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Annie raises her hand to the wood of the door, giving it a few rhythmic taps before moving to fidget with her hands and repeatedly tap her heel on the floor, biting her lip anxiously. Like every anxious stim coming out all at once.
After what feels like ages, but probably was only a couple of seconds, she hears the latch ping back and the door being opened.
Their eyes meet and they look at each other for a few moments, both looking sullen, neither quite knowing what to say to the other.
Annie sighs, before speaking first. “I, um- spoke to Troy. And Britta, too.” She opens with calmly as way of explanation, feeling like the ground beneath their whole group has been shaken.
Jeff’s shoulders sink, nodding, opening the door wider as an invite to come in, and shutting it almost silently behind her.
“Drink?” Jeff asks, feeling the weight of the day.
“Fuck, yes” Annie breaths out, making him chuckle under his breath.
“You ever manage to find out how Leanord was beating you two?” He asks while pouring a second scotch, something she’s acquired a taste for when with him since celebrating their yam trial case.
“He got an A in ‘rotary phone maintenance’ a-thousand-and-two years ago and has been taking everything else pass-fail ever since for a perfect GPA. It was pretty genius to be honest” she tells him, heading to his freezer to pull out a couple of ice cubes.
It drives him nuts she takes her scotch with ice, but he lets it slide.
Because it’s her.
Because she could do just about anything and he wouldn’t mind, because it’s her.
“That’s surprisingly impressive” Jeff comments after taking a moment to think about it.
“Tell me about it” she mumbles throwing back half the scotch in her glass with barely a wince.
Jeff stares with wide eyes, never having seen her do that before.
He tops back off her glass and they both head towards his sofa.
“So.. Is it just me or did the whole Troy and Abed in each others’ bodies thing start to get kind of trippy after a while..?” He admits quietly.
Annie barks out a surprised laugh. “Yes, absolutely. You don’t know the half of it, the Dean was flirting with me all day and I had no idea why it was getting me so flust-“
“He did what?!” Jeff says, his outburst suddenly becoming embarrassment when he realises how jealous he probably just came off.
“It was harmless, I was just caught off guard I think” she says with a shiver of disgust going through her spine looking back, at how it was so easy to sway her, just by acting like Jeff.
“Caught off guard?” Jeff asks with a raised eyebrow.
“Ugh, I got a little um-“ she sighs trying to think of the word without exposing herself too much, but at the same time she knows it’s absolutely no secret that she’s always had a crush on Jeff.
Maybe the secret itself is that she’s totally and completely in love with him, while others assume it’s a schoolgirl crush. But she’d much rather keep it that way, desperate to not feel humiliated by the situation anymore. “Flustered? More ditsy, I guess you could say. Shirley spent most of the day looking at me like I needed to be exorcised by her priest.” She tries to laugh off. “Anyway, enough about the Dean..” she decides to drop it all together, aiming for a serious topic to pull the attention off of her.
She looks up at him sweetly, a small “I heard what you did for Troy today. That was really sweet, Jeff” as she tells him sincerely, his heart pounding when he thinks of the moment Troy told him he didn’t want to be in a relationship with Britta anymore.
“I didn’t do anything-“ he tries to interrupt.
Annie cuts him off by taking his hand in hers. “You encouraged him to go about it the right way. To do the right thing by both of them. That’s not nothing, Jeff.”
He sighs, holding onto her hand tighter, not quite knowing what to say. “I just-“ he rocks his head onto the back of the sofa, before rolling it to the side, looking at her “I can’t help but think things should be different. I mean, Britta really loves him. She doesn’t like to show it in front of everyone, but fuck, Annie she really loves him. And I know he really loves her, too, just.. I don’t know..” he looks up at her eyes with tears brimming in both of his own. “What if two people loving each other isn’t all it takes?” He asks, making her furrow her brow.
“What do you mean?” She asks him softly, her thumb stroking the back of his hand.
“I just, uh-“ he blinks trying to absorb the tears but just causing them to fall down his cheeks “Ugh, it seems so stupid. I always just.. thought that if two people loved each other then one day they’d get their chance, you know? Like that’s how life works, like some script that’s pre written. And until I experienced love that first time, I guess I always just figured I’d never committed to any woman before because I just hadn’t loved someone and they hadn’t loved me. And then I’ve started to learn all this other shit gets in the way and other people give you their opinions and just..” he sighs, Annie looking at him sadly.
