Always, 5
INTRODUCTION: The next part. I only have one thing to say about this fic in advance, and that is that I know the ending is quite corny and it's totally un-me... But bare with me anyway, :)!
DISCLAIMER: I don't own the "Friends" characters. You all know who do.
Monica threw herself on the couch and stretched out her arms.
"I'm finally HOOOOOME!" she cried, ready to burst with joy.
Chandler and Ross watched her, keeping in their laughter.
The treatment was finally over. Monica had had a piece of Ross's bone marrow transplanted earlier that week, and was now officially declared as healthy.
She sat up and grinned at the two men.
"You know what the first thing I wanna do is?"
"Throw a party?" Ross suggested.
"Hardly. I'm not in a party mood."
"So what is the first thing you wanna do?" Chandler asked.
"You" Monica said, with a point. "Ross, get out of here."
Ross shook his head and mumbled something about gratitude. He leaned over, kissed her on the cheek and then left. Chandler joined Monica on the couch.
"So I'm the first thing you wanna do, huh?" he said with a grin.
"Don't flatter yourself" Monica said, grinning back. "I was referring to your hair. You need a haircut."
"You just wanted to do my hair?"
"Yeah. And you should wash it too."
Chandler made a face at her and rose again. Monica smiled at him lovingly.
"Well, we're here…" she said. "We're out of the woods. We made it."
"YOU made it" Chandler said with a warm smile.
"With a little help from my friends" Monica said with a smile. She reached out her hand to him. "Come here, sit with me on the couch."
Chandler sat down next to her and she begun stroking him gently with her right hand.
"And of course with A LOT of help from you."
"I didn't do anything… Except for force you to eat and look after our kid."
"You did so much more than that… don't you know it?" Monica gave him a kiss. "Chandler… You didn't allow me to give up. I would probably have ended up giving up the fight if you hadn't been there to force me to keep on going. And you kept me from feeling sorry for myself and you took such good care of me."
"You're my wife. Of course I took care of you."
Monica kissed him again.
"Well thank you anyway. You'll never know how much you meant to me through this whole thing. And after as well, of course."
"Oh, but not before?" Chandler jokingly said, raising an eyebrow.
Monica threw a pillow on him.
Chandler smiled lovingly and pulled her onto his lap. He was overjoyed to have her back, completely healthy and as good as new. He kissed her on the neck, absentmindedly.
"You know…" he said, "this has really made me realize that I didn't appreciate you before. Not as much as I should have."
"You did."
"No I didn't. I mean, yeah, I loved you with all my heart and everything, but it was like the everyday made the edge of it go away…"
"Right… Would you please start speaking English though, just so Regina learns at least that language properly?" Monica said, running her hand through his hair.
"What I mean is… well… I got used to you. Not in a bad sense in it self, because getting used to you is WONDERFUL, it's almost as wonderful as the fact that you married me and therefore wanted me to get used to you."
"You and I look at marriage differently" Monica said with rolling eyes.
"What I meant was that you wanted me to get to be with you that much. To see each other all the time and everything. That's what I mean by it. To get used to us being such a big part of each other's lives."
"Sounds cute…"
Chandler kissed her on the neck again, still absentmindedly.
"It was like… well, our first years I never really had time to get used to everyday. Things were always happening, and we went from sneaking around to just being an ordinary couple in the sense that we each lived in our own apartments."
"Even though we usually spent the night at the same place."
"Yeah, but we still had the… choice… to get to be alone for the night. Anytime we needed distance we just spent a night alone, and then the next day we were back at wanting to spend as much time as we could with each other. I mean, that's why I asked if I could move in here in the first place. To get to be near you as much as I wanted to. To get home from work and to know you'd be there. I always hated it before when I got home and I wanted to see you, but then I had to go off looking for you. When we lived together we almost always knew where the other one was. Closeness. That's why I wanted us to live together. And I got it."
"And everyday didn't come then?" Monica said, both amused and a bit touched. She was also a bit sentimental, remembering those things that all seemed to have taken place so long ago, when it in reality was only around six years ago.
"Everyday came long after that" Chandler said. "First it was the whole thing of experiencing what it was like to live with someone you loved, instead of living with Joey. Not that I don't love Joey, but there's a difference between friendship-love and… love-love."
Monica smiled slightly.
"And I have to admit that it ruled having a gorgeous woman cook me dinner each evening!" Chandler said with a slight grin. "And it wasn't too bad to get to come home from a hard day at work and throw myself on YOUR bed instead of the one I had when I lived with Joey. The whole thing was great, and that feeling lasted for about two years. Not that it's gone now, but it became more ordinary after that. I forgot what it was like NOT living that way."
"And now you remember?"
"Now I remember."
They sat quiet for a few seconds. Both were lost in thought. Then Chandler continued on his thread.
"And then I made up my mind to propose. Not after two years, you know THAT, but after almost a year of living together… And I haven't ever told you how nervous I was about that. I mean, I knew you loved me and everything, but that didn't have to mean that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me."
"Oh come on, you knew how attached I was to you!"
"Yeah, well you can be attached to a guinea pig without wanting to spend the rest of your life with it" Chandler commented.
"How many guinea pigs will live as long as people?" Monica said with a giggle.
"Mr. Jingles!"
"Mr. Jingles was a mouse, or a rat or something" Monica pointed out.
"Anyway, if the wife would keep quiet then maybe the husband could finish the story?" Chandler said. "Now, as I said, I was extremely nervous. I'm surprised you didn't notice."
"I thought you were still freaked out about the Hildy thing."
"You know, that night when we went out to dinner and ran into Richard, I've told you that that was the night I'd planned on proposing originally, right?"
"Yeah."
"Yeah. I was so nervous that evening that I'm surprised I even got my order right… Not to mention how surprised I am that I managed to get dressed, my hands were probably shaking like crazy! Then Richard came and of course made me just annoyed instead of nervous. Annoyed and a little jealous. Anyway, since you're the one I got engaged to, you know that shortly after we got engaged. And then there was the whole engagement thing to get used to, a new adventure if you wanna call it that. And before that had gotten old we got married. Which was even more fantastic. But I was very blue-eyed, I thought that getting married meant being together forever. Now I know that being married means being together for as long as, well as the vows say, until death do you part. I somehow thought that putting a ring on your finger automatically meant that we'd both live until we were around ninety, or something…"
"Death is just physical parting" Monica claimed. "I wouldn't have left you even if I'd died. You'd always keep me near."
"Sure, but as a memory. I couldn't treat you as if you were alive, because in that case I'd go crazy each time I realized that you were not… which would be often… It might work to TALK to someone who's dead, pretending she or he is alive, but trying to have sex with that person or, or dance with that person or… well, anything physically… wouldn't work. But when I stood there in front of that priest I was so sure that I'd live until I was really old, and you would be there every second."
