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Joey and Allison enter Central Perk hand in hand as Joey talks loudly about the different diseases he could get. Ignoring people's stares they walk over to their area to greet their friends.
"Hey, hey." "Hey everyone!" Chandler looks at them for a moment as he says "Hi." Phoebe greets them too before Chandler thinks of his joke, "And this from the cry-for-help department. Are you wearing makeup?"
"Yep! I am. As of today, I am officially Joey Tribbiani, actor slash model." Joey announces proudly. Allison grins while Chandler jokes, "That's so funny, 'cause I was thinking you look more like Joey Tribbiani, man slash woman." Allison grins, "You're a pretty woman though," she says thoughtfully.
Joey goofily smiles at her as Phoebe asks, "What we're you modeling for?" "You know those posters for the city free clinic?" Joey asks in return. Monica looks impressed, "Oh wow, so you're gonna be one of those 'healthy, healthy, healthy guys?'"
Phoebe smirks and states, "You know, the asthma guy was really cute." Allison briefly thinks about the asthma guy and shivers. Joey nudges her in mock annoyance causing her to sheepishly smile at him. "Do you know which one you're gonna be?" Chandler asks.
"No, but I hear Lyme disease is open so..." Joey trails off and crosses his fingers. "Good luck man, I hope you get it." Chandler says causing Allison to break into a fit of giggles as Joey thanks him.
Suddenly Ross walks in looking upset, "Well you were right, how can they do this to us? It's Thanksgiving!" Ross says while dramatically picking up his coat to sit down.
"Alright how about this? How about I cook dinner for you at my place?" Monica says trying to be nice. Meanwhile Allison starts to drift from the conversation to pay more attention to Joey's hand that she's been holding.
Comparing it's size to her own hand she realizes how much bigger it is and is suddenly very entertained trying to perfectly line up their hands while Joey tries to drink his coffee.
Joey watches her, amused, trying and failing miserably to hide his goofy smile behind his cup as she finally lines up their hands and makes a small triumphant noise. She finally looks up from what she was doing to see Joey and he watches as a rosy blush spreads across her freckled cheeks.
He absentmindedly answers Monica's question about where he's headed for the holidays before Monica asks where Allison is going. "Oh she's coming with me!" Joey says, suddenly excited at the thought of Allison meeting his parents and all of his sisters.
"Really?" Ross asks skeptically, "Don't you think that's....I dunno, too soon?" Joey immediately starts shaking his head to disagree. "Nah, I know my family will love her and it's just the perfect time ya know?"
Allison starts blushing even harder as she adds, "I'm really nervous and excited at the same time to meet all of his sisters but I hope we all get along." They both look at each other and grin as Ross looks at them doubtfully.
"Whelp, I'm off to Carol's." Ross announces as he gets up. "Ooh! Ooh! Why don't we invite her?" Phoebe asks excitedly. Ross looks down at her condescendingly, "Ooh ooh because she's my ex-wife and will probably want to bring her ooh ooh lesbian life partner."
"Well that's not our fault." Allison says looking Ross in the eyes innocently.
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Later on, Joey and Allison rush into the train station as they check to see when the next train come in. Looking around absentmindedly Joey spots a pretty woman sitting on one of the benches as Allison checks one of the maps.
For a moment he forgets that his beautiful girlfriend is just a few feet away and has half the mind to go and try to get her number. He starts to take a step forward when he feels a tug at his sleeve.
Right behind him is Allison tugging at him and pointing at a poster on the wall of the station. There he is in all of his glory on a poster warning people of VD with his face plastered on the front. Allison murmurs something to him sadly as he stares at it in shock.
He accepts her hug and lets the guilt of what he was going to do drift away and be replaced by embarrassment.
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The gang is all in the living room of Central Perk laughing as Joey comes through the door with shame radiating off of him. Allison follows behind as she has been the entire trip home trying to comfort him.
