Fic: "On Being Felicity (Or, Annie Edison Likes the Simplicity of Lists)", Community (Annie/Jeff), M
Well. Who'da thunk a bunch of dialogue in TextEdit would grow to a big, soppy story? Bless. (I blame you, McHale. And you, Brie.)
TITLE: On Being Felicity (Or, Annie Edison Likes the Simplicity of Lists)
FANDOM: Community (Annie Edison/Jeff Winger)
RATING: Mature (slight sexy tiems)
SPOILERS: Through episode 15, "Romantic Expressionism"
DISCLAIMER: Not mine. Sir Harmon's responsible for these guys.
On Being Felicity (Or, Annie Edison Likes the Simplicity of Lists)
Community-verse, 10th February 2010
---
NOTES: With thanks to baggers for being my late-night faux-Jeff text buddy. Annie's not got the same phone as I, but work with what you have. Apologies to the cast and writers of Felicity.
---
"Do you know what I definitely believe in? Fate - that things happen for a reason."
- Felicity Porter (Keri Russell) - Episode 21, "The Force"
---
There are things you're supposed to do in college - things you get out of your system, things you purge and wave goodbye to as you set feet down on the Yellow Brick Road of Big Girl Life. Granted, this was community college, and not some big fancy school with gargoyles and sororities you'd find in New York City after applying and not being rejected because of your stint in rehab made you drop out of school earlier than you'd thought - but still.
A list. Of those things one is meant to do before graduation, one she'd made herself (with a little help from a Felicity marathon she'd mainlined over the weekend):
1. Sleep around
2. Drink a lot (not probably going to happen, what with that whole addiction problem and all)
3. Change your image
4. Learn a lot of lessons
5. Meet your sweetheart and live happily ever after.
She wondered if the meaning of the words written was deflected by the pink notebook paper with hearts.
But mainly, she wondered how the higgins she was going to get all these things done, and still have time to study.
---
1. SLEEP AROUND
Vaughn was bad in bed.
Okay, it wasn't that he was bad; it was just that Vaughn was done in about fifteen minutes and didn't want to snuggle. Like now, where instead of whispering sweet whatevers into her ears, he was perched in the crook of his window singing a song about an eagle. More specifically, an eagle that had flown into a church in the middle of a mass about the madness of men, and she was half-naked in his white satin sheets ("I love The Moody Blues, man") with a frown on her face that almost resembled an 'n' it was so pronounced.
"Vaughn?"
He'd gotten to the third verse about teaching the eagle the words to a hymn about goodness and light (whilst also telling him not to follow the church but his soul), so she gave him the frowny-face and slipped out from the bed, grabbing her bag as she ducked into the bathroom.
If this was Felicity, she'd have found herself a Ben, and a Noel, and that other guy that worked at the coffee place by now. Half her problem, probably, was that she wasn't looking far enough outside her own circle (as awesome as they were), because, really, Troy wasn't biting, Jeff was - well, Jeff; Abed was like her weird older brother who seemed to eat popular culture and regurgitate it then eat it again and say it was "meta". And Pierce?
Ew.
"You're running late," she told her reflection. "You've got a lifetime count of two guys, which is technically only one, and that's only because Vaughn doesn't seem to be gay."
Annie paused for a moment as the tale of an eagle who seemed to speak filtered through the bathroom door. "Yet."
She wondered if she should have a moment of self-reflection, culminating in a montage to Sarah McLachlan of her pouring over text books and laughing with her roomie as they drank cheap wine and wore chunky sweaters off one shoulder, but the only female she thought fit the bill was Britta, and Britta would probably punch her and tell her she was conforming to a patriarchal view of women aged 18 to 25 and, as a result, letting the man win.
Maybe she could get a blog. www.frustratedandstupidannie.com. That could work.
She was mentally halfway through her first blog post ("today I sucked at being a woman. And a college student. And even a human being. Also ate fourteen donuts and a bag of Doritos covered in cheese") when she heard her phone chime. A message:
At least, Annie sighed, putting the phone down without replying (because he'd probably ring her in a panic anyway, despite it being 12:28am), at least there was one man who seemed to need her for something that wasn't directly related to songs about birds. And as if right on cue:
"And the eagle said 'no way, brother, I'm a family man!"
