Chapter 6: Exhaustion

Joey rearranged the vase on the coffee table for the umpteenth time. Either it didn't stand right in the center of the table, or the light just didn't hit it right, or the flowers in it – lilies, of course – weren't displayed to their fullest beauty. He'd done that for the past twenty minutes with indefinite patience. It began to wear thin. The time before his decorative efforts, he had spent – as always – with removing various numbers of hazardous objects from their living room. Toy cars, little plastic animals, and Barbie's high heels. One never suspected just how dangerous they were, until one actually stepped on either of those items with bare feet. An experience that, after having made it a few times, Joey meticulously tried to avoid.

It's been about an hour since Rachel had gone up with Tyler to put him to bed. Fifty five minutes that Joey had spent industriously bustling around in the living room, trying his best to be unconcerned. Trust was the key here, he reminded himself of what Rachel's shrink had told him. She needed to know that he wasted no thought whatsoever on her having a relapse. He needed to be her pillar of strength. Problem was, he didn't feel particularly strong right now. He felt more like tearing upstairs and finding out what the hell took her so long.

About a blink of an eye later, he did.

Rachel's bedroom was empty, which he took to be a good sign.

He heaved a deep sigh of relief when he found her in Tyler's bed. And then he did squash an equally deep sense of disappointment. He had loved their time together last night, loved how they could talk again, a little awkward still, but really getting down to their issues. He needed that, more than he'd ever thought he did. After all, he wasn't the talking kind of guy. But after two years of misunderstandings and silence, he had suddenly found out how much he had missed opening up to her. Well, and holding her, kissing her. In short, having a wife.

It looked as if she was sleeping alone, right on Bob the Builder's smiling face. Only a little fist possessively clutching a strand of her hair, and a mob of black hair peeping out from under the covers let him know that there was his son nestled into the curve of Rachel's body.

He had half a mind to let them sleep, but he knew he shouldn't let Tyler getting used to sleeping in one bed with Rachel all the time. Because, among thousands of very good pediatric and psychological reasons, Joey felt he ought to be the one sleeping in one bed with Rachel.

With care not to wake either of them, he untangled Tyler's hand from Rachel's hair, and then scooped Rachel up into his arms, a little unnerved about how light she still was.

After he had gently placed her on her bed, he took a look around the repainted and redecorated room. The repainting he had done himself while she was in the hospital. It had felt therapeutic. The redecoration he had left to a professional, but Rachel – as he noticed now – had added a few personal touches as well.

The pictures on her vanity for instance. One family picture from three years ago, with Tyler sitting on his smiling mother's lap, fiercely scowling at the camera. They'd been happy then. Another recent one of him with his children – without Rachel, for obvious reasons. And one she had taken eight years ago, while he slept. He hadn't understood for the longest time why she kept it in such high regard. It showed him, drooling in his sleep on the barcalounger, Ally – three months old at the time – sleeping peacefully on his chest, covered by one of his hands that seemed gigantic in comparison to the tiny baby.

"When I saw you two like that," she had tried to explain later, when asked about the picture, "I felt so much love for the two of you, I thought I might die from happiness."

He could understand that, there had been a lot of those moments for him, too. He only sometimes wished that he had a picture of them.

Reluctantly, he tore his gaze away from the pictures and took another look around. There were candles everywhere, matches besides. Rachel had that notion that nothing was more romantic and sensuous than making love in candlelight. For him, it pretty much didn't matter what light it was. In a pinch, he could do without any light at all. It was the making love part that he found important. Although, admittedly, Rachel looked spectacular in candlelight, especially when wearing nothing but a smile.

His mind came to a screeching halt at the thought. Was that what she had in mind? Was that the reason she had placed all those candles in here?

He had not thought of that. Deprived as he was, he had not dared, not allowed himself to think of that. She was too sick, too fragile, it was only her second day at home… and yet here she obviously was, thinking about it, planning it.

He took one of the matchboxes that was nearest and lit one of the candles with a slightly shaking hand. When he looked back at her, still peacefully sleeping, he found that she still looked breathtakingly beautiful in candlelight. A bit paler than usual, but still. The faint light illuminated the small scar on her cheek, and he couldn't resist reaching out and slightly touching it with his fingertips. As much as he wanted to wake her, he would not. He could ask her about the candles tomorrow.

