Annie only got a few breaks in the next two days. The first was that Troy and Abed easily believed she stayed in her room all weekend because of studying. In addition, neither Jeff nor Alison called to make things harder for her – and since no one else called, the news of their breakup hadn't hit the group yet as well.
But other than that, it was not a pleasant weekend to speak of. And Monday stood to be even worse once only seven people arrived in the study room. Worse yet, everyone would expect a big reaction from Annie – especially after all she put herself and the group through so she wouldn't break them up. How was she supposed to hide that technically, she caused it anyway? To say nothing of how Jeff would hide it?
And the little problem of facing Jeff wasn't fun either.
All Annie could do was control her public reaction first, and make sure it didn't boil over into something worse. So she spent all Sunday preparing for this, then arrived to school on Monday morning running through her game plan.
She must have concentrated pretty hard, since she didn't snap out of it until Shirley yelled at Jeff right next to her. By the time Annie caught up, she saw that Shirley was askmanding for answers on why Jeff dumped her fellow believer. Abed was listing the failed new TV characters who got written out for no reason to fix a show's mistakes. Then Britta tried her hand at asking why Jeff and Alison broke up – wondering if it was something Alison's "real psychiatry" couldn't solve.
Annie couldn't look at Jeff yet, but she heard him talk about how he and Alison got into an argument, and he retreated and cut her off when things got real, as usual. Objectively, that sounded like enough of an explanation, since everyone knew he always did that. For Annie, she just made sure she didn't ask him what – and who – he backed away from in this argument. But her last six months of personal rehab, and this last weekend of planning for this, kept her still and quiet.
"Wait, so Annie dumped us for nothing?" Pierce finally spoke out. Annie thought that Troy would be the one to mindlessly point that out first. But it made little difference, as this let her start her prepared response anyway.
"Maybe I did, Tr- Pierce – and I'm sure I'll yell at Jeff about it later. But I'm not going to do it here," Annie spoke in a slightly obvious rehearsed tone. "He's obviously guilty enough without us jumping all over him. We can do it in private if we have to, but I don't think we should go through it in here. So let's drop it and get back to studying."
Annie really wanted to get real, honest answers from Jeff for the first time ever instead of defending him. But asking for answers in public, when he would clearly never give them to her, never worked before and made her look worse. Besides, she wasn't sure she was even up for cornering him in private anyway. Yet if the group kept talking about this on and on, who knows how she or Jeff would snap?
"Annie, I don't know if we can just drop it," Shirley had to insist. "Alison was one of our last hopes for salvation, even if she didn't toe the line sometimes. If Jeffrey drove her away, we've got to make him come to his senses! Or she can't help you eat at the cool Heaven table with us!"
"Shirley, I already know this is tragic. I mean, I lost a friend because Jeff screwed up," Annie stopped herself before going into more upsetting places. "But I don't want to relieve that and have it rubbed in all day, and I'm sure Jeff doesn't either. We're both upset enough, so maybe we should deal with this in our own private way."
"You're just saying that because-" Britta started to say before Annie jumped in.
"Britta, drop it!" Annie warned, squeezing her hands together below the table to keep from getting any angrier – and more revealing. "The next person who brings this up and makes this harder to deal with isn't getting my notes today! Or any e-mail notes either, okay?"
Fortunately, that sent enough of a chill through everyone to make them quiet. Annie breathed a small sigh of relief, then made herself turn to Jeff to give him a courtesy nod of assurance. Jeff just stayed still, looking….like something.
Annie had finally mastered the art of reading nothing into Jeff during their big moments. Yet according to Alison, she did it so well that she didn't notice how Jeff was really looking at her – and had been doing it far more than with his girlfriend. Now Annie didn't know how to look at Jeff or what to look for, so she buried herself back into her far less cryptic books.
She did the same thing in English class so she wouldn't look at Alison, who was still in the same class as everyone. Annie also didn't check to see if Jeff or her other friends went to her for more details. And she supposed that the others wouldn't just stop talking to Alison because they thought Jeff dumped her.
But if they kept talking to Alison, they didn't say in front of Annie. If they got more details about Jeff and Alison's breakup from any of them, they didn't bring it up in group meetings. Annie didn't hear a thing about the matter from then on in, and Jeff didn't bring it up or act any different during their adventures.
