A Day In The Life

Disclaimer: All characters belong to NBC, and no profit is made from this piece of short fiction. Lyrics quoted belong to John Lennon and Paul McCartney of The Beatles.

***

I read the news today oh boy
Four thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire
And though the holes were rather small
They had to count them all
Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall.
I'd love to turn you on

Lennon/McCartney, "A Day In The Life"

***

She really hated herself for doing this. For feeling this.

Just because we kissed once, Annie's inner voice said sternly as her neat cursive began to fill the blank lines in her notebook, just because we kissed once doesn't mean that I should be feeling the way I'm feeling.

Kissing a guy during a debate competition (to prove a point), didn't give her some sort of right to be…she didn't want to use the 'J' word.

'Jealous', that is. So he slept with Pierce's daughter. So what?

When he slept with Professor Slater, she hadn't been this distressed, Annie recalled as she ran out of space on her page, and flipped it over to start a new one. Ok, she mentally amended. She had been, but it was only because Slater was a professor, and there could have been ramifications on both sides! Precisely what, Annie wasn't sure, but ramifications were to be had if they had gone on with their indiscretions. That was the only reason why she was relieved when it ended. Right?

As her pencil scratched against the paper, her thoughts kept flowing, winding, squirming in her mind, until…

"Gaaah!" Annie suddenly said out loud, slamming her small hand down on the table, and immediately regretted it. The silence that met her outburst was, despite how clichéd it sounded, deafening. Closing her eyes in mortification, she counted to ten before she peered upwards reluctantly. Her instructor looked perturbed, while her classmates mostly pretended she was invisible.

"Are you ok Miss Edison?" the professor asked hesitantly, stepping forward.

"I'm fine. Sorry. I just remembered I had to do something," she sounded apologetic as she stood up, clipping her mechanical pencil into the ringed spine of her notebook. She found that she would rather slam her head repeatedly into a brick wall, than sit in a room that judged her wanting in sanity.

Once outside the classroom, she looked down at her notes, and realized that not a single word she had just written made any sense. Angrily, she shoved everything into her book bag.

***

At the best of times, the campus was packed with students flowing out of every dark corner, but the library was always her friend with its peace and quiet, its knowledge tucked neatly away on countless shelves.

Family Day however, saw to it that she would get no peace even in what she considered her private haven. Students were showing their loved ones stacks that they never actually visited, while said loved ones lounged around as if they had any right to be there.

Honestly. The stupid ideas the Dean came up with to promote Greendale's visibility were just plain…stupid. Huffing in annoyance, Annie hurried away, looking for one spot, any spot where she could be alone.

As she emerged from the building, she looked across the courtyard and caught sight of Vaughn and his parents. The scene was so unexpected and surprising, it brought a smile to her face. Despite his hippie sensibilities, his parents seemed so…usual. Both of them looking nervous and proud all at once, his mother was dressed in a pastel suit with a flowery shirt underneath, while his dad wore a beige button down shirt over dress pants. A teenage girl scowling slightly off to the side, texting furiously on her cell phone must have been the sister he spoke of once or twice.

Vaughn gestured enthusiastically at his surroundings, and for the first time, Annie saw what a normal boy he was underneath the veneer of 'wisdom' he liked to put on. As he talked to his family, their eyes met, and she lifted her hand enthusiastically to wave at him. She would have hurried over, if the curt nod he offered didn't cut her dead.

("I didn't wanna bore you babe," he'd say later, reaching to brush her hair out of her face, but she had already stopped listening.)

Her hand dropping slowly to her side, she watched as Vaughn disappeared into the crowd with his loved ones in tow.

The smile remained frozen on her face.

***

The party was interesting. Sipping on her Coke, she overheard Troy and Britta as they discussed a certain 'Nana', and shook her head in wonder and amusement. Britta wanting to be spanked by an older woman – wow. She should have been bothered by how close Troy was standing to the blonde, but she found herself unable to muster enough energy to care.

Then, she walked in. It could only be one individual, considering the way Pierce lit up, and how Jeff's shoulders sagged.

Narrowing her eyes, she observed the way Jeff and Amber argued. When the girl departed, she left a resigned looking Jeff in her wake, and an oblivious Pierce not too far away. Annie felt an unfamiliar ball of rage growing insider her. Setting her drink down, she followed Pierce's step-daughter out to the foyer.

"Hey, you!" she called. "Amber right?"

The other woman turned around and looked suspiciously at Annie.

"Do I…know you?" she asked hesitantly.

"Not quite," Annie said primly, straightening her skirt. "But I know you. I've heard about you, I should say,"

"Oh are you Pierce's classmate?" Amber practically wrinkled her nose, looking ready to leave the conversation.

Yes. But when I said I know you, I mean I know about the money, and how you're scamming Pierce." Annie felt the words slipping past her lips faster than she could think them.

Amber looked nonplussed.

"You're the only family he's got left! How could you do this to him?" Annie demanded.

"This really isn't any of your business," Amber replied. "And I'm not his real daughter. Whatever he thinks we are? That's all in his head,"

"What's the matter with you?" Annie demanded in disgust.

"Are you sleeping with him?" The blonde asked contemptuously. "Why the hell do you care?"

