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Merry Pitchmas @becasbelt !!

The fluffiest fluff to ever fluff, hope you like it!

Title: Can I go where you go?

Pairing: Bechloe

Chapters: 1/1

Wordcount: 3579

Summary: Beca has Chloe over for dinner with the parents, but doesn’t tell Chloe one crucial detail: that she’s coming over as Beca’s girlfriend.

Read on AO3 or below.

Beca hears the door open approximately half a second after the doorbell rings.

Fuck.

She taps her phone screen, waking it up to check the time. She internally groans. Of course Chloe arrived early. She should come to expect it now. Fashionably late to parties, but early for important events. She’s always been proud of having her priorities in order. Perhaps she should feel flattered dinner at the Mitchell’s is considered an “important event”.

It’s her fault really, for losing track of time trying to make her room presentable for Chloe’s first time in her house. Stuffed animals were shoved into the closet, embarrassing pictures were hidden in drawers, counters were dusted and organized. She could barely recognize it after. Good.

The beginnings of a conversation drift up towards her as she sprints to leave her bedroom and rush down the stairs. Why does everything now feel five times the usual distance? Normally this interaction happening would be fine, but there’s something she hadn’t told Chloe yet about the visit.

“…nice it is to finally meet Beca’s girlfriend!” She’s close enough now to hear the words, and of course her step mother was first at the door. Leave it to her to be eager to make a first impression, not even letting Beca introduce her guest first. She cringes at the use of one particular word.

“Nice to meet you too! Excited to be here.” If Chloe was thrown off by what Sheila said, her voice doesn’t give it away.

“Chloe!” She’s out of breath when she finally reaches the front door.

“Beca!” Chloe says excitedly. Beca makes eye contact, and suddenly, the panic disappears, and the tension in her body floods out. It leaves a sense of comfort, like they’re the only two in the room. Like Sheila isn’t standing right between them, a solid one foot away.

She never realized she would miss college so much, until the best part of college gracefully invaded her home life.

Chloe moves to hug her, and Beca easily sinks into it. Her step mom’s face shifts into one of surprise, but it disappears so quick that Beca’s sure she imagined it. It must be a sight, Beca not only accepting a hug, but readily returning it. If it were three years ago, she would have undoubtedly been a stiff board with her hands by her sides.

How times have changed.

They step away from each other and Beca moves onto introductions. “Yeah so, Chloe, this is Sheila, and Sheila, this is Chloe.” She makes loose gestures between the two with her hands. “Though it seems you’ve already met.”

“Well, someone was a mile away.” Chloe notes, a quirk on her lips. “Is there a place I can put my stuff?”

“Yep, you can put it in my room. I’ll show you.” She replies quickly. Chloe’s tone was light, but Beca can tell she’s dying to ask something. And Beca can’t blame her.

“Okay. Well your dad’s just putting the finishing touches on dinner, so don’t take too long!” Sheila calls after them as they go up the stairs.

Beca closes the bedroom door behind them.

“So…” Chloe looks at her with a raised eyebrow. Beca cringes. “‘Girlfriend’?”

“I can explain.”

“I sure hope so.”

“Ok, don’t be mad, but I kind of told them I was…seeing someone.”

In one of the family dinners forced upon by her dad, Sheila and her dad kept heckling her about her love life. And by that, she means Sheila kept offering to set her up with some of her book club members’ kids. At last, Beca, unable to take it anymore, blurted out that she had a girlfriend. The room went silent for a good second, and she hoped that would be the end of the conversation. Maybe it would be silent for the rest of the evening and she could be back on campus and ignore the whole thing happened.

Unfortunately, she was not that lucky.

Oh, how exciting! Does she go to Barden? What’s her name? When can we meet her?

The questions were relentless.

“We would love to meet her, Beca.” Her dad added at the end of the interrogation. He sounded so genuinely sincere that she began to feel bad about lying. It’s one thing being dishonest to Sheila at any time or to lie to her dad when he’s being annoying. It’s another thing to lie while she can tell he’s really trying. “Maybe she can come around for winter break?”

She mumbled something like “maybe I’ll see if she’s free” to hopefully finally end the conversation.

Her dad seemed satisfied by the answer.

She hoped they’d forgotten about it when they hadn’t mentioned it in a month, but then she got a text from her dad asking if she’d be bringing around her girlfriend for Christmas.

She had successfully sequestered her friends away from her family for the past three years, but of course she was her own downfall in ruining that streak.

