Picking a birthday gift for Jeff was hard. Especially since she really didn't know him all that well, and she really didn't want to give the wrong sort of message after their kiss for the debate. True, it had been a very nice kiss, but Jeff was chasing Britta, and Annie didn't want to come off like a school-girl with a crush. And she was still a little embarrassed about being called a unicorn by Shirley and Britta at the STD fair. While she was fine with not talking about no-no parts in public, it did make her acutely aware that she was an 18 year old girl trying to buy a gift for a thirty something year old man. She would have to find out the exact age so she didn't say the wrong thing when singing happy birthday. She saw his student ID a few times, but was pretty sure that the information on it was made up or wrong. Unless his name was really Jeff Crocker. And for some reason his driver's license said he was born in 1971, but Annie was pretty sure he was not almost 40. He looked far too good to be that old.

Age aside, it was hard to figure out what to get him. According to Britta, he had expensive tastes, even after having downsized to a new apartment. She didn't want to come across as cheap, but she didn't have much of a budget for a gift either. She was carefully saving money, and her mother would never let her hear the end of it if she asked for money to buy a gift for an older man. They were barely on talking terms as it was, though she still lived at home for the moment. Unfortunately, when she decided to move out, or mother finally kicked her out, even her compulsive savings would not allow her to live somewhere decent. Annie had been quietly looking at cheap apartments, though the only places in her price range were in a bad part of town. If she did end up there, she was also going to have to budget for things like window bars and a tazer or maybe a gun.

After about an hour of writing down gift ideas with pros and cons in a neat chart, Annie finally groaned and stretched, feeling her neck pop as she worked out the stiff muscles. Maybe she was over-thinking this. It was a birthday gift for a friend. That's all. Even if he did smell like a woody, earthy smell whenever they hugged or got just a little too close to one another. That was it! Britta was always mocking his overly styled hair, even if the tousled look was pretty hot. She wouldn't go so far as to call Jeff a metrosexual, though Britta did on occasion as well as calling him a hipster, but he did take care in his hygiene and appearance.

Annie herself had recently discovered how much she liked some of the skin care products sold at Victoria's Secret. She was still a little uncomfortable going into the store, afraid someone might see her surrounded by a sea of underthings, though some of those did look quite flattering, and a few surreptitious feels of the racks of bras and panties and other things were enough to convince her that they did in fact feel as sleek and smooth as they looked. Maybe sometime she would work up the nerve to buy one and try it. Just for herself. And she would especially not mention it to Troy, or Jeff, or Britta. But there was no way she was going to get Jeff something from that store, that would really give the wrong message.

Fortunately, there were another few places at the mall that sold similar stuff, without also selling sexy things as well. After browsing the various stores, she settled on Bath and Body Works, which had the largest selection. she sampled dozens of products until a few made her sneeze and she had to get some fresh air. It was harder to find the right smelling stuff than she thought, and even if she did, that may be a little forward as well. Perhaps he would be better off picking for himself? Some may call it wimping out, but Annie decided to simply get him a gift card he could use to pick what he wanted. Hopefully he would appreciate it.

This Christmas gift was harder than last one. A lot had happened since the holidays and birthdays last year. She had dated Vaughn and then decided she really didn't want him at all. She and Jeff had kissed outside the Tranny Dance, which then led to several months of awkwardness which led to her trying to transfer away to City College. She had met rich, who was really nice and friendly, sort of like Jeff but less of a jerk, but still he wasn't Jeff. And for some reason Jeff had a hatred for Rich that she partially though was jealousy about her interest in the nice doctor. They had also seen possibly the worst sides of each other, when Jeff began hanging out with his old lawyer friends (Alan was a creep who liked staring at her breasts, though she did learn how handy chloroform could be), and when she had a minor (OK, maybe not so minor) breakdown about losing her favorite pens. And they had bonded again over a fake conspiracy class, where she got to vent some of her anger at Jeff and even (pretend to) shoot him.

