Patch it up
"Actually the naked thing ain't bad!" Ted said, and he high-fived Barney across the table.
After a beat, Ted paused to think about what he just said. "That felt kind of weird." He took a sip of his beer and Marshall carried on with his tirade against Barney and Robin's method of coping with domestic dispute. But a second later, when Marshall said "Call me crazy", Ted found himself saying "crazy" in unison with Barney.
That felt kind of weird-er.
- A year and a bit earlier -
Ted had heard titbits of information, of course. Little scraps here and there about what Barney had been doing since his thirtieth birthday. But when Ted ended up face-to-face with his former friend, dressed in a powder blue sweater and asking a girl to marry him just to make a point, Ted experienced two simultaneous and contradictory emotions.
The first was sheer relief. It was pretty awesome to be proved right. It was great to be validated, yet again, in his decision to cut this irritating man out of his life completely. It just showed him, and hopefully all his friends (if not everyone in the entire bar) what a jackass Barney Stinson really was.
The second emotion Ted felt was a little more illusive. It was a flutter in his stomach, a fist around his heart, a flash obscuring his vision. It was a subtle, insidious crawl of guilt across his skin. It was a weird sense of loss and longing. It was a sudden weightlessness, a drop from under his feet.
That second emotion made Ted feel like a giddy teenager, just for a second, and he didn't like it. It made him uncomfortable. It made him question his resolve, even in the face of incontrovertible proof that he was in the right.
Annoyingly enough, there was a moment when Marshall, Lily and Robin all gave him the same look, within seconds of each other, as though they were checking up on him. "Well?" That look seemed to say. "Look at the funny clown! Why did you take this away from us?"
Not that any of them would say such a thing out loud.
Yet still they mentioned Barney to him. Ted knew that Robin had met up with him at the bar and Marshall still hung out with him at work. Even Lily had given Barney and Abby some sympathetic looks.
But Ted didn't let it get to him. No, he pushed the second emotion right the way down and let the first consume him. He was righteous in the face of Barney's ridiculousness. Ted Mosby was a man of integrity.
He didn't let himself dwell on why he'd reacted so adversely, so violently against Barney - why he'd felt such a sense of betrayal - when he'd let Robin off Scott free.
In fact, Ted might have gone through life without analysing his behaviour at all, were it not for the fact that when he got back to the apartment that evening, Lily and Marshall were out.
And Barney was standing in the middle of his living room, stark naked.
- Eight years earlier -
Ted met the blonde at the urinal. It wasn't that unusual for him to pick up a random guy in the bathroom at MacLaren's. He'd do this maybe five times a year - drag some dude into the stall and get a BJ, or maybe they'd jerk each other off. Ted had been doing it off-and-on since college.
If he defined himself at all, Ted would possibly say that he was bi-curious. On the whole he preferred women. But occasionally, just occasionally, he'd meet a guy who just… did it for him. A guy who he couldn't keep his hands off.
Barney was one such guy.
That first time, Ted had practically torn his suit off his hot little body. Ted's lips had been hard and hungry on the long, slender column of Barney's neck. His fingers had been hurried and insistent, plucking at buckles, buttons and zippers. His fist was so tight and demanding around the other man's erection, the fingers of his other hand sliding across Barney's scalp as he encouraged him down on to his knees.
It had been fast and sordid, just like every other bathroom encounter. But unlike every other time, this guy, this Barney Stinson, he hadn't taken the hint afterwards. Ted was just so damn terrified that Barney would reveal what they'd been doing to Marshall and Lily that he didn't feel he could push too hard at the newcomer.
So Barney stuck around, and occasionally, when they were drunk, stuff would happen. Stuff like making out in the back seat of a cab. Stuff like Barney's lips wrapped around his dick, sucking him in until he was buried in the heavenly furnace of the other man's throat.
Stuff like…
It wasn't a relationship. It wasn't important. It wasn't even something Ted thought about consciously. He didn't analyse why Barney hung on to him, why he hung on to Barney. He didn't know why sometimes things got physical between them. And when Ted needed to walk away, he always thought there would be no regrets.
But he was very, very wrong.
- A year and a-bit-less earlier -
Barney was standing in the middle of Ted's living room, stark naked.
"Oh my god!" Ted threw a cushion at him, averting his eyes. "Jesus Christ!"
