Archive of Our Own

Sometimes Troy forgets.

He wakes up one morning when everyone else is still asleep, his feet layered with Abed’s, and takes a minute just to stare at the face a scant inch in front of his. Abed’s hair is rumpled and his jaw is slack, which is really cute because he looks so put together when he’s awake, and Troy likes to watch. Then his stomach gurgles, and he has to very slowly pull away because he knows from experience that if he moves too fast, Abed’s arm will fall heavily off his waist and Abed will jerk awake immediately, and then Troy will feel bad. He exits their bedroom—which used to be his bedroom, which used to be the Dreamatorium—and goes into the kitchen.

In the kitchen, he takes out a mixing bowl, a whisk, measuring cups and spoons, and all the ingredients for blueberry pancakes, and he carefully lays out his mise en scene. He took a half-semester Home Ec class at Greendale last semester. It’s not instinctive the way plumbing was, and Chef Renaldo banned him from improvising or using his best judgement on anything ever, but as long as he follows the rules, he does a good job.

It’s nice, to know what he’s doing, and it’s nice to do things for other people; he kind of gets why Shirley’s so into baking for people she loves. He sifts the flour and mixes the dry ingredients first and then adds the wet ones, and is careful to stop while the batter is still lumpy. He adds blueberries, because that’s the recipe they learned in class. Annie has assured him he could swap the blueberries for chocolate chips and it wouldn’t change the recipe at all, but he hasn’t tried yet—he wants to be a hundred percent sure. He watches the bubbles in the batter pop and slowly fill in, and waits until they remain open like little volcano craters. (He thinks about all those cartoons he watched as a kid where the characters turned microscopic and went inside someone’s stomach and found incredible worlds made out of food and body parts. He’s going to pitch it to Abed.)

When the pancakes are done, he makes two plates and puts butter on them the way Abed likes it and pours two glasses of milk.He takes them back into the bedroom. Abed stirs at the sound of the plates being put down on the nightstand.

“Hey,” he says groggily.

“Hey.” Troy leans down and kisses his cheek. “I made pancakes.”

“Blueberry?”

“Yeah.”

Abed yawns and sits up. Troy passes him a plate.

“Is Neil here?” Abed asks after a few minutes.

“Huh? Why would Neil be here?”

“When he stopped by last week, he came up with a series of implausible excuses to look in the bedrooms. I think he’s part of Pierce’s Marriage Verification Squad.”

Troy freezes with a bite halfway to his mouth and remembers that he’s not really married. He takes a bite. It’s hard to swallow.

“Nah,” he says. “Neil’s not here.”

“You kissed me,” Abed says.

“Oh. Yeah.” Troy’s heart is pounding. “Sorry. Habit, I guess.”

Abed is balancing the plate on his knees and cutting a pancake into precise pieces. He pushes the pieces around with his fork.

“It’s okay,” he says. “I don’t mind.”

“To Troy, I leave the obligatory sperm.”

“Maybe it’s because everyone else got one, and because it’s an old man’s semen, but… I’m kind of disappointed.”

“In addition, I am prepared to leave Troy Barnes my remaining shares in the Hawthorne Wipes company, currently valued at $14.3 million. On one condition: the ownership of the shares will be transferred to you at the end of twelve successful months of marriage.”

“What?”

“Again with the bait and switch,” Jeff mutters.

“Over the course of my life, I came to realize that it’s not enough to have the heart of a hero. Innate intelligence, handsomeness, and charm will only get you so far—you can never reach your true potential without being truly loved, and loving in return. I was married seven times. Each one ended in failure because I was too wrapped up in my own needs to fully experience true love. I have always regretted this, and I’d like to give you a chance to do what I never did. PS, my lawyer says that I need to set a reasonable deadline for the conditions of the will to be met, so you have one month. Good luck.”

“Okay.” Jeff sits forward in his chair. “First of all, let’s take a moment to appreciate the fact that Pierce’s definition of a successful marriage means one year of being with someone you’ve known for a month or less. Secondly, Troy, I’m a lawyer—it should be possible to contest these conditions as unreasonable—”

“I’ll do it.”

Why wouldn’t he do it? He gets to be a millionaire and find true love. Of course he’ll do it.

But it turns out that finding true love is hard to do in a month, because the kind of person Troy could have a successful romance with is creeped out at by some random dude mentioning marriage on the second date. He keeps trying, just in case he has one of those instant connections like the movies—he crams in maybe a hundred dates in the three weeks following Pierce’s death but never gets that everything-slows-down, the-soundtrack-swells, the-focus-goes-soft feeling.

Not unsurprisingly, it’s Jeff who first floats the idea of cheating. It’s one year. He can be married to anybody for a year, right? And then he’s a 25-year-old divorcé with fourteen million dollars and endless free time to find his true love. The only problem is that Pierce has tasked LeVar Burton with determining if the marriage fits his definition of success. There are a lot of ways to fail it—by cheating outside the context of a threesome, not living together, not spending a certain amount of time together, not sleeping in the same bed, fighting too much, not being nice to each other’s kids, scamming the other person for money for plastic surgery, etc. (They’re learning a lot about Pierce’s marriages.) And he’s hired people at Greendale to be LeVar’s eyes and ears, too.

So pretending to be married, even for a year, isn’t as easy as it sounds. He doesn’t think he could do it with a stranger. Shirley is morally opposed to a phony marriage, and Troy could barely act like he was in a relationship with Britta when he was actually in a relationship with Britta.

That leaves Annie. Annie seems like a good prospect. As a matter of fact, Abed has a thirty-page list of Qualifications for Troy’s Soulmate and Annie checks off a lot of the boxes—she’s within four years of Troy’s age and four inches of his height, Type A personality, more in control of her emotions but accepting of his own, creative, with a good sense of humor but not as funny as him so he’ll be able to make her laugh. Shirley tries not to look thrilled by this, and Jeff tries to look less not-thrilled.

And then it’s all moot, anyway, because Abed points out that they’ll have to kiss, often, if they have any chance of passing Pierce’s tests, and they can’t do that without one of them squealing because Annie is like his sister and it’s just too weird.

“Duh,” Chang says, and they all jump and scream because it turns out he’s been hiding under the couch this whole time—Jeff left him off the text chain because they didn’t think he could keep it a secret. “Marry Abed. You’re already dating anyway.”

“No, Chang, they’re not,” Annie sighs, equal parts pitying and frustrating. “Although…”

“Although what?” Troy says.

“Although if we’re talking about people you can pretend to like more than anyone else for a full year, Abed pretty much fits the bill, don’t you think?”

“Oh, duh-doy,” Britta says, and Shirley is nodding, and Jeff slaps the table.

“Wow, that was easy,” he says. “Meeting adjourned.”

“Wait—”

They only have a few days left in the deadline, but they don’t jump into it without thinking. They do research.

“I think they kiss here,” Abed says quietly as River Phoenix hugs Keanu Reeves on the screen, lit by only the orange glow of a flickering fire.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. The angle and the lighting are ambiguous, but—I think Mike is angled to kiss his neck when they go in for the hug.”

“Okay.” Troy sits on the floor. He stretches his legs out and opens his arms. “Come here, Abed. Just—come here.”

Abed squats on the floor, and then dives into Troy’s arms. His lips caress the skin just above the collar of Troy’s t-shirt. Troy closes his arms around him, and when he doesn’t push him away, Abed turns his head and parts his lips. His breath is hot against the curve of Troy’s shoulder. Troy holds the back of Abed’s head—his hair is soft. The scene cuts away at this point; he doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do next, so he just holds Abed until his butt starts to get numb from sitting on the hard floor.

“That was good,” Abed says, clearing his throat. “I want to do Pride & Prejudice next. It’s not a gay movie, obviously, but Annie’s watched it in the apartment so many times that I can’t not think of it any time romance films come up. Also the last scene is great for our purposes, because there’s a couple different kinds of kisses to practice.”

“Sounds good.”

Troy sits with his legs crossed on the table—Annie would be annoyed if she knew, but she’s probably resigned by now. Abed kneels on the table in front of him and adopts a British accent.

“What shall I call you when I’m cross?” he says. “Mr. Nadir?”

“No,” Troy says. “You may only call me Mr. Nadir when you are perfectly, completely incandescently happy.”

“And how are you this evening, Mr. Nadir?” Abed says. He kisses Troy’s forehead. “Mr. Nadir….” He kisses him on his left cheek, which is a little challenging because his hand is cupping Troy’s face so he needs to lean further until he’s really kissing the soft space below his ear. “Mr. Nadir…” He kisses the tip of Troy’s nose. “Mr. Nadir…” He kisses his right check, just near the corner of his mouth. “Mr. Nadir…”

His voice is hardly even a whisper. He kisses Troy’s lips. His lips are very, very soft, and he freezes a little when they first touch—Troy isn’t sure if that’s Abed or Mr. Darcy. He’s pretty sure it’s Mr. Darcy whose lips are slowly tugging at his, a gentle caress that won’t seem out of place in a fancy movie like this. Troy keeps his eyes closed the entire time, and when Abed pulls away, he leans forward unconsciously and opens his eyes slowly, blinking in surprise.

“Good character work,” Abed says.

“Thanks.”

“That was an alternate ending scene, you know. It played in American theaters but was unpopular with UK audiences.”

“Oh.”

“The next one is really better with stairs,” Abed muses. “But I guess we could just do it here. I’m going to go stand by the door. You stand just behind the blanket fort and pretend I’m walking heavily down some stairs. Oh, and here.”

He hands Troy his hat from cowboy paintball, which has been waiting on the couch this entire time. Troy puts it on.

“Got it.”

