community fic: gardens under the rain (1/2)
gardens under the rain (1/2)
it hits her, the feeling of his lips against hers, the tang of victory sliding against the texture of his tongue
jeff/annie, a little bit of jeff/britta. pg. 1867 words.
It sneaks up on her at weird moments, she looks up from a conjugation chart and Jeff is messing around on his phone and it hits her, the feeling of his lips against hers, the tang of victory sliding against the texture of his tongue. Her breath catches loud enough that Shirley turns in her seat, craning her neck to see if somebody’s invading their study space. Annie turns back to conjugation, twiddling her pencil and hoping nobody notices the slow burn in her cheeks.
Sometimes she’s pretty sure rehab was easier than study group with Jeff, but then again, they’re isolated moments. She can handle them. They tend to go away when she focuses on forming her words with the right Spanish accent, the one that makes Senor Chang groan because it’s better than his. The thing is, Annie can do whatever she puts her mind to getting done.
“I like being barefoot,” Vaughn says, his arm wrapped around the small of Annie’s back, “because it really connects me to the earth, you know? There’s no other animal that wears shoes, it’s like we’re breaking the connection. And you can feel the grass between your toes.”
She skims her fingers lightly over the green blades of grass in the courtyard. They tickle a little at the bends of her knuckles. Her ballet flats suddenly feel a little confining, even if the blue patent leather had seemed so pretty under the fluorescent lights at DSW. In the sunshine she can make out the splotch of mud on the tip.
“Your hair smells so clean, Annie.” Vaughn’s hand rumples her hair, right at the scalp. Her stomach twists a little and she allows herself a smile, a small giggle. He smells a little bit dirty, in a manly way she’s already decided she really likes.
“Well,” she says, “you know me. Showers with Herbal Essences every morning!”
“That’s my girl,” he murmurs, leaning in for a kiss. If only the dopes in rehab could see her now.
It’s a perfect April Thursday and Annie’s skirt swishes as she makes her way to Spanish. There’s a couple holding hands, picturesquely making their way through the dappled sunlight of the halls. It takes her at least twenty seconds to realize she knows the couple. The man’s bedhead and the woman’s blonde curls. The particular tilt of the smile on Jeff’s face. Britta’s favorite vest.
Annie has never missed Spanish 102 before, and this morning she never would’ve thought she’d miss it today, sobbing in the bathroom stall of the furthest women’s room, the one where the toilets occasionally have seats. She can’t get the gold-orange tint of the mental picture out from behind her eyelids no matter how many tears run down her face.
When she looks in the mirror the whites of her eyes are stained red. Her eyelids are puffy and there’s a trail of mascara down each of her cheeks. Britta’s her friend and wasn’t she nice enough to let her date Vaughn? And anyway she’s dating Vaughn, she doesn’t even like Mr. Hot Hobo Jeff Winger.
Later, when he’s grilling them some vegan burgers, Vaughn asks why she’s so quiet. Annie says she might be getting a cold. It turns out to be the wrong lie to tell, because he fixes her up with this gross mix of wheatgrass and cod liver oil and ten other superantiradicals and Annie’s worried that it might actually make her ill once it hits her stomach.
Still she manages to smile at him and take another sip.
Annie only sees it because her pencil just so happens to fall under their study table. Jeff and Britta are holding hands. His finger traces the line of her wrist like a bracelet of touch. She can’t look away but she’s got to because if Pierce figures this out, study group is going to become its own special level of hell, like the one Dante class she went to last semester before Troy realized the material was difficult even if the professor was hot.
When she pops back up to her chair, pencil clutched between her fingers, everything looks so nearly normal that she’s flooded with this weird nostalgia.
Then Pierce raises his eyebrows and asks what exactly she was doing under that table.
In high school, Annie’s mom used to tell her she could do anything. Annie didn’t always believe it and sometimes she wished her mom would stop saying little sentences that gave her stress headaches when she had big tests in BC Calc and AP Euro.
After the Adderall and the months in rehab, her mom started frowning and Annie started staying in her room. Sometimes after her parents have gone to bed she runs her fingers through her hair, rims her eyes with liquid eyeliner, and dims the lights. In the mirror, she doesn’t look like Annie Edison anymore, the little girl with doe eyes. Maybe one day she’ll grow up. Maybe one day she’ll dress like this in the daylight.
“Did you hear that Britta and Jeff finally ended the will they or won’t they?” Abed asks, popping a falafel in his mouth, which partially obscures the words he’s saying.
“That’s old news,” she says, pretending to be super interested in her Spanish notes. “I think it’s a yes.”