Vaughn's singing was momentarily interrupted as Taylor Swift rang out through the bathroom, and a picture of Jeff doing duck-lips came up on her phone.
Jeff Winger Calling
Annie rolled her eyes. "Typical," she said into the phone.
"Verbs! Verbs, Annie. Your caramel mocha-docha Frappawhatsit is on me if you accidentally on purpose spill the answers to questions four and eight." A pause. "Can I hear Shaggy singing that song about the bird who gets killed in church?"
"An eagle that flies into a church. And most of us do our homework in an allotted time after class, Jeffrey," she sighed dramatically.
But funnily? You couldn't keep the smile from her face.
---
2. DRINK A LOT
Where - what?
"Where's the party gone?"
"The party is well and truly gone for you, missy. Head up."
"Wass'that?"
"Water. There we go."
"I think - y'know, those virgin daiquiris weren't so virgin."
"Y'know, I think you may be onto something, Sherlock. Legs up."
"Nooooo."
"Yesssssss. As much fun as this is, Annie, and as much as I love having a writhing drunk girl in my bed, we both have an eight o'clock class tomorrow and Señor Chang's probably not gonna enjoy you too much if you're still rocking with your cock out."
"Ha! You said cock."
"Annie."
"Party popper."
"I think you mean pooper. Come on, shoes off."
"Th's isn't my bed. Ooooh, black sheets."
"It's my bed. In, come on."
"Ohhhh. Vaughn's sheets are white satin."
"Why am I not surprised. Head on pillow. No, not 'arms around Jeff's neck'. Annie."
"Staaayyyy."
"Annie."
"You are a ve'y han'some man, kind sir."
"Now you're trying to butter me up so you can stay up - ain't workin', sunshine."
"Whhhyyyyyy."
"Annie. I'm turning the light off. I am allowing you to sleep in my bed while I crash downstairs on my extremely uncomfortable IKEA couch. Please do not vomit on my sheets."
"Jeff."
"Yeah?"
"Thansh."
"I'll take that as 'thanks', and you're welcome."
"Jeff."
"Yes, Annie?"
"I like black sheets better."
---
3. CHANGE YOUR IMAGE
It was lunch time when Shirley suggested the bathroom walk.
"Excuse us, boys," she'd smiled, leaving her cheese sandwich to be fought over by Abed and Pierce, gesturing to Britta and Annie with a crooked finger.
"I don't need to go, if Britta's going," Annie'd said, her eyes on her Marketing textbook. The force to which she was pulled out of her chair by Britta was actually startling, enough to leave her sort of speechless until they got into the privacy of Greendale cafeteria's girl's room.
"What - "
"Let's talk." Shirley smiled in that way she smiled at Troy when he had noodles hanging from his mouth. "About -" she waved her hand in Annie's direction - "this."
Annie frowned. "This?"
Britta rolled her eyes and grabbed Annie by the shoulders, forcing her to look into the bathroom mirror. "The freakin' pink and black skull jumper Kat Von D whorey eyeliner elephant in the room."
"What? I'm changing my image. Sometimes it's good to shake it up, get down on it. Live a little!"
Silence.
"Have you gotten an after-school job at Hot Topic? Tell us now, and we'll stage an intervention."
"What's wrong with what I'm wearing?" Annie smiled at her strangely dour reflection. Skulls really weren't the happiest of motifs, were they? Even though she'd gone for the prints with little bows in their hair and polka dots, she couldn't help but miss her baby pink cardigan with the little fox embroidered on the chest. He was like something out of a Roald Dahl book, she thought happily. Skulls, however, were not.
"You look like a Fall Out Boy concert vomited on you," Britta scowled. "Is this about Vaughn? If it's about that blond Devendra Banhart bastard, I'll personally chop his locks off for you. And by 'locks'," she gestured, making a scissor action with her fingers, "I mean 'balls'."