It occurred to him, that he ought to at least take her pants off, and maybe her blouse, so she could sleep comfortably. She was wearing snug-fitting sweatpants that came off easily enough. As he looked at her exposed belly, he was startled once again at how painfully thin she still was. And then something else caught his eyes. Another scar, on the underside of her belly button, glinting silvery in the dim light. A stretch mark from her second pregnancy. He still remembered seeing it for the first time. It was an angry red bruise at first, about an inch long, leading downwards from her bellybutton, which was at the time sticking funnily out from her enormous belly. For a second there, he had thought she'd freak. She had been so proud after Ally's birth, that she had come away without any stretch marks at all. But she had just smiled sardonically down at her belly and said, "You owe me one hell of a thoughtful mother's day gift, baby."

Over time, the bruise had healed, and when her belly turned back to normal and her navel drew inwards again, all that was left was half an inch of barely visible scar tissue.

"My battle scar," Rachel had called it sometimes.

Again he couldn't stop himself from touching it lightly, feeling the texture of the healed rip, even softer and smoother than the surrounding skin. He hadn't needed to touch it to remember what it felt like under his fingertips. He actually also knew what it felt like under his lips, or on the tip of his tongue. He knew how it tasted. And although he knew all that, he still had half a mind to refresh the memory. But he caught himself just in time. He wouldn't steal such an intimacy from her while she was unconscious.

When he peeled her out of her blouse, a slightly more difficult task than the pants, his mind went back to the first time he had undressed her.

………

It was on the night of their first date. They had tumbled into his bedroom and onto his bed, kissing and blindly groping at each other like teenagers. Her unbridled enthusiasm had surprised him. Of course he knew she wanted that, she had made that clear before. But obviously she had also opted to skip the usual first date moves and strategies. Not that he was complaining.

Apparently fed up with his somewhat uncoordinated attempts at getting her out of her clothes, she started undressing herself. That was the point when he decided to try a completely different approach to this. He hadn't wanted this to be some frenzied fuck, some half hour long romp in the hay that both of them had probably had in abundance. He wanted to do something he had never tried before. Taking it slow, delaying the pleasure, drawing it out.

He put his hand over hers and stilled her movement.

"I want to do this."

She took a calming deep breath and sat up again from her half lying position. "Okay," she said, sounding mildly surprised.

He started to softly caress her face, taking his time to marvel at the softness of her skin, its silky texture. He carefully watched her for any signs of impatience or disappointment, but he found none. Her chest was still heaving with panting intakes of breath, but otherwise she stayed perfectly still, curiously watching him.

It had been an extraordinary experience. He slowly took off her blouse, barely touching her. Then he started caressing her slowly and extensively, breathing kisses here and there on her heated skin. With rapt fascination he watched her going from moaning appreciatively to trembling with unfulfilled need. After removing her pants and running his hands up her legs to her crotch, he teasingly touched the center of her desire through the fabric of her panties. Just enough for her to feel it, not enough to really get her anywhere.

Then he continued with what she had later called 'sweet torture'. Light kisses, teasing touches, caresses that set her skin on fire.

When he finally put his mouth between her legs, stroking her clit with his tongue just once, she exploded with a high pitched cry.

It left him a bit stunned and borderline disappointed because he had hoped to have more of a chance to get to feel her, to taste her. Which was the reason he brought his mouth down on her again and when she didn't protest, he didn't stop until she cried out again, clamping her legs around his neck, convulsing and trembling. He crawled up to her and watched her come down from her high.

Even eight years later he could still remember the ache that had filled his heart at seeing her like this, at realizing it was him who could make her feel this way. It had been an overwhelming, almost life changing realization. Looking back, he knew that it had been this moment that he felt for the first time that, if he could have her, he would never want to be with anyone else, ever again.

When he was finally inside her for the first time, her body molded itself around him as if it had been made for him. It had felt that way for him every time he was with her. As if they had been made for one another. Later, when their relationship had started to be about more than just sex, he had that feeling about almost everything they did together. That as long as they were doing something together, they couldn't fail.

