A/N: Thank you for the reviews! I will put the next chapter up in a day or two, if I get a chance.

Disclaimer: I do not own the Friends, or New York, or anything else in this story... blah blah blah.

CHAPTER 2 - Gone

Over the next few days, Chandler struggled to make things normal. Monica, too, seemed to be putting in an effort, but still, he knew, she wasn't really with him.

Then it was Friday morning. Chandler hadn't been able to fall asleep the night before - he'd been up all night imagining different scenarios of how Monica was going to break up with him. He slammed his hand down on his screeching alarm clock. He needed to hit something. He needed to grab something and make it feel as badly as he was now.

Chandler went over to Monica and Rachel's, an old routine that he couldn't bear to drop. Rachel told him that Monica had gone somewhere early that morning but would be home soon. He waited at her apartment until almost nine o'clock, but Monica never came home. He finally stormed off to work. He couldn't wait around all day while his girlfriend was off gallivanting around New York City with some guy who worked in a night club, had a gotee, and was named "Chip," which was how Chandler pictured Monica cheating on him. The made-up pictures tormented him constantly - Monica kissing another man, being touched by another man - it made Chandler want to throw his laptop computer across the office.

This was it, he decided. Tonight, he was going to get answers, or else he was going to end it. Chandler wouldn't let Monica off with another "there's-nothing-going-on" speech where she wouldn't even meet his eyes. Chandler would not let himself be played for a fool anymore. Not even by the woman he loved.

At his lunch break, Chandler picked up the phone and called his apartment. Today was Monica's day off - she should be home. No one picked up. "Monica, honey, if you're there, I really need to talk to you," he said. "It's really, really important. Please, please call me as soon as you get this message. I love you." An hour later, he called again, and again right before he left work. As he rode a taxi home, Chandler had never been more frustrated. It was so unlike Monica to not even call him back. Even if she was with someone else, she cared enough to return his urgent phone calls - didn't she?

No one was home when Chandler arrived at the building. He got his key to their apartment out of his wallet and went inside. Now Chandler was worried. The apartment looked just like it had when he'd left it after talking to Rachel. His breakfast dishes were still sitting next to the sink, and no others had been added. The answering machine hadn't been checked. Apparently, Monica had never come home.

Chandler went to his apartment. Joey was eating pizza and watching Baywatch. "Joey, have you seen Monica?"

"No," Joey said. "Why?"

"She hasn't been home all day, and I really need to talk to her," Chandler explained. "Listen, have you noticed anything different about her lately?"

"Different? No, no, haven't noticed anything different, not at all, nuh-uh," Joey said quickly. Too quickly.

"You know, for an actor, you sure are a sucky liar," Chandler said. "Is it something I'm doing wrong? Does she not want to be with me anymore?"

"I don't know," Joey said awkwardly.

"What have you noticed?"

"Well," Joey said. "She doesn't seem to - talk, as much, anymore. Before, it was like, Monica, shut up, and now, I don't know. She's... detached. And she doesn't... well, Monica used to be all, like, touchy-feely. With you, especially, but everyone else too."

"I know!" Chandler said. "She shrugs off my arm when I put it around her, and stuff like that."

"Yeah, but it's not just you, man," Joey said reassuringly. "When I got that great part last week, it was like she didn't care. Usually when I get a part, it's like she's all hugging and everything, but... there was none of that."

"I'm going to go out and look for her," Chandler said. "If you hear from her, call my cell, okay?" And Chandler left.

First Chandler talked to Ross, the Phoebe, but no one had heard from her all day. He even called her restaurant, and her cousin's house, but no one knew where Monica was. Feeling desperate, Chandler began walking around the Village, searching. He looked at their favorite deli, the dry cleaners, and that expensive little boutique she shopped at when she got stressed out. But no one had seen "the sexy brunette with the loud voice who always gets ham and cheese," as the kid behind the counter at the deli described her.

