Rachel's POV:
After we get back from the peaceful apartment, that could possibly be our new home, we decide to go for a wonder. Keep the happy mood rolling. I take a strong hold of Ross' hand as we stroll through the streets of New York City. Ross has no plan of where to go, and no idea of what to do, so I take control and slyly guide him to someones home, knowing that he will not disapprove in the slightest.
We get to the selected building, Ross still having not noticed where we're going, I open the bulky door, pulling my love inside the tower behind me. That's when it clicks, "Why are we here?" He asks with a smile. "To see my son!" I grin, finally reaching Carol and Susan's coloured front door and knocking gently against the wood. I hear a child's scream bellow and rushed, tiny footsteps becoming louder, along with louder footsteps approaching from behind them.
The door opens and Ben loudly shouts out "DADDY!" running vigorously to us. Ross lets go of my hand and bends down to embrace Ben in a big, squashed bear hug. Holding him still, Ross stands up and turns to face me. As he opens one of his not so butch arms out, I step into the two boys and join the hug. Wrapping one arm tightly around the back of Ross' broad body, and the other supporting Ben.
"Rachel!" Ben leans away from Ross and towards me, outstretching his hands to me. I pull my arm back from around Ross and take Ben from him. Now having one arm under Ben's bum, holding him up, with the other up his back and holding his head up, even though he doesn't need support anymore. I pull him closer to me and place a sweet kiss on his forehead, symbolising my unconditional love for him.
"Hey guys," Carol says, opening the door even more, gesturing that we all go inside. "Congratulations on the wedding and... You know!" She smiles politely. Ross being Ross, questions her words. "Why'd you say 'you know'?" Carol then reasons with, "I haven't told Ben yet. I thought you would want to tell him yourself, together, about the..." She stops before she contradicts what she is saying. "Thank You!" I silence before Ross could say anymore, swinging side to side with Ben in my arms.
We all go and sit down on the cushiony sofa; Susan walking in from the other room. I sit down next to Ross, putting Ben on my lap as I do so. "Hey, congratulations! You about to tell Ben the news?" Susan asks. "Thank you, yeah, we are!" I smile, Ross smiling too. "Okay, well we'll let you do that then." She finishes and walks into another room with Carol following behind her.
I turn to the side, with my back against Ross' chest more than before, twisting Ben around on my lap so that we are now face to face. "Hi Ben! Would you like me to be your mommy?" I ask in my little kid voice. Ross slides his hands down my back and around my waist as I say this. "You mommy?" Ben questions, confused, in his actual child voice. We both laugh at his cuteness. "Yes Ben, I will be your mommy too!" I hug him close to me.
After that Ross asks him another question. "Do you want to be a big brother? Do you want to have a baby sister or brother?" Ben fidgets on my lap, shaking about. "Sister!" He shouts, jumping vividly on my lap. We both laugh at him again. "No, you don't get to choose, you just get one!" Ross half explains.
"Well, you will defiantly be a big brother!" I assure him. "Yeah, and it's not that long either. Only about 7 months!" Ross conceals him. "Okay." Ben softly replies. "8 weeks 1 day!" Ross whispers in my ear, making me smile, as I'm sure he is too.
(A/N: I don't remember if Ben would really be able to speak or not... All I remember is that he said his first word to Rachel when she was still going out with Ross but I don't remember when that was...)
After that, Carol and Susan come back in and we talk as normal. We confirm dates of when we will have Ben, taking him to Barbados and the odd day that he gets to spend with us. Double-checking he has a passport to get into the other countries. We talk about where Susan and Carol will be going and doing at their little 'vacation'.
After a couple of hours, it's almost dinner time, so we head back home. "Bye guys." Ross and I say to the two women. "Bye Ben, see you soon!" I crouch down and give him a hug before Ross helps me back up to leave.
As we're walking down the street, I spot a familiar face and immediately get attached to Ross. I recognise her face well and anger fills up inside of me, but it doesn't click why I really don't like her. That is... until... I feel Ross' grip around me tightened, to symbolise that I was his and no one else could replace me in his full life. It was the copy girl from that xerox place that slept with Ross.
Overly mixed emotions cause me to vigorously claw my fingernails deeply into Ross' arm as it falls in front of me, and tears rush to my eyes, harshly threatening to fall as I start to softy whimper my saddness out. This bitch caused this foggy patch in our relationship. She is the reason we spent time apart. She's the reason my child almost went without a father. She is the broken reason.