He moved in a steady rhythm, again trying to get as much pleasure for both of them out of it as possible. Suddenly a jolt went through Rachel and he stopped, getting worried.

"Dahh… do that again," Rachel panted into his ear and he obliged, trying to exactly repeat the move he had made before. "Ahhh… I can't believe this… yeah… right there... "

It took only a couple more thrusts for her to climax yet again, digging her nails into his back and crying out his name. That one had gone through his body like a shot of adrenaline.

There was no control left in him after that, only raw desire. Luckily she exploded once more before he did.

When it was over, he had collapsed beside her, flat on his back.

After a few moments in which he tried to get his breathing back under control, he heard Rachel talk beside him.

"Wow, Joey, if sex with you is always like that, we won't do anything else for a looong time."

He rolled onto his side and looked at her. She was lying on her side too, facing him and favoring him with a wide and happy smile. He hadn't even tried to remember the last time that he had felt this happy, this content.

"Would you be disappointed if I tell you that I never used to do it like that, never took it that slow?"

She had seemed to have to think about this for a while before announcing, "No. No… I think that makes it even better."

………

Joey tucked the comforter carefully around Rachel's sleeping form. Life had taught him patience, and patient he would be. But now that he knew how Rachel thought about physical intimacy, a tendril of heat uncoiled in his gut, making him hope he wouldn't have to be patient for too long.

Rachel was in heaven. In her case, heaven was her living room in which she was sitting on the couch, making out with her husband. Today she had been smart. Trying to prevent herself falling asleep in her son's bed, she had taken a nap in the afternoon, and she had asked Joey to put Tyler to bed. Tyler had thrown a bit of a tantrum, but after Joey had conspiratorially whispered something in his ear, he had been silent.

After spending the second day in a row with her son, she had finally started to get an idea of what was bothering him. Without her even asking him anything, Tyler had suddenly started to ask her questions.

"Mommy, do you think daddy is happy?"

It was a loaded question and none that she wanted to go to the bottom to with a four-year-old. "Yeah, I think so, why?"

"He was always sad when you were here, he just started to be happy when you were away, in the hospital."

The realization that Tyler might have thought that Joey was happy about her being away hit her like a brick in the gut. It must have been torture for his little soul to be torn apart between wanting his mother back and thinking this would make his father unhappy. Unlike Ally, he had never seen the two of them being happy together.

Trying not to cry, she had taken her son in her arms and gently caressed his head. "Tyler, sweetie, daddy was always sad because mommy was sick. When I was in the hospital he knew mommy was getting better, so that is why he is happy again."

"So daddy really loves you?"

He has to, she thought, for having went through all those years without leaving me.

"Yeah, I think he does," she said to Tyler. "But why don't you ask him, you know, from man to man?"

Tyler wasn't so easily placated and there still seemed to be something that heavily weighted on him. "He was crying a lot, you know?" he said, making Rachel's heart constrict painfully. "Like a baby," he added with all the condescension in his voice, his almost five year old self could muster.

She did not know what to say. She wasn't even sure there was anything to say to that. Then again, a child needed the trust in its parents' strength. She might have an excuse for being frail, because she was sick. But Joey, he needed to be the daddy who could do everything, knew everything, and didn't cry like a baby, at least not without a very good reason.

"It helps to let your feelings out sometimes. And daddy was very, very scared for mommy, because I was so sick and he couldn't talk to anyone about it. And it's always better to talk about what's bothering you. You know, this is why mommy got sick, because I kept something a secret from everyone and it made me sick."

Tyler looked up at her with round, dark eyes, so much like Joey's it almost made her cry.

"And then you told your secret and you got better again?" he asked, almost sounding hopeful.

"Yeah," Rachel whispered, realizing the truth in this simple statement, "that is how it was."

'You are as sick as your secrets', was one of the many saying she had read in the book they had given her in the hospital.

"I've a secret, too," Tyler said quietly, resting his head against her shoulder.

"Do you want to tell me?" she asked, almost dreading what he had to say.

"I want to, but it's daddy's secret. I don't know if I should tell you."

Rachel had a sickening feeling she knew what this was about, but still hoped she was wrong.

"You should talk to daddy. Tell him what you thought, ask him if he's happy and… and about his secret."

