Chapter Text
Troy and Abed are sprawled on their couch, five movies deep into a J-horror marathon. Troy didn’t like horror movies before Abed. With Abed, they’re scary in a fun way, because Abed talks about camera angles and homages and the actors’ oeuvre, and his commentary can remove Troy enough that he doesn’t start feeling like the story is real. Abed delivers that kind of distancing analysis more with horror than any other genre, and Troy thinks he does it specifically to keep Troy from freaking out. Abed is good like that. Once he figures out a way to make the people around him comfortable or happy, he’ll do it meticulously and without fail.
Tonight, though, even with Abed’s commentary on what the umbilical cord they’re watching a man get strangled with is really made of, Troy’s heart isn’t in it.
It was for the first two movies. Coincidentally, Annie watched the first two movies with them. Annie also helps him handle horror because sometimes he’ll find himself watching her instead of the movie. She screams like him when something scary happens, but then she laughs at herself for it, and her laughter – regardless of context – seems to ground him. Or when she’s nervous her eyes will get really big, and he’ll feel like he’s looking at a baby deer, and the heavy breathing or creepy music coming from the TV will fade into the background.
The third movie was alright. Annie popped in and out for it, while she was getting ready for her date. She couldn’t follow the plot but knew better than to ask questions as Abed and Troy would find it annoying. She still liked seeing the freaky stuff. Troy is still sometimes surprised by the edgy side of her, the side that carried around a gun before she moved in with them, that fondly talks about the meth addicts she befriended in rehab, that spent a weekend picking out the perfect cat burglar gear for her and her two roommates, just in case “something comes up”, and then that something turning out to be breaking into Professor Duncan’s office to find evidence that his most recent published article was half based on an essay she had submitted in freshman year.
Annie left during a popcorn refill break before the fourth movie started, wearing the kind of pretty dress women in old musicals wear, movies that were originally in black and white but were recolored artificially and everything was just a bit too bright to be real. Annie is like that sometimes, and so are her clothes.
Troy did not follow the fourth movie. He is equally confused by the fifth. There is a possibility that Abed’s chosen viewing sequence has the plots getting increasingly more advanced and complex, and Troy’s not one to question Abed’s wisdom when it comes to things like this, so he continues watching. Even if he doesn’t follow the plot, a good jump scare is still a good jump scare. And watching anything with Abed is always worth it, because Abed is so attentive to the screen, never seems to blink, except for moments Troy can never predict, where Abed will turn to him – to see his reaction, to see if they’re on the same page, to see if Troy likes what Abed was hoping he’d like. And those moments make Troy feel warm enough that he never really cares what Abed suggests they watch. Abed hasn’t done that, though, hasn’t looked at Troy that way, at least not since the third movie. He’s been frowning and blinking and Troy doesn’t know what’s wrong until Abed suddenly picks up the remote and turns the TV off. Troy gasps in shock. Even when he really hates something, Abed waits until a scene break to turn it off. That was mid dialogue line!
“Something’s not right,” Abed says. “We’re not appreciating this the way it deserves to be appreciated.”
“Yeah,” Troy says. He shouldn’t be surprised that Abed is on the same page as him. “I should care more about that dog disappearing and where it could’ve ended up. But I just got a weird feeling in my stomach and I can’t give the dog the respect it deserves.”
Abed nods. “For me the decline in emotional investment coincided with Annie’s departure. Do you think they could be connected?”
“Maybe,” Troy says. He doesn’t like to think that Abed’s feeling how he’s feeling, because it’s not a nice way to feel, so he reaches over to take his boyfriend’s hand. Abed smiles at him, for a split second, and Troy forgets what they’re talking about.
“I can’t work out why Annie’s absence would change things, though,” Abed says. “I like showing her a lot of things. I don’t really mind not showing her J Horror. I don’t think she could benefit from it the way she can benefit from the Saturday Night Noir Session, for example.”
When they watch noir, Annie does femme fatale impressions where she covers one of her eyes with her hair and lowers her voice. Abed prefers playing the villains in noir, which means Troy gets to be the detective, and Annie flirts with him, and he really enjoys it. Abed flirts with him too because he says pre-code noir was rife with homoerotic subtext and gay-coded villains. Troy enjoys that too. Troy loves their Saturday Night Noir Sessions. “Yeah,” he says. “Maybe... I mean. Maybe we’re worried about her?”
Abed cocks his head. Troy elaborates. “This is the fifth date she’s gone on in the last two weeks, and none of the other four went well. Maybe we just don’t want our Annie coming home all sad again.”
Abed pauses for a moment, and Troy lets him. Abed taking things slowly always helps Troy slow down his own brain, and that’s something he usually struggles with. “You’re right. I am worried about her. We should plan something to cheer her up, if this date is another disaster.”
