I had met Phoebe Buffay when I was eight years old, and she was playing my dad's fictional son's best friend on his sitcom Story of My Life, a show somewhat based on my dad's life in that he played a struggling script writer and single father in Los Angeles. It was always somewhat ironic – or is it coincidental? – that the person my dad casted for his fictional son's friend became that to his real son.

We had really grown up together, finding ourselves practically inseparable for the majority of our childhood. She had been my first real friend. I had a pretty unstable childhood up until the eighth year of my life. My dad and I had constantly been moving between New York and L.A. as he switched between writing and filming. Story of My Life was the first gig to actually land him in one place for an extended period of time.

Not that the years before that had been torture on me. I loved moving around with my dad. I honestly don't remember a time in my childhood when I wasn't just about the happiest kid on the planet. And why wouldn't I have been? My dad was the funniest man in the world, and he had all the money I could dream of at his disposal just for the purpose of spoiling me, his only dependent, with every new toy or bike that I wanted.

However, vivid memories of my childhood really start with Phoebe Buffay and the way we would sneak desserts off of the food table at the studio and play hide-and-go-seek in everyone's dressing rooms. I still remember the outfits we wore to the Emmys when we were nine and complaining about how we had to spend the evening with a bunch of adults who wasted a night giving speeches and how Phoebe made it fun by whispering fake awards to me for each actor that went to receive one. They had titles like Best Actor in a Suit Much too Small for His Body and Best Actress that Still Needs to Trim her Mustache.

For years it was just Phoebe and I against the world, until we added a new friend to our group. A few media outlets actually dubbed us the Three Musketeers, Phoebe, me, and –

"Earth to Chandler!"

I snapped back to the present much sooner than I wanted.

"Sorry, Pheebs," I replied, trying my best to pass it off with a smirk. "I guess I'm caught up in Chan Chan Man Land again."

"Funny," Phoebe said. "You look good. Much better than you did yesterday."

I cocked my head to the side and appraised my outfit. My jeans were wrinkled and my shirt had a tiny stain dot, which surely came from a rushed cup of coffee, right above my belly button. Not to mention I was pretty sure my sweater had a tiny hole in the back and my once white tennis shoes were stilled stained brown from a puddle I had stepped in two weeks ago.

"You're kidding, right?" I laughed. "Yesterday I was in Armani."

Phoebe shook her head, "You know what I mean. Yesterday, you looked like Chandler Bing, son of the world's most respected funnyman. Today you look like Chandler, best friend to Phoebe Buffay and kickass comedy writer."

"Right, well," I stammered the same way I usually do when faced with any comment that road the line of being deep or serious, "You don't look so bad yourself."

And it wasn't a lie. I never claimed to be oblivious to Phoebe's good looks. She had always had something going for her. The curly, long blonde hair, the killer body, the inert funniness. However, my attraction to Phoebe went no further than a clumsy first kiss when we were eleven that had us both gagging for the weeks after.

"Why thank you!" Phoebe smiled. "And I meant what I said, you're looking good Chandler. I've been worried about you."

"Yeah, well, we don't all have the magical powers to cleanse our own auras when we're feeling a little down," I shrugged, knowing she'd appreciate the allusion to her "psychic" abilities.

"That's another thing, you're considerably less murky today! Did you light the candles last night like I told you to? They're so soothing!"

"Um, yeah, Pheebs. It really helped, thanks," I lied. The last thing I had done the night before was spend time lighting candles in the hopes of them magically curing me. Almost automatically, I scanned the room just to see if anyone was still staring at me. Sure enough, a few eyes were set on me. Of course they looked away when we made awkward eye contact.

It was clear that Phoebe noticed what I was doing when whispered to me, "Don't let the stares get to you, Chandler. It's just like when your dad would take us out to get ice cream and all those cameras would follow us around. Just ignore them, and it's like it's not even happening."

I smiled at her, recognizing her words as the exact ones my dad had told us when we were eight. Phoebe always had a way with saying the exactly right thing. Well, except for all the times she says exactly the wrong thing but with the best intentions.

"Thanks," I said sincerely. "Listen, I know that I've been hard to deal with lately, and I know that I've been worrying you and –"

"Good morning everyone!"

I resisted the urge to groan. I knew that voice anywhere. It was my childhood tormentor. The metaphorical bully in the schoolyard. My arch nemesis when I was feeling especially melodramatic. Pete freakin' Becker.