Chandler stayed up until three in the morning, waiting by the phone, pacing restlessly around her apartment. The most horrible thoughts filled his head. At this point, Chandler didn't care if Monica was cheating on him with twenty different men, he just wanted her to come home safe. What if she had been raped? Or mugged and left unconscious in an alley somewhere? Or killed? He finally went home and fell asleep on the couch with the phone on his chest.

He was woken at nine in the morning by the phone ringing shrilly three inches from his ear. "Hello?" he said, picking it up. "Monica?"

"No, it's Rachel," Rachel said, and Chandler heard an odd note in her voice. "I think you should come over."

"I'll be right there," Chandler said, and ran out of the apartment without changing his clothes. He expected to see Monica there. Instead, all her saw were Rachel and Phoebe, looking nervous. "Did you hear from Monica?" he asked in a rush.

"Yes," Rachel said.

"Thank God," Chandler said. "Where is she? Is she okay?"

"She's fine," Rachel said. "But she didn't say where she was, just that she's fine and... and..." Rachel glanced away.

"She needs some time away," Phoebe spoke up. "She doesn't, she doesn't want to see you for awhile." Chandler was speechless. "And she said, don't try to find her."

"Why?" he asked. "Wha - why?"

"We don't know," Rachel said. "I know she's been, been weird lately, and... I'm really sorry, Chandler. I don't know anything else. But she loves you, I'm sure of it. I think she just needs some time to... be alone. To think, or something. I don't know."

"I don't understand," Chandler said. "Why would she just leave? We've been having problems, but I thought, I thought we could work through it. Please, if you guys know anything else - "

"We would tell you if we did," Phoebe said gently. "We know you love her."

Chandler stood up. "Okay," he said, although he wasn't sure what he was saying okay to. "Okay." He went home.

"She doesn't want to see you," Phoebe's voice mocked him. "Don't try to find her." Chandler took a cold shower, hearing the last conversation he'd had with Monica play over and over in his head. It hadn't been anything special, but he could only pray it wasn't the last they'd ever have.

He had been over at her apartment, making sandwiches for dinner because she was too tired to cook. Apparently, he'd left the bread open. Monica had flipped out. "How hard is it to just close the bread, Chandler?" she had asked. "Look, watch me. You take the twisty-tie and you wrap it around the plastic. See? Now you try," she'd said in a patronizing voice.

"It's just bread," Chandler had replied, angry at the disdain in her voice. "Why is everything such a big deal?"

"It's not a big deal, it's just... why can't you just close the bread once in a while? Why can't you make it all easier?" Monica had started crying and stormed into her bedroom. Chandler had written it off as PMS. A lover's spat. Monica was always mad about something these days - if it wasn't the bread, it was his placement of the phone pen, and if it wasn't the phone pen, it was the half-drank soda he left in the fridge - always stupid things like that.

Now Chandler wished he'd followed her into the bedroom. Talked to her, held her, told her how much he loved her, instead of eating his sandwich, going home, reading the Times and watching the Yankees clobber the Cardinals. Maybe then he wouldn't have lost her like this.

Chandler sat on his bed and cried that day. Not big, choking sobs - just a few silent tears running down his face. The more he thought about it, the less sense it made. Why would Monica just leave if she loved him, like Rachel and Phoebe had said? Just pack up her stuff and leave, without saying good-bye, much less providing an explanation. None of it made sense. His girlfriend was gone. And by the sound of it, it didn't seem like she was coming back anytime soon.

Chandler didn't talk to anyone except Joey until Monday, when he went into the coffee-house and found Ross, Rachel and Phoebe talking. The conversation immediately stopped as soon as he came in.

"Hey, you guys," he said hesitantly.

"Hi," Rachel and Phoebe answered quietly. Ross didn't say a word, just looked Chandler up and down with a expression that showed disgust, confusion, pity and a number of other things. They sat in uncomfortable silence for about five minutes until Chandler got his coffee and left.

