The One With The Family Photos

David

A/N: This is another collab with @JuliaGnther656! She got this request from @No_1names_1. Jen called David her brother in an interview. How did David feel about that comment?

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David was enjoying the Los Angeles hotel room that he had all to himself for the evening. One of his closest friends, Nick, was visiting the US for the first time to attend the Emmy's for his hit show, and as promised, David happily tagged along to provide him with the ultimate trip while he was here. His friend had left a few hours ago to attend the red carpet affair before the event. David was planning on ordering room service and enjoying the show on tv, due to the limited number of guests that could attend this year.

As he scrolled through Twitter, he couldn't help but smile at all of the hype Jen had been getting in the past few weeks. A particular thread caught his attention more so than the rest. The pictures were typical shots of the two of them from the show but the captions were what stood out to him.

"Posing for family photos with my brother"

"When I lost my chewing gum in my brother's mouth"

"Right before having my brother's baby"

'What the hell?' he thought. He scrolled through at least 70 pictures of them, some from scenes in the show, and some from off camera at various events, but every single one of them referred to the two of them as siblings.

As soon as he typed her name in Google, he was hit with a dozen videos of a recent interview with ET.

"Jennifer Aniston says David Schwimmer dating rumors are 'bizarre'; claims he is like a brother"

'Oh God. What did she say this time?' he wondered.

Years ago, when they interviewed together, she often provoked him to take the lead when anything about the two of them was discussed. She knew herself well enough to know that when it came to David, she had a tendency to stumble on her words and say something she shouldn't, so he would always answer first and then she could feed off of his words. All these years later at the reunion, they still used the same approach.

The dating rumors became a frequent occurrence after their crushes were revealed to the world at the reunion. Add on the lobster merch pictures on social media and Jen's frequent podcast slips and the world had pretty good reason to suspect something more was going on between them.

The truth was, they weren't entirely wrong. Two years ago when the reunion was in its beginning stages, he and Jen were more or less reunited and forced into more frequent interactions. They knew they couldn't let it be awkward between them for the sake of the rest of the cast so one night during quarantine, they had a four hour zoom and laid everything out on the line. It was tear-filled and painful, but very needed. This followed with subsequent zooms for many months where they talked about their past, their future, and anything and everything in between. David was able to break down walls that had been up since he left LA all of those years ago. Jen explained why she chose Brad instead of waiting for the show to end to be with him. He explained why he left LA and why he didn't reach out when she went through her divorce. They had some very painful and vulnerable conversations that exposed nearly a lifetime of suppressed feelings, guilt, questions, and pain. But he was so thankful for the closure and the opportunity to start over and forge a friendship together.

He had missed her desperately for all of those years. He didn't ever allow himself to think about her, but she often crept into his mind anyway. As twisted and tragic as their story was, he couldn't deny how strong their bond was, and somehow, always would be.