Of course, that was years ago, back when we were both kids forced to play with each other while our dads worked out business deals. I hadn't seen him since we were fifteen on the count that he had been sent to boarding school. I had heard that his father, George Becker, had been slowly giving him control of different areas at NBC, but I had desperately been hoping that this was not one of those areas.

"If everyone would take a seat," Pete continued, gesturing to the empty chairs around the conference table and to those who were still standing or leaning against the walls of the room. Everyone scurried to an open chair and I straightened my Yankees cap while smiling ruefully at how they all bended to Pete's commands.

Phoebe leaned over in her chair to whisper to me again, "Wipe the smirk off of your face. As much as we would both love to beat his ass, he's our boss now. Who knows, maybe he's changed."

I shook my head just enough so that she would see it, but then straighten my mouth into a more acceptable, practiced, bored look.

"Thank you," Pete said once everyone was seated. I could tell that his smile was perfectly calculated and completely not genuine. I would know. I saw his genuine smile every time he used to steal my toys and hide them in his dad's office when we were kids.

"I'd like to welcome back everyone from our previous writing staffs, we're thrilled that you've returned to our humble show."

I scoffed. Loudly. I couldn't help it, and when everyone turned to face me, I tried to cover it with a cough. But, the look I got from Phoebe showed me that it was a futile attempt.

Pete continued as if I hadn't made a sound, "To those of you who are new, we welcome you to the show. May you actually manage to get a sketch on air this season." Pete laughed loudly and everyone else joined in nervously.

Pete should obviously leave the comedy to the people sitting in front of him.

"Now, I want to make a few things clear about this job. My father has placed me in charge of this show, so I'm your new boss. I'm going to be fair above all else. That means it doesn't matter how long you've been here, or how long you've been working on your sketch, or how long your father or father's father may have worked here." Pete's eyes flittered to me when he listed the last part, and I held my tongue to keep from pointing out that the only reason he had his job was because his father had handed it to him. Contrary to what seemed to be popular belief, I did have to interview for this job. I earned it.

"Those who write the best material will be the ones to get sketches on the show. Period. We're changing things around here. As I am sure you are all well aware, Saturday Night Live's ratings plummeted last year. It was crap. Our first show is in four weeks. Four weeks! And we cannot find well known celebrity willing to put their name out on the line to host. That's what we've become. This show has been around longer than most of us have. That means that we have a responsibility to everyone before us to keep it running. And I'm looking at you guys. You have got to step up. Rise to the occasion. Any questions?"

I glanced around, wondering who would be the first sad bastard to try and get an answer out of Pete Becker. Sure enough, one of the suits raised his hand.

"You said we don't have a host for the opening show."

"That's not a question," Pete cut in.

Jackass.

"Right, um," the new guy stuttered. "Well, how are we supposed to start writing if we don't know who we're writing for?"

"You can't," Pete scoffed.

Once again I fought the urge to correct Pete. Doesn't he know how anything works? Does he not understand that movies are written far before they're cast? We could easily begin writing generic sketches and then write host-specific ones once we had found a host.

"When are we going to find one?" a man dressed similarly to me, making it safe to assume that he worked here previously, asked.

"Who knows?" Pete scoffed. "This show has dug itself into a grave. You'd be lucky to find anyone worth a viewer! Not to mention your budget has been drastically cut, meaning whomever you get to host will have to do it for practically nothing."

I glanced around at the other writers, all of whom looked equally horrified. I however looked at Phoebe, completely undisturbed. She smiled back at me and nodded her head. She knew as well as I did, we had the perfect solution to this problem.

Phoebe raised her eyebrows to me, and I waved a hand in front of me, giving her permission to voice our idea.

"Joey Tribbiani."

Joseph Francis Tribbiani, the third musketeer. I had met Joey when we were both fifteen, and my dad was auditioning actors for a leading role in one of his movies. Joey hadn't gotten the part, his audition had been atrocious, and he hadn't gotten a single line of the dialogue correct. My dad called him "the worst audition from the best actor" he'd ever seen.

At the time, I had thought my dad was insane. From what I had seen from his audition, Joey was an actor that didn't take anything seriously. And I certainly didn't see any budding talent coming from his mispronunciation of simple words and butchering of short lines. Regardless, Joey and I had become fast friends from the second he apologized to my father for his less-than-stellar performance that he claimed was due to the fact that he had stayed up the entire night before watching the first three Die Hard movies.

