Chapter Text
Annie had left the quad seconds after kissing Jeff. The crush of people fleeing the cafeteria had separated them, and she'd been grateful for it. She could, it seemed, only live in the moment for a few minutes at a time. After that, she was the same old Annie who needed to plan for every eventuality.
For the next week, events conspired to keep her from contacting Jeff: a broken cell phone, suspicious parents, and an e-mail languishing in her drafts folder. Then, at a coffee shop near campus, dodging Vaughn's friends and hoping to run in to someone from the group, she spotted two familiar heads bent close together over twin coffees. Jeff and Britta. Britta was looking down, her face hidden behind her blonde hair. At something Jeff said, she looked up at him, and the two laughed intimately.
Annie fled, unshed tears blurring her vision. There was a voicemail from Jeff waiting for her on her repaired phone, but she deleted it without listening.
After three months, the e-mail was still sitting on her hard drive. It had undergone countless re-writes, revisions, and addenda, to the point where it bore almost no resemblance to its original form. Annie kept writing it while she was dragged, miserable, to visit her perfect cousin who attended the most prestigious school in the west, and she edited it often during the weeks she worked at her father's office without pay. In late August, she deleted it. Anything she had to say to Jeff was best said in person, and besides, she was discovering a new taste for procrastination.
First day of class, Annie made her way to the study room, which was occupied only by Shirley. She was scrubbing frantically at the table where she sat, using something that looked like a disinfecting wipe.
"Shirley! How are you? And what are you doing?"
"Annie, it's so nice to see you! I'm fine. Have a good summer?"
"Yes, thank you. But...what's going on? Did something spill on the table?"
"Oh, I'm just cleaning up."
Annie was confused. "Cleaning up after what? I've never seen you do this before."
Shirley had returned to her scrubbing, this time with a fresh towelette. With a resigned look, she started on the rest of the table, stopping only to frown up at Annie. "It's just that this table has been used."
"Used? Do you mean by the summer classes?"
"Something like that."
"I wouldn't worry about it. I'm sure the janitorial crew did a good job of cleaning up. I don't see any crumbs or anything."
Shirley beckoned Annie closer. "You didn't hear this from me, right?"
"Of course not."
"Last spring. The paintball tournament. Jeff and Britta."
"Jeff and Britta what? You mean they were the last two standing?" Dread was beginning to blossom in the pit of her stomach.
"No, I mean - " Shirley lowered her voice significantly " - Jeff and Britta. On our study table." She grimaced. "Not that they're not cute and all – well, Jeff walking out on her at the dance wasn't cute, but I think they're past that – but they could show some consideration to the rest of us, and keep their business out of the study room and off of our table, if you know what I mean."
The dread had turned to nausea. Annie pulled her hands into tight, painful fists and tried to focus on Shirley's face. "Well, I can see why you wanted to clean off the table. What do you mean they're 'past that,' though? Did they get together over the summer?"
"I can't say for sure, but I did see them having lunch at a diner one day when I was out with the boys. They looked friendly enough, and I don't think they'd be out together if they hadn't reconciled. But who knows with those two." Shirley put her hand on Annie's arm. "Annie, honey, you okay? You're all pale all of a sudden."
"I'm fine. Just low blood sugar, I think. I was too stressed to have breakfast."
"Well, you sit down and have a snack. I'm going to go wash my hands before everyone else shows up."
Annie obediently sat in the nearest chair, which happened to be her own. Jeff and Britta. They were together, and not just as coffee buddies. And they'd had sex. Why was she even surprised? How many women had Jeff gone through in two semesters? Professor Slater. Pierce's step-daughter. That kid's mom? And Britta. That man-whore. She focused her vitriol on Jeff in order to distract herself from her own shame and embarrassment. How could she have thought she meant more to him than a passing make-out partner? Besides, he and Britta were obviously well-suited. Both had full command of that effortless, bitter repartee that could only signal that they were destined to be together.
"I hope those are Hawthorne Wipes." Pierce entered the room, eying Shirley's towelettes. "How was Vermont? Hippie paradise? Glad to see you're still shaving your legs."
Annie turned on him with venom. "I e-mailed everyone that I didn't go to Delaware months ago. And my personal hygiene is none of your business. Plus, they're not Hawthorne Wipes, because these actually have antibacterial properties."
Pierce raised his hands. "Whoa, whoa! Did you transform into Britta over the summer? This group already has its feminazi space taken. And I'll have you know that the antibacterial line of Hawthorne Wipes was rolled out in summer 2009." He gave her a winning smile. "I forgot to mention, it's nice to see you, Annie, and I hope you had a wonderful summer."
She felt guilty. "I'm sorry, Pierce, that was rude. I don't know what got into me. How was your summer? Did you and Troy have fun?"
He shook his head at her sympathetically. "That time of the month, then?"
