is on Stacie.

“Pleasure is all mine.” Stacie all but purrs.

Beca takes a steps away, making a face. “Oh my god, dude. Seriously? There are children present.”

Stacie grins and moves to pull Beca back into her side. “Honey, I know you're short and your attention span is nonexistent, but you're definitely not a child.”

Both Chloe and Aubrey chuckle and Beca flushes, shrugging out of Stacie’s arm, grumbling under her breath.

“So,” Stacie starts, not even phased by Beca’s mumbled, half hearted insults. “How would you ladies like to go to dinner with us, sometime?”

Before anyone can say anything else, Beca jerks away from Stacie. “Dude!”

“Shut up, Beca. Don't act like you don't have the hots for red.”

Chloe and Aubrey share a look of amusement before they bring their attention back to the pair.

Beca huffs, cheeks flushing slightly.

“Well, I'm not sure about Aubrey, but I'd certainly be interested.” Chloe finally says, eyes bright as they meet Beca’s surprised gaze.

Aubrey smiles and nods. “Me too.”

“Great! Our numbers are in that folder.” Stacie winks while Beca just smirks, despite herself.

“Mommy I'm hungry!” Ella breaks everyone from their thoughts.

“Okay, baby. We’re gonna get something to eat.” Chloe says, brushing a few strands of hair from her daughter’s face. “We should probably go. But I hope we’ll see each other soon?” She asks, voice full of hope.

Beca smiles bashfully, nodding. “Yeah, uh-- just-- just text me or whatever.” She says, before she brings her gaze to Ella. “I’ll be sure to tell Santa everything you want. Keep being good.”

“I will!”

Stacie grins at Aubrey, slowly stepping back. “Call me soon, beautiful.”

Aubrey blushes and nods. “I will. Talk to you soon.”

They each wave goodbye before heading back out into the mall, both seemingly lost in thought until Ella breaks them. “Mommy?”

“Yes, baby?”

“Did you say yes?” Ella asks curiously as she looks up at Chloe.

“Say yes to what?” Chloe’s brows knit in confusion as she glances between her daughter and the people milling around them.

“To Beca. She said you were very pretty and wanted to know if I thought you would uhm-- hang out with her. I said I thought you would.” Ella says with a little shrug.

Chloe smiles softly. “She asked that, huh?”

“Uh-huh.” Ella nods matter of factly. “Well, first she said that her real name was ‘Beca’ and that ‘Sparkles’ was just her elf name and that she liked Beca better. And then she asked me ‘bout you.”

Chuckling and sharing an amused glance with Aubrey, Chloe nods. “I said yes.”

Ella smiles. “Good. She’s nice. I like her.”

“Me too, baby. Me too.”

[prettylittlesestras]

christmas magic

Christmas has always been Beca’s favorite. As a teenager, she scoffed at cheerful holiday shoppers and rolled her eyes at couples holding hands while ice skating, but she couldn’t help but smile when she listened to her mom sing Christmas carols, when she watched her family’s faces light up when they opened their gifts, or when she stepped back to admire the tree after placing the final ornament in its place. Christmas was her favorite because even as a broody teenager she couldn’t stay angry when she thought about the magic of Christmas.

The magic this Christmas, however, was…lacking. Beca was still working at the local music store she’d been at since leaving the campus radio station, and, while she knew she’d have to pay her dues, she didn’t count on them including working alone on Christmas Eve.

In all truthfulness, she brought this on herself. The music store is owned by a 87 year old woman known all over town as “Mrs. Bea”. When Mrs. Bea told Beca that she couldn’t get anyone to work the Christmas Eve shift and that she’d have to miss Christmas dinner with her grandchildren, Beca immediately insisted on working, and since Beca had been managing the store for eleven months without any problems, Mrs. Bea agreed. Beca wouldn’t have sacrificed her holiday for just anyone, but she knew closing the store wasn’t an option when ten percent of their holiday sales happen on Christmas Eve when last-minute shoppers rush in. Beca couldn’t bear to let Mrs. Bea miss Christmas dinner, so she faced the day alone. Christmas magic, right? She hadn’t really been in the Christmas spirit this year or felt any semblance of Christmas magic this year, but maybe doing something nice for someone else would help. Hopefully.

“Christmas magic. Christmas magic.”

That’s what she muttered over and over under her breath as hundreds of customers filed in and out of the music shop. She expected quite a few people to be out shopping today, but there’s no way she could’ve predicted truly how many shoppers she’d have to help.

By the end of the day, she couldn’t even muster up an ounce of Christmas cheer until her watch struck 9:30 and she looked up and saw Chloe strolling through the door to pick her up. It’s hard not to smile when a smile as bright as Chloe’s is directed right at you. She made her final decision to stick around campus for the holidays when she found out Chloe was staying too. Since Chloe had decided that this would be the year she would graduate, she was all business. She was staying at school over Christmas break to prep for the next semester and complete her grad school applications. If Beca had to be here, Chloe is the only person that could make it still feel like Christmas.

“Let’s go, Mitchell! It’s almost Christmas, and there’s four boxes of Chinese food in the car getting cold!” Chloe said with a smile as she brought Beca in for a hug. Chloe’s hug was soft and warm. She smelled like the perfect mixture of vanilla and peppermint, and she was the literal embodiment of Christmas joy. Beca glided over to the automatic sliding glass doors and as the last customer left and punched around on the keypad to lock the doors behind him, her mood already picking up.

“Let me just grab my stuff from the back and I’ll be ready to go,” Beca said as she disappeared down the hall and into the break room. She grabbed her bag, and as she was putting on her jacket she heard a loud crack and then all the lights in the building went out.

“Chloe? Are you okay?” Beca yelled as she ran down the hall to find her.

“I’m fine. What happened?”

They both walked over to the glass doors and looked out to see that a large tree branch had fallen onto the power lines and caused them to fall. There was so much snow on the branches that it wasn’t surprising that one had fallen.

“No no no this can’t be happening,” Beca muttered getting more and more panicked.

“What’s wrong? It’s just the power, and the store is closed. I’m sure it’ll be back on by the time the store reopens after Christmas,” Chloe said reassuringly.

“The locks on the doors are electronic. I was here when they came and installed all new doors and locks three weeks ago. Mrs. Bea may be old but she really likes to stay on top of all the new technology,” Beca said looking more panicked than ever.

“What does Mrs. Bea’s love for technology have to do with the fact that we’re still inside and there’s an egg roll in the car that’s calling my name?” Chloe asked with a slight giggle.

Beca closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead in frustration. “Chloe, we’re locked in here until the power comes back on. There’s a generator outside, but it’s not doing us any good in here.”

Chloe’s eyes got wide, and she started to look worried. “You mean we have to spend Christmas in here?”

“There’s no way I’m letting that happen. I’ll call the power company and let them know about the outage and see how quickly they can get it fixed,” Beca said, starting to look less worried now that she had a plan. She called the power company on her cell phone and was told by an automated voice to leave a message but that with the amount of ice on the roads, holiday traffic, and outages all over town that it would take days before the whole city had its power restored. When she told Chloe the news, Chloe’s mood quickly shifted from worried to determined.

“Well, I guess we better get busy,” Chloe stated very matter-of-factly.

“Busy with what?” Beca couldn’t think of anything they had to get done while stranded in a music store on Christmas Eve.

“Christmas, silly,” Chloe said with a grin. She stood up and gathered tinsel and santa hats from around the store that had been used as decorations. She placed pieces of tinsel around their necks as scarves and hats on each of their heads. They looked like two of Santa’s elves, and Beca rolled her eyes but kept the costume on. If Chloe wanted to make the best out of this situation, she wasn’t going to stop her.

Beca walked down the hall once again and emerged with a battery-powered lantern, a bottle of eggnog, and a bottle of rum. “We need to keep warm, right?” Beca asked with a smirk on her face. “Mrs. Bea loves a good cup of eggnog, and I figured we could break into her stash just a little.” Beca laughed as she poured two mugs full of eggnog for them to sip on. They sat and talked and drank eggnog for hours.

After a while, Beca got up and headed to the guitar section, grabbed a beautiful acoustic guitar, and brought it back over to where the two had been sitting. She sat down and began to strum the tune of “Deck the Halls”. Chloe sat in awe, and when Beca finished playing she said, “I didn’t know you could play! We live together! How could you not tell me?”

“I’ve worked in a music store for two years, Chlo. I don’t know; I picked up a few chords here and there, I guess,” Beca said as she smiled sheepishly. “We get lots of cool people who shop with us for their guitars, and they love to sit down and play. Sometimes people even give free lessons too, so I just pay attention while I work.” Truthfully, Beca had stayed after work many nights playing around with the guitars and teaching herself how to play different things with the “Guitar for Dummies” book. She couldn’t believe she was actually playing for Chloe. She never really got nervous when she was singing with the Bellas, but there was something so vulnerable about playing for Chloe and showing her something she’d worked so hard on and never let another person hear, like it really mattered if Chloe liked her playing. It was more intimate with another person than she had been in a long time; more intimate in a close and personal way than she had really been with Jesse if she’s being honest with herself.

Chloe sat, amazed, while Beca began to play “I’ll Be Home for Christmas”. Chloe sang along, and Beca joined in on the chorus. This was the first time during the night when it truly felt like Christmas for Beca, and she could tell that Chloe felt it too.

After their impromptu concert, Beca was practically shaking she was shivering so hard, so she got up and grabbed the lantern. “Wanna go see if we can find some blankets?” Beca asked while hanging the guitar in its rightful place. “There’s a pull-out couch in the break room, and I think there are blankets and pillows in the closet. Mrs. Bea keeps them up here for when her grandkids come and visit.”

Beca laughed as Chloe struggled to pull out the creaky bed from within the couch and quickly helped her get it set up. While Beca straightened out the mattress and sheets, Chloe rummaged through the closet to find two pillows and a couple of blankets. She tossed them over to the bed, and one of the pillows was so heavy that it hit Beca and knocked her onto the bed.

“Not nice!” Beca yelped. Chloe couldn’t hear her over her own laughter though. Chloe skipped over to the bed and plopped down beside her friend.

“I’m tiny! I can’t help that my body can’t withstand the force of the pillows you launch at me from across the room.” Beca laughed as she spoke.

“Well get your tiny body under these blankets! There’s no way we’re going to keep warm all night if we don’t share body heat.”

“You’re just trying to get in my pants, Beale. I see through that ‘good girl; facade,” Beca said with a level of sarcasm that only Beca Mitchell could achieve, but she didn’t actually mind.

“Sure, Becs. You just keep thinking that.”

Beca nestled into Chloe’s arms, and the two drifted off to sleep rather quickly. After a couple of hours, all of the lights came on at once, and Beca and Chloe both jolted awake.

“Hey Becs, do you want to go home now or just wait until morning?” Chloe whispered.

“Let’s just wait until morning,” Beca slurred sleepily. Chloe got up and turned out the lights and dropped back onto the bed. After a few minutes, Beca rolled over to face Chloe, their faces only inches apart.

“Hey Chlo?” Beca whispered

“Yeah?”

“Thanks for sticking by me through all of this. I’m sorry we had to spend our Christmas Eve trapped in a music store. Even though it’s been cold and dark and not actually anything like Christmas at all, I’m glad I had you here with me.” Beca spoke so quietly that her words were almost inaudible. She felt dumb for being so open with her feelings.

She started to turn back over when Chloe grabbed her face and brought their lips together, and that’s when she felt it. Christmas magic. That’s what she’d been missing. The music and trees and decorations were still the same this year, but she hadn’t felt the magic until now, until she was laying on a creaky pull-out couch cuddling for warmth and kissing her best friend. And that’s when she knew for sure that she loved her. She’d ignored the feeling for years. From the moment she spotted Chloe at the activities fair, the thought was there, always gnawing at her. But she pushed it further and further back in her mind. And then once being friends turned into being best friends which turned into the two of them being practically inseparable, she knew nothing could happen from there. She wouldn’t ruin a friendship over some stupid feelings. Beca pulled back looking confused but happy.

“Sorry, I don’t know what gave me the courage to do that, but I’ve wanted to for a really long time. I’m sorry, really, I am. I overstepped. I know we’re just friends and I–” Beca cut off Chloe’s desperate ramblings with another kiss. She felt it again. Christmas magic wasn’t about the presents or the songs or the decorations; it was about people, and Chloe was her person.

“Okay yeah so here’s the thing. I kinda love you, and I think I have for a really long time, so please don’t apologize for kissing me,” Beca said while adding a quick peck on her forehead. Chloe smiled and wrapped Beca in a big, warm hug. That’s when Beca knew that Chloe was all the Christmas magic she’d ever need.

merry pitchmas to @enchanteecloneclub from your (no longer) secret santa!!! sorry i’m a day late, but i hope you like it!

[zariscellphone]

Bear

Summary: Less than five minutes and she's already getting replaced with a puppy.

Rude.

Written for the amazing @aca-esthetic as part of the 2017 Merry Pitchmas Secret Santa gift exchange.

Enjoy!

FF.net, AO3

Okay so, admittedly, bringing a stray puppy home seemed like a better idea in the restaurant’s parking lot.

 Beca had been about to head home, at a decent time for once and with dinner in hand, when she caught sight of the pup, huddled in a corner and soaking wet. The poor thing looked like it might shiver itself to death.

 And okay she may have considered walking away — she’s not proud of it — but if she’s being honest with herself, the sight was too heartbreaking to walk away from.

 Beca had approached the small animal slowly, cautiously, so as to not startle it and potentially send it scampering to hide under a car or worse onto the busy street just steps away.

 As it turned out, all her fears had been unfounded.  

The dog had done nothing more than timidly sniff Beca’s outstretched hand and immediately nuzzle into her palm. Warm, brown eyes peered up at her then almost pleadingly. She never stood a chance.

 Predictably, he'd curled up on her lap on the drive home and no matter how many times Beca tried repositioning him in the passenger seat he'd just crawl over the center console and burrow into her lap.

 Now, as she tried to unlock the kitchen door without dropping their dinner or the dog, the little runt wouldn't stop squirming around and yapping.

 “Come on, you fuzzball. I just need to open the door. Do you want me to drop you?”

 A high pitched bark was her only answer as she finally managed to get the door unlocked while precariously balancing their dinner and the dog in one arm.

 Stupid paper bags with no handles.

