A (birth)day in the life.
“What’s going on Chlooo?” Beca whined as her giggling girlfriend dragged her down the corridor.
“Be patient! You’ll see!”
Beca pouted at this. It was 11am on her 20th birthday. She had known something was going on – three times now she had walked into a room where Chloe and another Bella were talking and the conversation had ended instantly, accompanied by giggles and glances exchanged between the other two girls caught in the act. On one occasion, Emily had even opened her mouth, bouncing in her seat, and responded to Beca’s “What’s going on?” with only a “We’re-“ before Chloe’s hand was over the taller girl’s mouth and a finger was prodding her sharply in the side with a dramatic “Shut UP Legacy!”. Once upon a time this might have worried Beca – she might have thought there was a secret, and the secret was bad, but these days Chloe was her girlfriend and she knew the Bellas loved her, so she trusted that giggling and shiny eyes wasn’t going to be a bad thing.
She was still pouting though.
“Chloe! It’s my birthday! You have to tell me what’s going on because I’m the BIRTHDAY GIRL!”
“Oh hush Bec, it’s your birthday so you’re not allowed to know what’s going on because it’s a birthday surprise and you’re the BIRTHDAY GIRL!” Chloe retorted, shaking her head slightly at her girlfriends petulant impatience.
Beca pouted again (“I can feel you pouting from here babe!” Chloe called, without turning around) and allowed Chloe to drag her downstairs. The dragging was a lot easier without her crutch, but was still pretty comical as Beca’s gait these days was very distinctive, lifting her whole right leg up every time she took a step.
Eager to bring her girlfriend to her surprise or not, Chloe still slowed down and turned around to help Beca successfully navigate the stairs. Somehow her foot not moving properly got in the way a lot more going down the fairly steep stairs than going up then, and neither Beca nor Chloe wanted to see the brunette fall head over heels down the stairs on her birthday.
Beca emerged at the bottom of the stairs to see… nothing?
Well, not nothing but… Just the girls, sitting around. Amy and Legacy on the sofa, Aubrey’s head poking round the kitchen door and Stacie laying knives and forks at the table.
“Oh, hey Bec,” Stacie said, smiling at the newcomers, “happy birthday!”
“Thanks Stace,” Beca replied, somewhat confused as to what was happening.
Then, as if there had been some invisible and silent signal, Stacie opened the kitchen door to reveal Aubrey again, but this time with a cake in her hands, resplendent with rainbow candles spelling out HAPPY BIRTHDAY! and a big 20. As the girls began to sing (in 5 part harmony naturally) Beca was shocked and appalled to feel her eyes prickling, and hoped to goodness her badass reputation wasn’t about the spoiled by her eyes leaking on her birthday. After a very dramatic ending to the traditionally simple song, Beca blew the candles out, beaming, and the girls all congregated around the kitchen table to eat tea from fancy tea cups and eat cake with cake forks (“Because it’s your birthday, Beca, and we’re a classy establishment” Fat Amy kindly pointed out).
“This is the best surprise ever guys, thank you so much!” Beca said, half an hour later, when all 6 girls were groaning slightly under the amount of lemon and pooppyseed cake they had eaten (“Couldn’t have you getting sick with the chocolate one could we Shortstack,” Amy pointed out, only a hint of mournful disappointment creeping into the statement). At this declaration all six girls began to exchange glances before Chloe said,
“That wasn’t the surprise, Bec. This is.”
She reached behind her to pick up two cards, one red, one white, which Beca hadn’t noticed propped on the radiator behind Chloe’s back, and put them on the table in front of Beca.
“Open this one first Beca, this one is the boring one,” Emily advised, although she was sitting straight up in her chair like an excited meerkat, and bouncing slightly with excitement.
“As long as you don’t fall out of your chair first Legacy,” Beca chuckled, reaching to take the white envelope from the table.