Chloe had finals later than Beca and thus had to spend a couple days extra on campus. They worked out that she’d come to Beca’s house the evening after she finished her last exam, stay a couple days, then catch a flight back home. Beca was hoping she’d be the first to greet her at the door so she’d be able to whisk Chloe away for an explanation before meeting anyone else, but that obviously didn’t work out.

She tried telling Chloe beforehand, but couldn’t figure out how to bring it up, and kept putting it off until it was too late.

She finishes her rambling explanation and anxiously awaits Chloe’s verdict. The other girl has been circling around the room, examining everything. It doesn’t help her nerves.

“Wish you told me earlier Bec.” She was expecting that response. “I could have done my entrance so much more convincingly.”

Okay she wasn’t expecting that.

Chloe actually looks…excited?

“Oh, this is cute!”

Even after quadruple checking the contents of her room, Beca managed to miss something. She snatches the picture frame out of Chloe’s grasp.

“Can you focus?” She hisses. “We need to discuss our stories so they’re consistent.”

She’s frantically trying to cover all her bases with possible questions that might be asked and topics that might be brought up, all while Chloe is still roaming. Beca’s not sure Chloe is even listening.

“Relax Becs, I’m great with parents.” Chloe doesn’t look worried at all. Which of course, makes Beca more worried.

“So, are we done here?” Chloe’s hand is already twisting the door handle open. Beca grumbles, which Chloe takes to be invitation to leave the conversation and the room.

Chloe was right about being great with parents. Beca can tell that both her dad and Sheila love her.

Conversation is going smoothly. It helps that most of the things they’re saying aren’t lies at all. They did meet at the activities fair, Chloe did prank Beca with a fake cockroach, and Beca did accidentally hit Chloe in the face with a basketball during team bonding.

It’s the middle of dinner, Chloe’s explaining something, talking about the Bellas maybe, but Beca’s too focused on the act of paying attention that she’s really not absorbing anything. Like she’s just an outsider to this conversation.

She feels a gentle hand on her knee, stopping the bouncing leg that she didn’t even notice. It’s a reminder to just breathe. She glances over, but Chloe hasn’t broken her vocal stride. Beca places her own hand over Chloe’s, and she sees a subtle brightening in the other girl’s face.

“You’re staying here through Monday, right?” Her dad asks.

“Yep! Then I’l be out of your hair.”

“Oh please, I told Beca here that you could stay as long as you’d like.”

That wasn’t a lie. They were pretty disappointed when Beca told them that Chloe would only be here for two nights.

The topic shifts. “So tell me, Chloe, what drew you to Beca?”

“Dad!”

“Come on Bec, I’m curious.”

She can feel her face heating up. Partially from being absolutely mortified, partially from panic that they didn’t cover corroborating this story in the quick initial debrief. She looks at Chloe, who of course is unbothered and actually looking amused.

Oh this will be good.

Beca would be lying, though, if she said she wasn’t curious at all at what Chloe might say.

“Well, it was freshman year, and she was doing the internship at the radio station. And there was a day that her boss was finally letting her play her music on the air. And she was absolutely buzzing the entire day, but was also trying not to show it. And she was still barely warming up to us, so I didn’t want to scare her by being too interested. But i tuned in that night and heard her mixes. Though the best part was her talking so passionately on her thought process and emotions and intentions with them all.”

Beca remembers that day, but had no clue Chloe also did. She did indeed ramble all about her mixes that night on air, but didn’t expect anyone to be listening at that hour, least of all someone she knew.

“How sweet! Beca said, though, that you guys have only been dating a few weeks?”

Chloe laughed. “Yeah, it took a while for Beca to get the galls to ask me out.”

“Okay great, let’s just make this pile-onto-Beca night.”

Chloe plants a kiss on her cheek as she sulks. “All love, Becs.”

She can feel her face flush again, but this time, it’s not from embarrassment.

============================

“I can tell you really like her, Beca. I’m happy for you.”

She almost drops the plate she’s loading into the dishwasher. Sheila had called Chloe off to help pick the movie for the night, leaving her and her dad to clean up the table.

What’s she supposed to reply with? “Thanks”? “I know”? “This is all a lie, and I’m not sure how to tell you that she’s just my best friend, not girlfriend”?

On the other hand, she’s relieved she’s sold the part. Then when they inevitably ask about Chloe in a couple weeks, she can say that they decided they were better as friends. Maybe she can even stretch it out a few months to maximize the time avoiding being set up on dates by her step mom.

