Chapter Text
Jeff starts awake in his bed, gripped by some terror he can neither define or identify. He’s surprised by that. Contrary to the cliche, he usually sleeps pretty soundly. His self-loathing and fear are much more of a problem when he’s awake. And after what he did last night, after he got home from the well-intentioned but poorly executed 36th birthday party the group had thrown for him, he would’ve expected to sleep more soundly, not less. Maybe there was some kind of stimulant in those pills he picked up in Koreatown. He’d known it was a bad idea to take them with scotch, but he’d also known he wouldn’t have the guts to do it without scotch since taking them at all was probably a bad idea, and if he didn’t try to take them he’d spend the rest of his life wondering if they would have worked.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t deal with being old anymore, although that was a hurdle he was still working on clearing. It was that if they did work, if by some miracle they made him fifteen or ten or even five years younger, it might change the math enough that he could maybe, just maybe have a shot at Annie without being toxic to her. It didn’t even need to be a big difference. If the pills got their gap into the single digits it would’ve been enough. Hell, it might even be enough if they just got his age down to what he’d told her it was. He was willing to risk some complications with that on the table. He probably would have been willing to make a deal with the devil with that on the table.
He wasn’t going to get back to sleep now he’d started thinking about that. Once he was asleep he usually slept soundly, but he’d laid awake thinking about Annie in ways that ranged from pleasant to excruciating over the last five years and had learned from experience that if he just kept lying there the thoughts weren’t going to go away. He had to distract himself, and since this was on the excruciating end of the spectrum he couldn’t do that in bed.
He goes for the lightswitch and is surprised when it has no effect. He toggles it a few more times, not really expecting any change, but swears all the same when there is none. It’s the first time he’s had a power outage in this apartment. He goes for the window, figuring there must be a freak snowstorm, but finds only black. Not the black of night, but the black of a cartoon hole or a dark artifact in some fantasy series Jeff would adamantly deny he’d read if questioned. It was black the way the sun was bright. There should be moonlight. It’s a full moon. He knew because of some weird conversation Abed and Shirley had had at the party about werewolves which he isn’t sure if he lacks necessary context to understand or not. Not only that, if there’s no light coming from outside and the apartment’s lights are out, he shouldn’t be able to see at all, but he can in a low light nightvision sort of way.
He makes his way to the living room, wary of what he might find, and spots a shadow sitting in one of his chairs, which has been moved to a place of central prominence in the room, presumably for dramatic effect. That, more than anything else, lets him know who it is before he speaks.
“What the hell is going on Abed?”
The figure lights a match which illuminates its face dimly and briefly enough that if Jeff hadn’t already known who it was it would have been a very dramatic reveal before using it to light a 19th century lamp Jeff is certain has never been in his apartment before. It gives off more light than it should, and that light seems to come from impossible angles..
“I am the first of four spirits that will haunt you tonight.”
Jeff pauses.
“Isn’t it supposed to be three spirits?”
“It’s usually said that way, but for some reason that never includes Jacob Marley. I assume Dickens was making a distinction between ‘ghost’ and ‘spirit.’ In the modern vernacular that doesn’t seem like as important a distinction.”
“You’re alive though, you’re not either.”
“Out there, yes. You’re a smart man though, Jeff. I think you’ve figured out we’re not out there by now, even if you don’t want to admit it.”
“Where exactly is out there?”
“Wrong question. The right question is ‘where is in here’ and the answer is ‘in your mind’”
Realization hits Jeff in a wave
“Those damned pills…”
“Yup. You’re in a coma. I have to ask, was it worth it?”
“Well obviously they didn’t work, so I don’t know if there’s really a value assessment to be made there.”
“But if they had, would this be worth it? How long would you have to be with Annie before they killed you for the balance to work out? If it gave you fifteen years with her, matching her age the whole way, would that be enough? Ten? Five? One?”
Jeff considers lying, but the fact that dream Abed went right to his real motivation shows there’s no point. That doesn’t mean he can’t deflect though.
“Depends on how many years with her as a friend I lose.” Not a lie, technically. Forty years of friendship with Annie might barely outweigh two years of romance in a purely selfish cost-benefit analysis. Being just friends with her made him understand masochism in a way he’d never thought possible.
“That’s not an answer. But you’ve thought before that there can’t be much time left before she wises up and moves on from Greendale. Since you also think you’re tied to Greendale now, you probably also think you’ll never see her again. Assuming you’re correct, wouldn’t that come out to maybe two more years of friendship at most? Taking that into account, how many years with her, actually with her, would be a worthwhile trade for your death?”
He considers lying again, but the question is asked in a way that implies the answer. Besides, he’s talking to part of himself. Those are much easier to lie to when they don’t have hallucinatory form. He can’t lie. There’s no point. He has to keep trying to deflect.
“If you’re Jacob Marley, why the hell do you keep asking about Annie? Shouldn’t you be imploring me to change my wicked ways or suffer as you do? For that matter shouldn’t you be Ted or Alan?”
“Not every spiritual intervention is about work or greed. I’ve only borrowed structure, not message. You’ll see soon enough. As for my choice in roles, the fact that you had a recently deceased boss was tempting for Marley, but I had to MC. Marley sets the tone and the stakes. It’s the only place I make sense. This isn’t about your career so Alan or Ted would have set up false expectations in a way I felt would be more of a betrayal to the viewer than a twist. At some point an homage has to take liberties or it risks being a poor copy of the source material which fails to either contribute anything original or live up to the original’s quality.”
“So if you’re not here to convince me that teaching at Greendale is a perfectly reasonable career why are you here?”
“To make you realize that what you’re doing is unsustainable. If you love Annie enough to kill yourself for a chance to be with her, then why is the age gap stopping you?”
“It’s not about what I want Abed. It’s about...it’s about what I can live with. I love her enough that I can’t do that to her.”
“Save it for the ghost of birthdays present Jeff. I’m just here as the setup man, and I may drop in from time to time.”
“So what, you’re going to tell me the first ghost will arrive when the bell tolls 1?”
“No. As much as it’s dramatic wildfire, since we’re in your head there’s not much point in making you wait. Then again, now that I think about it…”
A grandfather clock that Jeff was sure hadn’t been behind him when he entered the room sounds once
“Since we’re in your head, time is meaningless, so it’s much easier to go through the dramatic motions without the dead air in between.”
“I’m not getting out of this am I?”
“Not unless you have your own way to get out of a coma.”
“Don’t worry.” says a familiar female voice from behind him “I’m sure I can have him emotionally healthy before any of the other ghosts show up. Three for one therapy deal.”