"That's my plan" Monica said with a smile. "Although not every SECOND. Every DAY will be enough. If we spend each second together we'd grow sick of it."
"You know what I mean… And the feeling of getting to be together forever was so strong, and it felt like we were newlyweds for years…"
"Chandler our fourth wedding anniversary is in July. How many years did you feel like we were newlyweds? We practically are!"
"I know."
She jokingly mocked him and gave him a kiss.
"And then in December our second year you had a special present for me."
"Yeah, bun in the oven."
"Feels a bit odd calling it that now…" Chandler pondered. "After all, she's a year and a half by now."
"20 months."
"Well you sure knew what to get me for Christmas" Chandler joked. Then he chuckled. "And you were eight months along when we celebrated our second anniversary. You were so big."
"Thanks a lot darling, women love to hear that" Monica said, rolling her eyes.
"Yeah, well that's what you get for sleeping with men without using protection" Chandler teased lovingly.
"I WAS using protection. You can never be safer than 99% unless your sterile."
"Thank you for that wonderful biological lesson, Monica, but my story isn't finished."
"I do know how the story goes."
"Not from my point of view, you don't."
"And what are you gonna say next, 'you screamed like a banshee when Regina was born'?" Monica said, giving him a light push.
"No, SHE screamed like a banshee. I hardly heard peep out of you. But you know, I fell in love with you around a hundred times over again while you were pregnant. And then a few times more when you gave birth and then you lay there with this… red little thing in your arms…"
"Also known as Regina…"
"Well don't blame me for her being red and tiny!" Chandler said, jokingly. "And then I fell in love some more. With both of you. I really think that that period of our relationship was when it was as best. Not that it's been bad, but the whole thing brought us closer and everything…"
"I guess that's when we first felt like a real family" Monica pondered.
"Yeah, could be. But then after that I guess everyday came along… somewhere along the road. I mean, it was diapers, and day-care, and who's bought milk, and has anybody vacuumed, and who gets up in the middle of the night this time, and here are the bills and things like that… We had less time for each other and we weren't any longer the… only leading role in the other one's life, if I put it that way. There was the baby."
"Chandler? You make it sound as if things got worse when we got Regina."
"Not worse. And it's not Regina. It's parenthood, I guess. I mean, how much time did we have for talking and playing and erotica and things like that? Not to mention the fact that you don't get really horny when you've got an infant sleeping in your bed right next to you. But I think we handled it all really well. We got more teamed, sort of. Better at the team work thing. Learned how to interpret gestures and signals and stuff like that. Better than before, I mean."
"Sure…" Monica said. "But honey, I've gotta ask… Is there a point to all of this pondering? Because the current subject of discussion is gonna be home in about two hours and I want you to welcome me home before she gets here."
"Oh don't you worry, missy…" Chandler said with a sly smile. "But I guess I just got a bit sidetracked. And I'll be honest with you, somewhere during our third year together, during the second half of it most likely, I started to take you for granted. And I will never ever do that again, I swear to you!"
"Chandler… It's okay to do that sometimes." Monica softly said. "Of course you have to realize that you have no control over how long you're gonna be together with someone, that's the way of life, but it doesn't mean that you have to be alert all the time. Sometimes you're allowed to just take the other one for granted, take it for granted that the person will be there when you get home, take it for granted that the person will go to sleep next to you at night. And that's all there is to that."
"Sure, but I made it into a habit and I didn't even know it! I was always thankful that I had you, no one can come and tell me that I didn't know how fortunate I was, and still am. But I never thought about what it would be like if all of a sudden you weren't there anymore!"
"Honey, I didn't think along those lines either. I just knew I had you at the moment, and that was all I needed."
"I see it differently now" Chandler insisted. "You almost died, in fact you DID die for a few minutes, but for you it's not the same as for me. If you had died then your pain would have ended there. Mine would have just begun."
"Don't be too sure…" Monica softly said and leaned closer to him and slowly stroke his arm.
"Just having you away at the hospital made me uncomfortable, it made me miss you so much! And it was a wakeup call. It feels like this whole thing has been a wakeup call. 'Wake up Chandler and realize what you have and what you can loose'!"
"Chandler my cancer had no hidden meanings and no alternative motives. It was a disease, from beginning to end, and it had to do with physics and biology, not with your soul or anything else." She was quiet for a second. "But it probably had that affect on you."
"I'm very scared of loosing what I have" Chandler whispered. "Loosing you. Or loosing Gina. Or any of the guys. But mostly you and Regina. It's so strange, I've never even THOUGHT about the fact that Regina was mortal earlier… It's just been such an obviousness to me that she would survive us both. But I've seen children at the hospital who've died, one of them was only five years old, Monica!"
"I think every parent sees it as something obvious that they'll die before their children." Monica said. "That doesn't make you a bad father!"
"I didn't say that either. In fact, I know I'm a good father. Believe me, Regina hasn't let me think anything else. And it's not about being a good parent or not. It's about knowing what you have and appreciating it. And knowing that it's all just loaned to you. And the person you loaned it from might want it back when you least expect it!"
"Enough of being deep!" Monica said and kissed him. "I want my welcome home and I want it now!"
*
A year passed. Regina was now two years old and talking almost perfectly. She was, as Chandler put it, becoming a small human being, in the sense that she showed her personality more clearly and she had opinions on this or that.
Monica entered the apartment and looked around. She put the bills on the kitchen table and went over to the couch, thinking for herself that they needed a bigger place. Their apartment wasn't small, but it wasn't big enough for a two-year-old with all of her toys and her incredible energy. Right now she was out in the park with her Dad, her Uncle and her uncle Joey. Monica was alone in the apartment.
She sat down on the couch and rested her chin in her palm. Life was pretty strange right now. It had been so ever since her cancer.
When she'd gotten home from the hospital, she had noticed Chandler's eagerness to love her as if every day was his or her last, and to do anything at all for her. At first she had thought it was sweet, but when he didn't knock it off she began feeling uncomfortable. He was going too far in the other direction and what he needed was to find a balance. He had somehow gotten the idea into his head that the best way was to love her with all of his heart each day, in the sense that he'd never allow himself to not devote lots of energy to it.
Monica sure didn't mind being loved that way if it happened a few times a week or even a few times a day. But when it was constantly it made her feel slightly trapped. She wanted to be able to spend an evening just reading in bed with him next to her, but that was impossible now. Chandler would either want to hold her, kiss her, talk to her or in some other way demonstrate his affection. Monica really felt like they weren't on the same level.
