A/N: This has taken some time, but I'm back home for the holidays this week (good life, finally!), so I've been way too busy feeding myself properly for the first time in five months (turns out watching Man v. Food like crazy doesn't count as eating). But anyway, you probably don't care about the non-existent eating habits of a broken college student.

But hey, thanks so much for the reviews, people! You guys are so lovely, my fear of disappointing you all is getting more and more patent. (Keep them coming, though - I want more.)

Hah, here we go!


"Have I told you what happened the other day?" Monica asked when I was finally drifting off to sleep. Even though she seemed distant and unclear at first, when my eyes fluttered open at the sound of her voice, I realized that her face was mere inches away from mine.

I stretched my legs and made a sleepily, non-committal noise in the back of my throat, as my eyelids closed again. The sun had just risen, making its way through the half-closed blinds in her bedroom, and we were both still in bed, with her legs forced in between mine, my arm wrapped around her shoulders, and her head resting below my chin. Needless to say, it'd been a long, long, very long night.

"Well, my downstairs neighbor got arrested, you know, the one with the nerdy glasses but the sexy look," she explained, in a gossipy tone of voice, "and the thing is, it actually looks like he's not coming back, because they've put the apartment up for rent already."

"That's crazy," I managed to utter, showing no kind of interest in the matter. Why Monica thought I'd care about her downstairs neighbor this particular Sunday at 7-8 o'clock in the morning is something that still manages to escape my understanding.

"I know!" she continued, stroking my chest. "And 'cause he looked like such a nice guy, too."

"Did he always wave?" I said with small laugh as my eyes remained shut. Maybe under different circumstances my insecurities would've taken the best of me, but irrational jealousy over an imprisoned man seemed somewhat pointless this early in the morning - an approachable joke sounded more fitting.

"What?" Monica asked, raising her head and not approaching my joke.

"You know, like they always do on the news," I started, my eyes finally snapping open. She didn't seem to be following me, so I tentatively asked, "Like, when they interview the neighbors of a guy that just killed his children and beheaded his wife?"

Monica wrinkled her nose. "What?"

"Yes!" I let out a frustrated bark, momentarily forgetting I'd ever been tired in the first place. "And, of course, all they ever say is, 'He looked so normal and nice, he always waved at me!'"

Monica laughed softly. "They do?"

"Of course!" I said, pressing a hand to my face. When Monica stared at me as if I were talking about events that only took place in parallel universes she didn't have access to, a sigh the size of China escaped my lips. "Anyway, let's move on, please."

"Sure thing, honey, but only as long as you stop talking nonsense," she chuckled, snuggling closer to my neck and planting kisses there. I wasn't about to deny some affection, so I craned my neck to grant her better access.

"Sure thing, Sugar Plump," I agreed, running my hand across her arm. Monica lurved when I called her Sugar Plump.

"Ugh, don't call me that, it's so corny," she groaned, moving to my jawline. I let out a deep breath, squeezing her hand and then letting go. Was I about to receive some morning sex after the night we'd had? Life, I'd underestimated you. "This is nice, isn't it?" she breathed against my skin.

"Are you kidding?" I said while she nibbled on my ear. "I could stay here forever!"

The thing is, I probably would have, had my stomach not decided to growl noisily, as if to show me that my desire to eat was a tad stronger. Life, I'd overestimated you. "Are you hungry?" she asked, in case my physiological response was not enough proof.

"Not really," I lied, shaking my head and cupping her face so I could bring our lips together in a kiss that lasted until Monica decided to pull back.

"Hey, you want pancakes?" she offered, and my lips automatically quirked at the corners. Life, you're made up of very difficult decisions.

"That sounds amazing, actually," I said after a beat.

"Wait, no," she quickly said, slapping her head softly and sighing, "I'm out of pancake mix - my roommate is crazy about them, and she eats them at all hours."

This got me thinking: I'd met her roommate a total of four times in all the months I'd been dating Monica, but that sentence sounded weird, somehow, since I couldn't picture Monica's roommate being crazy about anything this world had to offer. I decided to let it slide, though. "Don't wo-"

"Wait, wait!" she cut me off mid-sentence, rising triumphantly over me, and clapping her hands excitedly on my chest, which was much more than I could have ever managed this early in the morning. "We could make it ourselves!"

That didn't sound as fun, to be honest. "I don't kn-" I started, making a face, but she cut me off again.

"Yes, yes!" she bounced on the bed, waving her hands around, as if she'd just had a true stroke of inspiration. "Oh, my God, it'll be so much fun! You can help me, and I'll teach you!"

"You sure you don't want cereals? O better yet, toasts?" I asked, wiggling my eyebrows. "I think I can make them French, and not in a dirty way or anything." (I couldn't, actually, but I'd watched Kramer Vs. Kramer enough times to trick myself into thinking I could.)

