It Was The Smartest Thing I Ever Did, Because Now You're Here (2/?)
Title: It Was The Smartest Thing I Ever Did, Because Now You're Here
Author: x_avecia_x
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Oh there be profanity and sex in this one.
Word Count: 3,837
Disclaimer: I do not own Community - although I would totally marry Dan Harmon then claim half in our (inevitable) divorce settlement - that is unless he conceeds to my end game Jeff/Annie demands.
Summary: Annie and Jeff deal with the consequences of their attraction.
Author's Note: Such a great response to the first chapter so thank you! And I guess my whole plot has been rumbled, although if you haven't figured it out yet and haven't read the comments on chapter 1 then I won't spoil you but in this chapter we go back in time from the first chapter to my 'Halloween Episode' (bonus points if anyone can guess the movie I reference in this - and no I don't mean the title of this story).
I fear that both Annie & Jeff are totally OOC in this instalment, Annie moreso, but I figured that she's grown a bit hard after Jeff's dismissal of the 'Annie of it all' - well in my head!canon anyway. I'm still waiting for Annie to take Jeff on about that considering we've gotten even more lingering looks this season I think than the last one combined and we're only on episode 4!
And as a sidenote, how amazing was this week's episode - I kinda freaked when I though Troy found something other than a gun in Annie's bag!
Anyways, hope you enjoy.x
______
Monday 31st October 2011
So far, third year at Greendale had been even stranger than the previous two Jeff had experienced - well not so much experienced, more like suffered through.
It had been a full eight weeks since college had recommenced after the Summer and Pierce was still trying to deny that he missed having a group of friends to talk to (read: people to be borderline racist/sexist/homophobic to). He denied this of course, but when passing Jeff in one of the corridors between class he proceeded to ask if he’d finally come out of the closet over summer break.
Troy had somehow managed to turn Greendale’s Human Beings into a group of players that semi-resembled a winning football team. And it totally had nothing to do with getting them to do a Beyonce style version of the Maori Haka War Dance before each game to freak out the opposition - which was also totally not stolen from that one episode of Glee Troy had sat through, much to the despair of his best friend.
Shirley struggled to get her post-pregnancy hormones under control (and as a consequence, her ability to make Troy cry at the drop of a hat) but after Abed of all people had a total mental breakdown (again) about constantly being told to stop being Meta, she dialled back her mothering (or smothering as Jeff thought on occasion) of the group enough for her gossip addiction to be the only thing that concerned them again.
Abed had (as a consequence of the full on nuclear meltdown he’d experienced with Shirley) agreed to not be Meta so much and Britta had decided to give Cougar Town a try (they also started hooking up which quite frankly grossed everyone out, but Jeff figured it might be a once in a lifetime event for the TV geek so Jeff urged the rest of the group to just go with it - but that was only after Britta threatened Abed with no further relations unless he stopped doing a 30 second recap for the group before each study session).
And then there was Annie.
That was the strangest change of all. It was like a completely different person who walked into Study Room F on the first day of term. She’d dialled back on the knitted twin sets, floral skirts and backpack with endless pockets. Instead, she seemed to find Greendale’s most local Urban Outfitters over the break, found herself a practical yet girly tan leather messenger bag and of all things started to wear her hair up in these messy little buns that Jeff knew from the precious time spent pruning his own hair, would have taken a lot more time to perfect every morning than Annie hoped it would appear. She looked like a typical twenty year old student.
But even stranger than that, Annie was still...Annie.
She still recorded all of her classes on her Dictaphone, she was still the reason that he got drawn into the debating team (again) and she still managed to kick everyone’s ass when they went to an actual paint ball arena as a reward for surviving the first week back at Greendale (Troy was heartbroken that he was beaten by a girl so cried the entire way home, and Jeff was mildly pissed that his cheap ploy of running around in a tight white tank top did nothing to distract Annie long enough for him to get a good aim at her - he decided she must either be blind or a lesbian at that point).
She was Annie, just a little more...relaxed. And if every member of the study group were to be honest, this was not the Annie they expected to see when she returned to Greendale after the summer break of 2011 - especially once they found out about her and Abed during the paintball game.
They all expected a similar reaction to how things happened the previous year when Annie’s thinly veiled attraction to Jeff could easily have manifested itself (cue Annie’s unbelievable right hook) if things hadn’t been nipped in the bud. But Annie firmly declared on her first day back that she only let the kiss with Abed during paintball continue for as long as it did because she gave into her long suppressed fascination with Harrison Ford and in particular his portrayal of Han Solo in Star Wars. She did however state that if Abed had been prepared to stay in character things might have been different.