It was starting to get back to normal when Abed finally snapped. He claimed to see everything in claymation, and they had to help him to deal with his mother sort of leaving him, a situation which struck close to home for Annie and Jeff, with his father. Plus, there was that moment where Jeff had joined her in singing, and they both chorused 'saying I love you!' which she was trying really hard not to read into, despite the many other moments between them over the past few months. He had even saved her life when she was choking! That meant something!

Jeff had skipped celebrating his birthday this year, by claiming he had a week long consultation gig with his old firm and would be out of town, so this Christmas gift was the first real gift she was going to give him since everything got complicated between them. She had to strike a balance between hinting that she was still interested (even if he could be a real jerk, he could also be really kind and sweet to her as well), but not too clingy.

The solution came when she thought back to Troy's birthday party. True, it hadn't gone all that well, with everyone ending up depressed and sad. Between being Caroline Decker from Corpus Christi, she recalled Jeff regaling Troy with the wonders of scotch, and the proper way to drink it. Of course, Britta had had argued with him, and Annie herself settled on a couple of Screwdrivers, which were OK but nothing too exciting. She had taken sips of the other's drinks during her short stint as bar maid though, and while Jeff's scotch nearly made her gag at first with how strong it was, it also had a pleasantly rich and warm taste to it. It was rather strong, but she continued to steal sips from his refills throughout the night. Which probably explained why she was so morose by the end of it.

That was the perfect idea though. True, she would have to ask Troy to buy it for her, who would be excited by the grownup act of buying alcohol. But it was perfect. A bottle of scotch was both personal, as he liked it, and still distant enough that it could be taken as a mere friend or coworker gift, and not a girlfriend or crush gift. Plus, it was a grownup gift, and hopefully a hint that she would not be opposed to a drink with him. True, she still had a year before she was legally allowed to, but after going through rehab for Adderall, she could be bold and have a drink or two before then. She hadn't gotten in trouble for the Caroline ID now, had she?

All that was left would be to pick a brand. Nothing too cheap, but she was on a budget still. Chucky and Elmo were both rather friendly, at least for drunks who lived on the street outside. Maybe they would have some advice. Sure, she didn't live in the best neighborhood, but there were a lot of interesting people. Plenty of people who could help her pick out a bottle of scotch as a gift for a friend who was maybe something more.

Just looking at them, the gift looked ridiculous. A package of five nice wooden coat hangars, unwrapped (since hangars looked like hangars if they were wrapped or not) and adorned with a multicolor bow. There was no message, no note, nothing besides the hangars and bow, but Annie hoped the message was clear. It was both a thank-you and an acceptance of his apology.

The dance had been Friday, and now it was Monday; she had spent the weekend obsessing over what happened. And what didn't happen. The Wigging Out party was one of the Deans increasing numbers of parties and dances, up from five the first year to seven in this semester alone. Apparently he was hoping to give Greendale a 'party school' reputation to bring in more young students and bring the campus average age down some. Between the Pulp Fiction party for Abed and occasional plays she was involved in with the Greendale Drama Club, Annie had found wigs to be itchy but fun, and combined with stage makeup, it thrilled her to see her eyes peeking out from a stranger's face and hair. Britta had tried to talk her into dying a blue streak in her hair once, but Annie put a lot of work into her hair, and dye might damage it.

Still, the announcement of the Wigging Out event thrilled her, as she could pick out a crazy set of hair and not be judged for it. There was a pink set of ringlets she had wanted to wear, and this would be the perfect opportunity. But apparently her friends were a bunch of spoilsports. Troy and Abed were going to a film festival. Pierce was going to a retreat with his laser lotus cult. Shirley didn't want to have to hire a babysitter for the night. Britta was still recovering from sharing peyote with her temporary new friend Meg. And Jeff would not want to mess up his hair. But she really wanted to go, and going alone would be sort of sad. Plus if she went alone, Starburns might try to hit on her again. Eww.

