Disclaimer: I don't own Community. If I did, Nathan Fillion would be guest starring as Richard Castle, not as a Janitor. I don't own "Castle" either, though I do live near to a rather cool one.

Chapter 14 - Relationships for Beginners

Week 20

Author's note: "The history of a battle is not unlike the history of a ball. Some individuals may recollect all the little events of which the great result is the battle won or lost, but no individual can recollect the order in which, or the exact moment at which, they occurred, which makes all the difference as to their value or importance." - Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington

(Study Room B, Monday 8:05AM)

"If she was coming, she'd be here by now." Joelle finally said what was obvious to both of them.

"Have you had any luck getting through to her?" Marcia asked.

"Nine voicemail messages, seventeen texts. No reply to any of them. I think Abed tried a few times, too - no better luck."

Yes, you guys really hit it off didn't you? Nice to see not everything went to crap that night. Marcia thought sourly. "Yeah, same here." She said out loud.

"Well, If she won't come to us, we'll have to go to her." Marcia said. "Do you know where she lives? Of course you do." She said in response to Joelle's raised eyebrow.

"Are you sure you want to do this Marcia? Haven't you helped Annie enough already?"

Marcia flinched. "Do you have a better idea, Joelle?" The other girl shook her head.

XXXXXX

(Annie's apartment, 8:40AM)

Annie had had a miserable weekend. It had started so well – Jeff had been sweet and attentive at the ball and their relationship really seemed to be in a good place. They had danced, they had talked, they'd laughed and at no point had he freaked out or patronised her as being too young – even if he still hadn't been thinking of her that way it did at least seem as though the idea was no longer ridiculous. Then Troy had asked her to dance after Jeff had gone off with Marcia and the next – and last – time she had seen Jeff he'd been burning up the floor with the blonde who had well and truly put Annie in her place by extracting more passion, emotion and intensity from Jeff in three minutes than Annie had managed in four months.

Well, Annie knew when she was beaten – she'd ran back to her car as soon as they'd finished dancing and driven home, switched her phone off and spent the rest of Saturday night eating an entire tub of ice cream while crying her eyes out. On Sunday, she'd logged on to the City College website and downloaded the forms she needed to process a transfer request. As far as she was concerned, the blonde was welcome to Jeff and the sooner she was in a place where she didn't have to see either of them ever again the better. It still hurt though, it still hurt so much.

In her misery, Annie had quite forgot she had switched off her phone and hadn't given much thought to the study session she'd missed either so when the banging on her door started and Marcia shouted to be let in she was taken by surprise.

Annie opened the door, Marcia stormed in with Joelle behind her and embraced her in a big hug. "Annie, we were so worried - you never answered your phone, and then when you didn't turn up for the study session…"

"I've been here all the time Marcia, I just didn't want to talk to anybody. I'm still not really up it." The hint wasn't exactly subtle, but Marcia ignored it anyway.

"What happened, honey?"

Annie really didn't want an extended chat, so she gave the briefest possible version she could.

"When I saw the way Jeff was with her I didn't see any point in staying, so I came home. I'm also going to transfer to City College, it's not as if anybody in Greendale will miss me and at least there I will never have to see them again." She said bitterly.

"I will. You're my friend." They were the first words Joelle had spoken since she arrived.

Against her will, a watery smile broke across Annie's face. "Thanks Jo, that means a lot – but my mind is made up."

"Marcia's got something she needs to say." Joelle said next. The two of them looked at each other in a way that suggested Annie was seeing the tail end of a long and bitter argument as Marcia sighed and asked if she could sit down.

Annie sat them down at the dining table and put the kettle on to make them all coffee. When she completed the simple task and sat down herself, Marcia began to talk. "It started the other week, after you told us about your trip to the mountains…"

Marcia didn't spare any details. She talked about coming to the realisation that what Annie felt for Jeff wasn't just a schoolgirl crush but something a great deal more serious, but also that whatever it was she had going on with Jeff had stabilised at a place that, whereas Jeff was probably comfortable enough, was a long way short of what Annie deserved. So she'd come up with a plan to shock Jeff out of his complacency and make him take action.

It was a good plan too – get him away from Annie during the Ball and tell him what he thought he wanted to hear, that Annie was no longer interested in him that way and was happy just being friends. Then, when he realised it wasn't what he wanted to hear after all he should be shocked into action. To make sure he was properly on the boil, the plan also called for Annie to be dancing with someone else when he came back - someone who was a credible threat, such as Troy. How to set this up was the only part of the plan that Marcia wasn't sure about until Joelle hooked up with Abed at the dance and they'd got him to ask Troy to ask Annie.

The only thing they hadn't factored in was how Jeff would react – the blonde had not featured in their plans at all, and everything had gone to pieces when she got her claws into him.

"We're really sorry Annie, but please – don't upend your life because your friends are idiots."