Britta didn’t much like that idea.
Jeff to be fair was more concerned about the infatuation with Harrison Ford than any infatuation with Abed (she really did have a thing for older guys, didn’t she?) - but maybe not as concerned as he was about Annie’s even newer infatuation with wearing jeans that were so tight on her ass it was almost as if they were sprayed on.
And so they all continued on with their weird, pseudo-family-like existence - they argued and broke up, before making up and having breakfast at Denny’s because it was for winners, and in Troy and Abed’s joint opinion they had watched enough situation comedies and underdog films to know that they were winners.
It wasn’t until Halloween rolled around that things started to go downhill again. Pierce had stopped even shouting ‘gay!’ as he passed Jeff in the hallways, Shirley experienced a return of her hormones, Troy was a nervous wreck, Britta and Abed were fighting (well, Britta fought, Abed struggled to understand why their argument wasn’t resolved within a 30 minute episode before heading back to his dorm room to make up) and Annie, well...she spent less and less time with the group which, with everyone else concerned with their own problem, wasn’t something they had actively noticed.
Except for Jeff.
He tried to bring it up with his friends, he’d even tried to bring it up with Annie but she simply smiled, shrugged and told him, ‘she had a life outside of the group as well,’ and that maybe he should ‘think about getting help for his possessiveness issues’ before turning and walking away.
And that of course made him feel like shit. Who the hell was she to tell him he had ‘possessiveness issues’ when just under eighteen months ago she’d got Chang fired in an effort just to keep the group together?
So he didn’t buy what she was selling and decided if the rest of the group wasn’t going to help him figure out what was up with Annie then he would damn well figure it out himself - he did used to be a lawyer after all.
And that’s why he was currently sitting in the corner of the library, slouched in a seat, eyes following her as she moved her way through the crowds of people (for a reason he couldn’t understand, after the freaky events of last year’s Halloween that nobody could remember, almost every student on campus wanted to turn up - he gave up trying to figure out why after about thirty seconds). The fact that he could quite easily have looked like a creepy pervert watching a young girl like she was his prey was not lost on him, but he was determined to get to the bottom of what had made Annie feel like she wanted or needed to spend time apart from her friends.
Putting things into perspective, he didn’t think he was crazy. She’d been quick to barge her way into his problems before to try and fix them - so he had no issue with doing the same to her (let her have a taste of her own medicine).
He watched as she chatted to plenty of people he knew, and even more that he didn’t. He also caught the look on the majority of the male student population’s faces when she took off her coat to reveal nothing but a shower curtain draped across her body, held up with a line of curtain hooks over her right shoulder. The blonde wig and the fake blood she’d trickled down the front of the shower curtain told him that this year she’d decided to go as Janet Leigh from Psycho - something which Abed appreciated greatly by giving her a double shotgun thumbs up, muttering ‘Cool. Cool, cool, cool,’ before he stalked off to find Britta (who this year had come as a giant shark).
So he sat there and watched her, noting no obvious signs of depression or even worse, having found another, better group of friends to hang around with (although Jeff knew that was a ridiculous notion considering how awesome the study group was, especially because he was in it). When Jeff was sure that she wouldn’t see him following her, he got up out of the seat and tailed her out of the study room, down the corridor. He watched as she soon disappeared into one of the other study rooms and tried to peek through the glass to see what she was up to but it was too dark see anything. He debated going in after her and stood there for a good two minutes arguing with himself about the pros and cons of doing just that. And Jeff Winger in an argument against Jeff Winger could go on all night - which was why when he heard the loud ‘ah-hem!’ behind him he was startled and rattled his fist of the glass window pane.
When he caught his breath and finished berating himself for acting like such a little girl, he looked behind him and there stood Annie with her hands on her hips and a face on her that Abed would suggest was very Season One - you know, that formidable look.
‘Just what in the hell are you doing? Do you realise how disturbing you look right now?’
He could tell she was looking for an explanation (seriously, who wouldn’t find some idiot dressed up as JFK openly acting like a peeping tom anything less than creepy?) The only thing he could think of to mumble was something he used when mostly trying to get Annie on side.
‘Milady...’
‘Don’t you Milady me Jeff Winger, were you seriously just following me there?’
Jeff sighed and looked tiredly back at Annie.
‘It’s not as creepy as it looks ok? I just wanted to make sure you were ok. You’ve been a little...distant recently. And what were you doing?’
‘Yeah, well, after Halloween it’s the run up to finals Jeff, everyone’s been acting a bit distant. And for your information I caught you in the other room watching me so I wanted to see if I was imagining it - because, you know apparently I’m prone to making stuff like that up.’