“I think they decided they wouldn’t, actually.” Thank god he swallowed, or she might just be imagining things. “I saw them out for coffee a few days ago and it looked really awkward. And did you notice how they weren’t talking at study group yesterday?”
“It was pretty quiet yesterday. But I thought that was because we had so much vocab to learn for the project.” She keeps her voice low, cautious. “There’s too much end of the year homework, Abed.”
“Maybe that’s what drove Jeff and Britta apart,” he muses. Annie pulls her notes up over her face to hide her smile. Somebody might see. “Or it could be the way on sitcoms sometimes, the people you’re supposed to want to get together at first really don’t work. There’s a surprising lack of chemistry.”
“And then what happens?” She keeps her voice perfectly level, which might be rude because it comes out almost exactly the same way that Abed talks. “In the sitcoms, that is?”
“There’s another couple that ends up working better. It catches everybody off guard.”
When Annie looks up from her notes, Abed’s staring straight at her and she feels her eyes widen, caught.
“... Annie? I was saying, do you want some examples?” Dimly, she’s aware of her head, nodding.
On the first day of their last week of Spanish 102, Annie finds herself in step with Jeff like some kind of little miracle. She shouldn’t call it that, though. Vaughn took her to see this indie band last night, so her mind is still kind of muddled from sleep deprivation and probably the fumes from whatever everyone was smoking.
“Earth to Annie,” Jeff says, waving his hand in front of her face. “Please don’t tell me you’re still scared of Senor Chang. It’s been months since he tried to eat your brain.”
“No, I was just thinking. Summer is going to be weird without our study group.”
“You can’t honestly say you’re not dying to know what pop culture references Abed will dig up in the next few months. And you’d better be taking the summer off. No extra classes for you.” He says the last part in that fatherly tone she so particularly hates, even if his advice is usually better than her dad’s.
“Actually I’m going to be working at this coffee shop, it’s a few blocks from home. Java’s?” She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. Vaughn helped her get the job. “It’s my first real summer job.”
“Seriously? I’ll have to stop by sometime when I can catch a break from lounging at the neighborhood pool and avoiding my old buddies from the law firm.”
They’ve reached the familiar, terrible door to Spanish but he stops and he’s smiling and why does he have to smile like that, so warm she wants to press up against him and --
“Just have an Americano ready for me,” he says. “It’s the Jeff Winger drink of choice.”
The pre-dawn early morning shifts give the summer a hazy quality, but Annie learns to take naps in the afternoons despite the caffeine. Her smiles are easier for the late shifts, then, when Vaughn serenades the coffee shop with songs he’s written. She still wishes he’d take “Getting Rid of Britta” out of heavy rotation, but tears had filled his eyes the first and only time she’d broached the subject and Annie Edison is not a mean girlfriend.
May is just about to give way to June the first time Jeff drops by, right at the end of her morning shift. She hands him is Americano with a flourish and after he takes a first cautious sip he raises his sunglasses in a salute, smiling.
“You’re a real hipster barista now,” he tells her, leaning his forearms against the counter. He’s definitely been working on his tan. Not that it matters.
“I’m good at memorizing,” she says, rearranging the muffins into a heart. “You know, Spanish class? Plus it’s dark in here. Anybody could look cool.”
He catches her eye and grins, slow and indolent, and she remembers the press of his lips against hers, the slide of his tongue -- she swipes her arm to clear away the memory and there’s a wave of hot coffee all down the front of her. Miraculously Jeff is still somehow smiling. A year ago he would’ve sued the entire shop, her in particularly. But when she feels her jaw drop in horror, he only extends his hand across the counter, towards her. It’s probably the shock of the spill, but she takes it.
“I don’t know how much longer you need to work in that,” he says, “but I can give you a lift so you can grab some clean clothes.”
It’s not all that chivalrous, really, in the grand scheme of things, but she was up at four o’ clock this morning and Vaughn forgot to call her last night. She’s not thinking clearly. She leans over the counter, oblivious to the puddle of coffee and espresso, wraps her arm around his neck, and kisses him. The texture of it is exactly the way she remembers.
It feels completely climactic, like it’s the big moment in a chick flick (and Abed would definitely approve of the reference), but when she pulls back there are a few wolf-whistles and this puzzled expression in his eyes. She grabs a paper towel and dabs it at the spilled Americano, like it’s this hugely delicate task.
“Annie?” His voice is low.
She jerks her head up anyway, practically flinching, meets his eyes. What is there to say, exactly? Still, he could’ve walked away, left to go perfect his tan, anything, and here he is, the hint of a smile quirking his lips. Her own lips curl and mimic the expression.