Monica had always thought that you should love just the same way you did everything else. In doses, some smaller and some bigger. She felt it was better to just let it be unsaid sometimes how much they loved each other, to let the emotion be there in the shadows. She knew he loved her, he didn't have to show her constantly. She felt like the times when they expressed their love were more special if they didn't happen all the time when they were around each other. And she also knew that people might get sick of them if they always had to express their love.
She also had a feeling that the rest of Chandler's emotional life suffered from this. There was only so much energy that a man could spend on his emotions, and if Chandler spent almost all of his on her, then what about their friends? He was just as before with Regina, he never set her aside, but their four friends probably got less of his enthusiasm and appreciation.
Monica frowned. She should talk about this with Chandler. But how? And when?
*
Chandler pushed himself onto Monica and moaned along with her. He lovingly looked at her. He loved feeling her body under his own. And he loved watching her face while they made love.
He leaned in to kiss her when all of a sudden he heard the door open.
Quickly but mechanically Monica grabbed a pillow and covered their upper bodies, that weren't under the quilt. Chandler stopped moving and silently cursed. Regina was at her grandparents', so it had to be one of their friends. And he didn't understand what they were doing there.
Joey stopped in his tracks when he realized that they were busy with something he had no business seeing, and his eyes grew slightly wide in shock. He hadn't expected to catch them in the act. He had just been interested in knowing if they felt like going out for pizza.
"And what the hell do YOU want?" Chandler hissed at him, when he saw who it was. "To clap the rhythm? Joey get out!"
"Uh, later! Sorry!" Joey said and quickly left them alone again.
Chandler mumbled annoyed and shook his head. He looked down at Monica who had a weird look on her face that quickly turned into a slight smile.
"Honey… maybe you should calm down a few" she gently suggested. "Joey didn't walk in on us on purpose!"
"He's got ears, doesn't he?" Chandler said, still slightly annoyed.
"Don't think about that right now…"
"Well excuse me for not wanting to be interrupted while I'm having sex!"
Monica gently stroke his cheek and wished he would calm down a bit. She kissed him gently on the earlobe.
"What, do you think I'm done for now?" she teased. "Come on mister, show me that rhythm you talked about…"
*
Fifteen minutes later Monica exited the bedroom, wrapped in her robe. Chandler was asleep. Her four friends were on the couch, eyeing her.
"What?" she said and sat down on the couch next to Rachel. "You didn't know Chandler and I had sex?"
"No, it's not that…" Rachel said. "Monica, have you noticed that Chandler has been a bit, well…" Rachel harked, not knowing how to tell Chandler's wife what she wanted to say. "Aggressive… lately?"
"Rach, he's never been aggressive with me."
"Well the rest of us have gotten our punches every here and there" Ross said.
Monica's chin fell.
"He's HIT you?"
"No Monica, not PHYSICALLY!"
"Well what do you mean?"
The four friends looked at each other, no one really willing to open their mouth and talk. Finally Joey did.
"We, we just mean that it's as if Chandler doesn't have any patience with us anymore. He gets mad for almost everything!"
"Does not!" Monica objected. "Joey, we were having sex and you walked in on us! He kinda' had the right to be mad."
"Then how come you weren't?"
Monica bit her lower lip. She wasn't mad because she didn't think it was anything to get mad about. At least not as annoyed as Chandler had been.
"Look, you guys…" she said. "I'm going to talk to him, okay? I promise."
"What is even going on with him?" Phoebe asked. "And how come you never get his anger?"
"Well…" Monica said, uncomfortable. She didn't want to talk about Chandler like this when he was in the next room, even if he was sleeping. "See, after I had the cancer… well… Chandler's been very afraid to loose me. And not just of loosing me, but of forgetting that I mean a lot to him, and… I think he's afraid something is going to happen with me again, and that he will feel like he's not given me the love and affection that he would want to have given me…" Monica looked down on her hands. "I think he's scared that something will happen to me and that he will feel when it does as if he's not showed me how he loves me, and not given me all he would want to."
"Cute story" Rachel said. "Although you sound a bit self aware."
Monica rolled her eyes.
"Rachel, I was not finished!" she pointed out. "Chandler seems to be devoting all of his energy to showing me and Regina how much he loves us, even though we're both aware of that without him showing us constantly. And this leaves him with less energy to show the rest of you that he cares. So instead he ends up loosing his temper with you long before with Gina and me."
"Well then talk to him" Ross said. "If we do it he might get mad."
"I will. Trust me."
Monica rose and went into the bedroom. She smiled lovingly when she saw him asleep, tangled in the sheets. She snuck down next to him and kissed him gently on the cheek. She knew he was acting a bit bad towards his friends, but she couldn't be mad at him when she saw him like his.
"Wakie, wakie…" she gently said and kissed his forehead again. "Simon says, time to wake up."
Chandler mumbled something and put his arms around her. He rolled over on his back and pulled her closer before he opened his eyes.
"Someone's put a robe on…" he commented.
"Chandler I need to talk to you. It's kind of important."
"As important as this?" he asked and kissed her neck.
"Chandler leave my neck alone right now. We need to talk."
"About what? There's nothing to talk about. We were fine just a few minutes ago."
"Chandler I know how you've felt ever since I got well again, about your responsibility to love me and Regina as much as you can. But honey you've gotta stop that."
"Stop that?" Chandler echoed. "What, I'm not allowed to love you two anymore?"
"Of course you are! It's not about that. It's about you needing to find a balance in your emotions. You, you, you devote pretty much all of your emotions to Regina and me, and that's not good for anyone."
"So now my love isn't good for anyone?" Chandler said, defensive.
"Misunderstand me correctly here" Monica said. "One of the best things about you is the way you love. But lately it's been too much. Too much for me, because I often feel like I can't match the image you seem to have of me, and I can't always be expected to show you just how much I love you either. Because even though I love you to death Chandler, sometimes it's better to let it be unsaid. Words and actions looses it's power if you use it too much, and I think it's better if us showing each other how much we care is something we don't do all the time. It makes the times when we do show it more special."
"No, Monica. I don't want to be one of those husbands who only tells his wife that he loves her about once a month, and who's words of love are about as common as snow in the rain forest."
"That's not what I want you to be either, but there has to be a middle path to this…"
"It's not about SHOWING you that I love you" Chandler said, sounding slightly hurt. "It's about never letting myself forget how special you are, or what life would be like without you. THAT'S what this is about."
"That is all very fine, Chandler" Monica assured him. "But you know, I'm very well aware of how special YOU are, yet I don't feel the need to show you all the time."
Chandler scoffed slightly.
"Listen…" Monica said. "Love me with all of your heart, just like I do with you, but tone down the displaying of the emotion. It's not good for Regina either, she's still so little, she gets a lot of pressure on her this way… I know it's not your intention, but this kind of thing has that affect on a child, it makes her feel like you've got an image of her that she can't live up to, so she's got to try her best to do so. And that's a lot of pressure on a two-year-old."