He shook his head at the bitter tone her voice adopted and tried to refrain from slamming the heel of his hand against the study room window again. He decided to ignore the last part of her sentence completely.
‘No, Annie. Everyone’s acting a bit strange but the one common factor to that is that they annoyingly insist on doing it in front of my face, during the time we spend together as a group. You on the other hand, have not been around that group for the past week.’
Annie simply shrugged, ‘I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.’
Jeff sighed again and went to talk again but was interrupted by the AV club running down the hall chasing Britta shouting ‘Jaguar Shark!’ dressed in light blue track suits and red, wool-knit hats in a homage to some film that he was sure Abed would be able to tell him about.
‘Ok, maybe this isn’t the best place to talk...’
Annie half snorted and looked straight at Jeff.
‘What is there to talk about? You were acting weird tonight and...’
‘I was acting weird because you were and I...’
He was cut off as another couple of members of the AV club ran down the hall shouting ‘Esteban!’
Jeff lost all patience with the situation, ‘...look, would you just come in here for a minute?’
And he pulled her inside the darkened, unfamiliar study room.
‘Good, now I have your attention - what the hell is going on with you Annie?’
‘It’s...look, it’s nothing ok. You don’t need to worry about me. I’m fine.’
Jeff wasn’t able to see her properly in the dark but once upon a time he was paid to spot the lies in testimonies for a living, so it wasn’t hard to tell she was keeping something back.
‘I’m not buying it. Annie, I’m your friend, you can talk to me you know.’
‘We’re not friends Jeff, you’ve got a nerve to say that we can be friends after what you did to me last year. You denied there was anything going on with us which hurt me. But I got over it. So excuse me for drying off my delusional ideas by taking them out of the shallow end of the college pool that is our study group, where might I add there are no apparent viable options for male companionship, and instead decided to dive right into the deep end by making other friends. Is that really a conversation you want to have with me right now?’
Jeff sat there like he was five years old and he just been lectured by his mother for giving her cheek.
‘It’s a lot more complicated than that Annie...’
‘God, not this again. Jeff I’m really not interested in hearing the same crap come out of your mouth to justify why you acted the way you did towards me. It’s always the same with you - you never give a straight answer when asked a question. So I’m done. I’m done with you and the way you play our study group like your some kind of stringed instrument.’
And the moment she turned away from him he realized she was deadly serious as his eyes adjusted to the darkness - no lingering look, no Disney eyes, nothing. He wasn’t prepared to let Annie just walk away from their group like that.
‘Annie, wait...’
He pulled her back around to face him and felt her tense immediately at the way he was gripping her shoulders. He’ll never understand why he did what he did next, but if he had to take a stab at it he’d tell himself that in the interests of not hearing any further character assassination come out of her mouth, he kissed her to shut her up.
‘Jeff...’ she mumbled into his mouth, trying to push away slightly but he was determined to keep kissing her until she just let all of her anger go. And the moment he felt the tension in her shoulders ease, he deepened the kiss, feeling her finally respond to him.
He gripped the sides of her flimsy shower curtain dress pulling her even closer, feeling her pull on his shoulders to keep him close. It was different from when they’d kissed before, different because he could tell she was still angry with him, even as he moved her backwards towards the sofa.
Thankfully though she seemed to have lost her ability to argue with him.
‘I shouldn’t be doing this,’ he sighed into her ear as he moved his mouth back along her jaw line to her lips, ‘this was complicated enough before.’
Annie didn’t respond verbally, instead she pushed further up to him and pulled him backwards onto the sofa, where he landed on top of her, forced between her legs.
‘Well this is only going to complicate things more for you,’ she muttered breathlessly as he ran his hands over her chest and down her side, resting them finally on her hip, ‘I already know how well you handle complicated.’
She was right, he didn’t handle anything to do with their attraction in a manner that could be described as appropriate. He’d shot any chance of that to hell when he practically tackled her with a kiss.
But as much as he knew this wasn’t how things should be between them, he didn’t want to stop. And for whatever crazy reason, she kept kissing him as he moved properly in between her legs, pushing down to give her no confusion as to where he wanted it to lead.
‘Let me worry about that.’
Annie’s eyes were glued shut as she bit her lip when Jeff moved his lips along her neck once again. She braced her free arm over her head as she pulled on him harder and faster to match the way he was teasing her below.
Somehow he managed to pull away from Annie, her hot breaths in Jeff’s ear making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.
‘You drive me out of my mind, you must know that right?’