They reach their marks. Abed’s face falls into an easy grin that’s also somehow restrained—and very, very manly.

“Troy fuckin’ Barnes,” he drawls.

He crosses the room and they hug. They’ve done this before, but this is a very different hug—instead of Troy carefully embracing a still, stiff Abed, it’s Abed who wraps his entire body around Troy, so hard they rock back and forth.

“Son of a bitch,” Troy whispers in the little space between them.

Abed leans back and looks around, making sure they’re alone, and then he fists his hands in  the front of Troy’s shirt and walks him back until they hit Annie’s door. In one movement he knocks Troy’s hat off and grabs his face. Troy grabs him back and then they’re kissing—nothing like their Pride & Prejudice kiss. A hard kiss, desperate, more about reassuring each other that they’re both here and solid than anything else. They’re both breathing hard when they separate.

“Scene,” Abed says. He clears his throat. “How’s your nose?”

“What? It’s fine.”

“Okay. Heath Ledger allegedly broke Jake Gyllenhaal’s nose during filming. We’ll get there.”

“I don’t think we have to get there,” Troy says with a frown. “Lots of couples don’t break each other’s noses and still have successful marriages. I think Pierce’s Marriage Verification Squad won’t mind.”

“Cool. Cool, cool, cool.”

“So is that it?” Troy asks. “I thought you said you had four ideas.”

Abed hesitates. Abed doesn’t usually hesitate—not when it’s just them.

“Well… I guess there’s one more. But it’s part of a sex scene. Pierce’s will is pretty weird but it doesn’t require us to have sex in front of witnesses.”

“I think we can still try it out,” Troy says, heart pounding. “We’re pretending to be a couple who has sex, so maybe it will be easier if we’ve already pretended to have sex.”

“Yeah.” Abed thinks about it for a moment. “Okay. Can you take off your shirt and lay down on the coffee table.”

“The coffee table? Not the couch?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay…”

Troy takes off his shirt and lies down. He stares at the water stains on the ceiling as Abed walks into the kitchen and opens the fridge. He hears the crack and hiss of a can opening and the sound of a shirt and a sweatshirt dropped on the couch. Abed’s knee nudges against his thigh as he climbs onto the coffee table, on top of Troy.

“We’d better hurry up, before Annie gets home,” Troy says. “You know how she feels about playing on the furniture.”

Abed shoots off a finger gun and clacks his tongue in agreement.

“The mood is frantic and emotional,” he says. “It’s our first time, and there are people waiting so we need to be quick, but we’ve known each other for a long time and that lends intimacy to the scene.”

“Got it.”

Abed wraps one arm around Troy’s shoulder and kisses him needily, impatiently, his head and his tongue moving like he can burrow inside of Troy, underneath his skin. Troy manages to keep up, barely, gasping and clutching at him—and then, just as fast as he started, Abed stops. Troy turns his head this way and that, looking for him.

He stills when Abed touches his forehead. He couldn’t move if he wanted to, with Abed’s legs bracketing his thighs, their chests pressed together, Abed’s hand on his forehead. He doesn’t really want to move, though. It’s warm and comforting and he trusts that Abed isn’t going to hurt him. Abed leans down. Troy’s lips are still parted, and Abed’s lips brush his as he opens his mouth, releasing a sip of soda followed by his tongue. Troy swallows, and kisses him, and tries to pretend that funny grunting noise wasn’t him. The liquid is warm, Abed’s mouth is warm and sweet, until Abed draws back and kisses along Troy’s collarbone instead.

Then Abed draws away. He sits on the couch, knees together and hands in his lap.

“My Beautiful Laundrette,” he says. “Daniel Day Lewis and Gordon Warnecke. It’s champagne in the movie.”

“Lemon Fresca,” Troy says.

“Yeah.” Abed hesitates. “I should probably tell you that I’m bisexual,” he says. “Which is why I’m so good at this. The kissing boys thing.”

“Oh.” Troy clears his throat. “I’m… not. Which is why I’m not.”

“No, you’re pretty good, too.”

“Cool. Thanks. I, uh, think we’ve got all the practice we need. Fourth time’s the charm, right?”

“Right. We should watch some fake-dating romcoms next. To strategize.”

“Good idea.”

Abed holds out his hands, and the scene is punctuated with their handshake.

They call the lawyer and tell him they’re engaged. He gives a perfunctory congratulations and asks for 24 hours to arrange for a witness. The next day, they leave for Santa Fe at 5 AM and are in the courthouse, marriage license in hand, by noon. LeVar Burton is there. So is the rest of the group, although Shirley is pursing her lips. The guy who marries them has a tiny speech impediment that isn’t really anything like the minister from The Princess Bride, but close enough that Troy laughs when Abed catches his eye and mouths “Mawwiage!”, and that’s enough to make the ceremony feel a little less terrible. LeVar Burton seems genuinely happy for them, and the group is in high spirits like it’s a big joke and Troy tries to act like he’s enjoying it, he really does, but he feels like a liar the whole time.

They hang around for lunch in town—Troy eats the best enchiladas he’s ever had in his life—and go shopping, because Troy wasn’t able to find wedding bands in Colorado. He knows that Abed doesn’t like wearing metal jewelry, because it gets too cold in cold weather and too hot in hot weather and he doesn’t like the way it feels against his skin. They find a jewelry store that has wooden rings, and they get matching ones, ebony with a mahogany stripe for Abed and mahogany with an ebony stripe for Troy. Abed comments that it would be cool if they had Green Lantern rings, but these are definitely classier.

And then they drive back to Colorado. It’s a long, long day. They pick up a pizza on the way home, but they’re all tired from the drive and barely finish it before going to bed. Troy pauses at his bedroom door, yawning.

“Abed,” he says. “What are you doing?”

Abed halts with his hand on the sheet door of the blanket fort. He looks inside. It’s empty except for the bunk beds—they’ve already moved his things to Troy’s room and begun the process of lining it with cardboard Dreamatorium walls.

“Oh. Habit, I guess.”

They both go into Troy’s room and change into their pajamas. Not their special adventure pajamas, just their normal pajamas—Troy has a raggedy pair of sleep pants and a stretched-out tank top, Abed a pair of boxers and a t-shirt worn soft.

“Do you have a side preference?” Abed asks. He pauses. “I’m not sure what that means, but sitcoms have led me to understand it’s a potentially relationship-ending issue.”

“I usually slept on that side when Britta was here,” Troy says with a smile. “But I can try this one if you want.”

“No, no,” Abed admonishes. “If this marriage is going to start off on optimal footing, we need to get this right.”

They swap sides. Troy turns off the light, and they climb into bed. The full-size bed feels so big when he’s alone, but now it feels small. Troy hopes that he doesn’t move around in his sleep—he remembers when he was a kid on family vacations and he and his country Demitri would share a motel bed, and Troy always woke up with shins covered in bruises.

“Uh oh,” Abed says.

“What?”

“Carrying over the threshold trope. We forgot.”

“Oops. We can try tomorrow, if it’s important.”

“Okay.” The room is quiet for a moment. “Troy?”

“Yeah, Abed?”

“What were you thinking today? You seemed quiet.”

“Shit. Do you think anyone else noticed?”

“I don’t think so. Or if they did, I’m sure they thought it was because LeVar Burton was there.”

“Yeah, that was pretty cool. Although the thought of LeVar Burton busting us for fraud is like a million times worse than anyone else busting us for fraud, so that’s scary.”

“Was that all? You were nervous?”

“I don’t know. I guess… it didn’t feel so bad when we were first talking about it, you know? It just seemed like fun. Troy and Abed doing our Troy and Abed thing. But with the marriage license and the justice of police…”

“Of the peace.”

“Oh, so he can’t arrest us? I guess that makes me feel better. But still, it’s like really, really official. We’re for real married. We’re going to have to get for real divorce. This is starting to feel like a big lie, and we’re going to have to keep it up for a year.”

Abed props himself up on one elbow.

“Think of it like this,” he says. “People say you should marry your best friend, right?”

“Right.”

“Well, that’s what you did. It doesn’t have to be more complicated than that.”

“Okay,” Troy says, relieved, because Abed knows everything about every type of relationship that’s ever been shown on film, so he must be right. “Thanks, Abed. Good night.”

“Good night.”

They fall asleep, almost a foot of space between them.

Garrett: Out $20. Bet that Troy and Abed had been dating the entire time.

Leonard: Out $50. Bet that Troy and Abed had been dating since mid-2010.

Magnitude: Out $45. Bet that Troy and Abed had started dating post Paintball 2.0.

Neil: Out $25. Bet that Troy and Abed had started dating post pillow war.

Todd: Out $10. Bet that Troy and Abed had started sleeping together +/- a week after Troy started dating Britta.

Pavel: Out $55. Bet that Troy and Abed had started dating post Britta/Troy breakup.

Vicki: Won the pot.

(They know all of this because every single person involved feels the need to come up and tell them so. This is just one of the three betting pools on their romantic life going on at Greendale. Troy is starting to get frustrated—is this the reason he hasn’t been getting any dates his entire Greendale career?—but is forced to smile and laugh sheepishly. Abed squeezes his hand and kisses his cheek. It’s an act, but it’s not.)

Once, Troy and Abed are having lunch together by themselves. Leonard walks by—they’re pretty sure Leonard is one of the relationship checkers, so Abed casually reaches across the table and takes Troy’s hand. When Leonard walks away, Troy lets go.

“Hey,” he says. “I’ve been thinking. If we were married, I don’t think we’d be that into PDA.”

“Oh,” Abed says. “Why not? You like touching.”

“Yeah, but you don’t. And I wouldn’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“I don’t think I’d mind. If we were married.”