"No, no, no," she answered, getting out of the bed already, picking my shirt off the floor and putting it on. "It's gonna be fun, I swear. I've always wanted to share my cooking wisdom with you!"

She blurred past the door, and just 10 seconds later, I started hearing her shuffling pans and other utensils in the kitchen. I reluctantly got up, getting the inevitable feeling that this was the story of my life in the past few months: she looked so excited about something that it was hard for me to say no. Oh, so hard; impossibly hard. When I stepped into the living room, she was already taking a carton of milk out the fridge.

I rubbed my eyes and went to lean against the counter. "Wow, you're fast."

"Thank you," she said, like it was meant to be a compliment. "Okay, look. We need milk, eggs, sugar, baking powder..." she informed me as she kept pulling different ingredients out of different cabinets, "and flour. That's all."

"Flour, huh?" I said, peering over it. "We could take part in a flour fight, y'know, like in the movies," I said, although she looked like she did not know. "Now, that sounds like fun," I finished. I don't think she shared this sentiment with me, since she put a hand on my shoulder and a tolerant smile across her face.

"That'd be fun, yes," she said, "but you know what would be even more fun?" I kinda got the feeling, but I shook my head anyway. "You not turning my kitchen into a mess."

"Ah, you're no fun," I took some of it between two fingers, a mischievous smile planted on my face, and I threw it at her.

"Chandler, stop it," she warned me, brushing it off, and my shoulders slumped in total and absolute defeat.

"Just trying to make this experience more enjoyable, but okay," I mournfully said.

"Getting things dirty is not enjoyable!" she admonished me, pointing an angry finger at me. "'Kay?"

A big chunk of me wanted to tell her to stop being so uptight, but an even bigger - gigantic, if you may - part of me didn't want her to break up with me. I hope you can see where my problem lay. "All right, lesson learned," I said, raising the palms of my hands. "Now let's make pancakes, please?"

"Yes, let's mix the ingredients," she said, her excitement coming back by the second. "But you gotta pay close attention, okay?" she asked, and I nodded, because what else could I do.

This is the part of the story where Monica started throwing all kinds of different ingredients into a bowl, narrating out loud every little thing she was doing, and expecting me to take mental notes of it all, but where I started pondering over the mysterious ending of The Shining, which I'd seen for the first time the week before. I was shuffling through different theories about how Jack Nicholson's presence was possible in that final picture - time-travelling? aliens? really good plastic surgery? - when Monica's roommate came out of her bedroom, a depressing sigh escaping her lips.

"Hi..." she said around another sigh, her name totally lost on me.

"Hi," we responded in unison, and I suddenly became very aware that I was standing in the middle of her kitchen clad in nothing but my underwear. I crossed my arms at the speed of light, as if covering my nipples made my nudism better.

"Remember to buy the thing," Monica cryptically said to her.

Oh, the thing. This is of no use to any purpose I might have, but after some persistence on my part, I would later find out with some disappointment that she actually meant tampons. Monica's roommate lifted her finger like it weighed a thousand pounds and then pointed at her head.

"Sure, it's recorded in here," she slowly said. Be careful that it doesn't die from loneliness, I thought around an imaginary laugh, suddenly finding kind of scary the fact that I was full of meanness inside. "Anyways..." she said as she tiredly dragged her body towards the front door, and then concluded in the only monotone she knew how to express herself with, "Bye."

"She seems like fun," I pointed out once the coast was clear. I thought maybe the fifth time would be a charm, but she still didn't look like a pancake lover to me. Or a lover of anything, for that matter.

"Okay, I'm done here," Monica said, rubbing her hands together and ignoring me. "Easy, right?"

"Easy cheesy," I lied with a tight smile on my face, as I dipped a finger into the batter and tasted it. Some yummy noises ensued, of course. "Whoa, this is delicious - can't we just eat this instead?"

"Of course not," she said with an expression she often reserved for some of my ludicrous suggestions. "Now come on, we gotta get this show on the road, okay?"

"Yeah, sure," I said with a wave of my hand. Since she repressed a yawn next, I wondered if our lack of sleep had finally taken its toll on her. This put another absurd idea in my head. "Hey, tell you what," I started, brushing some hair out of her face, and Monica looked up at me with shiny eyes, "why don't you go lie down on the couch for a while, and I'll finish this."

She eyed me suspiciously, looking at me like she wanted to burst into boisterous laughter due to such a ridiculous request on my part. "You want me to trust you with this?" she asked, and despite her best efforts, a small laugh slipped out.

"Yeah, c'mon," I took the bowl from her hands. She must've been really tired, because she looked like she was heavily considering my words. "This is the easy part, I'm not that useless."

