Chapter Text
Beca sat at her computer desk working on her latest mix. It was the end of summer and her sleep schedule was beyond fucked at this point. The sun had been peaking through for at least an hour now, but she woke up at 4:00pm the previous day and didn’t feel the least bit tired. Her phone vibrated next to her and she rolled her eyes because she knew it could only be one person texting her at 6:30am.
Chloe (6:30am): Good morning gorgeous! Still awake?
Me (6:30am): Its like you’re psychic or something :P Going for a run?
Chloe (6:32am): Its like you’re psychic or something, but yes. Will you be awake when I’m done? I want to call you ☹
Me (6:33am): Missing my ugly voice?
Chloe (6:33am): You know I love your voice, Bailey. Call you soon! <3
Beca didn’t intend for it to go on this long. She really didn’t. Her senior year of high school was a difficult one and once she graduated this past May she found herself friendless, single, and overall just really hating herself. She wanted to make more friends, maybe even get a girlfriend. She joined all the dating apps the first week of summer and posted all of her best photos. By the third week she had only gotten a few messages between all of the apps she downloaded and nobody had responded to hers. She somehow managed to feel worse about herself. She signed out of all of her accounts. Two nights later she had spent some time in her mom’s liquor cabinet and had a slight buzz going. She was scrolling through instagram when she saw a photo of this semi-popular girl, named Emma, from her school. She was a nice girl, super smart, and also gorgeous. She had brown hair, blue eyes, and pale skin. She had similar features to Beca, but Beca just felt she was so much prettier. She clicked onto Emma’s page and in her buzzed stupor, within twenty minutes, she had created a HER profile under the name of Bailey Mitchell. She felt guilty. Like really guilty. So within ten minutes of creating it she went to her settings to delete it, but she got a message notification before she could and she got curious. It was from a beautiful redhead named Chloe. Beca opened the messaged and Chloe was complementing her good looks and introducing herself. Beca clicked on her profile and saw that Chloe was from Tennessee. There was no way any of this would last more than a few days; she was a whole state away. Beca drunkenly gave herself the go ahead to respond to Chloe and Chloe only.
They began talking in the middle of May and it was now the end of August. Somehow that whole “lasting a few days” rationale shifted into texting, then talking on the phone daily, and Beca changing the name in her instagram bio to say B Mitchell so Chloe could follow her. Her username was already beatsbyB so it didn’t seem too awkward. Selfies also weren’t her thing either. She’s managed to evade Chloe’s attempts to video chat. She would either turn her lights off or have her screen facing the ceiling. Nev and Max from Catfish are probably shaking their heads in disappointment.
Beca was about to start school at wherever University her dad teaches at within the next few days and Chloe had been packing her things to go back to whatever university she goes to in Tennessee. She never actually asked Chloe what school she goes or anything like that. It’s not that she wasn’t interested, but Chloe never seemed interested in talking about it. She would only mention that she sang for some group. Beca and Chloe talked about things that were so much more in depth than just the normal superficial things. Everything she told Chloe about herself was real. The only thing that wasn’t real was her name and face. Beca knew their time of talking would come to an end soon though. Chloe was going to get too busy and her friends were gonna be around. She was definitely falling for the girl, but it was nice while it lasted.
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Beca sighed and pulled her mixing equipment from the back of the cab while the people who help the freshmen lug things to their dorms helped her get the last of her stuff. They followed behind her to her dorm room and placed the rest of her items into the room. She and her mom had taken the one-hour ride down to Barden University the day before and brought down the bulk of Beca’s items. Unfortunately her work schedule permitted her from taking the trip with her today, but she made sure Beca had everything packed up as well as some money to hold her over for a while.
She spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon getting her room fully set up to her liking. She didn’t really have the chance to text Chloe, but she was excited to see she had a few messages from her. They were the normal asking her how she is; hope she isn’t working to hard, that she misses her voice. The final message was a picture of the redhead wearing a blue plaid dress and holding a clipboard and said she was off to do some recruiting and she would call her later tonight to tell her how it went.
After Beca had a weird encounter with her dad bursting into her dorm and making a lame attempt of a conversation, she decided to go check out the activities fair being held in the quad. She saw a booth that said Barden DJs and made a beeline for the booth. After doing some silent reading, she and a girl who called herself Fat Amy awkwardly found out that DJ, in this case, did not stand for Disk Jockey. She walked around the quad a bit longer, shoving stickers, pins, lanyards, and whatever else free things all the clubs were offering. She was kind of excited to add some of these stickers to the bottom of her mixing board.
Beca was walking with her head down, trying to carefully shove her sticker collection into her front pocket. She almost stumbled over someone who was sitting on the floor, but managed to avoid her just in time. She doubled back to see the girl she met earlier, sitting on the floor doing what she called the mermaid. It was definitely an interesting site. When Fat Amy was adjusting herself to get up, she reached her arm out and Beca grabbed it, helping pull the blonde to her feet. In the midst of helping Amy get off the floor Beca heard a familiar voice speak up.