 “Chlo, I’m home,” she calls once inside. Surprisingly there's no Christmas music playing but she can hear the chatter from the TV in the other room.

 Beca smiles at the picture of pure bliss that greets her once she rounds the corner into the living room. For as many times as she's come home to this, to Chloe sprawled every which way on the couch, in an oversized hoodie and too-big-sweatpants it never fails to fill her with warmth.

 The ridiculous Christmas sweater and the Santa hat Chloe's been wearing every chance she gets since November 1st does its part as well.

 “Hey, babe. How was — woah!” Chloe immediately spots the puppy in Beca’s arms and her eyes widen in surprise. It only takes her a few seconds before she's clambering over the back of the couch to meet Beca halfway. “Where’d this little cutie come from?” She coos at the bundle in Beca’s arms.

 “Found him outside of Tony’s. I didn’t have the heart to leave him there,” Beca answers.

 “Aren’t you the most handsome little thing ever?” Chloe scratches behind the puppy’s ear and giggles at the way the dog leans into the touch.

 “Oh, yeah. I got dinner. It’s in the kitchen.”

 “Thanks, baby. Hi, by the way.” She leans in for a not-so-chaste hello kiss.

 “Hi,” Beca breathes against Chloe’s lips. A second later the dog’s being plucked from her grasp as Chloe turns and heads towards the guest bathroom without another word.

 “We’re gonna get you all nice and clean and warm. Yes, we are.”

 Less than five minutes and she's already getting replaced with a puppy.

 Rude.

 A moment later the sound of running water and the pitter patter of paws scratching against ceramic reaches Beca.

 She observes silently, leaning against the bathroom’s door frame, as Chloe goes about bathing the pup.

 She can tell Chloe's already enamored with the furball and the tiniest hint of dread pools low in her belly. She hadn’t exactly been planning on keeping it.

 But Beca can recognize that the dog is pretty adorable. From the big, floppy ears to the trio of white little spots on its back against its light tan colored coat. She knows already she won't have the heart to tear them apart.

 Sometimes she really hates how whipped she is for Chloe.

 It’s not long before her girlfriend’s wrapping the puppy in a towel, cuddling him close to her chest and murmuring something in his ear Beca can't quite make out.

 It melts Beca just a little more and the sudden, inexplicable swell of emotion that grips her at the sight leaves her a little breathless.

 She knows then this is definitely the right ‘next step’ for them.

 “Bec?”

 “Huh — what?” Beca blinked out of the daze she was in, and notices for the first time that Chloe's now standing in front of her, where she's very much blocking the doorway.

 “You okay? Where'd you go?”

 “No, nowhere. I just… you look really cute playing with a puppy and it's kind of really unfair.”

 “Sorry, not sorry.” Chloe giggles.

 Beca takes advantage of their close proximity to pull Chloe close, her arms around Chloe's waist to keep her from escaping her hold still mindful of the dog now sandwiched between them. “You're the worst.”

 “You love me,” Chloe says glancing down at the puppy between them. When she meets Beca’s eye again there's a distinct ‘puppy dog eyes’ look to her. “Does that mean we get to keep him?” She asks.

 Beca doesn't miss the hopeful tone of her words. She groans, letting her eyes slip closed in mock annoyance. “You're not being fair right now.”

 “Whatever do you mean?” Chloe asks breaking out the pout for good measure.

 “Stop it, you pulled out the puppy dog eyes and everything.”

 “Please, Bec?” She asks, bringing the puppy up close to Beca’s face. “Look how cute he is.”

 “I've looked at him plenty,” she tries her best to sound stern but its completely ruined by the chuckle that slips free when the puppy licks Beca’s nose.

 “Aw, see? He likes you.”

 “You really want to adopt this dog? It doesn't look like he's gonna be a small dog at all.”

 His paws, too big for the rest of its body, are a dead giveaway.

 Chloe just pulled the dog tighter against her chest in response.

 “Fine,” Beca sighs, “but you're taking him to the vet tomorrow first thing in the morning.”

 “Did you hear that, baby? We get to keep you forever!” Chloe squeals, peppering Beca's face with wet, sloppy kisses.

  A few days later, they have yet to agree on what to name him. They’ve been bickering about it for days now and even as Beca calls a truce on their (mostly) playful banter so they can decorate their Christmas tree.

 It's far too early to be putting a Christmas tree up in Beca’s opinion, only two weeks into November, but she's long accepted the fact that from the first week of November until well into January their house gets transformed into a Winter Wonderland.

 She huffs and puffs and grumbles about it but Chloe knows by now it's all for show.

 “I just think it’s too long.”

 “Is not,” Chloe argues again, as she gets to work on untangling the lights. “Besides it’s the perfect name for him, isn’t it Cuddle Bear?”

 The dog’s ears perk up and he barks from his perch on the couch.

 “See? He agrees.”

 “You wanna name a behemoth of a dog, Cuddle Bear? You heard what the vet said, he’s gonna be at least 100 pounds. He’s gonna be walking us in a few months and you wanna name him Cuddle Bear?” Beca asks as she sets another box ornaments down in front of the tree.   

 “Yes.”  

 Beca groans and plops down in front of the box and sets to unpack all the ornaments. Soon enough she’s surrounded by a few dozen trinkets collected through the years.

  While she unpacks, Chloe starts putting them on the tree; they work quickly like a well-oiled machine after almost ten Christmases together, sitting in comfortable near silence. Their newest addition however, sees it fit to interrupt, wading through the mess of papers and boxes to start playing with some of the sillier, plushier ornaments they’ve yet to put up.

  “Bad puppy. No.” Beca calls, suppressing a smile as she unwittingly starts a tug-of-war to wrestle the small, stuffed candy cane from his mouth. “How are we supposed to discipline him with a name like Cuddle Bear?”

  Chloe rolls her eyes and shrugs as she keeps looking for a spot for the ornament in her hand. “I don’t know, Becs. I’m sure we’ll figure it out.”

  “That’s enough, Bear.”

 The puppy barks, his tail wagging so hard his entire little body moves with it. The ornament in his mouth drops, forgotten.

 “Did we just find your name?” Chloe asks as she settles next to them on the carpet. “Come here, Bear,” she calls.

 The dog curls into the warm cradle between Chloe’s legs.

 “Guess we did,” Beca smiles reaching for her phone to capture the moment. She’s pretty sure the resulting picture’s going to be her phone’s lock screen for the next few weeks.

[thisgingerlovesbechloe]

Merry Pitchmas!

Hi @too-haught-haught-damn I was your secret Santa. Sorry it took a while but I have writers block. It’s pretty short but I hope you enjoy it.

Beca Mitchell was just going through the motions lately. She would put on a fake smile that was even more forced than normal hoping no one would notice. Funnily enough her best friend didn’t notice anything was wrong at all so she didn’t even have to try so hard at hiding her inner turmoil. It was her best friends fault she was feeling like this anyway.

Chloe and her stupid beautiful face, the way her eyes lit up when she was happy, her contagious laughter.

Yep it was finally clear to her. Beca was in love with Chloe and there was nothing she could do about it. How could she ever tell Chloe to her face?

“Beca, you’re starting to freak me out,” Jesse said as Beca paced the floor in his dorm. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing I’m fine,” Beca sighed as she finally managed to sit down in a chair beside Jesses bed.

“Well, you’ve been pacing for about 20 minutes. Not that I don’t enjoy your company, but you haven’t said a word. You’ve just been breathing weird” Jesse retorted.

“It’s just- ugh never mind I can’t talk about it,” Beca signed. Her phone chimed and she immediately looked at it.

“I’m guessing Chloe texted you?” Jesse grinned.

“What why would you think that?” Beca said looking up at him.

“Because you have that dopey I’m in love look you get every time she messages you or is around you” Jesse laughed.

“Oh my God! Shut up” Beca slapped him.

“So you do love her!” Jesse gasped. “That’s why you’ve been acting weird today.”

Beca turned bright red. “Okay, please don’t tell anyone. Yes I’m in love with her and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“Um, you could just tell her!” Jesse exclaimed.

“How am I supposed to tell her to her face! I can’t do that. It would be so humiliating if she doesn’t feel the same” Beca groaned.

Suddenly, Jesse grabbed Beca’s phone out of her hand and started typing a message to Chloe.

“Jesse what the hell?? Give it back right now!” She lunged at Jesse and jumped on his back trying to choke him with her hands.

Then her phone made the swoosh sound of sending a message and Jesse handed the phone back to Beca with a proud look on his face.

Beca read the message fast.

Beca: I’m too scared to say this to your face but Chloe I am so in love with you.

“What have you done?! Are you crazy? She will flip out!” She said smacking Jesse.

“Ouch! Beca I did you a favor. Now you don’t have to say it to her face! And you can stop moping around.” Jesse smirked.

Her phone chimed and she immediately opened the message.

Chlo: Beca, I’ve been in love with you for four years. Please come home so I can finally kiss you

And with that Beca fled out of Jesse’s dorm.

“What? No thank you??” Jesse called out.

[manyshipsinoneithink]

Hey @calmyourpitches! Merry Christmas and enjoy your “little” Mitchsen fic (;

As Beca made her way down the stairs, her laptop bag over her shoulder, and two other suitcases in her hand, her mother called after her.

“Beca! Didn’t you forget something?” She asked sweetly.

“Of course, let me just bring the suitcases down okay?” The brunette responded before continuing her way down the stairs. When she reached the front door, she set everything down and sprinted back up into her mother’s arms. “Goodbye mom, I will miss you.”

“Goodbye honey, I’m sorry that I can’t bring you to Barden myself. Try to be nice to your dad, okay? After all, he is granting you this college education for free.” The older woman smiled and squeezed her daughter tightly.

“I will try, but no promises. I’ll visit you during the Christmas break alright?”

“I’d love nothing more. Goodbye now, your taxi is surely waiting.” The women smiled at each other before Beca turned around and walked down the stairs again. She was gonna miss her apartment and her mom.

She grabbed her suitcases, swung the bag over her shoulders and went outside. Since she didn’t see a taxi, she sat down at a nearby bench, deciding to kill time by mixing two songs together. 10 minutes later, a car honk made her look up from the screen, and she got up to put her suitcases and her bag into the trunk. She was going to hate college, she knew it. If she wasn’t allowed to go to LA straight away, she was gonna show her dad what happens if you don’t grant your child their wish.

The ride was quiet due to Beca not being up for small talk, and rather listening to the new mix she made to find out if any improvement could be made. Before she knew it, the taxi pulled up to Barden and she got out. Taking her laptop bag again, she looked at the building in front of her. Suddenly, a blonde girl appeared out of nowhere. “Hi there! Welcome to Barden University! What dorm?”

Startled, the only thing Beca could manage was “Baker Hall. I think.”

“Okay, so what you’re gonna do now…” The brunette wasn’t listening as a car pulled up next to her and a boy sang to “Carry On Wayward Son”. He noticed her looking and sang to her. Just as he was singing and mimicking the instrumental, the car continued driving and he was out of sight. Beca shook her head and turned her attention back to the girl. “Here is your campus map and here is your official BU rape whistle. Don’t blow it unless it’s actually happening.” She said with a wink.

Nodding and raising an eyebrow, Beca took the whistle in her mouth and continued her way to her dorm.

When she found her room, she discovered that her roommate was already there. “Hey, you must be Kimmy Jin. I’m Beca.” The girl just eyed her up and down, and being unsure what to do, she tried to lighten the mood. “No English?” Another glance. “Yes English. Just tell me where you’re at with English.” When the girl didn’t respond, Beca turned around and started setting up her equipment.

Suddenly, it knocked on the door. “This is the campus police, hide your wine coolers!” Her dad poked his head in laughing, making Beca roll her eyes. “Chris Rock, everybody.”

“You must be Beca’s roommate.” He said as he discovered that his daughter wasn’t alone. “I’m Dr. Mitchell, Beca’s dad. I teach Comparative Literature here.” Kimmy Jin also just eyed him up and down without saying anything. Feeling the awkward silence, he spun back around. “So, have you guys been out on the quad yet? In springtime, all the students study on the grass.”

“I don’t want to study on the grass, dad. I want to move to LA and get a job at a record label and start paying my dues.”

“Oh, here we go again. Beca, DJing isn’t a profession, it’s a hobby. Unless you’re Rick Dees or someone awesome!”

“That’s not… I… Ugh. I wanna produce music, I wanna make music, dad!” Beca tried to argue.

“But you’re going to get a college education first. For free, I might add, end of story.”

“I’m going to the Activities Fair.” Kimmy Jin suddenly interrupted. Seeing her way out, Beca quickly spun around to follow suit. “Me too, I’m going to the Activities Fair with my super good friend, Kimmy Jin. Bye dad!” And with that, she left, leaving her dad standing in their room.

The girls didn’t talk, and the brunette kind of awkwardly followed the Asian girl around until Kimmy Jin found a booth for Korean students. Knowing she lost the girl, Beca wandered around, keeping her eyes open for anything that was related to music. When she found a DJ booth, her heart fluttered and she tried her best not to run to it. When she reached it however, she noticed that there were no music symbols anywhere.

“Ah, DJs. Deaf Jews.” A girl behind her suddenly said, mimicking a scratching noise.

“Shalom!” The guy behind the booth greeted them.

“That’s not a real word but keep trying! You will get there!” The obese blonde shouted, making Beca cringe.

“Not a lot of Jewish people where you’re from, huh?”

“No… I did do Fiddler on the Roof in high school, though. It was like me and some Aboriginals. It was really Jewish.” The girl replied. Beca nodded her head politely, slowly exiting the conversation. “It was full on Jew.”

Keeping her eyes open for real music booths, she thought about the girl she just met. She was weird. The confidence that seemed to radiate from her made Beca feel like not everyone would get along with her. She was so deep in thought that she almost jumped in surprise when a redheaded girl held out a flyer for her. “Hi, any interest in joining our acapella group?”

Looking at the flyer and then back up to the girl, she smirked. “Oh right, this is like a thing now.”

“Oh, totes! We sing covers of songs but we do it without any instruments. It comes all from our mouths.” The redhead answered.

The only thing Beca could muster was “Yikes.”

“There are four groups on campus. The Bellas, that’s us. We’re the tits.” Registering that there was another girl standing next to the redhead, Beca looked at her. She was blonde and wore a pink dress that fit her quite well. Her posture screamed that she had a stick up her butt and she likes to control things.