Dimly she’s aware of her head, nodding.
it hits her, the feeling of his lips against hers, the tang of victory sliding against the texture of his tongue
jeff/annie, a little bit of jeff/britta. pg. 1867 words.
It sneaks up on her at weird moments, she looks up from a conjugation chart and Jeff is messing around on his phone and it hits her, the feeling of his lips against hers, the tang of victory sliding against the texture of his tongue. Her breath catches loud enough that Shirley turns in her seat, craning her neck to see if somebody’s invading their study space. Annie turns back to conjugation, twiddling her pencil and hoping nobody notices the slow burn in her cheeks.
Sometimes she’s pretty sure rehab was easier than study group with Jeff, but then again, they’re isolated moments. She can handle them. They tend to go away when she focuses on forming her words with the right Spanish accent, the one that makes Senor Chang groan because it’s better than his. The thing is, Annie can do whatever she puts her mind to getting done.
“I like being barefoot,” Vaughn says, his arm wrapped around the small of Annie’s back, “because it really connects me to the earth, you know? There’s no other animal that wears shoes, it’s like we’re breaking the connection. And you can feel the grass between your toes.”
She skims her fingers lightly over the green blades of grass in the courtyard. They tickle a little at the bends of her knuckles. Her ballet flats suddenly feel a little confining, even if the blue patent leather had seemed so pretty under the fluorescent lights at DSW. In the sunshine she can make out the splotch of mud on the tip.
“Your hair smells so clean, Annie.” Vaughn’s hand rumples her hair, right at the scalp. Her stomach twists a little and she allows herself a smile, a small giggle. He smells a little bit dirty, in a manly way she’s already decided she really likes.
“Well,” she says, “you know me. Showers with Herbal Essences every morning!”
“That’s my girl,” he murmurs, leaning in for a kiss. If only the dopes in rehab could see her now.
It’s a perfect April Thursday and Annie’s skirt swishes as she makes her way to Spanish. There’s a couple holding hands, picturesquely making their way through the dappled sunlight of the halls. It takes her at least twenty seconds to realize she knows the couple. The man’s bedhead and the woman’s blonde curls. The particular tilt of the smile on Jeff’s face. Britta’s favorite vest.
Annie has never missed Spanish 102 before, and this morning she never would’ve thought she’d miss it today, sobbing in the bathroom stall of the furthest women’s room, the one where the toilets occasionally have seats. She can’t get the gold-orange tint of the mental picture out from behind her eyelids no matter how many tears run down her face.
When she looks in the mirror the whites of her eyes are stained red. Her eyelids are puffy and there’s a trail of mascara down each of her cheeks. Britta’s her friend and wasn’t she nice enough to let her date Vaughn? And anyway she’s dating Vaughn, she doesn’t even like Mr. Hot Hobo Jeff Winger.
Later, when he’s grilling them some vegan burgers, Vaughn asks why she’s so quiet. Annie says she might be getting a cold. It turns out to be the wrong lie to tell, because he fixes her up with this gross mix of wheatgrass and cod liver oil and ten other superantiradicals and Annie’s worried that it might actually make her ill once it hits her stomach.
Still she manages to smile at him and take another sip.
Annie only sees it because her pencil just so happens to fall under their study table. Jeff and Britta are holding hands. His finger traces the line of her wrist like a bracelet of touch. She can’t look away but she’s got to because if Pierce figures this out, study group is going to become its own special level of hell, like the one Dante class she went to last semester before Troy realized the material was difficult even if the professor was hot.
When she pops back up to her chair, pencil clutched between her fingers, everything looks so nearly normal that she’s flooded with this weird nostalgia.
Then Pierce raises his eyebrows and asks what exactly she was doing under that table.
In high school, Annie’s mom used to tell her she could do anything. Annie didn’t always believe it and sometimes she wished her mom would stop saying little sentences that gave her stress headaches when she had big tests in BC Calc and AP Euro.
After the Adderall and the months in rehab, her mom started frowning and Annie started staying in her room. Sometimes after her parents have gone to bed she runs her fingers through her hair, rims her eyes with liquid eyeliner, and dims the lights. In the mirror, she doesn’t look like Annie Edison anymore, the little girl with doe eyes. Maybe one day she’ll grow up. Maybe one day she’ll dress like this in the daylight.
“Did you hear that Britta and Jeff finally ended the will they or won’t they?” Abed asks, popping a falafel in his mouth, which partially obscures the words he’s saying.
“That’s old news,” she says, pretending to be super interested in her Spanish notes. “I think it’s a yes.”