A jolt of adrenalin ran through her chest and straight down below as she bit her lip and nodded furiously. Crushing her lips back to his, Jeff moved his hands under them, and set about quickly bringing them together, the groan of her pleasure perhaps all too loud considering the lack of real privacy of their location. Anyone could have walked in at anytime. What was it with him and study rooms?
Yet all it did was serve to make him grow harder as he almost lost it completely, only stopping when she squeezed his shoulder and pulled away, breathing in deeply.
Jeff had no a clue what to do, lying there with her shuddering beneath him. He lay as still as possible, buried deep within her. But Annie’s grip on his shoulder loosened and her breathing evened out. Opening her eyes, Annie looked at Jeff, trying to understand what was happening. Almost without thinking she trailed her hand up to cup his face, and before he knew it his mouth was on hers once again. Locked to his lips she wriggled underneath him, driving her hips against his. He moved against her again, gently this time. She stiffened slightly, but groaned in pleasure as he slid fully into her. She couldn’t help the ‘Oh God’ that escaped her as Jeff fought for control of his own body, the adrenalin threatening to take over more than it had done already.
Slowly Annie tilted her hips, giving him easier access. After a second or two, she tightened the grip of her legs around Jeff’s waist again and he let one of his hands move back to feel the smooth expanse of her leg, gripping ever so slightly at her knee to hold her in place. Her legs urged him to move faster and go deeper. So he did, filling her, then emptying her quickly, doing it again…and again…and again.
She was silent except for the tight moans and groans resounding in the small space. Any movement or change in direction elicited a little gasp and she violently arched her back off the couch, bringing her into him, her neck open for Jeff to run his mouth along it.
She looked wanton and every time she moaned in pleasure Jeff could feel himself getting closer to the point of no return. Intoxicated was probably the best word he could use to describe how it felt. The way she reacted to each thrust, how her fingernails dig into his shoulder...he couldn’t hold back much longer, his head dizzy with the anticipation.
Reaching down, he worked his hand in between them, his fingers drawing circles, putting pressure on her even further below. He felt her muscles contract and expand in a repetitive motion. Moving away from her, he sat up almost kneeling to watch, still moving inside her as Annie arched her back again, closed her eyes then let out the most pleasured sounding moan he’d ever heard in his life followed by his name over and over again.
Well that did it for him, hearing his name on her lips, he came inside her with a jerking spasm and an almost endless climax.
When it was over, he lay down beside her, completely spent.
She looked back at him, looking like she wanted to speak but not quite knowing what to say. Jeff struggled to find the words that wouldn’t spoil the moment, or put them back to square one.
‘I’m sorry...’
Clearly not the right words as she moved off the couch, silently readjusting her outfit and underwear before turning back to him.
‘No need for apologies, it happened. I wanted that as much as you did. But clearly I was right, this has already complicated things.’
He couldn’t really argue with her. He’d just had sex with the one girl he really should have known better than to do it with. That crossed the one boundary he thought he’d be able to stick to. But when the time came for sensible decisions, he’d acted just as selfishly as he always did - he had serious issues about abandonment that he was not in any way going to start addressing while he was still lying there with his pants and boxers around his ankles.
‘I don’t want you to walk away...from the group,’ he knows the last part of what he had to say wasn’t the whole truth but he couldn’t quite find it in himself to say that he didn’t want her to walk away from him.
She laughed somewhat bitterly and moved towards the door.
‘They’re my friends Jeff, I’m not going to walk away from them. Just...from now on don’t expect me to be such a walkover when it comes to you. I’m not an idiot and I’m not the same naive little girl you seem to think I am - something tells me after tonight you’ll think twice before dismissing me like you usually do.’
‘Well this has to be the worst post-sex conversation I’ve had in a long time...’ he muttered to himself, feeling distinctly uncomfortable.
‘That’s it out your system, and mine for that matter, and now we can go back to attempting to tolerate each other for the sake of the group.’
He looked at her, really looked at the way she was standing in front of him, and he would kick himself if he could because she still was capable of giving him a look that said she saw right through him.
‘Annie I don’t want it to be like this. This,’ he gestured between them, ‘I’m no good at - I don’t know how to fix things and end up fucking things up even more. All I wanted was for things to go back to normal, whatever the hell that is - but this? Isn’t it.’
Annie nodded curtly and opened the door to the study room to leave.
‘Normal would be nice, but this is Greendale - who are you trying to kid? But maybe, we’ll learn to be friends again someday. I just can’t promise when - perhaps when you stop lying to the group, to me and most importantly yourself.’