Practically shaking in anger, Annie spat out the only words that came to mind,

"Fuck you!"

"Whatever." The other woman rolled her eyes and walked away.

Annie stood there, unsure of what to do next. Finally, she turned around, intent on grabbing her purse and going home – she had just about enough for one day.

Jeff stood in the middle of the room, held by Pierce as he bawled into his arms. Her heart dipped even lower, but she refused to let herself to be stopped as she bent over to scoop up her things. She would have made it too, if Jeff hadn't extricated himself from Pierce's arms to stand in front of her.

"Hey." His eyes were red, and he smelled like alcohol a little.

"Hey yourself," she smiled wanly. "You doing ok?"

"Yeah, yeah…just…" he sniffed. "Just the usual shit, you know?"

"Yeah. I know," she looked down at her hands.

"Are you leaving so soon?" he asked, sticking his thumbs into his jean pockets.

"I'm really tired and I have a lot of reading to do…" she started.

"Oh hey, did your family come by today?" he asked, looking around. "I didn't see you hanging out with anyone else today…"

"Oh no." she decided it was a good time to start making for the exit anyway. Maybe he'd get the hint and just leave her be. "It wasn't a good day for anyone to come out."

"I see," he said, falling in step with her.

They walked side by side, from the noise of the party into the quiet murmur of Greendale at night.

"Where's your family?" she asked at last.

"Right," he laughed. "Them. Dad's…still mad at me. Well, he's always been mad at me. And Mom doesn't do anything Dad doesn't want to. That just about leaves…no one."

Annie's eyes widened. He must have been slightly drunk at least, she realized. The Jeff she knew didn't cry in public, and would probably prefer severing a finger with a blunt knife than talk about his private life.

"If it helps," she replied. "My parents didn't want to come to Greendale College, because," here, Annie made air-qoutes with her fingers, "'it's a reminder of what a failure we raised.'"

"You're not a failure," Jeff told her seriously.

"And you don't have 'no one'," she said. "You have us."

Annie chose to ignore his snorted response, or how trite her words necessarily sounded even in her own ears. They were close to the edge of campus now, where school intersected with their real lives.

"You should go home. Get some sleep." She stopped walking and looked up at him.

"But the night's just started," Jeff said with his best toothy grin. "We just started talking for what? The first time tonight?"

"And it's about to become tomorrow in a few hours. We can talk then," she said earnestly. "I promise. You need to talk about it anyway. All the stuff about…"

"Oh God fuck her. Fuck Slater and her stupid TV shows. Wanna hear a secret?" he leaned towards her. "She really, really loves The Bachelor,"

"Oh," Annie had no clue what the hell he was going on about. She hardly watched television. However, from his tone, it was probably a massive faux pas on the part of the intellectual professor in question. Some reaction seemed to be required of her though, so she responded lamely, "I'm sorry."

"Yeah. I am too. For watching two whole episodes of it." Jeff chuckled, his eyes looking deep into hers. As his hand drifted upwards and gently cupped her face, one thumb stroking her cheekbone, Annie's heart began to beat so fast, she thought it would jump out her chest. They were standing so close together, she could feel his breathe on her nose. Everything seemed to happen in slow motion as he leaned down and kissed her. Against her screaming instincts, she pressed into him, while she frantically tried to figure out what to do with her arms.

It was of course, Jeff who pulled away seconds later.

"Oh God Annie, I'm so sorry." He seemed remorseful, eyes suddenly clearer than before. "I don't know what came over me, I mean, I had a couple of drinks and then…"

"Don't worry about it," she assured quickly, stepping backwards. The wave of disappointment that washed through her was hard to push away.

"It's just I've been thinking about doing that again for so long." he ran his fingers through his hair, looking frustrated. "And today was just one massive crap fest, and talking to you was…talking to you makes it seem like everything's ok. You know?"

Annie had no idea how to respond, her mind too busy doing somersaults. On one hand, Jeff Winger had kissed her. Again. Apparently, this was something he thought about, and often too. On the other hand, it didn't help that she knew he already had rebound sex with a complete stranger once that day. And there was always Vaughn to think about, even if a part of her was beginning to see that he was a bit of a non-issue. If she thought anymore about it, her head was going to explode.

Situations were too confusing.

"This is too confusing." She said. "Look, let's…just go home, and talk tomorrow. Ok?"

He nodded miserably. As he walked away, Annie wasn't certain that she wanted him to leave her alone, but neither was she sure that she was sorry to see him go.

***

Pulling into her parent's driveway, Annie cut the engine. Instead of getting out, she sat still in the dark, listening to the sounds of the television leaking out from her house. She could hear her neighbours in their homes, doing their nighttime rituals.

She imagined her parents: her mother sat before the television set, laughing at whatever sitcom was on TV that night, while her father, stone-faced, worked in his study.

She thought of Amber, sitting in the cold cabin of a plane, staring at her cheque in satisfaction, and how Pierce would go home that night to call yet another escort service that would leave him lonelier by morning.

She tried not to think about Jeff at all.

Leaning forward, Annie pushed her head against the cool leather of the steering wheel, and concentrated on simply breathing.