#time to go through the grueling 30 minute process of getting ready for bed. maybe i'll even get to sleep on time

[slippery-minghus]

ebery time i let myself doze off on the couch then wake up gasping, i tell myself i need to stop doing it.

but, reliably, every night, i get too sleepy and too comfy and can only convince myself to get up after i've dozed a little. i need a little sleep to give me the strength to get up. but then. i wake up. panicked and out of breath. i'm so fucking sick of it.

[my-healing-journey]

With weary hands and exhausted eyes, I laid my sleeping infant in his bassinet at the foot of my bed, then climbed under my covers and drifted off to sleep. My baby hadn’t slept particularly well for the past few nights, and neither had my toddler. I was bone-tired from the frequent middle-of-the-night wakings from both of my children, followed by grueling 9-hour days at my office job and the unrestful evenings which awaited me after work each day. My husband worked a job which had been sending him to bed ridiculously early in order for him to wake up and start working at equally ridiculous pre-dawn hours, so there had been no help for me. I shouldered daycare, meals, work, baths, snuggles and nighttime care all by myself.

Not that my husband was ever particularly helpful in those categories to begin with. The less involved he was with the children, the less angry he seemed to be, so I tried to keep them away from him as much as possible.

I was worn out. I was so tired.

The last thought which came to my mind was along the lines of, the baby should wake up at about one o’clock, so that means I can get four hours of sleep if I fall asleep right now.

It didn’t take effort to fall asleep; at least not that night, anyway. No. I fell asleep quickly.

——

My baby was gentle when he woke. He usually was. He started off by making little grunting noises, then tested the room by letting out a few chatting sounds. I stirred from my sleep and dragged myself over to his bassinet and picked him up. He smiled at me, and I kissed his cheeks and laid him on the changing table. A couple minutes later, freshly diapered, I sat on the edge of my bed and nursed him. The room was dark. I did everything by feel and by the faint outlines I could see thanks to the light from the street lamp which filtered through the blinds in my bedroom.

My son ate quickly. He was efficient, and he fell asleep once he was done. I laid him back down in his bassinet after kissing his face again, then tucked myself back into bed. I was just so tired.

——

I next woke to a sniffling sound. My toddler. Without opening my eyes, I beckoned him to climb into bed with me. He did. I asked him what was wrong. He said he’d had a bad dream. I snuggled my child and hummed a lullaby. He fell asleep quickly. After he’d been asleep for a while, I picked him up and moved him back into his bed; I knew that if I let him sleep in my bed, he would kick me for the rest of the night and I wouldn’t be able to rest.

A quick glance at the digital clock on the stove showed that it was some time around 2 o’clock in the morning. My husband would be up in another hour. I trudged past his sleeping form on the couch. He’d relocated there right about the time I’d initially headed to bed in the first place; he hadn’t slept in the same bed as me for weeks at that point. I went into our room and closed the door behind me. Hopefully his alarm wouldn’t wake me up like it normally would; the baby would probably wake up again at about 4 o’clock, so I should have another couple of hours before I had to get up again next. I was still so tired.

——

Jake’s alarm somewhat woke me up. I managed to shrug it off and fall back asleep. What did wake me up, however, was when he crawled on top of me and whispered, “Wake up.”

I wanted to cry. Why was he waking me up? Didn’t he understand how exhausted I was?! My muscles ached with the need for sleep. My fingers didn’t want to move.

“Wake up,” he said again, louder this time. His tone of voice was playful. I knew he didn’t want sex - he almost never wanted sex - so what was he being playful about at three o’clock in the morning?!

“Why are you waking me up?” I asked. I didn’t care how my tone of voice sounded.

“Well, someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed,” he replied.

“Jake. I’m so exhausted that I might cry. I’ve been up twice since nine o’clock, and the baby is due to wake up again in an hour. Why are you waking me up?!”

He snorted as though he were amused. “I was hoping you’d make me a lunch.”

I looked at him with as much incredulity as I could muster. “Go make yourself a lunch.”

“But yours are so much better,” he said. “Plus... I’m running late. Still need to take a shower. Could you make me a lunch? Please?”

I rolled over onto my side. “Make your own damn sandwich and let me sleep.”

