Title: Nightswimming I

Author: Kaitlyn

Rating: PG-13/R

Summary: Burning lungs, dirty dancing, nightswimming and second chances...Loud music, tainted smoke, fiery kisses and racing hearts. Everyone remembers what it was like to be 18. Established R/R and eventual C/M

Okay, so I lied. The update will actually come BEFORE my New York trip. As it turns out, we're not leaving until 4 pm. So, I'm spending my afternoon packing, writing a paper and continuing this fic. I've been brainstorming about this chapter for a while, so I hope I do it justice! I'm going to do it in two installments, as I don't want to rush through and accidentally glaze right over some significant parts. If this is unclear, I am splitting the huge update into two, fairly sizable updates. The next one will be a new CHAPTER, but will be entitled "Nightswimming II", as it will also take place at the reservoir and will tie up loose ends from the happenings there. I hope this makes sense.

The title of this chapter comes from the song by R.E.M.

Note: I'm not sure if Dr. Green ACTUALLY served in Vietnam, but he did for the purpose of my story :-)

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"Who's this?" Monica asked, picking up a silver picture frame from Rachel's dresser and examining the photograph. It was a black and white print of a man and a woman standing by the ocean. The girl was on the boy's back, dawning a smile so wide that the expanse of teeth caught Monica's eye immediately. The boy, on the other hand, seemed mysterious with intensely dark eyes and a vigilant gaze painted across his face. Rachel glanced quickly at the photo.

"Oh, those are my parents. It was taken right after my dad got back from the war. My mom was just out of high school," Rachel answered, directing her attention back to the toenails that she was painting.

"Wow, your dad looks really serious."

"My dad is really serious," Rachel stated obviously, still not looking up from the meticulous work. "He wasn't always that way, though," she continued, getting up from her place on the carpet and heading for her desk drawer. She reached inside to reveal another photo- this one also in black and white, but of a slightly younger version of the kids from the first one. The boy was adorned in a football uniform and was kissing the hand of the very obviously giddy girl.

"This was my dad's senior year of high school. It was taken 2 weeks before he left for Saigon," Rachel mused, subconsciously running her fingers over the glossy image. She shook her head in nostalgia. "God, look how happy they were." She stared intently at the picture for a few more moments before retuning it to it's rightful place in the drawer.

"They're still happy, Rach. Your dad just got more serious. There's nothing wrong with that. I guess a war and medical school will do that to you." Rachel nodded, having returned to painting her toes in a metallic pink shade.

"I guess," she replied drearily. The girls were quiet for a few more moments. Monica hadn't meant to put such a damper on the moment. Without really thinking, she turned the framed picture upside down on Rachel's dresser. She wasn't sure why.

"Did you know that my mom used to want to be a marine biologist?" Rachel asked seemingly arbitrarily. Monica shook her head.

"Me neither," Rachel replied. "I was in the attic a few weeks ago and I found some of my mom's old notebooks and journals from when she was our age. She wanted to marry my dad, move to California and spend her life on a boat, studying the ocean." She let out an abrupt huff, shaking her head slightly. "I'm glad to see things worked out so well for her."

"Sweety, things did work out well for her. She ended up in a nice house, married to the man she loves, and having 3 beautiful daughters. What else could she ask for?" Monica tried to comfort her friend, but was not really sure what had provoked this onslaught of regretful reminiscence.

"The life she always wanted," Rachel answered, looking up at her friend for the first time since the conversation had begun. "Sure, this is okay, Monica, but it's not what she wanted. This wasn't her dream. She wanted to live by the ocean and study whales and dolphins. Instead, she's 37 years old and pigeonholed into a mediocre retail job, living 10 blocks from where she was born and married to a man who doesn't know she's there on the rare occasion that he is. It sucks, Mon."

"Rachel, if you don't mind me asking, what brought all of this on?" Monica asked in a soothing tone that let Rachel know she was concerned and not annoyed. Rachel shrugged, fixing the nail-polish's cap back onto the bottle and throwing it into the bag of make-up that it had come from.

