Disclaimer: I don't own the characters or the apartment, just the DVDs. There's no profit except writing practice being made here.
Querencia: a place from which one's strength is drawn, where one feels most at home; the place where you are your most authentic self
Chandler looked down at the limp napkin on the table and wondered if he should have made less of a show of flinging it out of the glass, if he should have folded it nearly and then tried to start his toast again. He wouldn't have drawn attention to himself that way, could have taken a moment to collect his thoughts and catch his breath.
But no. He'd ploughed on to the sound of nobody laughing, digging himself deeper and deeper as he shamefully continued to butcher a speech he'd practised a hundred times, trying to balance his teasing with his admiration of, and pride in, his friend perfectly. He had it all planned, he was going to start teasing his oldest friend, revealing the dorkier side of him to Ross' bride-to-be, and then he was going to go into reverent detail of how his shortcomings made Ross better, more sensitive than he got credit for, one of the best people he knew.
That had been the plan. But the first joke had fallen flat and the second came off as offensive and Chandler could feel himself getting flustered. He knew he needed to take a second and regroup but he could feel four hundred eyes on him, expecting something he was starting to think he couldn't give them.
What made it worse was that Chandler liked public speaking, liked Ross, liked Emily even though a blind man could see she wasn't right for Ross, He'll, he liked London in general but was still a little mad at Ross for assuming that being his best man meant he was coming to the wedding and he didn't need an invite. Chandler would have liked an invitation, and part of him wondered if Monica might stay after the wedding or ship off to Paris or Amsterdam for a day or two, looking for her foreign romance, because that seemed like something she might do and if she was looking for romance she wouldn't invite him to tag along. Which meant he'd be going home with Joey, who didn't understand how isolated Chandler was feeling as his oldest friend planned to move away with his wife and Chandler was still dateless on most nights, working in an office he hated with people who didn't know his name at a job that was meant to be temporary when he got out of college. At least, if Monica was coming home with them he could get her advice on whether he should quit or not, give up the career and stable income for something more creative and hope Joey would finally pay his half of the rent.
Speaking in front of people, about his best friend, in a place he liked, should not have been a problem. And normally he was pretty good at reigning in the bad jokes and pausing when he could feel the internal groans of disapproval to collect his thoughts and go down a different route. But not this time.
He looked up. Normally he was pretty good at making eye contact while he gave a speech, he had to do it all the time at work. But a sea of disappointed, disapproving faces were looking back at him and Chandler couldn't take it. He looked skyward, praying that someone would laugh at just one of his jokes.
His hands were moving almost as frantically as his words which were shaking out of his mouth. He couldn't ever remember being so nervous and worried that his voice shook like that. Certainly not at Ross' last wedding. Whoops, now he was talking about that.
Taking his eyes off his hands and consciously trying not to wave around the champagne flute, Chandler braced himself for looking up again.
He should stop talking, honestly. There was a hostile silence in the reception hall and a crowd of unimpressed faces.
But there she was. A familiar face in the middle left of the room. Monica.
She smiled politely at him, and that was when he knew. He and Monica had the same sarcastic sense of humour and she loved teasing Ross as much as he did, if she wasn't laughing then he wasn't doing a good job of delivering his jokes.
He melted in shame back into his seat, pressing his face into his hand, and Joey, ineloquence personified, stood. For a moment, he worried that his friend might embarrass himself, and Chandler didn't know how he would console Joey if that happened.
But it never did. Not only did Joey project his voice brilliantly, his theatre experience on full display, if only there was a talent scout around, Chandler thought. But he actually had some genuinely sentimental and sweet things too. Go Joe, Chandler grinned proudly at his friend, happy for him.
Chandler figured enough time had past and Joey had erased the memory of his ill attempt at a best-man speech, so Chandler looked out at the room again.
Nobody was heckling him anymore. Everyone seemed to be rapt in Joey's words. Everyone but Monica. In a sea of black ties and crisp white collars, she stood out like a diamond in the rough in her rusty-red dress, her make-up soft, her cheekbones high.
And she was smiling. At him. Not at Joey, at him.
Possibly the only person who felt worse than he did about being in London for Ross' wedding and she was smiling - properly beaming, probably hiding a lot of her own pain as she sat beside her parents who were experts at ignoring her best features to complain that she wasn't married, as though Monica's favourite part about herself, her independence, wasn't a commodity, and focus on the bit. That smile did wonders for his confidence nonetheless. All she had to do was look at him and Chandler could feel his chest puffing out involuntarily. He felt like he could stand up and say his speech the right way without fumbling clumsily over his words and meaning.
Monica's eyes flicked sideways and Chandler nodded in response. Joey was doing great and it was nice that he could share a proud moment over Joey with her because, knowing his roommate, Joey sure wasn't going to accept congratulations or accolades. Her eyes came back to his, brilliant cerulean and Chandler sat up straighter.