“No?”

“I actively dislike strangers touching me and in general I don’t initiate physical contact, but I don’t mind it from my friends. And I don’t have a lot of experience in longterm romantic relationships, so in that context I think I would look to classic romcom tropes for guidance. I think romcoms rely on tropes more than any other genre, which leads to a familiarity that’s particularly reassuring when it’s not annoying.”

“Really? Not scifi?”

“Scifi uses tropes, definitely, but they don’t feel quite as familiar because the point of scifi is to reinvent itself. Each story is a new world. Romcoms are the same story over and over again.”

“I get it,” Troy says, nodding. “Although… most people are pretty boring. If we were really married, I think we’d be telling something new.”

He turns his hand over. Abed smiles and laces their fingers together.

This is what Troy’s 2014 semester looks like as of midterms:

Philosophy 101: D+
Sociology 150, Why Are People?: C-
Religion 250, The Meaning Of Life: D
Intro to Creative Writing: A-

That last one wouldn’t be so bad if it weren’t for the fact that the professor who teaches it is more interested in students expressing their true inner energies than their writing skills, and Troy is pretty sure he’s the first student to ever get a minus in her class ever. He drops his head on the kitchen table with a thunk.

“If this is me finding myself, I think I’m finding an idiot,” he mumbles.

“I think you just need a study plan,” Annie says, trying to be encouraging. “I can get you some highlighters, and some flash cards—”

“It’s not like Spanish or Biology,” Troy says. “I’m not great at memorizing stuff but at least I can kind of do it. I’m just not good at reading all these big thinky books.”

“I think you’re taking the wrong classes,” Abed says, spinning noodles onto his fork. “Do you really think you’re going to find yourself by doing things you hate?”

“What else am I supposed to do?” Troy frowns.

“What do you like?”

“You guys,” Troy says immediately. “TV, sports, video games, movies… but they don’t have classes in that stuff. Except movies, I guess, but I don’t think I can find myself by becoming you, either.”

“You like fixing things,” Abed says. “Plumbing, air conditioning, haircutting, sailing. You like doing things with your hands, and you’re good at it.”

“But…”

“It doesn’t make you stupid,” Abed says without looking.

“Greendale has a lot of lifestyle courses,” Annie points out. She puts a hand on his arm. “Home Ec, Woodshop, Auto Repair, Pottery, Painting… It couldn’t hurt to give it a shot, right?”

“I guess. If I don’t flunk out this semester.”

Abed finishes his buttered noodles.

“The dean would never flunk you out,” he says as he stands and empties his bowl. “He loves us. But if you want to try some note-taking strategies, I saved some of my old film studies books, the ones I’d written in and couldn’t sell back—they’re in the bedroom. My system is logical, useful, and only one-fifth the craziness of Annie’s.”

“Thanks,” Troy laughs.

“Don’t mention it.”

Troy paces outside Professor Jeane Simpson’s office for ten minutes without even knocking. Leonard, thankfully, is the only one around to see and comment—Troy calls “Shut up, Leonard! I saw you painting the Gucci logo on your old man loafers!” and decides he has to either go in or leave. He knocks, and a woman’s voice tells him to come in. He opens the door and hovers there for a moment, clutching the strap of his backpack.

“Hi,” he says. “Are you the gay professor?”

The woman at the desk is wearing a button-down shirt with the sleeves pushed up, revealing a wristwatch and a tattoo of a feather. She has short hair and big green eyes that glitter with amusement when she looks up at him.

“Yes, I am the homosexual professor of the women’s and gender studies department who teaches queer representation in media,” she says, leaning back in her chair and spinning her pen. “And you are Troy Barnes.”

“Yeah,” he says, surprised. “How did you know?”

“Abed was one of my best students—we’re Facebook friends. Saw the wedding photos. Congrats, by the way. How can I help you?”

“Um.” Troy dropped into a chair. “Abed and I were talking about, uh, school, and he told me I should take a look at some of his old books that he had kept.”

He reaches into his backpack and takes out a book. There’s a sticker on it from the campus bookstore—it wasn’t new when Abed got it, but even so, the book is in rough shape. The corners are soft, one of them torn all the way off, and the spine is cracked. The pages are so heavily marked up that the whole book seems to be puffed out.

“The Celluloid Closet,” Professor Simpson says, perking up. “That’s a classic—I assign it in all my classes. Are you interested in film courses?”

“No, not really. It’s just…” Troy flips through the pages so she can see the margins crammed with Abed’s narrow handwriting, the the thin, perpetually sharp lines of his preferred mechanical pencils. “It looks like this was Abed’s favorite? He wrote it in more than any of the others, at least, and—I don’t get it.”

She’s going to tell him that he’s not even her student, so why should she help him, and also that he’s an idiot for not understanding the book in the first place. Normally Troy would be okay with that, because he knows he’s not great at school and it doesn’t usually bother him—he’s not sure why it bothers him now.

“Yeah, it can be a little dense,” Professor Simpson says. “Are you interested in film history?”

“Not really.”

“LGBTQ history?”

“Well I am definitely gay, but uh… I don’t know much about it. Being gay. I just know I’m—totally romantically and sexually interested in Abed. I guess I just—I don’t know, Abed usually tells me about stuff he likes, but he’s never even mentioned this book. I guess I wondered what was so great about it, but I barely got through the first ten pages.”

“I get it,” the professor says with a smile. “You can learn a lot about someone from reading their favorite books. Sure, I’m happy to help. What did you find confusing?”

“It says that the Cowardly Lion from The Wizard of Oz is gay. I played the lion in my conservative high school’s mostly-white production of The Wiz, so I’m pretty sure that’s not true.”

“Okay, so there’s a lot to unpack there,” she says. “But let’s start with the fact that the book doesn’t say the Cowardly Lion is gay—it says he’s a sissy.”

“Yeah,” Troy says, squirming in his chair. “But the book is about gay people, so… is it saying that’s the same thing?”

“Yes and no. So, there’s this thing called the Hays Code. The Hays Code was a list of rules implemented in the 1930s to the 1960s, about what could and couldn’t be shown in movies. There was a lot of concern about the moral impact films could have, so everything from profanity to homosexuality was banned. If we wanted to know for sure that the Cowardly Lion was supposed to be gay, the movie would have to show him in love with another male lion, right? And that was a no-go under the Hays Code. But if you wanted to put a gay character in a movie but couldn’t say so, how would you do it?”

“Wait,” Troy says. “Why would you care about putting gay people in movies if you couldn’t even say they were gay? Like, what’s the point?”

“Good question. We’ll come back to that. Let’s focus on the how first. How do you know people are gay if they don’t tell you so?”

“Um. Is this a trick?”

She chuckles.

“No, it’s not a trick. Go ahead, be honest.”

“I mean—for guys I guess if they wore a lot of rainbow stuff, or pink, and don’t like sports and are really into clothes and have that voice. You know, the—but isn’t that a stereotype?” he asks quickly. “That sounds like the kind of thing we used to yell at Pierce for saying.”

“Sure, it’s a stereotype, but some stereotypes are based in truth. I mean, take me, for example. I’m butch as hell. Not all lesbians are, but I am. And some of how I look and act is what I like, but some of it is also intentional, because I want people to know I’m gay. It helps me pick up chicks,” she adds with a grin. “Or at least it did before I met my wife. So in film, sometimes we’ll see men being feminine and women being masculine, and even though it’s not said that they’re queer, that will be the intention. Either because the actors or the writers or the director is queer and wants to show other queer people that they exist, or because straight creators want to make a moral point. Do you remember the first time you saw a gay character in a movie?”

“Yeah,” Troy says. The answer surprises himself—he doesn’t know why he remembers. He probably hasn’t thought about this in ten years, but he still knows. “It was, um… I don’t remember what it was called. There was a rerun on TV. It was Robin Williams and that other guy—”

“Nathan Lane? The Birdcage?”

“Yeah. I didn’t watch the whole thing. My mom came in the living room and turned it off.”

“That’s a good one. And a great example, because the whole point of the movie, right, is that Nathan Lane’s character doesn’t know the right way to be a man. Now in that movie he’s supposed to be sympathetic, but I bet if you think back, you can think of a lot of movies you watched that featured characters who acted the same way, who had some of the same mannerisms as Nathan Lane, and weren’t supposed to be admired at all—who were just jokes, either the whole movie or until they changed and got more masculine. The Cowardly Lion. If you watched Disney as a kid, Scar from the Lion King, or King John from Robin Hood, or—”

“Wait,” Troy interrupts, confused. “Is it always lions?” His eyes go wide. “Is that why it’s called pride?”

“Um, not quite,” the professor says, amused. “I don’t know why my first three examples were all lions… There are plenty of human examples—the book’s full of them, and once you know what to look for, you’ll see them everywhere. Anyway. The point is, sometimes movies used that sissy stereotype as the butt of the joke, to show people the wrong way to be a man. And if you spend your whole life watching queer characters get mocked, you grow up thinking that it’s not okay to be like that. It’s okay to bully people in real life who act like that, and if you ever find yourself acting a certain way, you should change your own behavior. Haven’t you ever acted differently because you were worried people would find you too feminine? You don’t have to answer that,” she adds quickly. “That’s a pretty personal question, and you just met me. My point is, this is probably stuff you already knew, even if you didn’t know you knew it.”

“I guess. I took dance classes at Greendale, and my first semester I didn’t want to tell anybody about it… Also, kind of everything about how I acted in high school. I was kind of a jerk.”