"Are you sure?" she said. "I mean, you're not gonna set my kitchen on fire, are you?"

"Of course not, c'mon, trust me!" I said, pushing her lightly in the couch's direction. She neither took a step back, nor aggressively snatched the bowl from my hands while hissing things like 'my treasure', so I'm going to jump into conclusions and confirm that she was, indeed, very tired.

Now, this is not something I would've admitted to Monica under any set circumstances, but the truth is I'd never cooked anything before in my life. I was not bone-dead stupid so, for example, while I got the basic idea on how to properly fry an egg, I'd just never put it into practice. (This might explain why I witnessed with a baffled expression how my first three pancakes came out totally and inexplicably burned.) Anyway, now that we're clear on this, everything went as follows: one trip to put some clothes on, a couple of small, minute casualties, and twelve pancakes that were luckily not burned.

After that, I was finally done, so I went to kneel besides her resting body on the couch. She looked insanely peaceful, but I thought of my pancakes as some sort of work of art that needed to be tasted by the world. "Ma'am, Chef Chandler has finished," I whispered in her ear to wake her, and Monica stirred, her eyes fluttering open.

"Yeah?" she whispered back, putting her arms around my neck and pulling me closer. "I don't think I believe you."

"Well, you better believe me, darling, 'cause it's true," I said, and then gave her an Eskimo kiss. It might - and does actually - sound corny, but it was just what I wanted to do right at that moment, so I did.

Monica giggled. "Okay, this I have to see."

"Alright, great!" I excitedly pulled apart, hopping to the kitchen. Once we'd both stepped a foot into kitchen territory, I stretched my arms in the air, and then said in a singsong voice, "Ta-da!"

(I thought that sounded kind of cute, but maybe, after all, it simply wasn't, since Monica decided not to join my excitement party.)

"You okay?" I asked after a few seconds of silence, nervously fiddling with the bottom of my t-shirt.

"What is this?!" Monica responded, pulling a hand to her chest.

I cluelessly looked around me. "This is pancakes?"

"Chandler, why does it look like a tornado hit my kitchen?" she insisted, her hand unmoving.

"Oh, that," I waved my hand dismissively, like it was no big deal. "I accidentally knocked over the batter a couple of times," I explained, and then wiggled my fingers over the plate full of pancakes, like it was a magic trick, "but look how pretty!"

"Oh, my God, Chandler," she said, and then swallowed thickly, like she was actually indisposed. "You clumsy idiot, you have to clean that up."

"Yeah, sure," I said, trying to encourage her, which seemed to be an almost impossible task, "but let's eat my pancakes first!"

"No," she shook her head furiously, not moved at all by my excitement. "Clean it up first."

I considered this, but I wasn't really fond of the idea. "Okay..." I said, and then started to chuckle nervously. "Well, then- so I..." I stammered, carrying on with my nervous chuckle, and beginning to flail my limbs in the air in a peculiar manner and walking backwards in the door's direction. "Anyway, so thanks for having me over!"

I then fled to the front door (no shoes on), and she threw a desperate 'stop!' at me, before skillfully jumping on my back to prevent me from leaving. We struggled for a few seconds, and I seriously don't know how things turned from semi-serious to not-serious-at-all in the middle of such a ridiculous wrestle, but I ended up with my back resting against the front door, her body pressed close to mine, both of us laughing hysterically at such an absurd situation.

"You're such a mess, I hate you!" she said, taking my face in her hands and kissing me. This, I guessed, was a way to prove her statement right. When she pulled back, she looked at me so intensely, I almost feared she was going to hypnotize me. "God, I don't hate you, I l-" I don't know what my face did here, but it must've been enough to make her consider her words. "I like you," she rephrased, as best as she could, and then concluded, "A lot."

Okay, that was awkward, and I'm not one to recognize awkwardness easily.

I must point out that this made me feel beyond bad and sad, all at the same time, but I was afraid of admitting, and I was afraid of things changing, and I was afraid of things ending, and because of this, she was now holding back things she wanted to say out loud and it was all my fault. I was such a mess, indeed.

"I like you too," I nodded in a low voice, swallowing thickly.

She nodded too, and this is when I realized that my heart had started hammering against my ribcage violently. I don't know if she could actually feel it through all those layers of clothing, but when her lips pulled into a twitch of a smile, the sadness beneath it was so evident it literally made my chest hurt. (This is a condition that went on for the next few months to the point of heavily considering a visit to the hospital, but I'm getting ahead of myself with this.)

After some awkward seconds, she withdrew from my touch slowly without saying a single word, going back to the kitchen and sitting down at the table, fixing herself one of my pancakes as she started to eat, putting off momentarily the cleaning that her kitchen, I'll admit, desperately needed.


A/N: These Americans and their fear of the L-bomb, amiright?