Chapter 7: Kiss Me Good Day
When Monica awoke an untold number of hours later, the hotel room was bathed in a kind of dingy gray, indicating that dawn was perhaps not far off. Her first instinct was to panic and wonder how she was going to get out of this hotel room without getting caught, or before Joey came back. The knowledge that the preparations for her brother's wedding wouldn't begin until closer to this afternoon, thus giving everyone in the wedding party an excuse to sleep in, mollified her, if only just.
She glanced about. First, her eyes darted quickly over to the other, single bed beside her and Chandler: empty. She let out a sigh of relief. Chandler was still dozing beside her, looking dead to the world. Studying his face and how it seemed so boyishly relaxed while in repose, Monica beamed fondly. She remembered distinctly the first time she had watched him sleeping, padding through her apartment one night while he had been slumbering on the couch. The memory of how he had awakened that time and startled her nearly made her laugh now; for the sake of not wanting to awake him as her mere staring had back then, she did not even so much as giggle.
It disconcerted and also warmed her to wake up in his bed like this, practically in his arms, after sleeping by his side. Monica was moved, nearly to tears, by how…. right it felt.
This notion, even just admitting it to herself, terrified her over what it could mean.
Rising languidly from the bed she and Chandler had shared, Monica drew the down comforter over herself, to wrap about her naked form. She left the under-blankets draped over where Chandler lay just as bare as she. Tenderly, she dared to bend over him and brush her lips along his temple.
For the second time that night, she almost whispered how she loved him. She could have – asleep as Chandler was, it wasn't as though he could hear her. Still, the second-guessing now sending her mind to spinning made the beautiful chef refrain.
Turning for the window, Monica glided towards the gentle breeze that was wafting through. Someone – either Chandler or Joey – had left the sash open at some point the night before, and with all the heat that had passed between her and Chandler while they spent hours upon hours making love, she just hadn't noticed. If anything, a gust of wind naturally air-conditioning this place had been helpful, especially between Rounds 3 and 4 when she and her paramour had been trying to actively cool their simmering bodies down, if not exactly keep their volume down.
Stepping out onto the balcony, Monica fixed her gaze upon the horizon, and Big Ben in the distance. From the graying light, dawn was likely but an hour away, if that. The thoroughly ravished woman kept perfectly still, wanting to freeze this moment in time, right now, and live in it forever.
But she couldn't do that any more than she could stop the sun from ascending. Which it now was beginning to, little pinks and purples dotting the edge of the horizon.
Down below, the city of London was already well awake, passersby below already bustling off to work. They were shouting and scolding and going about their lives in the way only proper British people could do, heedless of the gift it was to be her, or of the wonder that was being felt by the young woman just above them.
Just the same, Monica hung slightly back from the railing, refraining from glancing down at the streets below and she drew the down comforter tighter around herself, lest some leering bloke noticed her standing in this makeshift robe and tried to look up it to her statuesque form.
Monica shivered in surprise when she suddenly felt arms steal around her and she nearly jumped out of her skin, only to relax once she sniffed how it was him, his scent. Chandler smelled of sweat. He smelled of her. Closing her eyes, her lips upturned into a content, prideful grin at this, how she had marked him as her own.
"Mmm….. good morning," Chandler rumbled along her earlobe.
Monica sighed, sagging back into his arms, settling against his firm chest. "Good morning….." Her voice was breathy, almost a coo, like that of a dove.
"Whatcha doing?" Chandler murmured.
"Just watching the sun come up…." she warbled back.
Chandler dipped a kiss into her neck, one that made her pulse quicken. "Mind if I join you?"
She nodded.
The lovers watched the sunrise. With every passing second, the rational side of Monica knew the chances of their getting caught by someone increased exponentially.
"I have to go…" Though from how she moaned it, she clearly didn't want to.
"Stay…." Chandler whispered, lathering with his lips the spot where her shoulder met the creamy curve of her neck. "Joey's never up this early, and that's without the addition of jet lag…"
Monica chuckled low in her throat, turning her head to glance back and smile at him. "OK," she crooned. "I'll stay….."
They held each other close, and the blissful, romantic tableau brought Monica back to a similar moment like this, in her apartment. It had been right after Phoebe had moved out and she, Monica, had been despondent. After taking a long, hot shower, she had been crossing back to her room to go to bed, wrapped in nothing but a towel, when Chandler had wandered in, looking for beers, and sensed how sad she was. Heat flooded Monica as she recalled how Chandler had comforted her. Moreover, like the perfect gentleman he was, while he clearly noticed how she had been draped in nothing but a towel, he had made no moves to seduce her or take advantage. Just hold her, as two friends who cared a lot about each other would.
Were they still friends now, Chandler and she? Could they be, after everything that had passed between them this night? Monica dearly hoped so, even as a part of her was resigned to the fact that whatever they had been before, it had died, never to return. London had killed it.
No – not killed it. That would imply that Monica regretted what they had done, and she absolutely did not. She could never regret this – not for all the Crown Jewels in the Tower of London or any riches of the world. But had London blown up what she and Chandler had, in the sense that their closeness had been…. compounded, almost, now that they had been together in all ways two people could be? Oh, yes. In any case, there was no going back to what they had been before Monica had flung her arms around Chandler's neck and tasted his lips on hers.
A tiny pinprick of Monica's conscience didn't want to go back. Not from this. She didn't even want to go back to New York, because once back in the comforts of their home, what did all…. this…. mean?