He pushed off of the bed and frowned at me. I couldn’t see it, since I had closed my eyes, but I could feel his frown as he spoke the next words. “Fine,” he said loudly. The baby began to squirm. My eyes flew open and I sat up to hush my husband. “I’ll do it myself. Sam’s wife makes his lunch every day. I just thought it’d be nice if you’d make my lunch for once. But fine. Go back to sleep.” He stomped out of the room. My baby grunted some more, then slipped back to sleep.

Jake continued stomping around upstairs as he headed toward the bathroom. The idiot. He was going to wake up the toddler, too!

I ran upstairs and barged into the bathroom shortly after he’d stepped into the shower and started singing at the top of his lungs. “I’ll make your stupid lunch,” I announced. “Now please shut up and let the kids sleep.”

He grunted in response and stopped singing. I closed the bathroom door and walked back downstairs and into the kitchen, feeling deeply annoyed. He’d been willing to wake up his entire family - at three o’clock in the morning, no less - because he was mad about me being unwilling to make his lunch.

I threw together a sandwich and a few other things, put all of the items into a lunch sack, then sat it on top of the dishwasher. Jake entered the kitchen right as I was exiting it and heading back to bed. My baby was due to wake up for another nursing session in twenty minutes or so. I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep until after I’d fed him again, and I was mourning the lost hour of sleep I could have had if my husband hadn’t been so outrageously selfish.

“See? That wasn’t so hard,” he said. I resisted the urge to punch him. He hugged me. I was so tired that I started crying. “What’s wrong?” he asked. His tone of voice sounded like he cared. Maybe he did, in some weird way. It certainly didn’t feel like it at the time.

“I’m so tired,” I said. “I just want one night with eight hours of consecutive sleep. I haven’t had that in two-and-a-half years. I’m so tired.”

“I know how you feel,” he said. “I’m tired, too.”

I couldn’t process that at the time. I didn’t have it in me. My brain died as I thought of how many times he had slept through the entire night while I had taken care of the kids by myself. How could he understand? He wasn’t even trying to understand.

“Why don’t you go ahead and go back to sleep?” he cooed, then gently pushed me in the direction of our bedroom. “I’ll see you tonight when you get home from work.”

I waved at him and went to sleep. I couldn’t decide whether to feel angry that he’d woken me up, sad that I had a partner who was willing to wake me up when he knew my sleep patterns were ridiculous enough, annoyed that he thought he could possibly be anywhere near as exhausted as I was, or just happy to be going back to bed. Unfortunately, the warring emotions plus the knowledge that my baby was going to wake up at any time and need to nurse again prevented me from being able to fall back to sleep.

My husband left for work. I heard his car drive away. My baby woke up at about four o’clock, as normal. I changed his diaper and fed him again. He went right back to sleep.

4:30. I can still get two more hours of sleep before I have to get up for work.

Too many thoughts and emotions swirled through my brain.

5:30. One hour left. If I can just get my brain to be quiet...!

6:00.

6:10.

6:15.

I gave up the idea of sleeping and left my room in favor of taking a shower to get ready for work while my children were still asleep. On my way to the staircase, I passed the kitchen.

Jake’s lunch, the one he’d woken me up at three o’clock in the morning to make, was still sitting on top of the dishwasher.

I cried on my way up to the bathroom.

[aliciameade]

“Prima Facie”

For mah girl @pantslessgirlwonder who sent me a prompt begging me for, “Dude. Dude please. Steca brotp often mistaken as them dating. Besties Chloe and Aubrey stalking their lives to settle a bet on whether Steca is dating or ‘just really good friends.’”

That's not 100% what this ended up being, but it was a jumping off point.

“Bree, c’mere.”

“What’s up, Chloe?”

“I need your opinion.” Chloe leans against the piano in the rehearsal room. Aubrey has begrudgingly allowed a ten-minute break from dance rehearsal, forced to when the eight new Bellas staged a sit-in at hour three. Chloe nods at two of the new recruits sitting by each other in the auditorium seats. “Do you think anything’s going on with them?”

“Stacie and Beca?” Aubrey says with a near laugh. “Stacie the sex fiend and Beca the human porcupine?”

“Yeah. I mean...look at them.” Chloe doesn’t nod again; she just watches the two brunettes across the room. They’re laughing, engaged in some type of hand game - like a thumb war, but not. They’re using both hands and whatever it is they’re trying to accomplish is starting to get their arms tied into knots until Beca’s basically in a headlock face-first in Stacie’s cleavage, hands flailing until they wrapped around the taller girl’s neck, who has her head thrown back in laughter.

