Title: Another Way – Chapter 1

Fandom: Friends

Rating: PG-13

Word count: 1,801

Disclaimer: I don't own them.

Summary: "It's negative." Rachel never realised how much she hated change.

Chapter One

In movies, people can run for miles without getting tired. Rachel was gasping and clutching her side by the time that she'd made it down one corridor. Cursing under her breath, she leant against a wall, doubled over, as she tried to catch her breath.

Her breath came in wheezes and gasps, and she noted briefly how unfit she was. She'd stopped going running when she'd moved in with Joey, and, in hindsight, that was a mistake. And, thinking of mistakes…

She'd never understood how people could refer to a pregnancy as "an accident". You heard it called that all the time really: Katy had had an accident but got it sorted out, Ella's little accident was three months old now, Megan was the best accident her mom ever had. And Rachel had always thought, my god, how could they say that. She'd thought, wow, you'd have to be pretty stupid to have an accident like that. She'd thought, I'm glad it's not my responsibility.

And now it was.

Her hand was pressed against her side, trying to block out the stitch that running had given her. Looking at her hand, she slowly slid it down a few inches, letting it rest on her abdomen.

There was something in there.

Something. That was the safest word for it. Foetus, zygote, embryo, they sounded too clinical. Besides, they didn't all mean the same thing. She was fairly sure that there were different ones for different stages of pregnancy.

Pregnancy. That was another taboo word.

The worst word of all? She didn't let her mind dwell on it. It meant the thing in a pram, in a nursery, something that would grow up to be a person. It meant what she wasn't ready for, what she didn't want, and what she wasn't going to have.

Almost of its own accord, her hand drew back from her abdomen, and she had to bite her lip to keep from screaming.

Straightening up, she leant her head against the wall for a moment, wondering why Phoebe and Monica hadn't followed her. Were they that disgusted by her reaction? She felt a pang of shame at that thought, so she tried to push it out of her head before it took over and she began to cry.

Instead, she walked, very deliberately, away. She walked down two more corridors, three flights of stairs, four streets. And then, not knowing what else to do, she stopped. She didn't feel ready to go home, yet she didn't feel the need to go back to the wedding either. Instead, she walked into the nearest bar that she could find.

Swinging herself onto a high barstool, ignoring the looks her dress was attracting, she fumbled in her purse for a moment before pushing a twenty across the bar. "How much would that get me?"

The waitress, a girl of no more than twenty-five, ran a hand through her eccentrically purple hair. "Too much."

Rachel nodded. "Sounds good. Gimme it."

"Beer? Wine? Vodka?" The girl looked dubious.

"Surprise me."

Three glasses later, Rachel cracked a smile. "I'm Rachel," she told the girl. "You?"

"Meg." She picked up Rachel's latest empty glass. "I can take a guess at the answer, but… want another?"

"And then some." Rachel idly kicked the bar as she waited for Meg to return her glass. "So… why do you work here, Meg?"

She watched Meg scrunch up her nose as she thought. "I need something to put me through college, I suppose. And then, y'know, there's all the fantastic people I get to meet," she added, with an ironic smile, as she passed a vodka shot to Rachel.

Rachel downed it in one. "Ahh," she breathed, looking deep into the glass for a moment. Her reflection peered back at her, distorted and wet. "I work at Ralph Lauren," she told Meg. "Men's fashions."

"Great."

"It is. It's what I've wanted all my life." You have to be a special kind of drunk to spill your life story to a stranger, Rachel had always thought. She'd never understood the characters in the soaps who would do that. And suddenly, she'd… become that? It didn't make sense.

"Cool." Meg looked up. "So, why are you here looking so upset?"

Rachel looked down at the bar. Someone had carved their initials into it.

There had been an afternoon with Ross, a picnic, somewhere out of the city. She remembered his arms around her, his taste on her lips, his eyes in the summer sun.

Pouring champagne into each other's mouths, lying back on a blanket, feeling the dry grass underneath it. Rolling over to face each other, knowing that they were as one.

Feeling her hand wander gently up his leg, watching his agonised expression. Giggling.

RG♥RG spelled with spilt M&Ms – a mistake turned beautiful.

"My best friend got married today." It was the safest answer.

"Oh." Meg digested that, before asking, "I guess you were maid of honour?"

"Uh huh."

"So… why'd you walk out on it?" It was an understandable question, but that was all it took to make Rachel cry.