Of her friends, only Jeff was really an option to convince to go. She prepared a low cut shirt and wide eyes, but he surprisingly agreed as soon as she asked. He had picked her up and she giggled at his reddish furry mohawk thing, and they had a good time at the dance. It felt like a nice date, though neither called it that, and besides Vaughn, her last attempts at dating had been disasters. It was only near the end of the night that things got weird. She had been shivering at the chill in the evening air, and Jeff had tried to do the gentlemanly thing and offered his coat. It smelled like him, and she wrapped it around her, surrounded by his scent and his warmth. But then he went all neurotic about the jacket, first giving instructions on what not to do in it, and then finally demanding it back. It was rather off-putting that he had offered it to her and then almost immediately took it back.

The rest of the night was strained, and they barely spoke on the way home, but later that night, he sent her a text message. Sorry for going crazy. I'm a tad overprotective of my clothes. Hope you had a fun night otherwise, and I'll make it up to you somehow. So she spent the weekend wrestling with how to respond. He had been quite sweet the entire rest of the night, and they had a good time, relaxed with each other. She had felt like his equal the entire time, and he didn't even mention their age difference, the two things that tended to sink their other 'couples outings' things. So she decided not to take the coat thing personally, as he had done similar things to other people before.

It was his apology that sealed it though. While he had yet to apologize for some of the other crappy things he had done to her in the past, the fact that he took the time to do so this time gave her warm and fuzzy feelings. So late Sunday she went to the store and bought a small set of wooden hangars, and found a bow in her closet. Now they were sitting on the study table in front of his seat, partially hiding the old axe marks.

As the group wandered in, they gave curious looks to the hangars, but none actually voiced the question that must be bugging him. Finally, he came in, about 10 minutes late like usual, and sat down. She carefully avoided his gaze until he picked up the gift and then she let herself make eye contact. Hopefully he would get the message that his apology was accepted, and that she could deal with his occasional bouts of crazy, just like he accepted her own neurotic moments. Their gazes locked, and she could see mirth dancing in his eyes as he wordlessly put the hangars into his backpack. Then he gave her a faint smile, one only she would notice, and winked. She ducked her head, pleased at their silent communication. Maybe next dance she would ask if he wanted to go to it with her as well. But she would bring her own jacket.

She was getting annoyed with Jeff. After years of dancing around one another, he had finally stopped holding her at arms length or treating her like a child. Mind made up, he had turned his considerable charm to the goal of sweeping her off her feet, with a whirlwind of dinners, dances, and surprisingly a visit to the opera. And the Denver Aquarium once, where he had revealed a love for sharks that was positively adorable. He had even declined an offer to take photos with the bikini clad mermaids in favor of watching the sharks with lit up eyes. They had ate fine food, danced for hours, and shared breathless kisses for several weeks now, but Annie was getting frustrated. Where was the sex? He had been a perfect gentleman, surprisingly. Opening doors, pulling out chairs, offerings of flowers and jewelry, whispered compliments with a breath in her ear that made her toes curl. And she was sick of it. While she was thrilled that Jeff was treating her like a princess, she wanted to be fucked. Where was the wild passion that would leave her exhausted and sore in the morning, where afterwards she would lay next to him sweaty and dazed but euphoric? The coupling that would fill her entirely and straddle the line between pleasure and pain, leaving her screaming his name?

Irritated, she decided that if he wasn't going to give her what she wanted on his own (that or he was torturing her for some reason) she would have to force the issue with Operation- Seduce Jeff. It could have been Operation: Jump Jeff, which probably would have worked as well, but she really wanted him to be the one to start it, to take command and dominate her the first time, to show her that he loved her by ravishing her body. So the plan was to try to taunt him, leave suggestive hints until he couldn't take it anymore and snapped, giving her what she wanted.

So far, the plan was working. Suggestive texts, putting a bit more energy into their kisses, letting her hands roam while they cuddled watching a movie. She could see how he was breathless when they parted, and feel his interest poking into her hip when they lay on his couch watching Tangled. All it would take would be one final push to tip the balance. She briefly considered sending him a nude photo on his phone, but quickly rejected the idea. Not that she was shy about her body (well, she was a little bit, but that was nothing to be ashamed about), as her plan would end with him getting an up close and personal tour of her skin. The problem was that she really didn't want said photos in the hands of anyone but him. She didn't worry that Jeff would send them to anyone else, but all the stories of hackers getting nude photos off the phones of celebrities had her nervous. That and for someone who had a love affair with his phone, Jeff tended to lose or break the damn things. She herself had one of his old phones that he had left behind and never retrieved, back during their debate performance.