They’ll forget about it, and things will go back to normal. She’ll need to think of new excuses to get out of the blind dates, but she can handle it.

Right now, it's enough to just be in the present. Enjoying movie night.

After her dad and Sheila turn in for the evening before the movie finishes, citing the late hour, it feels like they’re back on campus: Chloe needing to see the end of the movie and Beca wanting to maximize time with Chloe, even if it meant staying up an extra hour for a movie she already figured out the ending to.

The togetherness is so much more natural now. The first time Chloe came within two feet, Beca immediately moved as far away as possible on the couch. She would’ve melted into the sofa arm if that was an option.

Now, they’re pressed up against each other like they’re a single person, and Beca likes it.

Beca feels Chloe flinch into into her at a particularly loud moment in the movie.

She whispers to the side. “You scared, Beale?”

“Yeah actually, could you hold my hand?” Her eyes are still on the screen, but her palm is facing up between them, awaiting response.

She places her hand in Chloe’s. “Just because you’re terrified of muppets.”

Her free hand scratches an imaginary itch above her lip so she can school the embarrassing smile taking over her face.

============================

Beca turns around to a space filled now with a random stranger. “Chloe?” She swears she was with her a second ago.

She tries to backtrack, but the wave of people is moving in one direction, making it difficult. Beca thinks she catches a glimpse of Chloe’s blue hat with a streak of red underneath, but it’s gone in a flash. It’s hard to be sure in the darkness.

When she suggested the winter market for their day two activity, she didn’t expect it to be chaos. There are so many more people than she expected, and with everyone cocooned in layers due to the freezing temps, even less space is available to walk freely.

After a minute or so of struggling against the natural motion of the crowd, she decides to move off to the side, in-between a couple of stands. She should have superglued their hands together; leave it to Chloe to get separated when she was the one desperately keeping them together earlier when they arrived. Beca pulls off her right glove, commanding her freezing fingers to move across her phone screen to call the other girl. The frigid phone is up against her ear as the rings continue.

It goes to voicemail.

Beca hangs up and immediately calls again.

“Chloe I swear to god…” She mutters to herself.

It’s about to finish ringing all the way through again when the redhead pops up in front of her.

“Hi!”

“Jesus, Chloe!” Beca puts her phone away. “Thought I’d have to get someone to announce over the intercom for help finding a missing child.”

“Ha ha very funny. Close your eyes.” Her hands are behind her back.

Beca narrows her eyes. “Why?”

“Just do it.” And after a hefty sigh, which fills the cold air with a large cloud of condensation, she does.

Moments later, Beca feels a softness wrap around her neck.

“Okay, you can open them.”

She feels it with her hands first before her eyes fully register the plush red scarf.

“Oh.”

“You said you were cold, so thought I could help warm you up.”

“Well, I meant that in a way so we could leave soon. And shit, now I feel bad I don’t have anything for you.”

“Well in that case, I can take it back…” Chloe makes a motion to reach for it.

Beca immediately goes to clutch the scarf against her.

Chloe smirks. “That’s what I thought.”

“Ok whatever, Beale. You’ve earned yourself exactly five more minutes here, then we’re heading back to the luxury of indoor heating.” She extends her hand in a moment of boldness. “But we’re going to be velcro-ed together for it.”

Chloe takes it without hesitation.

They continue to wander, Chloe taking time at every booth, musing out loud everything that would make a good gift for any of her family members or the Bellas.

(“Didn’t you get everyone gifts already? We already did our Bella gift exchange.”

“Birthdays, Beca. Birthdays! This is why you’re always last minute shopping.”

“How did this turn against me??”)

After about twenty minutes, and Beca finally being unable to hold back her “I’m freezing” complaints any longer (despite the new neckwear), they head back to the car.

Chloe’s the only person she’s allowed to take aux in her car. Not necessarily because she has the best music taste, but because she’ll give puppy eyes and until Beca eventually gives in. It’s better to pass the aux right away than be subjected to the guilt of Chloe’s pleading eyes.

Naturally, Chloe begins playing Christmas pop, starting off with the classic All I Want for Christmas is You. Volume gets maxed out, as they’re practically yelling along to the song. Next is Christmas Tree Farm, which has made its way into the holiday song rotation at the Bellas the past couple of years. The drive passes like this, singing their hearts out to their favorite songs, and she files it away as one of her favorite holiday memories.

============================

She’s more disappointed than she expected to be when she has to drop Chloe off at the airport. They’ve gone their separate ways for break so many times now, so it’s not like this is their first time away from each other after being joined at the hip. It’ll only be for a few weeks, just until class resumes.

