Scene Two: The Thunderbolt

Her fingers felt strangely thick, fumbling against the earrings, dropping them more than once. It infected everything, this restlessness running through her. Still in the back of her mind the thought that she should not have come. The earring slipped again, pinging against the sides of the basin; She swore under her breath, caught it. She resumed the attempt, her earlobe reddened and throbbing angrily at her clumsiness but she continued.

It was a distraction, if nothing else, from the other dull aches.

London, she decided, London was definitely overdoing it on the exes front.

Could she call Chandler an ex?

And she had not, she reasoned, sneaked out on him the second time, either; he had only been pretending to be asleep and you can't call it sneaking when the other person knows what you're doing; perhaps if he had spoken to her-

No, this was better. Their unspoken agreement that they would never talk (again) about what had happened between them (again).

Rachel looked at her reflection, critical. The fitted black dress looked fine, her hair pulled back almost severely, the earrings - she smiled slightly - the earrings were show-stoppers, worth the pain. It was all misdirection, all just the things she hid behind.

She sighed, stuffed her compact and lipstick into her purse, headed out into the bedroom. In the full-length mirror she studied herself again. Despite what most people - all people, she would have said - thought, it was not vanity, not just vanity, but more uncertainty. So much of her life spent with the understanding that she had nothing to offer but her looks was hard to overcome.

A knock at the door pulled her from her gloomy contemplation.

'Come in.'

Emily's dark head appeared. 'Oh.'

A pause. Rachel smiled brightly. 'Hi.'

'Hi. Hello.' Emily slipped around the door, hovering just beyond the threshold. 'Uh, I- Is Monica here?'

'No, she went down already.'

'Oh. Right. I just- I just wanted to give her this.' She held up a giftbag, colourful folds of tissue-paper standing in soft peaks from within. 'It's just a little thank-you.'

Rachel frowned.

'For the church.'

'Oh, right... Hey, that's Monica - never met a challenge she couldn't wrestle into submission.'

Emily smiled slightly. 'Yes.'

'Do you want to leave that here?'

'I- All right.' Emily placed the bag on a console table; her hands, now empty, smoothed down her dress. 'Actually, Rachel, I'm glad I've found you like this. There is something I've been wanting to say.'

'Oh?'

She pulled in a breath deep, let it go. 'Yes.' Another breath. 'Can we..?' She gestured towards the two chairs at the small table.

'Sure.'

Rachel took one of the chairs, watched the brunette expectantly.

Emily's hands stopped fiddling with her dress, started playing with the loose strands of her hair. 'I've been meaning to say- I really do admire the way that you and Ross have been handling all of this.'

'All of what?'

'This. The wedding. You're both so ... civilised about it. I have terrible relationships with my exes. Well, you can't really call them relationships at all, we're not friends - we're not anything, we're -' She stopped, shook her head sharply. 'That isn't what I wanted to say.' She took another breath. 'What I wanted to say is that I know it means a lot to Ross, your being here; and I wanted you to know, for what it's worth, that it means a lot to me, too. For Ross' sake. I know it can't be easy for you-'

Rachel shook her head. 'Honestly, it's fine.'

Emily smiled again, still slightly. 'Rachel, I know what you and Ross meant to each other, and I know that this is difficult-'

'Emily, really-' Rachel sat forward, earnest, her eyes on Emily's face; she took hold of one Emily's hands '-it's okay. I'm happy for you guys. I'm happy for you.' The words sounded in her head, resonating through her. 'I am happy for you.'

'Yes, you, uh, you said that,' Emily said, trying unsuccessfully to retrieve her hand.

'Yes, but I really mean it. I'm not just saying it, I really... I-'

She sat, rigid, unaware of her surroundings, of Emily's nervous gaze. The white noise of confusion that had been the backdrop to everything for the last few weeks, the misery of her self-imposed denial, all of it ended, resolving itself into two clear syllables. Chandler. The even balance of his name was beautiful, she thought; and the enormity of her monumental stupidity astounded her.

She turned her eyes back to Emily. 'I have to find- I have to tell someone something.' She dropped Emily's hand, stood, headed for the door, stopped, crossed back to the table, bent and embraced the still-bemused Emily. 'Thank you,' Rachel told her sincerely, and left.

ooOoo

It had been, Chandler decided, a trip characterised by one ridiculous problem after another; although even he would have to admit that the humiliation of the rehearsal dinner speech had been no-one's fault but his own. And while he had, in the spirit of comradeship and solidarity, thought it would be nice if at least one other person in their group was having as bad a time as he was, he still found it deeply unfair that Monica should have been so badly upset by someone who clearly was a slur on the good name of morons everywhere.

'The guy was hammered, okay? There's no way you look like Ross's mother.'

She turned her face to him, blue eyes blazing. 'Then why would he say it?'

'Because he's crazy. Okay? He came up to me earlier and thanked me for my very moving performance in Titanic.'

Motion on his peripheral vision; he turned his head and found Rachel hovering, smiling at him uncertainly. Her eyes also seemed more blue than usual, bright and clear.

'Hey,' she said softly. 'What's-'

'Do I look like Ross' mother?' Monica demanded.

Rachel's eyes widened. 'Huh?'

'Well, do I? Do I look like the mother of Ross?'

'Oh, sweetie.' Rachel took hold of her arm sympathetically. 'I know what she's like, but she is your mom, too.'

Between Rachel's disingenuousness and Monica's outrage, it would have taken a heart of stone not to laugh. Chandler smirked into his champagne. Their conversation rose and fell with increasingly shrill tones.

'I'm a single mom with a thirty year old son!'

'But he was drunk, right?'

'So?'

He slipped away, pushing down any feelings of guilt he may have had at leaving Rachel to such a fate; but he had paid his dues on Monica-duty, he thought. He was prepared to do it, no doubt, but if there were another person, preferably of the female, best-friend-of-Monica persuasion about, they were far more qualified than he.

His eyes kept straying back to their corner of the room. Monica still looked voluble, Rachel looked-

She looked radiant.

He had half-expected her to be a wan, tragic figure trailing through the gathering, possibly pressing a lace handkerchief to her tear-stained cheeks.

You, he told himself with disgust, have read way too many of your mother's books.

She did look wonderful, though, even more so than usual.

For that alone, he should be pleased for her but somehow he found it a depressing proposition.

ooOoo

Rachel tracked Chandler's progress through the crowd helplessly. Monica was still edgy and even though Rachel felt like cheerfully consigning her to the arms of the nearest consoling male, she still had some some qualms, some ties of friendship.

She comforted, she placated, she plied with alcohol.

And Monica's complaints did subside; she even seemed to be smiling when she finally stumbled in the direction of the powder room. And Rachel drew a clear breath.

She stood on the edge of the crowd, watching the faces of people she didn't know and then finding the faces of the people she did. Joey, talking to one of the bridesmaids with his 'soap' earnest face; Ross-

She analysed the feeling.

Once it had been so painful; and then, even after it had stopped, she had told herself it was still painful. She was living proof of the adage that if you tell someone something for long enough they will eventually believe it. And she had believed it, for far longer than she should. She studied his face and its familiar lines and allowed herself one final pang of nostalgic fondness before it was all swept away.

He was her friend and she loved him; she would always love him as her friend.

She moved on, her gaze finding Chandler and suddenly it felt as though someone had caught hold of her heart and squeezed. She was light-headed, breathless. There it was, she thought, there it was. And this time she would get it right; this time there would be no mistakes; this time it wouldn't be too late.