“Do you sing?” Beca’s gaze started to make its way up toward the voice that was talking to her. Her attention caught by a blue plaid dress that she could’ve sworn she had seen before, and then soft red hair on the girl’s shoulders, before she finally made eye contact with piercing blue eyes. Beca felt herself freeze. She managed to stutter out an “um” before the uptight blonde next to her spoke.
“Chloe, she’s not exactly who we are looking.” The blonde said with her fake smile plastered on and her teeth gritted together.
Beca was doing her best to keep her facial expression under control. Chloe. Oh no. Chloe. The one she thought lived in Tennessee. The one she’s been talking to for months. The one she has massive feelings for. The one she is cat fishing. Oh no. This wasn’t supposed to happen this way. This wasn’t supposed to happen at all, who is she kidding. Yeah, she has massive fucking feelings for the girl, but she just figured once school started, Chloe would just faze her out.
In the midst of Beca’s internal panic, Chloe and her blonde friend must have been bickering. Chloe pulls Beca out of her thoughts with the beginning of an apology which makes Beca think Chloe’s friend most likely just insulted her somehow, not that she even heard.
“I’m sorry don’t listen to her. She can be a little uptight. What’s your name?” Chloe asked with a smile. Beca’s heart was thumping out of her chest. Chloe smelled like sunscreen and a hint of whatever perfume she was wearing. She shook her head to get rid of the thought and Chloe gave her a questioning look.
“Uh, my name is Beca.” Beca offered a quick smile. “I don’t sing, though. I’m sorry.” She could see Chloe looked defeated and it made her heart ache. The redhead pulled a flyer from her clipboard and took two stickers from the table and handed them over to Beca.
“I’m sorry to hear that. Here’s when we are having auditions, in case you change your mind. I’m Chloe, by the way.” Beca just nodded and took the three items. She walked off in the direction of her dorm, looking back at Chloe once more before turning the corner.
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Once she was out of sight, Beca practically ran to her room. She took all the things from her pockets and threw them onto her desk. She was panicking. Really panicking. Does she tell Chloe? Does she not tell Chloe? Does she keep talking to Chloe? She plopped into her computer chair and stared at her computer screen. She placed her headphones on her head and began listening to her recent mixes, lost in thought. Barden is a really big campus. The chances of her seeing Chloe again are probably nonexistent right? And as far as she knows, Chloe doesn’t even have any feelings for her. Yeah, they flirt and Chloe tells Beca that she’s the only girl she’s talking to, but as friends right? She’s only sent like two fake photos and only faked her name. Everything else about her has been real and Chloe wouldn’t lie to her.
Beca had been stuck in her thoughts for about four hours. She accomplished nothing music wise and decided she wanted to take a shower before looking into where she can order food. She hadn’t heard from Chloe since earlier today and to be honest, she felt her heart break a little because she felt that phasing out process was already starting. She got her robe and shower caddy together and headed to the female showers. It was nice and quiet in there, so that meant she had some time to herself. She undressed and turned on her shower. She began to hum whatever song lyric popped into her head, occasionally singing a lyric or two. She switched between some random songs she heard while walking on the quad today that she couldn’t get out of her head.
“You can sing!” A voice said behind her excitedly, turning off her water. Beca shrieked and grabbed her shower curtain, scrambling to cover herself up. “Oh don’t worry. I’ve seen it all before.”
“Me, too!” Said a deep voice from behind Chloe. He wrapped an arm around the front of her bare chest and gave Beca a wink.
“Dude!” Beca shouted. Chloe shoved the guy off and handed Beca her towel. Beca felt herself flush, but she wasn’t sure if she was embarrassed about being naked, or angry that Chloe was sleeping with a guy.
“You should audition.” Beca could feel her embarrassment dimmer and her jealousy begin to bubble in her stomach.
“Will it get you out of my shower?” She said with a slight attitude.
“It might. Maybe I want to stay.” Chloe said with a cheeky grin before leaving Beca to shower. Beca would hear her gather her things and head for the door. A “see you Friday!’ echoed through the room and then Beca was, this time for sure, left alone.
She looked around her tiny shower cubicle and stared at the curtain in disbelief. What just happened? Not only was she jealous as fuck, but she was also a little turned on? But MOSTLY she was even more confused because her entire plan to evade Chloe completely shattered. Maybe she just won’t go to the audition. Beca turned her shower back on and tried to finish her shower fast before someone decided to pop in on her again. She kept finding herself feeling salty as fuck about this whole Chloe with a guy situation and she keeps having to remind herself that she is also lying to Chloe. This wasn’t how Beca pictured she’d be starting her freshman year of college.