Finally Tyler nodded and then he jumped off her lap and ran out the door. Before she had collected herself enough to get up and go about her tasks, he came barging back in, looking up at her.

"What was it?", he asked.

"What do you mean, sweetie?"

"Your secret, the one that made you sick, what was it?"

Rachel crouched down in front of him and gently took his hand. In the hospital, she had thought hours about how to explain to him one time why she had become an alcoholic. She might as well do it now.

"You know, daddy and I wanted Ally and you to have a little brother or a little sister. But then mommy found out that can't happen anymore and… it made me so sad, I didn't even tell daddy."

"It made you sad that you can't have another baby?"

"Yes."

"Are Ally and I not enough for you?"

She had only one answer to the innocently asked question. She opened her arms and pressed her son against her heart.

………

When Joey came down into the living room again, she had asked him if Tyler had talked to him.

"Yeah, what was that all about?" Joey answered, smiling a little insecurely. "He asked me if I love you."

She avoided his questioning gaze. "I told him to ask you. He told me today that he had been afraid that me being home again would make you sad because you had always been sad before."

Joey shook his head and unceremoniously plopped down on the couch next to her. "God, that must have been horrible for him. I didn't even know he thought I was always sad."

She turned to look at him, her stomach clenching at what she meant to tell him. "He said he saw you cry… a lot."

He froze for a second and then ran his right hand through his hair.

"It wasn't a lot," he said at length. "It was just once when they out of the blue asked me if you were going to die because you were sick all the time." He paused then, as if contemplating something. "And yeah… the one time after… I found you in the kitchen. Well and… last Christmas. But that's about it… I think."

Tears were streaming down her face by then, anguish knifing into he heart. "I'm sorry I did this to you, you have no idea how sorry."

Joey shook his head once again and fixed her with a resolute stare. "Rach, we've been over this. I don't want you to feel guilty, because it wasn't just your fault."

"But still, knowing how much you must've hurt…"

The evening that had started so promising seemed to rapidly turn into very tearful affair, but thankfully, Joey obviously hadn't the intention of letting it come to that.

"You wanna know what I told Tyler before?" he asked, suddenly cheerful.

She played along, not wanting to cry anymore either. "What did you tell him?"

"I told him that mommy was the first woman I ever fell in love with and the she's the only woman I'm ever gonna be in love with for as long as I live."

There was nothing more to say after that. So they kissed and they had been doing it since then. Joey seemed to have all the time in the world. It had been always like this between them, it was like with her, he always wanted to take his time. It was her who felt the urgency awake in her, the desire uncurling hot and demanding in her womb.

She sunk into their kisses, let the wave of passion sweep over her until she got a bit lightheaded. Just then, Joey pulled back, looking over her shoulder.

"Tyler, you're supposed to be in bed."

Rachel smiled to herself thinking back to the time five years ago, when Ally had caught them doing more than just kissing. They had never locked their bedroom door because they hadn't wanted to lock her out in case of an emergency.

It hadn't been really an emergency in Ally's case, just a bad dream, but nonetheless, she had found Joey on top of her, a comforter thankfully covering them from their waists down. Eventually they had gotten over their initial embarrassment and hastily put on their sleeping clothes. When they asked Ally what the problem was, Ally said that she had a bad dream and she asked if she could come in to their bed, cuddling too.

They had looked at each other at that, realizing that the kid perceived what they had been doing not as something filthy or forbidden, that she wasn't anywhere near interpreting it as something else than it really was – an act of love, two people expressing physically what they felt for each other. They had let her crawl between them and although frustration had made them share a slightly regretful smile, it felt natural somehow to have her there. After all, them having sex was the reason she existed.

Tyler's unusual cheery voice brought Rachel back from the past.

"You're kissing mommy," he observed, unmistakably happy about that. "Now I believe that you love her."

With that, he was on the couch and between them, snuggling against Rachel and putting his little feet in Joey's lap.

"Keep kissing her, daddy," Tyler murmured, already half asleep again.

"He never saw us kiss," Rachel thoughtfully said, "That's why he didn't believe you."