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah, that’s not surprising. I honestly think everybody self-censors themselves at one point, queer or not, because we’re all so used to seeing these ideals of what it means to be a man or woman and so few of us live up to them. That’s one of the reasons this book was written—to point out that gay people have been a part of American cinema forever, whether for good or bad. And if we know what the bad looks like, if we can actually identify it instead of thinking it’s something it’s not, then we can solve the real problem.”

“Like The Dark Knight Rises,” Troy nods. “Batman was so focused on Bane the entire film, he didn’t do anything to stop Talia al-Ghul until the very end, but she was the real villain the whole time.”

Professor Simpson stares at him for a second, and then she nods.

“You and Abed are going to be very happy together.”

“Thanks.”

“So does that help? The book throws out a lot of movie titles and most of them are pretty old, so don’t feel bad if you don’t get all the references. I just gave you the gist of some of the most important parts.”

“Yeah, it helped a lot, thanks.”

“No problem. If you have any other questions, feel free to email me. Or sign up for one of my classes—the deadline has passed but you can audit, if you like. Or just ask Abed, honestly.”

“Yeah, I might.”

Troy doesn’t sign up for any of her classes. And he doesn’t email her again, and goes out of his way to avoid walking by her office for months afterwards—because he dropped his guard and almost gave the game away in one ten-minute conversation and he can’t risk that. He doesn’t finish The Celluloid Closet, either—he gets through the first chapter, and about half of the second, before he sets it aside and doesn’t pick it back up again. He has readings for his actual classes he needs to do.

But that night, he asks Abed if The Birdcage can be their post-dinner movie. Abed doesn’t ask why. He doesn’t even give Troy a look as if it’s an odd request, which is one of the things that makes Abed so great. He just says “Sure,” and starts to skim through his DVDs. “I’m pretty sure I own it already. That’s one of my favorite Robin Williams movies, because there’s no—”

“Authority figure getting mad at him for making people laugh,” Troy says with a smile.

“Yeah.”

Abed finds the DVD and puts it in the player. They’ve rearranged the living room so it’s easier to watch TV while sitting on the couch, and that’s what they do now. Their chairs are more comfortable, but this way Troy gets to cuddle against Abed’s side and rest his head on his shoulder as the opening credits begin.

There’s a line in the book that has been underlined with such force, it dug a hole in the paper: “The discomfort that has consistently arisen in response to ‘buddy’ films springs from the paranoia and fear that surrounds exclusively male relationships. American society has always begun at square one, with the believe that men are never attracted to each other as masculine equals.”

Troy is sitting in the back of a cafe in his hometown, waiting for LeVar Burton. That in itself is pretty weird. And then LeVar Burton actually shows up and waves at him, which is even weirder. And he’s clutching a green tea in one hand and a manila folder from Pierce’s lawyer that contains instructions on how to figure out if Troy is legitimately married to his best friend, which is the weirdest thing of all.

“Hey, Troy,” LeVar Burton says with a smile. “Nice to see you again, even with the slightly unusual circumstances.”

“Nice to see you, too,” Troy says, clutching his hot chocolate like it will defend and protect him. The good thing, he thinks, is that he’s so nervous around LeVar already that it won’t be suspicious. “Sorry. Pierce is just… you know, Pierce.”

“Yeah. Odd guy. But I’m happy to help out—I’m sorry I had to leave the wedding so fast. I remember to give you your present, right?”

“Yeah,” Troy grins. He and Abed have been drinking out of Star Fleet logo champagne glasses at least one meal a day for the last three months. “They’re so awesome, thank you. You really didn’t need to get us anything.”

“No problem—you guys deserved it. So. It’s been three months and I’ve got some questions I’m supposed to ask, although I am going to be rephrasing some of these because… I’m just not going to say that.” He holds up a sheaf of paper and clears his throat. “First of all, tell me how you and your spouse got together.”

“Yeah. Uh.” Troy takes a deep breath and leans forward a little. “So, um, after Pierce’s will reading, my friends and I all got together and started talking about how I was supposed to find my true love in a month. Most of their advice was, like, ‘I’ll put up some fliers at my church!’ or ‘I think there’s room in my friend Starr’s polycule!’, but Abed showed up with this thirty-page guide to finding my perfect person. Literally he knew stuff about what I wanted in a relationship that I didn’t know I wanted. I still tried to date other people for a while but it didn’t really work, and someone suggested I should try dating Abed. And it worked,” he ends, lamely, with a shrug.

“That’s cute,” LeVar says with an encouraging smile. He glances down the page. “How did you propose?”

“Well, we kind of both knew it was coming,” he says. “Because of the will deadline thing. But I still thought Abed deserved a real proposal, you know? Since he was taking a pretty big chance just for me. But we ended up doing like twelve proposals.”

“Twelve proposals?” LeVar repeats.

“I think? Something like that. Abed really likes movies and TV shows, so I just kept re-enacting different proposal scenes until he said yes. I did my research. I’d do one big speech and then instead of saying yes he’d say ‘maybe—do that one next’ until I didn’t know which one he was talking about. It was fun.”

“If you say so,” LeVar says doubtfully. “Man, I’m a professional actor and I don’t know if acting out that many scenes in a row would be fun. Especially if you hadn’t gotten an answer yet!”

“Well, I knew he was going to say yes.”

“That helps. Let’s see, what’s next… you’ve told both your parents? Neither of you are keeping your lineage secret for some kind of elaborate corporate espionage scheme?”

“No,” Troy says with a huff of laughter, remembering Wu Mei. “Yeah, we told our parents. Mostly they were kind of confused? Like, you know, one minute your son is straight and single and then he’s eloped with some other dude. But it’s fine. They’re fine. Abed’s dad—” He stops suddenly, and then he shoves his face in the whipped cream on top of his cup to shut himself up. LeVar raises an eyebrow.

“Abed’s dad?” he prompts.

“I don’t know if I should say,” Troy admits. “It’s kind of personal. You’re not going to show this to anyone, right?”

“No, no. I have to give my recommendation to Mr. Stone, but the specific questions and answers can stay between us.”

“Okay. It’s just I always thought his dad didn’t like me, because I didn’t think his dad liked anyone, but when he told him he hugged us and cried. He talked to me about it after and Abed was really excited because he thought his dad was going to do the classic ‘if you break his heart’ speech but it wasn’t even like that. He just said that… he wasn’t used to other people caring about Abed so much and he was glad that he had me and he hoped I would treat him right and that we had better luck than he had with Abed’s mom.”

Guilt is gnawing at his stomach, and he gulps more hot chocolate in case that helps.

“That’s good, right?” LeVar says.

“Yeah. Kind of scary, though.”

“Marriage is a big responsibility. It can be scary at first, but it’s got perks, right?”

“Oh, definitely. Abed’s really awesome.”

“How do you guys spend your time?”

“Well, we definitely make out a lot, and… other stuff. And. Um. What else…?” Troy instantly forgets anything he’s ever done with Abed. He reaches into his pocket to pull out his phone and scroll through his photos, but LeVar leans down.

“Oh, you dropped this. Where’d you get that?”

It’s a rubber bracelet in rainbow colors, with the Greendale logo stamped on them; it must have gone through the wash. Troy snatches it back so LeVar doesn’t look at the logo too closely.

“The Greendale LGBT Student’s Union marched in the pride parade last week. They were throwing these at the crowd.”

They were very popular, even (especially) among non-Greendale students. Troy and Abed had heard a group of guys gleefully wondering how the school could not realize their logo looked like an anus—they were under the impression it was totally unintentional and hilarious.

“Oh, are you and Abed members?”

“No,” Troy says quickly. “No, we were just—there.”

He shoves the bracelet back in his pocket. LeVar’s face softens the way it did after he talked to Britta at the hospital, and his voice goes gentle.

“You can wear it, if you want. I won’t mind.”

Troy’s throat closes up, and he shakes his head. He and Abed hadn’t even been planning on going to Pride, except a few days before, Neil had dropped by for his surprise inspection and asked if they were going. Troy’s insides had felt weird and shaky the entire time, and Abed had squeezed his hand to keep him steady. There was something about it—not just pretending to be a version himself that’s married to Abed, but a version of himself that’s gay—that makes him queazy.

Later that night they had stepped into a bar because Abed was thirsty, and some dude in shiny silver shorts had given them shots and then Troy had taken a couple more and danced for a little bit and relaxed. But he still feels bad for pretending to be gay when he’s still secretly a little homophobic, and he thinks he should work on that before wearing rainbow stuff.

“Okay,” LeVar says. “We can move on. Let’s see… there’s a section here that Pierce claims is a game show idea he invented that’s clearly a ripoff of the Newlywed Game. Let’s get started.”

It’s nice to have summer break, after a really, really crazy semester. Troy gets a little breathing room—he still has to pretend to be married to Abed when they leave the apartment, in case they run into anyone from the Marriage Verification Squad (which they’re pretty sure now is just Leonard, Neil, Magnitude, and Dr. Escadaro somehow), but it’s not as difficult when they don’t have people staring at them all the time. They see Guardians of the Galaxy in theaters three times and invent new rules for a more awesome version of basketball and spend a lot of time in the blanket fort Dreamatorium. They go camping with Annie and eat s’mores without fighting about it and go stargazing and don’t accept any strange berries from mountain men. Troy makes a lot of blueberry pancakes, regular pancakes, and chocolate chip pancakes. He makes dinner and lunch sometimes, too, but he especially likes having breakfast ready when Abed wakes up.

Theoretically they could keep up the act only when those four people are around—but they don’t. They practice constantly, and get really, really good at being fake-married.

