My Friend Across The Hall
Chapter 1
When she heard the familiar voices outside her apartment door, Monica Geller scrambled to hide the evidence she had been eating anything out of the ordinary. She grabbed a bottled water from the fridge and was drinking from it when Rachel Green and Phoebe Buffay entered the apartment.
"Hey, Mon," Rachel and Phoebe said.
"Hi," she said, giving them a small smile and a wave.
Rachel set her shopping bags near the couch.
"Too bad you didn't go shopping with us," Phoebe said, her voice excited. "I loved seeing Rachel so totally in her element. You should have seen her racing to try on as many outfits as she could before the store closed. I think she broke her own record."
Rachel gave Phoebe an exasperated look but then couldn't help but to agree with her.
"It's true," she admitted.
"Sorry I missed that," Monica said, glancing nervously around the room.
"Is something wrong?" Rachel asked, picking up on her roommate's strange vibe.
"No, nothing. Why would you think that?"
"No reason. You just seem a bit skittish."
"Like you're hiding something," Phoebe added, nodding. "Ooo," she said suddenly. "Or someone."
Rachel quickly agreed with her friend.
"Are you?" they both asked Monica.
"No," Monica snapped. "I'm not hiding anyone in here."
Phoebe and Rachel exchanged shrugs and "oh well" type of looks.
"It was worth a shot," Phoebe said.
Monica shook her head and rolled her eyes.
"Let me just put my bags in my room and then we can all go downstairs for coffee," Rachel said.
"The guys are waiting for us," Phoebe added.
"I'm going to pass," Monica said, furthering her friends' interest in what was going on.
"Why?" Rachel asked, after emerging from her bedroom.
"No reason. I just don't feel like coffee. But bring the gang back here later. I'm making lasagna."
"Okay," they said, heading for the door.
As soon as she was alone, Monica quickly lifted the window seat cover and removed the empty bag of chocolate chip cookies, the empty box of cupcakes, and various candy bar wrappers and dumped them in the trash chute. Walking back towards her apartment, she promised herself, for the fifth time in the last two weeks, that she would not use comfort food to get over her breakup with Richard Burke.
But she had no sooner entered her apartment than she was thinking about what she would bake for dessert.
"For the others," she scolded herself out loud. "Not for you, Monica!"
Chandler Bing was the first to notice that Monica wasn't with Rachel and Phoebe.
"Hey, guys," they said, making themselves comfortable on the couch after having ordered their coffees. "Monica said she's preparing dinner for us tonight."
"Yeah, baby," Joey Tribbiani said, a huge smile plastered on his handsome face.
"Is that why she isn't here?" Chandler asked.
Rachel and Phoebe exchanged glances. "We're not sure," Rachel said. "Monica was acting a bit…strange."
"What do you mean?" Ross Geller, Monica's older brother, asked.
The ladies shrugged. "I don't know really," Phoebe said. "It just seemed like she wanted us out of the apartment."
"Yeah," Rachel concurred. "That's what it felt like to me, too."
Joey nodded. "That happened to me yesterday."
"Really?" Rachel asked. "What did Mon say to you?"
"She told me to get out of the apartment so she could get dressed. What? Like I was gonna watch?"
Ross gave Joey a look of disgust.
"Not the same thing, Joe," Chandler informed his roommate.
Joey shrugged nonchalantly and then took a big bite of his pastry.
"I think we all need to cut my sister some slack," Ross said. "You know she's still hurting from her breakup with Richard. She's entitled to be acting, well, a little weird."
"Sure," Rachel said. "I'm giving her the space she needs, honey."
"I know you are," Ross said, giving Rachel a kiss. "You're a wonderful friend to her."
Rachel smiled and patted Ross' knee.
"Hey, we're all her friends," Phoebe spoke up.
"I know that," Ross said. "She's lucky to have you guys, and she knows it. I'm sure Monica will snap out of this funk she's been in any time now. You'll see."
While the others looked at each other and nodded, Chandler remained curiously quiet. A few days ago, he'd inadvertently stumbled upon the remnants of one of Monica's eating binges. He'd wanted to talk to her about it, but he had absolutely no idea what he could or should say. He wasn't exactly known among his friends for being able to give sage advice. The last thing he wanted to do was to say the wrong thing and mess his friend up even more.
But he also knew there was no way he could let Monica self-destruct. If she needed help, as inept as he may be at it, he planned to be there for his friend.