It was a boring looking envelop, the kind that A4 paper folded into 3 fits in, and it was pretty thick. Beca opened it, hands shaking only slightly, and unfolded the sheaf of papers inside.
“Tenancy Contract for Flat 6, 15 Redland Road… Wait, what is this? Did you guys find us a house?” Beca said, confusion and excitement evident in her voice. It was May now, and most people had already sorted their accommodation for the following academic year. Beca couldn’t believe that she had completely forgotten about it. But now, this piece of paper seemed to suggest…
“Not a house Bec, a flat. A 5 bedroom, ground floor flat. Aren’t you glad they built those freakishly large dolls house houses now?”
“No stairs?”
“No stairs.”
“Five bedrooms?!”
“Five bedrooms! Everyone is staying in Bristol for one more year… You, me, Aubrey and Emily will be studying, Aubrey just got a job at @Bristol, and Amy… Amy, what is it you’re doing again?” Chloe asked, looking at the blonde girl as if the answer was on the tip of her tongue.
“I’m being that person who brings snakes and lizards to children’s parties. I pushed for crocs but turns out that’s not allowed over here,” Amy replied, a twist of confusion towards the end of her sentence.
“Exactly, Amy is doing that. So, we’re all staying!”
Once again, Beca’s badass reputation was being threatened by the salt water slowly building up in her eyes. Her friends were staying in Bristol. They were staying with her, and they had found a flat that was close to uni and didn’t have any stairs. Beca might not admit it very often, but every time she went down stairs these days, she was terrified of tripping. The idea that she wouldn’t have to do that every day, and that when she did eventually have her surgery to replace the ligament in her leg she would be able to recover on flat ground, meant almost more than she could say.
“Thanks guys,” she managed to choke out, tears finally spilling silently over her cheeks as she grinned.
“No Beca! Don’t start crying yet! That’s the boring surprise, open the other one, open the other one!” Emily practically yelled, pulling the tenancy agreement from Beca’s hand and shoving the red envelope at her to replace it.
“Ok, ok!” Beca relented, chuckling quietly at the younger girls exuberance.
Hands shaking even more this time, although mostly from excitement rather than nerves – whatever Legacy had said, there was no way this surprise was better than getting to live with her friends for one more year, in a flat she could navigate without fear – Beca opened the envelope.
And once again she was confused. The first thing she opened was an A4 letter, folded into four, and tucked in to the envelop in front of a rather thick feeling card.
“Dear Beca,” she read aloud, “It is our pleasure to offer you and 5 friends these VIP weekend tickets for Frost Fair 2016. We have also arranged hotel accommodation for you 30 minutes from site, and taxi to take you to, and pick you up from, the festival, daily…” at this point Beca’s voice trailed off, and her eyes skimmed to the bottom of the letter, “from the Make a Wish foundation, on behalf of your friends Chloe, Aubrey, Stacie, Amy and Emily”.
At this point, Beca couldn’t speak. She wasn’t even going to pretend there wasn’t a lump in her chest, that her throat wasn’t tight and her eyes weren’t full of tears. Everything was silent for a moment.
“We already spoke to your doctors and the nurses at the hospital, and there’s a tonne of things we’re gonna do to make sure you’re ok, and the docs are gonna give you extra medicine, and there’s a hospital nearby in case anything goes wrong, and-“ but Chloe’s anxious rambling was cut off Beca screech of excitement.
“We’re going to BoomTown?! All of us?! Tickets sold out months ago! How is this even happening?! Was this it? The sneaking and the giggling and the whispering and it was THIS?!”
“It was this. Sorry about the secrecy Bec but a lot of work goes into getting a Wish and we wanted it to be a surprise.”
“Which it was, no thanks to this one,” Amy pointed out smugly, once again prodding Emily in the side, making the younger girl blush furiously.
“I was just so excited!” she whined in her defence, slumping in her chair for once, long hair hanging in front of her face.