When she glances at her friend, Aubrey’s cheeks are tinted pink. “I highly doubt someone like Stacie would be interested in a Beca.”

Chloe tilts her head but keeps her smile to herself and chooses not to delve into the part of Aubrey’s statement that is quite interesting. “What’s wrong with Beca?” she asks instead.

“I mean, just look at her,” Aubrey says with a wave of her hand before whistling sharply to declare the end of their break.

Chloe does look at her and the way she’s red-faced and laughing when she gets herself out of the headlock. Her ponytail is mussed and she’s pulling it down to retie it as she talks to Stacie with a smile. Before Stacie turns to move out of the row of seats, she leans down to peck Beca’s lips. The other girl laughs and blushes and shoves her away and toward the aisle so they can return to the floor.

It makes something zing up Chloe’s spine and she whips her head to look at Aubrey who appears to have caught the moment as well - because she’s just staring at them, mouth open.

Chloe’s managed to forget about seeing Stacie kiss Beca at rehearsals...sort of. She doesn’t think about it at all, literally never, and definitely not when she’s talking to Beca. Or talking to Stacie. Or when she’s in the same room with either of them. Or when she’s sitting by herself in the quad. And least of all when she’s alone in bed at night.

She buries the memory again when she sees Beca approaching her and plasters a grin on her face. “Hey!”

“Hey,” Beca replies as she tugs at the strap of the duffel bag hanging on her shoulder. “I was wondering if, uh…” she pauses and fidgets and looks everywhere but at Chloe’s face. “I mean, Kimmy Jin is going to some video game tournament in Nashville this weekend so I was wondering if you wanted to come over tonight and hang?”

Chloe’s sure she’s hearing things because it sounded like Beca just asked her on a date - a date to her empty dorm room. She must have been quiet too long because she hears Beca start to stutter a retraction. “No! I mean, yes! Yeah, I’d love to come hang.”

Beca’s reaction is a grin. “Awesome. I mean, cool. Stacie’s bringing tequila, so…bring something you like to drink. Or if you want to bring like, chips or something? She’s coming over at 9:00, but if you want to come earlier than that, that’s cool.” She’s still smiling as she starts walking backward. “Okay, I gotta talk to Jessica before she leaves.” She hesitates, and then says in a stage whisper as she subtly points over her left shoulder, “Or is that Ashley?”

“Jessica,” Chloe mouths silently and receives a thumbs up in return.

Chloe feels like she just got off the Acrophobia drop tower at Six Flags. Her date isn’t a date at all. It’s just Beca inviting some of the girls over for a party. Stacie will be there. And now apparently Jessica. And who knows who else - maybe everyone.

“Okay, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Chloe grumbles as she flips through the hangers in her closet with more force than is necessary to accomplish the task.

“You’re going to rip the rod off the wall if you keep that up.”

Chloe eases back but still jerks them with annoyance.

“Well?” Aubrey’s voice is right behind her and she jumps in surprise, too focused to have noticed her approach. “What’s going on with you?”

“I’m going to Beca’s,” she bites.

She can almost hear Aubrey roll her eyes. “And you’re mad about that why?”

“I thought she was asking me on a date.” Chloe grabs a gray shirt off a hanger and turns. “But Stacie’s going to be there, too.” She hears Aubrey’s quiet noise of understanding. “And Jessica. And whomever else she invited; I don’t know.”

“I didn’t get invited.”

Chloe turns to strip and change, taking no offense to Aubrey averting her eyes and leaving her immediate personal space. “Oh. Well, you know...it’s Beca’s party I guess, so. I didn’t mean to make you feel left out.”

“It’s fine,” Aubrey says with a dismissive wave as she picks up her chiming phone. “Oh. Nevermind.”

Chloe finishes buttoning her jeans and fixes the drape of her shirt, tucking one corner of it into her waistband. “Nevermind what?”

Aubrey’s staring at her phone, chewing her lip. “Stacie just invited me to Beca’s party.”

“She’s inviting people to her party! Who invites people to other people’s parties?”

“I don’t know, friends?” Aubrey says as she taps out a stop-and-start text.

“Girlfriends. Girlfriends invite people to their girlfriend’s party.”

“If they’re inviting all of us, doesn’t that negate the implication you are making? Beca has the empty dorm room so she’s hosting. It was probably Stacie’s idea to begin with.”