"I think my parents are getting a divorce," she stated matter-of-factly, in a tone similar to the one she might use when giving a formal oral presentation for her English class. Her voice did not break. She didn't falter in the least. Monica, on the other hand, narrowed her eyes in disbelief.

"What?" she whispered.

"My dad packed a suitcase last week and walked out of the house the next morning like he was going to work. Only, he never came back. Amy overhead him saying something to my mom about 'a separation' and 'time to clear their heads'. That's not what he really meant, though. If my dad does something, he does it all the way. I'd be surprised if he even came back to say goodbye," Rachel declared. Monica moved closer to her friend and ran a sympathetic hand up her arm.

"I'm really sorry, Rach. I had no idea."

"Yeah, well, me neither," Rachel spoke somewhat bitterly, turning her head away. It was unclear if she was crying or not. There were no tears, but something in her voice was collapsing on top of itself.

"Does Ross know?" Monica asked. She didn't know why she did. If Rachel had only found out a week before and hadn't even told her yet, she had no reason to believe that Ross would know. Rachel shook her head.

"I haven't told him. I haven't told anyone. He'd just freak out, anyway. I know it's just because he cares so much, but I don't really need the pity brigade following me around right now. I don't think I could handle that."

"Well," Monica offered, her tone of voice raising a little to something a bit more uplifting, "I say forget about it. Your parents are big kids and they know what's best for them. Maybe this is finally the thing that's going to make both of them happy." Monica realized that those words might have sounded unintentionally harsh, but Rachel didn't seem to take them as such.

"Yeah, maybe," she sniffled. A few tears had finally gathered in the corners of her eyes, and she reached up to whip them away before they fell. "Whatever, I don't want to think about it anymore. Ross and Chandler are going to be here to pick us up in like 20 minutes. Let's go get ready."

Monica reached her hand out to her friend and helped her up from the floor. Rachel crossed the room and disappeared into her connecting bathroom, leaving the door cracked. Monica stood alone in the room, surveying it, and she couldn't help but overhear all of the lies it was telling. The walls were green and covered with posters from all of Rachel's favorite bands. Expensive clothes littered the floor and hung down from doorknobs and opened drawers. Dozens of metals and trophies were lined across the bookshelf in the corner from the days of her diehard cheerleading. Monica took a deep breath, taking in the contents of a room that would never know it's keeper. Rachel was so much more than all of that. In fact, those things seemed foreign to the image of her best friend that Monica possessed. Pretty pink stuffed animals and flowery sheets seemed so far displaced as to be almost ironic in context of the type of person she knew Rachel to be. So strong, she thought. So brave, and it's all going to hell. The room's lies began to sting after too much longer, so Monica pursued Rachel to the bathroom and shut the door behind her, trapping inside all of the fraudulent ghosts that were forever haunting her best friend.

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"There's a REASON you don't play football, Ross," Chandler pointed out, after having pitched the ball to his friend, only to watch him clumsily fumble it. Ross ran after the ball and retrieved it, winding it up and chucking it back at Chandler. It hit him square in the stomach.

"Whoops," he chuckled.

The four had arrived at the reservoir around an hour previously. It was set back into the woods a bit, at the end of a winding road that was blocked off by a gothic-looking steal gate. There was a large grassy bank leading up to the water, which was where the gang had chosen to set up. Chandler had brought several plastic lawn chairs and coolers full of soda. Ross brought his stereo and an old football. The girls sat on two of the lawn chairs and talked by the water while the guys tossed around the football.

"I wonder when that Joey guy's going to get here," Chandler cogitated aloud to Ross.

"I don't know," he huffed, rolling the football over in his hands and stretching his fingers across the leather. "Dude, I'm telling you, that guy's bad news. I mean, what kind of guy drives a Mustang, wears muscles shirts and leather jackets and ISN'T looking to score with another guy's girlfriend. It's like in the code book or something."

"Don't you think you're overreacting just a tad?" Chandler asked, jumping up in the air to recover the especially high pass that Ross had just thrown. "Besides, even if he did have some intention of making a move, Rachel would deny him immediately. I don't think you have anything to worry about."

