Chapter 4: Loving Is Enough

Phoebe had lost sight of Chandler in the dark and in the confusion. But she did manage to find Tag's brethren again. The gang was anxious, spooked.

"Now, we lay low, and if the cops snatch up any one of us, you are to say…." Pete, now in charge, was ordering.

"HEY!"

"Oh, go wear a skirt, Buffay!" someone groaned.

"I got scabby knees – listen!"

"Supposing they ask about the rumble?" one of the group wanted to know.

"Supposing they ask where Chandler Bing is and which party is looking for him – with a gun?"

That got Pete's attention. "Say, you know something?"

Phoebe just smirked. "I've always been great in the shadows…."

"Cut the crap, Pheebs! What's the buzz?"

"Well, I heard that Joey Tribbiani mouthing off to his buddies something about Chandler and Ross Geller's little sister. And Tribbiani says, 'If it's the last thing I do, I'm gonna get that peacock!' And he pulls out the bad news!"

Pete went ghastly pale in the moonlight. "We need to find Chandler first, before Tribbiani does!" He immediately set about giving orders, giving everyone zones to cover. "And meet back at Central Perk!" he calls to everyone's retreating backs.

"What about me?" Phoebe whined, half expecting Pete to tell her to beat it.

"Do what you do best, Buffay – stick to the shadows!" Blinking in surprise, she took off. "HEY!" Phoebe turned back. "You done good, buddy boy!"

Phoebe flushed pink at the praise. "Thanks….. Daddy-O!"

Pete arrived at Central Perk first. When he let the boy in, Gunther explained that Chandler was hiding downstairs in the basement. The rest of the Tags slowly trickled in, back from their patrols, in twos and threes.

Any moment now, one of them was expecting a cop to show up, asking questions. Someone did eventually show up with questions, but it wasn't any cop.

It was Rachel Green, the girlfriend of Ross Geller.

Glancing around at the gang members, she gulped, but held her head high. "I'm looking for Chandler Bing."

"He ain't here," Pete grunted, chancing a look over at Gunther, who remained quiet.

Rachel didn't move. "I have a message for him…."

"We can deliver it for you," Pete assured, even as he moved in towards her in a clear attempt to intimidate. Drive her off. Rachel stood her ground.

"I need to give the message to Chandler….." Sensing Tags starting to converge on her from all sides, she backed into the coffee house's front door, but doesn't run.

"I don't think Chandler wants to be disturbed right now…." Pete warned.

Of the Tags, no one was sure who made the first move, but before long, they were taunting with Rachel, toying with her, the lust in their eyes apparent. Just as things were about to be taken a little too far, Gunther broke the altercation up.

Having nearly been raped, a shaken Rachel struggled to her feet; Gunther moved to help her, and she flinched away, eyes burning.

"Don't…. touch…. me!" she growled, glancing at all the Tags in dismay. Disgust. "Ross was right! …. If one of you was in the street bleeding…. I'd walk by you and spit on you! ….. Now I have a message for your little buddy downstairs:" She ignored Pete's shocked look, stunned that she had figured it out. "You tell him that Monica is dead! Joey found out about him and her…. and shot her!"

Rachel stormed out in a huff. Gunther angrily moved to throw Pete and his hoodlums out immediately after, the barista staggering downstairs to the cellar. He found Chandler, frantically packing a bag.

"Can't thank you enough, Gunther…. We'll write to let you know where we are!"

"Chandler…."

"Monica and I…. we're gonna have kids – and we'll name all the boys Gunther! I promise you!"

"Chandler, you don't understand…."

"Not sure what we'd name any daughter of ours, though." Chandler paused, then a goofy smile came over his face. "Aw, hell, we'll just name her Monica…."

He was startled when Gunther suddenly spun him around and slapped him across the face. The balding man was near tears.

"What does it take to get through to you?" It took a moment for Gunther to regain control of his breathing. "That was Ross's girl, Rachel, upstairs. She said Monica is dead! ….. She said Joey found out about you and her…. and shot her!"

Dead silence. When Gunther reached for Chandler, the young man staggered back like a skittish animal.