“That could be interesting in the bedroom…” Beca thought and immediately, inappropriate images flooded her mind.

“So, are you interested?” The redhead suddenly said, snapping the brunette out of her thoughts. Panicking, she tried to come up with something.

“Sorry, it’s just… It’s pretty lame.” She ushered out, internally patting herself on the shoulder for that save.

“Acascuse me?” The blonde girl said. “Synchronized lady dancing to a Mariah Carey chart topper is not lame.” She added with an annoyed laugh.

“Great, my theory is right. She doesn’t like people talking against her and standing up to her.” Beca thought.

“We sing all over the world and compete in national championships.” The redhead chimed in.

“On purpose?” Beca almost laughed.

“We played the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, you bitch!” The blonde suddenly said, making the brunette raise an eyebrow at the snarky remark. Obviously, her friend was trying to calm her down. “What Aubrey means to say is that we’re a close-knit, talented group of ladies whose dream is to return to the national finals at Lincoln Center this year. Help us turn our dreams into a reality?” She added with a hopeful face.

“Sorry, I don’t even sing. But it was really nice to meet you guys.” Beca smiled and walked away. “Aubrey, huh?” She muttered, walking to a new aisle of booths. Finally, she found a booth about a radio station and signed her name. “Better than nothing.” She thought.

Later that day, she received a call about her internship. She had to start the next day. When Beca asked if she could play music, the phone call ended. Shrugging, she went to bed.

x

The next day Beca woke up, she groaned and rolled over, grabbing her phone. As she was stretching, she checked the time. 10:46 am. Her eyes went wide, realizing she was supposed to be at the radio station by 11. Hurriedly, she stood up, got changed and brushed her hair. After applying her trade mark, her eyeliner, she ran out of the door and across campus.

She could already see the building in the distance, but didn’t notice what was in front of her. Before she knew it, she collided with the blonde from the activities fair.

“Hey! Watch where you’re going!” Aubrey angrily said before getting back up.

“Sorry, I’m late.” Beca replied as she shoved the notebooks the blonde dropped into the blonde’s hands. The brunette turned around and continued her run to the radio station, leaving a confused and angry Aubrey behind. With a huff, the other girl turned around and walked away.

When Beca arrived at the radio station, she went inside, catching her breath.

“95.7, WBUJ, music for the independent mind.” A voice, presumably the host, said.

She looked around, being in awe at how much CDs and Vinyls there were. She couldn’t wait to be inspired for some mixes. And hopefully, she could play them too. Looking inside the booth, she didn’t see anybody. Beca could swear that she saw the host two seconds before.

Suddenly, the door opened, revealing a blonde guy. “Hey, I’m Luke, the station manager. You must be Becky, the intern?”

“Actually, it’s-“ But before Beca could continue, someone barged in, yelling.

“Hey man, what’s up? I’m Jesse.” Beca immediately recognized him as the boy who sang to her in the car. Oh boy, this is going to be great.

“I’m Luke, you’re late.” The blonde guy replied before walking over to a desk with a box full of CDs.

Beca followed suit. “Hey, I know you.” The brown haired boy suddenly said.

“No you don’t.” She replied.

“Yeah I do. I remember you. I sang to you. You were in a taxi. Wait, is your dad a taxi driver?”

“Dude, shut up.” Luke interrupted. Beca threw him a thankful look. “So, your job is stacking CDs. Start with this box. When you’re done, there is more. You guys will be spending a lot of down time together, so please… No sex on the desk. I’ve been burned before.”

The brunette girl made a gagging noise as Luke walked away. “This sucks.” She sighed. “I wanted to play music.”

“Not me. I’m here for one reason only. I really love stacking CDs.” Jesse said. Beca gave him a weird look. “So what’s your deal? Are you one of those girls who’s all dark and mysterious, and then she takes off her glasses and that amazingly scary ear spike and you realize that, you know, she’s been beautiful, the whole time?”

“I don’t wear glasses.” Beca shot back.

“Then you’re halfway there.” Jesse smiled goofily.

Beca rolled her eyes and returned her attention to the CDs. This was going to be a job that sucked, but maybe she could schmooze her way up to Luke so he would play her mixes or even let her take over the station. With a satisfied hum, she started stacking the CDs.

x

Later that day, Beca grabbed her shower utensils and headed for the shower rooms. Since she didn’t get the chance to shower this morning, she felt happy about cleaning all the sweat and dusk off of her. The radio station was in serious need of some deep cleaning. When she removed her clothes and threw her bath robe on, she started singing Titanium, knowing that nobody was showering at this hour. She selected a stall and turned on the water, waiting for it to heat up.

“You can sing!” A voice suddenly exclaimed, making Beca jump and turn around in shock.

“Dude, what the fuck?!” The brunette said to the redhead who she recognized from the activities fair.

“How high does your belt go?” The girl said, turning off the shower.

“My what? Oh my god!” Beca didn’t knew what to do, she only knew her rape whistle was too far away so that she could blow it. It was in her room, to be exact. So she hid behind the shower curtain.

“You have to audition for the Bellas!” The redhead stated, putting her hands on her own hips.

“I can’t concentrate on anything you’re saying unless you cover your junk.” The brunette looked at the ceiling to avoid looking at the very naked woman in front of her.

“Like what you see?” The ginger suddenly smirked, adding a wink. Beca almost choked on her spit.

“I would kindly request you to step out of my shower before I blow my whistle.”

“I can’t see the whistle anywhere on you.” The girl laughed. “Anyways, that was David Guetta, right?”

“You know him?” Beca looked at her, shocked.

“Are you kidding me? I love him!” The other girl replied. In her excitement, she ripped the curtain away from Beca.

“Seriously?” The brunette sighed, turning her private parts towards the wall. “I’m nude.”

“Yeah, duh, we both are. Anyways, Titanium is my jam! My lady jam.” The redhead winked, making Beca uncomfortable. “Can you sing it for me?”

“Dude no! Get out before I call for help. Seriously.”

“I’m not leaving until you sing, so.” The ginger looked at her expectantly. Beca sighed in defeat before turning around and picking up from where she left. The other girl chimed in at the chorus, and the brunette was surprised how well they sounded together. Maybe, just maybe, she will ask the girl to record a duet one day.

When they finished the song, they actually smiled at each other. Beca couldn’t believe she just sang with a complete stranger in the shower. Naked. She looked down and back up. Very naked.

“Oh yeah, I’m pretty confident about… All this.” The girl motioned to her body. “I’m Chloe, by the way.”

“Beca. No offense, but would you please go for real now? I really want to shower.” The brunette smiled awkwardly.

“Sure, if you audition for the Bellas.” Chloe shrugged and Beca sighed.

“Fine, when?”

“Next week at the drama stage. We meet at 2 pm.” The redhead smiled. “Nice tattoos by the way.” With that, she walked away, leaving Beca alone in her shower stall. Shaking her head, she turned the shower back on and stepped beneath it.

x

A week later Beca was pacing back and forth. It was now 1:55 pm and she had still not decided if she wanted to go or not. If she didn’t go she won’t be able to go to LA. If she went and endured it for a year, she could chase after a dream and make music. But what would happen if she ended up hating being a Bella? What if she quit halfway? Would her dad still allow her to go? If she was being honest with herself, deep down, she knew she wanted to join. She could actually sing and maybe show off her mixes so that the Bellas could dance to it. The only thing that sucked was that it was acapella. Professional music producers would sneer when they saw she had been part of a lame acapella group in college. But on the other hand, she felt this weird need to completely shake that Aubrey girl to the core. She was interested in her. Why was she such a stuck up bitch? Maybe there was more to her than she was showing.

The brunette sighed. She looked at the door and knew what to do. She grabbed her keys and made her way to the drama stage.

x

Standing in the door, she watched a nerd finishing up the last bit of “Since You’ve Been Gone”. Not being sure as to what to do, she looked at the flyer on the door. She noticed that this was the audition song. Shit.

“That was everybody for this year.” A guy on the stage said. “I’m really not impressed this year.” That’s when the girl realized she was too late. With a huff, Beca wanted to turn around when…

“Wait! There’s one more!” Chloe called out, turning everybody’s attention to her.

The brunette awkwardly walked in. “I uh… Didn’t know we had to sing that song.”

“Oh that’s okay! Just sing anything you want.” The redhead smiled at her.

“Uhm… May I?” Beca asked, motioning to the cup filled with pens. When Chloe nodded, the brunette grabbed it and put the pens on the table before placing the cup upside down in front of her. She took a deep breath before tapping out a beat and singing the Cup song, a song she will spend a lifetime regretting since the Bellas, especially a certain redhead, will always tease her with it.

After she was done, Chloe beamed at her and Aubrey was skeptically looking at her. But she had a glint of something else in her eyes. Had she actually impressed the blonde?

x

Later that day, Beca was walking along the sidewalk when suddenly someone put a bag over her head. She was about to scream when she heard Chloe’s voice next to her ear. “Shush, don’t scream. You can do that in the bedroom later.” The brunette could practically hear her wink. “You’ve been chosen to be a part of the Bellas. This is your initiation. Would you please let me guide you to our secret location?”

“Wow I have never experienced such a nice kidnapping. Will you get me food while we’re at it? Maybe a massage? How about a million dollars?” Beca replied sarcastically, and Chloe laughed.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” With that, she wrapped her arm around the brunette’s waist and they started walking. After what felt like hours, Chloe stopped. “We’re here.”

“Cool.” After the redhead didn’t move, Beca grew self-conscious. “Uhm, Chloe? You can let go of me, right?”

“Oh right.” The redhead in question retracted her arm and the brunette could hear her walk away. Unsure of what to do, Beca continued to stand around, after a while contemplating to take her sack off. Just when she was about to do it, she felt someone grabbing her arm and ushering her to god knows where. She could feel someone standing next to her when the person stopped her.

“We have gathered here to announce the new Bellas and to initiate them.” A voice behind her started to say, making Beca jump. “The sopranos. Jessica, Mary Elise, Lilly.” The brunette could hear something being pulled off, presumably the sacks. Nice, finally. “The mezzos. Cynthia Rose, Stacie, Kori. And our Altos. Fat Amy, Denise, Ashley and Beca.” When her name was said, the hood came off, and the brunette was greeted with candles literally everywhere. She saw something flicker next to her, which made her turn to the podium with more candles on it. Beca scrunched up her face.

“Now, we shall begin by drinking the blood of the sisters that came before you.” Aubrey said, walking over to a table and lifting up a fancy looking wine glass. The brunette almost choked on air. She had joined a fucking cult.

“Dude, no!” She exclaimed.

“Don’t worry, it’s Boone’s farm.” Chloe whispered to her and winked again. Begrudgingly, Beca took the glass and drank a sip before giving it back to Chloe.

After every girl took a sip, Aubrey handed everyone a scarf. “Please place the scarf into your right hand.” The redhead even showed it to them where they had to place it as if they were kindergarten kids. But just to be sure, Beca looked around to check if it was the right hand. “Repeat after me please.” The blonde continued. “I, sing your names.”

“I.” The girls said in unison before singing their names, which created a cringe worthy moment.

“Promise to fulfill the duties and responsibilities of a Bella woman.” Aubrey said.

“Promise to fulfill the duties and responsibilities of a Bella woman.” The girls parroted.

“And I solemnly promise to never have sexual relations with a Treblemaker, or may my vocal chords be ripped out by wolves.” Aubrey finished with a smile.

The other girls just looked at her in shock, but repeated the words anyways, even if with hesitation. “And I solemnly promise to never have sexual relations with a Treblemaker, or may my vocal chords be ripped out by wolves.”

“Congratulations, you’re all Bellas now.” The blonde smiled and the others squealed. Beca, however, still tried to take in the fact that she possibly just joined a cult. Would that mean she’d come in one day and they would perform a satanic ritual? Or would they start drinking real blood from horny fuckboys they seduced?

“Now, follow us to the initiation party!” Chloe exclaimed, and a tall busty girl squealed. “I’m so ready!” The girls excitedly made their way to the exit, but Beca stood frozen in her place.

“Beca?” Aubrey called out to her. After receiving no response, she walked over to the brunette. “Earth to Beca? You coming?”

“Huh, what?” The girl in question asked, shaking her head.

“Why were you just standing there? If this happens often, I’m going to kick you out of the Bellas, just so we’re clear. I want my girls to be fully attentive to me. If something goes wrong, they’re going to be punished. You don’t want to be punished, do you, Beca?” The blonde said.

“Woah, chill out dude. I was just lost in thought. No need to be like that. Besides, I could be into that kinda stuff, you never know.” Beca answered with a wink. Aubrey just gave her a baffled look and stared at the smaller girl in front of her, not knowing what to say. Smirking, the brunette walked towards the exit. “Are you coming now or what?”

“This feud is not over yet!” Aubrey angrily exclaimed and stormed past Beca. Chuckling, she followed the furious blonde.

Arriving at the amphitheater, the brunette cringed at the sight in front of her. People were already drunk, and some were already making out.

“Alright ladies, welcome to aca-initiation night. Prepare to soften the beach.” Aubrey announced before walking off. The other girls followed her, but Beca chose to stay where she was. When the obese blonde from the Activities Fair walked past her, the brunette spoke up.

“I don’t even know what I’m doing here.”

“Just living the dream. I still can’t believe that they let my sexy fat ass in.” The girl laughed. “I’m Fat Amy by the way.”

“Fat… Amy? Why not just Amy?” Beca asked.

“So twig bitches like you don’t say it behind my back, duh! If you’d excuse me, I need to seduce some confused frat boys. What was your name again?”

Before Beca could speak up, a voice called her name. The girls turned their heads to Jesse approaching them. “Beca! Beca, hey!”

“Ah, alright. I’ll leave you guys to it.” Fat Amy said and walked off.

“Oh great, what are you doing here? Are you stalking me?” The brunette girls asked the boy.

“Are you a Bella now? Funny, I never pegged you as the type who likes acapella.” Jesse smiled goofily. “But now you’re one of those acapella girls, and I’m one of those acapella guys, and we’re gonna have aca-children. It’s inevitable.”

“Dude, I think this is the perfect time to say it. There is never going to be something between us because I’m gay.” Beca shrugged.