She felt in her purse for a tissue, glad that Monica had chosen dresses with matching purses. Thinking of Monica made a fresh sob catch in her throat. "I walked out on her…" She gulped, leaning her head against her hand.

Meg had the awkward look of a child seeing an adult crying and being unsure of what to do. "I… I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make you cry. I just wondered."

Rachel breathed deeply, before replying. "It's okay. I just… I had some bad news. I had to get out of there before I ruined her day." She stood up. "And I should probably go now."

"Do you want me to call you a cab?" Meg offered. "I don't think you should go walking anywhere in that condition."

"Condition?" Rachel stumbled in her shock, before realising that Meg was referring to her sobriety – or lack of it. "Oh, yeah. I'm okay."

"If you're sure." Meg looked doubtful. "Good luck, Rachel."

Rachel didn't reply. She didn't even look back.

It was better to be alone, she reflected. Much, much better. If she was alone, then she didn't have to talk, pretend that she was feeling better than she was. She didn't have to answer questions about what was the matter. She felt that, had Meg pushed her any more, pushed her to confront what was happening to her, she would have screamed.

She didn't know what she would have screamed. It would have been incoherent. It would have been a plea, a prayer, for someone to take pity on her, to change her situation. Let it have been Monica's test after all, she would have prayed. Let this just be a dream. And she would have prayed to all the gods that she could think of.

It was nearly three in the morning when she forced herself to go home. It just felt much too hard to have to go home to the place where it had all begun.

As she pushed the door open, she heard voices. Phoebe and Joey were sitting at the counter, discussing something furiously.

"Joseph Tribbiani, it is none of your business!" Phoebe snapped, before breaking off as she saw the door open. She leapt up from her stool, knocking it over in the process, and bit her lip as she saw Rachel. "Oh god, oh Rachel… are you okay?"

Rachel shrugged, and wordlessly walked past them. She flung her purse in the general direction of her bedroom, before throwing herself down on the sofa.

"I've been so worried," Phoebe said, softly.

"No need." Rachel examined a broken nail on her hand, feigning nonchalance. "I'm fine. It's all fine."

"I don't think it is," Phoebe replied.

"What's the matter?" Joey asked, crouching down in front of her. "Phoebe won't tell me, but Rach… you know I care about you, right? You know I don't want you to be hurting; I'm your friend. I want to help you."

"No one can help me." That's a lie, said a little voice inside her head. Anyone could help you; you're just not letting them.

"It's never that bad," Phoebe told her, a slightly stern tone in her voice. "It's not like you're dying, Rachel."

Rachel's head shot up. "Stop it."

Joey looked uncertainly between the two. "Do you, uh, do you want me to go?"

"No, Joe, it's fine. Stay." Rachel reached out and grabbed his hand. "I'm fine, honestly." She looked over at Phoebe. "It's just, oh God, Pheebs, I've spent seven years getting to where I am in my life, I've finally got it all, and then… this happened."

"It's a new challenge." Phoebe smiled, but Rachel could tell that it was forced.

"It's not one I want." Rachel sighed. "I like my independence, y'know? That's always been what I wanted – that's why I left Barry, it's why I came out here… and I don't want to lose that."

Joey was nodding slightly to himself, and Rachel, looking at him, knew that he'd figured it out. Dim as he may have seemed, he wasn't stupid. "You're pregnant?" he asked, gently, and Phoebe nodded in response.

Rachel looked down at her hands. "I don't know what to do, guys. It's just, it's so scary, and so much, y'know?"

"Whose, uh, whose is it?" Joey asked, tentatively.

"I'm not sure I should say… I should probably tell him first." Rachel bit her lip. "But oh God, I don't want to. What if he wants me to… to have it?"

"Then don't." Before Rachel knew what was happening, Phoebe was next to her on the couch, and had put an arm around her. "Rach, sweetie, this is your responsibility, your choice… no one else's."

Joey nodded, and sat down on the other side. "It's your body." He thought for a moment. "I know that if a woman I'd been with told me she was pregnant, I'd leave it up to her to decide what to do. Even if I wanted… it, it wouldn't be up to me, because I wouldn't be the one to carry it for nine months or give birth to it or breastfeed or whatever." He looked closely at Rachel, obviously checking to see whether he'd gone too far.

"You're just a nice guy, Joe." Rachel leant her head on his shoulder, and smiled slightly as Phoebe gently moved her legs onto her lap, before starting to massage her feet. "Thanks, you guys. I don't know what I'd do without you."