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Evenings are best spent in bed, wearing your comfiest pajamas and tucked under warm covers while reading a good book and drinking wine. Add in the soft 80's music playing in the background and it's perfect.

Beca loves the evenings for all the peace and quiet it brings. A time to herself is the most important time. Being alone just means less problems. Less problem means less stress.

Less stress means having a healthy heart.

Beca likes having a healthy heart.

Her cat Bella is lazily lounging at the sofa inside her room and is not in the mood for cuddles, much to Beca's dismay. Kitty cuddles are a nice and warm with their little cat paws around your face. And if only her cat isn't being a moody little bitch that she sometimes is, she'd be happier.

Beca secretly likes kitty cuddles.

She turns another page, too wrapped up in the story she is reading that when she glances at the clock she's surprised to find that it's already past ten. Which isn't really a bad thing if you're not like Beca who takes importance in getting her eight hours of sleep. Less than that and her day is ruined. More than eight hours of sleep on the other hand, is absolutely bliss. Sometimes, often in the winter season, she just wishes to stay in bed all day. Probably hibernate for half a year. Aubrey tells her that more than eight hours is unhealthy and a waste. But how else would she spend time? If she's not working, she's sleeping. With the exception of the last Fridays' of the month where she is sneaking out of someone's bed past midnight, that's how her life rolls and it's going to keep rolling that way.

Closing her book and finishing her wine, she pads outside her room and towards the kitchen, rinsing her glass before getting ready to sleep.

Her nightly routine is simple. Arriving home, she changes her clothes, eats take-out dinner, if she's not taking a shower she's washing her face, applying facial toner, a little bit of night cream then it's crawling in the bed with a good book and some wine or snacks. When that's done, she cleans up, brushes her teeth, kisses her cat goodnight before sliding under the covers to curl up in between her dozen of fluffy pillows, putting on an eye mask and shutting off the lights.

It usually takes a couple of minutes before her breathing evens out and she more than welcomes a peaceful dreamless slee—

There's banging. Loud irritating banging and it's coming from the outside.

Beca literally jerks awake.

Her cat, Bella, jumps up on her bed, looking at the door of her room, while she fumbles groggily around. The lights open and she rips off her eye mask, squinting at her surroundings and for a second she doesn't hear anything. She almost thinks that it's all a dream when it happens again.

Loud incessant banging and this time she's sure it's coming from the hallway of her condo unit.

More specifically, her door.

It's about past eleven in the evening and not even Stacie would be causing this much ruckus on a Wednesday night, of all nights. But if it's Amy though, Beca wouldn't even be surprised. However, Amy would be most likely to crash Jesse's place though since she's allergic to cats—well she says that she is but everyone thinks that it's just because she has a traumatic experience of being scratched by a cat when she was child. CR says it's her serial killer trait.

With light footsteps she cautiously walks out of her room, her chest jumping as the banging continues after a momentary pause.

She's read this in crime novels.

Her mind is filled with all the possible gruesome scenarios with how this would end. None of them good. This could be a burglar, a killer or a rapist who has unfortunately chosen her as a target.

But then, criminals don't knock—psychopaths do though.

Finding a bit of courage, Beca crosses over towards the door, aiming to check on the monitor that would show the live video footage of the hallway. She had those installed when there were reports about cat burglars and cat-napping.

Bella's safety is top priority.

She takes one look at the monitor and frowns.

There's person out there all right but they seem to be leaning their head flat on the door and all she could see is auburn hair.

It's impossible though.

It can't be.

The moment she opens it, a body clumsily stumbles forward. She is quick to step back to avoid collision and reach out to catch the person's arm in time. She smells vodka and flowers instantly before dazzling blue eyes look up at her.

Chloe Beale?

"H-How did you—"

But she doesn't get to complete her sentence because the newbie is pointing at her with a scary tone.

"You!"

She gulps nervously as she starts backing away. She didn't even have any idea how this crazy employee of hers knew about her address—it's most definitely on the employee directory though.

Also, she's clearly drunk and the last time the newbie got drunk she had physically harassed her until Beca was running out of the club like her life depended on it. She shudders at the memory.

It was a very dark and embarrassing memory.

"This is all your fault!" the newbie yells, stepping forward and Beca knows she is doomed because trying to escape your own home just sounds absurd—her condo is on the twelfth floor and she does not want to die in the fire escape stairs, neck broken, like the victims of those crime shows.

"You, Beca fuckin' Mitchell!"

Shit's about to get real from this point onwards, Beca is sure of it and now she's on extreme panic mode—which doesn't happen... at all.

What has she ever done to deserve this?

Is this god's will, punishing her for being gay?

Maybe she's not praying to Hayley Kiyoko enough.

"Don't you come near me or I-I'm going to call security!" she tries to say that threateningly and it comes out weak—like those victims on crime shows.

Her hands instinctively grab around for anything to defend herself and she hates herself for not taking CR's suggestions about buying pepper spray for self-defense.