“Oh, okay… Well, can we be friends then? We could be each other’s wingmen and such!”

“Woah, this is the most positive reaction I’ve gotten when I turned a guy down.” The brunette looked suspiciously at the boy in front of her. “You’re being genuine, right?”

“Of course! There will be other girls that will like me for who I am.” Jesse smiled.

“Cool. Are you sure you’re gonna remember everything tho? You seem stupid drunk.” Beca chuckled.

“Am not! I’ll prove it to you!” The brunette boy pouted.

“Okay, so if I were to push you, you’d come back without hesitation?” The girl chuckled and proceeded to push him.

Jesse proudly came back without falling. “See, coming right back. But I think you should get a drink, you need to loosen up a bit. Be right back.” With that, he walked away, leaving Beca alone. Not for long though, because a redhead grabbed her hands and pulled her towards her.

“Hey there stranger.” Chloe chuckled.

“What’s up?” The brunette smiled.

“I am so glad that I met you.” The redhead grinned and came closer, so that their faces were only inches apart. “I think that we’re going to be very fast friends.”

“Well, you saw me naked, so.” Beca winked.

“You need to be careful though, Bree was shooting daggers at you and that Treble. If you hook up, keep it a secret.”

“Oh, we won’t hook up. I’m gay and I told him that. We’re most likely just going to be friends.”

Chloe seemed to be pleased with that information. “Well, that’s good. But anyways, I promise you, being a Bella is going to be aca-awesome.”

“So awesome that no one is going to impeach Aubrey? I feel like she is going to be like a general, dictating everyone around.” The brunette said, glancing over at the blonde girl.

“Don’t worry about her. She’s a good girl and actually pretty nice once you really get to know her. Her parents just never took her out of the shrink-wrap.” Chloe smiled reassuringly.

“I don’t know what that means. But okay, if you say so.”

“I feel like this year is going to be interesting for all of us.”

“Oh yeah? Why?”

“I just feel like you’re what the group needed. Maybe you’ll be able to convince Aubrey to use songs from the 21st century and not those boring songs we always perform.” The redhead grinned.

“Wait, you’re performing boring songs? How boring?” Beca looked shocked.

“Uhm… like 20th century boring. 80s and all that.” Chloe shrugged.

“Oh boy what did I get myself into?” The brunette groaned and shook her head.

“A family for life, I tell you! Anyways, I need to go, this ginger needs her jiggle juice! See ya later!” The redhead shook her ass playfully and winked at Beca before walking off.

“Make good choices!” Beca laughed and looked around. That’s when the DJ decided to turn up the music.

“Come and dance you losers!” He yelled and everybody cheered, making their way to the dance floor. Jesse was coming back with two cups in his hands.

“Here you go. This is awesome man! I’m so ready for college.”

“Yeah it’s really something.” Beca accepted the drink that was handed to her and took a sip.

“We are the kings of campus!” He yelled, making the brunette girl cringe. Just when she thought it couldn’t get worse, she saw Aubrey coming at her.

“What do you think you’re doing? You took an oath!” The blonde exclaimed.

“If I remember it correctly, that oath was about sexual relations. Not talking.” Beca smirked.

“So? You’re going to talk, then you’re going to drink and before you know it you hook up. That happened to a lot of Bellas in the past.” Aubrey spat out, stepping closer to the smaller girl.

“Dude, I am 100% positive that there’s no hooking up happening. So you can chill and maybe get yourself a drink to loosen up? Visit a doctor so he can remove the stick you got stuck in your ass?”

“How dare you talk to me like that?! You’re just trying to distract me so you can hook up with that damn Treble!”

“I’m fucking gay so the only people I’ll be hooking up with are 100% female. And last I checked that doesn’t go against the oath.” The brunette crossed her arms, glaring into the other girl’s eyes.

“Whatever. If I see you kissing that boy anyways, you’re going to be in so much trouble. Consider this your warning, if I catch you two making out, you’re out of the Bellas.” Aubrey huffed, avoiding Beca’s glare.

“Oh, and what about that girl over there? Dancing and humping that Treblemaker?” The brunette said, pointing to the dance floor.

“What?!” Aubrey’s head whipped around and saw them full on making out. “This is unacceptable! Kori!! You’re out of the Bellas!” She yelled, turning everybody’s attention, including the pair in question, at her. The next thing that happened was the girl running off, crying.

“Woah, was it really necessary to cause such a scene?” Beca asked.

“Don’t tell me how to run the Bellas.” With that, Aubrey walked away, leaving the brunette alone.

“I don’t know what just happened but damn she is a bitch.” Jesse said, shaking his head.

“Tell me about it. I think I’m gonna call it a night. See you around, Treble.” Beca smiled and turned around, walking towards her dorm.

x

The next day, Beca went to the auditorium for her rehearsal. “This is going to be so fucking awesome.” She thought as she walked in and met some other Bellas who were already there. The girls introduced themselves and the brunette kindly reintroduced herself back, and they chatted until Aubrey spoke up.

“Okay. Sit down, please. Sopranos in the front, altos in the back.” The girls did as they were told and sat down. “As you can see, Kori is not here with us. Last night she was trebleboned and had to face her consequences. She has been disinvited from the Bellas.”

“Yeah we all know after the scene you caused yesterday.” Beca muttered, but Aubrey still heard her.

“Well that’s how serious I am about this oath. I’m Dixie Chicks serious. Now, has anybody else something to confess?” The blonde looked around, but kept coming back to Mary Elise.

Knowing that the girl had been caught, she tried to justify herself. “I’m sorry, it was an accident. I didn’t-“

“Save it. Turn in your scarf and go.” Aubrey said, holding out her hand.

Begrudgingly, Mary Elise gave her the scarf. Just as she was about to leave, the blonde spoke up again. “Take your chair and drag it behind you.” The girl silently nodded and dragged her chair behind her before storming out, crying.

“Was that really necessary?” Beca asked, staring at the blonde in disbelief.

“This is war, Beca. And it’s my job to make sure that my soldiers are prepped at go time with three kick-ass songs sung and choreographed to perfection. If you have a problem with it, you can-“ But before Aubrey could finish speaking she put her hand up to her mouth and made quiet gagging noises. Beca looked baffled at her and Chloe put a hand on the blonde’s back and whispered comfortingly.

“Calm down, Bree. We don’t want what happened last year to happen again, do we?” Even though it was quiet, the girls all heard it. Lilly raised her hand.

“What happened last year?” She asked so quietly that the girls had to lean in closer.

“Excuse me? What did you say?” The redhead asked.

“What happened last year?” The girls leaned back, understanding her. “And do you guys want to see a dead body?” Even though it was quiet, Beca heard it loud and clear and decided to scooch away a little.

“Well, I’m going to be honest with you. I…” Aubrey took a deep sigh. “Whenever I get too riled up or nervous, I projectile vomit. That kinda happened last year during finals.”

Lilly suddenly whipped out a tablet and typed something into YouTube. Then she tapped on a video and played it. It showed the Bellas performing, Aubrey and Chloe in the front. The blonde took the mic from another girl and sang god knows what until suddenly, she vomited all over the front row. Some Bellas let out a disgusted noise.

“Okay, enough now. It happened, it’s in the past.” Aubrey interrupted them, pulling their attention back to her. “Now, we will practice every day for at least two hours, and I trust you will add your own cardio.”

“Why cardio?” Beca asked.

“Yeah no, don’t put me down for cardio.” Fat Amy said, making the brunette grin.

“Moving on. This is a list of all the songs we have ever performed. And you will notice that we only do songs that were made famous by women.” Beca accepted the list and raised an eyebrow. There really was nothing from this century on here.

“This list is boring. We need new songs. Songs from this century.”

“Not going to happen. We don’t stray from tradition.” Aubrey said firmly to which the brunette just raised her eyebrow.

“Whatever you say, General.”

Choosing to ignore the girl’s comment, the blonde continued. “Now, this board portrays how we will become champions.” She turned it around. “We will start with running some laps. Then we will do vocal warm ups and start with the choreography. Any questions?” When nobody raised their hand, Aubrey nodded and started with the plan.

x

Five hours later, Aubrey finally called it. The girls groaned in relief and picked up their stuff and began walking out. “Beca, a word.”

The girl stopped and turned around. “Yes, general?”

“First, stop calling me that. Second, you know you’ll have to take those ear monstrosities out for Fall Mixer, right?”

“Man, here I thought you would actually compliment me on my hard work today.” Beca said sarcastically.

“I don’t like your attitude.” Aubrey stated.

“You don’t even know me. Plus, you’re not the boss of me. So I will continue doing whatever the fuck I want.” The brunette smiled.

“I swear to god, I’m going to kick you out.” The blonde said through gritted teeth.

“You lost two girls already. I’m pretty sure you need me more than I need you, so.”

“Fuck you.”

“That’s all you can say to that? That’s weak.”

“I will make your life a living hell.” Aubrey said, stepping closer.

“I would like to see you try. This is going to be interesting.” Beca smirked.

“I’m going to slap that stupid smirk off your face.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Try me.”

Chloe awkwardly cleared her throat, turning the attention of the girls, who were only inches apart, to her. “No need to fight you guys. I’m sure you two can figure this out.”

“Whatever.” Beca said before walking off. She hated Aubrey with a burning passion, but there was something so irresistible about her as well. Shaking her head, she walked to the showers.

x

A week later, they performed for Sigma Beta Theta. Needless to say, it was a disaster. After the frat guy dismissed them, they walked back to campus.

“Well I hope you all remember how you’re feeling right now, so you’ll never want to feel this way again. Chloe, your voice didn’t sound Aguilerian at all. What’s the matter?” Aubrey said.

Chloe dramatically whipped around, making the girls stop in their tracks. “I have nodes.” She stated.

“What? Oh my god, why didn’t you tell me?” The blonde asked, shocked.

“What the fuck are nodes?” Beca questioned.

“Vocal nodules? The rubbing together of your vocal chords at above average rates without proper lubrication.” Aubrey explained.

“They sit on your windpipe and crush your dreams.” The redhead said with teary eyes.

“Well, isn’t that painful? Why would you keep on singing?” The brunette questioned.

“Because I love it! It’s my life.” Chloe sighed. “The key is early diagnosis. I am living with nodes. But I am a survivor. I just have to pull back. Because I am limited. Because I have nodes.”

Beca rolled her eyes at how dramatic the redhead was being.

“Chloe, this is horrible. I will take that into account and see what we can do about this.” Aubrey smiled.

“Woah, the general can actually be nice? Who would’ve known.” The brunette said.

“Shut it, Mitchell.” The blonde glared.

“Make me.” Beca smirked.

Aubrey was taken aback. Flustered, she turned around and walked away. The brunette just chuckled. The Bellas exchanged glances between each other as to what just happened.

x

Beca was sitting out on the quad when Jesse suddenly put a blanket down next to her. “Uh, what is this?”

“A picnic.” The boy responded and threw her a juice pouch. “As much as I love spending time stacking CDs with you, we need to do something out of the radio station, too. You know, hang out and stuff, like friends usually do.”

“Are you insulting me? Are you saying I don’t have friends?” The girl fake gasped.

Jesse chuckled. “No, you weirdo. So, I was thinking we could watch some movies. I have E.T., Star Wars, Jaws, The Breakfast Club and Rocky. Best scored and soundtracked movies of all time. That’s what I wanna do when I grow up. Score movies, move people to tears, blow their minds and all that.”

Beca groaned. “Do we have to? I would rather talk about my parent’s divorce. Or visit a gynecologist.”

“What? Do you not like movies?” Jesse asked, raising his eyebrow, to which the brunette girl just responded by taking a sip out of her juice pouch. “What?! What the hell is wrong with you?”

“They’re fine. I just doze off somewhere and never make it to the ending. The endings are so predictable too. Like, the kid sees dead people, the guy gets the girl and Darth Vader is Luke’s father.”

“Oh, so you’re telling me you just knew the biggest cinematic reveal in history? Just like that?” The brunette boy asked.

“No, everybody talked about it when it was revealed. I have ears. But for real though, Vader in Dutch means father. His name is literally “Dark Father”. Kind of obvious, don’t you think?” Beca said.

“Whatever. You need a moviecation. And I’m gonna give it to you.”

“Oh yeah, in between the Bellas rehearsals which are always.”

“Are you guys getting ready for the riff off?” Jesse asked.

“What the fuck is that?”

“I don’t know much about it, I just know it’s tonight and we compete against the other acapella groups on campus.”

“Tonight? Shit, that’s what Aubrey meant with a trip. I swear, I imagined worse things, but I hope this doesn’t suck.” Beca groaned and dropped her head in her hands. “Hopefully we don’t have to perform those old and boring songs.”

“We’ll see. I need to go, my class is starting soon. See you tonight!” The boy waved her goodbye and left.

x

The acapella groups gathered around in the pool when the announcer spoke up. “Welcome to the riff off! Are you ready to get vocal?” Everybody cheered in response. “The winners get the greatest price of all. A microphone used by Hoobastank when they performed at the Schnee Performing Arts Center.” The crowd went crazy and Beca just stared at him. “To win, you must steal the song from the other group by picking off a word they’re singing, and make it the first word of your own song. If you can’t think of a song, you are-“ He claps. “Cut off! If you repeat a song, you are-“ More people join. “Cut off! And most of all, if you suck, you are-“ Everybody joined in. “Cut off! Now, let’s have a look at the first category!” He pulled out a weird device which projected a spinning wheel onto the pool wall. “Let’s see our first category. It’s… Ladies of the 80s!”

Beca groaned as Aubrey ran forward, but the Treblemakers cut her off before she could sing anything.

Oh Mickey, you're so fine

You're so fine you blow my mind

Hey Mickey, Hey Hey Hey Mickey

Oh Mickey, you're so fine

One of the BU Harmonics stepped up and cut the Treblemakers off.

You're so fine and you're mine

I'll be yours till the end of time

Cause you make me feel

Yeah you make me feel

So shiny and new

Like a virgin

Touched for the very first time

Like the

Aubrey turned around. “Okay guys, we’ll sing “Hit Me With Your Best Shot!” She turned back around and started singing.

Like the one in me

That's O.K.

Let's see how you do it

Put up your dukes

Let's get down to it

Hit me with your best shot

Why don't you hit me with your best shot

Hit me with your best shot

Fire away

A girl from the High Notes stepped up and started singing, obviously completely high.

