Author: Toni McIntyre

Title: The One Where Nothing’s Easy 1/4

Joey looks up in the mirror and takes a deep breath. This was stupid, it was a date, he had been on countless amounts of dates.

But that was before he thought he could be falling for Rachel.

Not that it matters, but he was still out on that one. His feelings for Rachel confused the hell out him, constantly fluctuating.

He thought that maybe he could forget if he went on a date, hence his current position. However, as the moment comes closer he’s beginning to have second thoughts of going out at all. Rachel hadn’t been feeling too well all day and he spent the whole day at her bedside, fetching this and that for her. Would she be okay if he left? He had asked her this of course and she had insisted that he not cancel his date. Joey was just slightly disappointed in her answer, half hoping for another reason to stay home.

"Joey!" Rachel calls from outside the bathroom. "Your dates here!"

"Okay!" Joey calls and sighs. This is it, he thinks to himself and leaves the bathroom.

He rushes out of the apartment as fast as possible, thinking that the quicker the date starts, the quicker it will be over. Rachel watches with confused eyes as he leaves with a hurried farewell and she shuffles back to the lounger, pint of ice cream in hand. Joey had bought her Mint Chocolate Chip, her favorite flavor, just that morning after carefully taking care of her. It meant a lot more to Rachel then she dare to tell him that he had stayed by her side while she puked up three meals in fifteen minutes.

She sat down to watch TV, trying not to let the fact that Joey was going out on a date bother her.

**********

"So that’s when I said, to hell with that!" the woman across the table from Joey laughs and sips her wine before noticing Joey hasn’t laughed but rather is staring at the floor with a blank face.

"Joey?" she asks. "Joey?"

"Huh?" he snaps his head up. "Oh sorry Gina, I just zoned there for a second."

"You somewhere else or what?" Gina scoffs.

Joey thought about Rachel, sitting in their apartment. She’s probably watching some romance on PBS, she had favored the gushy flicks over the past couple of months, and she no doubt is curled up with some kind of snack. Probably ice cream considering how much she was complaining about crackers.

She’s probably already falling asleep by now. She always would, about five minutes into the movie. And that’s when he would tip toe to the chair and cover her with the blanket with the big rose on it she likes so much.

"Yeah, I’m somewhere else," he admits finally.

"Who is it?" Gina sighs.

"Huh?" Joey look sat her, surprised.

"Who is she?" Gina asks again. "Come on, you’ve already blown any chances of a second date so you might as well."

"Her names Rachel," Joey says with a sigh. "She’s my room mate."

"Uh oh."

"Oh no, wait here’s the best part: She’s pregnant with my friend’s baby."

"Ouch," Gina winces.

"Yeah," Joey nods. "One of the big reasons I haven’t really given it too much thought. I mean...I can’t do that to him can I?"

"Are they dating?" Gina asks.

"What? No, it was one of those one night things," Joey shrugs.

"So what’s the problem?" Gina asks innocently.

"I just told you," Joey says, rolling his eyes and obviously not catching on to what Gina is suggesting.

"No Joey, you just told me you have feelings for a woman clearly available with maybe some extra emotional baggage with the baby but are you prepared to handle that?"

"I think so," Joey pauses before nodding. "Yeah, I think I am."

"Then what the hell are you doing here?" Gina asks and she stands from the table slowly. "Okay here are your options, Joey. You can go home and tell that woman before she does end up with someone else…or you can come home with me and we’ll probably sleep together."

Joey looks at Gina, thinking it over and over in his head.

When really he had already made his decision a long time ago.

**********

Rachel must have fallen asleep during Pride and Prejudice because she wakes with a snort when she hears Joey enter at least an hour later.

"Oh honey, your date over?" she asks. She hides her enthusiasm and takes a spoon full of very melted ice cream.

"Yeah," he grumbles with a frown on his face.

"Oh I’m sorry," she says. "What went wrong?"

"Oh nothing, she asked me to come back to her place," Joey shrugs.

"Huh?" Rachel raises an eyebrow, slightly confused. "Then why are you here?"

"I didn’t want to sleep with her," Joey states and Rachel tries to hide her surprise to no avail.

"Why?" she chokes.

"I don’t love her," he says honestly, opening the refrigerator and pulling out some essential sandwich making ingredients.

"Since when does that matter?" Rachel grunts before she can think of how rude it sounds.

"It matters," Joey says, a little louder then usual, slamming the refrigerator door as he says it.

"Okay, I’m sorry," Rachel says immediately, surprised at the sharp tone in his voice.

"No don’t, I shouldn’t have done that," Joey sighs and leans against the counter. He looks over at Rachel who is still looking at him with a kind of genuine concern in her eyes he doesn’t get to see very often. He thinks back to what Gina said just before he left her standing there in the restaurant.

He can’t keep this from her, it’s too big.

And he hates secrets anyway.

"Rach, I have to tell you something," he says softly.

"Sure Joe, shoot," she whispers.

"Uh…okay," he thinks frantically to himself how to word emotions he’s just come to deal with. "It’s like this," he finally says. "You got a sandwich…" he grabs the meat he took out of the fridge and arranges it on a roll quickly.

"Yeah?" Rachel asks, slightly confused.

"And the very soul of the sandwich is the meat, right?" Joey asks, gesturing to the pile of salami and ham in front of him.

"I suppose," Rachel says slowly.

"Rachel, go with me here?" Joey demands.

"Okay, okay."

"But the sandwich would not be COMPLETE with out the bread," Joey says, lifting off the top roll. "I mean without the bread you don’t have a sandwich you just got a…hunk a meat."

"Joey I honestly have no clue what you’re talking about," Rachel says, raising an eyebrow at Joey’s poor metaphor.

"The point is that you…YOU," Joey gestures to her and sighs. "You’re my bread…and without you…" He gestures to himself. "I’m just a hunk a meat."

He watches as the meaning of what he’s saying sinks in slowly. Her face contorts into one on the brink of tears and she stands from the chair to walk around to him, putting her hands on his face as she speaks.

"Joey, that is probably the stupidest and sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me," Rachel whispers, smiling at him from ear to ear.

"Yeah?" he asks, proud of himself.

"Yeah," she nods. She sniffs, "And I’m happy to be your bread."

He grins at her and bends his head down to meet hers. Their lips touch with a spark and the kiss quickly evolves from a casual, tentative first kiss, to a kiss shared between two people who know this is something special.

When they part Joey beams.

"Oh YEA!" he shouts, throwing his arms up in to the air, just happy he didn’t royally screw up telling Rachel he cared about her. Rachel just laughs and throws her arms around his waist.