"I'm afraid it's something worse," Joey admitted with a rueful tone in his voice. "He walked in on me and Charlene once. And even though I ended it the same day and hired Linda, he didn't talk to me for two weeks."

The pain of Joey's admission of his tryst with the former nanny was still something Rachel was only barely able to handle. And even if she had told him she wouldn't hold it against him if he had slept with her, she didn't even want to think about the possibility. Just thinking they had kissed, thinking Tyler had seen this, was disturbingly painful. Undoubtedly, that was the secret that weighted so heavily on Tyler's small shoulders.

She looked down at her son and lovingly stroked his thick and unruly raven hair.

"He looks more and more like you," she observed solemnly, trying to divert her thoughts from the things she couldn't change anymore.

"Rachel, I'm so sorry."

She took a deep breath and looked up to him, a forced smile on her face. "It's okay Joe, I understand..."

"No Rach, it's not okay. Remember that time when Ally walked in on us?"

"Yeah," she breathed tonelessly, her throat starting to close in on itself, "I just thought of that a moment ago."

"Remember – after it stopping to feel awkward – how natural it felt, how like being in this cozy nest of family love?"

Rachel only managed a mute nod, barely able to look at him any more.

"What happened with Charlene... it felt like the opposite of that. Like ripping the family apart, like taking something irreplaceable away from Tyler. I never felt guiltier in my entire life. I mean… I know how I felt when I discovered my father had a mistress, and I was well over twenty by then. Tyler is four, I can't imagine…"

Rachel took another shuddering breath and looked up at Joey again. "You can't change what happened, Joe. I'm not saying it doesn't hurt, but... look at Tyler. He didn't need more to believe in us again than to see us kiss. Maybe... " she lifted the hand with which she had caressed Tyler's hair and softly stroked Joey's cheek, "... maybe it's as simple as that."

Joey looked down at his son too, tenderly enveloping his feet in his hands to keep them warm. "My mother keeps calling him Joey."

"Like I said, I can see why."

A little smile appeared on Joey's face and looked up at her again. "Let's hope he's gonna be smarter than me."

"Joey…" she started to protest, but he cut her off with a kiss. They lost themselves in the kiss for a while until Tyler started to squirm between them.

"We should take him to his bed," Rachel whispered. "And maybe… maybe that's where we should go, too," she continued, still in that small whisper.

"Yeah," Joey said with a warm smile, "very good idea."

Joey put his arms around Tyler and lifted him up. Then he got up from the couch and went to the stairs and Rachel followed him.

Seeing Joey carry Tyler so carefully in his arms made her realize once again how amazing this man was as a father. He had been from the first day on. From the day when he knew he was going to be one.

Not that she ever had any doubts about that. Although there were people who had. One person to be precise.

………

It had been about eight months into their relationship when she had had left work a bit early to meet Joey in the coffeehouse. They had planned to look for some new furniture for their apartment together. Ross had been sitting in the armchair, reading a science magazine.

"Hi Ross," she greeted him cheerfully. She had always been in an elevated mood back then.

"Hi Rach," Ross greeted back a lot less enthusiastically.

Since it looked like there would be no conversation taking place, she turned her attention to Gunther who left a customer practically in the middle of taking his order.

When she had her coffee and was looking through one of the furniture catalogues she had brought with her, Ross suddenly decided to speak. "So… how are things going with you and Joey?"

She smiled widely. "Great. Oh Ross I am so happy. I'm still so glad you told him to give us a chance, because it's so amazing, really. I love him so much."

Ross's face fell – practically to the floor. "You… you love him?"

Only at this moment did she realize that even if he was over her, this couldn't be easy for Ross.

"Yeah, I love him," she said, wiping the idiotic wide smile off her face.

Ross's voice suddenly started to shake and squeak, like it always did when he was upset. "So, how wonderful, you love him. Does he love you too?"

"He does," she answered and was about to elaborate, when she noticed the whiteness of his face ad the fact that he was shaking. "Ross, what is with you? Are you okay?"

"Oh, I am okay," he said cheerily, eyelids twitching treacherously. "I'm more than okay, I'm fine."

His voice was by now about a whole octave higher than unusual and he twitched and bounced as if he had spent the whole day drinking extra strong espresso.