Ross looked over at Rachel, who was sitting with her knees up under her chin in a white lawn chair down by the water. Even from where he was standing a few yards away, the familiar batting of her eyelashes and the enthusiastic gesticulations when she talked was unmistakable. She was wearing a simple white t-shirt and light jean shorts, and the fact that she was going barefoot made the whole outfit all that much more endearing. She could be wearing a sweat suit and she'd STILL take my breath away, he mused. For a moment, she let her hair down in order to put it back up again properly, and he was hypnotized by the way the long golden strands caught the last beams of dying sunlight.

"Uh, Ross?" Chandler asked, smiling at his friend's secret indulgence that had not gone so secretively.

"Yeah, sorry. I was just, um, thinking," Ross nodded, walking over to Chandler and placing the ball in his hands rather than throwing it to him. "Can I ask you something?"

"Sure, anything."

"Have you, uh, noticed anything different about Rachel lately? I mean, have you noticed her being, I don't know, more quiet than usual?" Ross gestured towards where she was sitting with his sister down by the water's edge. At the moment, she was laughing quite loudly at something Monica had just said, throwing her head back and grabbing her stomach.

"No, not really. Why? Have you?" Chandler asked. Ross nodded, not looking away from her.

"It's probably nothing. She's just seemed a little...sad, I guess. Maybe that's why I'm taking the Joey thing so hard. The fact that she's acting differently, paired with her sudden interest in this new guy, just kind of threw me off-guard. I'm just being paranoid, though, so forget I ever said anything."

At that moment, as if on cue, that proverbial jet black Mustang roared up to where the two boys were standing. It's tires screeched when it came to a halt. Joey emerged, wearing a pair of swimming trunks and nothing else. Ross was less than pleased.

"What's going on?" he asked, opening up his back door and pulling out 2 twelve-packs from the back seat. He held them up in the fashion of a peace offering, with one in each hand. "You guys got ice?"

"Yeah, the coolers are right over there," Chandler answered, pointing to where the girls were sitting. "Make yourself at home."

"Yeah, take whatever you'd like. You know, whatever you want, don't hesitate to just..." Ross paused, smiling smugly, "...SNATCH it right up." He snapped on the word "snatched" to accentuate his point. He wasn't surprised when Joey missed it completely.

"Thanks!" he exclaimed, walking past them and making his way down to the girls. Ross watched him as he walked away.

"Can you believe that? Swimming trunks. I should have figured. I bet he doesn't even have to work out, either. There's probably something in the Italian blood that just MAKES you look like that." Ross had definitely surpassed the enragement stage and was rapidly picking up steam on his way to chronic self-pity.

"Look, dude," Chandler said, placing his hand on Ross' shoulder, "you know what Rachel sees when she looks at him?"

"What?"

"Probably about the same thing she sees when she looks at me. Make you feel any better?" he asked.

"Yeah, sort of, actually," Ross kidded, patting his friend on the back in appreciation. "Thanks for putting up with all my shit, man. I know I'm being a real girl about all of this."

"No problem," Chandler nodded. "Now, you'd better score tonight, or that title is going to stick."

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Another 30 minutes or so after Joey's arrival, Phoebe pulled up in a van filled with 5 of her friends. She introduced them as being Marcy (whom Chandler had previously dated), Gary, Daniel, Frank and Carlie. Rachel immediately recognized Gary as the one who she'd been playing Hacky Sack with in the courtyard earlier that day. After the beer, chairs and CD's that they brought were unloaded, the gathering really picked up. The sun had long since vanished, and stars were just beginning to unveil themselves in the expanse of summer sky. Music was blasting, people were laughing and talking, and some had even started dancing.

Through all of the commotion, Ross had noticed Rachel sitting alone down by the water. She was on the edge of a small dock with her legs dangling down in the water. He wandered away from the conversation he'd been having with Chandler and Frank about the colleges they were looking at and made his way down the small grassy hill to where she was sitting. He took the seat beside her, rolled up his pants legs and sunk his feet into the cold liquid.

