Joey's POV
"Y'know, technically this isn't even the first time you an' I have kissed, Chandler, remember?"
"Oh yeah, at Monica's New Years eve party at midnight, how could I forget?"
"You know, I just realized something. Both times we've kissed we had an audience, and I was the one who initiated the kiss," Shit, why did he just say that? Why did he even think that?
"What, are you saying you're secretly in love with me or something?" Chandler asked with a laugh. Joey tried to respond with a laugh, but it trailed off in his throat. For some reason Chandler's joke caused his thoughts to start trailing off down a path he'd tried to block many times in the past. Joey hoped Chandler would keep talking to help distract him, but of course this was the one time Chandler decided he didn't want to use jokes to get out of an uncomfortable situation.
The car drifted into an awkward silence, something Joey had been hoping was over between him and Chandler, but apparently not. Why did he have to kiss Chandler? There had to have been another option, maybe if he had waited a couple more seconds Chandler would have come up with something better that didn't require this level of commitment to the part.
But Joey had let himself panic, and he acted without thinking, as usual. He just followed his first impulse, and once again, his first impulse in a moment of stress seemed to be to kiss Chandler.
Well, to be fair Joey's first impulse in most situations involving himself and someone attractive is to kiss them.
Oh my god. What the fuck. Now Joey was finding Chandler attractive? His thoughts really were going all over the place, the chaos and overlapping thoughts that always filled his head felt even louder and more prominent than usual. He debated trying to start up the conversation in the car again, maybe ask Chandler about work or something mundane to try and distract himself from the thoughts he was forcing back. But Joey knew that wouldn't work, and with the amount of repressed stuff running through his head dying to get out, he couldn't guarantee that he wouldn't say something even worse than what he'd already blurted out.
He tried distracting himself - it's not like it was usually hard for him to change what he was thinking about. His mind was normally fairly loud and chaotic, with a whole list of topics and thoughts it would randomly switch to whether he wanted to focus on something or not.
But the one time his easily distractible brain would actually come in handy, the only thing he could think of was the person sitting next to him in the car. One specific thought kept circling his head - one that he was trying desperately to ignore. But he couldn't push it back any longer, and, to Joey's dismay, the thought finally surfaced.
That was one of the best kisses Joey had ever experienced.
And he really,
really wanted to experience a kiss like that again.
Which technically meant that Joey... wanted to kiss Chandler again? Shit, no, that couldn't be true, could it? Joey was straight, he was completely straight, he was definitely still attracted to women, so why would he want to kiss a man?
Unless the whole "bisexual" thing Phoebe had mentioned a while ago was actually true? At first he thought that there was no way that could apply to him, but the more he thought about it, the more it started to cause a lot of events from his past make a bit more sense. The boys in his classes who he couldn't stop looking at and trying to impress in high school, the way he never really cared and actually felt kind of proud when people accused him of dating Chan- other men, the gay characters he had really enjoyed playing before, and a lot more he didn't feel like thinking about right now.
So, maybe Joey really was bisexual? Huh. That... was not a conclusion he had expected to come to at all. Well, on the bright side, at least he could feel a lot less guilty about taking this part, since he supposed he wasn't lying about liking men anymore (wow, that felt weird for Joey to admit, even just in his own head).
As he came to this realization, Joey realized that after a ride that felt way longer than usual, they had finally arrived home. Joey and Chandler silently got out of the car, and once they got up to their apartment, Joey said that he wasn't feeling well (which wasn't a complete lie) and went straight into his room to continue sorting out this shitstorm of thoughts.
Unfortunately, being back in the apartment reminded Joey how he came to his big revelation, and the specific feeling of guilt of lying about his sexuality was just replaced by guilt about something else. If he really was attracted to men, then that meant it wasn't completely impossible for Joey to come to the conclusion that he might, possibly, be attracted to his best friend. And if that was true, then he was the worst friend in the entire world.
But as much as he didn't want to admit it to himself, this also explained a lot. The amount of times he'd somehow ended up kissing Chandler, how excited and happy he got even just being around Chandler, the jealousy he felt when Chandler mentioned other roommates, best friends, or even girlfriends he'd had, how he felt closer to Chandler than he had ever felt to anyone before. Joey had just chalked this all up to typical best friend stuff, since he'd never really had a best friend like this before to compare his feelings to. But when he compared it to other friendships he'd seen, like Monica and Rachel, or even Chandler and Ross, who had known each other way longer than Joey had known Chandler, he realized Joey and Chandler acted significantly closer than most other people seemed to, with Joey being especially affectionate and close to Chandler. And Joey was starting to realize that this may be because he was kinda, sorta, just a little bit in love with his best friend. Shit.
Oh, god, what would Chandler think if he found out? Joey knew he had a lot of baggage thanks to his dad, how would he react to finding out his best friend wasn't straight? And possibly in love with him to top it all off! Joey had no idea what to do, and he realized he was starting to go down what Chandler called an "anxiety spiral" (geez, if Chandler experienced this as much as he said he did, Joey probably needed to talk to his friend more). He tried doing what Chandler always told him to when he was stressed. He took in a few deep breaths, closed his eyes, and made a mental list of his favorite Baywatch episodes. For as dumb of a distraction as that was, it always worked, and he was grateful to Chandler for coming up with it.
Joey decided he should take a walk to get some fresh air and try and clear his thoughts a bit more. He got up and changed into a more comfortable sweater before stepping out of his room. He called out to Chandler to let him know he was leaving, but he received no response. As he reached the front door of the apartment he noticed a new message scrawled on their message board, replacing the "break a leg, Joe :)" that had adorned it since that morning (and every morning Joey had rehearsals). The new message read "went to get more beer, be back soon". Huh, Joey hadn't realized they were out of beer in the first place. Well, he wasn't complaining, he wouldn't mind coming back to a cold beer to help take his mind off of things even more.
***
Once Joey stepped out of the apartment into the cool fall air, he confirmed that taking a walk was the right choice. The mild heat of discomfort that hadn't stopped persisting in his face quickly faded, replaced by a more bearable sting from the strong wind. His thoughts continued as he set off on his walk, but they were slightly calmer now, with a bit more logic creeping in to balance out the overwhelmingly intense emotions. The more he thought about it, the more he decided he was probably overreacting, right? Although he was slowly becoming more and more sure about being bisexual, he was starting to de-convince himself of the whole "being in love with Chandler" thing. It's not like he had ever really been in love before, with most of his previous relationships being casual hookups or flings. He had no frame of reference as to what being in love really felt like. So maybe this feeling wasn't being in love, maybe everyone was at least slightly attracted to their best friends? He didn't actually have an answer to that. Joey thought about it some more, before deciding that unfortunately the only way to be sure about this whole thing would be to ask someone else. Normally he would ask Chandler about this sort of thing, but that obviously wasn't an option this time. He decided he would ask his second closest friend, who was always willing to help Joey with any confusing or overwhelming issues like this one. He called over a cab that was conveniently passing by and gave the driver the address for Phoebe's house.
***
Getting really close to the end of this story, probably only a couple more chapters left! Sorry for those of you who have waited months for this, I'm out of excuses at this point, I just haven't had any ideas for what to write until now. I already have the next one planned out though, so hopefully there will be a much, MUCH shorter wait this time.