"I'm just trying something new!" She huffed, pulling her skirt down. Which really didn't help. Especially when she thought, suddenly, fondly, of the soft tartan skirt that fell smartly just above her knees she'd passed over for the rejected Reform School Girl costume she was currently sporting.
Britta folded her arms and looked smug. "Your ass is cold, isn't it."
Shirley mirrored Britta. "You know who's behind isn't cold?"
Annie shook her head, making the large pink plastic skull earrings she was sporting clank obnoxiously.
"The Annie that was here yesterday." Britta grabbed her bag, pulling a package of make-up wipes. "Here."
Despite trying to play it cool, to think of Felicity and super-cool gothic Meghan, the tears pulled at the corners of Annie's eyes. Partly because she was so embarrassed to be called out in the girl's bathroom - a safe place - but mainly because she felt so damn stupid in a bunch of clothes that had almost caused her a seizure to put on in the first place.
"I was just trying to be different, for once." She sniffed into the polka-skull sleeve of her sweater as Shirley began to fuss around her. Britta looked vaguely uncomfortable, offering again the make-up wipes and smiling satisfactorily as Annie took them and began to remove the M.A.C. induced mess around her eyes.
"Baby, you don't need to change a thing about you. If you did it and we could tell you were even a little bit comfy?" Shirley cooed, "then we'd be all for it."
"This was just scary," added Britta. "I thought MySpace had come alive."
Wiping the last bit of eyeliner off, Annie smiled. "This isn't really like Felicity, is it?"
"What? Why are you watching that post-feminist bullcrap? That girl couldn't even work out what to have for breakfast without an angst-a-thon, let alone manage to graduate college. I mean, really…"
Britta's rant followed them as they walked back to the table, where Abed and Troy were thumb-wrestling and humming a duet of "Eye of the Tiger", and Pierce was yelling in Spanish at his phone.
"He had a theory that his phone might be Spanish," Jeff sighed as they sat back down. He narrowed his eyes slightly at Annie. "You look less racoon-y."
She frowned. "Is that a good thing?"
He shrugged. "I like you better when you're not a racoon."
Annie smiled.
---
4. LEARN A LOT OF LESSONS
They'd been fighting - quite loudly - in the library. City College had called a rematch of their epic debate, and, despite Jeff claiming he was impervious to her tears and pouts, he'd agreed to partner with him again.
To say it wasn't going well? Understatement. Possibly of the century.
"This doesn't make sense." Annie pointed at the mess of words on his card. "We're debating why animals in entertainment are important, not to bring back Bonzo the Clown."
"Bonzo," Jeff said, lowering his voice dangerously, "was a great advocate of circus animals. He was their champion."
"He was also a freaky clown with no social skills."
"You don't know that!"
"You don't know he wasn't!"
Jeff scowled. "Did you learn anything from when we debated last time?"
"Yes, actually. I learnt you're a hips man and taste like a Starbucks mocha."
It was out of her mouth before she could stop it, Jeff's mouth forming an 'o' of surprise in response.
Her ears felt warm, the blush probably spilling down her face like she was twelve years old - although, to be completely honest with herself, the blush was probably more from the memory of his hand fitting firm on her waist, the way he pushed his mouth against her with a ferocity she'd yet to have replicated, his pelvis pushed against hers like it was the only thing either of them had left.
The funny look on his face as he looked at her now - his eyes kind of dark but completely focused, his hands that usually played with any pen, paperclip and stapler in sight were still on the table; the corners of his mouth turned up in a funny half grin, half something else she couldn't place, but she knew it gave her this feeling in her stomach like when she'd gotten a Barbie Dream House and had kissed Tommy Rivers behind it in fourth grade.
That feeling that maybe, just maybe, the things she was yet to discover, the things she was yet to learn, weren't seen on a TV show. Or a book, or a movie starring Jennifer Aniston or a tra-la-la ballad from a Canadian songstress.
She pulled her mouth up into a smile, slowly.
"Well," Jeff cleared his throat and shuffled his notes, "that was probably a good lesson to learn, I think."
---
5. MEET YOUR SWEETHEART AND LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER
"What's this?"
"What's what?"