Yet that was the only time Annie got to study him. Over the next three weeks, she and Jeff didn't share any one-on-one time, and went by the numbers in talking to each other amongst the group. They each kept their emotions subdued in those moments – assuming Jeff had emotions to subdue – so to the group, nothing was wrong between them.
However, the situation was both killing and relieving Annie inside. She still had no idea what she could ask or say to Jeff about so many things, or how safe it was for them to bring certain things up. But the fact that Jeff didn't come to her to explain anything, or apologize for his outburst on the phone, or apologize for however he drove away Alison…..it may have been for the best, but it still hurt.
But since Annie wasn't coming to Jeff either, she didn't know if she even could be offended. She didn't know about so many things, which was both rare and incredibly awful. She didn't know what to think, what to study, what to focus on or how to even feel. Although she put on her happy face for the group and Jeff in public, she was decidedly less happy in private. And she had no idea what to do about it, or if she even could do anything.
She did know she hadn't melted down publicly or privately about this, that she and Jeff didn't talk and make this worse, that the group had stayed quiet like she wanted, and Alison had steered clear as well. Other than that, Annie knew nothing – and that and her inability to change it was doing a number on her.
And the worse that felt, the more she'd probably explode when it was too much. And then she'd probably lose everything she worked so hard to keep anyway. Including Jeff. Whatever he was.
On the Saturday morning before Thanksgiving, Annie tried to take a break and get at least one day of peace. She was making her cereal and enduring Troy and Abed's Saturday morning "Cougarton Abbey" series rewatch before she heard a knock. Annie frowned in curiosity, not expecting anyone to visit here on a Saturday morning – and Abed was giving his film crew the weekend off.
But it wasn't the film crew standing at the door when Annie opened it. Just one giant man.
"Good, you're up," Jeff started. "How long until you're dressed?"
"What?" Annie asked in her confusion, as it didn't register that Jeff was seeing her in her pajamas – thankfully.
"We're going to spend the day shopping," Jeff further confused her. "Shirley needs a few things for the group's Thanksgiving dinner. So we might as well get them now, before we stumble into a spoof of Die Hard on Thanksgiving Day."
"Actually, we'd be likely to spoof Die Hard 2. But thank you for sparing us from that, Jeff," Abed noted from his recliner. Yet Annie ignored him and tried to press on as best she could.
"Jeff, you're really here to take me Thanksgiving shopping? Why would you do that? Why would you not want to play Die Hard? And…." At that, Annie stumbled as she tried to review what she could or couldn't ask without going sideways. It was hard enough to figure that out when Jeff wasn't here. And now that he was and was asking for them to go out all alone….
"Annie, I don't want to argue." This made Annie flare up for a second before she realized how he sounded. He wasn't saying this out of anger, nor was he saying it as an order. "I don't want to argue and I didn't come here to argue. I really didn't."
Annie loathed that she could catch the sincerity in Jeff's plea, since now it might make her want to notice other things. But it was either take that risk or shut him out and make things so much worse. And she was sick of feeling worse every day. If this was Jeff's way of saying he was sick of it too….
"All right, Jeff, I won't argue. Just give me a minute, okay?" Annie carefully asked. Once Jeff nodded, she went off to eat a little cereal, get dressed and run through speeches for whatever game changing talks were coming.
Annie didn't expect them to talk right away, so she wasn't thrown off when Jeff drove her to the store in silence. She was a bit taken aback when there were many other shoppers there to pick up Thanksgiving supplies early. And then it got weird when the store manager announced there was just one turkey left – and the next supply would come in on Tuesday when there'd be a much bigger rush.
The only way to avoid that madness was a winner take all battle royale in this store. And before Jeff or Annie or any of the other 14 customers could be offended and leave, the doors were locked, a closed sign was hung and the windows were draped.
Yet this was better than waiting until the last minute to find turkey they likely couldn't get, which they'd all do otherwise. But at least there were much smaller mobs of psychopaths to fight off here. Before Annie could protest and demand that Jeff do the same, the other customers started hurling food all around. However, Jeff actually covered her and got stains on his precious suit while getting them to safety.