What sounded like Chandler humming lifted Monica out of her musings. From the notes and pitch alone, the piece read like a folksy love song and a ballad all at once. It might have been from a musical, though Monica couldn't have pinpointed which one. She twittered a little in amusement at the knowledge that no doubt Chandler knew: she had seen the not one, not two, but three copies of the Annie Original Broadway Cast Recording scuttled away in his room where he thought they were well hidden.
"Come to me….. bend to me…. kiss me good day….."
Grinning radiantly, Monica took the lilting lyric for the request that it was; cupping his cheek, she turned her face back to his and brushed her lips against his, caressed them in a kiss good morning. Chandler chuckled into her willing mouth, and all without even missing a beat in the song as they sensuously broke apart:
"Darling, my darling, 'tis all I can say…."
His literal singing to her aroused her once more. "Chandler?"
"Hmm?"
"….. Touch me," she pleaded, her orbs darkening with desire.
He didn't tense, but from how he nevertheless paused, he seemed stumped over where exactly she wanted him to touch her. Well, she would make it clear. Taking where his hands now lovingly encircled her waist, Monica brought one down to dip into her wetness. The dampness pooling between her legs.
"Touch me…. here….."
Chandler swallowed hard as he dipped a finger inside her, stretching her spread and puckered folds. Monica settled back against his chest, her head drooping on Chandler's shoulder and she kissed the chiseled edge of his jawline.
Without needing her encouragement, much less prompting, Chandler dipped a second finger inside of her. He began to stroke Monica's bud, the nub of her mound in very deliberate circles. Monica moaned.
"Ohhhhhh…"
Chandler was keeping his lips productive by kissing her neck; in between pepperings, he sang just on the edge of his voice.
"Come to me, bend to me, kiss me good day….. Give me your lips…. and I'll take them away…"
Excited, Monica reached around behind her back and groped until her fingers closed around his burgeoning length. She gripped him in her fist and lovingly began to stroke him. She heard Chandler grunt in her ear, and she almost felt bad at how her ministrations were disrupting his admittedly sexy singing.
"Minx," Chandler growled, and Monica chuckled.
The gliding of her palm down to his tip, to the head, increased in tempo now; in response to her challenge, Chandler slipped yet a third finger into Monica's slit, opening her up so he could palm the petals of her sex. Monica could feel how his attentions, plus the cool springtime breeze was leaving her shaking. Goosebumps danced on her skin, and she felt how her knees were knocking together. If his other arm wasn't slung about her waist, practically holding her up, she no doubt would have collapsed to the balcony tiles, if not fallen farther. To the street beneath.
"Chan-Chandler…." Monica breathlessly bucked into her lover's hand, humping his deft digits while at the same time, she began to pump his cock. Grooming him. Priming him. Readying him for her. "I….. I'm gonna….."
With an alto hum, she came for him, her juices streaming down her quivering thighs. Moments later, Monica felt semen blast out onto her palm where it was wrapped around Chandler's cock and where she had been giving his balls quite a beating. She withdrew her hand, studying the clear fluid stains on her skin almost curiously. How many times had they made each other cum tonight – now last night? Seven? Eight? No, seven – seven times they had come together as man and woman. Recalling each and every one of those seven times made Monica grin. Seven…. how fitting. Seven was a lucky number. She gazed at him – their lucky number, it seemed. Catching Chandler's eyes and holding them, she very deliberately stuck her fingers, coated with his semen, into her own mouth and licked them clean.
Chandler groaned in lust and frustration as he watched Monica taste him on her tongue. His exasperation made Monica grin, pleased that she had such an effect on him.
She smiled beatifically. "…. Thank you…." she crooned in a whisper. Giggling, smiling into each other's eyes, she and Chandler leaned in and kissed softly.
Suddenly, what sounded like a shout, from somewhere in the near distance and emanating somewhere behind them, made the pair of lovers wheel around, startled. Two pairs of eyes went to the hotel door, still closed.
Monica went pale. She knew that shout. And it was coming this way. "That…. that sounded like Ross…" she breathed.
Chandler now turned about the same color as the semen he had just ejaculated onto Monica's hand. "Your brother can't find you…. The bed! Quick!"
Monica knew he was right. They were just about out of time. There was no time left for her to slip out without her brother seeing, much less redress. Whatever he was shouting, whatever was making him run through the hotel hallways like a madman at this hour of the morning, it was an emergency, one that might make him burst in here.
Time seemed to slow down. Chandler and Monica lunged for the bed, their strides loping as they propelled themselves from the balcony and across the room. Monica unfurled the down comforter from around where it had clothed her and spread it, trying to frantically arrange it so it settled in a normal position over the bed as she and Chandler worked to bury themselves under the bedclothes.
Ross was drawing near, his shouting clearer now. They had seconds - less than seconds. He would be outside their room, nearly on top of them, at any moment.
Monica ducked all the way under the covers. In the last ticks of time, as the final minutes of their wonderful night together melted away, Chandler sat up against the headboard, slung an arm over where Monica was trying to meld her body flush to the mattress, and struck a casual pose.
From under the layers, Monica heard the hotel room door bang open as though a bomb was going off. Then her brother's voice carried clearly, even through the cloth and wool.
"I'M GETTING MARRIED TODAY!"
"Morning, Ross," Chandler greeted, his tone suggesting a stupefying calm.
"I'm getting MARRIED – TO-DAY! WHOOO-HOOO!"
The door slammed shut faster than Monica was expecting, much to her relief. Chandler had barely nudged her thigh with his foot, signaling that the coast was clear before she was popping up from under the sheets, her eyes wild with panic.
"Do you think he knew I was here?"