Troy kisses Abed on the cheek when he wakes up and before they go to bed, and Abed doesn’t comment on it. If they’re going separate ways, they give a quick peck on the lips first. They hold hands. Sometimes Abed slips his hand in the back pocket of Troy’s jeans, which makes them both feel like they’re in an exceptionally cheesy high school romcom—Troy reciprocates, sometimes, although Abed’s jeans are a lot tighter than his and he can’t do it without actually grabbing Abed’s ass pretty hard, so usually he just puts an arm around his waist instead.

They sleep with six inches of space between them. Three. None. Troy wakes up with Abed’s face buried in his chest and their legs twisted together. He forgets most often in the mornings. He wakes up and everything is just so much more comfortable than it is during the rest of the day—the A/C is humming along nicely, and they’re settled into the bed and each other in a way that holds their warmth, and his muscles are all relaxed and Abed’s shirt smells like laundry detergent and sleep. In the mornings they’re like any other married couple.

He always remembers, eventually. But sometimes he wishes he didn’t.

Shirley invites him to a totally free lunch at Shirley’s Sandwiches, which is how Troy knows something is wrong.

“I’m moving, sweetie,” she says, lifting her chin. It wobbles anyway.

“Cool! Hashtag Shirley’s Move. When?”

“Next week.”

“That’s soon. Where?”

“Georgia.”

His stomach drops. Shirley reaches out and rubs his arm.

“I do declare,” Troy says in a half-hearted attempt at an accent. “That’s a mighty far trip.”

“I know. It’s my dad. He’s not doing so well, and he needs me.” She smiles feebly. “The group doesn’t need a mom anymore. Everybody growing up, getting jobs, getting married. You’ll be fine without me.”

“But we’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you too, Troy. And I just want to say…” She takes a deep breath. “You know I wasn’t the biggest fan of this whole… fake marriage plot. But I’ve been thinking on it, and if this is the way things had to happen, then—well. The Lord moves in mysterious ways.”

A tiny sob forces its way out of Troy’s throat. He nods.

“Oh, hon.” Shirley reaches across the table to hug him. “You take good care of that boy, won’t you?”

“I will,” he says. “I promise.”

It’s weird when they get back to Greendale and Shirley is gone and Frankie joins the group. Abed likes her. Jeff and Annie and Britta really, really don’t. Troy’s somewhere in the middle—he wishes she was just a little bit worse at her job, because Greendale is Greendale and he doesn’t want it to change that much, but he doesn’t get why the others are so upset.

Like, obviously he sides with them when it comes to building the secret bar. Because duh. But he whines the whole time about how it’s not fair that the others want to exclude Abed, too, and he doesn’t really have fun until Abed joins them.

And then… they have fun. Troy has never seen Abed wasted before, the whole time they’ve been friends, and wasted Abed is hilarious. He commits to the bit with even more enthusiasm than usual, and has a tendency to narrate what he’s doing—he just periodically yells “shots!” and “drinking!” and “alocohooooool!”—and laughs loudly and beams broadly, and he dances and makes funny faces. It’s like the Abed that usually only Troy gets to see, for everyone, times ten. He even flirts with Annie a little bit. She drapes her feather boa around his neck and kisses his cheek. Everyone goes “oooh.” Britta slurs “Hey, hey! That’s Troy’s husband!” and everybody laughs.

Abed laughs, too. Troy laughs. And then he follows his instinct and takes hold of the boa and tugs him in for a kiss. They’re sloppy, so the kiss is sloppy. It tastes like gin, which Troy doesn’t usually like, and Abed’s mouth is hot and wet and Troy can’t breathe but also doesn’t want to. Troy bites Abed’s lip and smooths it over with his tongue. Abed’s hands slip from Troy’s waist to his ass and Troy gasps into his mouth.

But Garrett is doing an energetic two-step with someone and crashes into Abed. They stumble and break the kiss with a sucking sound that would be gross if it wasn’t hot. Troy is still twisting Abed’s boa in his hands. Abed hands slide back up to his waist and they sort of sway for a second, although Troy can barely hear the music over the sound of Abed’s breathing.

“You know,” Abed says, a little too loud. “In a scene like this there’s usually at least a few frames of a sex scene.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Abed licks his lips. Troy wonders if it would be weird for him to lick Abed’s lips. He did a few seconds ago, so surely he can do it again, right? “Usually the guy lifting the girl up on a door or something, and then someone knocks—sometimes a blowjob scene if they get creative with camera angles.”

“I think I’ve seen that scene,” Troy says. His hands climb up the boa and scrapes the back of Abed’s neck, which he knows he likes—Abed swallows. His old-timey hat falls off.

“WHOOOOOO!”

Annie flings her arms around both of their necks. She’s holding one shot glass in her right hand and two in her left; one of them spills vodka down Troy’s shirt.

“Roomie shots!” she says, kissing Abed’s cheek. She gives one to him and one to Troy, and then her face falls when this leaves her with a mostly-empty glass. Troy trades her, and she beams and kisses him on the mouth. It should be the same as kissing Abed, but it’s not.

“Roomie shots!” Abed repeats. He holds up his glass and it sparkles in the light.

The next morning, they wake up snuggled together. Abed tells Troy he’s sorry if things got weird. Troy pretends he doesn’t remember.

Frankie makes small talk now, trying to get to know them. She asks how long Troy and Abed have been married—Abed says six months, two weeks, and three days, and she raises her eyebrows.

“That’s… specific.”

“It’s a fake marriage.”

“Britta!” Troy says.

“What? She’s part of the group now—she was going to find out eventually. And Frankie, you can keep a secret, right?”

“Our friend Pierce died in February,” Annie explains. “He left all of his money to Troy on the condition that Troy get married and stay married for one year. So he married Abed. They have four days, two weeks, and five months left, and then Troy gets 14.3 million dollars.”

“Hang on,” Frankie frowns. “That sounds a lot like fraud.”

“He gets fourteen million dollars,” Jeff repeats. “You want to know what I got? A bottle of scotch and a liquid-nitrogen-cooled cylinder of Pierce’s sperm. We all got one.”

“Uh-huh,” Frankie says slowly. “Okay. I think that reaches the level of crazy where a little fraud is acceptable.”

Troy thinks, resentfully, that Britta didn’t have to tell her it was fake.

A few weeks later, they’re in the study room working on a political attack ad against City College—well, no, against a dog who’s practically a Greendale alumna, which seems like it should violate some kind of code or other. Annie storms out. Elroy asks, “Were you guys close?”

Everyone goes back to what they were doing without responding, but Troy hates it when he asks a question and no one answers, so he does his best to explain, briefly, Jeff and Annie’s whole deal. At the end, he adds “And she’s our roommate,” gesturing between him and Abed.

“Oh, the Indian fella is your roommate?” Elroy says.

“He’s Palestinian and Polish,” Troy corrects. “And he’s my husband.”

“Oh.” Elroy pauses. Troy braces himself. “You know, you two remind me of some of the sample avatars I made in 1998 for an online virtual reality system targeted at the gay community called Alternative Life. Of course, this was before Second Life came around—they stole and straightified my design.”

“Uh huh,” Troy says skeptically. He’s not sure what to do with that information, so he goes over to Abed’s side of the table. Abed is typing rapidly. “I thought the ad was done.”

“Thinking,” Abed says. “Storyboarding.”

“Can I help?”

“I’m hungry. Can you get me some olives?”

“Olives?” Troy asks, wrinkling his nose. “It’s like four AM. Where am I going to get olives?”

“There are five open cans of them over there,” Abed says, pointing without looking. “The dean brought them for Jeff an hour ago but he wouldn’t let me have any. I’ve been craving them ever since.”

“Huh.” Troy waits until the dean isn’t looking, and then he stealthily grabs one of the cans and brings it over to Abed. Jeff does a double take.

“It is a code!” he declares triumphantly. “What does it mean?”

“It means Abed likes olives?” Troy says, confused. He sets the can down and Abed pops an olive into his mouth.

“Thanks, babe.”

It’s been six months, and it’s time for Troy to check in with LeVar Burton again. He’s actually excited this time, because he knows LeVar is going to ask if they did anything for their anniversary, and Troy has an awesome answer. Abed had arranged a schoolwide game of Hide and Seek, but the kind where if you find someone you also have to tag them, and if they get away they get to hide in a new spot. They won, because Abed knows all the coolest hiding spots from his Batman adventures, and when they won, Abed swept him off his feet and kissed him and everyone cheered. It feels very cool to have people cheer you for kissing.

Then Troy persuaded Annie to give him all the money from her secret evil savings account—on the condition that he stop calling it an evil savings account, and start a real one when he gets Pierce’s money—and he took Abed back to that fancy restaurant. They didn’t order anything market price this time, so they can splurge on wine and actually pay the bill at the end. Then they went to their favorite ice cream place and got ice cream and Troy gave him his anniversary present, which was a letterman jacket. But not just any letterman jacket, a Batman letterman jacket.

“Cool. Cool, cool, cool,” Abed said, running his hands over it reverently. “Very Season 1.”

Troy’s looking in the mirror, fixing his hair before he leaves, and he smiles at his reflection as he remembers the way Abed looked up at him, eyes gleaming with mischief as he slipped the letterman jacket around his shoulders.

“I’m Bat-Troy,” he said in a deep voice, and Troy burst out laughing. Every time he came close to getting control of himself, Abed had said something and that would set him off again, until finally he had shut Abed up by kissing him.

Troy is still staring at himself in the mirror. Slowly, his smile fades.

He stumbles back until he’s sitting on the edge of the bath. His heart is pounding in his throat and he’s worried that if he opens his mouth, it’ll fall out. He puts his hands on his knees and ducks his head down between them, because he saw in a movie somewhere that that’s how you deal with seasickness and that’s exactly how he feels right now. Like he’s on a ship, pitched back and forth by waves, like he’s just set out on a journey away from solid ground to somewhere new and terrifying and uncertain.

