The Best Years Of Our Lives— Part 2
Disclaimer: Again, I have nothing to do with any of the characters, and am in no way associated with the show.
Note: Unlike part 1, part 2 will be written strictly from Barney's POV.
December 25th, 2014- My office- 2:00 pm.
As I sat at my desk working, I just couldn't shake the feeling that something big was about to happen, and then I got the call. It was Lily, and all she said was "It's Robin. Meet us at the hospital." As soon as she said that, a feeling of fear and panic washed over me. That was all I needed to hear. Before she could say anything else, I had hung up, and raced out the door.
After what seemed like forever, I was finally able to hail down a cab. After telling the driver where to go, I tried to settle in for the ride, but with all the thoughts that were running through my head, I just couldn't. It was two weeks early, and since Robin was supposedly unable to have children, this was considered a high risk pregnancy. So understandably, I was very worried not only about her well being, but that of our daughter as well. As a loving husband and father to be, all I wanted was for them both to be happy and healthy, because as long as they were, I knew everything else would be just fine.
About 45 minutes later, the cab pulled into the hospital parking lot. I very quickly paid the driver, before hurriedly rushing in. I somehow managed to find my way up to the maternity ward, where I saw Marshall, Lily, and Ted sitting in the waiting area. As soon as they saw me, Lily rushed over and filled me in, although there wasn't really much to tell. All they knew was that, at the time they had arrived at the hospital, she had already been in labor for 4 hours, and apart from the doctors giving them one quick little update about how dilated she was at that point, they hadn't heard anything else.
As you can imagine, I was too nervous to sit, so I paced back and forth in the hallway just waiting...waiting...waiting, until finally 2 extremely long hours later, a doctor came out of her room, and walked up to me.
"Mr. Stinson?"
"Yes, that's me. Well, what's going on? Are my wife and daughter okay?"
"Why don't you go and see for yourself? They're in room 225, and congratulations!"
"Thank you." He nodded, before turning around and walking back down the hall. As soon as he was out of sight, I told everyone that I would be back to give them an update real soon. They said that that was just fine, and so I turned and started walking as fast as my legs would go down the hall, anxiously searching for room 225. As soon as I found it, I just stood outside for a few seconds, my heart practically beating out of my chest, not at all sure what I would see on the other side. A few more seconds went by before I finally had the nerve to go in. I quietly opened the door and walked in, expecting to see just my wife and our new daughter. Instead, I got the surprise of a lifetime, when I saw her sitting up in bed with a pink bundle in one arm, and a blue bundle in the other.
As soon as she saw me, she smiled,tears running down her face, and motioned for me to come closer. Upon reaching the side of the bed, I leaned in, wrapped my arm around her, and kissed her on the cheek, before burying my face in her hair, not quite ready for her to see me crying. After a few seconds of this, I stood back up, and wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. Just then, two tiny little cries was heard emanating from within both the pink and blue blankets, followed by four little arms waving around in my direction.
She smiled at them, before looking up and smiling at me.
"Barney, I'd like for you to meet your new daughter, and your new son." I smiled back, before reaching over and gently taking our daughter in one arm, while Robin placed our son in the other.
My daughter, and my son. I was still in shock at the fact that I was now the father of not only one, but two perfect,healthy little babies.
"Hey you two...I'm your daddy." By now, I was really starting to get choked up. I glanced at Robin briefly, before turning my attention back to the two babies that I held in my arms. "They are just the most beautiful, perfect babies I've ever seen." I leaned in and kissed our daughter on the forehead first, followed by our son, a single tear landing on each of them as I did, before handing our son back to Robin.
Then, for the next about half hour or so, we just sat on the bed, admiring our two little miracles, and pointing out who looked more like me, and who looked more like her.
"Well, she definitely looks more like you. I mean, with her little tufts of curly brown hair, and these eyes, she's going to be quite the looker when she's older, just like her mommy." I said, smiling at our little girl as she grabbed tightly onto my finger.