"Regina knows that I love her no matter who she is."
"No she doesn't. *I* know you do, but a child can't see it that way. And even if she does, that will also have the same affect in the end, because then she'll be busting her ass to be even more perfect so you will be proud of her. She'll be very scared of letting you down."
"Is there more, or can I be left alone now?" Chandler said, hurt and angry.
"Chandler…" Monica said, turning around in his arms so that she could look into his face. "Don't think that your love is wasted on us. We appreciate it, we do. And we both love you back. You're our hero."
"And I want to be left alone."
"Well actually, I wasn't done yet…" Monica said, getting a sigh from Chandler. "It's not just me and Regina… Chandler I'm your wife and I think it's my responsibility to be brisk sometimes, to tell you the truth. And the truth is that you're neglecting our friends. Not on purpose, but as a result of how you're with Regina and me. They've all asked me what is up with you these days, you often loose temper with them… Like with Joey, earlier."
"I reserve the right to be mad when he walks in on us like that."
"But you got a little TOO mad… Your quippy comment to him was unnecessary. And they all love you too, you shouldn't forget about them. You should try and spread your love to all of us. Of course Regina and I would get much more than the rest, but remember to love them too."
"Whatever happened to 'Lay All Your Love On Me' being your favourite ABBA song?" Chandler sarcastically remarked.
"You're not wasting your emotion if you give some of it to our friends" Monica said.
"Maybe not, but I am sharing my devotion if I do… not to mention how I'm not laying all my love on you."
"All the kind of love that matters to me" Monica pointed out. "Because I don't need to have monopoly on all your love, just on all the… romantic love, if you know what I mean. Listen, I know you're offended, but I really thought you needed to hear this. I love you."
She kissed him on the mouth. He didn't kiss her back. She realized with a sting of hurt that this was the first time since her cancer that he hadn't responded to her love. She rose and exited the bedroom, leaving him alone.
*
Monica came home early and sat down on the couch. It was a year later, in the middle of the summer. The weather was great, and she was planning on going out to the park later on with Rachel and Phoebe.
She saw the photo album on the coffee table and smiled to herself. She picked it up and opened it. Chandler had almost completely gotten rid of his habit of making weird faces on photos. Monica had started the process by mostly just taken candid pictures of him, and gradually he had started to realize that the pictures looked better without him making weird faces.
The most recent picture in the album had been taken a month earlier, when Chandler and Monica took Regina to a carnival. Chandler was kneeling down with Regina, and was busy trying to avoid her getting her cotton candy in her hair. Monica had taken the picture, so she wasn't in it. Monica looked at it with a loving smile.
Chandler had taken the criticism Monica had given him the year before quite well. He'd toned down his display of affection towards her and Regina, and apologized to their friends. Monica knew that he was still just as set at loving them as much as he could has he had been before, but at least now he didn't show it as clearly.
She still had trouble understanding why he felt like it was so important. Monica preferred to live for the day and enjoying the love she felt. Love to her was a privilege, not an obligation, and she was set on enjoying it in ordinary life instead of constantly having to worry that it would one day be no more. She already knew that she wasn't going to get to live like this forever, that everything had to end sometime. Chandler would most likely die before she did, since he was a few years older than her and a man. If they both stayed free from accidents and diseases, she would most likely become a widow sometime around the age of seventy or eighty. But she couldn't know when that would be, so why worry about it?
It seemed to her as if Chandler was too busy loving her that he didn't take the time to enjoy it. He didn't seem to enjoy anymore to just soak in a bath all by himself and enjoy being loved by her, or to watch a movie with her and enjoy her company.
But at least he had tuned town his strong urge to show her constantly how much he cared. And she appreciated that. She rose and put the photo album back, then went back to the couch.
The phone rang, and Monica answered. It was Rachel.
"Oh hi Rachel! I was just about to call you, where and when are we going to meet?" She rose and continued to talk, not letting Rachel get a word in. "I've pretty much just gotten through the door, and I need at least fifteen minutes before I can get ready to go anywhere. I could really use a shower, and something to eat, plus I should get changed…"
"Monica" Rachel said, trying to get her attention.
"Actually, why don't we say thirty minutes?" Monica continued. "And we can meet at the coffee house. It's so warm out today that I don't want any coffee, but some lemonade or something wouldn't be too bad. What do you think?"
"Monica, maybe the park isn't such a good idea today…" Rachel carefully suggested.
"What? Why not?"
"Honey, maybe you should turn on the news."
"The news?"
"Yeah… Call me later if you want Phoebs and I to come over…"
"Well, wasn't that almost the plan? Rachel what are you on about?"
"Just turn on the news, and call me back later, okay?" Rachel said.
Monica heard her hang up. She looked at the phone, confused, and hung up herself. She grabbed the remote and turned the TV on, searching for any channel where the news was on. She wondered what it was that was so important. After a minute she found a channel airing news, and she put the remote down on the table. Her eyes grew wide as she realized what the story she was seeing was about.
Some terrorist organisation was holding an entire building hostage, waiting for their demands to be met. And just like any terrorists in an action movie, they were threatening to kill one of the hostages each half hour before their demands were met. Monica didn't hear what their demands were, but she didn't really care. She knew the building far too well, it was where Chandler worked.
She covered her mouth with her hand when it slowly sank in that Chandler was in there. That Chandler might not even be alive. The news anchor said that five people had already been killed, but they gave no names. And so far it had only been twenty minutes since the terrorists had taken over the building, so no hostage had been killed yet. But Monica had no way of knowing if they would kill Chandler.
She closed her eyes hard and tried not to hyperventilate and panic. She swallowed hard and closed her eyes even harder. This was horrible. She had no way of knowing how he was doing, or if he was even still alive. The anchor had said nothing about anybody getting out of the building this far, so she couldn't hope that he'd gotten out before the terrorists had taken over. And it wasn't lunch time, so she couldn't hope he was out on lunch either.
She resisted an urge to go down there to see for herself, to see and hear what was going on. She realized with a little common sense that she would know a whole lot more watching TV than she would being on the spot, because the TV anchors always seemed to get all the updates at once.
Monica felt a chill down her spine when she thought of the fact that just a few minutes ago she had been thinking that she would become a widow, that she would be the last one of them to die. She had pictured this happening way into the future, but she had thought that that was only if nothing unexpected happened, like an accident or a disease.
'Or a bunch of angry terrorists who want some stupid demand met…' she added now in her thought.
Slowly she sank down on the couch, shivering with the light shock and fear, and unable to grasp it.
"Oh Chandler, please be all right…" she begged, and kept her tears back behind her closed eyes when the anchor said that the first hostage had been executed.