Away - ay...

It must have been love

But it's over now

But it's over right now

“The negative side effects of medical marihuana, folks.” The announcer interrupted the girl. “You are…” Everybody clapped. “Cut off! Let’s check out the next category.”

“So we just pick any song that works? Even from this century?” Beca asked, turning to Chloe.

“If it fits the category, yes.”

“And you just go with it?”

“Yep.” The redhead smiled.

“Man, that’s nice. Why can’t we always be like this?” The brunette sighed.

“Alright, the next category is… Songs about Sex.”

Just as a Treblemaker stepped forward, Cynthia Rose emerged from between the Bellas.

Na na na

Come on

Na na na na na

Come on, come on, come on

Cause I may be bad

But I'm perfectly good at it

Sex in the air

I don't care I love the smell of it

Sticks and stones may break my bones

But chains and whips excite me

Cause I may be bad

But I'm perfectly good at it

Sex

Beca chuckled, that category was clearly fit for Stacie. Before she could continue her humping with Cynthia Rose, a Treble stepped up.

Sex baby

Let's talk about you and me

Let's talk about all the good things

And the bad things that may be

Let's talk about sex

Alright

Let's talk about sex

A little bit, a little bit

Let's talk about sex, baby

Aubrey, who ushered Stacie back, lost her again when she turned back around to cut the singing Treble off.

Baby, all through the night

I'll make love to you

Like you want me too

And I

Jesse stepped up, cutting Stacie off.

And I guess it's just the woman in you

That brings out the man in me

I know I can't help myself

You're all in the world to me

It feels like the first time

It feels like the very first time

It feels like the first time

It

Watching Jesse made Beca chuckle. He seemed to love music so much. Knowing she had to make the Bellas win the competition though, she ran up to the brunette boy and cut him off.

It's going down, fade to Blackstreet

The homies got RB, collab' creations

bump like acne, No doubt

I put it down, never slouch

As long as my credit can vouch

A dog couldn't catch me, straight up

Tell me who could stop when Dre making moves

Attracting honeys like a magnet

Giving them eargasms with my mellow accent

Still moving this flavor

with the homies Blackstreet and Teddy

The original rump shakers

Everybody was baffled that Beca could rap. Even her group, that should have backed her up, looked at her in shock. Uncertain, the brunette continued to sing.

Shorty get down, good Lord

Baby got 'em open all over town

Thankfully, Fat Amy came to the rescue and began singing with her.

Strictly biz, she don't play around

Cover much ground, got game by the pound

Getting paid is a forte

Each and every day, true player way

Beca looked at Aubrey, who just stood there, staring at her in disbelief. Not breaking eye contact, she sung the next lines.

I can't get her outta my mind

I think about the girl all the time

“Did she just…  blush?” The brunette thought. Shaking her head, she continued to sing.

I like the way you work it No diggity, I got to bag it up, Baby

I like the way you work it No diggity, I got to bag it up, Baby

The other acapella groups and even the audience joined in to sing with them. Beca walked around, grinning like an idiot.

I like the way you work it No diggity, I got to bag it up, Baby

I like the way you work it No diggity, I got to bag it up, Baby

I like the way you work it No diggity, I got to bag it up, Baby

I like the way you work it No diggity, I got to bag it up, Baby

We out!

The crowd cheered while the Bellas celebrated their victory. Or so they thought.

“Tough blow ladies.” The announcer spoke up. “The word you needed to match was “it”. And you sang “it’s”. So you are…” Everybody clapped again. “Cut off! The winners are the Treblemakers!”

“I’ve never heard that rule!” Aubrey exclaimed before walking away. “Come on ladies, come back.” The Bellas followed her. “Before everybody goes to bed tonight, I need you to make a list of everything you did wrong.”

“But guys, what we did was great, right?” Beca spoke up.

“Calm your pits, Beca, we still lost.” The blonde huffed.

“Yeah, but it was spontaneous, it was awesome. We were actually listening to…”

“Okay, everybody, hands in.” Aubrey cut her off.

“No, I refuse to accept that you want to punish us for doing something great! You don’t want to admit it, but you also know that this, what just happened, was better than anything you ever did in this Bella career. So why don’t we continue doing that?” The brunette asked angrily.

“Yeah I’m with Beca on that one. This was so great today.” Cynthia Rose said and went to stand next to Beca.

“Yeah, I agree.” Fat Amy replied, putting an arm around the smaller girl. Slowly, all the Bellas went to stand next to Beca.

“Chloe?” Aubrey asked, looking with hurt in her eyes to her best friend.

“I’m sorry, but I agree with Beca. We need new songs, we need to stray from tradition and be better than last year.” She said apologetically before walking over to the girl.

“Oh, I see how it is. I’m the jerk, the one that dictates everyone around and controls everything. It isn’t like I’m the captain of this group or something!”

“Aubrey, it’s totally okay how you run the Bellas. We just want newer songs.” The brunette tried to reason.

“No. Honestly, fuck all of you. I’m done.” The blonde said and walked away.

“It’s best just to give her space. We’ll meet tomorrow at 9 am for practice. Good night guys.” Chloe smiled, and the Bellas bid their good nights. Then, the redhead looked at Beca. “Can I walk you to your dorm?”

“Why? You scared that someone will steal me?” The brunette chuckled.

“No you weirdo. I just want to get to know you better.”

Beca nodded and they started walking. After some silence, she spoked up. “I feel bad. Aubrey didn’t deserve the whole group turning against her.”

“Hey, you tried to convince her to use a new set list. You’re not the first, I tried as well, but even though I’m her best friend, she just won’t listen to me.” Chloe sighed.

“What makes her not loosen up?”

“Her dad. He’s in the military and always trained her to be the perfect daughter with perfect grades and all that. She doesn’t want to disappoint him.”

“Her dad can fuck off. Nobody can be 100% perfect.” Beca sighed. “I just wish she would accept the fact that new songs would help. I know that she also knows it’s better. She just needs the nudge to do it.”

Chloe looked up to the sky. “I always see you out on the quad with your headphones in and staring really intently into your laptop. What are you doing?”

“Stalker much?” The brunette chuckled. “I like to mix songs together. I started it when I was around 14 and never stopped doing it. I want to move to LA and become a music producer.”

“Wow, that’s cool! Can I listen to it?” The redhead asked as they stopped in front of Beca’s dorm room.

“Well, I’m usually not comfortable showing them, but… What have I left to lose? If Kimmy Jin isn’t here, you could listen to them right away.” The smaller girl answered and unlocked the door to reveal an empty room. “Well, I guess it’s settled then. Have a seat on the bed.”

Chloe nodded happily as she sat down on the bed, eagerly waiting for Beca to hand her the headphones, when she did, the redhead immediately put them on, letting the music consume her. “Shit Beca, this is really good! I like it.” She smiled.

“Thanks, Chloe.” The brunette blushed.

“We could show this to Aubrey, maybe she will realize that the Bellas wouldn’t be lost with new songs, but that you can mix them together and we can work on the choreography.”

“You think?” Beca asked, plopping down next to the redhead.

“I’m sure of it.” They smiled at each other, and Chloe took in a deep breath. “The Bellas aside, I wanted to ask if you might want to go on a date with me? I really want to get to know you better.”

“Oh, uh… No, sorry. I’m not interested in you.” Beca scratched the back of her neck. “I see us as friends. Nothing more.”

“Oh, okay. Nothing wrong with asking.” The redhead smiled softly. “Well, I’ll be going. See you tomorrow, and bring some samples with you, will ya?”

“Will do. Good night, Chloe.” The brunette smiled and closed the door behind the girl. She sighed and put her head against the door. “Why is everybody crushing on me?” She thought. Shaking her head, she went to bed.

x

The next day Beca walked in to the Bellas panicking. “Woah guys, what’s wrong?”

“Beca, Aubrey hasn’t been home all night and she didn’t show up here!” Chloe cried.

“Shit. I’d say we spread out, look all over campus. Exchange numbers so we can message each other. She surely is somewhere.” The brunette said. “Ashley, Jessica, you’ll look for her in the school building. Maybe she is in a classroom. Cynthia Rose, Stacie, you check the dorms. Maybe she crashed somewhere. Denise, Fat Amy, you search the quad. Chloe and I will look around college. Maybe she went to the lake. Is everybody’s task clear?”

“Yes!” The girls said in unison.

“Wait, where is Lilly?” Chloe asked.

“I guess she already went to look for her. Now, go.” The Bellas went outside before splitting up. Chloe and Beca started their way to the lake.

“I’m so worried, she never did that before. I hope she’s okay.” The redhead said, sniffing.

“Hey, I’m sure she is. We’ll find her in no time.” The brunette smiled reassuringly.

When they arrived at the lake, they decided to split up and walk around either side so the search would go faster. Beca shoved her hands in her pockets and looked around, trying to spot a certain blonde. After a while, she stumbled over a treehouse. Deciding it would be worth a look, she climbed up, opened the trap door only to reveal Aubrey, sitting in a corner with her knees pulled up to her chest and her head on the knees.

“Hey, Aubrey.” The brunette said softly.

“Go away Beca. I hate you.” The blonde mumbled.

“Okay, bye.” Beca smirked, starting to climb back down.

“No wait. Please don’t go.”

Beca went back up and fully entered the tree house. “Nice hideout. Do you come here often?”

“Maybe so.” Aubrey answered, her head still on her knees.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you yesterday. I was just trying-“

“Save it.” The blonde cut her off. “Why am I never doing enough for anybody? Not even my dad is proud of me. I always tried to live up to his standards but he was always disappointed.” She sobbed and slammed her fist against the wall.

“Maybe he doesn’t want you to live up to his standards. Maybe he is disappointed because you don’t try to do your own thing. Maybe he set such high standards because he knew you could never reach them, and wanted to inspire you to break out from that and find your own way to do things.” Beca suggested, sitting down next to the blonde.

“Oh yeah, great. I’m sure he thinks that way. You don’t even know him. Not like I do.” Aubrey angrily said, wiping her tears.

“Well, maybe so. I just made some suggestions. I always make my dad disappointed in me because I don’t do as he says. Honestly, I just joined the Bellas so it would benefit me. He said if I joined a club and I didn’t like it by the end of the year, he would help me move to LA and fulfill my dream. But, then I joined and I felt this need to fix this group. To help it become better.”

“Wow, how great. You still would’ve left us after that year huh? Destroy everything and then leave, am I right?” The blonde looked up at Beca, glaring into her eyes.

“If you asked me a month ago, I would’ve said yes. But honestly, I can’t really think about leaving you all behind. I want to help you. And probably stay for these four years of hell. But I can only help if you let me.”

“Tsk, how would you even be able to help? Do you know how to think of a choreography? How to filter out all the musical instruments in a song so the acapella version sounds good? How to even put together an arrangement? I bet you don’t, so why would you be able to help?” Aubrey spat out.

“In my free time, I like to mix songs together. Create mashups. That’s my thing. I add the songs with a similar beat together. Chloe thinks they’re good. She listened to it last night and encouraged me to show you. Do you want to?” The brunette asked with a hopeful look on her face.

“The Bellas are shattered anyways, so why the hell not.” The blonde huffed, looking out of the window. Beca got out her phone and started playing a mashup of Bulletproof vs. Release Me. With each second that passed, Aubrey’s face softened more and more, until she turned to look at Beca. “Wow, this sounds really good.”

“You think? Even good enough to use it for our competitions?”

“Out of the question!” The blonde exclaimed, making Beca scooch back a little in shock. Then, the blonde chuckled. “We can consider it. But for the Regionals we have to go with our routine, we don’t have time to rehearse something entirely new.”

“Woah, is Aubrey Posen actually being nice and genuine to me? Wow, I think I must be dreaming.” Beca pinched herself and Aubrey slapped her leg playfully. “Well, I think we should head back.” The blonde nodded and the brunette sent out a text to everyone that she found Aubrey and they would be coming back to the auditorium. They jumped down the ladder and bumped into Chloe.

“There you are! I was so worried!” The redhead said, engulfing her best friend in a hug.

“I’m sorry, it won’t happen again. I just needed to be alone.” Aubrey said apologetically.

“It’s okay. Let’s go back.” Chloe smiled and the three girls walked back.

x

The regionals were a disaster. If it wasn’t for Amy’s solo, they wouldn’t have advanced to the semifinals. Beca looked at Aubrey who looked like she was about to throw up. She decided to let it slide, but when they entered the entrance hall, she witnessed the Treblemakers fighting with what seems to be another acapella group. When she saw Jesse being begged to hit one of them who obviously looked like he was into that shit, she stepped down the stairs and punched the guy in the face.

“Oh, that was awesome! Do it again!” He exclaimed.

Fat Amy appeared behind the brunette and snatched the trophy out of Jesse’s hand, getting ready to hit the guy again. “Feel the fat power!” She shouted.

“Amy, don’t!” Beca yelled.

“Fat Amy, kick me in the balls!” The man shouted excitedly and Amy obeyed, hitting him right in the crotch. “Oh that hurt so good.”

“Amy, give the trophy back!” The brunette girl exclaimed, grabbing onto it.

“I want to put this sharp weapon up his ass!” The obese blonde said, pulling on the trophy.

“Oh, cherry on top!” The guy grinned, holding out his ass. But it would never come to it. The trophy suddenly broke in half and went flying through the window, smashing it. To their luck, there was a cop just standing outside who looked up from giving a van a parking ticket and walked towards them.

“Vertical running! I’m vertical running!” Amy exclaimed and ran away, leaving Beca standing there, alone, with half a trophy in her hand.

“Ma’am, I am going to arrest you because of destruction of public property.” The police officer said and handcuffed the brunette girl.

“This is a misunderstanding, really. Can’t we talk about this?” Beca smiled innocently.

“You can talk at the station.” The officer said, ushering her out.

“Fuck.” The girl mumbled.

x

After Jesse, or more like her dad, bailed her out of jail, she was beyond pissed. She knew that her dad wouldn’t be all too happy, but when he said she wasn’t allowed to move to LA anymore, she grunted. Way to ruin dreams. She stomped into her room, only to find all the Bellas waiting for her. Immediately, all her anger faded. “You guys waited up for me?” She smiled.

“Of course we waited up for you!” Chloe said, smiling.