Jeff, Britta, Troy, and Abed entered the room in a cluster of chatter and laughter, but Jeff and Britta were more clustered, just like Troy and Abed always were. It was, Annie thought, more like two separate clusters of two temporarily joining forces to make a paired set. Shirley followed, and the group, aside from Annie, coalesced into an single unit of hugs and greetings, with Jeff as its nucleus. Annie watched scornfully as Jeff said exactly the right thing to everyone, making them feel comfortable and welcomed with his silver-tongued, lawyerly deceptions. He'd been bamboozling them all since the beginning. She remembered how, last fall, she'd been awed by the fact that someone as handsome, cool, and accomplished as Jeff was willing to be part of their group. Well, that was over. She was done drinking the Jeff Winger Kool-Aid. She was going to handle this with icy dignity – no more dramatic outbursts – and –
Then she realized everyone had turned to stare at her. "Annie, are you okay?" Britta asked.
"She might be a little touchy this week, if you get my drift," Pierce informed everyone.
Britta and Shirley glared at Pierce, but Annie sprang up from her seat and said "I'm fine! Just so happy to see you guys!" She joined the group hug, ducking under Jeff's arm to avoid any contact with him, and greeted everyone else. Jeff shot her a puzzled glance, but she ignored him.
Sitting around the table, they talked about the summer. Abed, Troy, and Pierce had watched the entire MST3K series and almost every RiffTrax. "They were funny, but I'm convinced we can do better," Abed announced. "We're going to do our own, starting with Killers and Eclipse, which are both ridiculous. We want some special guest commentators, too. Any of you guys up for it?"
"I don't know if they're funny enough," Troy said, looking them over critically. "We might want to have them submit audition tapes."
"Nah, we've seen their work," Abed waved his hand.
"What?" Pierce yelped. "You made me do an audition!"
Abed frowned at him. "After the Kickpuncher debacle, we had to make sure you weren't going to have someone else ghost write your lines. That was a strike against you. We know, for example, that Annie's never going to cheat. It would go against her nature. Speaking of Annie, we didn't see you over the summer. I thought you might want to come to some of our movie nights when I sent out the general invitations."
"Yeah, Annie, where were you all summer?" Troy asked.
She squirmed. "I, was, uh, busy? With family stuff. And traveling."
"There's still a lot of tension in the group. I'm concerned that it may corrupt our signature dynamic," Abed said.
Britta squinched up her face. "Uh, yeah. About that. I want to apologize to all of you about what happened on prom night. I know I've talked to most of you since then, but not as a group. So, I'm sorry. It was ridiculous and I regret it. Can that be the end of it?"
There was a chorus of "Sure!" and "Certainly!" and "Of course!" from around the table, except from Pierce, who said, "Does that mean you and Jeff are banging?"
Shirley kicked Annie under the table and grinned.
Jeff scowled at Pierce and said, "Britta asked that that be the end of it, so let's respect her wishes, okay?"
"He's being gallant, which means he's totally hitting that," Pierce announced.
"'Hitting that'? Who teaches him these things? Troy, didn't I talk to you about being more responsible about what slang terms you explain to Pierce?" Jeff was exasperated.
"He just picks them up! It's like trying to be careful around a little kid. I can't do it all the time."
As if on cue, Dean Pelton burst through the door of the study room. "Hello, all! Welcome back to another semester at Greendale! It just warms my heart to see you back here as a group, even after the drama that occurred the last time we were together."
Britta slumped in her chair.
"Dude, the last time we saw you, you were slow-dancing with two people dressed up in Dalmatian costumes," Troy snickered.
Dean Pelton drew up stiffly. "Fursecution is a serious problem on today's college campus, and I'm scheduling a Furry Awareness and Tolerance week for later this semester. You, young man, would do well to attend."
"Fursecution?" Troy mouthed, bewildered.
Dean Pelton continued in a more modulated tone, "But that's not why I'm here. I want Greendale to replicate in 2010 the unmatched triumph it had in 2009. By that, of course, I mean a victory in the debate team regionals. Miss Edison has already committed, but her former partner has transferred, so I'm appealing to Jeffrey to make last year's interim position permanent. We all know that you two make an unstoppable team. All of last year's contingent benefits would continue as well. I saw that you already took the liberty of parking in the reserved lot."
Jeff looked disaffected, but after stretching it out for a moment said, "Okay. I'm in."
"Excellent!" Dean Pelton clasped his hands together. "I'll have my staff start on the press releases immediately." He turned on his heel and left the room.
"What did you just do?" Troy asked Jeff. "Because I'm having trouble believing that you just said you'd go around in a Greendale cardigan and make an idiot of yourself to win another tiny-ass trophy to put in that empty case."
Jeff shrugged. "Honestly? It's a good way to keep my hand in, now that I'm not speaking in court every day. Plus, you didn't expect me to park among the plebes all year, did you?"
"Well, just so long as you two don't try to win every debate the way you did the one last year," Shirley giggled.
Annie was speechless. She could feel Jeff looking at her. "I think we'll make a great team," he said quietly.
"And can someone tell me what the hell 'fursecution' means?" Troy asked.
"It means that this is shaping up to be an interesting year," Abed answered.