She finally sees us and clocks that she should not be near. She shamefully lowers her head and speeds up her walking, but she's walking in the direction of where we are. As she approaches, I feel like pouncing at her and ripping her boy-cut hair out until there is no more to show for her, but tears clouding my vision and my unwillingness to loosen the fierce grip I have on Ross prevents me from doing just that.
As she gets near, she raises her head and made eye contact with me -bad choice- then with Ross as she hurries and scurries past. A little cough showing she isn't comfortable nor happy to have seen us out and about. She saw the hurt in my eyes and the hate in my actions, as do most people who take one glance at me. Ross holds me close and kisses my hair softly, whispering in my ear that she means and meant nothing to him. I meant and mean everything to him. Me, Ben and our unborn child. Our family. Us.
This calms me down a bit. But I'm still furious about what happened and just has to remember the future to get the horrifying images of the past out of my head.
Barbados. The beach and the ceremony. Our wedding and the start of our married life, with our family too. Our friends all taking time away from their lives to celebrate with us. I'm so grateful of them, our friends. I really wouldn't be who I am today without them. They are the people who have shaped and moulded me into this figure of who I am. They gave me my new life and my new personality. They gave me the strength to get through all the tough times. I love them all so much.
When Ross and myself finally climb the last set of stairs and stumble through the always-unlocked front door, we see the widely familiar hair that stands and waves down the back of our four friends heads. Mon turns round, followed by everyone else and greets us. Standing up swiftly and gliding over to where Ross and I are, she grabs her 'super helpful' yellow notepad off the smaller coffee table. "Hey!" I sing. "Hi, someone called for either one of you earlier!" Mon states, handing the notepad to us. As Ross takes it, Monica continues with what she has started to say. "Yeah, the lady sounded very happy and said that you should call her back as soon as possible because she has some very good new!" She displays a very confused look but still managed to smile as she spoke to us.
I look at the notepad and see the number and a name written down on it. A very new name to me, to us. It was the one of the lady from this morning at the other apartment. Ross and I start to walk to my room to call her back. Mon continues to walk to the kitchen and does her usual routine of getting dinner ready. Looking in the fridge and the freezer; cupboards and everywhere else before she decides which fascinating dish to whip up.
I take the notepad and walk over to sit on the bed, Ross closing the door as I do so. I grab the phone and start to dial the number, putting it on loud-speaker so that Ross can be apart of the conversation when the lady answers. "Hello?" she politely greets. "Hi, it's Ross and Rachel. You called us earlier but we weren't home. What can we help you with?" we reply with smiles.
"Oh, yes. Ross and Rachel. I have great news for you, the apartment we looked at this morning is definitely yours! It's been decided that you cane move into it in just 3 weeks. All you'll have to do is meet up with the landlord within the week that you move in." The kind lady says at once. "Thank you. That's great to hear. Thanks."
"Well, I'll leave you to it then. Have fun in the new place." We hang up. Ross and I look up at the same time, after putting the phone back on its stand. We gaze into each others eyes and our vision locks together. His beautiful brown eyes and those soft, push lips... He's making me crazy with all our love. My heart starts to race as we continue to just stare into each others eyes.
Ross gently lifts his hand and brushes loose strands of my hair behind my ear before holding the side of my face soothingly. As he removes focus from my eyes to my lips, I can't help but lick them slightly, making them moist. I see Ross' rising anticipation and smile with pleasure, knowing that he's about to kiss me.
Then he does. With his hand cupping the side of my face, he grazes his thumb over my rosey-red cheeks and progressively draws me into his toned body. As we both lean in, his soft, puch lips fall onto mine and heaven touches my heart. I suck on his lip as he sucks on mine and we just share in this magical moment of love together.
His sparkling, charming eyes seduce, attract and hook me to his love. The way my lips fit in his; the way he holds me close. Nothing can beat this feeling! Knowing that someone loves me. That he loves me as much as I love him, it is just the most amazing feeling in the entire world! The love. The lust. The passion and the homey feeling.
As our lips move in a patterned rhythm and we suck at each others pouted smiles, I feel the kiss intensify and deepen into a kiss better than the last few we've had. My smile widening from within the kiss causes Ross to smile even more too.
