Phase Three

Chapter 6: She Can't Stop Shaking; I Can't Stop Touching Her

~.~

I was gonna wait to post this, but…I have an uber-busy weekend coming up, what with an engagement party and all, so I thought I'd post it since it's written. And because I'm in a good mood today. Even after a super late night with the kids I nanny for last night. They went away to camp for a week, and came back as monster-children, lol. Okay, that's an exaggeration, and I still love them very much, but they are just completely out of control this week. Their mom even said so. Thank god their Aunt is in town to deal with them instead of me, ha!

~.~

"Hey," Monica greeted Chandler, who was sitting alone in her apartment, watching tv when she walked in.

"Hey," he replied. "Joey has a date over, so," he trailed off, explaining his presence.

"This early?" Monica looked at her watch as she started putting away the groceries she brought home.

"Yea, well, it's Joey," Chandler shrugged, still staring at the tv screen.

"So, where's Rachel?" Monica asked, sounding almost accusatory.

"Why would I know where Rachel is?" Chandler tried to keep the panic out of his voice. It could actually be a completely innocent question. He's home; Rachel is not. Hey, where's Rachel?

"Oh, I don't know, because you guys are attached at the hip lately?" Monica finished putting away the food before walking over to the living room. Chandler looked at her like he didn't know what she was talking about. "Oh, come on," she smiled at him.

Chandler shrugged. "Well, she's at work still right now," he finally admitted. "And, I don't know, we just realized that, while both of us hang out with you a lot, the two of us never actually hang out, but we didn't really know why, so I guess maybe we started hanging out more after that," he finished, shrugging again. She would buy that response, right? It was the half-truth.

"Oh," Monica replied, sitting next to him on the loveseat. "Well, since the two of you are hanging out all the time, you both might kind of be ignoring someone else," she said softly, sounding almost jealous.

"Oh, sorry, Mon," Chandler replied, and he was suddenly uncomfortable with her attempting to cuddle with him. He wasn't sure if he should put his arm around her or not, suddenly feeling like what was nothing out of the ordinary for the two of them would almost be…

He felt like that would almost be cheating on Rachel or something. His breath caught in his throat at that revelation.

"Are you okay?" Monica asked, concerned.

"Yea, I just…yea, no, I'm fine. Why?"

"You're just acting really weird," she looked at him, and off his look added, "weirder than usual."

"No, I'm fine," he shook his head, trying to sound a lot more fine than he actually felt. Monica continued to look at him, as if she didn't believe him.

"Hey, guess what?!" Phoebe came through the door, and Chandler sighed in relief, thankful for any kind of distraction.

"What, Phoebs?" he asked, still trying to sound convincingly fine. However, he didn't even listen to her (very likely, entertaining) response, his mind wandering.

~.~

Chandler lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. He hadn't seen Rachel all day, and it was killing him. They hadn't even kissed in four days, not since the porn-incident, but he had seen her the other three days, hung out with her, had all three meals with her each day. But today, he had meetings all day. And she got caught up at work. And then she had a late client. And then she had to go out with people from work because it was someone's last day. They hadn't even spoken all day. Just played a bunch of phone tag.

And, goddamnit, he missed her. He missed her a lot. That scared him. They weren't anything. They weren't dating. They were hardly even messing around. How could he miss her?

Closing his eyes, he tried to push those thoughts, those feelings away. He couldn't date her. He couldn't have any feelings towards her starting with the word "L," even just liking, let alone the other one. He couldn't sleep with her. He needed to stop flirting with her and kissing her and cuddling with her. He needed to just be her friend. Actual friend. Not dating without the title. Just. Friends.

Hearing the door open and close, Chandler didn't flinch, knowing exactly who it was. A smile crept across his face as he felt her get into bed beside him, all of those thoughts vanishing as she cuddled up from behind him.

"I missed you today," he whispered away from her.

