(East Stairwell, post "Introduction to Political Science")

"If I'd known how gross this was going to be, I would have called in sick." Jeff grumbled half-heartedly as he dipped his sponge into the now almost black bucket of diluted bleach and started scrubbing another patch of black mould. "Still, at least my delts are getting a good workout." He grinned as he flexed his shoulders.

Annie rolled her eyes, but there was a small smile on her face. "Thanks," she said. "It would have been okay, you know? You really didn't have to do this."

Jeff's smile faded. "I kinda did?" He said slightly uncertainly. "I mean, neither of us covered ourselves in glory, but I pushed you more than you pushed me."

It was a conversation they'd had more than once, but it clearly still troubled his conscience a little.

"Jeff, it really is okay." Annie said firmly. "This means a -" her phone warbled to announce the arrival of a text message, Annie read it and cursed softly. "Dammit -" she checked the time on her display "- is it that late already? I'm supposed to be meeting somebody in half an hour and I need to get changed! Can you clear all this away? Thanks -" but Annie had already grabbed her backpack and was scurrying in the direction of the women's changing room at the far end of the corridor, frantically texting as she ran.

"Whaa-" but Jeff never got a chance to finish his sentence.

XXXXXX

Fifteen minutes later Annie reappeared, hair still slightly damp from a hurried shower and wearing a cute orange-red dress and sensible heels instead of the overalls and gym shoes she'd been wearing previously. Jeff hadn't quite finished tidying up - he'd made a point of going slowly to ensure he didn't finish before Annie reappeared, his curiosity had insisted on it - but he registered she'd clearly dressed for a date with somewhat conflicted feelings.

"Hot date?" he asked with a somewhat forced smile.

"Uh-huh…" Annie seemed to have tensed up when she saw Jeff was still there. She dropped the bag containing the dirty clothes she was carrying.

"So, where's he taking you? Someplace nice?" Jeff's suspicions were aroused by Annie's anxiety and her reluctance to make eye contact.

"Eeeee-" Annie squeaked, too nervous to speak.

Jeff sighed, he had a reluctant feeling he knew what the cause of Annie's nervousness was. "It's okay Annie," he said, slightly hesitantly. "We're not in a men's room." Jeff grinned hopefully, only to see the joke land with a wet thud as Annie glared at him. His smile faded as he tried again. "Look - I know that wasn't my finest hour, okay?"

"Really, Jeff?" She was still glaring at him.

"Yeah. It might be true that I need to trust my friends know what they are doing with their lives and I need to back off a little. You especially," he conceded. "It's not as if mine's in any sort of place to be giving lectures from after all."

Annie relaxed a little at the almost-apology.

"So-" he took a deep breath. "I promise I am going to be cool about your dating life." He took another deep breath. "I am going to back off, trust you know what you're doing, and be a friend." He let out the breath.

Annie raised an eyebrow at him. "How much therapy did it take for you to realise we're supposed to be friends, Jeff?"

"Some," he admitted ruefully. Then his smirk came back. "So long as it isn't Rich, anyway." His smirk fell away. "Wait - it isn't Rich, is it?"

Annie rolled her eyes at him. "No Jeff, it's not Rich."

Jeff let out a small sigh of relief. "Then make sure whoever it is understands how lucky he is and he always treats you right."

Jeff, perhaps somewhat selfishly, expected such a magnanimous sentiment to be greeted with one of Annie's huge smiles but instead she looked as though she was about to panic.

"What's the matter?" Jeff looked concerned. "Is he-" he started to get angry.

" Itsnotahe-" she gasped out in a single breath.

"Then what?" He looked puzzled for a fraction of a second. "Oh…" he let out as realisation hit him.

Annie nodded. "Her names Claire she's a friend of Britta's friend Paige and we got to know each other watching them make fools of themselves at the Valentine's Day dance and we met up for coffee the next day and it was nice and we've been-" she gasped as she ran out of breath.

"Easy, Annie-" Jeff was feeling somewhat stunned himself. "I'm sorry, I never for one moment thought you were -"

"Yeah," Annie had recovered her breath and started talking more normally. "Neither did I." She stopped to look him straight in the eye, her torso rigidly upright. "Here's the thing, Jeff - have you ever been in a place where you feel you know what you should do, but however many times you try to do it and in however many different ways it never feels right, but then you allow yourself to try something else and everything suddenly makes sense?"

Jeff looked down at his friend, a mixture of fondness and a vague sense of loss passing through him. "Yeah, I think I have." he said softly.

As though reading his mind, Annie smiled apologetically at him. "That's what it's been like with Claire - it just feels right you know?" She paused for a moment then smiled again, with genuine amusement this time. "I feel like I should give you a hug, but you're kind of gross right now." She pointed at his overalls, liberally covered in dirt and mould.

Jeff smiled too, as though a burden had been lifted. If he intended to say anything he never got to as they were interrupted by the sound of a door opening. Annie turned to face the sound, and then her face lit up.

"Claire!" She called, and scurried off to one side. Jeff turned to look as Annie ran up to and hugged another woman about her age, with hair cut into a cute shoulder length bob and wearing beige capri pants, a white t-shirt and with a sweater tied around her neck.

"Hi Annie! Er-" Claire added nervously as she returned the hug. She was looking at Jeff.

Annie turned and squeaked slightly in surprise, as though in the last few seconds she'd forgotten he was there.

"This is my friend Jeff."

"Hi?..." Claire said, a puzzled expression going backwards and forwards between Jeff and Annie.

"It's okay, he knows." Annie said softly. She looked at Jeff with an expression that seemed to say it *is* okay, isn't it Jeff?

He nodded and smiled softly in affirmation. "I'd offer to shake hands, but-" he said to Claire, pointing at the same dirt and mould he'd just been talking about with Annie.

Claire relaxed at this, and even smiled a little. "Maybe next time?" She said.

"Maybe next time," Jeff agreed solemnly.

"Sorry to leave you with all this Jeff," Annie waved in the direction of the cleaning material. "But…"

"Go. Have a nice time. And Claire, it was nice meeting you."

"And you," Claire replied, slightly uncertainly.

Thanks Jeff, Annie mouthed silently at him. He smiled back. "See you in study group on Monday?"

"See you Monday Annie."

There was a final, brief exchange of goodbyes and then Annie and Claire turned and left through the door Claire had entered. Jeff watched them leave, already in animated conversation and holding each other's hands as they went.

As Jeff watched them go complicated feelings passing through him - a mixture of regret, longing, but also the sense of a burden lifted as though something complicated had suddenly become simple. As they turned around a corner and passed out of sight he turned back to the cleaning materials and started gathering them up.

Author's Notes:

I'm usually a pretty hard core J/A shipper, so this story was something different to what I usually do. I wanted to do it however for a somewhat unhappy reason - there's a troll in this fandom who purports to be a J/A shipper and who has been spamming works by non-J/A shippers that show Jeff or Annie in relationships with other people with the same copypasta quoting Dan Harmon each time.

This fic is offered up by a J/A writer to all the non-J/A writers affected as both a present and an apology from the J/A fan community as they deal with this. Please be assured that the troll does not speak for us and you have our sympathy and support through this unpleasantness.

And as always, thanks to Jeffwik and Raj_Sound for awesome beta-reading services:-)