“You did good, Legacy,” Beca pointed out kindly, gently kicking the other girl’s shin until she sat up again, cheeks still fuchsia but with a smile on her face.
“You all did. Thank you so much guys, this is incredible. Like, super really awesome. Like, a lot.”
“Yeah well, you’re a pain in the ass but you’re kinda alright and almost worth the hassle,” Aubrey said, just about deadpan, and although her girlfriend gentle punched her shoulder in admonishment, there wasn’t a trace of bite in her statement.
“Good thing it doesn’t say which five friends I’m taking, eh Aubrey!” Beca grinned back with a wink.
“Ok, enough enough enough,” Chloe interceded, before the faux shocked look on Aubrey’s face and Beca’s wicked smirk were fully expressed. “Now, because I am the best girlfriend ever-“ she looked to Beca for confirmation, and the smaller brunette rolled her eyes before pausing and nodding just once, “and because you all love me-“ Chloe turned to each of the Bella’s in turn to receive a variety of eye rolls, nods, and frantic shaking of her head from Aubrey, “-we’re going to sing!”
She cleared her throat and turning slightly towards a blushing Beca, began, “When I see your face…”
By the time the Bellas went retired to their respective bedrooms that night, their throats were raw from singing (every mix of Beca’s they had ever sung in any context in their entire Bella career), their abs were sore from laughing (not least at Amy’s 5 minute demonstration of Advanced Mermaid Dancing with Crocodiles) and their hearts were full (mostly of each other).
But Beca’s birthday wasn’t over yet.
After their customary communal teeth-brushing, and after Beca had completed her usual vague struggle into her pyjamas (getting a foot that won’t behave into leggings is no easy feat), and just as she was about to turn her light off and crawl, exhausted, into bed, there was a gentle knocking on her door. Smiling to herself, she opened it to let a clean and shiny looking Chloe in.
They sat opposite each other on the bed, crossed legged and one hand holding the other’s between them.
“That was the best birthday ever Chlo.”
“Well, it isn’t quite over yet,” Chloe said, smiling as she drew her free hand from behind her back, holding a parcel Beca hadn’t noticed her holding before.
“Chloe! You already got me a present!” Beca protested.
“A Wish from Make a Wish doesn’t cost me any money, dumbass, of course I was gonna buy you a present as well! Just take it!” Chloe refuted, rolling at her eyes at the stubborn brunette in front of her.
Rolling her own eyes at the excessive generosity of her girlfriend, Beca took the small box from Chloe’s hand.
The box was pretty small, and wrapping is not Chloe’s strong point, so it took Beca a few minutes a several huffs of frustration before she was able to remove enough of the sellotape to actually rip the paper open, to reveal a small jewellery box.
“Chlo, I know about the stereotypes, but are you sure wanna propose before we’ve even had sex?” Beca joked, although her heart was thudding slightly in her chest.
“Just open it you idiot!” Chloe responded, growing more and more frustrated at the amount of time it took for Beca to just open the damned present.
“Ok, ok!” Beca replied, as she snapped open the box.
Inside was a necklace. A thin, delicate silver chain, on which rested two delicate pendants: a treble cleff and a base cleff, separate from each other, but on the same small ring.
“It’s beautiful, Chlo. Do it up for me?” Beca said, tears welling up in her eyes. In her own bedroom, in the evening, in her soft pyjamas, with just her bedside light and her Chloe sat opposite her, turning around and lifting her hair up for Chloe to fasten the clasp, Beca didn’t even try to pretend she wasn’t crying with happiness.
“It’s the Bellas, but it’s also… Us. If you want it to be,” Chloe said shyly when she was done, eyes cast down at her own hands, clasped together and twisting in front of them.
“It’s the Bellas, and it’s us, and I’m never taking it off,” Beca replied softly, before leaning forward, her hand on Chloe’s cheek, tilting her girlfriend’s face up to face her before kissing her softly.
And she never did.