Guilty Pleasure
Title: Guilty Pleasure
Fandom: Pitch Perfect
Characters: Beca/Chloe
Word Count: 768
Summary: Beca has a secret
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: These characters sadly don’t belong to me. No copyright infringement intended.
Beca would never admit it to anyone, but her favorite guilty pleasure is girly pop music. She knows the stuff is BEYOND cheesy, but she doesn’t care. Who doesn’t occasionally want some sweet, bubbly, and just completely unapologetic feel-good music? Still, it’s not something Beca wants people to know about her.
When Chloe barges into her room uninvited a few weeks before finals and wags an accusing finger in her face, she knows the jig is up. “YOU know every word to ‘Party in the USA!’ EVERY WORD. And I could swear I’ve heard you humming old school Britney songs when you thought you were alone.”
“I... Shit. Chloe, I just-”
“Nope. No sense denying it now. I’m on to you, Beca ‘To Cool for A Capella’ Mitchell. You’re a closet pop fan! You’ve totally been holding out on me. Now the question is, what am I gonna do about it?”
Beca’s eyes widen comically and then turn pleading. “Please, don’t tell the other Bellas. I’ll never live it down. Chloe, please?”
Chloe just smiles broadly and stays uncharacteristically quiet as she watches her friend get increasingly antsy.
“Seriously. Please don’t tell them. I’ll do anything you want if you just don’t tell them.”
It’s too late when Beca realizes that Chloe is edging her way to her computer. Her own awkward last minute dive toward the mouse is futile as Chloe casually shifts it out of her reach and sifts through her music collection. The redhead clearly knows what she is looking for as she picks up their lapsed conversation. “Anything, huh?”
“Um, what I meant was, uh...” Beca hedges as she sees Chloe’s too-innocent smile.
“First,” Chloe glances over Beca’s play counts and nods her approval, “I want you to make me a mix of your top 15 most played songs. No cheating to make it ‘cooler,’ either. I have a photographic memory, so I’ll know.”
“Okay, fine. It’ll take me a couple days, though. But I’ll have it for you Friday.”
“Great! Also,” Beca cringes as Chloe smiles even wider before continuing, “I wanna know why it’s such a big secret? Tell me why you like it so much but you don’t want anyone to know.”
Beca looks at Chloe miserably. She knows the other girl is just generally curious and isn’t actually trying to torture her, but that fact doesn’t make it any easier to open up. She looks down at her hands, worrying away at the edge of her blanket. “Well the secret part is pretty obvious. I mean, it’s dorky music! Why would I, or anyone else for that matter, willingly admit to being such a cheeseball?!”
Chloe tries to look offended, but she can also see her friend’s point so she nods grudgingly. “Fair enough. But you still haven’t explained why you like it so much in the first place.”
“I just... it’s... it’s fun! They’re the songs that are happy and sweet and bubbly. The kind of thing where you listen to them and just can’t help but smile. Even if you’re having a shitty day, one of those songs comes on the radio and you’re smiling and bobbing your head to the music before you even realize it. Like musical uppers. They’re fun and they make you feel good. You, of all people, should know what I mean.”
“Oh?”
“Well, yeah. You’re the same way... you’re like the living embodiment of pop music! The way you’re always happy and warm and sweet and bubbly and stuff. Like you just can’t rest until you make sure that everyone around you is smiling. Even me.”
“Especially you.”
Beca feels her cheeks grow warm at Chloe’s affirmation. She glances up from her hands to find Chloe abandoning her desk in favor of sitting next to her on the bed. “Does, uh, that answer your question? Am I off the hook now? Please.”
“Almost. There’s just one other eensy little thing...”
Beca notices that her friend is once again WAY inside her own personal space. She has to swallow nervously before she manages to answer. “What?”
“This.” Beca feels, more than hears, the word whispered against her skin. Because Chloe’s lips are suddenly on hers and they’re impossibly soft and warm and... perfect. It only lasts for a heartbeat before Chloe pulls back with a question in her eyes.
Beca’s done talking. Instead she just wraps her hands into silky red hair and pulls Chloe’s lips back down to hers. She decides that maybe letting some secrets slip (only to Chloe, though) might not be such a bad thing after all.