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Annie had just finished explaining how to do the equation for what felt like the billionth time that night. "So, now do you see?"
Britta looked at the textbook, back up into Annie's increasingly desperate yet hopeful eyes, and back down again. "Yes," she said, hoping against hope that Annie would believe her and call it a night. The problem with asking Annie to tutor you was she took it seriously.
"Oh, good! OK, I think you should do just one more equation, and I'll sit here"--she dragged a chair so she was sitting closer to Britta's-- "and watch you do it, and then when you're all done I can tell you if you did anything wrong."
"Sounds great," said Britta. Her pulse had spiked a little, but she wasn't sure if it was due to her uncertainty with the equation or to how close Annie had dragged her chair. Either way, her hand felt a little shaky as she took a deep breath and started to write. She was only halfway through setting up the variables when Annie made a sort of choked noise in the back of her throat. When Britta turned, Annie was giving her what she had come to think of as the "Nobody home, huh?" look. Britta sighed. "Sorry. That's wrong, isn't it?"
"Just...just a little bit! Here." She leaned over so her body brushed against Britta's arm and quickly crossed out all the parts Britta had screwed up. "Do you see what I just did?"
Britta sighed. "Yeah, I guess. Look, Annie--"
"I haven't helped you at all, have I? Oh, I'm sorry--"
"It's really not your fault. Don't worry about it. It's just late and we're both tired. I'm sure it'll all make sense to me in the morning."
Annie's eyes lit up again. "You think?"
"Probably not, but at least you'll have tried."
"Oh," she said, and with a little nervous flutter of her eyelids she seemed to realize how closely she had leaned in to correct Britta's paper. She leaned back so quickly her chair rocked back a little bit and grabbed her bag. "It is pretty late. Look, they even turned all the lights out."
Britta had noticed that. It had made her a bit nervous at the time, but she had been too intent on not looking like a total idiot in front of Annie at the time to worry too much. "You don't think..."
"Think what?"
Britta stood up and pulled at the door handle. It was locked.
"Oh no." Annie went to the other door, but that was locked as well. "I had no idea the doors locked automatically! I thought they needed a janitor to do it or something."
Britta swore, but under her breath. "Is there anyone we could call?"
Annie hesitated. "I might have the Dean's number somewhere..."
"Oh no, we don't have to do that." For whatever reason, every scenario she could picture where they called the Dean to let them out was totally unpalatable. Annie seemed to agree, because she started pounding on the windows and shouting. "Don't bother, Annie. It's after midnight, everyone must have gone home already. I had no idea it had gotten so late."
Annie turned around, looking miserable. "I didn't either. I'm sorry, Britta."
"God, just--don't apologize, Annie. It was an accident, all right?"
"But are we really going to have spend the night here?"
They exchanged a look and must have had the exact same thought at the exact same time, because a second later they were both looking towards the study room's only couch.
"You take it."
"No, Annie, that's not fair. We'll share."
"Oh."
"Don't look so stressed."
"I'm not! I'm really not."
"OK. Good."
The couch was really too small for even one of them, so the only really viable way to sleep was for Britta to sort of scrunch her body up and for Annie to rather awkwardly try to spoon up against her. They were able to turn down the lights, so the only illumination was a faint fluorescent glow coming from somewhere down the hallway. Britta tried to calm herself down enough to fall asleep, but Annie's body was tense and distracting against hers. Every so often Annie would curl her toes and try to dig her feet further into the couch cushions to keep warm, brushing up against Britta's bare ankles as she did so.
"I don't even like to think about how dirty these couches are," said Annie conversationally.
"Mmm."
"I mean, the other day I saw Abed and Troy eating peanuts here."
"Mmm. Some people."
"In the shell. Just think about how much of that got underneath the cushions."
"Yuck. You know, Annie, maybe that's not really helping things."
"You're right. I'm sorr--" She cut herself off.
"It's OK! Let's talk about something else, like, um." She searched wildly for something, and landed on what had been occupying her mind for the last couple of hours. "You smell nice."
"Oh! Thank you."
In fact, Annie always smelled of scented body lotion and whatever type of flowery shampoo she used on her hair, but now that Britta was holding her so close she smelled less like a perfume sample and more like, well, a person, or, more accurately, a woman, and it was a little disconcerting. "Sorry," said Britta, wincing. "I guess that's not much better."
"No, no! You know, people always think I'm so innocent." With that rather worrying, unheeded sentence, Annie broke the established little spoon/big spoon arrangement that the two of them had so tenderly constructed and turned so she was facing Britta. Britta felt herself tense now. She dug her feet into the cushions, so insistently that when she encountered what she hoped were some of Troy and Abed's peanut shells she didn't even care.
"Are your feet cold?" asked Annie softly.
"A little."
"I've got an idea." Annie sat up, took off her sweater, and spread it over their bare feet. "Better?"
"Yeah." Annie was still wearing her dress under the sweater, but she lay back down, she was much closer than before. Britta imagined she could feel the underwire of her bra and the beating of her heart. "Annie. You're sure you're OK with this?"
"I'm fine!" Britta couldn't see much of her face, but what she could see looked indignant. "You know, Britta, maybe it's you who says things that aren't exactly helping."
"That's probably true," said Britta wearily.
"But--." Annie tentatively reached up to brush a bit of Britta's hair out of her face. "Look, I know I annoy you a lot--"
"You don't annoy me."
"I do! But I just...." She trailed off and rested her hand on Britta's cheek. "I just--"
"God, Annie, don't sit there pouting at me all night," said Britta when she couldn't take it anymore and kissed her. Annie kissed her back and made that same choked noise in the back of her throat, but this time it made something in Britta's stomach twist for a completely different reason.
"I'm sorry," said Annie, after they broke the kiss.
"You don't have to apologize," Britta assured her, rolling on top of her and kicking Annie's sweater to the floor.