Jeff-Monica-Rick-Lesley

Monica and Jeff’s marriage was a disaster right from the get-go. As soon as he stepped foot into General Hospital, Jeff was burdened with his older brother’s stellar track record as a hot-shot surgeon. Not only was Jeff not a hot-shot, he couldn’t even stand the sight of blood. He even dreamed that everyone in the hospital was calling him "Rick," and Monica’s words of comfort were no help. Although he loved her almost to the point of obsession, he could never forget that he was Monica’s second choice after Rick.

Soon after Monica and Jeff joined GH, the news came that Rick was alive! He’d been captured by warriors in Africa but was now on his way home. Monica panicked – her lie that Rick had proposed was sure to be exposed! Ironically, Rick wished he'd never sent that letter to begin with. Accompanied home by a missionary, Rick poured his heart out about his relationship with Monica:

"When I first met Monica, she was a fourth-year medical student and I was a first-year resident. She was wandering the halls of General like a lost lamb -- and she really was one. Monica was brought up in a foundling home and she was the kid no one wanted. I was her first real love, but being a very selfish 29-year-old, I didn't know how to make her happy. I just attacked, rather than helped her!"

For the ten months he was held captive, the only thing that kept Rick going was the thought of Monica. Rick prayed that Monica hadn't taken his advice to find another man, because he realized he couldn't live without her.

Too bad, so sad. Rick was stunned to find Monica waiting for him at Kennedy (she had secretly flown to New York to meet him, telling Jeff she was going to St. Louis to see Gail) and devastated to learn she'd married his brother. But Rick agreed to back up Monica's lie about the letter, if only to save his brother from further heartache.

Rick rejoined the staff at General and resumed his work as chief resident in the cardiac wing. He tried to fight his feelings for Monica, but that proved impossible. They all lived together at the Webber home. He saw her everywhere at GH. To make matters worse, Jeff had discovered his meeting with Monica in New York, and while he still trusted his wife, he hotly informed Rick that he wished he’d just stayed dead.

For her part, after watching Rick in surgery, Monica decided that she too wanted to train to become a cardiac surgeon – putting her even closer to Rick and alienating her from Jeff, who now had to watch as his wife, as well as his brother, surpassed him professionally.

And Rick and Monica were growing closer still. After losing a patient, they found themselves in each other’s arms, admitting that they still loved each other. But Rick was determined that he would not hurt Jeff by giving into his feelings for Monica, and finally moved out of the Webber house. While Monica made a half-hearted attempt to be noble herself, when she overheard Mark Dante advise Rick to date Dr. Lesley Faulkner to get over her, she decided to fight for her man. Deliberately picking fights with Jeff, she tore at the seams of her marriage and went crying to Rick about what a bully his brother had become. Jeff was bewildered at his wife’s behavior and tried to talk her into having a baby. While Monica wasn't about to conceive a child with anyone but Rick, scheming Heather Grant was more interested in making Jeff a father. Having targeted Jeff for herself, Heather went through Monica's purse and found the old love letter from Rick -- the break-up letter that states Rick's undying love for Monica. Slipping it through the mail slot at the Webbers' house, Heather had Jeff believing that Monica had left it for him, her cagey way of letting him know she was still in love with Rick.

But Monica had bigger schemes to scheme. She mussed herself up, appeared late one night at Rick’s apartment, and cried that Jeff had hit her. Unable to stand seeing the woman he loved in physical and emotional pain, Rick took Monica into his arms and into his bed. The next day Monica moved out of her apartment with Jeff and into intern’s quarters.

While Rick wanted to come clean with Jeff the next day, Monica begged him to let her handle it. Meanwhile, Monica became aware that Jeff wasn't the only person keeping her and Rick from sailing into the sunset together -- Rick's old friend, the now pregnant and widowed Lesley Faulkner, was in love with him. Monica warned Lesley that Rick was hers -- and she flashed his apartment key to prove it. When Lesley stopped by Rick's early one morning, sure enough, there was Monica in Rick's bathrobe. Lesley was so hurt by Rick and Monica's affair, she ended her friendship with Rick -- and Rick, thinking his old friend was judging him, didn't want to have anything to do with her, either.

Devastated by his wife’s desertion, Jeff was easy pickings for Heather, who seduced him and set him up to find out about Rick and Monica. But Heather misjudged Jeff’s reaction; when he found Monica leaving Rick's apartment in the early morning hours, Jeff got drunk and put a gun to his mouth. His brother’s life hanging by a thread, Rick knew Jeff’s suicide attempt was his fault, and ended his relationship with Monica. Steve Hardy was so furious that he tried to kick Monica off the staff. Only Gail, who’d come to Port Charles to visit and ended up staying, gave Monica any comfort.

To keep her job, Monica returned to Jeff, who made a quick recovery. But her heart was with Rick, and it killed her to see the closeness that was developing between him and Lesley. She angrily confronted Lesley and told her to stay away from Rick. When that didn’t work, Monica finally left Jeff, who was now happy to let her go to begin a life with Heather, who was carrying his child.

Still, Rick and Lesley remained close, and Rick proposed to Lesley when they went to Canada to rescue Laura from the clutches of a cult leader named Buck. Lesley put him off, though -- saying that marriage shouldn't be used to escape one's past, and telling Rick that she feared he wasn't really over Monica. Rick refused to listen to Lesley's fears, and the two became engaged.

But Monica wasn't ready to give up. One night, she went over to Lesley's penthouse apartment and threatened the very-pregnant Mrs. Faulkner by saying she’d tell the hospital board about her relationship with Rick, jeopardizing his appointment as head of the cardiac wing. When Lesley tried to follow Monica out, she fell down the stairs and ended up losing her baby. Monica’s blackmail had inadvertently been caught on an answering machine tape, and Rick and Jeff tried to have her fired. Only Lesley’s intervention – she truly believed that Monica was a brilliant doctor – saved her rival’s job. Grateful, Monica bowed out of the way, and Rick and Lesley married soon afterward. 

To read about how Alan and Monica went from hospital rivals to Dr. and Dr. Quartermaine, click here.