"So...let me get something straight..." Joey began rather angrily. "You care that you're blonde and your parents are brunette."
"Well no-" Jack attempted to interrupt but Joey silenced him with a look.
"You care that your mum was never pregnant and that you knew a different woman for all two seconds of your life?" Joey continued.
"It's not like that, you don't understand!" Erica protested.
"You're right I don't understand! I look at you and I see them." Joey sat back down and looked intently at the twins.
"You do?" Jack said quietly.
"I do." Joey looked him in the eyes. "I see it when you bake me cookies or make me a sandwich that for some reason tastes so much better when you do it!"
Jack grinned and Joey turned to Erica. "I see it when you make a little one-liner and I laugh so hard my stomach hurts."
A smile played at the edges of Erica's mouth and Joey pressed on. "No your parents didn't make you from their DNA, but they did make you from them."
Their faces softened and they looked at each other. Joey saw the look pass between them and he dialled his tone down a little, back to the big softy they knew him as.
"Monica and Chandler were made to be parents, majority of their lives they've looked after me!" Joey laughed knowingly. "But someone or something decided that having kids wasn't gonna be easy for them. And now they've got you and after all these years you're just going to throw that back in their faces. So ask yourself this: is that what they would do?"
Back in the dining room, silence filled the air awkwardly.
"What do you think he's saying in there?" Rachel finally asked what they'd all been thinking.
"I don't know, he is Joey." Chandler chortled.
As if by magic, Joey came suddenly sauntering through the doorway, Jack and Erica in tow.
Monica and Chandler instantly jumped up. "Hey-Hi-How's-I'm...sorry." Chandler stammered.
"It's okay." Jack promised taking a seat at the table.
"Really?" Monica checked sitting back down opposite Erica.
"I mean we're not happy you lied to us...but we'll get over it." Erica's face broke into a grin.
"We're family and family's forever." Jack confirmed.
"Damn right." Joey echoed, looking around at Rachel, Ross, Phoebe, Monica and Chandler.
"Kids! Get down here!" Phoebe called loudly.
Thundering down the stairs came Ace, Electra and Emma, they bounded into the doorway closely followed by Mike.
"What's up, Aunt Pheebs?" Emma wondered.
"We just wanted to you guys to know that...you're all family. All of you. No matter what." Phoebe replied.
"Umm..sure." Emma giggled awkwardly.
"No, really. Maybe not many of us share blood..." Rachel smiled looking around, resting her eyes upon Jack and Erica. "But for all we've been through, we're more of a family than any I've ever met."
"Because families stick together." Chandler smiled, pulling his wife into him.
Slowly, everyone got up from their chairs and congregated in the middle of the room. And like some kind of magnetic pull, they dissolved into a huge group hug.
6 friends. 5 kids. 3 couples. 1 family.
And we're done! Thanks everyone for the immense amount of support and compliments I've had on this fic!