And with that she was gone.
‘Well...shit.’
Author: x_avecia_x
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Oh there be profanity and sex in this one.
Word Count: 3,837
Disclaimer: I do not own Community - although I would totally marry Dan Harmon then claim half in our (inevitable) divorce settlement - that is unless he conceeds to my end game Jeff/Annie demands.
Summary: Annie and Jeff deal with the consequences of their attraction.
Author's Note: Such a great response to the first chapter so thank you! And I guess my whole plot has been rumbled, although if you haven't figured it out yet and haven't read the comments on chapter 1 then I won't spoil you but in this chapter we go back in time from the first chapter to my 'Halloween Episode' (bonus points if anyone can guess the movie I reference in this - and no I don't mean the title of this story).
I fear that both Annie & Jeff are totally OOC in this instalment, Annie moreso, but I figured that she's grown a bit hard after Jeff's dismissal of the 'Annie of it all' - well in my head!canon anyway. I'm still waiting for Annie to take Jeff on about that considering we've gotten even more lingering looks this season I think than the last one combined and we're only on episode 4!
And as a sidenote, how amazing was this week's episode - I kinda freaked when I though Troy found something other than a gun in Annie's bag!
Anyways, hope you enjoy.x
______
Monday 31st October 2011
So far, third year at Greendale had been even stranger than the previous two Jeff had experienced - well not so much experienced, more like suffered through.
It had been a full eight weeks since college had recommenced after the Summer and Pierce was still trying to deny that he missed having a group of friends to talk to (read: people to be borderline racist/sexist/homophobic to). He denied this of course, but when passing Jeff in one of the corridors between class he proceeded to ask if he’d finally come out of the closet over summer break.
Troy had somehow managed to turn Greendale’s Human Beings into a group of players that semi-resembled a winning football team. And it totally had nothing to do with getting them to do a Beyonce style version of the Maori Haka War Dance before each game to freak out the opposition - which was also totally not stolen from that one episode of Glee Troy had sat through, much to the despair of his best friend.
Shirley struggled to get her post-pregnancy hormones under control (and as a consequence, her ability to make Troy cry at the drop of a hat) but after Abed of all people had a total mental breakdown (again) about constantly being told to stop being Meta, she dialled back her mothering (or smothering as Jeff thought on occasion) of the group enough for her gossip addiction to be the only thing that concerned them again.
Abed had (as a consequence of the full on nuclear meltdown he’d experienced with Shirley) agreed to not be Meta so much and Britta had decided to give Cougar Town a try (they also started hooking up which quite frankly grossed everyone out, but Jeff figured it might be a once in a lifetime event for the TV geek so Jeff urged the rest of the group to just go with it - but that was only after Britta threatened Abed with no further relations unless he stopped doing a 30 second recap for the group before each study session).
And then there was Annie.
That was the strangest change of all. It was like a completely different person who walked into Study Room F on the first day of term. She’d dialled back on the knitted twin sets, floral skirts and backpack with endless pockets. Instead, she seemed to find Greendale’s most local Urban Outfitters over the break, found herself a practical yet girly tan leather messenger bag and of all things started to wear her hair up in these messy little buns that Jeff knew from the precious time spent pruning his own hair, would have taken a lot more time to perfect every morning than Annie hoped it would appear. She looked like a typical twenty year old student.
But even stranger than that, Annie was still...Annie.
She still recorded all of her classes on her Dictaphone, she was still the reason that he got drawn into the debating team (again) and she still managed to kick everyone’s ass when they went to an actual paint ball arena as a reward for surviving the first week back at Greendale (Troy was heartbroken that he was beaten by a girl so cried the entire way home, and Jeff was mildly pissed that his cheap ploy of running around in a tight white tank top did nothing to distract Annie long enough for him to get a good aim at her - he decided she must either be blind or a lesbian at that point).
She was Annie, just a little more...relaxed. And if every member of the study group were to be honest, this was not the Annie they expected to see when she returned to Greendale after the summer break of 2011 - especially once they found out about her and Abed during the paintball game.
They all expected a similar reaction to how things happened the previous year when Annie’s thinly veiled attraction to Jeff could easily have manifested itself (cue Annie’s unbelievable right hook) if things hadn’t been nipped in the bud. But Annie firmly declared on her first day back that she only let the kiss with Abed during paintball continue for as long as it did because she gave into her long suppressed fascination with Harrison Ford and in particular his portrayal of Han Solo in Star Wars. She did however state that if Abed had been prepared to stay in character things might have been different.
Britta didn’t much like that idea.