"And what about our little boy here? With those gorgeous tufts of blond hair, and those piercing blue eyes, he's definitely going to be a heart breaker, just like his daddy." She said, doing the same with our little boy.
"So," Robin said, changing the subject, "I know chose the name Alexandra Elizabeth when we thought we were just having a girl, but now that we have a boy as well, we probably should think up a name for him."
I nodded my head in agreement. "You're right, and I think it's only fair that since I got to name her, you should get to pick a name for him."
"Alright then, I will." She thought about it for a minute or so, before looking back up at me, and smiling. "How about Joshua Andrew?"
"Joshua Andrew. It has a nice ring to it. I love it, I really do. Well, we may love the names, but do they?"
I leaned in and whispered in her ear "Hey, Alexandra Elizabeth", at which point she gurgled, and smiled the cutest little smile ever.
We both couldn't help but smile at the sight. "It looks like she loves it just as much as we do." I said.
Robin then did the same thing with our son. She leaned in and whispered in his ear "Hey Joshua Andrew",which elicited the same reaction as from his sister, again causing both of us to break out into huge smiles.
"It looks like he loves his name, too." She said.
"Yeah, it does. Well then, now that it's official, why don't I bring in the rest of the gang, so that they can meet them?" I said, gently laying our daughter back in Robin's other arm.
She looked up at me, and nodded. "Yeah, that's a good idea."
"Okay, I'll be right back." I said, leaning down and giving each of them a kiss, before heading out the door to find our friends.
As soon as they all caught sight of me, they raced over, wanting to know everything. I just told them the same thing that the doctor had told me a few short hours before...Why don't you go and see for yourselves?
So they all followed me down the hall, but just as we set foot in front of the door to her room, I stopped them.
"Why are we stopping?" Ted asked.
"I just want you guys to be prepared." I replied.
"Prepared for what?" Lily asked.
"Prepared for this..." I said, opening the door and ushering them in, in plain view of Robin in the bed, holding not one, but two babies.
We all walked over and stood around the bed, with everyone just as shocked and surprised as I had been at first.
"But wait a minute,..." Marshall started. "I thought you guys were just having one baby, and it was a girl. What happened?"
"Well, I'll tell you." Robin looked at me, and we both smiled at each other before she began. "On the day that that they ran the ultrasound, the only one we could see happened to be a girl. That's why we thought we were only having a girl. As it turns out, though, he was in there, too, but was just hiding behind his sister so well that he couldn't be found."
"Wow, who would have seen that coming?" Marshall replied.
"So," Lily spoke up. "Have you two picked out their names names yet?"
"As a matter of fact, we have." I said, leaning in and taking our daughter gently out of Robin's arms, and into my own. "This " I said, propping her up in my arms "is Alexandra Elizabeth Stinson."
"And this," Robin piped in, doing the same with our son "is Joshua Andrew Stinson."
"They're absolutely beautiful. Congratulations, you two." said Ted, and both Lily and Marshall nodded their heads in agreement.
Another 10 minutes or so went by before everyone finally decided to head on home, so as to give Robin and I more alone time with our two new little bundles of joy. As soon as all the goodbyes had been said, and everyone had gone, I sat down, wrapped my arm around her, and joined her in just gazing down in awe at these two tiny little human beings we had created.
"They really are perfect."
"Well of course they are. With parents like us, how could they not be?" I said, smiling at her. I knew that this was a very serious moment, and that I shouldn't be making cracks, but I just couldn't help it...I had to. Much to my surprise though, instead of getting on my case about it, she just looked me directly in the eyes,and smiled that absolutely gorgeous smile of hers before we both leaned in for a kiss. After wards, we looked back down at our children...our children, our little miracles, and in that moment realized just how lucky, no, blessed we really were. This was our family, and we honestly wouldn't have changed that for the world.
Now I said that, at the beginning of this day, I just couldn't shake the feeling that something big was going to happen, something that would change my life forever. Well, something did...my children were born, and in my eyes, there is nothing, absolutely nothing that could possibly be more life changing than that.