Jeff was standing over a box, a pink notebook open to a (very unsuccessfully completed) list. His eyes were narrowed, but his mouth was twitching into a smile Annie recognised as the "I'm gonna tease Annie good and possibly forever" smile.
"Um."
He walked over to her, reading as he went. "Change your image? I'm guessing that was that Angry Emo Barbie day, right?"
Her eyes widened, and she made a grab for the notebook, which went badly considering he was the size of a small mountain. "Jeff…"
"The crossed-out Drink a lot makes more sense…learn a lot of lessons - well," he shrugged, "Any student of Señor Chang's would have to be pretty versed in How Not To Be A Normal Human Being, and Britta's really got you into angry lady rock."
"Jeffrey, I'm serious. Give me the notebook."
That smile began to creep up on his face again, and he added to the look with a head tilt that definitely meant she was going to hear about this until her hair was various shades of grey. "But sleep around? That's the one I can't exactly verify. I mean," he flopped down on the couch that was in the middle of the fairly bare room, propping his feet jauntily on a box of books, "there's Vaughn, right."
"Jeff."
"And I'm pretty sure you didn't do Troy." He eyed her. "Correct me if I'm wrong."
"Give me the notebook." Annie's voice took on a dangerous edge that only made him happier.
"You didn't do Pierce, did you. I mean, I wouldn't judge you, per se, but I'd probably judge you behind your back."
"Oh, geez, I didn't "do" -" she scraped the air with her fingers in sarcastic inverted commas - "Troy, or Pierce - ew - or Abed, for that matter."
"Señor Chang?"
"No!"
"Buddy?"
"Ew, no!"
"Starburns?"
"Yes, every night after class he'd show me the ways of love."
"That's hot. I always knew you had a thing for older men."
That was it. Annie lunged at him, straddling his waist and grabbing at the notebook as he held it away from her with his stupidly long arms.
"I'll exchange you for it."
"Exchange me what?" Her chest was pressed against his, their faces close and their breathing heavy.
"You unpack all our books and put them on the shelves."
Annie narrowed her eyes. "And?"
"Kiss me like you mean it."
At this point in time, Annie knew a few things about Jeff Winger.
(A list, because Lord knew she liked lists:)
1. He was tall
2. He liked grapefruit covered in sugar, a la Homer Simpson
3. He cried at The Shawshank Redemption
4. His middle name was traditionally a girl's first name, and she had to take that knowledge to the grave
5. There was a part of him that, despite all his puffed chest ladies' man-ing, liked nothing more than snuggling on the couch, making out while watching a stupid movie they'd borrowed from Abed after a dinner of leftover pizza and cold beer.
So she leant in, deliberately, and kissed him - slowly, at first, then building the pressure until they reached that point of ferocity she loved, and had first learnt about three years ago in front of a crazed bunch of debate spectators.
They broke apart, and Jeff smiled, brushing his nose against hers. "That'll do it." He handed her the notebook, and she pushed it under the couch seat with a scowl on her face.
"I hope you realise you own seventeen thousand law books." She slipped off his lap and into the crook of his arm, the both of them looking around the apartment they'd bought together - two days after graduation and, thought to herself, the first day of her Big Girl Life.
"I do realise I have seventeen thousand law books. That's why I negotiated something you need for something I need."
He put his head next to hers. "This is kind of cheesy."
"What is."
"I'm the number five on your Awesome College Girl list. That's gross."
She rolled her eyes. "Totally gross."
The two of them sat in comfortable silence as Annie thought back to that night she wrote that list. Felicity, she supposed, would probably wax on about how she was a "different girl" and how everything was a journey - but, in all reality, Annie knew she hadn't changed that much. Maybe just shifted a lot, accepted a lot; gone with the flow and taken what destiny gave her, warts and all.
It was cheesy, she knew, and totally gross. But nice, and grounded and fun and honest. The Yellow Brick Road felt solid under her feet, and she smiled, happily, against the chest of a man who was seven times aggravating and about a billion times the best thing that ever happened.
"Annie."
"Yeah?"