Jeff to be fair was more concerned about the infatuation with Harrison Ford than any infatuation with Abed (she really did have a thing for older guys, didn’t she?) - but maybe not as concerned as he was about Annie’s even newer infatuation with wearing jeans that were so tight on her ass it was almost as if they were sprayed on.
And so they all continued on with their weird, pseudo-family-like existence - they argued and broke up, before making up and having breakfast at Denny’s because it was for winners, and in Troy and Abed’s joint opinion they had watched enough situation comedies and underdog films to know that they were winners.
It wasn’t until Halloween rolled around that things started to go downhill again. Pierce had stopped even shouting ‘gay!’ as he passed Jeff in the hallways, Shirley experienced a return of her hormones, Troy was a nervous wreck, Britta and Abed were fighting (well, Britta fought, Abed struggled to understand why their argument wasn’t resolved within a 30 minute episode before heading back to his dorm room to make up) and Annie, well...she spent less and less time with the group which, with everyone else concerned with their own problem, wasn’t something they had actively noticed.
Except for Jeff.
He tried to bring it up with his friends, he’d even tried to bring it up with Annie but she simply smiled, shrugged and told him, ‘she had a life outside of the group as well,’ and that maybe he should ‘think about getting help for his possessiveness issues’ before turning and walking away.
And that of course made him feel like shit. Who the hell was she to tell him he had ‘possessiveness issues’ when just under eighteen months ago she’d got Chang fired in an effort just to keep the group together?
So he didn’t buy what she was selling and decided if the rest of the group wasn’t going to help him figure out what was up with Annie then he would damn well figure it out himself - he did used to be a lawyer after all.
And that’s why he was currently sitting in the corner of the library, slouched in a seat, eyes following her as she moved her way through the crowds of people (for a reason he couldn’t understand, after the freaky events of last year’s Halloween that nobody could remember, almost every student on campus wanted to turn up - he gave up trying to figure out why after about thirty seconds). The fact that he could quite easily have looked like a creepy pervert watching a young girl like she was his prey was not lost on him, but he was determined to get to the bottom of what had made Annie feel like she wanted or needed to spend time apart from her friends.
Putting things into perspective, he didn’t think he was crazy. She’d been quick to barge her way into his problems before to try and fix them - so he had no issue with doing the same to her (let her have a taste of her own medicine).
He watched as she chatted to plenty of people he knew, and even more that he didn’t. He also caught the look on the majority of the male student population’s faces when she took off her coat to reveal nothing but a shower curtain draped across her body, held up with a line of curtain hooks over her right shoulder. The blonde wig and the fake blood she’d trickled down the front of the shower curtain told him that this year she’d decided to go as Janet Leigh from Psycho - something which Abed appreciated greatly by giving her a double shotgun thumbs up, muttering ‘Cool. Cool, cool, cool,’ before he stalked off to find Britta (who this year had come as a giant shark).
So he sat there and watched her, noting no obvious signs of depression or even worse, having found another, better group of friends to hang around with (although Jeff knew that was a ridiculous notion considering how awesome the study group was, especially because he was in it). When Jeff was sure that she wouldn’t see him following her, he got up out of the seat and tailed her out of the study room, down the corridor. He watched as she soon disappeared into one of the other study rooms and tried to peek through the glass to see what she was up to but it was too dark see anything. He debated going in after her and stood there for a good two minutes arguing with himself about the pros and cons of doing just that. And Jeff Winger in an argument against Jeff Winger could go on all night - which was why when he heard the loud ‘ah-hem!’ behind him he was startled and rattled his fist of the glass window pane.
When he caught his breath and finished berating himself for acting like such a little girl, he looked behind him and there stood Annie with her hands on her hips and a face on her that Abed would suggest was very Season One - you know, that formidable look.
‘Just what in the hell are you doing? Do you realise how disturbing you look right now?’
He could tell she was looking for an explanation (seriously, who wouldn’t find some idiot dressed up as JFK openly acting like a peeping tom anything less than creepy?) The only thing he could think of to mumble was something he used when mostly trying to get Annie on side.
‘Milady...’
‘Don’t you Milady me Jeff Winger, were you seriously just following me there?’
Jeff sighed and looked tiredly back at Annie.
‘It’s not as creepy as it looks ok? I just wanted to make sure you were ok. You’ve been a little...distant recently. And what were you doing?’
‘Yeah, well, after Halloween it’s the run up to finals Jeff, everyone’s been acting a bit distant. And for your information I caught you in the other room watching me so I wanted to see if I was imagining it - because, you know apparently I’m prone to making stuff like that up.’