He thinks about Abed, how Abed comforts himself when he’s upset. He doesn’t want to rock back and forth—he’s unsteady enough as it is—but he takes deep breaths and hums and runs his hand up back and forth through his own hair. (He’s not sure if Abed actually likes the hair thing, but Troy started doing it once and Abed never told him to stop.)

There is a knock on the door.

“Troy?”

“Yeah?”

His voice sounds unbelievably normal. Bored, even.

“You’re going to be late.”

“Be right out.”

Abed tries the knob—it’s unlocked, so he opens the door and looks at Troy. Troy forces himself to sit straight.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Troy says. He clears his throat. “Just felt dizzy for a minute.”

“Are you sick? I can call LeVar for you and reschedule.”

“No,” Troy says. “No, I’m fine.”

He stands and puts on a wobbly smile. Abed doesn’t look convinced, but he doesn’t have any reason to suspect Troy of lying to him, because they don’t lie to each other. As Troy passes him, Abed kisses him on the cheek, and Troy smiles at him for real.

He already has his keys and his wallet, but Troy doesn’t leave right away. First he ducks into their bedroom and starts to rifle through the drawers until he finds the rubber bracelet from Pride. Rainbow stripes, rudely interrupted by the Greendale logo. He stares at it for a long time. Then he slips it on his wrist.

When the school board offers to give Dean Pelton a spot, Abed and Troy are brought into the meeting, because of course they are. Frankie and Jeff do most of the talking—all Troy and Abed do is confirm that there’s nothing wrong with pretending to be gay for material gain. And even then, Troy isn’t sure if they say that because they believe it or because they would be massive hypocrites if they didn’t.

A few days later, though, Troy stops by the dean’s office by himself.

“Hey,” he says. “Can we talk?”

“Troy.” The dean stands, looking guilty. His hips cant to the side. “Look—about the birds.”

“I’m not here about the birds,” Troy says. He sits down. “Listen… you know how Abed and I are faking this whole thing for money?”

“Yes, yes,” the dean says, pointing. “And at least I’m doing this to make an improvement, so—”

“I’m not here about that, either,” he says, frustrated. “Just—just listen. Can I tell you something that I haven’t told anybody? Even Abed?”

“Of course.”

Troy takes a deep breath.

“I’m gay. For real.” He swallows. The dean reaches across the desk like he’s going to take Troy’s hand.

“Troy…” he says softly.

“And I spent most of my life trying not to think about it, and if I hadn’t been in this pretend relationship, I probably still wouldn’t be thinking about it. But sometimes—sometimes lying can help you tell the truth. You know? Because if people think they know you, they’re not looking for anything else, and that takes the pressure off. Sometimes pretending to be someone else makes it easier to be who you really are.” He stands. “I just wanted to say that… I’m proud of who I really am. I hope you are, too.”

He glances over his shoulder as he leaves. The dean looks troubled.

One of the birds dies. The other one lives. They put on cat masks and finger wings and wave it into the sky. Troy looks up at Abed, their hands laced together.

“What?” Abed asks, eyes flickering from the sky to Troy and back again.

“Nothing,” Troy says hoarsely. He kisses the back of Abed’s hand and leans his head against his shoulder.

There’s an email exchange between Jeff and Abed that gets leaked during the Gupta Gupti Gupta scandal. It’s short, and it doesn’t get any attention in the middle of the bigger mess. It goes like this:

From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: (no subject)

I don’t think I can do this.

From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: (no subject)

I know it’s hard, buddy. It’s just a year. You can make it for a year.

Troy doesn’t bring it up in the cafeteria. It builds up inside of him until a few days later, when he and Jeff are playing one-on-one. Jeff makes a basket and whoops—it puts him in the lead. He grins and retrieves the ball from the sidelines, passing it to Troy.

“Your ball.”

Troy passes it back, hard.

“Are you sleeping with Abed?”

“What?”

“‘I don’t think I can do this,’” Troy quotes. “I know he was talking about me.”

Jeff’s face becomes serious.

“That’s not— no, Abed and I aren’t—”

“Then why was he emailing you ? Is being with me so bad that I’m not even his best friend anymore? He can’t even talk to me about it?”

“Troy…” Jeff props the basketball against his side and takes a deep breath. “I’m not going to break a confidence, okay? I owe Abed that much. But I will say that I know he cares about you, and I know you’re the best friend he’s ever had. And if you’re worried about those emails… you should really talk to him.”

The anger drops out of Troy like a cartoon character through a trapdoor.

“Yeah,” he says dully. “Whatever. My ball.”

He doesn’t talk to Abed.

Troy’s report card, Fall Semester 2015:

Beginner Pottery: A
Home Economics 201: A+
Basket Weaving (half semester): A-
Ballroom Dance (half semester): A
Modern Dance: A+
Woodshop: A

“See?” Abed says the day grades come out. They’re having lunch in the cafeteria, and Troy is so excited he’s barely touching their chicken fingers even though he knows Abed went through a lot of trouble to get them. “You did great and you enjoyed yourself a lot more than last year, didn’t you? Your hands are geniuses.”

“I had to use a lot of lotion to keep them from hurting when I went between basket weaving and woodshop, but I think it was worth it. It just feels really calm, you know, like when I’m working all the pressure is off and I can explore myself and my thoughts without having to use big words. Like yoga but without the pants, but those pants are comfortable, though—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Abed dismisses. “Open up.”

Troy opens his mouth dutifully and Abed feeds him a chicken finger. Magnitude catches his eye across the room and gives him a congratulatory “pop pop!”, and Troy knows Abed is only doing this for the benefit of the Marriage Verification Squad, but he pretends that he doesn’t. He’s having a good day, and he doesn’t want to ruin it.

The script for Chief Star and the Raiders of the Galaxy is actually genius, and Troy is embarrassed on behalf of all the other actors who don't see that—their acting is so bad that he’s not convinced any of them have actually read it. Troy’s role is Kahnmaul, the Alpha Raider and Space Draguman’s Dragon. He gets to wear a lot of black and these cool boots and some dragon wings he makes himself out of scraps from their Dreamatorium stash. Abed explains that the word “dragon” in this context is supposed to be an industry term meaning that he’s the second-most important villain and not a literal dragon, but his costume is so cool that Abed lets him keep it anyway. And then halfway through the show, Space Draguman becomes Space Dracula and GlipGlop steals the secondary villain role, so everything seems to be falling apart anyway. Troy doesn’t have to improvise much because the dialogue written for him is so good, but when he does, he’s pretty sure he’s better at it than anyone else in the cast. Abed sees to hate him less than anyone else, at least.

Halfway through filming, Abed passes off the camera to an A/V club member and grabs Troy by the upper arm. He drags him into in a closet and puts his hands on either side of Troy’s neck.

“If I have an ounce of anything resembling sanity by Monday,” he says in a quiet, serious voice. “It will be thanks to you.”

“You’re welcome,” Troy says, trying not to breathe too hard because he knows Abed can feel it against his lips, and sure they’ve kissed a lot, but this feels different somehow. Abed’s adam’s apple goes up and down in his throat.

He tries not to think too hard as he grabs Abed by the lapels of his hoodie and yanks him in for a hard, quick kiss. Someone on the other side of the door is already complaining about the delay, so it doesn’t last long, but it’s enough.

When they all finally get back into the RV after being locked out, they’re mellow enough to admit that the best way to get through the night until the tow truck comes is to cuddle for warmth and share the blankets. There isn’t a whole lot of space, though. The three women—and the Dean, who is the smallest left—share the bed. Jeff takes the one-person booth and Elroy sits in the driver’s seat, propping his feet on the passenger chair; they get the heaviest blankets. Troy and Abed get the last booth, and he’s pretty sure they’re the most comfortable people there. They slip their arms around each other and Troy pillows his head on Abed’s chest. This is barely different than how they sleep any other night.

“Remember when our hot air balloon went out of control and we crashed in the woods and that creepy guy gave us drug berries and we sat around the fire telling secrets?” Troy says dreamily.

“Yeah.”

“Mm-hm.”

“Why did you have to remind me?”

“What the hell goes on with you people when I’m not around?”

“That was fun,” he says. He takes a deep breath and feels Abed’s chest rise and fall in time. “I’m gay.”

The RV is very, very quiet except for the crickets. Elroy is the first to speak.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “Didn’t we already know that?”

Abed squeezes him tighter. Jeff reaches over and puts a hand on Troy’s shoulder.

“Troy,” Annie calls. “It’s too cold to come over there and hug you. But we love you.”

“Yeah,” Britta says softly. “We love you so, so much.”

“Love you, too,” Troy yawns. He burrows his head further into the softness of Abed’s flannel and goes to sleep.

This is it.

It’s their anniversary.

They meet, once again, in the study room, except this time everyone is here, including the Dean and Chang and the new people. Mr. Stone comes with a posse, too—not the liar lady and her assistant, but LeVar Burton and the most boring person Troy has ever seen.

“Afternoon, ladies and gentlemen,” Mr. Stone says. “This is my associate, Mr. Bland, who is a notary public. And I presume you all know Mr. Burton.”

“No,” Frankie says pleasantly. “Should we?”

“Butterfly in the sky,” Elroy sings, pointing. LeVar grins at him.

“My man right there. How you doing, Troy?” he says, clapping Troy on the shoulder. “Good to see the rest of you again.”

“Now, Mr. Burton,” Mr. Stone says. “In your opinion, can the marriage between Mr. Troy Barnes and Mr. Abed Nadir be termed ‘successful’?”

