you and me, alright [roschel]

intro.

"We really should've done this a long time ago," Ross says, and it's the first full sentence either of them have said after nearly an hour of niceties and nodding. "Maybe we wouldn't be here at all if we'd started earlier."

"At least you're here now," replies Dr. Fiona Phalange (It's a real surname, who knew! Phoebe did.) with a wry smile.

"We're done being stupid," Ross echoes the creed they made on that apartment doorway with a squeaky chuckle of his own that Rachel has always found endearing. "This is it."

"This is it," Rachel chimes in from her side of the couch, the tip of her heel brushing her partner's (? Boyfriend? Baby daddy? One of the many, many issues they have to confront) pant leg. Their first, and hopefully last, couples therapist nods, her face as blank as the walls behind her.

They decided to move to Paris after all, sometime between Monica and Chandler strapping their twins into matching minivan car seats, and Joey brandishing a plane ticket to Los Angeles. Phoebe was all too happy to let her lobsters go as she and Mike had been thinking about Connecticut. For Ross and Rachel, the decision had been as easy as downing a huge cup of smooth Central Perk brew. And as hard as they made the last ten years out to be, all the pieces seemed to have finally fallen into place. Rachel rebooked her ticket for a week later and for one more, to give Ross the shortest possible time to move his tenure to the fatefully just opened NYU Paris. She may never forget the way Emma's face brightened up when she told her daughter that Dada's joining them on the big trip this time.

Paris by herself seemed like such a blur - a long ascending ride that can snatch the wind out of her at any second - but never does. There were times between the franticness of packing her boxes, leaving Emma to her mother, giving prepared individual farewells to her best, best friends - when she no longer felt like herself - as if she's watching a movie montage where the main character is muffled by overarching music, playing to a crescendo that doesn't crest, but rather skids to a halt a hundred feet in the air without relief.

The night she was supposed to leave is the maddening descent at the tip of the coaster - every minute of that evening ticking with dread at the thought of saying goodbye to the one person that matters most. Instead of a rain-drenched bride fleeing from the droll of preplanned suburbia, she's a woman hurtling to a swift return to her spirit's calling. Her heart beating wildly in unison with every step away from that plane, hearing his pleading shouts exhilarating her summit up the apartment building, the calm in her sigh when she says I Got Off the Plane. Beneath the shock in those deep brown eyes, she's found the clarity that's eluded her in overseas city lights. They're each other's lighthouse keeper, and when he walks toward her like a man awaiting rescue, before kissing her with the passion of planetarium stars, her arms find their place around his nape, enclosing them in a cocoon that's always been theirs. Home.

Paris with Ross feels like a honeymoon - with the new location and the confident fire stoked in their relationship, it truly is a new start for them while also picking up where they left off. They've settled into the 16th arrondissement in the heart of the city, which doesn't feel as far off as the Village, but there's a romanticism in this frenetic environment that one can attribute to joie de vivre. It's been an absolute madhouse, though - several of their boxes remain taped, they both immediately started working, and aside from couples therapy, they've also been taking French classes recommended by her co-worker and have started to use the language conversationally at home. Aside from being their biggest supporter, she's also their one friend who's fluent in French, so Phoebe's been their most frequent caller. ("You're much, much better students than Joey!")

Rachel twiddles her thumbs, placed close to her lap, as she takes in the nondescript office, her work fashion brain whirring its engine. She thinks the stark white space can definitely use a splash of colour, aside from the obsidian leather couches they currently occupy. There are a few personal knickknacks on the shelves that can use the company of flowers or a plant. But she's not about to cross one of the few available English-speaking therapists in their new home base. Beside her, she can see Ross alternating between flexing his fingers and tapping them on the armrest. She wonders if his restlessness comes from still getting used to the time difference or from flashbacks to divorce lawyers' offices. But he had been the one to bring this idea up, after a rather spectacular round of makeup sex that she actually forgot what they were even arguing about in the first place.