*peeks out from behind the bushes* hi remember me? I never intended to leave this story for so long, but I just cannot and will not publish anything I'm unhappy with, and as anyone who follows me on instagram knows, I was going through a major case of writer's block for a long time, then I kinda left the fandom. While this chapter is very short, and doesn't even come close to making up for my long absence with this fic, I hope you all (if there's even anyone still reading) enjoy it.

"Hey, you're up early," Joey noted, stretching as he emerged from his room the next morning. Chandler sighed into his coffee cup and hung his head.

"Yeah, I guess I couldn't sleep," Chandler shrugged.

"You okay man?" Joey asked, obviously catching on to his roommate's demeanor.

"Umm…" Chandler wasn't entirely sure how to answer. No, he wasn't really okay, but he didn't know why he wasn't okay. Monica had eventually come back to the table last night, and they had finished the meal in slightly awkward silence. He hadn't pushed her to talk to him, still stinging from her rejection, and she hadn't seemed too eager to start a conversation either so they just…didn't. It had been years since Chandler had felt that uncomfortable around Monica and he was struggling with how to deal with it.

They had walked straight home, rather than casually wandering as they had on the way there, and after Monica had quietly announced that she was tired, they had gone straight to bed. He really had no idea what was going on in Monica's mind through all of this, and he wanted nothing more than to ask. But he didn't. He just climbed into bed next to her and tried not to let it affect him when she turned her back to him to fall asleep.

Chandler himself got very little sleep, hence why he was on his third cup of coffee already when he saw Joey, and while theoretically that should be more than ample to deal with his roommate's questioning, he didn't want to talk to anyone until he talked with Monica. Whenever that happened.

"Where's Monica?" Joey pressed, and Chandler realized that he hadn't said anything for some time.

"Still asleep, I think," Chandler shrugged. "Or across the hall making breakfast? I don't know, she was sleeping when I got up."

"What are you doing over here then? The only time you two are ever apart is when one of you has to work."

"We…kinda had a…thing, last night," Chandler responded vaguely, taking a sip as casually as he could.

"A thing?" Joey clarified. "Like, a fight thing?"

"No, not a fight," Chandler argued. "It was more…I said something stupid, and…you know what, it doesn't matter."

"Really? 'Cause it seems like it matters a lot for you to spend the morning moping over here instead of doing whatever it is you two do in the mornings."

Joey had a point, of course, and Chandler doubted he would get off so easily without some sort of explanation.

He was saved from going any further, though, when the apartment door cracked open a moment before Chandler felt arms around his waist. He sunk into the embrace immediately, any anguish he had been feeling about the previous night's not-fight all but gone at the easy display of affection and the glorious sensation of his child pressed against his back.

"Morning handsome," she greeted, softly kissing the side of his neck, and Chandler turned to say good morning properly.

"Hey you," he responded, meeting her lips for a quick kiss. It was so casual, as if nothing had happened between them. Chandler was more than okay with just putting the incident behind them if that was what Monica wanted to do.

"I made breakfast if you guys wanna come over," Monica told them.

"Why didn't you lead with that?" Joey exclaimed, the door opening and closing not a moment later as he went off in search of food.

Chandler held Monica close for a minute, just enjoying the feeling of having her in his arms again. Even though he had technically slept next to her last night, it was nothing like sharing the closeness of their bodies pressed together.

"I'm sorry," he finally mumbled into her hair. "If I made you uncomfortable yesterday. You know I only want to make you happy."

"Forget it, Chandler, we're good," she assured him. "I promise, everything is fine. Now, we should probably get back over there before Joey eats all the pancakes—and the batter I haven't cooked yet."

Chandler ran his hands down her back and sides to press them lightly against her stomach before drawing back completely with a small smile. When he really thought about it, that was what it was all for. He was going to have a baby with Monica, and anything else was just background noise. His sole focus needed to be making sure their kid would have the best life they could give it.

Chandler followed his girlfriend across the hall where Joey was already indulging in what appeared to be his second helping of pancakes. Monica's batter, however, seemed safe for the moment as she reclaimed her spot at the stove to continue cooking. Rachel joined them for breakfast eventually before excusing herself to meet Phoebe to go shopping. Joey left eventually too and they were alone again. Chandler was unsure how to start a conversation, worried about accidentally bringing up something she didn't want to talk about. He couldn't have a repeat of the previous night.

"Y'know," she started casually after they had been alone for barely a minute. "We still haven't talked about names."

"Okay, so let's talk about names," Chandler shrugged. "You go."

"Why do I have to go?" Monica raised an eyebrow, crossing her arms over her front.

"Because you brought it up, and you're the mother, and you're Monica, and—"

"Okay, fine!" Monica huffed. "I haven't…I haven't thought about it too much…"

"And Chandler is off the table, Mon, just so we're clear," Chandler interrupted.