Her weapon of choice instead? A fuckin' remote control!

She's doomed and her poor Bella is going to be an orphan soon. She should've taken Aubrey's advice about writing her will and securing the future.

"I came here to LA so I can be with him... because I love him. We had our future planned out and now you... you come along and decide that I take everything for granted. You gave me an unreasonable deadline because you think your employees don't have a life just like you!" the newbie starts to rant and that last one really hits home.

The nerve of this woman to forcibly enter her home and insult her work ethic! So what if she doesn't have a life? She's successful and can do anything she wants with whoever she wants. And why does she care about some pathetic relationship that she's not even involved in?

Furiously, she throws pillows as she continues stepping backwards from her redheaded psychopath. She almost pumps her fist when she hits Chloe straight on the face but her celebration would have to hold because the girl is relentless—like that blonde evil, but hot, robot chick from Terminator.

Now she's backed up at a corner, against her glass windows, with no escape routes and she's seriously about to scream for help when—

"You... you don't hate me. You hate love. You hate it so much that you... you,"

Her impending scream fizzles into thin air at the words, watching in shock as the newbie's tears fall down delicately and that's when she sees it. The life in those baby blues starts to dim, the sorrow in them evident and unmistakable.

She's seen it before.

In the mirror.

"He's gone,"

The sadness in those words presses down on her chest because she herself cried them out before and it's suddenly like déjà vu. The memories of the hurt and the anger pouring from every corner of her body. The nights spent wasting away on clubs because she doesn't know how to cope, doesn't know how to claw her heart out so she could stop... feeling.

"And it hurts..."

She looks down on the ground where the newbie kneels pathetically, sobbing painfully on the floor as she grips on to the fabric of her pajama pants, a silent cry for help.

Just like she did.

The problem was this sort of cry for help usually remains unheard buried under assurances that 'it's all going to be alright' or 'don't worry you'll find somebody else' when it's not what you need at the moment. It's all true but it does nothing to alleviate the pain.

"It hurts so much and I'm exhausted. I haven't slept in two days and my head hurts. Now it hurts everywhere and it's all my fault..."

Her fingers suddenly tremble, itching to reach out but there are rules she needs to follow. Rules she's made to protect herself. Because once you let your walls down, you become vulnerable and that's when people take advantage of you.

They stab at you repeatedly, leaving you bleeding down the ground crying and begging. She doesn't want to be that girl anymore but...

"I should've been there on time. I should've apologized some more. I should've..."

She reminds herself of the rules again.

This is clearly a threat. Blatantly attacking her and entering her home. She should do something about it.

She needs to yell at her, tell her to go away and call security if she doesn't. The newbie's problems aren't hers to carry. She shouldn't care about any of this nonsense.

She should back away, far, far away.

Lines have been crossed and now she needs to draw new ones.

Leave her, it's what her mind screams. Pull away from that grip she's got on the fabric of her clothing. She has no right to touch her. This girl is just some employee who got hired because Beca had the last one quitting and running away in tears—and tons of curses aimed at her.

They're all weak.

And this one, she's just like—the old Beca?

"It's not your fault," The words tumble out of her lips before she could bite her tongue. Her whole body is shaking.

Struggling to fight against the urge to run away. The urge to move and touch another soul. Afraid to reach out and connect because there's only one ending to that scenario. It's definitely not a happy one.

She's almost forgotten how the whole thing works.

It's been awhile since she... tapped into feelings.

But yet here she was pulling this newbie back to her feet. Maybe it's the odd similarity. Maybe it's those blue eyes. Or the way she tries to hold desperately on to her. She doesn't know. For whatever it is, she doesn't want to dive in deeper.

"He left. You love him and yet he still left you like this. That makes him garbage. He's worthless and he doesn't deserve your love."

Even her breath is shaky as she says those words. Not only because she's aware of how deep her involvement in this situation was becoming but because she's never talked about anything related to this sort of matters for a long time with anyone before.

But there's just something about this scenario she can't place and it has her feeling uneasy. For some reason there's that need to protect this soul, she feels it even though she couldn't understand why.

Why she picks the newbie off the floor, or why she holds her with care, worried that she'd hurt herself. Why she just stands there as arms encircle her and cling to her like she was the last source of hope from someone who is drowning, she has no idea.

She doesn't know where to place her hands. Thinking twice before finally giving the redhead a small awkward pat on the back.

This hug is taking too long though and naturally she's starting to get antsy.

"Uhm... you done?" she slowly asks before faltering because for a second the embrace tightens. So she's back to awkwardly patting the newbie's back.

"I-Is there someone I can call? Because I'll..." her frown deepens.

Not only because she feels uncomfortable being all disgustingly nice and helpful but also because, she might be imagining it but, it seems like the newbie is getting heavy. And now she almost loses her footing and both of them would've fallen down hard on the floor if it weren't for her fast reflexes.