Chloe isn’t sure if that explanation helps more than it hurts. “Well, whatever. I’m gonna go.”

“Already?” Aubrey’s in the process of gathering her shower caddy and robe. “Stacie said 9:00.”

“Beca said I could show up earlier. And I need to stop at the liquor store first.”

“Uh huh.” Aubrey’s giving her a smiling side-eye and Chloe isn’t sure why. “I’ll be sure to knock really loudly when I get there.”

“What? You know what, nevermind, I gotta go.” With that, Chloe slips into her low-top black Converse and grabs her phone and keys and leaves.

“You’re here,” Beca says when she swings open her dorm room door. “It’s 7:30.” It’s obvious she’s in the middle of getting ready, wearing gym shorts and a sports bra, hair tied up in a messy bun. She looks like she’s been exercising, but she knows that’s not possibly the case.

“You said I could come over early; did I interrupt your private time?” Chloe teases, not being shy about staring at Beca’s relative state of undress. She almost laughs when she hears Rihanna’s “Birthday Cake” playing in the background. “Is that your lady jam?”

“Oh my God, shut up,” Beca says with a groan as she spins to run through the room and tap a key on her computer keyboard to skip the song. “I was cleaning.” She grunts again when the next song is David Guetta’s “Titanium” and Chloe just giggles and takes Beca abandoning her at the door as her invitation to enter.

“You could let that one play, you know,” she teases. “I could use the release. It’s been a long week.”

Beca spins on her, pointing. “You. Shut up. And as much as I hate to say what I’m about to say because I know you are going to turn it into something dirty, I do have to go take a shower. I didn’t think you would be here so early.”

Chloe bites her tongue, opting to be sympathetic instead. “Sorry. I should have checked first. I can come back at 9:00?”

“No, it’s fine. Just like, don’t snoop through all my shit when I’m gone.”

“I won’t.” She watches Beca grab her toiletries and depart and has a fleeting thought of jealousy that Aubrey is down in the showers, too, where Beca is about to be. The door closes behind Beca and Chloe surveys Beca’s room to see what’s ripe for snooping.

It’s a decent room, not the shoebox Chloe had been stuck with her freshman year. She knows Beca’s dad is a professor at the university and figures that might have offered her some type of upgrade. She climbs onto Beca’s bed on her knees to survey the shelves alongside it. Sure, she’s been in Beca’s room a handful of times, but never alone, and never with the freedom to spend as much time as she wanted to, looking at the things that make up Beca’s life.

The shelves are dominated by Beca’s vinyl record collection. She doesn’t bother going through those - that was one of the first and only things Beca had allowed her to dig through during a visit, so there was no mystery there. Instead, she takes the time to browse the photos clipped and tacked everywhere: photos of Beca with friends Chloe has never met in places she’s never been, photos of Beca with who she assumes are her grandparents, photos of Beca with the Bellas.

There weren’t many of those, but there also haven’t been that many photo ops so far this year. Their rehearsals have been long and grueling and not conducive to fun photo sessions. But there are a few that Chloe doesn’t remember seeing when she and the other girls waited for Beca to get home from her evening spent in jail.

What there are plenty of, however, are photos of Beca and Stacie:  photos of them making faces at the camera on Beca’s bed, in crowds at what look like concerts, Beca driving Stacie’s convertible with its top down and...yep, with Stacie’s top down, too.

Jealousy boils inside her because Beca always shies away from her when she tries to take a photo of or with her. There’s also that little detail that it’s quite clear Beca is totally at home and comfortable around Stacie, and that the feeling is mutual. And, you know...apparently being topless is a part of that.

“I thought I said no snooping?”

Chloe jumps so hard that she actually topples from balancing on her knees to sitting on her hip. She glances sheepishly over her shoulder at Beca to apologize, but her tongue gets twisted by the fact that Beca’s standing there in a bathrobe which is tied a little too loosely, wet hair combed but tousled and hanging over her shoulders, and smirking knowingly at Chloe.

“I wasn’t snooping!” she finally says. “Your pictures are readily on display.” She gestures at them to make her point and then turns to sit more comfortably on Beca’s bed and face her instead of the wall of photos featuring Stacie’s boobs.

“Uh huh,” Beca says, still smirking, as she pulls open her closet door. It creates a barrier between them, but Chloe knows Beca’s changing behind it, can see the robe slip lower down her legs and then disappear, probably being hung up, can see underwear being stepped into - patterned briefs of some kind - followed by jeans. “So what’d you bring?”