They hate me, he thought as he walked home. They think I made Monica leave. Maybe he did. Maybe he was so inefficient as a boyfriend that Monica just packed up and left. But why? Why would she leave, why wouldn't she just break up with him? Was there something else going on with Monica? What could there possibly be? Up until a month or so ago, everything was completely normal, and then, almost overnight, Monica vanished. Not literally, of course, but emotionally, spiritually. Maybe, Chandler thought sarcastically, they should have called in an exorcist.

A week went by, and they was no sign of Monica. Chandler couldn't sleep, could barely function. He hadn't realized how long it had been since he didn't have a girlfriend, didn't have that safe comfort of falling asleep every night thinking, "A beautiful woman wants to be with me," and waking up the next morning with the same thought. He hadn't gone this long without seeing Monica, in, well, probably six years - they lived right across the hall from each other for five before hooking up. Even when Monica had been acting strange, she was still there.

On Saturday, a week after Monica had left, Chandler had an 10 AM meeting at the office. Before arriving, he stopped at a donut shop and a coffee-house he had never been to. He was in line at the coffee place, contemplating the effects of a super-tall mocha chill, when he almost choked on his glazed donut.

"I'll have a grande latte, half-and-half, with whip, and could you put some cinnamon on the top?" Chandler knew that order by heart. He had ordered it for Monica so many times...

"Monica?" he said tentatively to the brown-haired woman who looked so much like Monica, if it wasn't her, it was her twin. Monica turned around, and for a moment their eyes met, and it was exactly like it used to be - so much expressed in one moment, so much said without words - and then, without warning, Monica's eyes hardened and she turned back to the counter, quickly picked up her drink, paid, and started to leave.

Chandler felt his heart fall. Monica wouldn't even look at him. "Monica, come on," he said, trying not to let Monica hear the catch in his voice. He followed her out of the coffee shop. "Talk to me, Monica! Why did you leave? Why didn't you even say goodbye? Do you just not love me anymore? Don't you care at all?" A few people standing near the entrance stopped and stared at them, but Chandler didn't care. All these nosy New Yorkers could go screw themselves.

"Don't make a scene," Monica said, but her voice was quiet and strange, very strange.

"Goddammit, I'll make all the scenes I want!" Chandler said, raising his voice again. "Just tell me what the hell is going on? Are we over? Is this your way of breaking up with me? You know, most of the time I at least get an, 'It's not you it's me,' or some other bullshit, but you don't care enough to even say goodbye? Just have your friends give me some crap about needing some time alone?" Monica continued walking, faster, faster away from him. Chandler followed her, intent of getting her to speak, to explain. Finally he grabbed her arm and forced her to stop walking. "Why can't you just say something?"

"You don't understand!" Monica suddenly shouted, pulling away. "You don't know - "

"So then tell me! Make me understand!"

"It's easier this way," Monica whispered, looking straight into his eyes. "Please, just believe me. It's easier this way."

"Easier than what? Than telling the truth? You can't just run away from everything, Monica. You can't leave and think that's going to make everything better." Chandler's voice was hoarse, and he was desperate. "Just tell me what happened. Please tell me, so I can get some - some closure." That wasn't the right word, Chandler thought, closure wasn't exactly right.

"You want it to be over?" Monica said, standing up straight. "Fine, Chandler. It's over." Chandler felt his face crumple. "See? Didn't that make everything better? It's over. Now are you happy?"

And then she was gone, walking briskly away, blending into the crowd of dark-clothed people, leaving Chandler speechless. "All right, folks, show's over," he barked at the small crowd of people that had gathered to watch. Chandler started walking in the opposite direction that Monica had gone. He didn't care if he ever saw her again. He hated her.

No. He loved her. He loved her more than anything. Monica was the first, the only woman he'd ever really loved. As sappy as it sounded, Monica completed him. She made everything else go away - his crappy childhood, his boring as hell job, any troubles he might have - she made it all disappear with one little smile. Even when she left, he still thought she would come back. That they could work it out. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, as someone once said.

He was right. Chandler was dying inside.

A/N: Please review! Reviews really make me happy!

-J