"You've stopped watching Felicity, right? I can't have that crap in my house."
---
Fin.
---
I know I should end this with this particular gif, but I'm feel another suits my purpose just as well:
TITLE: On Being Felicity (Or, Annie Edison Likes the Simplicity of Lists)
FANDOM: Community (Annie Edison/Jeff Winger)
RATING: Mature (slight sexy tiems)
SPOILERS: Through episode 15, "Romantic Expressionism"
DISCLAIMER: Not mine. Sir Harmon's responsible for these guys.
On Being Felicity (Or, Annie Edison Likes the Simplicity of Lists)
Community-verse, 10th February 2010
---
NOTES: With thanks to baggers for being my late-night faux-Jeff text buddy. Annie's not got the same phone as I, but work with what you have. Apologies to the cast and writers of Felicity.
---
"Do you know what I definitely believe in? Fate - that things happen for a reason."
- Felicity Porter (Keri Russell) - Episode 21, "The Force"
---
There are things you're supposed to do in college - things you get out of your system, things you purge and wave goodbye to as you set feet down on the Yellow Brick Road of Big Girl Life. Granted, this was community college, and not some big fancy school with gargoyles and sororities you'd find in New York City after applying and not being rejected because of your stint in rehab made you drop out of school earlier than you'd thought - but still.
A list. Of those things one is meant to do before graduation, one she'd made herself (with a little help from a Felicity marathon she'd mainlined over the weekend):
1. Sleep around
2. Drink a lot (not probably going to happen, what with that whole addiction problem and all)
3. Change your image
4. Learn a lot of lessons
5. Meet your sweetheart and live happily ever after.
She wondered if the meaning of the words written was deflected by the pink notebook paper with hearts.
But mainly, she wondered how the higgins she was going to get all these things done, and still have time to study.
---
1. SLEEP AROUND
Vaughn was bad in bed.
Okay, it wasn't that he was bad; it was just that Vaughn was done in about fifteen minutes and didn't want to snuggle. Like now, where instead of whispering sweet whatevers into her ears, he was perched in the crook of his window singing a song about an eagle. More specifically, an eagle that had flown into a church in the middle of a mass about the madness of men, and she was half-naked in his white satin sheets ("I love The Moody Blues, man") with a frown on her face that almost resembled an 'n' it was so pronounced.
"Vaughn?"
He'd gotten to the third verse about teaching the eagle the words to a hymn about goodness and light (whilst also telling him not to follow the church but his soul), so she gave him the frowny-face and slipped out from the bed, grabbing her bag as she ducked into the bathroom.
If this was Felicity, she'd have found herself a Ben, and a Noel, and that other guy that worked at the coffee place by now. Half her problem, probably, was that she wasn't looking far enough outside her own circle (as awesome as they were), because, really, Troy wasn't biting, Jeff was - well, Jeff; Abed was like her weird older brother who seemed to eat popular culture and regurgitate it then eat it again and say it was "meta". And Pierce?
Ew.
"You're running late," she told her reflection. "You've got a lifetime count of two guys, which is technically only one, and that's only because Vaughn doesn't seem to be gay."
Annie paused for a moment as the tale of an eagle who seemed to speak filtered through the bathroom door. "Yet."
She wondered if she should have a moment of self-reflection, culminating in a montage to Sarah McLachlan of her pouring over text books and laughing with her roomie as they drank cheap wine and wore chunky sweaters off one shoulder, but the only female she thought fit the bill was Britta, and Britta would probably punch her and tell her she was conforming to a patriarchal view of women aged 18 to 25 and, as a result, letting the man win.
Maybe she could get a blog. www.frustratedandstupidannie.com. That could work.
She was mentally halfway through her first blog post ("today I sucked at being a woman. And a college student. And even a human being. Also ate fourteen donuts and a bag of Doritos covered in cheese") when she heard her phone chime. A message:
At least, Annie sighed, putting the phone down without replying (because he'd probably ring her in a panic anyway, despite it being 12:28am), at least there was one man who seemed to need her for something that wasn't directly related to songs about birds. And as if right on cue:
"And the eagle said 'no way, brother, I'm a family man!"
