Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"I still think that we should've at least put in asterisks that not EVERY cavewoman had a male partner and mothered children, but okay"

Everyone's eyes are now on you, glaring. "Seriously, Britta, why are you like this?" Jeff asks. It's a rhetorical question, but it cuts deep. You honestly don't know why you're like this; sometimes being this SJW feels like a weird force of habit. Everyone else hates you for it, and honestly, you hate yourself for it too.

At the end of yet another late diorama craft-session, Annie adds a final touch, before stepping back and taking a last good look at everyone's project. "I think it's finished"

There's a collective sigh of relief, as everyone starts grabbing their stuff and leaving. Annie is usually the one to dismiss everyone at the end of these sessions, and this time, it took especially long before she was satisfied. It's nearly 20:00 and you still haven't done the homework for your other classes either. As you start mentally mapping out what you're going to do this evening, someone calls your name: "Hey Britta, could you stay a bit longer?" It's Annie. You turn around, prepared to tell her that you've got more important things to do tonight than just working on this diorama, when you get a good look at her. She looks nervous and almost sad? With your frustration, suddenly turning into confusion, you say: "O... K"

As you wait for everyone to leave, with Jeff being last, you awkwardly stand next to Annie and finally close the library door. You give Annie a look that conveys that she can start talking. "Could we maybe sit down for this?" You give her a confused look, but comply, sitting down next to her at the study table. "So, what did you want to discuss?" Annie starts fumbling with her hands and reluctantly starts. "Uhm, so, ok. I think, I guess that I've been. No, Uhm- so" Her breathing gets slightly faster. You put your hand on Annie's. "Are you okay?" She takes a deep breath before answering "Yes. I wanted to talk to you today, because since the Valentine's dance, I've been thinking a bit more. About me, and the fact that... I don't entirely think that I'm straight." She's very purposefully avoiding eye contact and looking down in front of her, with a tense expression, waiting for your response. You comfortingly move your hand across Annie's arm before retrieving it and saying: "Well, Annie, that's great." She looks up at you with puppy eyes and you give her a smile, before she looks away again. "Guess I didn't even need to be friends with Paige to have a queer friend; you were right here." Annie slightly laughs and speaks again: "Yeah, I guess. And for clarity, you can ask me questions, I don't think it's rude." You suddenly remember how you called Annie a homophobe not that long ago and are hit with guilt when you realize why she wanted to ask those questions about Paige. What do you want to know about her, though? From the way she worded her coming out, you don't think she knows quite what she is yet, so you won't pry about it. "Well, I do have one question, or technically two. Why did you decide to come out now? And why specifically to me; not trying to be rude, but we're not exactly super close."

"Heh, well, I guess with all the events at the Valentine's dance, I was kind of reminded of all this stuff I'd kept tucked away in my mind. Gay stuff. It's almost like I got so good at suppressing it, I forgot about it myself. When I saw that you were comfortable being friends with Paige, I took a mental note, that I would probably be safe coming out to you." Safe? You can understand why she'd be nervous about coming out to Pierce or Shirley, but she knows that the other people in the group will love her for who she is, right? "Wait- am I the first person you're coming out to? You could've talked to the others too when they were here." Annie starts nervously laughing, likely to suppress tears. "I don't know. You are the first person I'm telling this, aside from my parents." She closes her eyes and swallows, before continuing: "It's just that, when I was younger, I thought my parents were cool people, so I felt really safe telling them how I was feeling back when I was 16. And I could never forget how they reacted." She starts slightly crying, "They said that, by the age of 18, I either had to change my mind or move out." "Jesus Christ, Annie, that's horrible." Smiling through her tears she mutters: "I just, I love the study group so much, Britta. And I really believe that they're all good people, but just don't want to go through anything like that again. I don't want what we have to change."

As Annie cries more and you pat her back, not really sure of how to comfort people. She tries to forcefully stop herself and says, smiling and shaking her head through her tears: "I'm sorry for being so dramatic, I think my period's about to come up, it's-" You slap her in the face. Confused and indignant, she looks at you. "Annie, no! Period or not, your feelings are freaking valid! Also, sorry, I slapped you slightly harder than intended!"

Annie starts laughing now, the way you love to see her. She's actually laughing, not the nervous kind, as she sweetly looks up to you. She gives you a hug that communicates all the gratefulness she clearly feels towards you. It feels magical how just accepting someone can really help them this much. It reminds you of why you're so Britta. Everyone finds you annoying for always preaching your ideologies, but seeing how being like that can truly help someone who's secretly struggling, is why you do it. And in accepting Annie, you accept yourself a bit more, too.

Chapter Text

Annie had to drop Britta off with her car after the latest school dance, because of course Britta drank too much and of course she's not able to get a cab with her reputation of puking in cabs. The others would drive her, but Annie insisted that she's the only one who's completely sober, so she should be the one with the most lives in her hands. Jeff had some problems with that, because he offered to drive Britta home first, but with him trying to simultaneously please Annie and Britta, he couldn't think of another plan quick enough.

Britta's sitting next to her, struggling to put on her seatbelt, as Annie starts up the car. She painfully waits for way too long, for way too many missed attempts, until Britta gets it right, and starts driving. In complete silence, the air inside the car only slightly hotter than the air outside of it, they drive to Britta's house. Without prompting, Britta starts pushing the buttons surrounding the radio, and before Annie can stop her from getting them into an accident, the radio actually starts playing. Or rather, Annie's own tape. She swats Britta's hand away. "Britta, you don't push random buttons in cars, what are you, four?!" "Sorry Annie, can we put on music?" she asks with a smirk, as the first song starts playing. Before Annie can lecture her any further though, she realizes what Britta has unintentionally done and almost wishes that she'd pressed a self-destruct button instead. Annie quickly reads the first song title and nonchalantly tries to skip it. She honestly can't tell if Britta notices, because she is pretty hazy. 'girls - girl in red', skip that. 'girls like girls - Hayley Kiyoko', 'she - dodie'. God, Annie would swear that this is not what her entire playlist is like, but the shuffle function is really not doing her any favors today. "Hey, why do you keep skipping?" Okay, so Britta did notice. "I- I just want it to land on a song that you would like. Y'know, these are all sappy Annie songs," she says trying to reach for the skip button again. "If I can't push buttons, so can't you," Britta says, pushing Annie's hand away, "It's your car, listen to your music, you don't always have to be a perfect hostess. I can handle some sappiness." Annie feels her hand twitch, as she reads what the next song is, but supposes there's no skipping now. She keeps her eyes glued to the road in front of her as 'she keeps me warm' by Mary Lambert plays. They both don't say anything for the entire duration of it. Annie can feel Britta's eyes on her after it ends and the car is silent for a bit, Annie praying that Britta doesn't say anything.

The next song starts and it's Taylor Swift's 'love story', thank God, something not explicitly gay. During the chorus, Annie can sense Britta bopping and slightly humming along, which she really didn't expect from Britta of all people. Annie flashes her a smile as she turns up the volume and by the second chorus, they're both screaming the lyrics. And Annie thinks to herself: this is nice. Unfiltered Britta, with no pretentious feminist, tomboy rules she has for herself, just enjoying what she enjoys. Britta's girly side almost never comes out, but when it does, it makes her feel more real. You know that she's truly holding nothing back anymore. The next song, 'Dear future husband' comes up and Britta sings along with full confidence to that as well. She doesn't get all the lyrics right, and her voice is (very) far from perfect, but there's something endearing about it. Britta is still very much in the sing-along mood, and Annie thinks that she might've even forgotten about the, more... sapphic songs that came before, when the next song starts.

Annie doesn't have to look at the title, because less than half a second in, she can recognize those opening drums. Time to shut up and avoid eye contact again. She's so close to Britta's house as well, but the universe just wants to out her a little bit more. "This was never the way I planned-" she can hear out of the speaker and Britta's mouth simultaneously. Should Annie sing along too? Maybe it's only weird if she makes it weird. A few seconds in, she notices that Britta knows the lyrics perfectly and she sings them with the same amount of intensity she had for the other songs, if not more. Annie decides to only hum along, quietly enough so the music drowns it out. Britta doesn't seem to care in the slightest though, screaming "I kissed a girl, and I liked it!" without a care in the world. Annie can see Britta dancing, moving around in that sensual, dramatic way she herself sometimes does too, when she's home alone and feels like the sexiest, most powerful woman on earth. It's nice to see that others do that too. It looks a bit silly from an outside perspective, but also kind of actually hot? God, no! It's this damn song, it always makes Annie feel things, and she just happens to be projecting that onto Britta right now. Throughout the rest of the song, Annie is thankful that the streets are empty, because she can't stop herself from looking at Britta every two seconds, her fantasies rushing out of her control. Should she ask Britta to stop? If she did, Britta would ask why and Annie would have to explain that she's making Annie feel too many things for her to be able to focus, so let's not do that. Annie tries to simultaneously savor and repress this new experience with Britta next to her, as she slightly goes over the speed limit to get to Britta's house faster. When they get there, Annie can't stop herself from parking carefully, but as soon as she's got it in position, she removes her key and stops the radio before the song ends. Britta snaps out of her singing haze and looks around her. "Oh, we're here." "Yeah." Without thinking about it, Annie gets out of the car to walk over to Britta's side and open the door for her. Britta absolutely could've done that herself. She helps Britta out and walks her to her front porch. "Well, good night, Britta." Britta gives her a hug, and doesn't pull back yet. "Hey, Annie. Just know that I support your, uh... taste in music." She rubs Annie's back before pulling back from the embrace. "Thanks. Don't mention it. Like, actually don't mention it, to, like, other people-" "I get it, I won't. Don't worry," she chuckles, "I actually like those songs myself too." Annie could definitely tell. They both stare at each other in silence for a bit, enjoying the sounds of crickets and the cold air around them. "Well, good night, Britta. Again." "Good night." As she walks back to her car, Annie mentally goes over what Britta said. "I like those songs myself too", did that have a double connotation? She gets into the car and sees Britta still standing in her doorway. As she drives away, she can see Britta waving through her car mirror and she waves back until she's out of sight. She turns on the radio and listens to the rest of 'I kissed a girl' as she drives back to her own apartment. She can see Britta next to her again. She knows that she won't leave her mind for the rest of this night. She can't decide if driving Britta home tonight was a smart choice, but it's certainly an exciting one.

Chapter Text

You honestly have no idea what compelled you to sign up for this class. For some reason a few weeks ago, salsa dancing classes sounded like a great way to learn a new skill just for yourself, unrelated to your future or anything like that. A method of unwinding and getting out of your own head. Cut to now, with you sitting in a class with the Dean talking your ears off (is he even allowed to enroll in classes here?) and a few strangers silently warming up to the music the teacher put on. You have no idea how to warm up for this and you don't want to look stupid, so you just sit on a bench with the Dean while waiting for class to start. Which should be in a few minutes. Why are you always so damn early, Annie?

"So while I absolutely didn't ONLY add this class to our selection so that I could enroll in it-"

the door to the classroom opens and Britta steps inside, scanning her surroundings as if to make sure no one sees her in a class like this. She catches your eye and is clearly immediately embarrassed and trying to hide it. You beckon her over. You know she probably doesn't like that, you don't even really like getting too close to Britta lately, but you just want someone besides the Dean to be here with you. She hesitantly walks over and sits next to you, starting to change her shoes. "Hey, Annie. And Dean." She very purposefully avoids making eye contact with you until she's put on her dance shoes and looks at you shyly. "You won't tell the others about this, right?" "Britta, they know you did tap, they won't judge you for this." "Still, salsa's, like, even more... make-fun-of-able, so if you just could not mention me being here?"

As she says that, the door opens again and Troy and Abed walk inside. "That might get a bit difficult." you joke. Britta looks horrified and tries to hide her face even more, as if that'll help anything. They walk over to the three of you. Abed looks at you and Troy immediately greets Britta, "Hey, Britta, we share a dance class this time!" "Yeah, I guess we... all do, and that's great." she says with clearly plastered on excitement. "Well, I think that this will help the five of us all grow closer as a group!" the Dean excitedly says as he gets up to join some people that are warming up on the side of the classroom. You understand that Troy and Britta are here, they both have taken dance classes before, but Abed is a bit more surprising. You decide to straight up ask him what made him sign up and Troy answers for him: "Well, you see, I wanted to take more dance classes, but Greendale didn't have any aside from this one, and I just thought that salsa was more of a buddy thing, so I asked Abed." Britta leans in close to you and says "yeah, 'cause salsa's famously a "buddy" thing." "Britta, we can all hear you. But yes I signed up for this class because Troy didn't want to be one of those sad sacks that signed up for a salsa class on his own, and it seemed interesting." You and Britta both look at him a bit indignantly, but he doesn't get the hint that he should take back calling you sad sacks, so eventually you let it slide.

The school bell rings, indicating that the class will start, right at the moment that the door opens again. Jeff is standing there. He looks at the four of you and before the ringing sound ends, turns around and leaves without a word.

You all get up and pick a spot in the room to stand. In any other class you would never do this, but you decide to stand more in the back so that no one can look at you. Especially now that you know your friends are here, you feel weird about dancing and how you look doing it. Everyone needs to learn the steps on their own first before you partner up. Mrs. Aydem goes a little too fast for your liking, but if you try really hard, you're able to do all the steps, technically. Looking at the other students around you, they seem to be getting the hang of it relatively quickly. It's weird, not in a nice way; you're used to being top of your class and just seeing everyone understand something that you don't; it's a horrible feeling. You look at Troy, with his masculine yet elegant form. He missteps sometimes, but in a way that doesn't make it look wrong. Abed's movements are definitely a bit stiffer than Troy's, but he puts his feet in the perfect places during every spin or other move that you just can't seem to get the hang of. And Britta. She's standing behind Mrs. Aydem and just copies down what she does perfectly, dare you say improves on it? It's kind of jarring, almost, to see Britta be this good at something. Normally she's bad at everything , it's, like, her thing. When you get an A- on a test, you can at least always compare your grade to Britta's to feel better about yourself, but you're not going to be able to do that here. God, Annie, it's horrible that you do that, now that you think about it. Britta would say that that's all your insecurities and unhealthy expectations for yourself grasping at straws or something phycological like that. You're in your head, Annie, and it's making your dancing even worse somehow. The teacher turns around and now lets you do all the steps on your own, rehearse them for yourself for a little bit before you partner up. You keep your eyes fixed on Britta to... appreciate her form and try to emulate it. You manage to nail all steps down, be it after a few tries, but you did it.

Now it's time to actually dance with someone else. Everyone immediately forms duo's and you're stuck with the Dean again. You don't dislike him, but his chaotic energy is just a bit much for you sometimes. While you're dancing, he stays relatively silent, though. He's actually pretty good at guiding you and you find yourself doing better now that there's someone to subtly correct your movements. "You know, I thought Jeff would be here, he's registered in the system, but he didn't show up." Of course he's worried about that. You try to keep your face neutral, to disguise that fact you all saw him in the doorway earlier. Do you tell the Dean? "We'd have to fight over who gets to dance with him, though." the Dean says, in an almost threatening tone. "Just kidding," he says before laughing it off. You awkwardly chuckle at his remark. "sort of." he adds, condescending himself again. If Jeff shows up for later classes, you'll just let him dance with the Dean. You're not sure what would happen to you if you didn't, plus you're trying to be less Jeff-focused lately. You like him, but lately whenever you fantasize about him for too long, you always get really anxious for some reason. Maybe you have a fear of commitment, just like him and Britta? You don't know, but it doesn't matter. God, Annie, you took this class to unwind and you're worrying about Jeff again.

"Everyone, switch partners now! If you were leading before, you have to follow now and vice versa." You didn't know that there were going to be partner switches, but you suppose it's a welcome distraction. You smile at the Dean before looking around for a new dance partner. Troy and Abed part and you catch Troy looking around him too. You walk over to him, "Hey, you were leading just now, right?" "...Yeah" he says after thinking about it for a second. "Great, we can dance then." You grab his hand and start stepping forward and back. You're supposed to insinuate with your hands what the next move will be and Troy has to lean into that. You move your hand to the right, which should mean a spin and you clumsily spin Troy around. You're struggling and mainly just idly step, at the risk of messing something up. If Troy notices (, who are you even kidding, you're terrible at leading) he doesn't say anything about it. You cautiously make him spin once more and it actually goes pretty well this time. You're slowly getting the hang of dancing with him. He's way different from the Dean in his movement and grip, and you wonder if he notices a significant difference between you and Abed as well. As you fall into a pretty comfortable rhythm, you talk to him. "You know, if you told high-school me that I'd be salsa dancing with Troy Barnes one day, she'd probably start hyperventilating. Or just straight-up not believe it." You don't know exactly why you say that. "Are you hyperventilating right now?" he asks, suddenly worried and slowing down his movement. "No, no! Definitely not. This is good. I just found it funny that I dreamed about something like this for so long, and now that I finally do it, it's with you as my friend. And I wouldn't want it any other way." He smiles at you and you think about how 16-year old Annie would try to kiss him at this moment, or at least think about it. But you don't. You don't want to. So you keep dancing.

After a few minutes it's time to switch again. You try to math out who you could dance with here. If you were leading Troy just now and Troy danced with Abed before, that would mean that Troy was leading two turns ago, so Abed was leading last turn, so he would have to follow- "Hey! are you following this round?" Britta's voice suddenly pierces your thoughts. "Uhh- yeah! I don't know if you'd want to dance with someone of my skill level, though. You looked pretty experienced before." Britta gives you a look that's somewhere between being flattered and confused. "That's- Annie, trust me I'm not." she says, confusedly laughing at how, for once, she's the one on the receiving end of compliments. It's kind of adorable how she doesn't know how to handle them, you didn't even entirely mean for it to be a compliment, you're just genuinely scared that your inexperience will inconvenience her. Before you can say anything else, though, she grabs your hand and starts guiding you. "If you fuck up now, it'll be on me, I'm leading. Which, by the way, God, I love this teacher. Everyone has to lead sometimes and everyone has to follow, none of that unnecessarily gendered crap." You give Britta a smile and look down, at your feet. Where are you supposed to look during salsa? Your eyes drift from your feet, to your hands, to the empty space behind Britta, which is when you step on her foot. "Sorry! sorry. I don't know where to look and-" God, this is what you were worrying about. "Just look at me, okay? It's fine." You look at Britta's eyes and she tries her best to comfort you with a smile. Britta's not that good at comforting or smiling, but you appreciate it. Your eyes eventually settle a bit lower, because looking into Britta's eyes while dancing is kinda trippy for some reason and it makes your movements even worse. Why are you suddenly so aware of everything you're doing? You weren't worrying about this with Troy. Maybe it's because you don't know Britta as well as Troy, that it feels harder to be this close to her.

"Annie, just remember, this is your first class, stuff like that happens: stepping on people's feet, bumping into each other. If you don't worry about it, your body will adjust by itself. You need to loosen up a little. Loosey-goosey" she says, squeezing your arm a bit, which admittedly is very tense. You try to relax into her grip. Her hand's colder than Troy's, but somehow there's something nice about that? For the entirety of this round, you're not able to fully relax, but you do get a bit better. Britta's a great lead; she's able to feel what you can handle, which is mostly normal stepping, and sideways stepping, and the occasional spin, after which you need to regain your rhythm each time. Mrs. Aydem calls for everyone to split up again and the rest of the class is spent going over what you learned today, followed by a cooling down. You find yourself not really being able to cool down.