She clutches the hand she’s already holding between both of her hands, holding it close. “What’s going on Jeff? What’s really happening? Cause you love Britta and Troy, I know you do, but there’s something else happening here. Is this about your parents?” she asks him nervously.
“I mean.. kind of?” He says, shuffling himself over on the couch to be closer to her, her taking his queue and swinging her legs over his lap, leaning herself sideways into the back of the sofa and letting him lean sideways onto her chest, tucking himself up under her chin, cradling him.
“That you for coming over by the way” he tells her, hoping to avoid what needs to be said.
“Stop deflecting” she scolds hun playfully and sweetly.
“See, you always call me on my crap” he tells her, before letting out a big sigh, closing his eyes before letting her heartbeat calm him.
“Before I fell in love for the first time, I thought two people loved each other and that was it. When my dad left my mom in my tiny 6 year old brain my mom loved my dad but he stopped loving her - that’s why they didn’t work. But I don’t know if it’s enough anymore. Britta and Troy really loved each other and it wasn’t enough. I fell in love and I guess I thought I had all the time in the world and now life is moving past and I’m nearly graduated and what if this stuff isn’t fate? What if it isn’t ‘if two people are meant to be they’ll be’ and it’s just shit getting in the way when the woman I love deserves much better than I can ever give her” he rambles.
Annie sits there, mouth fallen open in utter shock, frozen at his words.
At the vulnerability of them; at the honesty of them; at the sadness and anxiety in them; at the revelations in them.
“Oh, Jeff-“ she sighs, pulling him in even tighter, wanting to hug him and make all the sadness go away.
“It sucks when we learn we aren’t in control of our own fate. We can make choices all we want and then the universe can throw us a curve ball out of nowhere. But Love? It’s so powerful, it can survive things we don’t even understand ourselves.”
He snuggles himself into her chest even more, his head resting where he can hear her heartbeat, calming him in ways he can’t quite explain.
“Have you told her?” Annie asks, trying to ignore the wobble in her own voice as it breaks a little at the thought of the man she loves in love with another woman.
Jeff, though, hears the wobble too. He pulls back up and leans next to her with his side on the couch, face to face with her - inches away.
To try and make clear who he’s talking about he tucks a strand of hair sweetly behind her ear, and cups her face tenderly as he replies “she’s far, far too extraordinary for me. She deserves the world, not some broken man nearly in his 40’s who has a disastrously wrong track record for screwing up”.
“Well maybe you should let her decide what she deserves. Maybe communicating is one of those additional things on top of love that keeps people who love each other together” she tells him firmly, encouraging him.
“What if she doesn’t feel the same way? I’ve done a pretty great job of messing up with her in the past” He asks anxiously.
“I have no doubt in my mind that she feels the same-“ she answers still in the hypothetical, just in the bizarre and unlikely chance that this is all some practice for the other woman. “Some might even think it’s a schoolgirl crush when the truth could be that she’s entirely in love with you too” she adds on.
The way Jeff’s breath catches in his throat loud enough for her to notice reassures her even more that this could really be their moment.
“And, maybe, she’s desperately tired of pretending that she doesn’t love you” Annie whispers to him.
That’s all it takes for Jeff to pull her face to his, their lips somehow colliding with even more curiosity than their last kiss a few years ago. They move in exploration of the other, except this time, exploration of the other’s love for them, not just attraction.
Their lips move together slowly, both kissing the other like they have all the time in the world, knowing they do.
She feels Jeff’s thumb stroking her cheek sweetly, her senses overwhelmed with him.
The smell of his cologne; the taste of his scotch on his lips; the small sounds she’s drawing out of him; the feeling of his hair as she cards her fingers through it; the way their eyes so automatically meet when they both pull back, slow heavy breaths filling their lungs.
Their foreheads connect softly while they look at each other with a pure tenderness.
The silence is broken gently when Annie whispers a quiet “Wow..”
“Yeah” he whispers back, both grinning like Cheshire cats.
Suddenly Annie’s face drops and he can see the turmoil in the thoughts behind her eyes.
“What is it?” He asks, still holding her close.
“I just feel bad Troy and Britta’s relationship ended today, and here we are, happy like this together” she tells him, lifting her forehead from his to cuddle into his chest, tucked under his chin where he can bend down to plant kisses on her head.
“I know, it’s not fair, none of it’s fair. All we can do is be there for them - and eventually when their break up isn’t so raw we break our news to them gently” he replies.