So nude photo was out. Her eventual solution was thanks to Abed, though he didn't know it. Last semester he had taken a massage course, and while technically skilled, he hadn't bothered to continue after the class ended. The folding stand was stuffed in a closet, but it was the bottle of massage oil she was interested in. Careful to lock the bathroom door in case one of her roommates returned, she stripped off her clothes and inspected herself in the mirror. Slowly she massaged the oil into her skin, and while she was not one of the bronzed goddesses that usually did this, the oil gave her porcelain skin a wet sheen that made it seem to glow. Plus the slick oil warmed with her body heat and felt like a second layer of skin.

Satisfied, she stepped into the shower to rinse it off, but took the opportunity with the oil and the hot water to imagine Jeff's hands roaming over her body until she was gasping and out of breath. Perfect. Tomorrow she would go buy a new bottle of the oil, and add a note before leaving it in Jeff's apartment for him to find. Imagine what we could do with this! ought to do the trick. She scribbled the message on a plain piece of paper and added a winking face to seal the deal. Tomorrow.

Annie sat at the table, enjoying the fruits of her latest gift to Jeff. He was still snoring away in bed, and she was still rather tired after spending the majority of the night tangled up in each others arms, kissing and tasting and thrusting. But her stomach had awoken her with insistent rumblings and so now here she was, eating a plate of fresh waffles wearing only one of Jeff's T-shirts with her hair messily tied back in a rather frowzy ponytail. The crispy waffles smothered in butter and syrup were exactly the right thing at the moment, a tasty end cap to the fantastic night she had. Jeff would cringe to see how many carbs and calories were on her plate right now, but to her, fluffy waffles made fresh were the perfect cap to a night of energetic sex. True, she had presented the waffle maker as a gift to him last week, but they both knew who it was really for in the mornings. She heard the floor creak behind her and turned to see Jeff glance at her with a fond smile, rolling his eyes at the stack of waffles but not saying anything.

Annie stood up and pulled his head down to her level, kissing him with lips sticky with syrup. Their tongues dulled, his with the taste of mint toothpaste, hers with butter and maple. As they broke apart, he frowned at her. "I'm going to have to do extra crunches because of that, you know!" She merely smirked and ran her hand across his abs, which were well worth the constant attention he gave them and the resulting pride he took at their mere mention.

"How about I watch you do them? she teased.

"No, no. Last time I never got to finish!" he complained lightly.

"Maybe, but we still burned off a lot of calories, and exercised a lot of muscles that don't get nearly as much work," her voice lowered huskily. She kissed his collarbone, leaving a sticky patch that she then proceeded to clean off with her tongue. He shuddered and pulled away.

"You finish your evil waffles, I'll go do my workout now while you're distracted," he laughed before retreating. Annie smiled to herself. If she hadn't given him the waffle iron, she would not have such a good breakfast. And she never would have realized that syrup and his skin made a tasty combination. She would have to suggest it to him sometime.

The envelope was mocking her. It had arrived in the mail, with no return address, but she could immediately recognize the scrawl as Jeff's. Her name and address were in the casual handwriting he used when writing quick notes, but on the back was a pair of more carefully written lines: Annie's Birthday. No Peeking! The fact that it had arrived more than two weeks before her birthday, before even Christmas, was obviously an attempt to irritate her. Despite dating for more than ten months now, they still had major disagreements on the value of punctuality. So having this card arrive so early was just his way of tweaking her on that topic. Thus the card sitting on the counter of the apartment she still shared with Troy and Abed and basically Britta now too.

Still, the curiosity was killing her. She already knew what his Christmas gift to her was, a pair of very nice and very expensive tailored women's suits for those days that she needed to dress up at work, for meetings or such. He had paid for them with his credit card, but she had found out the price anyways, and those two suits cost more than the rest of her entire wardrobe combined. He had shrugged it off, as his budget was much higher since getting readmitted to the bar. The pair of suits were now occupying a pair of the wooden hangars she had given him as a gift more than a year ago, the ones he used for his favorite jackets.