"But why, Marcia?" Annie cried at the end. "I'm sorry things didn't match up with how you thought they should be, but I was okay with where they were – Jeff was comfortable being around me, we could talk and joke and even dance without him being freaked out by the age difference or what other people thought. Okay, we weren't Romeo and Juliet, but we were in a good place and there was every possibility of getting into a better one with time. But now – now he's with her and I'm transferring to City College so I never have to see him again!"

"Annie, we're so sorry, but aren't you overreacting –"

Annie wiped another round of tears from her eyes. "Thanks for coming around guys, but I really want to be alone now." She got up and went over to the front door. Annie refused to meet their eyes as they left.

As they were heading back to Marcia's car, Joelle took out her phone and started tapping at it.

"Who are you texting?" Marcia asked.

"Abed." Was all Joelle would say in reply.

XXXXXX

Jeff Winger was feeling a sense of gathering foreboding. His weekend had gone somewhat differently – after dancing with Britta he'd been all but mobbed by other women as Britta went back with Troy. As Annie was nowhere to be seen - she's probably had a better offer he'd thought sourly - he'd indulged himself dancing with a succession of partners, but he couldn't shake how annoyed he was that she hadn't bothered to say goodbye before leaving so his mood soured up enough that he'd slipped off himself after a while. He'd checked his phone – no messages – and gone to a bar to drink himself stupid. When he woke up the following morning to a hangover but still no messages on his phone he – against his better judgement – sent Annie a one line message saying he hadn't seen her leave and hoped she'd got back okay, then went out for a long, strenuous run and exercise session to avoid thinking about it.

That evening, when he'd still got no reply, Jeff had taken his car out and driven over to Dildopolis. He parked his car and walked around to the back and saw the windows of her apartment brightly lit, and for a brief moment an Annie sized shadow walk past. So you haven't had a fatal accident then – you're just ignoring me. For the life of him, Jeff couldn't think what he'd done to deserve the cold shoulder, but he determined grimly that he'd done his bit to see she was safe and it was up to Annie to make the next move, if there was one.

Study group had been difficult on Monday morning – Jeff was out of sorts because he didn't know what was wrong with Annie, Troy and Britta were grinning at each other and even Abed was slightly distracted by something. Shirley was ignoring Troy and wanting only to talk about Britta and Jeff's dance, only Pierce was reliably himself. Unfortunately.

Spanish class was different too – Jeff instinctively looked around as soon as he walked in, but Annie's usual desk was empty. For that matter, Joelle and Marcia weren't there either. As they were leaving at the end of class, Abed came up to Jeff.

"Jeff, there's something you need to know." He showed Jeff the message on his phone. It was even more condensed than usual for Joelle's text speak, and it took a couple of readings for Jeff to be sure what it was saying. When he was, he broke into a dead run and headed for the car park.

XXXXXX

Who is it now? Annie thought as somebody knocked on her door again. Maybe if I'm quiet they'll go away.

"Open up Edison!" It was Jeff's voice.

Oh, no. She thought to herself.

"Edison! I know you're in there - your crappy little car is still in the road outside!"

"Hey! It's all I could -" She shouted back, instinctively. Seriously, Annie - you fell for that?

"Open up or I'll kick the door down! One way or another we're talking!"

"There are three locks and two bolts on it Jeff - there's no way you're getting through!" Annie screamed back.

"I'm a big guy, I have muscles! It might take some time but I'm coming through - nobody around here will be calling the police!"

"I will!"

"Then I'll tell them you're my emergency contact - I know you Edison, you wouldn't leave a friend to rot in jail - you'll come down to bail me out and then you'll have to talk to me!"

There was a crashing noise as Jeff kicked the door.

"Okay! Okay! Just stop, and I'll open it!" Annie rushed over to the door and started unlocking it.

"Are we, Jeff?" She asked as she got the door open. "Are we friends?"

Of all the things Jeff had expected to hear from Annie, that had not been one of them. He had to gather his thoughts for a moment.

"Edison, what on earth is going on? I thought we were having fun on Saturday night, then you drop off the face of the earth, ignore everybody's messages and the next thing I hear - from Abed, not you - is that you're quitting Greendale and going to City College! And yes - we're friends!" Jeff practically screamed the last bit. "Why the heck would you think anything different?"

"Friends don't abandon each other just because some blonde in a dress that would get her arrested for public indecency in seventeen states wiggles her ass at them!"

"That's what this was all about? You're upset I danced with Britta?"

"I was there, Jeff! What you two were doing wasn't dancing - that was as close as you could get to sex in public while still fully dressed! People were pointing at me - pitying me!" Annie was practically screaming now - "Oh, Winger's got a real woman now - he won't need that silly little girl anymore!" She sneered.

Jeff was utterly flabbergasted by the intensity of emotion pouring out of Annie.

"Okay Annie, first of all - we were dancing a tango, that's what it's like - if the Queen of England and the Pope danced a tango they'd look like they were about to have sex by the end of it. It doesn't mean they will - that's just how the tango is." Despite her determination not to be distracted Annie was reeling at the mental image Jeff had put in her head.

"And secondly, I'm sorry people pointed at you but you were the one who bailed on me, remember?"

"WHAT? Don't be ridiculous Jeff!"