“They waited here for hours. It was a real inconvenience, Beca.” Kimmy Jin said before leaving the room.

“Beca, I’m really glad that you are here.” Aubrey said, making the brunette look shocked at her. “Now that we’re all here, I’m calling an emergency Bella meeting.”

“Oh no…” Fat Amy mumbled.

“First up…” The captain said.

“Oh yes…” The obese girl mumbled again, making Beca snort.

“The score sheets showed that we were almost beaten by the Sockapellas. Fat Amy, you need to do things exactly like we rehearsed them, okay?”

“Have you considered that they almost beat us just because we were boring and Amy saved our asses?” The brunette girl chimed in. “We should be taking risks, it’s not enough to be good, we need to put ourselves out there, be different.”

Aubrey glared at Beca. “And you think your little arrangements will really help?”

“Uh, yeah? Mostly because they contain songs from this century.” The brunette shrugged.

The blonde scoffed. “Actually, no. We’ll perform this arrangement again, just like we rehearsed it. Your pseudo-mashups suck and you’re a grade A pain in my ass. I’m the captain and you don’t have a say in this group.”

Everybody looked shocked at their leader. Beca felt tears starting to form, but she swallowed them and glared at Aubrey. “Honestly, fuck you. Get out of my room. All of you.” When no one moved, she screamed. “Out!” The Bellas hastily picked up their stuff and went out, Chloe shooting the brunette an apologetic look. The blonde stared angrily at Beca but followed suit.

“Rehearsal at 8 am sharp.” She just said and Beca slammed the door shut behind her. Then she threw herself onto her bed and let the tears flow. “Why the fuck is she suddenly so mean?! She liked the mashups and even had some plans for a choreography. I thought we would be friends!” She thought and let out a loud sob. Apparently the blonde was a backstabber. Beca threw a pillow against the wall and tossed and turned until she eventually fell asleep.

x

The brunette hated the months until the semifinals. Aubrey was being unbearable again, so Beca went back to her snark and sarcasm. Yes, during the time where she showed the blonde her mixes and the regionals, the girl was actually being nice and refrained as much as she could from any comment. But since they were back to square one, why should she continue being nice?

The day of the semifinals was here, and Beca woke up, turning on the campus radio to listen to music when she got ready, something she did over the months, in the hopes that Luke would finally play her mixes. It started to frustrate her. Was she not good enough for him?

Suddenly, she almost dropped her eyeliner pen. The radio station played a mix. Not any mix, her mix. She quickly got ready and stormed as best as she could in her stupid outfit to the radio station. She barged in and walked over to Luke, excited. “You’re playing my song right now! This is my track! Do you like it? You put it on the radio, that’s so awesome!”

“It’s a sick beat. The DJ at the garage does a brilliant version of this, but yours? It’s better.”

“Hell yeah it is.” The brunette smiled.

“I’m gonna listen to her tonight. Wanna join me?”

“I can’t, I need to go to a competition. Otherwise I really would have.”

“Oh, flight attendant competition?” The blonde boy asked.

“No, the Barden Bellas. We have semifinals tonight.” Beca grinned sheepishly.

“I wouldn’t have pegged you as an acapella girl. Good look though.”

“Hey Beca, let’s go grab lunch before the performance!” Jesse spoke up.

“Sure, why not? Bye Luke!” Luke waved them goodbye and they went outside.

“I kept bugging him to listen to your mixes by the way. I saw that he always threw your USB-Sticks into the admission basket but he never got them out. I’m glad he finally listened to me.” The brunette boy confessed.

“Thank you Jesse! I was getting worried sick that he just didn’t think I was good enough.” Beca was genuinely touched. No one did that for her before. “I’m sorry about the other night. It just kind of ruined my dream of moving to LA after this year.”

“Ah, don’t sweat it. I’m sure if you talk to your dad you can fix this.” The boy smiled and they went into the campus café.

x

Beca hated it. She hated that everybody was nodding off. She hated that they were forced to do this again. She hated that the Footnotes were making fun of them. But most of all, she hated Aubrey. She had no clue what she did to mess things up, but it pissed her off that the blonde set their relationship back to square one. So she did what she could do best. Go against the captain.

When Aubrey started her solo, the brunette started to sing Bulletproof, earning the audience’s interest back. Even though the blonde shot her a glare, she didn’t care. Satisfied, she proceeded, like everything was normal.

After the performance, Aubrey stormed after her. “What the hell Beca?! Were you trying to screw us up?”

“Are you being serious right now?” Beca asked.

“Newsflash, this isn’t the Beca show.”

“Okay, I’m sorry that I messed you up, but in case you haven’t noticed, everybody pretty much dozed off during our set!” The brunette defended herself.

“It’s not your job to decide what we do and when we do it.” Aubrey spat back. “Why don’t you ask the rest of the group how they felt about your little improvisation?”

Beca looked around. Everybody was avoiding her eyes. “Amy?” She asked weakly.

“It was cool… It just caught us a little off guard…” The blonde in question replied.

“It caught us a lot off guard! I told you she wasn’t a Bella, Chloe.” Aubrey said, crossing her arms.

“Aubrey, don’t.” Chloe tried to ease the situation.

“Save it. You don’t have to pretend you actually have a say in this group. Thanks to General Posen, everybody is unhappy here.” Beca said angrily. “I really tried to save this group, I really thought I had a chance. Turns out I don’t and everybody is a backstabber here. I’m done with this group. Fuck all of you.” She turned around and stormed out of the door. She heard Benji calling her name, but she was too angry to talk to anyone right now. She went outside and called a cab, telling the driver to go back to Barden.

When she got back, she found a lot of text messages, mostly from Chloe, asking if she was okay. She turned off her phone and went to the garage where she was supposed to meet Luke. She got herself a drink and gulped it down.

“So, how was the competition?” The blonde boy asked.

“I don’t wanna talk about anything of what happened this night.” The brunette replied, looking at the DJ.

“Well, okay. Do you like her mixes?” Luke asked, following her line of sight.

“Yeah, she’s good. I don’t want to sound cocky but I prefer my mixes more.”

The boy chuckled and spoke up. “Listen, Becky. I want you to take over the radio station during spring break. Play your music.”

“Are you being for real right now?” Beca asked, her mouth open.

“Yeah. I want to go home and who better to ask than you?” He smiled and the brunette punched him playfully.

“Don’t you think I want home too?”

“Well, if you want to, I’ll just put something random together and loop it.”

“No, I was joking. I would be more than honored.” Beca smiled. “By the way, my name is Beca. Not Becky.”

“Well, why didn’t you say anything?” Luke asked, tilting his head to the side.

“I honestly don’t know.” They laughed.

“Well, I’ll be heading over to my girlfriend. See you around.” The blonde boy smiled and walked away, leaving the girl all by herself. She decided to have another drink before heading home.

x

Spring break was lonely. Everybody she knew left to go home, but she couldn’t due to her mom being in Europe. She spent day and night at the radio station, occasionally putting on some automatically generated playlist so she had a break of a few hours or could sleep. Those hours where she was awake were usually filled with Beca wondering what the Bellas were up to and if they missed her. She wondered if Aubrey still drilled them to death. She generally wondered what Aubrey was up to. She just couldn’t wrap her head around the fact that the blonde was suddenly so cold to her again. What in earth did she do?

She decided to go to her dad. As much as it pained her, she still had to convince him to let her move to LA. And maybe he could offer her some advice as to what to do with the Bellas. She sighed and knocked on his door.

“Beca? What are you doing here?” He asked.

“I need you.” She simply said and walked past him into the kitchen. Her dad immediately poured them her favorite tea and sat opposite of her.

“What happened, honey?”

“I quit the Bellas. Aubrey absolutely broke me apart. She just… She is such a bitch and so stubborn.”

“Well, you can’t go against everyone. Some people have to learn it the hard way that not everything works their way. I think Aubrey is one of those people.”

“It’s just so frustrating dad. She said she liked my mashups and we even started to become friends or something. And then suddenly she shows me the cold shoulder again, completely ruining whatever we had and she started being mean again.”

“Hm, maybe you said something that upset her? Not everyone takes your comments well.” Her dad suggested.

“Ugh, I don’t know. It’s kind of like she has shut me out.”

“Just like you do?” Dr. Mitchell asked.

“Huh?” Beca asked, looking at him.

“Well, you shut everyone out if you can’t stand being vulnerable around them. You shut me out too. I tried to make things right between us but you just wouldn’t let me.”

“It’s just easier, you know?” The brunette sighed.

“But also really lonely. Pushing everybody away, even those who you love most…”

“Dad, what do I do? How can I fix this?” Beca asked, looking down onto the table.

“It’s up to you. I would suggest waiting until Aubrey comes to you. Maybe she will have realized by now that the group doesn’t work without you.” Her dad said and hugged his daughter.

“Thanks dad. Will you still not let me move to LA?” The brunette asked.

“Well, I think you should fix everything here first and then decide if you still want to go to LA. Whatever your decision is, I’ll support you.” The man smiled.

“Thank you, dad.”

x

The last day of spring break came and the students came back. Beca was just walking back to her dorm from the radio station when she bumped into Aubrey. “Oh great.” She thought.

“Beca…” The blonde said, looking her up and down. The brunette knew she was in a bad shape. She was paler than before, lost a little weight and had bags under her eyes. “Are you okay?”

“Pf, since when do you care about me?” Beca said bitterly.

“I’m sorry about what happened, can we talk?” Aubrey asked.

“No, I don’t think so. Good day.” The brunette turned around and was ready to walk away when she felt a hand wrapping around her wrist.

“Beca… Please.” The voice was begging. Begrudgingly, she turned around.

“Fine, but not here. Let’s go to my room.” They walked to Baker Hall and into Beca’s room. “Talk.” She said after closing the door behind them.

“After you left, the Bellas fell apart. Like, really fell apart. Over spring break, I had time to reflect on this year, and I want to genuinely apologize to you. You were trying to revolutionize the Bellas, and I didn’t let you. I guess that was because you didn’t take any shit from me and always fought back. That made me furious, and I never knew why.” Aubrey chuckled. “I came to the realization that I really did control everyone and everything, and I scared people so much that they didn’t dare to talk against me. That was until you came along. You shook me to the core and opened my eyes. And I really like your mashups. I just felt really hurt when you said that this performance with The Sign and Eternal Flame sucked. I mean, I also put work in it so we could perform it. Just like you put work in your mixes.”

“But why did you have to be so cold to me again? I actually started to like you. You basically shut me out. Just like I normally do with people.” Beca sighed sadly.

“I just wanted to show you that we didn’t suck if everything went like it was supposed to. It honestly killed me that we went back to square one. But with your comments it eventually became easier to hate you again, because some things you said really weren’t nice. So I wasn’t nice, too. And I guess I went too far during the semifinals.” The blonde sighed. “I’m really sorry Beca. I want to start over. I honestly missed you.”

The brunette sighed and looked out of the window. She looked back at the blonde. “Even if I were to accept your apology, I couldn’t do anything. We didn’t advance to the finals.”

“Actually…” Aubrey said, making Beca look at her with interest. “Benji found out that the lead singer of the Footnotes was still in high school. We advanced into the finals. And I’m asking you, Beca Mitchell, if you want to arrange a killer mashup and plan out the choreography with me, making us win the finals and beat the Trebles?”

“Well. I will accept. But if you dare to break my heart again, I’m never coming back. Do you understand?” The brunette stated, holding out her hand. The other girl took it and shook it.

“You got my word.”

“Then you got my help.” Beca smiled softly.

Aubrey stepped forward and hugged the shorter girl tightly. “Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.”

The brunette awkwardly wrapped her arms around the blonde and squeezed her a little. “No problem.”

“Well, we will meet tomorrow at 2 pm. Will you drop by?” Aubrey asked, letting go of the girl.

“No, you suck, I got better things to do.” Beca sarcastically said. “Of course I’ll be there. See you tomorrow.”

They smiled contently at each other. “Thank you again Beca. You don’t know how much this means to me.” The blonde said before turning around and leaving the room, leaving the brunette behind.

Beca couldn’t explain it, but she felt immediately better. She was happy that Aubrey seemed to care about her. She missed the blonde just as much as the girl did her. She couldn’t wait for tomorrow to come.

x

The next day she was making her way over to the auditorium when she bumped into Jesse, who began telling her about his spring break. She listened, avoiding the questions what she did during that time. After a while she saw it already was 2:30 pm.

“Shit Jesse, I need to go. See you later!” She said, dashing to the auditorium. When she came in however, she saw that everybody was fighting. Beca took in the sight before her. There was vomit on the floor, where Lilly made… Vomit angels? It was disgusting. Cynthia Rose was obviously groping Stacie while the busty girl blew the rape whistle. The other girls stood around, screaming. Fat Amy, Aubrey and Chloe wrestled for the pitch pipe. “Woah, guys! Guys! Stop!” She exclaimed, making everybody stop in their tracks. “What’s going on here?”

“Nothing.” Aubrey said, standing up straight. There was a vomit stain on the blonde’s shirt, indicating she was the one who vomited.

“Doesn’t look like nothing to me. What happened?”

“We couldn’t live with this dictatorship anymore.” Fat Amy said. “We wanted to break free.”

Beca took in a deep breath and looked at Aubrey. “Well, what if I told you Aubrey and I kissed and made up and we’re going to arrange something new for the finals?”

“Wait, you two kissed?” Chloe asked, making both girls blush.

“What? No, it’s a saying.” The brunette stuttered. “Anyways, I think it’s important for us to get on the same level. Find our sound.”

“I agree.” The blonde said and threw Beca the pitch pipe, but she couldn’t catch it and it landed in the vomit.

“Well, maybe not here. Let’s go to the pool.”

They made their way there and Beca turned around. “Ok, here we are. Aubrey, would you pick out a song for us please?”

“Bruno Mars – Just The Way You Are.” The blonde answered, smiling.

“Okay. Chloe, are you okay with taking the lead?” The redhead nodded and Beca started with the intro.

Oh, her eyes, her eyes make the stars look like they're not shinin'

Her hair, her hair falls perfectly without her tryin'

She's so beautiful, and I tell her everyday

Grinning, Beca started singing Just A Dream.

Uh, uh, I was thinkin' bout her, thinkin' bout me, thinkin' bout us, who we gon' be (I know, I know when I compliment her, she won't believe me)

Her eyes wandered to Aubrey, who was looking back at her, smiling widely.