He shook his head at the bitter tone her voice adopted and tried to refrain from slamming the heel of his hand against the study room window again. He decided to ignore the last part of her sentence completely.
‘No, Annie. Everyone’s acting a bit strange but the one common factor to that is that they annoyingly insist on doing it in front of my face, during the time we spend together as a group. You on the other hand, have not been around that group for the past week.’
Annie simply shrugged, ‘I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.’
Jeff sighed again and went to talk again but was interrupted by the AV club running down the hall chasing Britta shouting ‘Jaguar Shark!’ dressed in light blue track suits and red, wool-knit hats in a homage to some film that he was sure Abed would be able to tell him about.
‘Ok, maybe this isn’t the best place to talk...’
Annie half snorted and looked straight at Jeff.
‘What is there to talk about? You were acting weird tonight and...’
‘I was acting weird because you were and I...’
He was cut off as another couple of members of the AV club ran down the hall shouting ‘Esteban!’
Jeff lost all patience with the situation, ‘...look, would you just come in here for a minute?’
And he pulled her inside the darkened, unfamiliar study room.
‘Good, now I have your attention - what the hell is going on with you Annie?’
‘It’s...look, it’s nothing ok. You don’t need to worry about me. I’m fine.’
Jeff wasn’t able to see her properly in the dark but once upon a time he was paid to spot the lies in testimonies for a living, so it wasn’t hard to tell she was keeping something back.
‘I’m not buying it. Annie, I’m your friend, you can talk to me you know.’
‘We’re not friends Jeff, you’ve got a nerve to say that we can be friends after what you did to me last year. You denied there was anything going on with us which hurt me. But I got over it. So excuse me for drying off my delusional ideas by taking them out of the shallow end of the college pool that is our study group, where might I add there are no apparent viable options for male companionship, and instead decided to dive right into the deep end by making other friends. Is that really a conversation you want to have with me right now?’
Jeff sat there like he was five years old and he just been lectured by his mother for giving her cheek.
‘It’s a lot more complicated than that Annie...’
‘God, not this again. Jeff I’m really not interested in hearing the same crap come out of your mouth to justify why you acted the way you did towards me. It’s always the same with you - you never give a straight answer when asked a question. So I’m done. I’m done with you and the way you play our study group like your some kind of stringed instrument.’
And the moment she turned away from him he realized she was deadly serious as his eyes adjusted to the darkness - no lingering look, no Disney eyes, nothing. He wasn’t prepared to let Annie just walk away from their group like that.
‘Annie, wait...’
He pulled her back around to face him and felt her tense immediately at the way he was gripping her shoulders. He’ll never understand why he did what he did next, but if he had to take a stab at it he’d tell himself that in the interests of not hearing any further character assassination come out of her mouth, he kissed her to shut her up.
‘Jeff...’ she mumbled into his mouth, trying to push away slightly but he was determined to keep kissing her until she just let all of her anger go. And the moment he felt the tension in her shoulders ease, he deepened the kiss, feeling her finally respond to him.
He gripped the sides of her flimsy shower curtain dress pulling her even closer, feeling her pull on his shoulders to keep him close. It was different from when they’d kissed before, different because he could tell she was still angry with him, even as he moved her backwards towards the sofa.
Thankfully though she seemed to have lost her ability to argue with him.
‘I shouldn’t be doing this,’ he sighed into her ear as he moved his mouth back along her jaw line to her lips, ‘this was complicated enough before.’
Annie didn’t respond verbally, instead she pushed further up to him and pulled him backwards onto the sofa, where he landed on top of her, forced between her legs.
‘Well this is only going to complicate things more for you,’ she muttered breathlessly as he ran his hands over her chest and down her side, resting them finally on her hip, ‘I already know how well you handle complicated.’
She was right, he didn’t handle anything to do with their attraction in a manner that could be described as appropriate. He’d shot any chance of that to hell when he practically tackled her with a kiss.
But as much as he knew this wasn’t how things should be between them, he didn’t want to stop. And for whatever crazy reason, she kept kissing him as he moved properly in between her legs, pushing down to give her no confusion as to where he wanted it to lead.
‘Let me worry about that.’
Annie’s eyes were glued shut as she bit her lip when Jeff moved his lips along her neck once again. She braced her free arm over her head as she pulled on him harder and faster to match the way he was teasing her below.
Somehow he managed to pull away from Annie, her hot breaths in Jeff’s ear making the hairs on the back of his neck stand up.
‘You drive me out of my mind, you must know that right?’
