Let her cry chapter 4

A/N Well I’m back again. This one jumps around a bit but don’t hold that against me.

Disclaimer: I don’t own them, which is a good thing cause if I did I wouldn’t be able to afford food for them. Remember a friends character is for life, not just for Christmas!



The fire, the screams, the grief, the remorse.

Both Monica and Chandler could remember it as if the accident had happened yesterday. On they trudged in silence, their hands and hearts joined but their minds stumbling in the dark past.

~* 2002 *~

Chandler wandered around the apartment aimlessly. He was torn between waiting for Monica to return and going to bed after a long day. Sighing, he resigned himself to sleep and headed towards the bedroom but was stopped in his tracks by the shrill ringing of the phone. He smiled to himself and lifted the receiver, fully expecting to hear Monica’s warm voice on the other side assuring him that she would be returning soon.

“Hello….yes this is Mr Bing speaking…..yes she’s my wife…..look I don’t understand what you’re saying”

The voice on the other end of the phone rasped harshly in his ear but his mind had gone blank. The only thing he could hear were the cruel words that were going to haunt his dreams for the rest of his life,

“ I’m sorry Mr Bing, you’re wife has been in a car accident”

A wave of fear washed through his body and a strangled sob escaped his throat. Still the voice continued to drone,

“She’s in intensive care right now, we’d like you to come down to the hospital and help us clarify a couple of things. Mr Bing….Hello….Mr Bing.”

Chandler forced himself to snap out of his blank reverie. Swallowing down the tart panic rising in his throat, the phone to dropped from his limp hand, he grabbed his coat and ran unseeingly out of the apartment. The phone swung lifelessly, emitting a high unearthly shriek into the now eerily still apartment.

Hours later he sat at her bedside quietly weeping. Ross was dead, his wife was in intensive care, life had never appeared bleaker. Silently he laid his head down on her knees and cried the night away.



~*~

The water continued to cascade around Chandler and Monica’s huddled forms as they walked on under the spotlight of the glaring street lamps. Monica’s tears were now flowing freely, the salty drops mixing with the cleansing rain. She looked up at Chandler and saw in his eyes the same look of shadowed hope that she had seen as she had woken up in her cold hospital bed so many years ago.

~*~

Monica’s eyes slowly flickered open then scrunched up against the searing fluorescent light that surrounded her. Her throat felt dry and her voice sounded ragged and hollow in her ears,

“Chandler?” she whispered to the form bent over her body. His head snapped up immediately, his hand tightening it’s grip around hers,

“Oh my God Monica, you’re awake!” Tentatively he reached forward and brushed a dark strand of hair from her pallid face, “I’ll go get a nurse.” He told her as he got up onto his unsteady feet.

“No,” she pleaded in hushed tones, “Please stay.”

Chandler sighed and sat back down. There were millions of thoughts racing around his head. Millions of things he wanted to tell her, yet not one of them would come out. He wanted to tell her how much he loved her, but he couldn’t say anything, he was too overcome with feelings beyond relief that she had woken up, relief that he had not lost her forever to death. Slowly he leant forward and in a choked, barely audible voice spoke into her ear.

“You’ve gotta know babe, no one blames you for this. I love you so much, I’m so glad you’re awake. Never leave me again.”

~*~

Monica remembered those words with perfect and bitter clarity. He may not have blamed her but she blamed herself. The accident had been the turning point in her life, the point at which days began to stretch out before her in an endless parade of guilt and anger. Not even the strength of Chandler’s love had been able to save her from her own torturous feelings, feelings that had driven her life and their love into the ground.

~*~

“ Will you just leave me alone!” Monica screamed at him as she ran into the bedroom and tried, unsuccessfully, to shut the door in his face.

“ Monica, you have to go. For God’s sake it’s your brother’s memorial service! They waited until you were out of hospital to have it, you have to go!” Chandler pleaded as he took in her sobbing form stretched out on the bed.

“ No I don’t,” came her muffled response, “I don’t want to and I don’t have to. I’m sure Ross wouldn’t appreciate my presence there.”

Chandler sat down gently on the side of the bed and stroked her back, flinching with regret as she shied away from his touch. He had tried, repeatedly, since Monica had returned from the hospital to break through the layers of guilt she had built around herself. Yet his efforts had, so far, been in vain.

“ Monica listen to me,” she shook her head into the damp pillow, “ No one, I repeat NO ONE blames you for Ross’ death…”

“But if I had just…”

“BUT nothing Monica. It was an accident. And I know you miss him, we all do,”

he stopped and drew a shaky breath, “ but you can’t hide behind this guilt forever. Your gonna just have to accept that Ross is dead,”

“I know he’s dead! I was there! It was my fault!!!” she screamed back at him, she wanted to slap him for being so callous.

Chandler held her struggling head firmly and looked into her eyes,

“Don’t do this to yourself Mon. Fight it, I’ll help you. But don’t DON’T believe this is your fault cause it will eat you alive.”

Her tears were streaming unchecked onto his hands, “ I can’t fight it Chandler cause I know it’s true. I killed Ross!”

Chandler groaned in exasperation, “ Will you listen to yourself? This is not you, my Monica would never say this.”

“Your Monica has changed.” She said, pealing his hands away from her face and walked into the bathroom, locking the door behind her.

Chandler sat down on the bed heavily and buried his head in his hands. He couldn’t take this much longer, the angry fights were tearing him apart. In the few weeks that Monica had been back home he felt like he was living with a stranger. The woman he loved was being destroyed by her own emotions and he could do nothing but watch helplessly. He felt like a failure as a husband, try as he might he couldn’t get through to her. She wouldn’t allow herself to grieve, a huge barrier of guilt stood between her and all her friends.

Chandler got up slowly and wearily then left the apartment, headed for Phoebe’s where the gang were waiting for him and the absent Monica. As he closed the door behind him he spoke into the ominous silence.

“ Don’t do this to yourself Mon, don’t do this to us. I love you so much but I don’t know how much longer I can fight this for you.”

Little did he know, he wouldn’t have to. Monica had made her decision. She knew what she was doing to Chandler, she felt his pain as acutely as her own, yet she couldn’t let herself stop it. He was right, the guilt was eating her up inside but she didn’t have the strength to stay and stop it. She felt like leaving was the only way out, both for her and Chandler. That night she packed her bags and walked out of his life for what she had thought would be a heartbreaking forever

TBC

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