A/N: This is going to be a two part story, since this bit and the next part I'm doing work better together than apart. I'll hopefully get to add the second part late tomorrow, but I wanted to get this up since I meant to have it finished yesterday. This was definitely the saddest thing I've written in a while, but I hope I did this scene justice. The next part shouldn't be nearly this sad, and my last (I think) baby centric Mondler missing moment that I doing after I finish this will definitely be happier. Thank you so much for reading the stuff I've written. You guys are all wonderful.
Disclaimer: I do not own Friends, but some dialogue is taken from "TOW the Fertility Test."
Chandler sat on the sofa reading the paper as he waited for Monica to get home. In the back of his mind, he was slightly nervous. He and Monica had taken their fertility tests the day before, and he knew that there was some small chance that something was wrong with one of them that meant they wouldn't be able to have a baby. Janice, of all people, had calmed him down about the whole thing at the doctor's office, but he knew he would feel a lot better once he found out that everything was okay.
The phone rang, and Chandler picked up. "Hello."
"Hi, Chandler. It's Doctor Connelly," the voice said on the other end of the line.
"Oh, hi, Doctor Connelly," Chandler replied. This was is.
"Is Monica there too?" the doctor asked. "I have something to tell you both."
"Ah, no, well she's not here," Chandler said, "but, uh, ya know, I can tell her."
"Okay," Doctor Connelly replied.
"Should I be, uh, sitting down for this?" Chandler joked.
"Maybe you should, Chandler. I'm afraid I'm not calling with good news," came the reply.
Chandler felt as though his heart had stopped.
"It seems your sperm have low motility," Doctor Connelly continued.
Chandler leaned down against the back of the couch. "Oh."
"So fertilizing any egg would be difficult for you," he explained.
"Uh huh," Chandler said in response, trying to process what he was hearing.
"But things are worse because Monica's uterus is an inhospitable environment," the doctor continued, Chandler's heart sinking even more as Monica's name was mentioned.
"Uh huh," Chandler said again, unable to form real sentences.
"So even if your sperm make it, there's a good chance they won't survive," Doctor Connelly finished, every word like a dagger through Chandler.
"Well, so, what does that mean?" Chandler managed to say.
"It means that you could possibly still have a baby together, but the chances really don't look good." The doctor's voice grew more sympathetic. "I'm sorry, Chandler. Give me a call, and we can schedule a meeting to discuss your options."
"Okay, uh, okay. Thank you. Thanks," Chandler said tonelessly.
He moved mechanically, going through the motions of hanging up the phone, but not giving the action any thought. He felt like someone had punched him in the stomach. Doctor Connelly's words spiraled through his head: "low motility" "inhospitable environment" and worst of all, "the chances really don't look good."
Almost immediately, Monica walked through the door. "Hey, sweetie," she said brightly, smiling at him.
Chandler looked up at her, trying to prepare himself for what he was going to have to tell his wife.
"Doctor Connelly just called," he said as she closed the door.
"Oh! With good news?" Monica said, walking toward him, but then she inhaled slightly, her face falling. "Oh course it's not good news, you just said 'Doctor Connelly just called,' if it had been good news you would have said 'Doctor Connelly just called!'" She waved her hands in the air, clearly getting more and more frantic as she went on. She brushed her hair out of her face, nervously. "So, what is it? Is it, um- is there a problem? Is there a problem with me… or with you?"
Chandler knew that nothing could be worse than telling his extremely worried looking wife what he had to tell her.
"Actually, it's both of us," he said finally.
"What?" Monica replied, her voice quieter than usual as she stared at him, her hand on her chest.
Chandler began to explain. "Apparently, my sperm have low motility, and you have an inhospitable environment."
"Oh," she said, staring down at the ground for a few seconds. "Well, what does that mean?" she asked, looking up at him with a last little glimmer of hope left in her eyes that maybe things would be okay.
"It means that my guys won't get off their Barcaloungers, and you have a uterus that is prepared to kill the ones that do," Chandler said with the smallest of smiles as he tried to keep a joking quality in his explanation. If he stopped joking about this, then it would become way too real. He began to give another joking analogy. "It means that–"
"Alright, Chandler," Monica interrupted him, her eyes shiny with tears.
Chandler knew he had to say it. "It means that we can keep trying, but there's a good chance this may never happen for us."
Monica stared at him, sniffing, as her eyes grew watery. "Oh my God."
"I'm sorry," Chandler said, not knowing what else to say.
"I'm sorry too," Monica replied, stepping in to wrap her arms around Chandler desperately, as he did the same to her.
Chandler could hear his wife sniffling into his shirt, and he knew he had to do something. He was just as crushed as she was, but he had to be strong for her; he had to reassure her that everything was going to be okay. "Well, we're gonna, we're gonna figure this out," he said as he rubbed her back comfortingly.
"Yeah," she breathed out. "I know."
He felt tears begin to drip down onto his shoulder, and he wrapped his arm more protectively around Monica's head.
The pair stayed that way for several minutes. Chandler's arms hugging Monica tightly to him, Monica clinging to Chandler, crying into his shoulder.
Chandler had heard the words from Doctor Connelly, and he had said them to Monica himself, but only as he felt Monica's tears soaking into his shirt did he really grasp what this meant. It was close to impossible for him and Monica to have a baby of their own. That little Bing he had been thinking about for at least a year would probably never happen for them. His plan for four kids – a boy, twin girls, and another boy – was definitely out. Having kids wasn't a matter of when anymore, now it was a matter of if. And that if represented only a very slight chance. Chandler felt a teardrop slide down his cheek and fall into Monica's hair. He breathed in shakily. He was supposed to be trying to be strong for Monica, but his heart had shattered into a million pieces.