She always managed to make him feel better with just a smile, everything falling into perspective when her eyes met his. Suddenly it didn't matter that Ross was growing up and getting married for a second time and talking about moving overseas or to the suburbs with Emily while Chandler could count his long term relationships on one hand with fingers to spare. It didn't matter that going home would mean Rachel inevitably pining over the loss of Ross and Phoebe having children and as a result, Monica wanting babies as well as her career and not having figured out how to balance the two yet. All of that was tomorrow's problem when Monica was giving him the strength of her faith in him.
And then he met Ross' eyes and it all came flooding back, all the shame and fear that he wasn't good enough. He put his head back in his hands and Chandler waited for the laughter to finish. He'd pat Joey on the back for a job well done and then he'd stay seated so people could avoid him easily and not throw gratuitous lines at him about how his speech was lovely even though they were gritting their teeth as they said it, or how lucky he was to know Ross. Or, his favourite, and the most typical, how do you know Ross, dear? Or maybe he'd go find Monica and she would make him feel better.
"What are you doing?" Chandler's deep voice penetrated the silence of the morning.
Monica flinched. She'd been standing at the end of the mussed bed, a mess they'd created together in the heat of the passionate hours they'd spent together, staring at the tangle of sheets in the soft pink light of her bedside lamp.
"Nothing," Monica shrugged, pulling her robe tighter around her naked frame. She'd been setting out a military-esque plan of how she was going to attack making the bed.
She glanced over at him.
Monica had thought Chandler would have left by now, they'd bid each other goodbye but something had stopped him. Chandler stood, shirtless, against her closed door, watching her. In all the years of their friendship, she'd never seen him shirtless. Which was a crime, Monica thought. He had a lovely chest, golden and solid with hair that started just below his sensitive pink nipples, that arrowed down to his boxers. It made her chest constrict to know that he trusted her when he was naked and vulnerable like this, no haze of lust to alter the truth of his form, just Chandler in all his masculine glory, for her eyes only.
Chandler wore maroon boxers and held his shirt in his hand, having picked it up from where he'd dropped it in his haste to meet her on the bed earlier. The boxers she had seen before, a couple of times when he'd slept on her couch or ducked over for breakfast before anybody else was around to see him in his underwear and a baggy jumper. She hadn't realised, but even back then, Chandler was straightlaced and well-groomed, always dressing professionally, and it was only because he trusted her implicitly that she got to see his exposed calves and the sock tan that still hadn't faded from his time playing tennis at the boarding school he'd attended. Joey didn't even know he played tennis and Phoebe had never seen him even wear shorts except for that one time on the beach.
He leant backwards, resting his broad shoulders against the closed bedroom door, his groin jutting toward her but not pointedly or with any intention of covering her body with his again. He was smiling at her, his teeth showing, another part of him she'd never really seen before. Another crime.
"Mon."
She loved it when he said her name, his baritone rumbling deep in his chest when he exhaled the nickname and it made her spine tingle with excitement every time he said it. Had it really only been a week that this man had been making her shudder with excitement with just a word? How had she not noticed earlier?
Handsome? Yes. Sensible? Yes. Funny, intelligent, romantic and sensitive? She'd known all of that in singularity before, recognised all those traits in him and understood in theory that he'd be a good boyfriend. But witnessing it all collected and simultaneous? That was a heady shock to her system, that her best friend was a solid, reliable, lust-inducing partner both in the bedroom and on a lazy Saturday afternoon where they could just be together, cooking and reading the paper.
Watching his smirking mouth, Monica found herself mesmerised by her most constant friend. His brown hair was a fluffy mess atop his head, bleached a little lighter from the summer just gone. His cheekbones were high on his face and his sharp nose pointed downwards to his kissable pink lips. Chandler had always been handsome, but there was a confidence in him now, it had been blooming all year and shied away when he went to London, but that night, trying to comfort her, it had bloomed and Monica had never known anything more attractive than Chandler Bing being serious and vulnerable with her. Even without the charming words and piercing blue eyes and the lusty tone, Monica found herself drawn towards the man in her bedroom. A part of him that she couldn't see or touch or explain, but it was evident in the way he looked at her from the other side of the room, an easy fondness dripping from his smile.
"Want a hand changing the sheets?"
Monica shook her head and glanced back at the bed, a safer place to look that wouldn't result in her crushing herself to him. "Probably don't need to. We didn't really make it there, did we?"
He blushed. Chandler Bing actually blushed. An hour ago, she'd tacked him as he walked in the room, forcing him to the bed where they'd fallen to the floor in the height of their passion, amongst it all he'd been whispering filth into her ears.
"Why'd you get out of bed then?" He asked, smiling a little, as though he already knew the answer. "You could have a full twenty minutes of sleep before you have to get up."