"Ross, you're not, what is up with you? I thought you were okay with Joey and me being together? What's changed?"

"Oh, you're asking what's changed?" he repeated, voice shrill like a wrong tuned violin. "Uhm… to be honest… nothing. Nothing has changed since I fell in love with you back in the ninth grade. Which seems to be my problem, because you're in love with Joey now."

Now she was upset. Angry to be exact. "What?" she cried, a little on the shrill side herself. "Ross, I can't believe that. How could you tell Joey it's okay for him to go out with me when you're still feeling like that?"

Her rage seemed to calm him a little. "I thought it would last like two weeks, a month tops. I mean, he's Joey. I thought you would get it out of your system and then he would screw up somehow and it would be over."

She was flabbergasted. "You counted on the fact that it wouldn't last?"

"God, Rachel, is that so hard to understand? He's Joey."

"Which means?" she asked tartly.

"Come on, you know what that means. He chases girls, he's a cheater. And face it, he's not very bright. Do you think you can build a life with a man like him? Get married, have kids?"

It had been eight months by then. Almost as long as her relationship with Ross, not quite as long as her relationship to Barry, not long enough to think about marriage and kids. But she felt fiercely protective of Joey, regardless.

"Ross, I'm not thinking about stuff like that right now, but believe me, I have no reason to doubt that Joey would be wonderful as a husband… and a father. Believe me, there is much more to him than you see."

In this moment a happily shouted, "Hi beautiful, hi Ross," alerted them to Joey's presence.

He sat down beside her and gave her a smacking kiss on the lips. When he pulled back, he noticed the awful mood in an instant. "What are the long faces for?"

"Joey, sweetie, Ross was only okay with us going out because he thought we would mess up after a few weeks," she gave him the news in an ugly, abridged version.

Joey froze. "What?"

She shrugged while glaring at Ross. "Don't ask me, I just learned it myself."

"You lied to me, Ross?"

Ross was defensive. "I told you what you wanted to hear. What would you have done if I had told you I still love Rachel?"

"Nothing!" Joey said as if that was the most obvious answer. "I wouldn't have done anything. I would've respected your feelings even if it wasn't easy, but I would've stayed away from her. I thought you knew that about me."

"I think I did, but…"

"You lied to me. What are you expecting me to do now? Do you think I'm gonna give her up now? Now that I'm in love with her?"

"No no, Joey, I don't want you to give her up. I mean, yeah, I made a mistake, I really thought you wouldn't make it. But now that you have, I have to get used to it. I think it will be okay, somehow. I was just a bit… shocked when Rachel told me you guys are in love."

"I can't believe you thought we would mess up. Did you think I would cheat on her two weeks in or something?" Ross's silence had given Joey the answer he had been waiting for. "Nice to know what a low opinion you have of me."

"I'm sorry, Joe. I don't any more. You've changed since you two are going out. I can see a lot of stuff now that I couldn't imagine. I just wish… I wish I had seen it before."

………

While she watched Joey putting Tyler to bed, lovingly brushing a wayward strand of hair out of his face and tucking him in, she leaned her head against the doorframe, feeling the familiar exhaustion coming over her. She groaned inwardly. Another night where nothing would happen.

Joey turned around and she took a few steps back, allowing him to close the door to Tyler's room. "You tired?" he asked her when he saw the look on her face.

"God, I'm so sorry Joe. I don't know what's up with me. It's not that I don't want to, I do, but I'm afraid I'm gonna fall asleep the second I lie down somewhere."

Joey cupped her chin and forced her to look into his smiling face. "Hey baby, it's okay. You've been through hell and back, your body needs time to recover. We don't need to do anything."

"But I want to," she said earnestly and the smiling happiness in his eyes gave way to something else. Something excitingly familiar.

"I know," he whispered. "Me too. But you have to take your time, you getting better is more important than anything else."

He stepped closer to her and wrapped one arm around her, using his other hand to gently caress her face. "You know, when you're ready, I'm still gonna be here wanting you."

She smiled at hearing him say that. It was so comforting to know that he hadn't forgotten; that those memories were as important to him as they were to her.

"I love you," she whispered.

"Love you too," he said and kissed her forehead. "Good night."

"Good night."

tbc

Please review.