Opened my eyes, and it was only just a dream (And it's so, it's so sad to think that she doesn't see what I see)

It was only just a dream (But every time she asks me do I look okay? I say)

The Bellas began clapping and stomping to the rhythm, all clearly enjoying what was happening.

When I see your face (So I traveled back, down that road, Will she come back, no one knows)

There's not a thing that I would change (I realize yeah, it was only Just A Dream)

'Cause you're amazing

Just the way you are (It was only Just A Dream)

When I see your face (So I traveled back, down that road, Will she come back, no one knows)

There's not a thing that I would change (I realize yeah, it was only Just A Dream)

'Cause you're amazing

Just the way you are (It was only Just A Dream)

When I see your face (Face)

They finished and everybody was grinning from ear to ear, and Beca and Aubrey were staring at each other.

“Hands in, girls.” Aubrey said, holding out her hand. Everybody put their hand on top of hers, before they counted to three and, for the first time, made a perfect harmonized sound. That was, if there wasn’t suddenly a bass note. Chloe clasped her hand over her mouth.

“I’ve never made that sound before!” She said.

“Usually you aren’t supposed to. Chloe, what did you do?” Aubrey asked.

“I might have gotten rid of my nodes via surgery?” The redhead admitted sheepishly.

“Chloe!” The blonde gasped.

“Yo, with her messed up vocal chords, she can hit the bass notes. We could perform so much more songs!” Cynthia Rose spoke up.

“That’s true. I have a rough arrangement planned out in my head too.” Beca smiled.

“This is so nice.” Lilly suddenly said, loud and clear for everyone to hear.

“Woah, what?” Stacie gasped. “You can talk?”

“No need to shout.” Amy said, making everybody laugh.

x

The weeks before finals were filled with Aubrey and Beca planning out an arrangement and choreography, them teaching the Bellas and successfully mastering it before the finals. They grew closer, too, due to them staying up late together. Chloe found them more than once cuddled up in bed when they passed out from their sessions. The redhead smiled at the sight and took pictures for blackmail purposes later.

The day of the finals was finally here and everybody was nervous. They huddled up and watched the Treblemakers perform, having to admit that they had really outdone themselves. But they had the element of surprise on their side. When the announcer walked on stage, they turned to each other.

“I love you, awesome nerds.” Beca grinned.

“Yeah, you guys are the best. Even though most of you are pretty thin, you all got fat hearts, and that’s what matters.” Fat Amy said, making everyone chuckle. “Okay let’s just smash this!”

“Ladies and gentlemen, the Barden Bellas!” They walked onto stage and immediately received positive feedback from the crowd due them not being dressed like flight attendants anymore. They stood in formation and Beca began singing.

x

When they ended their performance, the crowd was going wild. They gave the Bellas a standing ovation as they cheered. Beca and Aubrey looked at each other with so much pride.

“Are they really cheering for us?” The blonde asked in disbelief.

“Yes they are, doofus.” The brunette replied, making Aubrey hug the smaller girl.

“Thank you for making this possible.”

They walked off the stage, and soon, the announcer told them the winners.

“On third place, the Hullabahoos. On second place, disappointingly, the Treblemakers. But, therefore, taking the first place and winning this competition…” He trailed off, letting the drum roll take over the silence. “The Barden Bellas!”

The girls cheered and ran onto the stage. Fat Amy took the trophy and lifted into the air. “We won, bitches!”

While the girls were hugging each other, Aubrey stood there, taking in the cheering crowd. Then she proceeded to look at her girls, especially at one girl. The one girl without whom none of this would have happened. She walked over to Beca, grabbed her cheeks and pressed her lips onto hers. The crowd cheered louder, but she didn’t care because the other girl kissed her back, wrapping her arms around the blonde’s waist. She could hear the Bellas whistling, and when she broke away from Beca, the girl smiled at her.

“So I take that as a sign that you like me?” The brunette said, smirking.

“Oh shut up.” Aubrey giggled and kissed her again.

[blank-shit]

Merry Pitchmas!

@bethkirwan I ended up writing my first fic ever so hope you like it! 

Meet Me Under The Mistletoe

Beca groaned as she walked up the steps to her former Bellas house with Chloe and Fat Amy. It’s been a rough week at work and the last thing she wants to do is attend this Christmas party Emily is hosting for all the former Bellas since all the new Bellas have left for break. Fidgeting with the gifts she had to carry, she turned to the other two beside her. “If this turns out to be crappy, I’m heading back home with or without you guys.” Chloe turned to face Beca with a small pout. “C’mon Becs, it won’t be that bad. If anything, I think it’s great to get together with the Bellas again and open the amazing gift I got you,” she said with a wink.

Beca rolled her eyes as Chloe reached over to ring the doorbell. “Fine, but it better be worth it.”

Fat Amy, who had been watching the interaction just imitated a whipping sound and motion that earned her a glare from Beca. Before anyone could say something else, the front door opened revealing Emily in an ugly Christmas sweater and reindeer pajama pants. “Hey Bellas! I’m so glad you guys made it, Aubrey and Stacie are already here too. They’re in the kitchen helping me set up the desserts.”

The three of them stepped into the house and set down their belongings. Fat Amy rushed off first to the kitchen to see what kind of desserts were going to be served. Beca leaned into Chloe and whispered into her ear, “There better be alcohol so I can make it through the night.”

Chloe simply rolled her eyes and grabbed Beca by the hand to tug her along towards the kitchen. “You and your booze. You have me here to make this whole thing more bearable,” Chloe joked as she briefly looked back at Beca.

A small smirk appeared on Beca’s face as she looked at the woman tugging her along. “Whatever you say, Beale.”

Once they arrived, they greeted Aubrey and Stacie who were organizing the gingerbread cookies. Chloe immediately went up to Aubrey and hugged her. “Bree! I’ve missed you so much!”

Beca walked up to Stacie and gave her a smile. “Stacie, nice to see you again.”

“You too Beca, I see you and Ginger over there were pretty cozy holding hands together earlier when you came in here,” Stacie replied with a smirk of her own.

“Yeah, think whatever you want but Chloe and I are just friends, nothing more,” Beca said with a slight hesitancy in her tone. It wasn’t the first time she’s thought about how her relationship with Chloe did seem a little more than friendly over the years but always brushed it aside not wanting to deal with whatever was going on.

“Right, cause that face you just made really sold me the truth. It’s cool, I just better see you two making out under a mistletoe cause I know there is one around here,” Stacie said as she returned her attention to the arranging the cookies.

Beca let out a nervous laugh at the thought of the possibility. She looked over at Chloe and Aubrey who were still in their own happy reunion bubble and couldn’t help the butterflies that erupted in her stomach as Chloe caught her eye with her own piercing blue ones as she laughed at something Aubrey said.

Fat Amy came up beside Beca with a glass of milk in one hand and two cookies in the other, chewing on one of them. “Stacie’s got a point, you got some lady-loving going on with Ginga over there. For what it’s worth, she’s definitely gonna want you to unwrap her gift if you know what I mean.”

Beca quickly turned her head to Fat Amy with a tiny frown etched onto her face. “Dude, no. Plus, don’t you have cookies and a glass of milk to stuff in that mouth of yours instead of coming here to make unnecessary comments like you always do.”

Fat Amy held her hands up in surrender as she slowly walked out of the kitchen. “Alright, but you know you can’t run away and hold it in forever or it’ll all be released like horse shit coming out like fro-yo.”

Beca scrunched her face up in disgust. “Thanks for the details, I’ll keep that in mind.” She turned back to find Chloe and Aubrey coming over to her.

“Hey Beca, it’s good to see you again,” Aubrey said as she went in for a hug.

Beca took a step back and held her arm out. “Whoa there Aubrey, I know it’s the holidays but I still don’t like hugs and you know that. I’ll just give you a pat on the arm, it’s the most you’ll get from me.”

“Well it’s good to see you haven’t changed a bit, deep down you’re still that alt-girl who made fun of acapella that day of the activities fair,” Aubrey joked with a smile.

Beca just shook her head with a smirk and glanced over at Chloe who seemed to be giggling at their interaction. “C’mon, let’s go help set up before the rest of the Bellas arrive,” Chloe stated as she went to grab a tray of cookies.

Just as expected, more Bellas soon came through the door and greeted each other with hugs. Beca escaped to the kitchen to grab a beer to which she assumed either Aubrey or Stacie brought because Emily was way too innocent for that. Just as she was seizing the bottle opener from one of the drawers, she felt someone encircle their arms around her waist and rested their chin on her shoulder. Beca knew it was Chloe due to the fact that she’s the only one who does this and is allowed to do this with her and how she smells like the perfume she bought her a month ago.

“I see you’ve found the alcohol. That’s a record if I correctly remember from our last gathering where you went straight for it only after fifteen minutes in.”

Beca let out a chuckle as she continued to open her beer bottle. “Yep, anything to loosen me up during social events.” Beca couldn’t help but feel nervous, yet relaxed at the same time when being held in Chloe’s arms the whole time. She really has to figure this shit out.

Beca broke out of Chloe’s embrace and held her hand out. “Come on, let’s go say hi to the rest of the nerds.”

Chloe gave a warm smile to the brunette and took her hand. “You mean you go say hi to the rest of them cause I already did before I found you here.”

Beca just shrugged her shoulders and took a swig of her beer and walked back with Chloe to the living room. After the welcomes and food consumption, the Bellas sat down on the couches. Of course, Beca and Chloe ended up sharing the single chair lounger like the couple they are not (but soon to be) with the DJ’s arms around the redhead as she rested her head on her shoulder. Everyone in the room knew the two had something going on even if they weren’t willing to admit it so their choice of seating wasn’t a surprise.

“Alright aca-bitches, let’s see what you all got me for Christmas,” Fat Amy said as she reached for a present under the tree by the couch. One by one, all the Bellas began to carry the presents to the middle and sat back down in their places. Each one opened their gifts with a content expression and surprisingly loved everything they received. When it was Chloe’s turn to open her last gift which was from none other than Beca, the brunette looked down and began to fiddle with her thumb ring, feeling anxious about whether or not Chloe would like her present.

“Beca, I–,” the redhead began. Tears welled up in her eyes as she turned to look at the DJ. In her lap was a photo album that contained pictures of mostly them two together and some with the Bellas that had cute descriptions written on the back by Beca as well as a titanium necklace that read “I Love You Nerd, Beca”.  

Chloe threw her arms around the brunette’s neck, hugging her tightly and whispered, “Thank you. I love it so much and I love you too.”

Beca squeezed back around the redhead’s waist. “I’m glad you really loved it. I was a bit worried, not gonna lie,” the brunette replied with a hint of nervousness.

Watching the whole interaction, the Bellas let them have their moment while sporting adoring faces and mouthing aw. “You catching this shit on camera right?” Cynthia Rose asked Flo.

“I better hope so. A lot of the film was used to record my family’s journey to escape from my hometown, partly due to malaria.” Cynthia Rose raised a brow at this but didn’t say anything else.

Wiping the tears, Chloe reached over to grab her present for Beca. “Okay Becs, your turn! Hopefully you’ll love it!”

Beca took the gift from the redhead and began to unwrap it. “I’m sure I will. You don’t need to worry about that, trust me Beale.”

The DJ went speechless and had her eyes widened once she opened her present. In her hands were two backstage passes to David Guetta’s concert and a brand new pair of headphones that the brunette had been dying to get ever since it was released. “Dude, fuck. Chloe, I can’t accept these gifts. They’re way too expensive,” Beca exclaimed as she shoved them back to the older woman.

Chloe placed her hand on the brunette’s to stop her from returning the gifts. “Stop. I want you to have them, you deserve it. Plus they are non-refundable so you have no choice but to enjoy them.”

Now it was Beca’s turn to fling her arms around Chloe and squeeze her in a tight embrace. “Well I’m glad I can enjoy one of them with you cause we are going to have a hell lot of fun at the concert,” Beca said as she pulled back.

After cleaning up all the wrapping paper from the opened presents, everyone separated into their own conversations. Beca ended up leaning against the counter at the island snacking on a gingerbread cookie when Chloe came up next to her and grabbed her hand. “Come with me, I still have one more present left for you.”

Beca felt chills down her spine at the feeling of Chloe’s lips moving against her ear as she whispered. Finding herself speechless for the second time, Beca let herself to guided by the redhead. They ended up just outside of Chloe’s old bedroom within the door frame. Chloe turned around to look at Beca, biting her lip in what the brunette assumed was out of nervousness or hesitation. Raising an eyebrow at their close proximity, she kept quiet to allow Chloe to explain what was going on.

“First of all, I just want to say thank you again for the wonderful gift you’ve made for me. Who knew badass Beca Mitchell was capable of being that sentimental.”

Beca rolled her eyes and donned a small smirk. “Only for you Beale.”

Chloe looked down and blushed before looking back into Beca’s stormy, blue eyes with her own electric, baby blue ones. She took a breath before continuing on with her speech. “You mean a lot to me Beca and over the years I’m really glad you let me in and let me see this other side of you that you close yourself off to from others. I hope you don’t mind but let me in on one more thing because God knows how long what’s been happening between us has been going on for.”

The redhead looked up above and the brunette followed suit and realized there was a mistletoe hanging above their heads. Beca looked back at Chloe and chuckled nervously. “And to think it was all one-sided all along.”

Chloe giggled before looking intently into the DJ’s eyes and started to lean in closer to her. “Definitely not,” Chloe murmured, her breath tingling the brunette’s lips. A small gasp escaped Beca’s mouth as Chloe cupped the brunette’s cheek as she glanced down to her lips that looked ever so soft and irresistable. Instinctively, Beca placed her hands around the older Bella’s waist and gently tugged her closer, eliciting a tiny gasp from the other woman as well.

Chloe gently kissed Beca on the lips, allowing the brunette a chance to pull away if she changed her mind. She smiled when she felt Beca’s lips met hers once more, deepening the kiss. The redhead ran her hands through the DJ’s dark hair as she sunk into the kiss. Both girls had their hearts pounding and were in shock of how the other pair of lips felt incredibly soft. Beca’s tongue peaked out, begging for entrance to which Chloe gladly permitted. At the touch of their tongues, both girls moaned at the new feeling and desired more.