“Well, I’d like to go on the record as saying that one year is far too short a time to decide whether a marriage is successful or not. It’s the second year that’s the toughest, and the fifth, and the tenth, and the twentieth—when you’ve both grown to the point that you hardly recognize yourselves or each other, but your love has grown just the same. When—”

“Respectfully, Geordi,” Jeff interrupts. “The time for speechmaking was at the party last night, and I think I speak for all of us when I say I killed it.”

“I think I’ve made my point,” LeVar concludes. “Anyway, that being said—in my opinion, yes, Troy and Abed are the most successfully married couple I’ve ever seen, and there’s no doubt in my mind that the next twenty years will bear that out.”

Troy and Abed do their handshake.

“Very well,” Mr. Stone says. “Congratulations, Mr. Barnes. Please sign here, here, and here.”

He produces a packet of papers and Troy signs. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Mr. Stone hand an envelope to Abed, too, but his view is mostly blocked by Mr. Bland, who steps forward to stamp the papers with a very cool looking stamp that he refuses to stamp on Troy’s hand when he asks.

“According to the stipulations of the will, Mr. Gilbert Lawson inherited the bulk of Mr. Hawthorne’s ready cash and possessions at the time of his death,” Mr. Stone says. “However, the dividends of the past year have been set aside for you. You can expect an immediate payment of 1.7 million dollars to your account, and approximately 430,000 dollars per quarter hereafter, assuming the value of the shares remains consistent. Pleasure doing business with you—feel free to contact my office with any further questions.”

He shakes Troy’s hand and leaves. The door clatters shut behind him. There is thirty seconds of silence.

Troy is pretty sure he’s the first one to scream, and then everyone else is screaming and standing on their chairs and bouncing off the walls. This is buried treasure times five, which is crazy because that was more millions than this is but Troy has one point seven million dollars now. Chang seems to think they all have one point seven million dollars now, which is a problem for another day, and Britta is shouting about how much she loves capitalism, and Jeff is dancing with the dean, and Frankie is fanning herself and presumably calculating how much insurance that could buy.

It’s a good ten or twenty minutes before they all settle down in their seats again.

“What are you going to do with all that money?” Frankie asks.

“He’s going to put it in a savings account,” Annie says loudly.

“Yeah, yeah,” Troy says, reaching into his checkbook. He’s written exactly three checks in his life, because rent was his responsibility until Annie moved in with them, but he googled how to write a check so he’s pretty sure he’s doing this right. “Two things first. Dean, this is for you. Well, for Greendale.”

He tears off a check and passes it to the dean. The dean stares at it and makes several different faces in quick succession, and then he just collapses on the ground. Frankie snatches the check from his hand as he falls. She raises her eyebrows.

“That’s… very generous, Troy.”

“Yeah… this place has been pretty generous to me, too.” He writes another check. “And Abed…”

“No,” Abed says immediately. “I don’t want any of it—I’ll never be respected as a director if my first movie is funded even in part by my ex-husband. That’s the whole reason we got a prenup.”

“It’s not for you,” Troy says, tearing off the check. “Can you pass that on to your dad?”

Abed’s hand closes on the piece of paper automatically.

“My dad?” he repeats faintly.

“Annie helped me do the research,” Troy says, smiling at her. “Falafel’s making a comeback, and that should be enough for an interior remodel, a new logo, an ad campaign, and at least one year’s pay for an employee that’s not you or your dad. So you don’t have anything to worry about when you go off to get famous all by yourself.”

Abed stares at the check for a minute.

“Cool,” he says finally. He folds it into precise thirds and slips it into his pocket. “This gives us a good reason to divorce, too—if it looks like I was being a gold digger, no one will suspect you were the one committing fraud. We should file the paperwork soon. I’d hate for this to turn into a Ross and Rachel Season 6 plot.”

Troy’s heart sinks. Part of him was waiting for this, but… he didn’t think it would be so soon. The incredible high of the last thirty minutes is suddenly gone.

“Yeah,” he says in a mangled voice. “Good thinking.”

“Wait,” Elroy says. “What?”

Someone’s going to explain it to him. Troy doesn’t want to hear the explanation. He mumbles something about going to the bathroom and leaves the room, and doesn’t stop until he’s outside the library. He leans against the wall and grinds the heels of his hands against his eyes.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” he says, dropping his hands. Britta leans against the wall with him.

“Smoke?” she offers. It’s become a little habit they share since Britta moved in—once a week, when Annie visits her bubbe and Abed works on his screenplay, they go out on the fire escape and share a joint. Things were awkward between them when they broke up, and this helped. It helped them laugh again, without feeling guilty. But Troy doesn’t really feel like laughing now.

“No thanks.”

“Troy,” she says slowly. “Have you considered the fact that you might want to be with Abed, romantically, for real?”

Troy shoots her a withering look, and she looks offended.

“Okay, fine, you already know that, I’m the worst, sue me. Have you tried… talking to him?”

“We had a deal,” Troy says. He stares down at the ground, scuffing his toe against the concrete. “He held up his end of it. I can’t ask for more.”

“Have you—”

“Britta. Please stop.”

“Okay.”

She rubs her hand in a circle on his back.

“We’re still best friends,” Troy says, clearing his throat. “We’ll always be best friends. We’ll be okay.”

Getting divorced is weirdly similar to getting married, except they don’t have to drive to Santa Fe, and the judge wants them to explain why even though they didn’t have to explain why they got married. Abed invents a gold-digger role that sounds strangely similar to a Joe Pesci character. Troy plays the role of Heartbroken Troy, which he’s pretty good at. They go home. Annie’s ordered a pizza. They make root beer floats, like it’s supposed to be a celebration.

This time, Abed is the one who moves to go into their (Troy’s) bedroom, and Troy is the one who is surprised.

“You’re… not going to sleep in the blanket fort?”

“Oh. Do you want me to?”

“No,” Troy says hastily. “No, you can sleep here if you want to.”

“Cool. I’ve gotten used to sleeping in here. It’s more comfortable.”

“Cool.”

They change. Abed is wearing a Kickpuncher shirt that was originally Troy’s. Troy isn’t sure he realizes it’s not his—their clothes have gotten all mixed up in the last year. More than once Troy has put on a t-shirt only to find it’s too tight across the chest and shoulders, but Abed can wear his with no problem, so he might not have noticed.

Troy climbs into bed. Abed turns off the light and joins him. He wraps his arms around Troy, just like he’s done every day for months, and Troy wonders how long this will last. It takes at least ninety days to get divorced in Colorado, so they’ll be fake married for another three months. He wonders if everything is going to change after then, or before. He doesn’t want to know, but he can’t stand not knowing.

He doesn’t realize he’s going to cry until he is. His breath hitches and he tries to be quiet in case Abed is already asleep, but then he feels Abed’s hand against the back of his head, holding him against his chest. A sob escapes.

“It’s okay,” Abed whispers. “It’s okay.”

He cries for a long time, and Abed holds him and doesn’t say another word.

“There’s something I want to tell you,” Abed murmurs as they waltz through the A Cleaner Greendale Tomorrow Gala. Troy thinks this might actually make them more conspicuous because no one else is dancing, but it means he gets to make good use of the ballroom class he took last fall so he’s not complaining.

“Arnett to Bale, go ahead.”

“It’s not about paintball,” Abed says. He dips Troy. “I’ve been applying for jobs in Los Angeles.”

He whips Troy back up and Troy crashes against his chest inelegantly.

“What?” he says. “But—Greendale?”

“I’m not enrolled in a degree program,” Abed says as if that were the question Troy was really asking, scanning the room as he talks. “I wanted to take enough classes to get better at dealing with people, especially people very different from myself. I’ve been friends with someone who doesn’t own a TV for almost a full year, Troy. I think I’ve grown up enough to move on.”

Troy hates Frankie. He wonders if Jeff and Annie and Britta would restart the We Hate Frankie Club, and if they could peer pressure Abed into joining it the way they did last time.

“Nothing is certain yet,” Abed continues. “I haven’t been offered a job, and it’s a really competitive field. But I wanted to tell you first. And I wanted to tell you now, as an homage to characters in heist movies having wildly inappropriate personal conversations in the brief lull before the action.”

“Cool,” Troy says, and he thinks of the polygraph operator, her cool, emotionless voice saying lie over and over again.

TROY, dressed in a suit and clutching a flute of champagne, rushes towards the camera with obvious delight and drunkenness. The champagne sloshes over his hand.

TROY:
Abed!

ABED:
Don’t address the camera, please.

TROY (slightly too loud):
Abed! This wedding—is—awesome. It’s just so awesome.
(whispering loudly)
But you know what was even better? Our wedding.

ABED:
We didn’t have a wedding. We eloped.

TROY:
But we got married. We were wearing fancy clothes—do you remember? You were wearing that vest. That—blue vest? You should wear vests more often. It looked good. Because you’rrrrrrre sexy.

ABED:
Thanks.

TROY (triumphantly):
And I got you flowers. Do you remember?

ABED:
I remember. They were yellow.

TROY:
Can I tell you a secret?

He wobbles as he steps closer, holding his hands up to his mouth.

TROY (whispering):
I stole them. They were growing outside the courthouse and I picked them for you.

ABED:
Nice. Very indie movie.

TROY (insulted):
No!
(He reaches out to pat Abed’s shoulders.)
No, no, no. It wasn’t a reference. I thought of it all by myself. Because you deserve it, you know? Because you were doing me this favor and it was fake and I felt bad because it should’ve been real. It should’ve been, like, a real wedding where everyone was so happy for you and telling you how pretty you were and giving you jewelry and not toasting you because I don’t even know why they call it that. Is it because you get all hot and embarrassed when people talk about you? I don’t know. I just know you are such a good friend and such a good inspector and you make good movies and you deserve flowers.