“Shadow puppet theatre?” Troy asks. It’s the most sure fire way he and Abed have of getting her to smile. Jeff has his speeches, Shirley has her baked goods and hugs, and Britta has somehow retained enough cool girl cred in Annie’s eyes that if she offers approval, Annie will stop being so hard on herself. Even Pierce has some strange fatherly role in Annie’s life, so that when he tells her to chin up, she often does. Troy feels safe offering Annie comfort through shenanigans and role play. There are other things he can think of – like maybe trying to make her pancakes, or him and Abed cuddling her, or telling her how awesome and special she is. For some reason those possibilities make him feel scared, so he thinks resurrecting Horsebot 3000 might be a better option.
“That’s a good idea,” Abed nods. “What about finally resurrecting Horsebot 3000? I think there’s been enough build up.”
“Yeah,” Troy says. “I’ll cut out something to be the fountain of youth.”
Annie comes home at eleven thirty. She smiles at them and asks about the movies so convincingly that Troy thinks the date must’ve gone well this time, but then Abed asks her out right did the date go well this time and her face crumples. She does that thing where for a few seconds she looks like she’s going to start sobbing, before she composes herself. It’s as heartbreaking as ever, and Troy turns to Abed, and they nod at each other.
They don’t ask any more questions because they know from the last four times that Annie doesn’t like talking about what went wrong until the next day. Instead, they gesture for her to take a seat on the bottom bunk in the blanket fort, and they grab the puppets. As soon as she must realize what they’re doing, Troy hears her squeal from behind the sheet. He hated seeing her face the way it looked, and has hated seeing her scrub away her makeup almost like a punishment, like she was embarrassed to have put it on in the first place, the other four nights she came home. But he has to admit that he’s kind of happy to have her here with them rather than wherever she might be if the date had gone well, laughing and clapping as they play out the resurrection and subsequent adventure, and then giving them tight hugs in thanks afterwards. Partly because he put a lot of work into the fountain and he wouldn’t want it to go to waste, and partly because Abed told him that Britta said Annie was on a date with the smug TA from history of ice cream, and they both agreed that guy is a tool.
Abed climbs into Troy’s bunk three hours later. A lot of nights Abed prefers to sleep alone, and sometimes he likes staying with Troy for a while to talk about their days or their thoughts or their anything, until retreating to his own bunk. There’s no real pattern to it but somehow Troy can tell that Abed will be sleeping here tonight. He smiles into his pillow and tangles their legs together. Abed taps his finger against Troy’s shoulder. It’s a habit of his that Troy doesn’t really understand, a strange placeholder for more conventional forms of physical affection, but Troy is going to give himself another month or so to figure out what it means before he asks Abed. He likes when he’s able to figure out Abed’s quirks himself.
“I think our mission was a success,” Abed says, in one of his movie voices.
“Affirmative,” Troy agrees.
“But I want to do more,” Abed says. “I don’t want Annie to keep going on bad dates.”
“Oh. Do you think we should try to find someone for her to go on good dates with?”
“No,” Abed says firmly. Troy is momentarily taken aback, because Abed has been good at at least going through the motions of considering Troy’s suggestions before dismissing them ever since the Blanket Pillow War. But he doesn’t mind this time, because he finds he doesn’t want Abed to have agreed to his suggestion. He’s always struggled to think of anyone that would be good enough for Annie anyway. Except for a vague concept of chivalry and accomplishment, or Clive Owen, or Abed. He gets why Annie kissed Abed when he was Han Solo. He’s been jealous about some of Abed’s other romantic escapades from before they got together officially, but never that kiss.
“Should we try and get her to stop going on dates?”
“I don’t think that’s fair.”
Troy nods. As much as Abed hates being told what to do or how to think, he is equally loathe to do it to others.
“Then what can we do?”
“Further research is required. Why is Annie going on all these dates? Why the sudden interest? What is she finding disappointing about them? What is she looking for from them? Only then shall we know what we must do.”
“Awesome,” Troy says. “We should talk to her tomorrow.”
Abed smiles at him. “Yeah.”
They’re in the cafeteria when Annie goes over the date, Shirley cooing on her right and Britta grunting indignantly on her left. Annie starts with the TA staring at her boobs the whole time (Troy himself has long since learned to set himself a five second limit) and finishes with him acting like there must be something wrong with her for not having transferred out of Greendale yet. Jeff offers to start making demeaning comments within the TA’s earshot about how underwhelming his biceps are, and Annie instructs him not to but brightens visibly anyway. Pierce tells her that real men are hard to come by these days, and Annie nods and agrees – Troy suspects because none of them want to know what Pierce considers a real man. Troy doesn’t know what to say, and Abed doesn’t either, but they’d linked arms with Annie on their way to class that morning and he hopes that counts for something. He does feel intensely angry – reminded of the librarian’s cruel words about Abed being weird on valentine’s day – but he doesn’t know how to articulate it. He keeps clenching and unclenching his fist under the table, until Abed covers it with his hand.
