The One With The Fake Dating

Pep Talks From Chandler Bing

Chandler's POV

It was a lazy Sunday evening for Chandler Bing. He was sitting in his fully-reclined arm chair with his feet up. He was enjoying the last few hours of his weekend with a cold beer in one hand and the TV remote in the other, lazily flipping through channels. After changing through channels for a while, he finally landed on Baywatch. Perfect, this was exactly what he needed after a busy weekend. Beer, Baywatch, and no distractions.

Unfortunately for Chandler, only about ten minutes passed before his moment of peace was interrupted by a loud door slam and some vaguely Italian-sounding mumbling. Without turning away from the TV, Chandler called out to his disgruntled roommate. 

"Hey Joe, how'd the audition go?" He didn't get a response at first, so he turned his chair around to look at his friend. Joey was standing in front of the open fridge, eating leftover pizza right out of the box. "Are you alright man? You didn't even heat that up." Joey's eyes were focused on the floor, and he had a miserable, gut-wrenching look on his face that made Chandler's heart sink. And what he asked next was even worse. 

"Am I really that bad of an actor?" Chandler hated seeing his best friend this upset. I wasn't the first time Joey had come back this disappointed from a failed audition, but that didn't make it any easier for Chandler to see him like this. He needed to cheer him up.

"Of course not, Joe, you're a great actor. You were on Days of our Lives!"

"Then how come I haven't had any good parts since that? I keep goin' to audition after audition, just to get rejected over and over and over again." He walked over to where Chandler was seated, pizza box still in hand, and dropped down defeatedly into the armchair beside him.  "This was supposed to be my big break. I worked so hard for this part, Chan, and I still wasn't good enough. Maybe I should just give up and get a real job." 

"Oh come on, don't say that." Chandler reached over to Joey and put his hand on his shoulder. Joey lifted his gaze and looked right at Chandler. Chandler looked right into Joey's eyes, which were usually so wide and carefree, but currently looked like they were holding back tears. "You're just in a bit of a slump, Joey. It happens to everyone. It's like...it's like me with women. I ask out woman after woman, and look at how much I get rejected! But do I give up?" 

"No?"

"That's right I don't! Because I know that as long as I keep trying, I'll find a woman won't reject me. Who knows, maybe I'll even find one who'll really like me. And you just have to do the same thing with your auditions." Joey gave Chandler a small smile.

"Thanks man. You're the best. Even if your speeches aren't that good." Chandler put his free hand on his chest in mock offense. "Hey! I thought that was one of my better pep talks! That metaphor was perfect." 

"Whatever you say," Joey responded with a chuckle. Chandler smiled back at him. He loved Joey's laugh, and he knew he would do anything to see Joey happy. The two men stayed like that for a minute, before Chandler realized his hand was still on Joey's shoulder, and that plus the eye contact meant it was starting to get a bit weird. He leaned back into his chair and tried to muster up his manliest voice possible. "So, you wanna watch Baywatch?" 

"I thought you'd never ask."

***

Joey's POV

It had been a few weeks since that evening. Joey and Chandler were sitting in Central Perk along with the rest of their friends. Ross was telling another boring  dinosaur story, while Chandler was pretending to fall asleep whenever Ross wasn't looking at him. He did this a lot, and although most of the group had gotten tired of the him using the same joke, it never failed to make Joey laugh. 

"-and then I said "no, that's paleobiology, not paleontology." When he realized no one was laughing at his joke he turned to Chandler, who was in the middle of fake snoring. Ross decided to try his hand at sassing Chandler, which backfired immediately. "I'm sorry, am I boring you with my AWESOME paleontology anecdotes?" 

"YES!" The rest of the group responded in unison.

Ross crossed his arms and leaned back in his seat, annoyed with his friends. Joey would have felt bad, but after about a minute Ross started up again with another story, causing the entire group to groan. Joey took that as his cue to leave, since he had to be at an audition soon anyways. Monica saw him standing up and interrupted Ross. 

"Great going, Ross. You bored Joey into leaving." 

"Nah, I've just got an audition to go to. But seriously, Ross, you need to get some better jokes." Ross rolled his eyes at Joey while the rest of the group said some short goodbyes. Joey started walking away, but once he stepped outside the coffee shop he was hit with a wave of nerves. Estelle had warned him that he really needed to land this part, because she was finding less and less opportunities for him. All of the doubts and negative thoughts from his last failed audition surfaced in his mind. What if they hate my audition? What if I screw up my lines? What if I really am a horrible actor? 

Chandler noticed Joey had stopped walking and joined him outside. 

"Hey Joe? Try not to worry so much." Joey turned to face Chandler. "You're going to do great." 

"You always say that, but what if I mess up? Or they hate my acting? Or-" 

"Don't think like that, Joey. I know you better than anyone, and you are the most dedicated, passionate actor I've ever met. Those other guys won't stand a chance against you. I've got a feeling this is going to be your big break. Trust me."

Somehow Chandler always knew what to say to make Joey feel better. Joey's frown had morphed into a big smile, he was so grateful to have Chandler in his life. He leaned over and gave his best friend a big hug, hoping that would be enough to communicate how much he had helped him. 

"You know what, I take back what I said last time. That was a pretty good speech." Chandler laughed at that, which made Joey smile even more. Chandler was usually the funny one, so Joey loved it when he was able to make his best friend laugh like this. Chandler was the first to pull away from the hug. "You should probably get going, you don't want to be late."

"Oh, right, thanks. Bye Chandler," Joey replied, before heading off towards his audition. 

***

A/N - Comments are really appreciated, so feel free to let me know what you think of this so far!