A jolt of adrenalin ran through her chest and straight down below as she bit her lip and nodded furiously. Crushing her lips back to his, Jeff moved his hands under them, and set about quickly bringing them together, the groan of her pleasure perhaps all too loud considering the lack of real privacy of their location. Anyone could have walked in at anytime. What was it with him and study rooms?
Yet all it did was serve to make him grow harder as he almost lost it completely, only stopping when she squeezed his shoulder and pulled away, breathing in deeply.
Jeff had no a clue what to do, lying there with her shuddering beneath him. He lay as still as possible, buried deep within her. But Annie’s grip on his shoulder loosened and her breathing evened out. Opening her eyes, Annie looked at Jeff, trying to understand what was happening. Almost without thinking she trailed her hand up to cup his face, and before he knew it his mouth was on hers once again. Locked to his lips she wriggled underneath him, driving her hips against his. He moved against her again, gently this time. She stiffened slightly, but groaned in pleasure as he slid fully into her. She couldn’t help the ‘Oh God’ that escaped her as Jeff fought for control of his own body, the adrenalin threatening to take over more than it had done already.
Slowly Annie tilted her hips, giving him easier access. After a second or two, she tightened the grip of her legs around Jeff’s waist again and he let one of his hands move back to feel the smooth expanse of her leg, gripping ever so slightly at her knee to hold her in place. Her legs urged him to move faster and go deeper. So he did, filling her, then emptying her quickly, doing it again…and again…and again.
She was silent except for the tight moans and groans resounding in the small space. Any movement or change in direction elicited a little gasp and she violently arched her back off the couch, bringing her into him, her neck open for Jeff to run his mouth along it.
She looked wanton and every time she moaned in pleasure Jeff could feel himself getting closer to the point of no return. Intoxicated was probably the best word he could use to describe how it felt. The way she reacted to each thrust, how her fingernails dig into his shoulder...he couldn’t hold back much longer, his head dizzy with the anticipation.
Reaching down, he worked his hand in between them, his fingers drawing circles, putting pressure on her even further below. He felt her muscles contract and expand in a repetitive motion. Moving away from her, he sat up almost kneeling to watch, still moving inside her as Annie arched her back again, closed her eyes then let out the most pleasured sounding moan he’d ever heard in his life followed by his name over and over again.
Well that did it for him, hearing his name on her lips, he came inside her with a jerking spasm and an almost endless climax.
When it was over, he lay down beside her, completely spent.
She looked back at him, looking like she wanted to speak but not quite knowing what to say. Jeff struggled to find the words that wouldn’t spoil the moment, or put them back to square one.
‘I’m sorry...’
Clearly not the right words as she moved off the couch, silently readjusting her outfit and underwear before turning back to him.
‘No need for apologies, it happened. I wanted that as much as you did. But clearly I was right, this has already complicated things.’
He couldn’t really argue with her. He’d just had sex with the one girl he really should have known better than to do it with. That crossed the one boundary he thought he’d be able to stick to. But when the time came for sensible decisions, he’d acted just as selfishly as he always did - he had serious issues about abandonment that he was not in any way going to start addressing while he was still lying there with his pants and boxers around his ankles.
‘I don’t want you to walk away...from the group,’ he knows the last part of what he had to say wasn’t the whole truth but he couldn’t quite find it in himself to say that he didn’t want her to walk away from him.
She laughed somewhat bitterly and moved towards the door.
‘They’re my friends Jeff, I’m not going to walk away from them. Just...from now on don’t expect me to be such a walkover when it comes to you. I’m not an idiot and I’m not the same naive little girl you seem to think I am - something tells me after tonight you’ll think twice before dismissing me like you usually do.’
‘Well this has to be the worst post-sex conversation I’ve had in a long time...’ he muttered to himself, feeling distinctly uncomfortable.
‘That’s it out your system, and mine for that matter, and now we can go back to attempting to tolerate each other for the sake of the group.’
He looked at her, really looked at the way she was standing in front of him, and he would kick himself if he could because she still was capable of giving him a look that said she saw right through him.
‘Annie I don’t want it to be like this. This,’ he gestured between them, ‘I’m no good at - I don’t know how to fix things and end up fucking things up even more. All I wanted was for things to go back to normal, whatever the hell that is - but this? Isn’t it.’
Annie nodded curtly and opened the door to the study room to leave.
‘Normal would be nice, but this is Greendale - who are you trying to kid? But maybe, we’ll learn to be friends again someday. I just can’t promise when - perhaps when you stop lying to the group, to me and most importantly yourself.’
And with that she was gone.
‘Well...shit.’