The rest of the group was too tired after an evening wasted building a stupid, pointless diorama for Professor Duncan's Anthropology class to notice that Annie and Britta headed out of the library in the same direction. That in and in itself wasn't that unusual; only Abed, if he'd thought to think of it, would have found it suspicious that two women who lived in opposite directions of the campus would park in the same parking lot. But he didn't, and even in his subconscious didn't add it on to the building flood of realization that would burst on him later on in the year about what was going on between his two friends.
Even Troy, though, probably would have raised an eyebrow if he'd seen them both get into Annie's rusty old Honda.
Annie Edison wasn't concerned about that as she fastened her seatbelt, though. She was much more concerned about what was going on in the head of the woman in her passenger seat.
She'd been acting... distant. In a way that went beyond the way they acted around each other, now, when the rest of the group was around. That was just discretion. It was a necessity, unless they wanted to deal with Shirley's judgment or Pierce's condescension or whatever Jeff would end up taking away from this whole thing.
That was not brushing her hand along the small of Britta's back as she painted in the black fur of the Australopithecus, not feeling the warmth of her flesh through the soft wool of her flannel shirt as the blonde flicked the brush with practiced skill. It was trying not to catch her eye during those little lulls in the day, or, if she couldn't resist, to at least try not to get lost in her gaze for too long.
It wasn't being rude. It wasn't trying to pick little fights, trying to get under her skin throughout the day. It wasn't flat out pretending she wasn't there. Even now, when they were alone, driving to her stupid apartment, Britta was just staring out the window. Annie had almost pulled out of the Greendale parking lot and she still hadn't said anything.
"Is anything wrong?" Annie asked, in a careful, controlled way.
"Why would anything be wrong?" Britta asked in return, her tone icier than the glacier Troy had made for their diorama. A lot icier, actually, since that had just been Papier-mâché. Annie exhaled, frustrated. If that's how she wanted it...
"Alright," Annie said. They were silent for the rest of the drive.
The day had started out so well, too. They'd finally started their fundraiser for the BP oil spill, and it had been a really big hit. People had gathered around in the center of the quad to see their diorama. The one just she and Britta had made together, over nights of Rom Coms (Annie's choice) and Thai food takeout (Britta's). The one Annie had decided to make when she saw Britta crying over a photo of a pelican, covered in a toxic mix of oil and mud. The reddish brown muck coated the wretched animal's feathers, and it was crumpled, pathetically, in a small heap on the shore.
"The poor little birdy!" she'd said, sobbing. "It's just stuck there."
Annie had thought raising almost $500 dollars in one day would have helped. In fact, the mental image of Britta, cradling that poor bird in her arms and beaming, had helped keep her bright and chipper through the hours they'd spent shilling for donations.
But Britta hadn't acted happy about the total. At first, when she'd just been quiet and slightly sullen, Annie had just assumed that she'd felt bad about not raising nearly as much as her. But as her sort-of-kind-of-but-she-doesn't-like-labels girlfriend had grown less and less passive in her aggression she'd come to think that that explanation wasn't enough.
Annie was still fuming as they pulled up in front of Britta's apartment. She pulled her car into an open spot and parked.
"Do you even want me to come up?" she asked, not bothering to hide the anger anymore.
"I don't know. Do you want to come up?" Britta was staring out the windshield, her arms crossed over her chest.
"Yes!" Annie shouted, feeling her face redden. "I want us to go up there and tear each other's clothes off, and then I want to touch you and kiss you and taste you and do all the other things to you that I've wanted to do all day! And I want to do them until all this stupid awkward energy you keep putting out goes back to wherever the hell it came from! Until we can just be together again."
Britta stared. She looked a little shocked at her outburst. But it was brief, and small, and then the frown was back.
"All right," she answered, setting her jar and nodding. "You'd better come up then."
#
The door to the apartment slammed behind them. Annie's fingers were quick and nimble as they danced down Britta's shirt, unbuttoning each button as the other woman forced her backwards. She heard a cat jump up, skittering out of their way. Her heart beat lightning quick in her chest, and she already felt the desire starting to drip out of her. She pushed the flannel shirt and leather jacket together off Britta's shoulders just as her foot caught the edge of the bed.
Annie's back hit the mattress with a squeak of shifting bedsprings and Britta pursued her, capturing her hands above her head as she pressed her into the cotton sheets. The blonde attacked the nape of her neck, kissing it as Annie bucked and struggled under her, trying to dislodge her, to get back some measure of control of this situation. She was the one who was supposed to be angry here, darn it! But it was no use; she was at Britta's mercy, here on her back. She wondered, briefly, if she'd made a mistake in strategy trading space for clothes so brazenly in their grapple on their way into the apartment. Then Britta straightened, lifting her upper body away, and the way the moonlight hit the pale skin of her smooth, naked breasts made them appear almost luminous made Annie realize that was a stupid question.
"I caught you," Britta said. Annie's eyes flitted up to her face. She was grinning down at her, and there was a feral gleam in her eye.