"Beale, you cannot be sleeping!" she says through gritted teeth, moving her shoulders in a poor attempt to wake the redhead up whose head is lightly bouncing near her neck.

There's audible mumbling but it's basically gibberish and Beca groans at how her perfect night is turning out—very horribly.

It only took one drunk psychotic redhead to flip her peace into chaos. It hasn't even been five minutes and she's been insulted, threatened, chased and groped—yes groped as of the moment because there's certainly a hand squeezing on her breast right this second and it has her flustered.

"Beale! Wake up, you drunk idiot!" she cries out as the redhead literally rests all her weight against her and now they are both sinking down the floor.

Less than a minute later, they do end up on the floor with Chloe all over her, trapping her in a corner, head resting on Beca's chest while she, on the other hand, tries to escape—or push naughty hands away from groping around private places where groping is not allowed.

"Not this again!" she moans miserably.

It takes about five minutes of her struggling, squirming, pushing and grunting before she crawls out successfully to freedom. Now both of them are lying down the floor next to each other, Chloe passed out cold on her side while Beca is tiredly sprawled on the carpet, hair messy, clothes wrinkled and breathing heavily like she run a marathon—a sex marathon but without the pleasure.

Bella meows at her, curiously staring at them but makes no move from her position on the couch with her tail slowly swinging around.

On to the next step then.

Heaving and gritting her teeth, she pulls then carries—drags—the newbie—sack of rice—off the floor and finally lays—throws—her on to the bed before resting—collapsing—on the sofa seat of her room.

Her cat follows her and hops on to the bed which immediately catches her attention.

"Bella, stay away from that psycho. She looks harmless now but she'll make your life hell," she mutters, rather seriously, to her cat.

But her words fall into deaf cat ears as her fur child curls up next to Chloe's cheek and starts sleeping —adorably.

Traitor!

That cat always had a thing for pretty ladies. Lounging contentedly on Stacie's lap, rubbing herself against Aubrey, sweet only when around the cute girls and following the pretty neighbor down the tenth floor for kitty rubs. And now she's getting cozy with the redhead.

Useless lesbian cat!

She's about to stand up and pull her stubborn cat away from the dead to the universe newbie when she hears a knock on the door. This time it's a polite knock and Beca sighs heavily because this better not be another drunk redhead, a polite drunk redhead.

However, when she finds that it's the building's security, she immediately opens the door.

Turns out, security had been looking for a drunk crying redhead who entered the premise a couple of minutes ago with the excuse to use the restroom because she badly needed to pee. With one of the female staff busy attending a complaint from one of the residents, the male security had to stand a couple of feet outside the female restroom only to find out that Beca's sneaky employee managed to slip away from him.

Fortunately, Chloe had given her name earlier before entering the restroom and that's why they came up to check on her.

"She's with me," Beca assures them, massaging her temples as she explains some lie about how girlfriends fight from time to time and that results to... irrational behavior.

Basically, it was an awkward conversation and she pretty much slammed the door shut afterwards.

An alibi is essential. Her building's security is strict, given that it's rather on the high end scale of residential buildings. They've always been proud of the safety of their building and that is one of the main reasons why Beca had bought a unit. Lying was the only way so that she wouldn't be the subject of nasty rumors about having her work mate act like a criminal by stalking her address and breaking in her home. Neither does she want the police getting involved. At least, if it's something personal related, like relationship problems, it's more understandable.

"You better be on your knees begging for forgiveness tomorrow," she grumbles as she drapes her blanket over the sleeping redhead.

Her cat is still, unfortunately, sleeping next to Chloe and is now settled at the crook of her neck, paws around her cheek, obviously already claiming Chloe as one of her humans—this slutty little feline.

Beca stares at them for a moment.

It's weird, how comfortable they look on her bed.

She's never brought women in her home. Her friends were the only other people who had stepped into her condo.

Having someone in her bed now, sleeping soundly next to her cat. It looks so...

She shakes her head, frowning at how absurd her thoughts are getting and grabbing two of her very many pillows before walking out towards the sofa where she is, apparently, going to spend her night.

Closing her eyes, she tries to sleep for a minute only to groan and get up again. With much difficulty she walks towards the kitchen with heavy steps, opening her fridge to take out a bottle of coconut water before heading to the bathroom to unlock the medicine cabinet and grab an Advil assuming that there will be a headache for the redhead psycho tomorrow. She places all of that on the small cabinet next to the bed for Chloe.

Dimming the lights, she finally trudges back to the sofa.

It's already past midnight and it's not even the weekend. Her sleep schedule had been ruined, she's spending a night in the sofa and having somebody else in her house is making it hard for her to sleep. She twists and turns, sighing every once in a while.

It's past two in the morning when she loses consciousness, last thoughts drifting to annoying redheads and shitty love problems.

It's broken, all the rules.

For the first time in a year, she's broken all of it and she doesn't even know why she did so.

She hates herself for that.