Monica Geller privileged, inexperienced childhood best friend Rachel (Jennifer Aniston), with whom she had long lost contact, suddenly arrives in her neighborhood unannounced as a runaway bride after abandoning her own wedding, Monica allows her to move in with her while she attempts to reorganize her life, and the two reconnect. Monica begins dating Dr. Richard Burke (Tom Selleck), an older man who is also one of her father's best friends and 21 years her senior. However, the couple mutually agrees to end their long-running relationship after realizing that Richard does not want children, while Monica aspires to eventually raise a family
Monica Geller role in the pilot, which he considered "casual sex", and created a "stacked" questionnaire asking audience members if they thought Monica was a whore. Kauffman recalled Ohlmeyer specifically expressing that Monica deserved to be dumped, a statement by which the writer was greatly offended, dismissing Ohlmeyer as a misogynist. Ultimately, the results returned in favor of Monica; audiences liked the character nonetheless, and the episode aired unchanged. Early in the series, Monica's apartment is established as one of the show's two primary locations. In the pilot, the apartment number is 5, which was changed to 20 in subsequent episodes after