A/N: This is just a little break from all those mushy/fluffy stories of mine, just an attempt to prove to myself that I'm capable of writing angst, when it comes to this fandom, and this couple, who has dominated my reality a lot more than I'd like to admit.
The title is from the Train song of the same name.
Warning: Adultery. Miscarriage. M/Ri. Not my typical story.
The Finish Line
Chapter 1
2002 – The Present
The others never knew what had happened between them. She preferred it that way now. But what irked her the most was, he'd preferred it that way, right from the very beginning.
It all started with a question. 'I'm still on London time, does that count?'.
Yeah, it counted. For her, it did. What she still wondered was, did it count for him? If it did, why did he let it all slip through their fingers, so very easily? If he'd had the courage to come back to her and declare how he felt, why hadn't he had the courage to fight back for what he knew that they both wanted? Were they not worth fighting for?
"Mrs. Burke?"
She snapped back into reality. Whenever someone called her that, it felt like she'd been drenched in scalding water. "Yes?" She looked up at the hotel manager, panicking slightly. She hadn't been listening to what he'd been saying.
"We're really impressed with your work experience. We feel that you're exactly what we've been looking for," the manager smiled and continued, "and I'm happy to tell you that you've been hired for the position of Head Chef, here at Javu."
"Thank you," Monica smiled, and rose from her seat.
"Congratulations." They shook hands before she left.
She left the building, flagged down a cab, and got in. She recited the address that she knew like her own, where she felt more at home than in her own.
On reaching the building, she paid the cab fare, and waited outside as the cab whizzed past her. The gray sky, filled with depressingly heavy clouds, loomed over her with the promise of a torrential downpour. She entered the building, not in the mood to be soaked in rain.
She remembered the day it all ended. She remembered the day it all began again. At no point in her life did she imagine it would all turn out this way.
~.~
1999 – The Past
"Maybe we should tell the others?" she asked slowly, her voice low and soft, in tone with the silence of the night.
"About what?" he asked, his fingers finding hers. He knew exactly 'what'.
"About us," she murmured back.
After about six months of spending every possible moment with each other, she thought they were ready to tell the others about their relationship. She knew she was in love with him. She knew she no longer wanted this to be a secret – neither their relationship, nor her love.
"I need some more time," he replied with a coolness in his voice that hadn't been there before this conversation. It was the tone that she'd come to associate with the reply that usually followed this suggestion of hers.
They didn't speak again that night. When later that night, his arms wrapped themselves around her, she stared out the window, wondering whether their relationship would reach the 'finish' line, before it even reached the 'start'.
~.~
2002 – The Present
She knocked on the door, and waited for him to open it. His apartment was on the third floor and the hallway was painted the same color as the walls inside his apartment – pale green.
This apartment was a lot smaller than the one that he'd shared with Joey. He'd always said that he liked it this way, 'small and cramped', but she knew that it was something else. She knew that he was mildly claustrophobic, and that he gained a small amount of masochistic pleasure by living here.
Something stirred inside her as she heard his bare feet make their way towards the door. She held her breath, waiting for him to open the door.
He opened the door, with his hair rumpled, and his familiar features strikingly defined by a 5'o clock shadow. He opened the door wider on seeing her, allowing her to come in. "Hey, Mon," he smiled, closing the door behind her. "How did the interview-"
She cut him off by pinning him against the door. "Don't talk now, Chandler." Her hands rising to frame his face, she kissed him hard, pulling herself closer to him. At moments like this, she could forget Richard so very easily that it almost scared her.
"Got the job?" he asked, breathless, when she pulled back for air.
"Hmm," she said, before pulling him towards her for another kiss.
He tugged at the sleeve of her dress as his mouth opened hers. Each article of clothing was thrown in various directions, and he backed her towards his bedroom.
She moved with him, gasping as his lips moved along her body, barely hearing the dull thud of her wedding band hitting the floor.
~.~
1998 – The Beginning
"I'm still on London time, does that count?" he asked her, staring straight into her eyes. He felt naked, like he had bared his soul, and he would have sworn that his heart had stopped beating in his chest for those few seconds that she took to answer.
"Oh, that counts," she nodded, moving towards him.
He barely heard her reply as their lips met. His heart clenched in his chest, reminding him of his very first kiss. But this was not his first kiss. This was just his first sober kiss with her.
She pulled back a little and smiled at him softly, before she leaned in to kiss him again.
At that moment, his clenched heart told him that this is what happiness felt like.
~.~
2002 – The Present
With uncharacteristic naivety, she had believed that that happiness would last forever.
~.~.~