Please review. You must have some opinion on it if you've read these many parts... :)!
INTRODUCTION: The next part. I only have one thing to say about this fic in advance, and that is that I know the ending is quite corny and it's totally un-me... But bare with me anyway, :)!
DISCLAIMER: I don't own the "Friends" characters. You all know who do.
Monica threw herself on the couch and stretched out her arms.
"I'm finally HOOOOOME!" she cried, ready to burst with joy.
Chandler and Ross watched her, keeping in their laughter.
The treatment was finally over. Monica had had a piece of Ross's bone marrow transplanted earlier that week, and was now officially declared as healthy.
She sat up and grinned at the two men.
"You know what the first thing I wanna do is?"
"Throw a party?" Ross suggested.
"Hardly. I'm not in a party mood."
"So what is the first thing you wanna do?" Chandler asked.
"You" Monica said, with a point. "Ross, get out of here."
Ross shook his head and mumbled something about gratitude. He leaned over, kissed her on the cheek and then left. Chandler joined Monica on the couch.
"So I'm the first thing you wanna do, huh?" he said with a grin.
"Don't flatter yourself" Monica said, grinning back. "I was referring to your hair. You need a haircut."
"You just wanted to do my hair?"
"Yeah. And you should wash it too."
Chandler made a face at her and rose again. Monica smiled at him lovingly.
"Well, we're here…" she said. "We're out of the woods. We made it."
"YOU made it" Chandler said with a warm smile.
"With a little help from my friends" Monica said with a smile. She reached out her hand to him. "Come here, sit with me on the couch."
Chandler sat down next to her and she begun stroking him gently with her right hand.
"And of course with A LOT of help from you."
"I didn't do anything… Except for force you to eat and look after our kid."
"You did so much more than that… don't you know it?" Monica gave him a kiss. "Chandler… You didn't allow me to give up. I would probably have ended up giving up the fight if you hadn't been there to force me to keep on going. And you kept me from feeling sorry for myself and you took such good care of me."
"You're my wife. Of course I took care of you."
Monica kissed him again.
"Well thank you anyway. You'll never know how much you meant to me through this whole thing. And after as well, of course."
"Oh, but not before?" Chandler jokingly said, raising an eyebrow.
Monica threw a pillow on him.
Chandler smiled lovingly and pulled her onto his lap. He was overjoyed to have her back, completely healthy and as good as new. He kissed her on the neck, absentmindedly.
"You know…" he said, "this has really made me realize that I didn't appreciate you before. Not as much as I should have."
"You did."
"No I didn't. I mean, yeah, I loved you with all my heart and everything, but it was like the everyday made the edge of it go away…"
"Right… Would you please start speaking English though, just so Regina learns at least that language properly?" Monica said, running her hand through his hair.
"What I mean is… well… I got used to you. Not in a bad sense in it self, because getting used to you is WONDERFUL, it's almost as wonderful as the fact that you married me and therefore wanted me to get used to you."
"You and I look at marriage differently" Monica said with rolling eyes.
"What I meant was that you wanted me to get to be with you that much. To see each other all the time and everything. That's what I mean by it. To get used to us being such a big part of each other's lives."
"Sounds cute…"
Chandler kissed her on the neck again, still absentmindedly.
"It was like… well, our first years I never really had time to get used to everyday. Things were always happening, and we went from sneaking around to just being an ordinary couple in the sense that we each lived in our own apartments."
"Even though we usually spent the night at the same place."
"Yeah, but we still had the… choice… to get to be alone for the night. Anytime we needed distance we just spent a night alone, and then the next day we were back at wanting to spend as much time as we could with each other. I mean, that's why I asked if I could move in here in the first place. To get to be near you as much as I wanted to. To get home from work and to know you'd be there. I always hated it before when I got home and I wanted to see you, but then I had to go off looking for you. When we lived together we almost always knew where the other one was. Closeness. That's why I wanted us to live together. And I got it."
"And everyday didn't come then?" Monica said, both amused and a bit touched. She was also a bit sentimental, remembering those things that all seemed to have taken place so long ago, when it in reality was only around six years ago.
"Everyday came long after that" Chandler said. "First it was the whole thing of experiencing what it was like to live with someone you loved, instead of living with Joey. Not that I don't love Joey, but there's a difference between friendship-love and… love-love."
Monica smiled slightly.
"And I have to admit that it ruled having a gorgeous woman cook me dinner each evening!" Chandler said with a slight grin. "And it wasn't too bad to get to come home from a hard day at work and throw myself on YOUR bed instead of the one I had when I lived with Joey. The whole thing was great, and that feeling lasted for about two years. Not that it's gone now, but it became more ordinary after that. I forgot what it was like NOT living that way."
"And now you remember?"
"Now I remember."
They sat quiet for a few seconds. Both were lost in thought. Then Chandler continued on his thread.
"And then I made up my mind to propose. Not after two years, you know THAT, but after almost a year of living together… And I haven't ever told you how nervous I was about that. I mean, I knew you loved me and everything, but that didn't have to mean that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me."
"Oh come on, you knew how attached I was to you!"
"Yeah, well you can be attached to a guinea pig without wanting to spend the rest of your life with it" Chandler commented.
"How many guinea pigs will live as long as people?" Monica said with a giggle.
"Mr. Jingles!"
"Mr. Jingles was a mouse, or a rat or something" Monica pointed out.
"Anyway, if the wife would keep quiet then maybe the husband could finish the story?" Chandler said. "Now, as I said, I was extremely nervous. I'm surprised you didn't notice."
"I thought you were still freaked out about the Hildy thing."
"You know, that night when we went out to dinner and ran into Richard, I've told you that that was the night I'd planned on proposing originally, right?"
"Yeah."
"Yeah. I was so nervous that evening that I'm surprised I even got my order right… Not to mention how surprised I am that I managed to get dressed, my hands were probably shaking like crazy! Then Richard came and of course made me just annoyed instead of nervous. Annoyed and a little jealous. Anyway, since you're the one I got engaged to, you know that shortly after we got engaged. And then there was the whole engagement thing to get used to, a new adventure if you wanna call it that. And before that had gotten old we got married. Which was even more fantastic. But I was very blue-eyed, I thought that getting married meant being together forever. Now I know that being married means being together for as long as, well as the vows say, until death do you part. I somehow thought that putting a ring on your finger automatically meant that we'd both live until we were around ninety, or something…"
"Death is just physical parting" Monica claimed. "I wouldn't have left you even if I'd died. You'd always keep me near."
"Sure, but as a memory. I couldn't treat you as if you were alive, because in that case I'd go crazy each time I realized that you were not… which would be often… It might work to TALK to someone who's dead, pretending she or he is alive, but trying to have sex with that person or, or dance with that person or… well, anything physically… wouldn't work. But when I stood there in front of that priest I was so sure that I'd live until I was really old, and you would be there every second."