Before Annie knew it, she and Jeff were working together to navigate the store, look for the prize turkey, and survive this deranged, un-filmed reality TV-like battle to the moral death. Using everything shy of a bow and arrow, the two survived the traps and showdowns with the turkey-crazed customers. Once Annie had been targeted, Jeff had actually put in an effort – yet was shocked when Annie got through her battles without much help from Jeff.
It was a vintage Jeff/Annie Greendale adventure outside of Greendale. If Annie didn't know better, she'd have wondered if Jeff set this up as some elaborate stunt to bond with her again. If anyone could convince a store to shut down for an afternoon over a crazy, messy, satirical fight for turkey, it'd be Jeff.
Yet when Jeff finally found the turkey, it didn't seem like a rehearsed moment. And neither did the Winger speech he used when he talked the beaten contestants out of their bloodlust for him, and trained it back onto the manager.
God, it really had been three months since Annie heard a Winger speech. In her weaker moments, she really missed hearing them once every week or three.
Finally Jeff and Annie made their escape, as the Winger-swayed mob took their vengeance on this insane capitol of supermarket tyranny. Once Annie wondered if they went too far – only out of tradition if nothing else – she rejoiced over having gotten the turkey and excelling with Jeff as her partner again.
But after they rejoiced together, they saw that this whole battle had only taken 30 minutes. They didn't even spend 8-14 minutes talking about other things in between, so this was a truly action packed ordeal. Of course, they were no closer to actually talking through their real issues. Yet at least this was a hell of an icebreaker.
It also made them hungry, so Jeff next drove them to lunch. Once they made sure there'd be no battle royale for bacon and eggs at the restaurant they found, they sat down. Fortunately, thanks to their last big adventure, they had something to talk about other than their relationship.
Going over it all and praising each other's survival skills took up the first half of their lunch. But once that died down, they had to think of other ways to dance around their issues. And yet Annie wasn't consciously trying to dance around them – she was just enjoying her first easy conversation with Jeff in over half a year. However, since they had the turkey, she figured that they would drop it off at Shirley's and be done for the day.
Yet Jeff revealed that he wanted to get other Thanksgiving food, and stuff for the dinner table, while they were still out. If they did that, then he figured he wouldn't have to do any other holiday tasks for the next year or five. At least that was his explanation out loud. But he admitted that since Annie was the more experienced planner, she might know the best stuff to get.
Annie was more of a school and wedding planner, yet she did know enough about good Thanksgivings. It was the last holiday of the year where her parents' religions didn't clash, along with her parents in general. So it was often the last completely peaceful day for her in some of her teen years. Once she finished stating that, she caught a glimpse of Jeff looking sorry and sympathetic before he hid it – another blast from the distant past.
But Annie figured that since Shirley was hosting Thanksgiving, she already had her own stuff ready. Yet Jeff insisted it wouldn't hurt to have backup stuff around, once the first two acts of the dinner went horribly wrong. Using Abed speak put Jeff's argument over the top, as Annie then went full steam ahead into planner mode.
Although Jeff drove her around, Annie completely directed him on where to go. They found a few sane supermarkets to get canned food, and Annie also found a few places to get new tablecloths, forks, pans and a couple of centerpieces. She even had them go to a toy store to find a few toys for Shirley's kids. Hopefully, this would keep them busy enough to stay out of the kitchen while the adults were cooking.
After Annie was satisfied that they had everything – and that Annie paid for enough to keep Jeff's bank account intact – she was ready to take everything to Shirley's. But Jeff dropped his next bombshell by stating that Shirley and her family were out for the weekend. As such, they would need to put all this stuff in Jeff's apartment until he could deliver it.
Annie agreed before she let all of her nerves show on her face. Yet since they both knew this would be her first trip to the apartment since….that night in May….it wasn't like she was hiding anything. Especially since Jeff probably set this whole thing up for her to go there at the end. Was he just trying to help her erase that night, or do something else?
Since she was back to the dark old days of not knowing what the hell Jeff wanted from her, Annie briefly wanted to go home. Yet she was now dealing with a Jeff who had just had a serious girlfriend, been told some harsh things about his feelings for Annie, and was actually doing well in therapy. Maybe this Jeff would be different – and if he wasn't, this Annie was different enough to deal with it better.
