A/N: I was feeling rambling and maybe a tad nostalgic- apologies! Maybe I do have an inner Ted... yikes.
ANYWAY please review... I'm not afraid to beg! :) Any feedback at all is so greatly appreciated.
September 2035
It's thirty years later.
It's been thirty years, Robin thinks.
Thirty years.
Barney remembers that day, of course. He'd never admit it, but he even remembers what she was wearing. (A green turtleneck. You couldn't miss it.)
He almost wishes he had spotted her first. But what then? He'd have hit on her- she would have flirted with him and maybe slapped him (SO HOT.) And then he'd have been screwed. (Literally- Robin had told him how hot she'd found him even then, of course. He's the Barnacle for crying out loud.) But it wouldn't have gone any further. That he was sure of.
Maybe Ted is right- maybe the universe does have a plan.
Ted thinks back to that day, how he'd thought that the whole 'seeing a girl across a crowded room' was real. He becomes preoccupied in memories. Because he's maybe had just a tiny, tiny corner saved for Robin, not in a romantic way or even a "what if" way- he let her go a long time ago, for real. But he wonders sometimes about why they didn't work, because the love was there, and they had clicked- if that had been there, shouldn't they have been able to overcome the obstacles?
Around this time, Marshall and Lily go out to dinner and become just a wee bit tipsy. (They deserve that extra bottle of wine.) And white wine makes them nostalgic, and they talk about their cutesy pooshty little babies, and the good old days when they were young and living the good life while listening to Ted whine all day. ("I think she's the ONE!" they shout several times.) And they talk about when they knew that Barney and Robin were going to make it.
Am I old? Robin thinks.
Then Barney comes in, and oh does she realize that she's not and never will be old, because smack her twice and call her Queen Elizabeth if an old person could go at it for eight fucking hours.
Good God does the universe have a plan.
Because Barney Stinson has the perfect woman. And that would never have happened without some divine help. What up, big guy?
Ted thinks about things for a long time. It's Sunday and he sits in a rocking chair in the den (oookay, he might be an old man at heart). And he slowly comes to a realization. He remembers the dogs, and he remembers that at a certain point Robin would only reliably have sex if she had just been out broing with Barney. He thinks about her independent ways, and the way that she would hang onto that check for dear life. He remembers how she would call him cute, and the way when they had their backslide she gave him a pitying look before they kissed. He remembers all this with a clarity that he's never had before, not even while reliving it all five years ago. And he sees why they really didn't work. It's not that they had different life goals. It's not even that she and Barney are soulmates, which of course they are. It's that he and she were different at a fundamental level, and their love just wasn't that passionate kinship that it should always, always be.
Lily slurs: "And then when they hooked up, remember that, baby?" Marshall replies:"Of course I remember baby- it was only like the biggest thing ever to happen in the history of ever." "So true, baby." "Remember how we all defriended Barney." "I remember- didn't you feel kind of bad?" "Of course, baby, but we had to be loyal to Ted. Duh..." They snort. "He was so immature back then," Marshall says. (One other thing white wine does- it makes into a fifteen year old girl. Or in the case of Marshall, just a fifteen year old.)
Robin loves this guy so much. She has had the hots for him for thirty years, and has been deeply, passionately in love with him for twenty eight. 'Feelings' developed somewhere in between. (She won't say exactly when, in respect for Ted.) And she remembers the way his fingers burned on her shoulder when he tapped it so many years ago.
Barney can't say what's the best part about being married. Okay, it might be the sex, which after all these years is just as constant and dirty as ever (this weekend was spent doing unspeakable things in a public pool) but there are all the other things too. The way that every fucking day she cracks up when he tells her why breakfast is an essential part of the day (it's become a rehearsed repartee, but he's never failed to make her burst out laughing at some ridiculous comment). The way she gets turned on by laser tag. The way that she'll go from serious and indignant to that little snort that might be the thing he loves most of all.
Ted is sitting in front of the fire, still a little staggered by his realizations. And then he looks up, and the most beautiful woman in the world slips into his lap, and he's reminded for the millionth time why this was the girl he married. (The sex is really, really good. Not that that's the reason, but shouldn't sex with "The One" be the best sex ever? Of course.) And Ted loves the beautiful person who makes love in a rocking chair like a pro.
"Ilove you sho much, baby." "Metoo, Marshmallow." "Shex in the bathroom, baby?" "You know it."
They meet at MacLaren's the next weekend. They still go there sometimes, for old times' sake. They pay Carl (he still works there!) to let the kids in the bar- they're teenagers anyway; who really cares? They spill out of the booth; there are six chairs squished around. Ted and his wife take turns trying to best each other in an Oscar Wilde quote-off while the kids have assumed the rule of Fart-Noise-Makers-In-Chief. (Actually, Barney, Robin, Marshall and Lily have figured out to harmonize to the kids.) Barney organizes a competition to see who can tell the most ridiculous lie (he wins, of course.) Barney and Robin then proceed to play footsie under the table while Lily and Ted's wife try to embarass their children. Marshall and Ted, meanwhile, try to stack forks on each other's heads.
Life is good.