"That's my plan" Monica said with a smile. "Although not every SECOND. Every DAY will be enough. If we spend each second together we'd grow sick of it."
"You know what I mean… And the feeling of getting to be together forever was so strong, and it felt like we were newlyweds for years…"
"Chandler our fourth wedding anniversary is in July. How many years did you feel like we were newlyweds? We practically are!"
"I know."
She jokingly mocked him and gave him a kiss.
"And then in December our second year you had a special present for me."
"Yeah, bun in the oven."
"Feels a bit odd calling it that now…" Chandler pondered. "After all, she's a year and a half by now."
"20 months."
"Well you sure knew what to get me for Christmas" Chandler joked. Then he chuckled. "And you were eight months along when we celebrated our second anniversary. You were so big."
"Thanks a lot darling, women love to hear that" Monica said, rolling her eyes.
"Yeah, well that's what you get for sleeping with men without using protection" Chandler teased lovingly.
"I WAS using protection. You can never be safer than 99% unless your sterile."
"Thank you for that wonderful biological lesson, Monica, but my story isn't finished."
"I do know how the story goes."
"Not from my point of view, you don't."
"And what are you gonna say next, 'you screamed like a banshee when Regina was born'?" Monica said, giving him a light push.
"No, SHE screamed like a banshee. I hardly heard peep out of you. But you know, I fell in love with you around a hundred times over again while you were pregnant. And then a few times more when you gave birth and then you lay there with this… red little thing in your arms…"
"Also known as Regina…"
"Well don't blame me for her being red and tiny!" Chandler said, jokingly. "And then I fell in love some more. With both of you. I really think that that period of our relationship was when it was as best. Not that it's been bad, but the whole thing brought us closer and everything…"
"I guess that's when we first felt like a real family" Monica pondered.
"Yeah, could be. But then after that I guess everyday came along… somewhere along the road. I mean, it was diapers, and day-care, and who's bought milk, and has anybody vacuumed, and who gets up in the middle of the night this time, and here are the bills and things like that… We had less time for each other and we weren't any longer the… only leading role in the other one's life, if I put it that way. There was the baby."
"Chandler? You make it sound as if things got worse when we got Regina."
"Not worse. And it's not Regina. It's parenthood, I guess. I mean, how much time did we have for talking and playing and erotica and things like that? Not to mention the fact that you don't get really horny when you've got an infant sleeping in your bed right next to you. But I think we handled it all really well. We got more teamed, sort of. Better at the team work thing. Learned how to interpret gestures and signals and stuff like that. Better than before, I mean."
"Sure…" Monica said. "But honey, I've gotta ask… Is there a point to all of this pondering? Because the current subject of discussion is gonna be home in about two hours and I want you to welcome me home before she gets here."
"Oh don't you worry, missy…" Chandler said with a sly smile. "But I guess I just got a bit sidetracked. And I'll be honest with you, somewhere during our third year together, during the second half of it most likely, I started to take you for granted. And I will never ever do that again, I swear to you!"
"Chandler… It's okay to do that sometimes." Monica softly said. "Of course you have to realize that you have no control over how long you're gonna be together with someone, that's the way of life, but it doesn't mean that you have to be alert all the time. Sometimes you're allowed to just take the other one for granted, take it for granted that the person will be there when you get home, take it for granted that the person will go to sleep next to you at night. And that's all there is to that."
"Sure, but I made it into a habit and I didn't even know it! I was always thankful that I had you, no one can come and tell me that I didn't know how fortunate I was, and still am. But I never thought about what it would be like if all of a sudden you weren't there anymore!"
"Honey, I didn't think along those lines either. I just knew I had you at the moment, and that was all I needed."
"I see it differently now" Chandler insisted. "You almost died, in fact you DID die for a few minutes, but for you it's not the same as for me. If you had died then your pain would have ended there. Mine would have just begun."
"Don't be too sure…" Monica softly said and leaned closer to him and slowly stroke his arm.
"Just having you away at the hospital made me uncomfortable, it made me miss you so much! And it was a wakeup call. It feels like this whole thing has been a wakeup call. 'Wake up Chandler and realize what you have and what you can loose'!"
"Chandler my cancer had no hidden meanings and no alternative motives. It was a disease, from beginning to end, and it had to do with physics and biology, not with your soul or anything else." She was quiet for a second. "But it probably had that affect on you."
"I'm very scared of loosing what I have" Chandler whispered. "Loosing you. Or loosing Gina. Or any of the guys. But mostly you and Regina. It's so strange, I've never even THOUGHT about the fact that Regina was mortal earlier… It's just been such an obviousness to me that she would survive us both. But I've seen children at the hospital who've died, one of them was only five years old, Monica!"
"I think every parent sees it as something obvious that they'll die before their children." Monica said. "That doesn't make you a bad father!"
"I didn't say that either. In fact, I know I'm a good father. Believe me, Regina hasn't let me think anything else. And it's not about being a good parent or not. It's about knowing what you have and appreciating it. And knowing that it's all just loaned to you. And the person you loaned it from might want it back when you least expect it!"
"Enough of being deep!" Monica said and kissed him. "I want my welcome home and I want it now!"
*
A year passed. Regina was now two years old and talking almost perfectly. She was, as Chandler put it, becoming a small human being, in the sense that she showed her personality more clearly and she had opinions on this or that.
Monica entered the apartment and looked around. She put the bills on the kitchen table and went over to the couch, thinking for herself that they needed a bigger place. Their apartment wasn't small, but it wasn't big enough for a two-year-old with all of her toys and her incredible energy. Right now she was out in the park with her Dad, her Uncle and her uncle Joey. Monica was alone in the apartment.
She sat down on the couch and rested her chin in her palm. Life was pretty strange right now. It had been so ever since her cancer.
When she'd gotten home from the hospital, she had noticed Chandler's eagerness to love her as if every day was his or her last, and to do anything at all for her. At first she had thought it was sweet, but when he didn't knock it off she began feeling uncomfortable. He was going too far in the other direction and what he needed was to find a balance. He had somehow gotten the idea into his head that the best way was to love her with all of his heart each day, in the sense that he'd never allow himself to not devote lots of energy to it.
Monica sure didn't mind being loved that way if it happened a few times a week or even a few times a day. But when it was constantly it made her feel slightly trapped. She wanted to be able to spend an evening just reading in bed with him next to her, but that was impossible now. Chandler would either want to hold her, kiss her, talk to her or in some other way demonstrate his affection. Monica really felt like they weren't on the same level.