"You know," he began, "people are eventually going to be drinking this stuff." He motioned towards their feet, making her grin weakly. He scooted a little closer, sliding a hand over her back.

"What's wrong?" he asked concernedly.

"Nothing," she replied. He knew all along that would be her answer. He had never asked her what was wrong without her answering in that way. She was far too stubborn to get straight to the point, he thought fondly.

"Don't say that. I know you better than that," he coaxed, rubbing circles over her back with his hand. She allowed herself to lean into his body weight and rest her head against his shoulder.

"I know you do."

"So..." he urged, begging her to continue. She sighed deeply and licked her lips.

"I don't know, to tell you the truth. Everything lately has seemed so...fucked up." He was somewhat staggered at her harsh choice of words, but he found himself only tightening his grip around her.

"Tell me about it," he asked, using the term as it's literal meaning.

"A lot of things are just getting put into perspective, I guess. I really opened up on Monica the other night after we got back from the club about how sometimes I feel like more of a possession than a real person. Then, I broke down again this afternoon in front of her because of my parents," she revealed. She regretting it immediately. She didn't want him to know. She didn't want him to pity her. Surprisingly, though, that wasn't the part he chose to focus on.

"I make you feel like a possession?" he asked feebly. She turned under his arm, looking him in the face.

"Oh, no, honey. I didn't mean you. If anything, you're the only one keeping me sane. I just meant...well, I guess I'm starting to realize my real reasons for quitting the cheerleading squad. Being wanted isn't always a good thing."

"I'm not sure I understand."

"It's kind of like," she started, trying her best to explain, "this water. It's shiny and inviting on the surface, and everyone looking at it admirers it and wants to dive in. The only problem is that it's murky and impossible to see what's at the bottom. For all anyone knows, it's only 4 feet deep the whole way across. They might dive in a break their necks on the rocks." She looked a Ross to see if he was understanding. He clearly was not. She began again.

"No one cares what's underneath, Ross, because the point isn't to ACTUALLY dive in. It's the desire to do it. It's the fantasy of it. What's on the bottom has no significance to you or me, because all we want this reservoir for is to dip our feet into it and stare longingly."

"You're the reservoir in this analogy, right?" he asked innocently, earning him a sympathetic chuckle from Rachel. He was trying his hardest to understand her point. "I'm really bad with metaphors."

"Yes. I'm the reservoir." She looked directly into his eyes as she said it, deepening it's impact.

"You think that no one sees you?" he asked, staring back with an equal caliber of intensity. She sighed again and turned her gaze away from him to look out over the breadth of water.

"I think that no one has seen me in a very long time," she reflected, somewhat vaguely. She wasn't facing him, so she didn't catch the look of twisted pain on his face from that piece of his heart that broke ever so slightly from her words. He reached up his with left hand and turned her chin to face him. He brushed her cheek with the backs of his knuckles.

"I see you." He smiled, hoping that those words were enough. He alone had sufficed to mend her heart very few times during their relationship, but he had always been okay with this. Loving her came with the small price of knowing that she could take care of herself and yield her own pain. If for just a moment in time, though, her heart could forget how brave she was, maybe he could be enough for her, just this once.

She smiled, bringing her hand up to cover his. He leaned in, kissing her lips just firmly enough so that she knew it was there before he broke it. Then, he rose to his feet. Without thinking, because he had done enough of that already that evening, he bent his knees, swung back his arms, and pushed his momentum forward, sailing right off the dock. He jumped up, bending at the top of his arch and diving in headfirst. He pierced through the surface with a flawless precision, causing only a small ripple of waves. Rachel panicked for a moment, having not seem it coming. She rose quickly to her feet, prepared to jump in after him. Before she could react, though, his head had already emerged from the water. He was a good 15 feet out when he resurfaced, his hair shaggy and damp and sticking out in every direction. He smiled at her proudly, knowing that he had proved a point to her that night. He would not ever say anything of his gesture. He would never verbalize what a grand monument it had served to his feelings for her. He let the action speak for itself, and as he waded in the water, he caught a glimpse of her smile through the night. He had dived in.

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End Chapter 5. Continued in Chapter 6.