"God, me, too," she nodded against his back. "This is bad, huh?" she asked as he turned to face her. "I mean, this isn't going away. This is like…something. I mean, we're like…something…

"I know," Chandler sighed. "I just, I still feel like, if something happens, really happens here, I'm like, betraying Ross somehow. And I just, I don't want that."

"Ya know what?" Rachel pulled away, suddenly angry. "If nothing is ever actually going to happen with us, I'm just gonna go right now and make it that much easier," she turned to leave, but Chandler jumped up after her, grabbing her arm.

"Please don't go," he whispered, almost pleading. "Stay. Stay all night…"

She looked at him for a moment, weighing what she wanted to do versus what she probably should do. It still seemed like things would be messy between them if they were together. It still seemed like Ross would flip out. But what did she care what Ross thought? Ross had Emily. She was doing nothing wrong by wanting to be with Chandler. Although the guys would swear that he was breaking some silent guy code since she was Ross's ex, she really couldn't see what Chandler was doing wrong, either. They were two single adults who wanted to be together. What harm was there in that? How did that break any rules?

"But what will I sleep in," she finally whispered, hiding her grin.

"Hmm," he thought for a moment, fighting back his grin as well as he took off his tshirt. He then pointed to her suit, first pushing the jacket off her shoulders to the floor. Then, he slowly started unbuttoning her shirt, trying to steady his breathing as well as stop himself from saying fuck the buttons and just ripping it off of her in one swift movement. He was also half tempted to try that move just to see if he could pull it off. Joey could probably pull it off.

"What are you-what are we doing?" Rachel said through shaky breaths. "Ch-Chandler?"

"If you want me to stop, tell me to stop," he whispered, now pushing the shirt off her shoulders as well, planting small kisses along her collarbone.

"I don't-I don't think I can do that," she said, suddenly very aware of the fact that he was only in boxers. "I don't think I want to." Chandler smiled, pulling her close as he finally kissed her. One of those slow, infuriating kisses that completely buckled her knees so that she was clinging to him for support. "God, your kisses piss me off in the best way possible," Rachel laughed slightly, pulling back so she could look him in the eye.

"See, I would ask if that's a good thing or not, since it doesn't really make sense, but," he paused, kissing her again. Another slow, long, infuriating kiss. "God, you're right. Kissing you pisses me off in the best way possible…"

"Well, then we'll just have to see what you can do that would make me completely livid in the best way possible," Rachel grinned against his lips as he kissed her again, this time unbuttoning her pants before sliding them down. "Look at that, I'm all caught up with you," she said, referring to the fact that they were both in only their underwear.

"Oh. Well, that's all I wanted. You can go home now," he smiled, pulling away from her as he sat on the bed, still holding her hands in his.

"Is that so?" Rachel asked, and he shrugged, pulling her onto the bed on top of him as he lay down, kissing her again. However, it didn't go beyond kissing.

"Shit, why am I so nervous?" Chandler finally asked with a laugh.

"God, I know. We've done this before…although, there was quite a bit of alcohol involved that time…"

"Yea," he kissed her again, hand on the back of her head. "Ya know, maybe this isn't such a good idea," he trailed off, dropping his hand.

"What?!" Rachel looked at him, obviously quite angry as she started to pull away. "Chandler-"

"I was just kidding," he laughed, pulling her back towards him, but she still attempted to fight him, pulling away.

"You're an ass," she shook her head, but finally stopped fighting, letting him pull her down against him once again. "I think I can live with that, though," she mumbled, her heart beating fiercely when he moved to push down her underwear after taking off his own boxers. "About fucking time," she added, getting a laugh from Chandler between frantic kisses.

He couldn't agree more.

~.~

"Chandler," Rachel mumbled, looking at the clock, which read 5:35. "Chandler," she repeated, rolling over and placing her hand on his bare chest.

"Hm?"

"I need to go," she whispered, and he finally opened his eyes. "Chandler, don't look at me like that…"

"Sorry," he mumbled, pulling her closer as he kissed her. "I wish you didn't have to go…"

"Me, too," she sighed, but pulled away anyway. "I'll see you in a couple of hours, though," she said, getting out of bed as she began searching the floor for her clothes. She settled on the tshirt he had offered her earlier, as well as her own pants.

