Author's note: Thank you for the kind reviews! (What, predictable? This? LOL…) Just a note to the readers: if you can remember what Chandler acted like when he'd had "a million" cups of coffee in the season one episode where he breaks up with Janice, that's what I'm going for in part of this chapter. It's hard to describe, but it's funny as hell on TV! Hope you like.

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She was quiet for a long moment, staring at the ground and moving her foot back and forth along the floor. When she finally spoke, her voice was so soft he barely heard. "I'm late."

"What?" he asked, not understanding.

"I'm late, Chandler. My period is late."

When he didn't respond, she chanced a look up at him, and saw that his face had paled considerably.


"Chandler?" she asked quietly.

"How late?" he finally asked, avoiding her eyes.

She swallowed. "Uh, about a week."

He scrubbed his hands over his face, then gave her a disbelieving look. "You… you think that you're…"

"Maybe." She hugged her arms around herself and looked away. "I bought a test, but I haven't gotten up the nerve to take it yet."

He nodded slowly, than stumbled backwards until he hit the chair. He sank onto the back of it and stared at her. "So were you just never going to tell me?"

"I don't know, okay?" Monica wiped away tears that she hadn't even realized she was crying. "God, Chandler, these last few weeks have been so… upside-down… and now this; I don't even know what to do anymore! I don't know if I'm actually pregnant, or if this is all just because I've been so stressed out, or…" She trailed off, gesturing helplessly.

Part of him wanted to put his arms around her, to hold her until she stopped crying and tell her that everything was going to be okay. The other part was scared to death, holding him right where he was. He cast around for something to say, finally falling back on his tried-and-true defense mechanism: humor.

"Maybe we should have just played a few rounds of Scrabble that night," he said weakly.

"Chandler…" Amazingly, he'd gotten her to smile, if only fleetingly. She sighed and brushed away the remainder of her tears.

"You said you bought a test," he said, fidgeting nervously.

"Yeah."

"Maybe you should… take it now."

"Now?" She sounded incredulous.

"Yeah. Why not?" He gave a short laugh. "I mean… at least then we'll know if freaking out is justifiable, or if it's all just been a false alarm."

Her hands shook slightly as she clasped them in front of her and stared at him. "You want me to take it now. You're telling me that you're ready to hear that I'm pregnant, that you'll be a dad in nine months like it or not, that our lives are changed forever--"

"Oh my god," he said, annoyed. He lurched up suddenly and began pacing, hands deep in his pockets. "No, I'm not ready for any of that. But I sure as hell don't want to be walking around on pins and needles not knowing. You think either of us isn't sleeping now? Wait a few weeks and we'll both be certifiable."

His voice had been rising, and the sudden show of temper caused her own to flare. "Fine, that's what you want? Really? Okay, I'll take the damn test! Just don't come crying to me when it doesn't give you the answer you want." She stomped back into her bedroom.


He ran his hands through his hair and took deep breaths, trying to calm down and failing miserably. After a moment, he turned around and walked over to the door, bolting it and then banging his head against it repetitively.

God, he needed a cigarette.

Monica came out of her room and headed straight for the bathroom, not looking at him. The little box in her hand made him nervous, and he suddenly wished he hadn't been quite so insistent.

"So, what, you just pee on the stick and see which color it turns?" he called after her, his voice cracking slightly. As he moved back a step, he banged into the coat rack beside the door, which wobbled precariously before he caught it.

"You were expecting something more complicated?" She paused by the bathroom doorway and eyed him with trepidation. He was shifting into full 'Chandler' mode, exuding nervous energy and fidgeting continuously. She recognized the symptoms; he must be absolutely terrified. Good.

"Would you stop moving around like that, you look like a marionette." With one final glare, she turned and disappeared into the bathroom.

He chewed his lip nervously and tapped away the seconds. After almost a full minute of silence, he couldn't take it any longer. Raising his voice, he called in the direction of the bathroom, "Are you taking it now?"

"I'm giving myself a facial first," she snapped, her voice muffled by the door. "What do you think?"

Her sarcasm barely registered.

"Hey, what, uh, what does each color mean? I mean, how will you know if it's positive or negative?" He moved around the apartment restlessly before finally jumping onto the counter, long legs swinging back and forth.

There was a long pause during which he came to the conclusion that she was ignoring him, and then the toilet flushed. "We have to wait five minutes," she called reluctantly, and he opened his mouth in a wordless scream of impatience, then jumped down and fairly ran to the bathroom door.

"Five minutes?! We can send people to the moon and blow whole cities off the map with one press of a button, but it takes five minutes for this to work? You gotta be kidding me."

She flung open the door, glaring at him. "Chandler, would you please just not talk for the next few minutes? Or better yet, go to your own apartment?"