Chandler let go of his wife to try to wipe the tears from his eyes, and Monica moved back slightly.
As Chandler looked down into Monica's face, he saw a mask of tears, her eyes barely opened as she looked down at the floor. "Tissues," she said simply as she stepped away and grabbed a couple from the box from the counter, dapping at her eyes and blowing her nose.
Chandler joined her, doing the same.
He looped his arm around her waist and held her to him. "Come on, Mon." He lightly guided her from the counter over to the sofa, taking the tissue box with him and setting it on the coffee table as they sat down facing each other.
Chandler moved his arms around Monica again, as she curled up into his chest, sobs wracking her body.
"It's just- it's just- it's not fair!" she choked out into his shirt.
"I know. I know," Chandler whispered down into her hair as tears continued to trickle down his cheeks. "It's not even a little bit fair."
"I was gonna be such a good mom," Monica continued, between sobs. "And you were gonna be such a good dad."
Chandler took in a shaky breath, trying to calm down as his tears began to cease. "We're gonna figure something out, Mon. You're still gonna get to be a mom, I promise."
Monica's sobs began to die away as she took short, ragged breaths. "But it's… it's not the same, Chandler," she said, almost a whisper, her voice no longer constricted by her sobbing.
Chandler felt his heart break again at Monica's words. She sounded so hopeless, so empty, as though she had lost everything. Chandler understood; he felt the same way.
Monica lifted her head up from Chandler's chest, making eye contact with him. "It's just not fair!" she said for a second time, stronger than before, a new anger entering her voice. "There are so many mothers out there who didn't ask to have kids or who didn't want them and have them anyway. Look at Rachel! One drunken night with Ross, and she has Emma! She didn't even try; she just got herself a baby, no problem. How does that work?" Monica hit her hand against the sofa cushion. "And here I am, trying for months and months to have a baby with my husband, and then we find out that it's all been worthless: we can't have one anyway!" At her own words, Monica broke down again, her shoulders shaking.
Chandler reached out to her, resting his hands on her upper arms. He knew he had to try to calm her down. "Monica," he said softly, moving one of his hands to swipe at the tears traveling swiftly down her cheeks. "It'll be okay. I know this isn't fair, but we can't get mad at anyone else for it. I'd love to be able to yell at Ross for fathering two kids with two different women, neither of which he's married to – clearly his sperm don't have any motility problems –" Chandler joked almost bitterly, "but that doesn't do us any good. Let's not bring anyone else into this. It sucks for us. I think that's enough." He began to stroke her hair lightly as she took several deep breaths.
"You're right," she said finally, looking up at him, tear tracks visible on her face, though she had stopped crying for the moment. "I'm not really mad at Rachel, I'm just… I was so excited about this, Chandler! All I ever wanted was to get married and have a baby, and now I find out that I can't…" she trailed off, staring down into her lap.
"I know, Mon," he replied, looking downward as well. "I was excited too." Sure, he had only been ready to have a baby for about a year now, but he had known that he wanted kids with Monica for much longer than that. He'd thought about it since before he'd proposed to her; they both had. It had always been something wonderful they were saving for someday in the future, but now it seemed that someday would never come. Monica wasn't going to get pregnant sometime soon like they had hoped. Chandler wasn't going to have his little baby Bing.
But he did have Monica.
Chandler tilted Monica's head up so he could meet her eyes. "Monica," he said softly, "we are going to get through this, and we are going to get our chance to have a baby and be parents, and this is all going to work out. You know why I know all that?"
Monica shook her head, blinking, seeming to be trying to keep her tears at bay.
"Because I'm on your team, and your team always wins," Chandler answered, remembering Monica telling him that less than six months into their relationship, right before his face-off with Phoebe that had ended in him admitting to Phoebe, Rachel, Joey, and Monica herself that he was in love with Monica. That had all been so long ago.
Monica's mouth formed itself into the faintest of smiles, though still a smile nonetheless.
Chandler continued, looking into her eyes. "I love you so much, Monica, and that's why I know that we'll figure this out and that everything's going to be okay." He took Monica's hands in his and brought one to his lips, kissing it softly.
Monica sniffled slightly as she stared back at him. "I love you too, Chandler. Thank you."
Chandler wrapped his arms around his wife again. "Of course, Mon. Of course."
She took a deep breath and moved back from him, evidently trying to compose herself. She grabbed a tissue from the box on the coffee table, wiping at her eyes and blowing her nose. Finally she looked up at Chandler. "So, what do we do now?"
Chandler stared back at Monica, amazed at how well his wife had pulled herself together in the face of how awful this was. He exhaled slowly. "Well, tomorrow I'll call Doctor Connelly so we can meet and discuss our options from this point, but for now, how about we curl up here and watch a movie and take our minds off all this?"
Monica nodded back at him. "I'd like that." She got off the sofa to look through their movies in the cabinet next to their TV.
Chandler moved in front of the cabinet and knelt down next to her as she scanned the boxes. He pressed a kiss to her temple, and she leaned her head on his shoulder.
"We'll figure this out," he said quietly, partly to Monica and partly to himself. All he could hope was that he was right.
A/N: Writing this was really hard and took longer than it should have, just because this whole thing was so incredibly sad. The second (hopefully less sad) part of this should be up tomorrow or Tuesday at the latest. Thanks for reading! Reviews are the best!