"Kid…"

"No," Chandler clipped, face twisting in agony and denial. "NO!" He pelted up the stairs, Gunther charging after him, knowing full well that if Chandler Bing stepped one foot outside Central Perk, there was a chance he wouldn't survive the night. But the barista tripped on the steps and crashed to the wood, where he lay sprawled, sobbing.

"JOEY! JOEY! Come on, get me too, Joey! I'm right here! I'm ready!"

Chandler was running through the streets of New York, out of his head with grief. Slowing out of his frantic jog as he neared a dimly lit blacktop, he collapsed against the chainlink fence.

"Please… Please, Joey…. Just do it…. I don't know what else to do…."

"Chandler!"

He whirled around. "Who's there?!"

"It's me! Phoebe! We have to get you…."

"Get out of here!"

"Chandler, come on, quit fucking around…."

"For God's sake, Phoebe, you're a girl! Be a girl and beat it!" Disturbed, Phoebe ran away as Chandler drove her off. "JOEY! DAMN YOU!"

"Chandler!"

Across the blacktop, he saw a figure approaching, and as Chandler watched her draw near, he could only gawp in disbelief. Was it a ghost, come to taunt him? Was he hallucinating? Had it come to that?

"Monica…." Seeing her dashing towards him, a suitcase in hand and beaming, Chandler entered the blacktop, intent on running into her arms. "Monica…..!"

BANG!

A sharp and stabbing pain plowed into Chandler's back when he was only feet away from his love, the force of it propelling him the rest of the way into Monica's embrace by sheer inertia. He felt liquid fire coursing through him, followed by a sudden chill, and he felt his legs give out from under him. A horrified Monica lowered Chandler to the pavement, cradling him in her arms, her tears falling onto his upturned face like sweet rain.

"I….. I didn't try hard enough…." Chandler rambled, in his death throes. "I thought it…. would be enough…."

"Loving is enough!" Monica wept, clutching at him, begging him to stay with her. It was too late; he couldn't be saved. Seeing her love slipping away, just in time for hordes of people to come swarming into the blacktop, Monica bent over Chandler and sweetly kissed him on the lips farewell. "I love you, Chandler Bing."

She witnessed the moment when he expired.

Drowning in grief as she was, Monica rose to her feet with surprising dignity. Turning, she approached Joey, who was gawping between the pistol he wielded and Chandler's dead body in disbelief, staring at what he had just done. Without a word, Monica held out her hand; Joey slapped the gun into it.

She studied the weapon emotionlessly, coolly.

"….. How do you fire this gun, Joey? Do you just…. pull this little TRIGGER?!" Monica's voice pitched in grief at last as she brought the gun up, hearing the pitched cries of fear from Tags and Geller-Tribbianis alike, but the barrel only clicked. Jammed, perhaps? Or maybe it was out of….

"How many bullets do I have left, Joey?" Monica pressed, eyes wild with grief and rage. "Enough for you?! YOU?!" She spun about in a circle, rounding on these men who play-acted as boys, thinking war was nothing more than a game. "ALL OF YOU! You all killed him! And my brother! And Tag! How many bullets left, Joey? How many can I take down? And still have one bullet left for me? You killed my love with your hate! Well…. now I can kill too….. because I have HATE!" She settled the barrel of the gun on Joey again, ignoring how he flinched. The trigger finger shook.

In the end, however, much like Chandler before her, Monica couldn't do it. Dropping the gun to the pavement, she fell to her knees and wailed, keening. The cops arrived in the interim. One of the Tags began moving in the direction of Chandler's body and Monica flung herself prostrate over him, hissing like an angry cat.

"Don't you TOUCH HIM!" Everyone else kept a wide berth. Eventually, Pete gently approached and draped a shawl over her; Monica bristled, but accepted it. And when several men – Geller-Tribbianis and Tags alike – approached to gently heft her lover's body into a fireman's lift and then a casket's hoist, she didn't interfere.

The pallbearers, coming from two different worlds, accepted each other in their ranks as a sort of peace offering. It was a somber funeral procession that now moved out of the blacktop, Monica bringing up the rear in the role of the grieving widow, leaving the cops behind to arrest Joey and lead him away.