Vaughn's singing was momentarily interrupted as Taylor Swift rang out through the bathroom, and a picture of Jeff doing duck-lips came up on her phone.
Jeff Winger Calling
Annie rolled her eyes. "Typical," she said into the phone.
"Verbs! Verbs, Annie. Your caramel mocha-docha Frappawhatsit is on me if you accidentally on purpose spill the answers to questions four and eight." A pause. "Can I hear Shaggy singing that song about the bird who gets killed in church?"
"An eagle that flies into a church. And most of us do our homework in an allotted time after class, Jeffrey," she sighed dramatically.
But funnily? You couldn't keep the smile from her face.
---
2. DRINK A LOT
Where - what?
"Where's the party gone?"
"The party is well and truly gone for you, missy. Head up."
"Wass'that?"
"Water. There we go."
"I think - y'know, those virgin daiquiris weren't so virgin."
"Y'know, I think you may be onto something, Sherlock. Legs up."
"Nooooo."
"Yesssssss. As much fun as this is, Annie, and as much as I love having a writhing drunk girl in my bed, we both have an eight o'clock class tomorrow and Señor Chang's probably not gonna enjoy you too much if you're still rocking with your cock out."
"Ha! You said cock."
"Annie."
"Party popper."
"I think you mean pooper. Come on, shoes off."
"Th's isn't my bed. Ooooh, black sheets."
"It's my bed. In, come on."
"Ohhhh. Vaughn's sheets are white satin."
"Why am I not surprised. Head on pillow. No, not 'arms around Jeff's neck'. Annie."
"Staaayyyy."
"Annie."
"You are a ve'y han'some man, kind sir."
"Now you're trying to butter me up so you can stay up - ain't workin', sunshine."
"Whhhyyyyyy."
"Annie. I'm turning the light off. I am allowing you to sleep in my bed while I crash downstairs on my extremely uncomfortable IKEA couch. Please do not vomit on my sheets."
"Jeff."
"Yeah?"
"Thansh."
"I'll take that as 'thanks', and you're welcome."
"Jeff."
"Yes, Annie?"
"I like black sheets better."
---
3. CHANGE YOUR IMAGE
It was lunch time when Shirley suggested the bathroom walk.
"Excuse us, boys," she'd smiled, leaving her cheese sandwich to be fought over by Abed and Pierce, gesturing to Britta and Annie with a crooked finger.
"I don't need to go, if Britta's going," Annie'd said, her eyes on her Marketing textbook. The force to which she was pulled out of her chair by Britta was actually startling, enough to leave her sort of speechless until they got into the privacy of Greendale cafeteria's girl's room.
"What - "
"Let's talk." Shirley smiled in that way she smiled at Troy when he had noodles hanging from his mouth. "About -" she waved her hand in Annie's direction - "this."
Annie frowned. "This?"
Britta rolled her eyes and grabbed Annie by the shoulders, forcing her to look into the bathroom mirror. "The freakin' pink and black skull jumper Kat Von D whorey eyeliner elephant in the room."
"What? I'm changing my image. Sometimes it's good to shake it up, get down on it. Live a little!"
Silence.
"Have you gotten an after-school job at Hot Topic? Tell us now, and we'll stage an intervention."
"What's wrong with what I'm wearing?" Annie smiled at her strangely dour reflection. Skulls really weren't the happiest of motifs, were they? Even though she'd gone for the prints with little bows in their hair and polka dots, she couldn't help but miss her baby pink cardigan with the little fox embroidered on the chest. He was like something out of a Roald Dahl book, she thought happily. Skulls, however, were not.
"You look like a Fall Out Boy concert vomited on you," Britta scowled. "Is this about Vaughn? If it's about that blond Devendra Banhart bastard, I'll personally chop his locks off for you. And by 'locks'," she gestured, making a scissor action with her fingers, "I mean 'balls'."
"I'm just trying something new!" She huffed, pulling her skirt down. Which really didn't help. Especially when she thought, suddenly, fondly, of the soft tartan skirt that fell smartly just above her knees she'd passed over for the rejected Reform School Girl costume she was currently sporting.