With that, Annie stayed calm on the outside as she headed back to Jeff's apartment. Fortunately, they had to figure out where to put all their stuff, so that took up several opening minutes. But after narrowly fitting everything in, and having a healthy debate or two on how to do that, the beginnings of an awkward silence were felt.
Then Annie realized she had to be the one to break it. Jeff had taken command in setting up this little day out, which was his first big step. Annie still didn't know why he had done this, but she could shoot down some theories as her first step.
"You didn't do anything wrong," Annie started. When Jeff was properly taken back, Annie continued with, "I mean, you didn't do anything wrong since May. Not to me." Unfortunately, this reminded them both of how he did do her wrong before then, and how he did more wrong to Alison after that. But Annie made herself get to her original point anyway.
"If you're feeling guilty over my last visit here, you don't have to. You don't even have to be upset over that phone call! You were mad because you lost your girlfriend, and it was a total shock to you….I assume. How could you be in your right mind then?"Annie rhetorically asked.
"None of us did anything wrong since May. You just found love, and I just had to leave because I had to at the time. We weren't wrong to do any of that, but we both feel rotten about it anyway," Annie realized. "Really, the only mistake when it comes to us was when I yelled at you six months ago. You yelled at me a few weeks ago because you lost someone, but I yelled even though I didn't lose you! Just an idea of you I should have lost a lot earlier. That's the only thing worth apologizing for in this whole mess."
"But I never accepted your apology," Jeff finally answered. "You said you were sorry, and I said 'are you'?" Annie took a while to recall that part, yet it came to her pretty quickly.
"You apologized right away that night, and I didn't even believe you meant it," Jeff recalled. "I did when you left, but it's not like I had the guts to say it to you. I mean…..you know me," he said a little shakily, which inspired Annie's next topic.
"Do I? I don't think I have all year. Although a lot of that was my fault too," Annie admitted. "But for one reason or another, we haven't known each other or been close for months. Not even in the summer or when I came back, even after we 'resolved' stuff."
"Well, what do you think this is, then?" Jeff countered, waving at the areas where they put away Thanksgiving stuff. "Do you really think I'd spend the day shopping, for food, for any other reason than to do that? I mean, none of this is good for my hair or my wardrobe, although those psycho customers begged to differ. But I got it anyway so we could do something!"
"I….I didn't ask you to do that, Jeff," was all Annie could say.
"Well, why didn't you? You told the group that you'd yell at me in private about Alison later. So why didn't you?" Jeff somehow asked.
"You, you wanted me to yell at you?" Annie got out.
"I don't know! No matter what she said to me or probably said to you, I don't know! I don't know anything, happy now?"
Of course Annie wasn't happy, and she could tell Jeff wasn't happy either as he sat on his couch. She was more confused than anything else, since they were both really rambling more than anything else. But from the end of that last ramble, it sounded like Jeff was confused too. Maybe even more than she was.
Of course he was.
For all of Annie's confusion and struggle to understand all of this, she failed to see that Jeff might be that way too. She just assumed – or tried not to – that he was fully aware of any feelings he had for her, and that's why they ruined things with Alison. But what if he was oblivious? He really was so much of the time, or tried to pretend he was.
Yet if he really didn't know he was being more affectionate towards Annie than Alison….and it really shocked him that Alison dumped him for it….and he really did want Annie to talk to him while being too confused and uneasy to make the first move….just like she was….?
Oh, craphole.
On that note, Annie sighed and put a hand on Jeff's arm, noting how his back stiffened up in surprise. "Jeff, I'm here now," she offered. "If there's anything you want to say, I promise I'll listen. I won't overreact one way or the other either. I'd just like to help you feel better, if I still can."
"Annie, I don't like….sharing with people," Jeff started ominously. "Even when I do, I usually don't like it. There's only three scenarios in my life when I've felt differently. When I've talked to Alison, when I've been in group therapy, and when I've talked to you. But now Alison's gone, and I still haven't found a new group that she's not in. That only leaves you and look where we are now. Like you said, it's no one's fault. We just both feel lousy about it anyway."