“Hmm?”

Beca’s head pokes out from behind the closet door; Chloe can tell her shoulders are still naked and she busies herself picking at non-existent lint on Beca’s quilt. “Booze.” She points at the tote bag on the floor by Chloe’s feet, which Chloe had forgotten about until now.

“Oh! Yeah! Well,” she says, waggling her eyebrows as she works to find her chill again, “IIIIII brought vodka.” She pulls the bottle from the bag to hold it up with a smile.

“Grey Goose? Okay, big spender.” Beca disappears for a few more seconds and when the closet door closes she’s wearing a silky looking red tank top with a row of three buttons trailing down from the neckline, two of which are unbuttoned.

“You said to bring what I like, and I have good taste.” She smiles and decides to get off Beca’s bed to work on making the bottle fit in Beca’s mini-fridge. “Oh, you have mixers already!”

“If you guys are bringing the booze, I figure it’s the least I could do. Other than, you know, offering my room.”

Beca’s comment reminds Chloe that this is not a party of two and she hopes her smile doesn’t look too fake when she turns to face Beca again and reclaim her spot on the bed. If it does, Beca doesn’t comment on it. “Aubrey said Stacie invited her to come over, too.”

Beca laughs at this. “Did she? Good. I didn’t want it to be like...third-wheely.”

Chloe laughs, too, as though she’s in on the joke. “Oh, totes! No one likes to be a third wheel.” Especially Chloe Beale.

“So,” Beca says as she crawls onto her bed and plops down next to Chloe, not quite closely enough to be touching, but close enough that Chloe can feel her, “what do you wanna do ‘til they get here? We have like forty-five minutes.”

Chloe lets her eyes fall to the open buttons of Beca’s shirt where plenty of cleavage is visible and lets her gaze linger long enough for Beca to notice.

“Dude!” she says when she does, covering herself with her hands, but she doesn’t actually do up the buttons. “Keep it in your pants, maybe.”

Chloe throws her head back to laugh because while Beca does look startled, she doesn’t actually seem to be that uncomfortable and Chloe isn’t quite sure what to do with that yet, so she laughs and covers with more humor. “You’re right. We only have forty-five minutes and I’d definitely want more time than that.”

“Oh my God,” Beca mutters. She feels at her pockets, looking for her phone obviously, but Chloe knows she’s not going to find it.

“You left it on your desk,” she offers as she retrieves and passes it to Beca.

“I suppose you snooped through it, too?”

“Don’t be silly, Bec.”

“You’re right, sorry,” Beca says with an honest look of apology.

“I couldn’t figure out your passcode.”

The remark earns Chloe a scoff, a scowl, and a shove, and she laughs. “Kidding. I wouldn’t do that. Besides, I was too busy checking out Stacie’s rack.”

Beca looks up from her phone sharply at the comment. “What?”

Chloe points above their heads. “Was snooping through your visibly on display pictures and couldn’t help but notice the boobs of our lead mezzo.”

“Ohh,” Beca says after a second. “Yeah, that day was fun.” She goes back to texting and Chloe’s eyes can’t help but catch the name at the top of the chat window is that of the topic of their conversation.

“Seems like there’s probably a story that comes with that picture?”

Beca nods, finishes her text, and sets her phone aside, face-down. “Yeah, we cut our Friday classes that weekend Aubrey had food poisoning and actually canceled rehearsal, and drove out to Stone Mountain Lake. And she let me drive, which was cool. Because, you know - Camero.”

“And she’s topless because…” she prompts, trying to sound teasing and not jealous.

“Oh, because we went skinny dipping and she decided to let the wind dry her off,” Beca says with a laugh at the memory.

Chloe blinks at this. “You went skinny dipping?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Not really something I’d expect from you, that’s all.”

Beca just shrugs. “Stacie can get me to do a lot of things I wouldn’t do otherwise.”

Chloe feels herself deflate a little at this. Obviously, Beca trusts Stacie, has something special with her. She allows Stacie into her personal bubble, lets her talk her into things outside her comfort zone. All good things to have with your girlfriend. All things Chloe wishes Beca had with her instead. She’s slow to come up with a cheeky response to keep up the banter, but Beca’s looking at her phone again, which buys her some time that she needs even more of once she sees the way Beca blushes and smiles at whatever Stacie just sent her.

