Tag: community

one more basically abandoned wip – the trobed high school au where troy fakes an injury during a football game and joins drama, where he becomes friends with annie and abed. 

i’ve been trying to write this for like five years or something ridiculous, jesus. 

Troy takes the hit harder than he needs to. He doesn’t even
realize that he’s doing it, moving into the linebacker’s shoulder instead of
spinning against it, until he’s on the ground and the whole stadium goes
silent. His ankle throbs, a little, like he maybe twisted it or maybe just hit
the bone a little too hard, but something in his head shifts at the same time
and he screams.

His coach is there in like five seconds, kneeling on the
ground next to him, saying, “That damn ankle better not be broken, Barnes,
we’ve got a game to win.”

Troy nods and says, “It’s almost definitely broken.”

“It’s not, though, is the thing,” Annie cuts in,
interrupting where Abed’s kneeling with a hand on Troy’s shoulder and looking
concerned. The drama teacher raises one perfectly manicured eyebrow at them.
“It’s not broken.”

“You didn’t actually injure your ankle?” Ms. Pendergast
asks.

“Nope,” Troy says, smiling at her.

“So, you’re all telling me you want to base the spring
musical off an incident that, when the truth comes to light, is going to cause
the more sports-oriented side of this institution to possibly literally burn
Mr. Barnes at the stake,” she says, slowly.

Troy hadn’t really thought about it like that yet. At least
not with the burning and the stakes. He kind of already lost all of his friends
when he ended up joining drama instead of manfully sitting on the sidelines at
practices. He hadn’t really thought about the coach seeing it, though. Or his
parents.

“Is that what we’re doing?” Troy asks.

“…maybe we go back to the popular narrative where you
tragically fracture your ankle and nobody murders you because we didn’t win the
championship this year,” Abed says.

“You said this version was more John Hughesian, though,”
Annie protests.

“It is infinitely more John Hughesian,” Abed agrees, “but
maybe we can go in a more Friday Night
Lights direction instead.”

“Clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose,” Troy says, and Abed
shoots him a quick smile. His hand is still on Troy’s shoulder, but he’s
sitting next to him now, long legs folded underneath him. Troy leans into the
touch because he feels like he needs to take advantage of it while he can,
while they’re in the theatre and it’s acting and okay.

“I can’t believe I went to grad school to do this,” Ms.
Pendergast says faintly.

“Was that a yes?” Annie asks.

Ms. Pendergast nods and Annie squeals, hopping up and down
and then falling next to them to throw her arms around Abed who smiles and only
mostly looks like he doesn’t know what to do. They’ve all gotten pretty good at
hugs, but it’s been a lot of practice.