Monica had always thought that you should love just the same way you did everything else. In doses, some smaller and some bigger. She felt it was better to just let it be unsaid sometimes how much they loved each other, to let the emotion be there in the shadows. She knew he loved her, he didn't have to show her constantly. She felt like the times when they expressed their love were more special if they didn't happen all the time when they were around each other. And she also knew that people might get sick of them if they always had to express their love.
She also had a feeling that the rest of Chandler's emotional life suffered from this. There was only so much energy that a man could spend on his emotions, and if Chandler spent almost all of his on her, then what about their friends? He was just as before with Regina, he never set her aside, but their four friends probably got less of his enthusiasm and appreciation.
Monica frowned. She should talk about this with Chandler. But how? And when?
*
Chandler pushed himself onto Monica and moaned along with her. He lovingly looked at her. He loved feeling her body under his own. And he loved watching her face while they made love.
He leaned in to kiss her when all of a sudden he heard the door open.
Quickly but mechanically Monica grabbed a pillow and covered their upper bodies, that weren't under the quilt. Chandler stopped moving and silently cursed. Regina was at her grandparents', so it had to be one of their friends. And he didn't understand what they were doing there.
Joey stopped in his tracks when he realized that they were busy with something he had no business seeing, and his eyes grew slightly wide in shock. He hadn't expected to catch them in the act. He had just been interested in knowing if they felt like going out for pizza.
"And what the hell do YOU want?" Chandler hissed at him, when he saw who it was. "To clap the rhythm? Joey get out!"
"Uh, later! Sorry!" Joey said and quickly left them alone again.
Chandler mumbled annoyed and shook his head. He looked down at Monica who had a weird look on her face that quickly turned into a slight smile.
"Honey… maybe you should calm down a few" she gently suggested. "Joey didn't walk in on us on purpose!"
"He's got ears, doesn't he?" Chandler said, still slightly annoyed.
"Don't think about that right now…"
"Well excuse me for not wanting to be interrupted while I'm having sex!"
Monica gently stroke his cheek and wished he would calm down a bit. She kissed him gently on the earlobe.
"What, do you think I'm done for now?" she teased. "Come on mister, show me that rhythm you talked about…"
*
Fifteen minutes later Monica exited the bedroom, wrapped in her robe. Chandler was asleep. Her four friends were on the couch, eyeing her.
"What?" she said and sat down on the couch next to Rachel. "You didn't know Chandler and I had sex?"
"No, it's not that…" Rachel said. "Monica, have you noticed that Chandler has been a bit, well…" Rachel harked, not knowing how to tell Chandler's wife what she wanted to say. "Aggressive… lately?"
"Rach, he's never been aggressive with me."
"Well the rest of us have gotten our punches every here and there" Ross said.
Monica's chin fell.
"He's HIT you?"
"No Monica, not PHYSICALLY!"
"Well what do you mean?"
The four friends looked at each other, no one really willing to open their mouth and talk. Finally Joey did.
"We, we just mean that it's as if Chandler doesn't have any patience with us anymore. He gets mad for almost everything!"
"Does not!" Monica objected. "Joey, we were having sex and you walked in on us! He kinda' had the right to be mad."
"Then how come you weren't?"
Monica bit her lower lip. She wasn't mad because she didn't think it was anything to get mad about. At least not as annoyed as Chandler had been.
"Look, you guys…" she said. "I'm going to talk to him, okay? I promise."
"What is even going on with him?" Phoebe asked. "And how come you never get his anger?"
"Well…" Monica said, uncomfortable. She didn't want to talk about Chandler like this when he was in the next room, even if he was sleeping. "See, after I had the cancer… well… Chandler's been very afraid to loose me. And not just of loosing me, but of forgetting that I mean a lot to him, and… I think he's afraid something is going to happen with me again, and that he will feel like he's not given me the love and affection that he would want to have given me…" Monica looked down on her hands. "I think he's scared that something will happen to me and that he will feel when it does as if he's not showed me how he loves me, and not given me all he would want to."
"Cute story" Rachel said. "Although you sound a bit self aware."
Monica rolled her eyes.
"Rachel, I was not finished!" she pointed out. "Chandler seems to be devoting all of his energy to showing me and Regina how much he loves us, even though we're both aware of that without him showing us constantly. And this leaves him with less energy to show the rest of you that he cares. So instead he ends up loosing his temper with you long before with Gina and me."
"Well then talk to him" Ross said. "If we do it he might get mad."
"I will. Trust me."
Monica rose and went into the bedroom. She smiled lovingly when she saw him asleep, tangled in the sheets. She snuck down next to him and kissed him gently on the cheek. She knew he was acting a bit bad towards his friends, but she couldn't be mad at him when she saw him like his.
"Wakie, wakie…" she gently said and kissed his forehead again. "Simon says, time to wake up."
Chandler mumbled something and put his arms around her. He rolled over on his back and pulled her closer before he opened his eyes.
"Someone's put a robe on…" he commented.
"Chandler I need to talk to you. It's kind of important."
"As important as this?" he asked and kissed her neck.
"Chandler leave my neck alone right now. We need to talk."
"About what? There's nothing to talk about. We were fine just a few minutes ago."
"Chandler I know how you've felt ever since I got well again, about your responsibility to love me and Regina as much as you can. But honey you've gotta stop that."
"Stop that?" Chandler echoed. "What, I'm not allowed to love you two anymore?"
"Of course you are! It's not about that. It's about you needing to find a balance in your emotions. You, you, you devote pretty much all of your emotions to Regina and me, and that's not good for anyone."
"So now my love isn't good for anyone?" Chandler said, defensive.
"Misunderstand me correctly here" Monica said. "One of the best things about you is the way you love. But lately it's been too much. Too much for me, because I often feel like I can't match the image you seem to have of me, and I can't always be expected to show you just how much I love you either. Because even though I love you to death Chandler, sometimes it's better to let it be unsaid. Words and actions looses it's power if you use it too much, and I think it's better if us showing each other how much we care is something we don't do all the time. It makes the times when we do show it more special."
"No, Monica. I don't want to be one of those husbands who only tells his wife that he loves her about once a month, and who's words of love are about as common as snow in the rain forest."
"That's not what I want you to be either, but there has to be a middle path to this…"
"It's not about SHOWING you that I love you" Chandler said, sounding slightly hurt. "It's about never letting myself forget how special you are, or what life would be like without you. THAT'S what this is about."
"That is all very fine, Chandler" Monica assured him. "But you know, I'm very well aware of how special YOU are, yet I don't feel the need to show you all the time."
Chandler scoffed slightly.
"Listen…" Monica said. "Love me with all of your heart, just like I do with you, but tone down the displaying of the emotion. It's not good for Regina either, she's still so little, she gets a lot of pressure on her this way… I know it's not your intention, but this kind of thing has that affect on a child, it makes her feel like you've got an image of her that she can't live up to, so she's got to try her best to do so. And that's a lot of pressure on a two-year-old."
