1. Sunday
2005
It all started when this athletic chick, Cherry, got him to run his first 10K. She'd promised to blow him for every two kilometers he manged. He didn't have the heart to tell her that he regularly did six miles twice a week at the gym without breaking a sweat. It was different running in the open air, though. It made him think of school, which was weird, because those sort of memories weren't the kind he usually liked to dwell on. Being a bright, sensitive kid in a bad school was never going to win him any popularity contests. Being smart enough to know when to run became a survival trait.
And so as he ran with Cherry, matching her stride, their sneakers pounding the tarmac, he felt that he could go on for hours.
It almost annoyed him when they reached the 2K marker and she slowed to a stop.
Then he caught her eye and that daring, provocative pout, and he grinned as she pulled him into the brush as the side of the track. This running business… he could be onto something.
2. What up, non finishers?
2007
It terrified him to think that he might have really hurt himself. For three hours Barney genuinely believed he might be paralysed from the waist down.
The thought of being confined to a wheelchair didn't scare him half so much as the idea that he'd never be able to run again. A marathon shouldn't have been any different to all those six mile runs he'd clocked up in the park every Sunday for the past two years. A marathon shouldn't be any harder than the thirty-two different 10K charity runs he'd completed.
You started running… and that was it. One foot hit the dirt, you shifted your weight and you leaned forward. Your other foot slammed down, your lungs gulped in the fresh air, the ozone-layered air, the ice-cold air, the smoggy air…
You built up a rhythm, heartbeat, footfall, muscles shifting, shoulders back and relaxed, arms bent at the elbows. Your vision grey-ed out until you noticed the chick next to you, her rack bouncing along nicely, distracting you…
When the feeling returned in his legs a half-hour later, pins and needles so bad that he almost blacked out, he sent up a fierce prayer to the big man in the sky.
"Dude, seriously." He said, earnestly. "Thanks."
3. Breaking the Bro Code
2008
No cabs, not at first. He tried, twice, but after that he stopped looking. He relaxed into his usual, steady gait, it quickly becoming an easy lope despite the fact that he was wearing the wrong shoes and his shirt was sticking to his back.
Not far… not far… How far? A mile and a half? That was nothing… But speed was everything. What if he didn't get there in time? What if Ted was already gone?
He upped the pace, his heart pounding harder in his chest, his thigh muscles protesting.
If only he hadn't pushed himself on Sunday (ten miles the previous week, twelve this week…), if only he hadn't been at work, if only he'd been able to… able to…
If only he hadn't screwed over his best friend by screwing over his other best friend.
If only he hadn't… and what if Ted's already dead? What if he's slipped away because Barney didn't run hard enough, fast enough. If he could never apologise, he could never be free. He'd just keep running further, faster, harder until that's all he was doing: Running and running forever like Forest Gump.
Just before he had the chance to descent into the nadir of lame-ass-ery, two things happened.
He reached the hospital.
He was hit by a bus.
All things being equal, he considered himself pretty lucky.
4. All warmed up
2008
Doug was a big guy. He was a really big guy. He was an insane, skull-bashing, bone-crushing big guy. And because Barney was smart enough to know when to run, he ran away, screaming like a girl.
It wasn't something that he was that proud of, but hey. Self preservation, dude.
He was even less proud of some other, more insidious, emotion that stopped his feet in their tracks and almost caused him to fall flat on his face.
This was wrong.
Running was wrong? Oh man, did you see the size of that guy?
How could he leave like that? What if Doug went crazy and hurt Robin?
Really? Robin again? Damn feelings!
Grinding his teeth, he jogged up and down on the spot a few times, hoping to argue himself against any stupid, chivalrous act.
Damn!
He took one last look towards the end of the alley and freedom, then turned back.
He tried very hard not to think about what he was running back to.
5. Taking out the triz-ash
2009
"I love you!"
There, he'd said it.
And every instinct inside him was primed to flee. Every muscle in his body was ready. Even as he desperately wanted her to hear him, he was also poised to get the hell out of dodge.
"Exactly!" She said.
What the hell? His body did something strange - trying to move and stay in the same place at the same time, trying to be in two places at once. He felt his muscles quiver, like they were trying to tear themselves away from his bones.
Exactly half of him thought it should be running. The other half didn't know what the hell to do.
"He's not like you…" Scherbatsky continued, and the weird fight-or-fight reflex practically tore him apart.
Ted. She's talking about Ted, knucklehead.
The heady mix of adrenalin and dread confused him, made his stomach churn. When she mentioned tacos, he wasn't ready. His mask wasn't yet quite in place.
An hour later, when she'd finished eating, Barney still felt as if his own skin were trying to rip itself free and run off down the street.
Two whiskey and sodas later, the vibrations stopped and he felt himself settle into her rhythm. When the others arrived at McLaren's, he found himself able to laugh at her jokes and enjoy himself, almost as though everything was back to normal.
However, part of him was wondering, when he began his regular run on Sunday, how in the hell he was ever going to force himself to stop.