"Gee, Monica. I wish you'd told me to buzz off three weeks ago when I came over," he said sarcastically.

"That makes two of us." She brushed past him and walked over to the sofa, sitting down and crossing her legs calmly. He watched her nervously, then began pacing around the apartment, reaching out occasionally to fiddle with various objects.

"How can you just sit there?" he finally demanded.

"Well, since you're bouncing around here like a ping-pong ball on Prozac, I figured one of us should be calm."


"I'm fine," he said, demonstrating that he was absolutely not fine by shifting restlessly and glancing repeatedly at his watch. "Four minutes and seventeen seconds." He swallowed hard and then gave a little hop over the coffee table, sitting down on it across from her.

She gave him a look. "Didn't I tell you to leave?"

He didn't respond, instead glancing around the apartment and biting his lip. Finally, a tiny smile crossed his face, and he turned to stare at her.

"What?" she asked, unnerved.

"This," he said, gesturing back and forth. "Us. We're actually communicating again. It's nice."

"Ohhh, yeah, this is so great," she said. "You know, we should get together more often and do this sort of thing." He had started tapping his fingers against the table and twitching again, and she eyed him carefully. "Do you need a sedative?"

"Nah, I'm good." He drummed his fingers against the table one more time, then suddenly stopped and stared at her. "Monica."

"What?" she asked warily.

"What are we going to do if it's… you know… positive?"

"Get married, of course."

He stared at her until she leaned back against the couch and started giggling.


"You're kidding," he stated, relieved.

"Yeah, but you should have seen your face." She wiped at her eyes – this time they were tears of laughter – and glanced at her own watch. "Three minutes."

He started shifting around again, looking a little pale. "Whatever it says, shouldn't we buy another one? Just to make sure? These things can be false, can't they?"

"Looking for an 'out'?" she asked wryly. "I'm actually surprised you haven't thrown yourself off the balcony by now."

He smiled grimly. "Part of me is still convinced this is a dream."

"A nightmare?"

He paused. "I'm not sure. Most dreams with you in them are good dreams. This is one I would have some issues with."

Monica raised her eyebrows at him, trying to calm the butterflies in her stomach by focusing on something else. "You dream about me?"

He groaned. "Don't go there. Not now."

There was a long, painful silence, during which they could hear every tick of the clock on the wall as the second hand inched its way around.

"How do we even begin to deal with this?" Monica finally asked. "We're not prepared. We're not involved, and we're both obsessive and neurotic. No way are we ready for this."

"Speak for yourself, Monica. I'm obsessive, neurotic, immature and needy." He glanced at his watch. "A minute forty."

"This isn't how I planned for this at all, you know. Richard and I were supposed to get married, move to the suburbs, and have three kids starting when I was thirty. A boy, a girl, and another boy. Daniel, Emma and Jonathan."

He gave her such a laconic look that she flushed and turned away.

"This isn't my fantasy-come-true either, Mon," he said wryly. "But I'm not rubbing your face in it, am I? I was supposed to grow old lonely, childless and miserable. God damn it, I want my empty future back."

"Shut up, Chandler," she sighed.

"Sorry." He fidgeted until she looked at him pointedly, then reluctantly stopped and glanced at his watch again. "Fifty nine… fifty eight…"

She sighed and covered her face with her hands. "This is so unbelievable," she murmured. "I mean, I can't even remember that night."

"I know. Me either." He stared glumly at his hands.

She sighed and gave him a serious look. "Chandler, are you going to flip out if it's positive?"

"No. If it's positive I'm gonna go out and buy you fifteen more tests, and if all those are positive… well, maybe." He gave her a wry smile, but she didn't smile back, so he sighed. "I'll need some time for it to sink in. Okay? How's that?"


"I'm going to need a day or two, myself," she said softly.

"If it's negative," he continued, "we'll call everyone we know and have a huge party. The theme can be, 'Condoms: Better Safe than Sorry.'"

She looked at him suspiciously to make sure he was joking, and when he gave her a weak smile, she sighed again and reached out for his hand.

"Even though you're obsessive and weird, Chandler," she said, "there's no one I'd rather be going through this with than you."

He turned his hand over, carefully threading his fingers through her own and meeting her eyes with a sober expression. He'd finally stopped fidgeting, she noticed – he was absolutely still.

"Me too," he finally said, his voice little above a whisper. "Me too."

The second hand ticked away the last few moments as they shared a long look, both realizing the magnitude of what they were embarking on if the test was positive.

Finally, she got up and walked into the bathroom without another word. He buried his face in his hands, realizing after long seconds of her silence that he already knew the answer.

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To

Be

Continued…