There are other couples there, either dropping off someone or reuniting, and there’s some ache in her chest. It’s absurd because the two of them aren’t even a real couple.

As she pulls the last of Chloe’s stuff from her car’s trunk, Beca asks a question that’s been nagging her mind since the first night’s dinner.

“Was it true, what you said about what drew you to me? The night I got to play my songs on radio?”

Chloe pauses. “You’ll have to ask me on a real date to find out.”

She swears her heart stops. Or doubles in speed. She’s not sure.

She manages to splutter out a response. “Very coy, Beale. Fine, keep your secrets.”

Chloe just winks at her before strolling through the airport doors.

Beca mopes for the whole day.

Her dad and Sheila plan a day of activities, like they knew she would be having a pity party in her room if she was left alone. It ends up being surprisingly fun, doing stuff like hanging up ornaments and decorating cookies, but she keeps on thinking how it’d be so much nicer if Chloe was here too, doing everything along with them.

She’s not sure how she can do three more weeks of this.

But then Chloe calls, and they talk for two hours (only hanging up because Chloe was basically about to fall asleep on the phone) and it doesn’t feel so bad. There’s still some sort of longing ache, but the hopelessness is gone. It seems ridiculous now, like the moment of clarity after finishing a five minute task that was put off for two months.

She takes to wearing around the house the scarf Chloe gave her. If her dad or Sheila notice, they don’t say anything.

Her and Chloe talk a few more times over break, but it’s sparser, with family activities ramping up on both sides. They still are texting plenty, but it’s not the same.

Beca misses her.

============================

Chloe [11:31 pm]: Are you home?

Beca [11:31 pm]: Yeah, why?

She presumes Chloe is wanting to call or the like, and is wondering if she’s awake. When she doesn’t get a text in the next couple of minutes, she focuses back on the TV.

New Year’s Eve festivities fill the screen. After all these years Beca still finds it fun to see the ball drop and the performances leading up to it.

Harry Styles is in the middle of a song when the doorbell rings.

“Can you get it, Beca?”

“Sure.”

She goes and opens the door to one Chloe Beale, standing on her porch.

“Wait, what? What are you doing here?” What she assumes to be an Uber drives away in the background. Chloe’s hair is frazzled and she looks out of breath. “Are you okay?”

Beca herds her through the front door into the house, away from the cold outdoors, while going through every single worst case scenario in her mind.

“Yeah totally. No everything’s great.”

“Okay…well you look really stressed dude.”

Chloe gaze moves down and her shoulders relax. “You’re wearing it.” Her voice lilts with wonder.

Her hands reflexively go up to touch the scarf. She forgot she still has it on. “It can get pretty cold in the house.” She says indignantly.

More hands make their way to it. “I’m glad you like it.”

“Of course I would.”

“Everything okay, Beca?” Her dad calls from the living room.

“It’s just Chloe!” She yells back.

“Okay!”

“I’ve been thinking…” Chloe trails. Beca’s attention is back on her.

Chloe plays with the tassels on the scarf, while Beca waits patiently for whatever Chloe is needing to say. Whatever it is, it’s rendering Chloe Beale speechless. A tremendous feat. Beca’s still not entirely convinced something awful didn’t happen.

So she stands, watching Chloe avoid eye contact as she continues to mess with the scarf and play with some loose strands. If this was under circumstances less on a brink of a large information reveal, she knows she could comfortably do this all day. Staring at Chloe. Just in each other’s space, breathing together.

“Can I kiss you?”

Oh.

Suddenly, everything clicks into place. How did she not see it before? Of course it’s Chloe. It was always going to be Chloe.

Sleepless nights and stupid fights and the hours upon hours they’ve spent practically glued together all led to this. Seeing each other at their best and worst, but always finding one another in those members. It’s utterly insane that she didn’t think of this before.

Beca nods without hesitation. “Yes,” she breathes.

Their lips meet in the middle as Chloe pulls her in with a gentle force on her waist and a tug on her scarf.

This feels like what she’s been waiting for all her life.

They startle apart as fireworks explode in the neighborhood, lighting up the sky. Champagne is popped in the living room, and muffled cheers emanate from the TV.

Chloe laughs sheepishly. “Sorry, guess I went for it a little early.”

“No it was perfect.”

Beca hooks a finger around the loop of Chloe’s jeans, pulling her back in.

Perfect time, perfect place. This is right where she’s meant to be.