Never breaking the kiss, the brunette ended up pushing Chloe back into the room and gently led Chloe to the bed. Surprised by Beca’s confidence, the redhead immediately became more turned on and pulled the DJ down onto her and wrapped her legs around her waist. As their tongues battled for dominance, whoops and cheers could be heard from the hallway right outside the room of the still opened door.

Breaking the kiss to look at the source of sound, the pair found the rest of the Bellas cheering and saying something along the lines of “about time these two realized their toners for each other.”

Beca heaved an irritated sigh at the interruption. “Not to be rude,” Beca sarcastically began, “but do you guys mind?”

“Not one bit,” Stacie said while smirking.

“I like happy endings with blood and death,” Lily quietly mumbled.

Ignoring the statement and eager to finish what they started, Beca stood up and grabbed Chloe’s hand, pulling her to her. “We’re gonna take off now, thanks for everything and we’ll see you whenever.”

All the Bellas laughed at the sight of their former co-captains with disheveled hair, ruffled clothes, and swollen lips as they rushed out of the house.

Chloe quickly turned back waving bye and yelling a loud thanks over her shoulder before stepping out of the house and shutting the door.

Fat Amy turned to the rest of the Bellas. “So who’s house am I gonna crash tonight. Those two are gonna be doing it like wild dingoes tonight with all their pent up sexual tension.”

“You can stay with us,” Jessica and Ashley simultaneously said.

With the arrangement settled, everyone eventually left the house all with the same thought that this has definitely been one of the best Christmas ever, particularly the first two who were undeniably and irrevocably in love.

[gaytrashgoblin]

Merry Pitchmas!

Happy holidays from your no longer secret santa, @prettylittlesestras!

Chloe was excited. Since they weren’t speaking during the holidays last year, because of the whole quitting thing, this would be the first time Chloe would get to celebrate her favorite holiday with her favorite person! Knowing how tense things were for Beca with her father, she figured the girl would be staying in the Bella house for Christmas. Which is why she begged off going home to see her parents and brother this year. So, excited was probably an understatement. Chloe was ecstatic. Until she saw Beca start packing a week before the holiday.

“Hey, whatcha up to?” she asked as she bounced into the brunette’s room.

“Packing to head home. You going down to Florida?”

“Oh, um, not this year no…” she trailed off. Beca looked up at her with a raised eyebrow.

“How come?”

“I just… well I thought you were staying here because of your dad, and I didn’t want you to be alone…” Beca quickly moved back out of her closet at the admission, fixing Chloe with an incredulous stare.

“Wait, for real? You blew off your family to keep me company?” When the redhead nodded, Beca shook her head with a laugh. “Okay, weirdo. Go pack your stuff. And it’s snowing, so keep that in mind.”

“Pack my stuff? I just told you-”

“Yeah, no, I’m not gonna leave you stranded when you decided to stay for me or whatever. So, go pack your stuff, you’re coming to Oregon with me. And don’t even try to argue, my mom wants to meet you anyway,” she added when she saw the redhead prepare to say something. Chloe was the only person she had ever felt so comfortable around. And maybe it filled her stomach with butterflies that she had decided to stay to prevent Beca from being alone. And maybe it made Beca feel like maybe she had a real shot with the girl. And maybe she wanted to introduce her closest friend to her mom and family. Maybe.

“Your mom won’t mind? I don’t wanna crash your celebration.” Beca sighed as she moved from her bag to stand in front of her.

“Chloe, of course you can come. You’re like, my best friend. I’ve… never really had one before, so like, my mom wanted to meet you at some point anyway, because you got me out of my shell, or whatever,” she said shyly. The awkwardness she had felt with the admission was well worth it to see the bright smile on Chloe’s face as the girl squealed happily, then jumped into her, wrapping her arms around her tightly.

“I’m so excited! I can’t wait!”

“Ok nerd!” Beca called after her as she ran to her room to pack. This would be an interesting trip.

The flight had been boring, seeing as they both slept through it. As Beca was grabbing their bags, slapping Chloe’s outstretched hand away, a loud voice rang out.

“Bumblebee!” A brunette woman had yelled. Beca smiled and whipped her head around. She dropped the bags and ran at the woman, launching herself into her. She was only a few inches taller than Beca, and Chloe could see the woman was her mother, since they looked almost exactly the same. Once she was back on her own feet, Beca realized she had dropped their stuff and picked it up while gesturing the redhead over.

“Chlo, this is my mom, Linda. Mama, this is Chloe,” she introduced. To Chloe’s surprise, the woman drew her into a hug.

“It’s great to meet you, Chloe! I’ve heard so much about you!”

“It’s great to meet you too,” she replied. As her mother started talking to Chloe, Beca watched with a fond smile. She missed her mom like crazy, and she was glad that she liked Chloe. If the redhead’s surprised smile was anything to go by, the feeling was mutual. Beca opted to sit in the back with Chloe once they got to the car, and she asked her mom the dreaded question.

“So, who all made it this year? I figure we’re the last to show up?” Her mom hummed.

“Yeah, you’re fashionably late, as usual. Let’s see, your sister and her family, your aunt and her family, Uncle Josh, Grams and Gramps…” She trailed off, making Beca tense.

“How many of the cousins made it?”

“Oh, you know, Jason, Maddie, Liv, Brandy, and Peter.” Beca’s mother cackled when Beca groaned. Chloe had no idea the brunette had such a large family. She had kind of assumed Beca didn’t have much family. At her look of confusion, Beca clarified.

“Right, so, my family should all love you. The only problem is my cousins, who are all assholes. To me specifically.”

“Oh stop exaggerating!” Her mom added. “They do love to tease you though.”

“About what?”

“Oh, uh, I’m the only cousin that… likes girls. Which they find hilarious, since they can all talk about boys and I would rather not.” Beca’s face had gone red, knowing that, while she didn’t hide it, she didn’t really make an effort to tell anyone either. She’s only liked one girl since she came to Barden, and said girl is currently sitting, like, three inches from her.

“Wait, what! Why’d you never tell me that? CR and I totally thought we were the only sapphics in the house,” she pouted playfully. Beca just nudged her with her shoulder with a shrug.

“I wasn’t hiding it or anything. It just… never came up.” Chloe nodded, bumping her shoulder back playfully with a smile. A few minutes later, they pulled up to Beca’s childhood home.

“Oh, Beca, do you and Chloe mind sharing your room? We’re a little short on space since so many made it out this year.”

“Nope, we’re cool,” she said with no hesitation. She and Chloe had shared a bed far more than once; they’d be fine.

“Alright, well, once you get your stuff settled, you can come introduce Chloe to the family.”

“Sure thing ma,” she replied, ushering Chloe down the hall and into her bedroom. It was slate grey with white baseboards. Her room was covered with band and musician posters, concert photos and signed memorabilia, and loads of pictures of her and her family.

“I didn’t know you were so close to your family, Becs.” Beca’s brows furrowed.

“What d’you mean? I talk about my sister Sarah all the time. And my aunts Danielle and Rin.” Chloe’s jaw dropped. Beca had talked about all those people rather frequently.

“Maybe you should have told me at some point that they were related to you!” Chloe said with a wide smile.

“I thought I did. My bad,” she said with a shy smile. “So, ready for the inquisition?” Chloe nodded with another smile. Chloe grabbed Beca’s hand and laced their fingers as Beca directed them to the backyard, and the brunette didn’t even think about it. They did it pretty much all the time, so she wasn’t phased by it. As they stepped out, there was a chorus of people yelling Beca’s name or some nickname of hers. Beca smiled at them, then gestured to Chloe.

“Hey guys! This is Chloe Beale, my best friend and co-captain of the Bellas.” Beca walked them around, greeting her various family members and introducing Chloe properly. They were about to move to the group of people that looked their age when someone jumped onto Beca from behind.

“You sneaky bitch! You think you could get away without seeing me!” Beca shouted in surprise, but caught the girl’s legs from below so she didn’t fall nonetheless.

“Sarah! What the fuck have I told you about jumping on me? One of these days I am going to just let you fall on your ass!”

“Ah no you won’t. You love me too much, sis,” she said smugly as she dropped onto the floor. Beca turned around and punched her sister in the arm with a barely contained smile.

“Asshole.”

“Pot. Kettle. Anyway, who is this?” She said, looking at Chloe, who stepped in then.

“Hi, I’m Chloe! Beca’s told me so much about you.”

“Oh! You’re, Chloe, huh? Beca’s definitely mentioned you before,” she said with a smirk directed at her younger sister, turning her face bright red.

“Alright, that’s enough. Where’s Tommy and baby Lou?”

“I here auntie B!” The little boy shouted as he ran at Beca. Chloe watched with undisguised awe as Beca scooped up the maybe four year old boy and tickled him with her free hand.

“There you are! I missed you. You’re so big, you’re gonna be bigger than me in no time!”

“But you’re tiny, auntie B,” he said through his giggles. Beca’s jaw fell when her sister started cackling. The boy wiggled out of her grasp and started running around before she could respond. Chloe walked over and wrapped her arm around the brunette’s shoulder, whispering to her.

“It’s okay. I love that you’re tiny.” Beca’s face went red again, and Chloe smiled.

“Nerd,” Beca responded fondly. Chloe shrugged and kissed her cheek before bouncing toward the patio to get something to drink, Beca following a few steps behind. She saw her mother, and her two favorite aunts, watching her and Chloe’s interactions closely. Her aunt Danielle looked at her pointedly while Chloe was distracted, and Beca made a cut throat gesture. Of course her mother and her two gay aunts knew about her feelings for Chloe. As if the way she acted around the redhead wasn’t a big enough rainbow flag for her family to know she was head over heels in love. Which she had never been before. Her aunt put her hands up in a surrender gesture, so Beca turned back to Chloe, who was carrying a drink for both of them. She handed Beca her drink with a silent smile.

“So, are you going to introduce me to the infamous cousins?”

“Not if I can avoid it,” Beca muttered, taking a sip of her drink. Beca heard Rin, her aunt Danielle’s wife, call out for Chloe. The two of them both looked up, but Chloe looked to Beca.

“Go ahead. If they meant me they would have said me, I’m sure,” she said with a roll of her eyes.

“Okay. You know where I’ll be then,” she chirped, making her way over to Beca’s aunts and mom. As soon as Chloe sat down, Beca was grabbed from behind and being dragged away with a hand over her mouth. She fought for all of ten seconds before rolling her eyes and biting the hand over her mouth.

“Ow! She fucking bit me!”

“Damn right I did, you bitch,” Beca responded to her cousin Brandy, who had been the one that grabbed her. “You all know better than to grab me if you want your limbs and nuts left in tact,” she said to the group of cousins that was gathered in the garden on the side of the house.

“Yeah, yeah. Big bad Beca’s gonna get me, whatever. Now, tell us about the girl you brought with you! Who is she? You two look awfully comfortable,” her very stereotypically gay cousin Peter asked.

“Chloe? She’s, like, my best friend. Co-captain of my club,” she said with a shrug. All five cousins looked at her with disbelieving expressions.

“Right,” Peter said, dragging out the word. “And I’m the captain of the football team.” Beca scoffed.

“Beca, we’ve been watching you two. Don’t even try to deny the fact that you two are together,” Madison added, making Beca groan.

“We are not!”

“Bu you want to be,” Olivia said softly. “You want to be with her, don’t you?”

“What is with you guys? Chloe is my best friend, why can’t you just leave it alone?”

“Because it’s obvious that you like her, just admit it!” Jason said. Beca stepped toward him threateningly as she responded.

“Fine! I like her! The only friend I’ve ever really had, and I fucking like her! Happy?!” Jason’s condescending smirk made her want to punch him, so she turned to leave. Her anger left her body instantly as she saw Chloe standing a few feet behind her, staring at her with a dropped jaw. Beca half screamed in irritation as she stormed away from her asshole cousins. She grabbed Chloe’s hand as she passed and dragged the redhead with her as she went straight into the house and to her bedroom. Slamming the door, Beca started pacing her bedroom, muttering under her breath.

“Can’t believe… murder him… like this… god damnit.” On her maybe tenth or eleventh turn, Chloe caught her by her shoulders. Beca huffed, her head dropping as she stared at the floor.

“So, those are my cousins,” she said blankly.

“Beca… is- is what you said true? Do you like me?”

“I- well, I mean, yeah, but it’s not a big deal, or anything. I’m not gonna make things weird between us, cuz you’re still my friend, so it’s totally fine, and we can-” Beca was cut off by Chloe putting her hand over her mouth. She looked up at her for the first time since her outburst with her cousins. And she saw Chloe smiling softly at her.

“Bec, I like you too,” was all she said. Beca’s eyes bugged out. “Yes, seriously. I have for a long time,” she said with an eyeroll at the brunette’s surprise. Beca tugged at the hand over her mouth, and Chloe let her move it. She was glad she did when Beca didn’t drop her hand, and instead laced their fingers together.

“So… does that mean that I can kiss you?” Beca asked, lightly drawing circles on the redhead’s palm. Chloe’s blinding smile was all the answer she needed to lean forward and press their lips together softly. After a few seconds, Beca pulled back, smiling like an idiot. But it was okay because Chloe looked a lot like she did.

“I guess now I know who I’ll be kissing under the mistletoe,” Beca said with a smirk.

“You don’t need the excuse of mistletoe to kiss me.” Beca smiled.

“No. I guess I don’t.” They were silent for a ew moments. “Chlo?”

“Hmm?”

“Be my girlfriend?”

“I thought you’d never ask,” she responded giddily. Beca leaned in and kissed her again.

“I’m glad you invited me to come home with you for Christmas.”

“Me too. You’re the best Christmas gift ever.” Chloe blushed with a smile.

“Shut up and kiss me,” Chloe whispered to her. So she did. Silently Chloe agreed with her.

Best Christmas ever!

[snowonebutyou]

A little aca-family Christmas morning fluff for my giftee @mostgirls! Merry Pitchmas, Julia, I’m your secret santa :)

[merry-pitchmas]

MERRY PITCHMAS!!!!

It is here!!! Merry Pitchmas, one and all!!! May the day be merry and bright for all of you.

You can now go ahead and start posting your gifts (I see some of you have already!), and tagging the person you created it for.

Once again you have until Dec 31st to finish.

I hope everyone had/is having fun with the Pitchmas Exchange this year!!

Red