"So I guess you all saw it." Joey says hiding his irritation behind a tight-lipped smile. The gang all jokingly deny it before Phoebe says, "No we're just laughing. You know how laughter can be infectious." causing the group to burst into another fit of giggles.
Allison rubs Joey's arm comfortingly but he continues to stand rigidly and shrugs his arm away.
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Allison and Joey sadly walk through Monica's door later that night. "Set two more plates for dinner. My entire family thinks I have VD." Monica and Phoebe stop prepping dinner for a second to give him sympathetic looks before Chandler jokes, "Tonight on a very special blossom."
Joey gives him an annoyed look as Allison stands awkwardly next to him as he casually doesn't allow her to touch him.
The next morning the entire gang is in the kitchen besides Rachel as Monica prepares thanksgiving dinner and Phoebe and Allison help.
Ross is forlornly slouched over the table sighing as Monica finally has enough and asks, "What?" "I don't know. It's just not the same without mom in the kitchen." He says childishly
"Oh alright. You know that's it. Just get out of my way and stop annoying me." Monica snaps. "Oh that's closer!" Suddenly Rachel bursts through the door waving her plane ticket in the air.
"I got the ticket! I got the ticket! Five hours from now shoop, shoop, shoop." She says as she shoops. "Oh you must stop shooping." Chandler says as he watches her from the doorway.
"Okay I'm gonna get my stuff." Rachel says as she rushes off again to pack. "Chandler will you just come in already?" Joey asks as he stands uselessly in the middle of the kitchen. "Oh no thanks. I prefer to keep a safe distance from all this merriment." He quips back.
Allison giggles lightly as she continues her task that Monica set aside for her to help with but ignores Joey's look as he stands behinds her. "Look out, incoming pumpkin pie! Nyeooooow." Phoebe mimicks airplane noises as she flies the pie by Chandler's face.
"Okay, we all laughed when you did it with the stuffing but that's not funny anymore." Chandler says mocking hurt as he leaves dramatically.
"Hey Monica, I got a question. I don't see any tater tots." Joey says as he snacks on some marshmallows. Allison looks up from her work to see Monica looking unimpressed as she says, "That's not a question."
"Well my mom always makes them. It's like a tradition. You get a little piece of turkey on your fork, a little cranberry sauce and a tot!" Joey says childishly. Allison quietly gets back to work as she logs the information into her head.
"I mean it's bad enough I can't be with my family because of my disease." Joey says trying to guilt trip her. Hurt by him saying it was just him that couldn't go Allison quickly offers, "I could make your tater tots Joe."
"Nah, no thanks. I'm sure Monica would make them great." He says, shooting her down. Not sure how to take that Allison just nods before setting down her spoon and quickly mutters something about checking on Chandler.
She speed walks out of the room before anyone asks any questions and quickly enters the room across the hall. Chandler seems to be sitting there lifelessly at the counter so she goes to stand next to him.
"You okay Chan man?" She asks. "It's thanksgiving." Is all he replies but it's enough of an answer for her. Silently she just stands next to him as she stares at the wall in thought.
Chandler couldn't stand the quiet though and quickly asked, "Okay, what's up with you?" "Hmm, I dunno, it's just—Joey's being weird so now I feel weird. Not to mention the whole thing at the station." Allison half-answers.
"Thing at the station?" Chandler asks curiously, bobbing his head up to look at her. "Joey was going to flirt with another girl." Is all she says. Confused, Chandler replies, "I'm sure that's not it. Maybe she just needed someone to talk to and he picked up on that."
He knew that excuse sounded rough even to him and winced at the thought that he actually said that. "No, I know he was going to. He had the whole smirk thing he does going and was about to walk over before I distracted him. I don't think I'm going to bring it up though." Allison says thoughtfully.
Now thoroughly confused Chandler asks, "Why not?" "Its been more than his usual two weeks," Allison says, "any argument might lead to the breakup you know?" It's obvious she was vulnerable which made Chandler uncomfortable leading him to say nothing and instead just turn on the tv.