Britta folded her arms and looked smug. "Your ass is cold, isn't it."
Shirley mirrored Britta. "You know who's behind isn't cold?"
Annie shook her head, making the large pink plastic skull earrings she was sporting clank obnoxiously.
"The Annie that was here yesterday." Britta grabbed her bag, pulling a package of make-up wipes. "Here."
Despite trying to play it cool, to think of Felicity and super-cool gothic Meghan, the tears pulled at the corners of Annie's eyes. Partly because she was so embarrassed to be called out in the girl's bathroom - a safe place - but mainly because she felt so damn stupid in a bunch of clothes that had almost caused her a seizure to put on in the first place.
"I was just trying to be different, for once." She sniffed into the polka-skull sleeve of her sweater as Shirley began to fuss around her. Britta looked vaguely uncomfortable, offering again the make-up wipes and smiling satisfactorily as Annie took them and began to remove the M.A.C. induced mess around her eyes.
"Baby, you don't need to change a thing about you. If you did it and we could tell you were even a little bit comfy?" Shirley cooed, "then we'd be all for it."
"This was just scary," added Britta. "I thought MySpace had come alive."
Wiping the last bit of eyeliner off, Annie smiled. "This isn't really like Felicity, is it?"
"What? Why are you watching that post-feminist bullcrap? That girl couldn't even work out what to have for breakfast without an angst-a-thon, let alone manage to graduate college. I mean, really…"
Britta's rant followed them as they walked back to the table, where Abed and Troy were thumb-wrestling and humming a duet of "Eye of the Tiger", and Pierce was yelling in Spanish at his phone.
"He had a theory that his phone might be Spanish," Jeff sighed as they sat back down. He narrowed his eyes slightly at Annie. "You look less racoon-y."
She frowned. "Is that a good thing?"
He shrugged. "I like you better when you're not a racoon."
Annie smiled.
---
4. LEARN A LOT OF LESSONS
They'd been fighting - quite loudly - in the library. City College had called a rematch of their epic debate, and, despite Jeff claiming he was impervious to her tears and pouts, he'd agreed to partner with him again.
To say it wasn't going well? Understatement. Possibly of the century.
"This doesn't make sense." Annie pointed at the mess of words on his card. "We're debating why animals in entertainment are important, not to bring back Bonzo the Clown."
"Bonzo," Jeff said, lowering his voice dangerously, "was a great advocate of circus animals. He was their champion."
"He was also a freaky clown with no social skills."
"You don't know that!"
"You don't know he wasn't!"
Jeff scowled. "Did you learn anything from when we debated last time?"
"Yes, actually. I learnt you're a hips man and taste like a Starbucks mocha."
It was out of her mouth before she could stop it, Jeff's mouth forming an 'o' of surprise in response.
Her ears felt warm, the blush probably spilling down her face like she was twelve years old - although, to be completely honest with herself, the blush was probably more from the memory of his hand fitting firm on her waist, the way he pushed his mouth against her with a ferocity she'd yet to have replicated, his pelvis pushed against hers like it was the only thing either of them had left.
The funny look on his face as he looked at her now - his eyes kind of dark but completely focused, his hands that usually played with any pen, paperclip and stapler in sight were still on the table; the corners of his mouth turned up in a funny half grin, half something else she couldn't place, but she knew it gave her this feeling in her stomach like when she'd gotten a Barbie Dream House and had kissed Tommy Rivers behind it in fourth grade.
That feeling that maybe, just maybe, the things she was yet to discover, the things she was yet to learn, weren't seen on a TV show. Or a book, or a movie starring Jennifer Aniston or a tra-la-la ballad from a Canadian songstress.
She pulled her mouth up into a smile, slowly.
"Well," Jeff cleared his throat and shuffled his notes, "that was probably a good lesson to learn, I think."
---
5. MEET YOUR SWEETHEART AND LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER
"What's this?"
"What's what?"
Jeff was standing over a box, a pink notebook open to a (very unsuccessfully completed) list. His eyes were narrowed, but his mouth was twitching into a smile Annie recognised as the "I'm gonna tease Annie good and possibly forever" smile.