"You'd better hope Monica or Joey isn't up really early for some reason," Chandler laughed at the over-sized tshirt and dress pants. Rachel shrugged, sitting back down on the bed. Chandler moved closer, sitting up as well as he cupped her face in his hands, kissing her slowly. "Oh, don't go…just stay here. We'll lock the door and stay here all day. Screw the rest of them and what they think."

"Chandler," Rachel laughed, and he just sighed.

"Yea, I know," he kissed her once more, running his hand through her hair. "Bye..."

"Bye," she replied, kissing him again before standing up to leave. "See you in a bit," she added, walking out his bedroom door, flashing him one last grin as he watched her walk away.

~.~

Rachel sat next to Chandler on the couch in her apartment, watching a movie with Monica. Rachel was beside him on the couch, sitting entirely too close, and he was holding her hand under the blanket. She marveled at his ability to keep his composure, because every time he squeezed her hand, or ran his hand up her leg, she about lost it.

When Monica got up to go to the restroom, though, he was practically on top of her the second the bathroom door closed, kissing her hard, fingertips digging into her back as her hand found the back of her neck. But, the second the toilet flushed, he was back on his side of the couch. Rachel looked at him as Monica walked by, and while she was having a hard time just breathing, he was sitting there smirking.

God, how did he do that?

~.~

Rachel lay in bed, awake. They had come to an unspoken agreement, and every other night they switched off who did the sneaking to the other one's apartment at exactly 2:30 AM. She had gone to his place the night before, so it was his turn to come over tonight. And it was only 1:50. The late nights with no sleep were killing her, but it was very worth it. Although she could have (and probably should have) slept up until the point they met up every night, she never actually could. Her bed was too cold and missing about six-feet of Chandler.

Chandler snuck into Rachel and Monica's apartment, tip-toeing across his former living room on his way to Rachel's room. For some reason, getting caught by Monica seemed a lot scarier than getting caught by Joey. Maybe because he could lie through his teeth and Joey would buy it, whereas one look and Monica would know he was lying. And, really, what good lie could he tell that would explain his presence at 2:15 AM? He was 15 minutes early, but he just couldn't lay in his own bed alone any longer.

Opening Rachel's bedroom door, he smiled in victory. His smile widened when he saw her in bed, sleeping in his shirt. He crawled into bed with her, dropping his robe to the floor. He wrapped his arms around her, spooning her.

"Oh my god, you're not wearing any underwear," he whispered into her hair. She was wearing his shirt and nothing but his shirt. She jumped slightly at the sound of his voice; she must have fallen asleep after all.

"Yea, I might have been expecting someone," she smiled groggily, rolling over to face him.

"Oh, should I leave, then?" Chandler moved to get up, but Rachel just laughed, pulling him back down. "God, my bed sucks without you," he mumbled before kissing her.

"Yea, mine sucks without you, too," she agreed, settling into his arms, almost asleep again already.

"Night, Rach," Chandler whispered, kissing her hair as he closed his eyes as well.

"Mm, night," she whispered back. Chandler tightened his arms around her. He was okay with just sleeping together without sleeping together, although that wasn't what he had been expecting that night. And it seemed to be crossing a line even more to a relationship-ish place. He kissed her hair again, deciding that he needed to stop thinking and just go to sleep, trying hard to push away the thought that he had just had.

Maybe it was too late. Maybe they were already in that relationship-ish place.

And maybe…maybe, they were both okay with it.

~.~

Thank you to the two participants of my "that's what she said" game, lol. I actually typed it out after Rachel said, "Girls can only take so much." Good for you for getting that, KMJ. I'm glad your mind is in the gutter, right along with mine, hehe :)

Thanks for the reviews/alert adds :) I really love writing this series. It's lots of fun :) I'm glad you guys are enjoying it as much as I am. Or are at least enjoying it. Review, please…I'll update as soon as I can :)