The group soon starts to disperse, but Abed and Troy know Annie doesn’t have a class, so under the table they each catch one of Annie’s ankles with their own in a synchronized and practiced move, effectively keeping her from standing up. She raises her eyebrows at them, and they motion for her to stay quiet, which she does save for a giggle. Shirley glances at them in confusion, but still continues with the rest of the group in departing from the cafeteria.
“What’s up guys?” Annie asks, before gasping lightly and leaning in. “Are hijinks afoot?”
When the study group first started Troy wouldn’t have picked Annie for being the most on board with his and Abed’s ways, but it makes sense now. She might spend a lot of her time proving how adult she is, but she needs an outlet, and he knows – with all she’s been through – she appreciates getting to see the world in a more magical light. That’s the Abed guarantee.
“Always,” Abed assures her. “But right now we want to have a conversation.”
“As your roommates your happiness is our top priority,” Troy continues, and feels encouraged by her responding smile and blush. “And we strive to deliver the most pleasant living experience we can.”
“But you’ve been on five unsuccessful dates now,” Abed says, “and we want to make sure you’re alright. We want to know if there’s anything we can do.”
“Oh, you guys, that’s sweet!” she says, then shrugs. “And I’m alright. Have to kiss a few frogs, right?”
Apparently the correct response to that isn’t silence, because Annie’s face threatens to crumple again. “Oh, God, there’s something wrong with me.”
“Annie, you have perfect hair and teeth,” Abed says. “And you make people feel good when you’re around. I mightn’t know the guys you’ve gone out with, but I know you, and that’s enough for me to conclude that there’s something wrong with them.”
“Aw, Abed! I appreciate that, but...” Annie shakes her head. “you haven’t seen how I am on those dates. It’s no surprise the guys aren’t interested in me. Crazy Annie always ends up coming out.”
“Crazy Annie’s fun,” Troy says. “Unless. Did you chloroform any of them?”
“What? No!” Annie says, then leans in with her voice lowered. “You know Abed confiscated the chloroform.”
“Then I don’t know how you could’ve screwed it up,” Abed says, looking as confused as Troy feels. “We’ve known you for years. Guys think you’re adorable, and we know you’re good at getting what you want.”
Annie laughs, but it doesn’t sound happy. Abed glances at Troy who shakes his head to confirm that it wasn’t a good laugh. “I guess that might be the problem. I get excited that a guy shows interest in me, and I plan it out in my head, how amazing it’s going to be, but when I’m actually there, I can’t focus on being a good date. Because what I really want… is sort of to be back at the apartment. With you guys.”
Abed’s grip on Troy’s hand under the table tightens, and Troy feels warm and excited.
“I’m sorry if that’s weird or clingy,” Annie says, wide eyes widening further. “I don’t mean to be a third wheel or anything.”
“I don’t really know what metric to use to judge weirdness or clingy-ness, but I don’t mind it either way,” Abed says.
“And what’s wrong with third wheels?” Troy says. “I always wished they made tricycles for adults.”
Abed nods. “And three wheeled cars are cool.”
Annie smiles. “I prefer those sleeker, narrower shopping carts to the four wheeled ones. You have more control with them.”
Troy smiles back, glad to resolve that issue. “If you’re not really sure about these dates, then why are you going on them?”
“Well…” Annie sighs. “Shirley’s back with Andre, and it turns out Jeff and Britta were secretly dating all last year, and living with you guys… I guess I just felt lonely. I wanted to be in a relationship too. I wanted to have someone.”
“You have us,” Abed and Troy say simultaneously. Usually when they say the same thing at the same time they do their handshake, but it doesn’t feel appropriate right now. Troy is shocked and saddened to learn of her loneliness. He had known she had felt isolated last summer, working a job where she struggled to fit in with her mostly older colleagues, but he had assumed that was in the past. He had assumed, he realized, that her moving in with him and Abed had solved that problem. His stomach twists thinking it may in fact have exacerbated it.
“And I love you, but it’s not the same.” Annie looks down, shrugs. “I want someone I can, you know… go on dates with.”
Troy and Abed glance at each other, and exchange secret smiles. This information gathering mission has been a success on par with resurrecting Horsebot 3000.
They know exactly what they have to do. They have to bring Annie on the perfect date.