“You’re right-” she tells him, leaning up to kiss the underside of his jaw. “Plus I just wanna focus on us for a bit, without having to let the rest of the world in”
He hums and looks back down to her, “Sounds perfect”.
“Yeah?” She asks, genuinely curious.
“Absolutely-“ he reassures her, “I’m done letting what I’m worried other people will think of have an opinion on dictate the choices I make. Annie you have no idea how long I’ve waited to get here. To have you in my arms feels like a fucking dream that I never want to wake up from. This thing between us is ours, no one else’s”
“I keep thinking I’m going to wake up and be in some class I didn’t know I was enrolled in” she says, making him laugh by echoing the words of his nightmarish experience with two women throwing drinks in his face when he had no idea why.
“No waking up. You’re mine, Annie Edison” he punctuates with holding her even closer.
Annie bites her lip, finding herself incredibly turned on as she takes a shaky breath in, taking her fingertips and grazing them through his stubble.
It isn’t so much that she gets turned on by someone being possessive of her, as much as it is a reaction to Jeff’s true expression of how much he wants her.
“Fuck, Jeff” she whispers with a smirk of a smile, him taking note of the glint in her eye.
“As much as I want to really make you mine, I’m going to do this properly. Take you on dates first, make sure this is done right” he tells her, leaning his forehead down on hers.
“Oh yeah? You gonna wine me and dine me, huh, Winger?” She teases with a sneaky smile.
“Oh you bet your gorgeous ass I am” he retorts with a smirk.
“Spent much time looking at my ass have you?” She continues to tease him with a smile and a cheeky click of tongue between her teeth.
“Absolutely, I’ve been dying to get my hands on it. Though I will say it’s second on the list of things I’m very much excited to explore” he tells her with a cheeky grin.
Annie blushes and gives a very-Annie gasp, smacking him on the chest like she does when she’s annoyed but he only loves.
“Oh I have no idea what could be at the top of that particular list” she jokes, sliding across his lap to straddle his thighs, conveniently and intentionally positioning her breasts right in front of his face.
“Edison, you are making it so hard to be a gentleman” he tells her, eyes fixed on her chest in front of him like a kid in a candy store.
“Trust me, Winger, I can feel how hard it is for you” she replies as she enunciates her point by grinding down on his lap.
Jeff groans and tips his head back onto the back of the sofa, doing his best to look away from her chest and remain a gentleman.
What he doesn’t plan for however, is Annie taking the opportunity to start kissing down his now very exposed neck.
“Your attempts at chivalry are incredibly noble milord-“ she begins formally to make him chuckle, then sits back pulling his head up with her hand, having him look at her directly “but we’ve wasted so much time. So much time we could have been together. I know you want to do this respectfully and I’ll respect that if that’s definitely what you want. But if you’re doing it for my sake? Just know I wanna be intimate with you whenever you’re ready to. Okay?” She asks with a sweet and gentle but serious tone.
Jeff smiles and brushes her hair back behind her ear, gently stroking her cheek with his thumb.
“I’m nervous” he works up the courage to admit.
“Nervous? You’re Jeff Winger, you know exactly what you’re doing. I’m the one who’s lacking in experience. It’s just me, baby” she replies softly, testing out the nickname, genuinely confused why he’d be nervous with her.
“But it’s you, An. This isn’t just any other time, because no matter how much I’ve cared about a woman when I’ve slept with her I’ve never been in love with a woman I’ve slept with. I’ve had sex, but I’ve never-“ he cannot believe he is about to say these words, and shakes his head to try and not think about it “I’ve never made love before, and I know with you it’s going to be a big deal. It’s just a little pressure I’ve put on myself because you deserve perfect”.
“I don’t need perfect, Jeff, I just need you-” she reassures him gently, resting her forehead on his. “You and me, that’s what’s perfect. All the other stuff? The place, how long it lasts, what we do, what we’ve done before? That’s just white noise. Jeff I couldn’t care less if our first time isn’t perfect. Or the time after that. Because for now? I just wanna connect with you.” She reassured him encouragingly.
“It’s you and me” she whispers, leaning in closer.
“You and me, baby” he whispers back right before their lips collide, their whole world blurring outside of them.
It’s not fireworks, it’s not sparks - it’s so much more than that.
It’s home, it’s safety, it’s comfort. It’s the feeling of knowing you could be anywhere in the world but if you’re in each others arms you’re where you belong.
It feels right.
Because it’s them.