"I'm not." Jeff said grimly. "Or do you not remember throwing me at Marcia when I was trying to make it clear I preferred to stay with the girl I'd been with all along? How about when I finally disentangled myself and came back, only to see you dancing with Troy? Do you not remember that either? And you certainly didn't look like you were hating the experience either." Jeff tried, but couldn't quite succeed in keeping the bitterness out of his voice.

Annie was speechless. Jeff wasn't. "So yes, I ran into Britta - she was feeling a bit rejected as well, she'd been dancing with Troy most of the night after all. And yes, I asked her to dance - after all, nobody else was dancing with either of us - and then 'Roxanne' started. It's a good tune to tango to, and the tango is a good dance to do when you're feeling angry and rejected. Then we parted and spent the rest of the night with other people. When I tried to find you, nobody had a clue where you'd gone."

Annie still didn't know what to say. She had replayed the events of Saturday night dozens of times in her mind since then, but not once had she thought how things might have looked from Jeff's point of view - in her experience Annie Edison was the one who got dumped, not the one who got to do the dumping, and certainly not where guys like Jeff Winger were concerned. That somebody like Jeff could not only be dumped by her, but feel hurt by it, was so far out of context for Annie that she simply did not know how to process the idea. Instead, she tried to break down what Jeff had said into pieces she could handle.

"I didn't throw you at Marcia to get rid of you, I just thought it was funny she wanted to dance with you." Annie said sadly. "And I thought Troy asked me to dance because you'd asked him to. And then when I saw you and the blonde looking so amazing together I thought you'd done it to get us out of the picture so you could have her to yourself."

Jeff was really confused now. "Why would you think that?"

"Because he said that he'd heard that I was using this as a replacement for the Prom I couldn't have, and that he'd consider it an honour if I let him have one last dance as Prom King. I'd only told you, Joelle and Marcia that and they don't know him, so..."

"We hooked Joelle up with Abed, remember?"

"Well I know that's how it happened now obviously - Marcia and Joelle told me. But it didn't occur to me at the time. And yes, I thought that it was nice he asked, and he's a guy I used to want to be with but is barely a friend now - a friend of a friend at most, really. Whereas you and the blonde -"

"Britta is a girl I used to want to be with but is just a friend now." Jeff derived a certain satisfaction from using Annie's words back at her.

"So you're not together then?" She said in a very small voice.

"Me and Britta? Good grief no - okay, the sex would probably be pretty fantastic for a while, but we'd be trying to kill each other within a month, and I'd rather stay alive. Some people are just better off staying friends." Jeff saw the expression on Annie's face and smiled. "Too much information?"

"A bit, yes." Annie said dryly. "Look, I'm really sorry Jeff - In all the time I spent going over this and obsessing about what it meant I never stopped to figure out what it must have looked like to you."

"And I guess I never stopped to think you had your reasons, too." Jeff admitted. "Look Edison - can I ask you a favour?" Annie nodded, with a surprised expression on her face.

"I know I can be a jerk sometimes, but I really care about you and don't want you to go anywhere. I will also say or do things that can be interpreted in more than one way - can I just ask that if one of those ways causes you hurt or pain, you will trust that I meant the other one? Or at least you will talk to me first?"

Annie smiled. "Yes Jeff, I think I can do that."

"And one other thing."

"Yes Jeff?"

"Can we please get out of here? Your apartment is very… you, but the neighbourhood depresses me."

"Where do you want to go?"

"Well, when I was a mess and you took some time out to support me you wanted to go to the park for a picnic. It's my turn now, and I've brought food." Jeff held up his backpack and held out his arm. "Shall we?"

Annie smiled, and linked her arm through his.

"After you, milord."

XXXXXX

(Later, in the park)

Jeff's choice of picnic goods was somewhat haphazard - basically what he could grab on a five minute run through the first store he'd passed when driving to Annie's apartment - but Annie appreciated it was the thought that counted and she'd eaten her share happily. She was now lying flat on the ground, her head resting on Jeff's chest as she looked up at the clouds. Jeff was idly looking at a strand of her hair that had got loose and was twisting in the breeze and wondering if she'd mind if he twirled it in his fingers.

There was however something Annie had been mulling over since they were in her apartment.

"You said earlier that some people are just better off staying friends. Is that how you see us?"

Jeff was silent for a long moment. "I don't think we've found what our relationship is meant to be yet, Edison. Everything we've tried so far has turned out to be a fiasco, after all."

"And yet here we are, still looking?"

"And yet here we are, still looking."

"Jeff?"

"Yes, Edison?"

"When you find an answer that works you will tell me, won't you?" Annie tried hard to make her voice sound casual, but she couldn't quite manage it.

Jeff smiled down at her. "On my honour as a disbarred lawyer with a fake degree."

"Jeff!"

XXXXXX

Author's note: hopefully that's these mixed up idiots back on track. And, having achieved what is presumably the unique feat of tying the Duke of Wellington into a Community fanfic, it seems appropriate to announce that next chapter war comes to Greendale!