""But—"

"I mean it!"

Monica rolled her eyes. "Okay, whatever. I wasn't actually going to suggest Chandler. And I really haven't thought about it too much, at least not lately." She shook her head, smiling shyly downwards. "It's funny, I used to dream about this all the time, having a baby. I had names picked out by the time I was twelve. But now—now that it means something…"

"I know," Chandler interrupted. "I know. We have time, Mon, we really don't have to do this now."

"Shouldn't we though?" Monica argued. "Shouldn't we have, I don't know, a list or something? At least of possibilities?"

"It would make you feel better to have a list," Chandler observed. "We can do whatever you want to honey. They don't even have to be good names. Hey, we could make a list of all the names we don't want!"

"Are you serious?"

"Why not?" Chandler shrugged. He turned around to grab a notepad from the counter, one of many that Monica kept lying around the apartment, probably for occasions such as this. Or, maybe not occasions like this, but generally. "We've even got the first name to put at the top."

"And put Monica down after it," she instructed. Chandler raised his eyebrows at her. "What? That would be weird, naming my own baby after myself. It's not even an option."

"Do we want to rule out the rest of the guys' names?" Chandler asked as he scribbled down their first two names for the "bad names" list. "'Cause I imagine the trouble we'd get in for picking any of them over the others would outweigh anything we actually like about the name."

"Good idea," Monica agreed. "What else?"

"Well, we should probably eliminate the names of any ex-boyfriends and girlfriends."

"You mean you don't want a daughter named Janice?" Monica teased, and Chandler physically shuddered.

"Dear god no," he quickly added that to their list, along with Kathy, Richard, and Pete.

"We've both dated more people than that," Monica reminded him.

"Well, we can rule those names out when they come up. But these are the ones way out of the question. What else?" Monica sat thinking for a moment. "Come on, Mon, use your imagination. Anything at all. Any name you would hate our kid to have."

"Hmmm…Angus," she said finally, and Chandler laughed. "What? There's literally no way to spin that into a good name!"

"I'm not disagreeing with you!" Chandler said defensively as he wrote it down. "I just…wasn't expecting that. I don't know."

"Your turn," Monica instructed.

"We don't have to actually take turns, Mon—"

"Chandler!"

"Okay, okay!" Chandler surrendered. "Ummm…what about Gertrude?"

"Ugh, yes, put that on the list. Wilson."

"Duke."

"Annabelle."

"Lars."

"Flo."

"Flo? Is that even something people actually name their kids?"

"Well, we're definitely not," Monica stated.

"No argument there," Chandler agreed. "How about Nelson?"

"Good. Moe?"

"Done. Dawn?"

"Hmmm…yeah take it off. This is kind of fun actually."

"Isn't it though? You're turn."

"Maureen."

"Marshall."

"Gwen."

They continued back and forth like this for a while. Chandler was surprised when they ran out of room on the page, and went to flip to a clean sheet when Monica stopped him.

"I think that's good for now," she said.

"You sure?"

"Yeah," she smiled. She stood up and walked around the table to sit on his lap, and Chandler instinctively wrapped his arms around her to keep her in place. "Thank you."

"Don't mention it," he brushed her off. "Like you said, it was fun."

"No, I mean thank you for everything. Thank you for thinking of it, thank you for knowing exactly what I need, thank you for being so patient with me, just…thank you."

"I love you," Chandler replied. "All that other stuff? Kinda comes with the territory."

"I love you too," Monica said. "I feel like I haven't said it enough recently, but I do. So, so much."

"You've kinda had other things to worry about," Chandler poked at her stomach, making her giggle. "You don't have to say it for me to know it's true, okay? I get it."

"I love you," she repeated, and Chandler kissed her temple in response. "No matter what other stupid things I say, or you say, I love you."

"I know," he said. "I know."

I decided to change my writing approach to this fic a bit, and that's making it a bit easier to write. At one point I had a very detailed plan of everything that I wanted to happen, in the order I wanted it to happen, and while at first that helped to keep me on track and productive, it eventually became limiting, so I've decided to abandon that a bit. Hopefully that means I'll continue to update from time to time, now that I more or less have my writing mojo back. That being said, as you can see from my profile I'm in the middle of two other fics at the moment, in addition to participating in a Post-Ep challenge for The West Wing. Updating those will continue to be my top priority, so updates here might be slow going. But, with any luck, they will continue to come. Writing for The West Wing has, for whatever reason, gotten me back in the groove of writing. As luck would have it, writing Chandler is very similar to writing Josh (from TWW), so the more comfortable I've become writing him, the more I've been able to relocate Chandler's voice.

Anyways, after that essay of an A/N that literally no one asked for, THANK YOU to everyone still sticking with this story! You guys are the reason I haven't given up yet, and why I'll try my hardest to see it through to the end. Reviews are beyond appreciated, so please let me know what you think!