sugar and spice, friends

iii. thumb wars

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The group, minus Phoebe, were sitting in their usual spot in Central Perk talking about nonsense when Phoebe came in, "Hi guys!" She said as she approached them.

"Hey, Pheebs! Hi!"

"Hey. Oh, oh, how'd it go?" Ross asked, referring to her date.

"Um, not so good. He walked me to the subway and said 'We should do this again!'" Phoebe frowned.

"Ohh. Ouch," They all, excluding Rachel and Marty cringed.

"What? He said 'we should do it again'." Rachel shrugged.

"Yeah, that's a good thing, right?" The redhead asked.

"Uh, no. Loosely translated 'We should do this again' means 'You will never see me naked'," Monica told her.

Marty made a face, "It does?"

"Since when?" Rachel asked.

"Since always. It's like dating language. Y'know, like 'It's not you' means 'It is you'" Joey told the girls.

"Or 'You're such a nice guy' means 'I'm gonna be dating leather-wearing alcoholics and complaining about them to you'," Chandler said.

"Or, or, y'know, um, 'I think we should see other people' means 'Ha, ha, I already am'" Phoebe continued.

"And everybody knows this?" Rachel asked innocently.

"Yeah. Cushions the blow." Joey nodded.

"Yeah, it's like when you're a kid, and your parents put your dog to sleep, and they tell you it went off to live on some farm." Chandler trailed off.

"That's funny, that, no, because, uh, our parents actually did, uh, send our dog off to live on a farm." Ross said.

"Uh, Ross." Monica said, giving her brother a look.

"What? Wh- hello? The Millners' farm in Connecticut? The Millners, they had this unbelievable farm, they had horses, and, and rabbits that he could chase and it was- it w- .....Oh my God, Chi Chi!"

"Oh, Sweetie." Marty frowned, rubbing Ross' shoulder in comfort.

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The next day, the gang, minus Rachel and Phoebe were sitting in Central Perk.

"No, no, no. They say it's the same as the distance from the tip of a guy's thumb to the tip of his index finger." Monica told the guys, who examined their fingers.