"Regina knows that I love her no matter who she is."
"No she doesn't. *I* know you do, but a child can't see it that way. And even if she does, that will also have the same affect in the end, because then she'll be busting her ass to be even more perfect so you will be proud of her. She'll be very scared of letting you down."
"Is there more, or can I be left alone now?" Chandler said, hurt and angry.
"Chandler…" Monica said, turning around in his arms so that she could look into his face. "Don't think that your love is wasted on us. We appreciate it, we do. And we both love you back. You're our hero."
"And I want to be left alone."
"Well actually, I wasn't done yet…" Monica said, getting a sigh from Chandler. "It's not just me and Regina… Chandler I'm your wife and I think it's my responsibility to be brisk sometimes, to tell you the truth. And the truth is that you're neglecting our friends. Not on purpose, but as a result of how you're with Regina and me. They've all asked me what is up with you these days, you often loose temper with them… Like with Joey, earlier."
"I reserve the right to be mad when he walks in on us like that."
"But you got a little TOO mad… Your quippy comment to him was unnecessary. And they all love you too, you shouldn't forget about them. You should try and spread your love to all of us. Of course Regina and I would get much more than the rest, but remember to love them too."
"Whatever happened to 'Lay All Your Love On Me' being your favourite ABBA song?" Chandler sarcastically remarked.
"You're not wasting your emotion if you give some of it to our friends" Monica said.
"Maybe not, but I am sharing my devotion if I do… not to mention how I'm not laying all my love on you."
"All the kind of love that matters to me" Monica pointed out. "Because I don't need to have monopoly on all your love, just on all the… romantic love, if you know what I mean. Listen, I know you're offended, but I really thought you needed to hear this. I love you."
She kissed him on the mouth. He didn't kiss her back. She realized with a sting of hurt that this was the first time since her cancer that he hadn't responded to her love. She rose and exited the bedroom, leaving him alone.
*
Monica came home early and sat down on the couch. It was a year later, in the middle of the summer. The weather was great, and she was planning on going out to the park later on with Rachel and Phoebe.
She saw the photo album on the coffee table and smiled to herself. She picked it up and opened it. Chandler had almost completely gotten rid of his habit of making weird faces on photos. Monica had started the process by mostly just taken candid pictures of him, and gradually he had started to realize that the pictures looked better without him making weird faces.
The most recent picture in the album had been taken a month earlier, when Chandler and Monica took Regina to a carnival. Chandler was kneeling down with Regina, and was busy trying to avoid her getting her cotton candy in her hair. Monica had taken the picture, so she wasn't in it. Monica looked at it with a loving smile.
Chandler had taken the criticism Monica had given him the year before quite well. He'd toned down his display of affection towards her and Regina, and apologized to their friends. Monica knew that he was still just as set at loving them as much as he could has he had been before, but at least now he didn't show it as clearly.
She still had trouble understanding why he felt like it was so important. Monica preferred to live for the day and enjoying the love she felt. Love to her was a privilege, not an obligation, and she was set on enjoying it in ordinary life instead of constantly having to worry that it would one day be no more. She already knew that she wasn't going to get to live like this forever, that everything had to end sometime. Chandler would most likely die before she did, since he was a few years older than her and a man. If they both stayed free from accidents and diseases, she would most likely become a widow sometime around the age of seventy or eighty. But she couldn't know when that would be, so why worry about it?
It seemed to her as if Chandler was too busy loving her that he didn't take the time to enjoy it. He didn't seem to enjoy anymore to just soak in a bath all by himself and enjoy being loved by her, or to watch a movie with her and enjoy her company.
But at least he had tuned town his strong urge to show her constantly how much he cared. And she appreciated that. She rose and put the photo album back, then went back to the couch.
The phone rang, and Monica answered. It was Rachel.
"Oh hi Rachel! I was just about to call you, where and when are we going to meet?" She rose and continued to talk, not letting Rachel get a word in. "I've pretty much just gotten through the door, and I need at least fifteen minutes before I can get ready to go anywhere. I could really use a shower, and something to eat, plus I should get changed…"
"Monica" Rachel said, trying to get her attention.
"Actually, why don't we say thirty minutes?" Monica continued. "And we can meet at the coffee house. It's so warm out today that I don't want any coffee, but some lemonade or something wouldn't be too bad. What do you think?"
"Monica, maybe the park isn't such a good idea today…" Rachel carefully suggested.
"What? Why not?"
"Honey, maybe you should turn on the news."
"The news?"
"Yeah… Call me later if you want Phoebs and I to come over…"
"Well, wasn't that almost the plan? Rachel what are you on about?"
"Just turn on the news, and call me back later, okay?" Rachel said.
Monica heard her hang up. She looked at the phone, confused, and hung up herself. She grabbed the remote and turned the TV on, searching for any channel where the news was on. She wondered what it was that was so important. After a minute she found a channel airing news, and she put the remote down on the table. Her eyes grew wide as she realized what the story she was seeing was about.
Some terrorist organisation was holding an entire building hostage, waiting for their demands to be met. And just like any terrorists in an action movie, they were threatening to kill one of the hostages each half hour before their demands were met. Monica didn't hear what their demands were, but she didn't really care. She knew the building far too well, it was where Chandler worked.
She covered her mouth with her hand when it slowly sank in that Chandler was in there. That Chandler might not even be alive. The news anchor said that five people had already been killed, but they gave no names. And so far it had only been twenty minutes since the terrorists had taken over the building, so no hostage had been killed yet. But Monica had no way of knowing if they would kill Chandler.
She closed her eyes hard and tried not to hyperventilate and panic. She swallowed hard and closed her eyes even harder. This was horrible. She had no way of knowing how he was doing, or if he was even still alive. The anchor had said nothing about anybody getting out of the building this far, so she couldn't hope that he'd gotten out before the terrorists had taken over. And it wasn't lunch time, so she couldn't hope he was out on lunch either.
She resisted an urge to go down there to see for herself, to see and hear what was going on. She realized with a little common sense that she would know a whole lot more watching TV than she would being on the spot, because the TV anchors always seemed to get all the updates at once.
Monica felt a chill down her spine when she thought of the fact that just a few minutes ago she had been thinking that she would become a widow, that she would be the last one of them to die. She had pictured this happening way into the future, but she had thought that that was only if nothing unexpected happened, like an accident or a disease.
'Or a bunch of angry terrorists who want some stupid demand met…' she added now in her thought.
Slowly she sank down on the couch, shivering with the light shock and fear, and unable to grasp it.
"Oh Chandler, please be all right…" she begged, and kept her tears back behind her closed eyes when the anchor said that the first hostage had been executed.
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