The Macy's day parade was on and both Chandler and Allison decided to just settle down and watch it when the news struck. In an instant both of them were up and rushing across the hall.
"The most unbelievable thing has happened." Chandler starts. "Underdog has gotten away." Allison finishes looking the most excited she has all day. "The balloon?" Joey asks confused.
"No no, the actual cartoon character." Chandler says sarcastically. "Of course the balloon!" "It's all over the news. Right before it reached Macy's and broke free and was spotted flying over Washington Square Park."
"We're going to the roof. Who's with us?" Allison asks excitedly, practically bouncing up and down. Joey rushes up at the opportunity and the three are out the door with the other girls shortly behind.
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"The moment when the giant dog shadow fell all across the park." Rachel exclaims. "Yeah but did they have to shoot him down? That was just mean." Phoebe said to which Allison nodded along.
Allison quickly realized that the food would be done soon and if she wanted to make tater tots her way for Joey then she would have to do it now. She quickly said something about heading to her apartment quickly as Monica was talking about the crispness of the turkey.
Less than an hour later Allison comes back to the apartment only to smell a horrible burning smell and everyone arguing.
"What's going on?" She asks loudly as she hold the tray of tater tots as well some roasted vegetables that she whipped up. Everyone turns to her before Joey asks, "What's that?"
Nervously Allison answers, "I know you said you wanted Monica to make you tater tots and not me but I felt like you should at least try mine." She sets down the tray and opens the window while fanning out the smoke.
"Ooh! And I made roasted vegetables too! It's not much but I think they're pretty good." Monica practically sobs before thanking Allison and hugging him.
"Ewww, ugly naked guy's taking his turkey out of the oven." Phoebe exclaims. "Ewww." Everyone repeats. "Oh my god. He's not alone. Ugly naked guy is having thanksgiving dinner with an ugly naked gal."
Everyone immediately scrambled over to the window and started being happy for them. "It's nice that he has someone." Phoebes says. Joey immediately looks to Allison who anxiously smiles back and looks over at Chandler.
Chandler's already looking at her and nods at her as if to encourage her to say something but she stays quiet and chooses to enjoy Joey's arm around her for now.
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"Shall I carve?" Chandler asks from the head of the table in front of a large plate of grilled cheese. "By all means." Rachel says as he starts to cut into the sandwiches. Meanwhile, everyone piles tater tots and vegetables onto their plates and thanks Allison besides Joey.
Joey judgmentally tastes a tator tot as Allison watches nervously before he grabs some more without thanking her in the process. She waits expectantly for a moment before realizing that he wasn't going to say anything and accepts a grilled cheese sandwich.
"Does anyone want to split this with me?" Monica asks holding up a sandwich to which Joey immediately replies, "Oh I will." Allison looks up from where she was going to split one for them and chose to watch.
They both pull at the sandwich as if it was a wishbone, "Oh-ho! You got the bigger half! What did you wish for?" Phoebe asks. Allison silently hopes that he'll say something profound about the people he's with or her as his girlfriend but is quickly disappointed.
She realizes she couldn't expect that of Joey as he says, "The bigger half." as if it was obvious. Chandler stands up with a glass in hand.
"Alright, I'd like to propose a toast. Little toast here. Ding, ding." Chandler says gaining everyone's attention. "I know this isn't the kind of thanksgiving that all of you planned. But for me, this has been really great, ya know? I think because it didn't involve divorce or projectile vomiting."
"Anyway, I was just thinking that if you went to Vail or if you guys went to spend time with family and stuff we wouldn't be all together you know? So I guess what I'm trying to say is that uh, I'm very thankful that all of your thanksgivings sucked."
Allison smiles at Chandler knowingly as he tries his best to express his emotions the best way he knew how. "And hey, here's to a lousy Christmas." Ross says. "And a crappy New Year." "Cheers!" Everyone exclaims.
And later, after the meal if Chandler came over to Allison and asked if she was alright and she didn't even know what to say then no one would have to know.
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