“I think they decided they wouldn’t, actually.” Thank god he swallowed, or she might just be imagining things. “I saw them out for coffee a few days ago and it looked really awkward. And did you notice how they weren’t talking at study group yesterday?”
“It was pretty quiet yesterday. But I thought that was because we had so much vocab to learn for the project.” She keeps her voice low, cautious. “There’s too much end of the year homework, Abed.”
“Maybe that’s what drove Jeff and Britta apart,” he muses. Annie pulls her notes up over her face to hide her smile. Somebody might see. “Or it could be the way on sitcoms sometimes, the people you’re supposed to want to get together at first really don’t work. There’s a surprising lack of chemistry.”
“And then what happens?” She keeps her voice perfectly level, which might be rude because it comes out almost exactly the same way that Abed talks. “In the sitcoms, that is?”
“There’s another couple that ends up working better. It catches everybody off guard.”
When Annie looks up from her notes, Abed’s staring straight at her and she feels her eyes widen, caught.
“... Annie? I was saying, do you want some examples?” Dimly, she’s aware of her head, nodding.
On the first day of their last week of Spanish 102, Annie finds herself in step with Jeff like some kind of little miracle. She shouldn’t call it that, though. Vaughn took her to see this indie band last night, so her mind is still kind of muddled from sleep deprivation and probably the fumes from whatever everyone was smoking.
“Earth to Annie,” Jeff says, waving his hand in front of her face. “Please don’t tell me you’re still scared of Senor Chang. It’s been months since he tried to eat your brain.”
“No, I was just thinking. Summer is going to be weird without our study group.”
“You can’t honestly say you’re not dying to know what pop culture references Abed will dig up in the next few months. And you’d better be taking the summer off. No extra classes for you.” He says the last part in that fatherly tone she so particularly hates, even if his advice is usually better than her dad’s.
“Actually I’m going to be working at this coffee shop, it’s a few blocks from home. Java’s?” She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. Vaughn helped her get the job. “It’s my first real summer job.”
“Seriously? I’ll have to stop by sometime when I can catch a break from lounging at the neighborhood pool and avoiding my old buddies from the law firm.”
They’ve reached the familiar, terrible door to Spanish but he stops and he’s smiling and why does he have to smile like that, so warm she wants to press up against him and --
“Just have an Americano ready for me,” he says. “It’s the Jeff Winger drink of choice.”
The pre-dawn early morning shifts give the summer a hazy quality, but Annie learns to take naps in the afternoons despite the caffeine. Her smiles are easier for the late shifts, then, when Vaughn serenades the coffee shop with songs he’s written. She still wishes he’d take “Getting Rid of Britta” out of heavy rotation, but tears had filled his eyes the first and only time she’d broached the subject and Annie Edison is not a mean girlfriend.
May is just about to give way to June the first time Jeff drops by, right at the end of her morning shift. She hands him is Americano with a flourish and after he takes a first cautious sip he raises his sunglasses in a salute, smiling.
“You’re a real hipster barista now,” he tells her, leaning his forearms against the counter. He’s definitely been working on his tan. Not that it matters.
“I’m good at memorizing,” she says, rearranging the muffins into a heart. “You know, Spanish class? Plus it’s dark in here. Anybody could look cool.”
He catches her eye and grins, slow and indolent, and she remembers the press of his lips against hers, the slide of his tongue -- she swipes her arm to clear away the memory and there’s a wave of hot coffee all down the front of her. Miraculously Jeff is still somehow smiling. A year ago he would’ve sued the entire shop, her in particularly. But when she feels her jaw drop in horror, he only extends his hand across the counter, towards her. It’s probably the shock of the spill, but she takes it.
“I don’t know how much longer you need to work in that,” he says, “but I can give you a lift so you can grab some clean clothes.”
It’s not all that chivalrous, really, in the grand scheme of things, but she was up at four o’ clock this morning and Vaughn forgot to call her last night. She’s not thinking clearly. She leans over the counter, oblivious to the puddle of coffee and espresso, wraps her arm around his neck, and kisses him. The texture of it is exactly the way she remembers.
It feels completely climactic, like it’s the big moment in a chick flick (and Abed would definitely approve of the reference), but when she pulls back there are a few wolf-whistles and this puzzled expression in his eyes. She grabs a paper towel and dabs it at the spilled Americano, like it’s this hugely delicate task.
“Annie?” His voice is low.
She jerks her head up anyway, practically flinching, meets his eyes. What is there to say, exactly? Still, he could’ve walked away, left to go perfect his tan, anything, and here he is, the hint of a smile quirking his lips. Her own lips curl and mimic the expression.
Dimly she’s aware of her head, nodding.