"Yeah….wait a minute," Annie trailed off as some things dawned on her. "You started talking to me long before Alison and group therapy. So the first thing you liked opening up to was me?"
"Well, that explains all my rookie mistakes, doesn't it?" Jeff tried to joke, but they both knew it wasn't the best way to explain it.
"Jeff, how do you expect me to read into something like that?"Annie wanted to know.
"I don't know. I'm not saying it to be evasive, I just don't know," Jeff assured. "I don't know if….what Alison said to me that night is really true, either. And I know she must have told you what that was."
"Screamed it at first, actually," Annie chimed in, not even bothering to deny it.
"I know I should know this stuff by now, but….with all our old issues and now all our new ones….I'm too mixed up. And I'm sure you are too," Jeff noted. "I'm tired of both of us feeling like that, and I was even before I met Alison," he left hanging. "I want to figure this out for good, I do. But I can't do it without your help."
Post-therapy Jeff was more open, that much was true. Even after these last few rotten weeks. Yet Annie still needed to hear more. "What are you trying to ask me, Jeff?" she carefully inquired.
"I haven't asked anything yet, I'm still explaining. You're pulling all A's in English, you should know the difference." It seemed Jeff was once again deflating something serious with a joke – but Annie did appreciate the chance to laugh right now. And yet it didn't mark the end of this heart-to-heart after all.
"I want to figure….us out. But that's not going to be possible if we can't even hang out together. You're right, we haven't done that at all for over six months. So we're going to have to change that. I mean, before we were anything else, we were friends. Kind of close to being…."
Jeff trailed off a bit, then seemed to try and will himself to continue. However, Annie already knew what he was going to say. "Being best friends," she filled in.
"Right. If we can't even be that anymore, how are we going to sort out the rest?" Jeff asked. "I want to be who we were – the good parts of who we were – before we start sorting out what we will be. But it means nothing if we aren't friends again. Especially the kind of friends we usually are."
"Do you want to be more than that, Jeff? At some point?" Annie had to be absolutely certain.
"Do you still want it?" Jeff asked. And that actually threw Annie off, which Jeff likely counted on. After all, she spent months trying not to want it anymore. "Exactly," he pointed out. "And even if we were sure we wanted it now, we probably owe ourselves better than to jump right in."
"Not to mention Alison," Annie slipped out. Although they might never see her again after the semester, she didn't deserve to see all her theories come true right in her face. Especially when they didn't know for sure if they were true.
"Right, so let's forget all that other stuff for now. Not because you're running away or I'm running away or I'm in denial. I just…." Jeff seemed to steel himself before he made himself say this next part. "I want to be your best friend again. I miss being at least that much, and I miss ignoring your advice when we both know I'll take it at the end anyway," he quipped. "And I hate that you've been back for three weeks and I still miss you. I miss us, really. Okay, that one was too much even for group therapy me."
"Maybe, but it's not bad, though," Annie tried to say evenly. "For what it's worth, I never actually admitted I missed you. Not some fantasy version of you, or something I wanted to….like just to feel liked. I missed you, and I missed the real us. Okay, that was too much even for old rehab Annie too."
After they shared a good long laugh, Annie got less sentimental and more hopeful. "Look at that. Even with all this other crap, we've been having fun. We had a whole crazy adventure together, we did things you were supposedly too manly to do, and we were more open with ourselves than ever. Even now, we can do that! That's just…. us!" Annie cheered before smiling right at Jeff, which made him smile on cue. "Thank you for wanting that back, Jeff."
On that note, Annie reached over and gave him a hug. Not a by-the-numbers 'resolved' hug or a regular old friend hug – but a real Annie hug, the likes of which she hadn't given Jeff in a long time. And this time, there were no butterflies or fantasies or girlish thoughts running through her head – not any that she couldn't handle.
She was just showing gratitude and love for a friend. A once and future best friend and maybe….someone she could consider to be something else if she was ready. And she even kept that perspective when Jeff hugged her back as well.
"I am really sorry I yelled at you, though," Jeff confessed.