Monica nodded. They set the alarm early enough that Chandler could sneak out without the risk of being seen, giving him enough time to change and shower before coming over for breakfast if he wished. With Rachel back, things were a little trickier but, given their history of living in each other's pockets, Chandler could sit out in her kitchen as though he'd gotten up early to help her with cooking breakfast for Joey. It wasn't totally inconceivable or unprecedented, Chandler was always the first one over before London, bringing a paper tucked under his arm and an extra jug of milk. It was the being there before Rachel that was hard to explain, hence the early shower to delay him a bit longer. Sometimes he showered or got dressed up in his work clothes or actually got a few winks of sleep in while Monica managed the same.
"I was going to shower."
He hummed disbelievingly. "Want a hand making the bed?"
NO! Dear God, no.
Monica balked. As lovely as it was that he offered to help her clean, it would be more of a hindrance if he tried and Monica would end up having to do double the work. She had a system, an intense set of strict rules she cleaned by. Rules she knew didn't make sense to anybody but her but that she liked to abide by all the same. It was far too early in their relationship to reveal that side of herself to him, so scare him away with her anal retention.
"You don't have to," Monica told him.
But Chandler was already by her side and what he had to say shocked her. He touched her elbow, his wife, calloused palm holding her petite arm. "If me helping you out is weird or too much, I can leave."
"I don't want you to leave," she chirped back quickly, not wanting him to get the wrong idea. She wasn't lying when she clung to him while their alarm went off, she hated that he left the bed cold in the morning before it was actually time to greet the day. She hated that she watched from the corner of her eye as he stopped himself from touching her arm and her hair when their friends were around. It had been a week, and Monica already knew Chandler was a tactile man, but she hadn't realised how easily the need for his skin to touch hers would manifest between them, how aggressively she'd reciprocate and how quickly she'd gotten used to his hand in hers.
It was so inherently him and simultaneously validating that he offered to help but recognised she was uncomfortable. Naturally, he'd try to lend a hand, complain and tease and quip the entire time to make you regret you'd accepted the offer, too, but Chandler was the kind of man who always tried to be helpful. But to rescind the offer? No one had ever done that before. Monica was used to being pushed and prodded by Ross, Rachel, her mother, by Richard, by Pete, by Fun Bobby, into doing things or revealing things that she didn't want to or wasn't ready for, compromising herself for their benefit.
But not her best friend. Because, even with all the great sex and newfound need to lay lazily beside him before getting up for work, he was still her best friend. Of course Chandler Bing would recognise the smallest of her movements and slightest facial expressions for her true feelings and extricate himself from the situation, gleaning that he was the problem not her. But he wasn't. This was Monica and her bad experiences showing her true colours in her past relationships, she was used to being patronised for her need to clean and laughed at when boyfriends thought she wasn't looking.
And then she remembered. He'd been her friend for ten years. Chandler had a front-row seat to her mania and neurosis and knew what made her tick. She had a sneaking suspicion that he liked that part of her, he was the only person who never viewed it as a problem, just mildly irritating because it took time away from when they could be doing other things, and she got the feeling that he wasn't going to leave if he saw more of it.
Chandler chuckled. The sound was low and reverberated around the room. he probably hadn't meant it to cause such shockwaves to send tremors through her body, but the sound was downright sexy and Monica couldn't help but sway towards him. "Good to know."
He kissed her cheek.
That was another one of those gestures that had come out of the blue but wasn't all that surprising either; kissing each other was so natural, muscle memory already.
"I just meant," he corrected. "I'm not the best at hospital corners, and I'm sure you could teach me a thing or three about how to properly fold a fitted sheet. But I am pretty awesome at making sure the flowers are pointing up at the head of the bed."
She melted.
"Are you sure?" She asked, cocking her head to the side.
This was it. If she showed him all of her, there was no turning back. He would know the worst parts of her, the dark, dirty, discipline of her mind. That while he was the most observant person she knew, there was a whole side to her she'd never let anybody see. Whether he'd be offended she hadn't told him earlier given their trusting friendship over the last decade, or not, Monica wasn't sure. What she did know was that he wouldn't laugh or condescend to her. And she was fairly certain he wouldn't run, she didn't want him to run. I know it's only been a week but dear God don't let him run. She figured she better warn him one last time but Monica didn't want Chandler to back down. Monica trusted him, more than anybody else in her life.
"I get a little militant about this sort of thing. Obsessive."
"Mon," it was a term of endearment coming from his fond smile. "Bring it on."
And that was that. It was that simple for them. He took the far end of the bedspread as Monica instructed and a feeling of calm washed over her. Monica had never quite been able to put her finger on what irked her about other men until that moment. Where they all tripped and fell, Chandler strode confidently.
It wasn't that he didn't care whether she was a neat freak or was that to be Monica, she had to be, that if she wasn't bossy and tidy then she wasn't being herself. They had a foundation of trust and years of learning how to deal with each other, so much so that it was almost unfair how attuned they were to each other's needs and fears.
She had a good feeling about their relationship, because when she was with Chandler, Monica felt at home.