From that day on, Joey and I had been the best of friends. Since his parents lived in New York, Joey was staying with his sister in L.A., but his sister seemed to have more interest in finding a rich guy to marry than watching after her little brother. As a result, Joey spent most of his nights at my dad's Beverly Hills estate. He was like the brother I never had.

"Ms. Buffay," Pete smiled, but, as usual, it seemed a little forced, "What a inspired suggestion. However, how do you plan to make an actor of his caliber host the show when so far we've been turned down by lesser-knowns?"

Phoebe opened her mouth to reply, but I cut her off.

"I can call him right now. I'm sure he'll be more than happy to do it."

"Ah, Mr. Bing, we're so thrilled to have you join us this season," Pete deadpanned.

I just raised my eyebrows.

"Well," Pete said, "don't you have a call to make?"

I smirked and pulled out my phone, sliding the bar across the screen to unlock it. I scrolled to Joey's number in my contacts and pressed on it to call him.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Joe!" I greeted.

"Chandler! Hey! What's up? How are you doin'? Need some Joey pick-me-up time? 'Cause I'm on set right now, but I forgot to memorize my lines for today, so I could use an excuse to get outta here before they expect me to start actin' and stuff."

I felt the smile spread across my face before I could stop it. Classic Joey. Always looking to help me while coincidentally helping himself.

"I'm doing good. But, listen, I have a favor to ask," I told him.

"Dude, you know I love you, but if you're going to ask me to pretend to be your gay best friend to help you pick up girls again, I'm going to have to decline. There's only so many times my PR team can decline the rumors before people start to really believe them."

"Right, well, as … tempting … as that sounds, I think I have a little more pressing issue than my lack of a love life. Thanks for pointing it out again though, that felt good."

"Sorry, man. You've got my full attention, I promise. What's up?"

"I need you to host SNL. I know you've got a lot on your plate with the new movie and stuff, but it would really help –"

"Say no more! I am so there! Dude! It's like J-Man and Channie at it again!"

"Joe, nobody calls us that."

"Nobody calls us that yet. I'm thinking of referring to us as that in my next interview."

"That's fine, but this time try not to refer to us as 'partners.' It took weeks to convince the media that we weren't closeted lovers trying to use Phoebe as a surrogate for our baby."

"That was crazy! I mean I don't even know what a surrogate is!"

"Of course you don't, Joey," I laughed. "Anyways, I'm in a meeting, so I've got to go."

"Right, you're one of those people. Actually going to their meetings and stuff. I guess I'll actually try and figure out what I'm supposed to be doing in my next scene. I love you, man."

"Back atcha, Joe," I said, and then I hung up the phone.

I turned to Pete, who was still standing at the head of the table, watching me expectantly.

I let out a big spy and then smiled.

"Looks like we've got ourselves a host."

I shut the door to my apartment and immediately headed to the fridge. I yanked it open and pushed aside what seemed to be endless containers of left over Chinese take-out boxes to reach the six-pack bottled beers in the back.

I hauled them out of the fridge and carried them with me to my living room, placing them on the coffee table as I leaned back against the couch.

I grabbed the remote sitting next to me and switched the TV to video, so that the disc in my DVD player began to play. The screen lit up and the sound of his voice on the video was enough to get my tears flowing.

"Come on, Chandler! You can do it!" my dad encouraged.

The screen showed younger me – four-year-old me, to be exact – standing on top of the play set my dad had given to me as a birthday present earlier that day. I was positioned to go down the slide for the first time.

"Daddy! I can't I'm scared!" toddler me exclaimed. My tiny hands were clenching the rail above the slide so tightly that my fingers were turning white.

I laughed bitterly to myself, "You're scared? You're scared? He's right there! He's right there in front of you! You're going to be just fine!"

"I've got you, buddy! Just do it! You've got this!" my dad called to little me, and even though the video didn't give a shot of his face, I could tell that he had been grinning when he said it.

Younger me slid down the slide, giggling and cheering, while I opened a bottle of beer, sobbing into my hands.

I thought back to what I had told both Phoebe and Joey earlier that day.

I was a liar.

I'm so not okay.

AN: Thanks to those who reviewed last chapter for their encouraging words! Also, thanks to all of you wonderful readers for taking time to check out my story!

So now we've met Pete Becker and Joey Tribbiani! Get excited:) They're going to have some pretty serious roles from here on out.

I know there's still not Monica, Ross, or Rachel; but we've got half of the gang accounted for! That's something, right?

Please leave a thought or opinion on the chapter! Even if it's just a word:)