"I know," Annie informed as she broke from Jeff to set him straight. "But you spent months trying to make sense out of your feelings. Then you got blindsided and they jumbled up all over again from some shocking news. Your good side didn't know what to do, so the bad one took over in the chaos. And it made you too guilty to face it until now," Annie finished. "I understand what that's like. I wish I didn't, but I do. So just stop feeling sorry for yourself before you leave us and hide out at the Gap, okay?"
"Well, now that that's out…" Jeff quipped, which actually made Annie relieved. But there was no sarcasm in Jeff's relieved eyes, which reassured Annie and made her hug him again.
"So I take it this means you might stay for dinner?" Jeff broke the silent hugging with. "I think there's still some food left here that isn't Shirley's." He was kind of right, as he did still have food of his own – just barely enough dinner food for him and Annie. As it turned out, asking her to stay for dinner wasn't part of his original plan. It just came out of him during their hug. Interesting.
Once Jeff managed to make their dinner, he finally got down to real business. He asked her something he had been dying to ask for months but never got the chance to – what it was like to crush Simmons like a little douche bug. Her bragging and his awe took up the entire dinner and an extra half hour.
By then, Annie saw little point in leaving now, so she stayed to flip through TV and movie channels with Jeff. They even saw a few shows that Troy and Abed had gotten Annie to watch during her sabbatical – some of which Annie could even explain to Jeff. The others were too illogical for Annie to explain with a straight face, yet her attempts were more entertaining to Jeff than the shows themselves.
Soon it was late enough for Annie to get going, although Jeff pointed out that the weekend wasn't over yet. As such, it wasn't awkward, sentimental or anything else weird when Annie left, since she came back after lunch the next day. After all, Jeff was going to give Shirley her Thanksgiving stuff when she came back that night, and he needed help guarding it until then.
While they 'guarded it' Jeff and Annie got to discussing the other ordeals and adventures they were on during Annie's absence. Annie was relieved to finally hear Jeff's perspective on the Mad Men debacle, while Jeff tried desperately not to mock her for her visits to Pierce's mansion. He even brought up his group adventures with Alison once or twice without feeling too awkward.
Sometime in mid-afternoon, Annie brought up Jeff's revelation that he hadn't been to therapy since the breakup. She tried to make him see that he shouldn't give up on it and he could always find a new group. Plus, Alison had been in therapy for years despite being better already. So, compared to that, leaving now would make Jeff look like a quitter.
Jeff insisted that therapy made him less affected by those attacks on his manhood. This both made Annie's case and showed how affected it did make him. Yet since this was one of those things where Jeff would ignore Annie's advice and then take it anyway, they ultimately dropped the issue.
After a few more talks and parts of a few movies, Annie helped Jeff load up Shirley's new stuff. They drove in separate cars and wound up getting there minutes after the Bennetts returned. Shirley was so excited and thankful to get her turkey early that she didn't even ask about Annie being with Jeff. So it was one final victory for the weekend before Annie took off for home.
These last two days were meant to get her friendship with Jeff back to normal – but this still wasn't really normal. When they were friends before, they never spent the weekend together, came as close to revealing feelings as they did, or did this much that wasn't school related. Although Jeff and Annie were now both experts in denial and avoidance behavior, even they couldn't ignore that. It was bringing it up that was another matter they hadn't faced yet. But that was okay.
None of them wanted to address the deeper stuff yet, but it wasn't because they were cowards. Not this time. As much as one or both of them might have wanted more, even after all this – they missed what they were more. They missed the teasing and the banter, and being surprised that they were the first people they turned to in a crisis. They missed trusting each other in ways that transcended any romantic feelings, and being there for one another in spite of all their other problems together.
They missed being Jeff and Annie.
And whatever else Jeff and Annie were, they didn't need romance and drama to care about each other – in ways they didn't care, or didn't show that they cared, for anyone else. Whatever else they were meant nothing if they didn't have that. But if they were that again, Annie finally felt like it would be enough to make the rest fall into place. Whenever it did or however it did.
For the first time since the middle of May 2012, they were starting to get that back. And maybe for the first time since well before May 2012, that was enough to an extent. To what greater extent was a question for some other day.
However, this time there was more certainty that such a day would actually come. At least sometime in the future.