“Like what?” Chloe finally settles on when Beca sets down her phone again.

“Like this.”

There’s a brief flurry of movement, too quick for Chloe to register, but what she does register is the fact that Beca is kissing her.

She’s frozen in shock, eyes still open in surprise, and she can see in the furrow of Beca’s brow the sheer amount of focus and determination going into the action and Chloe finally realizes that Beca is kissing her and she stops analyzing and closes her eyes and reaches to frame Beca’s face with her hands and kiss her back.

There’s a hint of a whimper from Beca and it stirs something inside her and she’s about to try to deepen the kiss when Beca pulls back, holding Chloe at arm’s length with a hand pressed to her shoulder.

The moment broken, reality snaps back like an elastic band. “What about Stacie?” Chloe asks, lips still burning.

Beca’s face is redder than Chloe’s ever seen it, and she’s seen her after being forced to angrily run a mile. “What about her?”

“Aren’t you dating?”

At this, Beca bursts out laughing and falls further away from Chloe, face lightening from red to pink. “Me and Stacie?!”

“Well, yeah!” Chloe feels indignant. “I mean, you kiss her, you cut class with her to go skinny dipping, you let her invite your mortal enemy to your party, she’s texting you dirty things while I’m right here...”

“Oh my God,” Beca says, still laughing as she rights herself and turns to sit on her knees facing Chloe. “I need you to stop.”

Chloe presses her lips together and waits.

Beca holds up her hand, fingers splayed, and starts counting things off on them. “Number One, we’re not dating. Number Two, that’s just how Stacie is with the kissing and I feel like you are the same way with your good friends.”

Chloe just shrugs at that, because that’s true. She’s totally a huggy, kissy, touchy friend with anyone who allows her to be.

“Number Three, I wanted her here because I didn’t know if I could handle being alone with you all night. Number Four, she invited Aubrey so she wouldn’t be the third wheel, and Number Five she wasn’t texting me dirty things. Well, she was, but not like that. She texted me to say she and Aubrey were going to do their own thing tonight and that I should suck it up and just kiss you.”

“I...what?” Chloe feels like she’s having an out of body experience. And then Beca’s phone is in front of her face, open to the text conversation with Stacie, where sure enough, in less than G-rated commentary, Stacie is saying she’s kidnapping Aubrey to help her get her panties untwisted and that Chloe obviously has a crush on Beca so she should just go for it.

“So...yeah. I...was she right? You have a...a crush on me?”

Chloe’s finally finding mental clarity, though the fog is quickly being replaced with heat. “You could say that,” she manages to say with a smile. She notices that Beca’s gaze has slipped to her mouth and Chloe bites her lip as a test and sees Beca’s eyes flash. “Do you have a crush on me, too?”

Beca just nods at this, kind of dumbly, and Chloe relishes the effect she’s having on the girl that, not five minutes ago, she was so sure had zero interest in her. She reaches a hand to Beca, catching her at the elbow to give her a tug forward. “Can we try that kiss again? I’m a lot better at it when I’m expecting it.”

“Okay,” Beca says thickly before swallowing and wetting her lips.

Chloe halts her progress forward for a second to tilt her head. “Wait. Stacie and Bree?”

“She’s had a thing for that monster from Day One. Don’t ask me why.”

Chloe giggles at this and stops urging Beca forward; she’s doing that well enough on her own now, and instead reaches to slide her fingers into the still-damp hair at the base of Beca’s neck. “Good. They’ll be good for each other. So...they aren’t coming over tonight?”

Beca just shakes her head and Chloe notices the girl is nearly in her lap, knees wedged against the side of Chloe’s thigh, so Chloe decides to go for it the way Beca was brave enough to and uses her free hand to sweep Beca’s knees out from underneath herself and shift to lay her down and settle next to her. She’s smooth, she knows she’s smooth when she’s prepared for something, and Beca’s looking up at her with a mix of surprise and excitement on her face.

Chloe lets her hand rest at Beca’s waist, feeling the softness of the fabric of her shirt and the warmth of the skin beneath it, and just watches Beca and the way she’s clearly impatient and a little uncomfortable with the scrutiny, yet is repeatedly steeling herself to not interrupt the moment.

“Now, about that kiss…” Chloe whispers, and Beca’s eyes are closed before she even reaches her lips.