Barney turned towards him. "No, Ted. Common mistake. Now, I know my physique is god-like, but…"
"Just put some clothes on, please!" Ted yelled, half turned around, half unable to quite look away.
Barney's body was… incredible. Toned, lean, with exactly the right amount of muscle in the right places. He was lightly tanned, waxed within and inch of his life, manicured, pedicured, smelling of something different and yet weirdly familiar.
His clothes were nowhere to be seen.
"Ted, come on. We need to talk!" Barney insisted.
"No-" Ted said, the word broken off into a laugh and violent shake of the head. "No, we really don't."
"You wanna fuck me instead?" Barney asked, in a weirdly innocent tone.
"WHAT?" Ted exploded.
"I know we always said that… you know? Taking it up the ass wasn't something either of us… well…"
"Jesus, you make it sound so romantic!" Ted snapped.
"Since when did you want romance, Mosby?" Barney bit back, bitterly.
Weirdly, those words cut him. Barney was right, of course. This was the secret that really held them together. As much as Ted searched unremittingly for the perfect woman, for a serious relationship, for "the one", when he was with Barney, what he got from Barney sexually, was about as far away from love as it was possible to get.
With Barney, it was all about the speed of getting there, tumbling towards ecstasy at a break-neck pace. With Barney, it was all about the now, the chase, the explosion.
Kind words, gentleness, tenderness, all these things would be death to his hard-on. The enemy of the erection. The opponent of the orgasm.
Romance would have killed the mood.
"Is that what you want from me?" Ted asked with an incredulous laugh. "Romance?" He took two steps towards Barney and shoved him hard against the wall.
"No," Barney said with a "Uh!" as Ted knocked the wind out of him, slamming his body into his and capturing his mouth in a savage kiss. "I just-" Barney tried to turn his face away, but Ted caught it, held it between his two palms. "Just-"
Barney gave up trying to talk after that. With Ted's tongue half way down his throat, it was difficult to make a cogent argument.
Romance… Ted considered the word. Yes, he chased the dream, Marshall and Lily's dream, that fleeting fantasy that had almost come to nought even for his best friends. Yes, he wanted that fantasy. But at the same time, he wanted this - with Barney. This illicit fucking. The antithesis of the image he portrayed to the outside world.
But he'd given it up once already.
Ted shoved Barney against the wall once more, hard enough to bruise his shoulders.
"Fuck you!" He said with a growl, one hand going for Barney's scrotum, grabbing it and twisting it, squeezing until Barney yelled in pain. "Fuck you!" He repeated, as he felt Barney's erection bob against his jeans and he pulled them down hurried, staring at the ceiling when Barney dropped to his knees.
Wrong, so wrong.
Stop it. Stop it now.
No room for Barney. He'd made that decision. No room.
He came before he was even aware of the warm, tight, wet sensation, the vice around the column of his penis. He came in three hot bursts, in despair, in dread.
Afterwards, Ted pushed Barney away. "You never even said you were sorry!" Ted said with a sob. He grit his teeth. He wasn't going to do this. Barney didn't deserve an explanation.
"I'm not sorry," Barney said blithely. "Having sex with Robin was awesome. And it's nothing to do with you! You've got a girlfriend-"
Ted shook his head. "Just stop it."
Barney covered his face with both hands, rubbing his eyes. "Ted, just… please?"
"Get out. Get dressed and get out."
Barney stood there, naked, more gorgeous than he had any right in being and stared at him. Desperately, pleadingly.
"Don't do this. Ted. Ted? Don't-"
"Get out."
- Present day -
And now Barney was, despite all logic and reason, in a relationship with Robin. Ted hadn't touched him, not since the bus accident. Not since Barney put his pride to one side and apologised. Not even when they'd both been drunk out of their minds last winter during the great three-day snow-in.
Ted hadn't touched Barney in way too long.
"Actually, the naked thing ain't bad," Ted said, and he caught Barney's eye. And for the first time in a year and a bit, he saw that saucy spark in his friend's eye.
Ted was a little disappointed when Robin joined them a few minutes later. He kind of hoped he'd be able to get Barney alone. It would have been great to get some one-on-one bro-time.
Strictly platonic, of course.
At least, that's what Ted tried to tell himself.