After a good few minutes of sharing that much passion, we finally separate. We keep giving each other small kisses and quick pecks before we stop and look into each others sparkling eyes once more. His big, beautiful, brown eyes, locked with my owen blue ones, make my heart race faster than the speed of light. I feel numb with love.
Once our heart-felt moment fades back into reality, we stand up tgether and walk out into the living room to where all of our friends sit around the dining table. We glid over and join them as we all start to eat dinner. The devine food that Monica cooked suprises me as I don't get the expected erge to throw up, but I'm overcome with the need to eat more and more. I shovel mounds of the dish on my third-time-cleared plate as we continue to chat with each other.
"So guys, but mainly Monica..." Ross starts, "That call was from this lady that Rachel and I met up with this morning. She was at this apartment we went to look at." He continues. I smile as I hellp to tell the story, "Yeah, it was so goregous and there is so much room there! It had three bedrooms and two bathrooms!" I dream about the future.
"It has this MASSIVE living room areas and a door out onto a balcony and quite a big kitchen!" My smile refuses to disappear. "It even had a storage room and a study and everything!" Ross finishes, just as jolly. "And the best part is, it only cost $50-ish more than what I pay for my current place!" Ross cheers.
"Uh- And!... It's literally just across the street!" I stand up and walk over to the big window. The rest of them following me over to see what I'm about to do. Ross slides his hand down my side and rests it on my waist as I continue what I was saying before hand. "See that apartment right there!?" I start, pointing out to the apartment that Ross and I are buying. "Same level as here.... The window to the left of the one opposite us!? The end one!" I try to describe which one I'm talking about.
"It's probably opposite your place guys!" Ross points out. "Oh yeah!" I sing. "Well that's the one that we're moving to!" I smile, giddy. "It's so amazing! I can't wait until you see it!" I hum, happy. "The lady said we could move into it in just three weeks!" I chime, looking up at Ross to my side. "And yes, I know we won't be here, but we could always ask our parents or Carol and Susan to pick up the keys for us and get them off them when we get back!" Ross justifies.
(A/N: this has nothing to do with the story, sorry. But when I went to write 'justifies', I almost wrote 'justifier' as a habit of mine!... :/ oh well)
"Oh. Well I guess that's cool..." Mon says with a monotone voice, slowly walking back over to the table without a smile. I quickly rush to her side and force her to look at me by holding my hands on her shoulders. "Hey! What's wrong?" I ask, concerned. "No, it's nothing! I'm fine!" She fakes a smile, which makes me sad. "No, tell me! What's wrong?"
"It's just that... I don't want you to move! I'd rather you both stay here, with me! I know it sounds really selfish, but I don't want to live by myself! And I love both of you to bits and I'm going to love this baby with all my might and I want to help out and I can't really do that if you live somewhere else!" Monica depressingly explains. "Oh!" I sigh, upset.
"Well, Mon, I just think..." I start to balance from my point of view. "It's time that Ross and I really start our lives together! I mean, we're getting married! And we're having a baby!" I emphasise. "It wouldn't be fun for you to have to put up with a newly married couple then a screaming baby only a few months later! It's going to be real hard work for us to balance our lives when our angel comes, but we need to figure it out for ourselves and compete head-first to the challenge and win it over independently!
We're still going to need your help, but it's going to be new and scary for us and it's something we need to conquer and get over! Plus, we're only going to be across the street! You can come and visit whenever you want! And we're going to be here a lot! We'll even stay some nights to keep you company if you want! All three of us!" I hug her. "Just because I'm moving, it doesn't mean that I don't still love you and that we'll never see each other!" I whisper. "I'll always be here!" I tell her metaphorically.
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SORRY!!!!
I know! I know it's been, like, forever since I've updated but if you read my comment on the last chapter you'd know why!
This week was my first week back at school after the week of work experience I had last week! So last week I wasn't even home, nor had the time to write an update! This week I've had course work to focus on but I have been trying to get something!! Then the week before work experience, I was spending my time making sure I had everything organised ready for it!...
So, today, I did have a friend round but after she left I just sat staring at my laptop until something came to me to write and went from there!
It's probably really bad but it's just been too long and I didn't want to have to wait until next week, after I break up from school for good, before I publish a new chapter!!
Again, SORRY!!!!!!!