"Um."
He walked over to her, reading as he went. "Change your image? I'm guessing that was that Angry Emo Barbie day, right?"
Her eyes widened, and she made a grab for the notebook, which went badly considering he was the size of a small mountain. "Jeff…"
"The crossed-out Drink a lot makes more sense…learn a lot of lessons - well," he shrugged, "Any student of Señor Chang's would have to be pretty versed in How Not To Be A Normal Human Being, and Britta's really got you into angry lady rock."
"Jeffrey, I'm serious. Give me the notebook."
That smile began to creep up on his face again, and he added to the look with a head tilt that definitely meant she was going to hear about this until her hair was various shades of grey. "But sleep around? That's the one I can't exactly verify. I mean," he flopped down on the couch that was in the middle of the fairly bare room, propping his feet jauntily on a box of books, "there's Vaughn, right."
"Jeff."
"And I'm pretty sure you didn't do Troy." He eyed her. "Correct me if I'm wrong."
"Give me the notebook." Annie's voice took on a dangerous edge that only made him happier.
"You didn't do Pierce, did you. I mean, I wouldn't judge you, per se, but I'd probably judge you behind your back."
"Oh, geez, I didn't "do" -" she scraped the air with her fingers in sarcastic inverted commas - "Troy, or Pierce - ew - or Abed, for that matter."
"Señor Chang?"
"No!"
"Buddy?"
"Ew, no!"
"Starburns?"
"Yes, every night after class he'd show me the ways of love."
"That's hot. I always knew you had a thing for older men."
That was it. Annie lunged at him, straddling his waist and grabbing at the notebook as he held it away from her with his stupidly long arms.
"I'll exchange you for it."
"Exchange me what?" Her chest was pressed against his, their faces close and their breathing heavy.
"You unpack all our books and put them on the shelves."
Annie narrowed her eyes. "And?"
"Kiss me like you mean it."
At this point in time, Annie knew a few things about Jeff Winger.
(A list, because Lord knew she liked lists:)
1. He was tall
2. He liked grapefruit covered in sugar, a la Homer Simpson
3. He cried at The Shawshank Redemption
4. His middle name was traditionally a girl's first name, and she had to take that knowledge to the grave
5. There was a part of him that, despite all his puffed chest ladies' man-ing, liked nothing more than snuggling on the couch, making out while watching a stupid movie they'd borrowed from Abed after a dinner of leftover pizza and cold beer.
So she leant in, deliberately, and kissed him - slowly, at first, then building the pressure until they reached that point of ferocity she loved, and had first learnt about three years ago in front of a crazed bunch of debate spectators.
They broke apart, and Jeff smiled, brushing his nose against hers. "That'll do it." He handed her the notebook, and she pushed it under the couch seat with a scowl on her face.
"I hope you realise you own seventeen thousand law books." She slipped off his lap and into the crook of his arm, the both of them looking around the apartment they'd bought together - two days after graduation and, thought to herself, the first day of her Big Girl Life.
"I do realise I have seventeen thousand law books. That's why I negotiated something you need for something I need."
He put his head next to hers. "This is kind of cheesy."
"What is."
"I'm the number five on your Awesome College Girl list. That's gross."
She rolled her eyes. "Totally gross."
The two of them sat in comfortable silence as Annie thought back to that night she wrote that list. Felicity, she supposed, would probably wax on about how she was a "different girl" and how everything was a journey - but, in all reality, Annie knew she hadn't changed that much. Maybe just shifted a lot, accepted a lot; gone with the flow and taken what destiny gave her, warts and all.
It was cheesy, she knew, and totally gross. But nice, and grounded and fun and honest. The Yellow Brick Road felt solid under her feet, and she smiled, happily, against the chest of a man who was seven times aggravating and about a billion times the best thing that ever happened.
"Annie."
"Yeah?"
"You've stopped watching Felicity, right? I can't have that crap in my house."
---
Fin.
---
I know I should end this with this particular gif, but I'm feel another suits my purpose just as well:
