Disclaimer: 'Community' belongs to NBC and Dan Harmon.

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Annie let the tepid spray wash over her face for a moment before turning away from the shower head and letting the water run over her paint-saturated hair. The showers in the girls' locker room at Greendale had terrible water pressure, but she couldn't stand the idea of leaving campus in the state she had been in not four minutes ago. It had been a good game, and in the end the bittersweet victory had been theirs. Sure, things had gone down in very messed up and crazy Greendale fashion, but that was her school. Annie was finally ready to admit that she truly loved it there and didn't want to leave.

She rubbed a washcloth against the cheap bar soap that had been left in the large group shower cave that she was in, slightly grossed out by the possibilities of who had last used it. She worked up a relatively good lather and began to scrub her forearms harshly, flakes of orange paint falling to the wet tiled floor at her feet. Annie knew she should probably be running the water hot in order to help break the paint down better, but was so hot and sweaty from the game that the best she could manage was slightly warm for the time being. After getting the majority of paint off of her body, Annie began to focus on her hair, running fingers through the tangled and stiff mess that she'd made of her usually pristine brunette locks. The door to the locker room opened and Annie stilled in her movements for a moment, silently cursing herself for not having flipped the door lock when she'd come in earlier. A uncomfortable shiver ran over her entire body and she reached a hand over to adjust the temperature of the water upward. Shoes clicked against the tiled floor of the changing area. "Hello?" she finally called out unsurely.

"Hi." Annie felt an odd sensation of being both relieved and completely unnerved by the voice that she recognized so well.

"Um," Annie chuckled nervously. "Jeff, I'm kind of naked here." She cast her eyes around the large darkened stall.

He exhaled. "Yeah."

Annie returned to her task of trying to drag her fingers through her hair, careful not to tug at knots that had formed. "I think some people might read something into this," she shot out defiantly and gave herself a mental pat on the back for giving off more attitude than she actually felt at the moment. She really didn't know if she was in the mood to have a battle of wits with Jeff. It had been a long day.

A long year.

"Are you one of those people?" he asked and Annie noted his voice had a stilted, anxious quality to it that made her uneasy.

Shaking her head gently even though she knew he couldn't see her, Annie answered quietly. "I learned my lesson." She flipped her hair over her other shoulder before speaking. "I left my shampoo out there on a bench. Could you get it?"

"Uh…yeah." She heard his boots click away and then return a minute later. "Um…" Annie pursed her lips and reached one wet arm around the full-length tiled wall and toward where he was standing. His strong fingers brushed against her own slippery ones as he handed the bottle to her and Annie rolled her eyes at the jolt she felt in her stomach. Old habits died hard but they did die.

Eventually.

"Thank you," she said after a beat.

"Sure."

They stood in awkward silence for what seemed like several hours before Annie finally poured a generous amount of shampoo into her palm and started to work at washing her mess of hair. "So what brings you to the girls' locker room, Jeff?"

"I…wanted to talk to you," he stated haltingly. "And I figured if I cornered you here, you couldn't do that thing where you flounce away half way through."

Annie paused, her hands full of soapy hair. "Are you planning on saying something that is going to upset me?"

"I'm not sure," Jeff chuckled humorlessly. "Maybe? Probably."

She sighed and applied more pressure to her head, scrubbing with her fingers near the roots. "Okay."

He didn't speak for several seconds, and Annie was on the verge of calling out to him when he cleared his throat. "I just…I wanted to tell you that…" Annie hadn't realized she was holding her breath until her brain took over for her and she gasped lightly for air. "…you were right." He coughed. This was the most awkward conversation they'd ever had by a country mile. Annie scrunched up her face. Were country miles longer than city miles? "…when you said the study group is like a family."

"Really?" Annie squeaked.

"Yeah," he answered, and his voice was strangely gruff sounding. Annie felt her body react to it and reached over to turn the water temperature up. "And, in order to keep things that way-"

"Right," she said to herself, knowing where this was going already.

"-then I really need to remain the father figure here." Annie heard regret in his voice, but in the next instant was sure it was manufactured in her own mind. Jeff sighed. "Okay? Annie?"

"Yeah," she replied perfunctorily. She began scrubbing harder at her scalp, trying to wipe away the streams of suds running down her face as well as she could. "No, that seems right. You and Britta will be the parents and Troy and Abed and I will continue to be the kids, right?" He was right, she did want to flounce away. Trapping her in a cold on-the-verge-of-condemnation group shower on a deserted campus was probably the best he could have hoped for.

"Annie," he sighed again and she could hear how very tired he was of the whole thing. He was actually trying to be a good guy. "You know this is the right thing to do."

Annie frowned down at the tiled floor that was covered with orange-tinted foam. "Yeah," she breathed and she could almost hear the relief in his voice when he spoke again.

"And because we've gotten that figured out now," he started with a slightly bolder tone. "I think you can probably cut back on the whole 'teenage acting out' thing you've been trying."

Annie had stuck her entire head under the gentle spray of water to begin rinsing her hair, and therefore was sure she had misheard him. "What?" she asked, drawing the word out for several syllables.

He chuckled. "Come on, Annie." She frowned at the wall he was standing behind. "You try to make time with the hired paintball assassin and then you try to make time with Abed." She felt her cheeks flush at the memory no one else knew about. "I mean, seriously. What was that?"

"Nothing," Annie lied coolly, feeling her jaw tighten and cranked up the water temperature yet again, letting the steam spill through the tense air Jeff had created between them. "And I'm pretty sure dads don't ask those questions to their teenage daughters."

"You bet your ass they do," he shot back quickly before falling silent.

She fully rinsed her hair out, combing her fingers through it easily now. She was fairly certain he was still there, breathing only three feet from her with a solid concrete wall separating them. If he had ever had the urge at all, he would only have to take a step forward and look back.

But he stayed where he was, just as Annie had known he would.

"Jeff," she sighed.

"Yeah."

She stared expectantly at the wall, as if he would be able to feel it. "You're still here."

"Yeah," he echoed, his voice seeming distant.

She cleared her throat. "So, was there something else you needed?"

"I stand by everything I just said, Annie." He had turned to actually face the wall now, she could tell by the shift in his tone.

"Yeah," Annie answered, feeling irritated. "I know."

"We're a family," Jeff reiterated. "But…you weren't necessarily reading into things." She was aware she was holding her breath now, waiting for him to explain himself better on that topic, but the locker room was silent again save the running water. Annie reached over and turned the faucet off. "Look, I'm kind of slowly learning how to care about people, Annie." She crossed her arms protectively over her chest, feeling the immediate chill the lack of water left her with. "And you're a big part of that. But part of that process is knowing that we …would never work." Annie wanted to berate him for taking the easy way out. She wanted to barrel toward him, debate him until he was beat into submission. She wanted to argue against his reasoning.

But she didn't.

"I guess I'm lucky you're so moral when it comes to me," is what finally came out some time later. He sighed again and Annie was really starting to hate that sound. He was the put-upon one here?

"You do know it's a compliment, right?" Jeff drawled out.

"I know," She replied softly. She moved forward and reached around the end of the wall, grasping blindly for the towel she'd hung there.

"Oh," Jeff called out and then the towel landed in her outstretched hand. She pulled it back, feeling a slightly tremble shoot through her body. "I should probably leave," he said after an awkward moment.

"We're still going to Denny's?" she asked quickly, hopefully. Annie still wasn't quite ready to say goodbye to her study group for the summer yet.

"Yeah," Jeff answered and she could practically hear him rolling his eyes. She let herself smile slightly. They stood together in silence for what could have been a full minute before Annie cleared her throat. "So, I'll see you there?"

"Oh, yeah." He paused. "You have…clothes to change into?"

"Abed leant me some," Annie replied as she began to dry herself with the small towel he'd also given her. She was going to have to buy for him as a thank you.

"Abed," she heard Jeff repeat.

"He was Han," she heard herself say in her own defense.

Jeff cleared his throat. "Yeah."

Annie bit her lip. "Pancakes?"

He exhaled. "Pancakes."

The tell-tale clicking of his boots against the cheap tiling told Annie he was walking away. She heard the door open and then close and counted to seventeen before taking a deep breath and stepping out of the shower and walking the short distance to the changing area. She bent over slightly and began to dry her hair in earnest with the small already-wet towel Abed had offered her.

And then the door opened again.

Everything slowed down. Clumsily, Annie tried to cover herself with the small towel she'd had wrapped around her thick hair only a moment earlier. It seemed to be in vain however, as she watched Jeff's jaw slacken and his eyes widen at the sight of her before he remembered exactly who they were and then his entire body shifted sideways and he was facing the door again, his eyes squeezed tight.

"Yeah," His voice sounded strangled. "I was just going to tell you which Denny's."

"You could have texted that," Annie huffed, still trying to conceal her naked form.

"Yeah," Jeff responded. "I'm sorry."

"Well," Annie frowned at him. "I've seen you naked, so now we can be even."

"'Friends'?" Jeff asked without glancing toward her.

"Yeah," Annie chuckled in response before rolling her eyes. "So, which Denny's?"

"I'll just text you," Jeff shot back quickly as he reached blindly for the door handle.

"Jeff?" Annie asked, actually beginning to enjoy how flustered he appeared to be by the current situation.

"Yeah?"

She slowly walked toward him, the damp towel clinging to her courtesy of a hasty closure in between her breasts. "I don't think dads do this either." She bit her lip.

He opened his eyes then and looked over at her, his expression serious.

"Yeah."

He was gone as quickly as he had come and Annie was alone again.

Naturally.