Well, no peeking just meant no looking, didn't it? Nothing wrong with trying to figure out what it was by feel. The size and shape was a normal birthday card, probably with a cute kitten on the front that would make her smile, or sometimes a suggestive joke that would make her blush still. But it was heavier and thicker than just a card alone could account for. But not too heavy though. It weighed sort of like the necklace he had gotten her for their six month anniversary, but things like that came in velvet boxes, not stuffed inside a card. Grumbling, she held it up to the light, but evidently the card was too thick for her to see any shape through.

"Did little miss scholar forget how to read?" a teasing voice came from behind her. Annie gasped and whirled around, trying to hide the card behind her back, but Jeff's smirk told her it was far too late. he had probably been standing there the entire time she was inspecting the card.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, trying to change the subject.

"We were going to meet Shirley and her family for dinner, remember?" Oh. Right. Whoops.

"If I say I forgot, can we just stay here and order Chinese or something?" she asked hopefully.

"Sweetie, you were the one who wanted to do this dinner before they went to visit their relatives for Christmas," he countered reasonably. Annie huffed in annoyance that he was right. "The gift will still be there for you to obsess over when we get back." She glared at his stupid smug expression and his stupid being right and his stupid ability to read her mind. He merely crossed his arms and leaned against the wall. Finally she dropped the envelope on the table and went to go get changed.

She spent the entire dinner alternating between playing with Ben (who was getting rather big), halfheartedly responding to questions and comments by Shirley and Andre, obsessing over the contents of the envelope, and cursing Jeff for being able to make her crazy. The dinner went by in a blur, and she barely noticed being shuffled off to Jeff's car until she was seated and wearing her seat belt.

"You don't remember a thing about that dinner, do you?" he asked her bemusedly. She crossed her arms and pouted petulantly, refusing to answer. "You're really obsessing over it, aren't you?" Again she refused to answer. He sighed. "Fine, you can open it when we get home. You have absolutely no patience this year, do you?" She gave him a brilliant smile. Of course she had patience, but for some reason that envelope was annoying the crap out of her. "Just realize that you won't be getting any replacement presents if you open it," he warned. She didn't care. Curiosity was killing her. Her imagination was going wild trying to think of what it could possibly be.

She rushed in the front door of the apartment, aggravated with the finicky locks and tossed her jacket on the floor before snatching up the envelope and tearing it open. The front was a ballerina with some message, but it was what was inside that she wanted to see. She could read the card later. Flipping it open, she was confronted by a plain key, scotch taped to the inside just above a simple Love, Jeff. She stared at it blankly.

Jeff came in and hung up her coat that she had discarded on the floor. "It's a key." she told him, confused.

"You smarty, me dumb," he smiled.

"It's a key," she repeated. After the excitement and anticipation, it wasn't registering at all in her mind.

"Yes...it's a key," he rolled his eyes at her incomprehension.

"A key for what?" she asked.

"For my apartment," he explained simply.

"What does it mean?" she wondered.

"Well, that is up to you. I didn't want to pressure you, so it's your call. If you want, it can be so that you can drop by anytime, even if I'm not there, and relax, get away from this crazy place for a while. Or..."

"Or what?"

"Or, it could be your new home key." Finally it sunk in.

"You want me to move in with you?" she squealed. He shrugged.

"Only if you want to." She nodded excitedly and launched herself at him. The envelope and key were forgotten for the rest of the night, until she stepped on it in the morning.

Author's note: Got through Sandy just fine, so I can't use that as an excuse for why the next chapter of Proxy Warfare is taking so long. I do want to thank the people who have sent me reviews and messages, especially nyclove3 and Rashaka. Discussing the show and story with them has given me a few new ideas for later chapters that ought to make it flow a little better.

This story is just an idea that has been bugging me for a few weeks now, so I finally got it out of my system. Now hopefully I can get back to work on chapter 8 of Proxy. I have figured out who will be speaking for the next set of chapters though: Jeff, Britta, Molly, and Annie will each own chapters 9 through 12.