He sniffs. The music changes and Troy’s face brightens.

TROY:
I love this song.

He steps back and starts to dance by himself, for the camera.

TROY:
We didn’t have dancing at our wedding.

ABED:
We didn’t have a wedding.

TROY:
Oh my god! Babe! Babe, we should get married again. We should have another wedding, and this time there should be dancing and cake and flowers and LeVar Burton again—

ABED:
Troy, we’re getting divorced.

Troy stops dancing. His face falls, and for a second he looks just above the camera lens with a heartbroken expression.

TROY:
Oh, yeah.
(He rallies)
That’s okay. You know why that’s okay? Because I love you.

ABED:
Thanks, Troy.

TROY:
I do, I really do. I—love—you.

He grabs the camera and playfully kisses the lens, then turns and walks away. He sees Garrett across the room and points at him.

TROY:
Garrett! Shots!

The camera shakes as Abed sets it down on a table.

Abed comes into frame. He rubs at the lens with a piece of fabric, then pauses. He stares at the lens for a moment, face inscrutable.

END SCENE.

“It’s possible there is more skill to it than I thought,” Frankie admits dryly.

“There is skill to it. More importantly, it has to be joyful, effortless, fun. TV defeats its own purpose when it's pushing an agenda, or trying to defeat other TV or being proud or ashamed of itself for existing. It's TV, it's comfort. It's a friend you've known so well, and for so long you just let it be with you. And it needs to be okay for it to have a bad day, or phone in a day. And it needs to be okay for it to… to turn into something different. Something you don’t need anymore. Something that doesn’t need you. Because it was there for you when it mattered, and that’s all you can ask for.”

The rest of the table is quiet. For the first time, Abed looks up, and his gaze meets Troy’s, and Troy feels… he doesn’t know how he feels. Full. Overwhelmed. Like he should say everything, because if he doesn’t then he’ll lose his chance, but nothing, because if he does then he’ll spoil everything up to this point. Abed is still looking at him. There are unshed tears glimmering in his eyes. He nods, minutely.

Then Britta sobs, and Abed comforts her, and the moment is gone.

He finds Abed in Study Room F, with the lights half off, because of course he does. The remains of a Seven and Seven is churning in Troy’s stomach and his feet feel heavy, but he forces himself to smile.

“Giving things a finale vibe?”

“Yeah,” Abed says. “I wanted to make sure it ended here, because this is feeling more like a series finale than a season finale, and I have to make sure it ends right. I don’t know what happens after a series finale—that’s the point where real life comes back into play and things get complicated.”

“Unless you spin off.”

“Yeah.” Abed stares down at the table for a minute. “My flight leaves next week. I already checked with the court—we can finalize the divorce even if I’m not here.”

Troy nods slowly, because he has to, but he can already feel tears pricking at the corner of his eyes. He takes a deep breath.

“Can I come to California with you?” he blurts out, and then he winces. The longing in his voice is too obvious—he sounds like someone’s little brother begging to come to the park with the older kids. Abed’s mouth stretches in a guilty grimace and Troy’s stomach plummets.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he says slowly.

“Oh. Okay. But—why not?”

“It’s the Joey/Frasier principle. The show ends at the conclusion of the hero’s arc, at the moment when the main couple or couples find happiness in domestic bliss, and then the quirky weirdo spins off to a new adventure. Troy… I am so proud of you.”

Abed’s voice doesn’t break, because Abed’s voice never breaks, but it does fracture just a little bit. He takes a deep breath that sounds shaky when he blows out.

“Your arc has been all about learning to accept who you are and not caring what other people think. You’re a different person than you were in the pilot. You’re open, honest, caring, and kind. You’re not afraid to cry or be vulnerable around your friends. You taught me so much about myself. You came out. And now…” He swallowed. “Now it’s time. You don’t need me anymore—you deserve to be your own man and… and find your endgame.”

Troy takes a step closer. Abed’s hands are hanging at his side, but he doesn’t protest when Troy gently entwines their fingers. Troy ducks his head, because Abed is staring at the ground and he wants to make eye contact. It doesn’t work—Abed closes his eyes.

“What if I already have?”

Troy touches one hand to Abed’s cheek reverently and kisses him. He lets his eyes fall closed. This isn’t their first kiss. It’s not their hundredth kiss. He knows the feel of Abed’s mouth against his, the shape of his lips, the sound of his breath and the pressure of his nose when he tilts his head, the rhythm he settles into, the pattern of his tongue’s exploration, the exact moment when he is going to surge forward and Troy has to force his mouth to soften and draped his arms around Abed’s neck.

It’s not their first kiss, but it might be their last. He lingers for a long time.

“I love you,” Troy says quietly. “Not as a joke, not as a friend, not pretend. I love you. And you don’t have to love me, but—but I love you.”

Abed cups Troy’s face in his hands.

“I hate romcoms so much,” he says in a wobbly voice. “Because the overuse of the miscommunication trope is practically criminal. But…”

He closes his mouth and nods.

“Yeah?” Troy says. “Yeah—what? Yeah you love me, or, or yeah I can come with you, or yeah we can cancel our divorce and live happily ever after and maybe get a dog and a fence, although I don’t get why you need a fence to be happy—”

“Yeah,” Abed laughs. “Yeah. Since—I don’t know, since season one? Yeah.”

Abed kisses his neck, his forehead, his nose, each cheek, and then his lips, which is great because it keeps Troy from trying to process this information, which is going to wrinkle his brain more than it’s ever been wrinkled. He doesn’t have the brain power for that right now—all he wants to focus on is Abed’s lips.

“Well, well, well,” Jeff says. “That’s a last-minute finale hookup if I ever saw one.”

Abed draws away, slowly, and Troy flashes him a sheepish smile. They turn their heads.

“Jeff,” Abed says. “I know it gives you comfort to see everything through that meta-lens, but...”

“Guys?” Troy puts his arm around Abed’s waist. “I’m… going to LA with Abed. And we’re going to stay married.” He rests his head on Abed’s shoulder as an uncontrollable laugh bubbles up out of him. Abed kisses the top of his head. “Sorry if that messes with your Season 7 pitches.”

“Troy,” Annie says, beaming. “I think I speak for all of us when I say that if relegating Troy and Abed to occasional guest stars on Season 7 instead of main characters is the cost of you guys being happy… we’ll take it. No questions asked.”

There is a chorus of agreement.

“Cool. Cool, cool. Cool, cool,” Abed says. “That’s one cool for each season.”

Chang makes him repeat himself so he can fart, and then Frankie proposes that they all close their eyes and imagine their own personal pitch for the next season. Troy gave his pitch at the Vatican—they all made fun of him for the fact that his version of the show was more a buddy show than an ensemble series, but that’s nothing compared to what Troy’s picturing now. He closes his eyes and all he can see is sunlight and palm trees and beaches and Abed. Abed goofing off with Annie and waggling his eyebrows at Jeff and watching Britta with amusement written all over his face. Abed behind a camera, in the Dreamatorium, as Inspector Spacetime, playing paintball, waving his hands as he talks about Star Wars, eating pancakes in bed. And then a couple more scenes that make a flush creep down his neck.

It’s a very good pitch, and Troy is very glad he’s the only one who can see it.

Jeff drives them to the airport. Annie’s flight leaves much sooner than theirs, so she heads straight for security—after a lot of hugs and blubbering and “good luck”s. Troy and Abed stop to get dinner at the food court first. They eat one-handed so they can hold hands with the other, and Abed insists on sharing a milkshake because that’s a trope they thought was too saccharine even for a fake relationship but now he wants to try it out. Troy is anticipating a lot of new trope exploration in the next few months, and he can’t wait.

Eventually they get in line to check in. Abed takes out his wallet and pats his pockets.

“I left the tickets in the first pocket of my backpack,” he says to Troy. “Can you get them?”

“Sure.”

Troy unzips the pocket. There’s a lot of paper in there—the tickets, which he hands to Abed, and the printout of their hotel confirmation (they’re staying in the honeymoon suite until they find a nicer apartment than Abed’s initial five-roommate plan), and a small, square envelope with Abed’s name on it that is battered around the corners, like it’s been bouncing around in his bag for months.

“What’s this?” Troy asks curiously.

“Oh.” Abed’s mouth flickers in a smile. “That’s the note Pierce’s lawyer gave me when you got the money. I’ve been carrying it around ever since because I wasn’t sure what to think about it, but… in retrospect, Pierce might have actually been a genius. Which makes me a genius for predicting it in the first season of Community College Chronicles.”

“What?” Troy snorts. “Pierce a genius? No way.”

“Open it.”

Troy takes the card out of the envelope. It’s a plain white card with Pierce’s monogram on it in shiny letters. He flips up the top.

Dear Abed - 

Sorry your bequeathment is late. And you’re welcome.

Pierce Hawthorne

“Oh my god,” Troy says in a high, breathy voice. “Pierce might have been a genius.”

“Nice to know Greendale had one final plot twist up its sleeves.”

“Does Greendale have sleeves? It didn’t even have hands until like two months ago.”

They debate this point as they go through security and reach their gate, until the announcement is made that it’s time to board their flight. They stand there for a minute, holding hands and staring at the open door. Troy’s whole body is tingling with something—he’s not sure if it’s nervousness or excitement.

“We’re really doing this,” he says. “We’re leaving Colorado. We’re moving to LA. You’re going to be famous and we’re going to be married.”

“We’re already married.” Abed ducks down for a kiss and smiles at him softly. He gives a reassuring nod. “Engage.”

They cross over the threshold.