Us
They're changing. They both know. This thing they're doing is turning into something else, and they're not admitting that, but they're letting it happen.
At first its little things. Knowing stuff about each other; she prefers strawberry ice cream to chocolate so he buys it in. Going out to clubs. Hanging at his apartment alone together: watching TV; reading the newspapers; laughing at cat videos on Youtube with her elbow resting on his shoulder as they hunch over the laptop. Letting the odd "baby" slip into conversation. He tries to cheer her up when she has a bad day. Shooting jealous glares if they see the other one flirting with somebody else. He helps her zip up her dress in the morning. She does his tie for him. His usual table at the cigar bar gains a permanent second chair.
At first it's little things.
Then it's the physical. Pecking his cheek in greeting whenever they meet each other alone. Playing with each other's fingers under the table. Fiddling with his lapels. Waking up with tangled ankles and her breath tickling his chest and chin. Momentarily breaking a kiss to stroke his cheekbone with her thumb. Gently running his fingers through her hair while she sucks him off.
Of course, their sex is never going to feel like sun rising over a sleepy field- but it feels different to how it has with other people; different to how it used to feel between them. Neither of them dwell on it enough to verbalise (Barney doesn't understand it and shoves it to the back of his mind), but it feels…closer. She tells herself that it's always like this- the more two people do it, the better they become at responding to each other's bodies and learning what the other person likes; becoming a joint act- not just one person fucking the other. It's just an inevitable development for any two people who've had sex more than a couple of times. That's what she tells herself, though she knows it's something more.
They talk to each other differently. Their friendly chit-chat remains, though they bicker less (fight more) and ask each other casual-but-important questions (often Barney can't help but tell the truth back. At times it doesn't even occur to New York's biggest pathological liar to fib to her. That's the scariest part). Of course they still tease and banter and mock each other, but now they joke together about others: Ted's obsessions, taxi drivers' rudeness, Mrs Sumner's disapproving glares at them in the corridor. They have their own ways of affectionately irritating each other, but often it feels like the two of them giggling together at the silliness of rest of the world.
And then there are the big things.
Dinner. Dates. Muttered I-love-yous. Calling him at lunchtime. Calling her in the morning when he knows she'll be on her way home from work (Robin never asks him what he's doing up at this time. The answer scares her, and not just because it could be some illegal). He reserves a room in a classy Soho hotel for an afternoon, pretending it's for a change and so they can add some spice- but they both know that if it was just for sex, even Barney wouldn't spend this much money on a girl. Casual mentioning of future events; nothing concrete, but vague discussions of upcoming films they'd like to see, restaurants they might go to, areas of Greenwich Village they should one day check out. There's always a mutually understood, jointly awkward pause which follows these admissions, but they've both got good at hurrying the conversation on.
Sleepy afterglow talks at 3am.
"Where d'you get that scar on your eyebrow?"
"What's the most trouble you've ever been in?"
"Red M&Ms or blue M&Ms?"
"Okay, I admit it; I sometimes watch Dancing With The Stars,"
He knows that this isn't what he does; that's it's breaking his rules- but he pushes those rules to the back of his mind and ignores the voice inside which keeps asking what the hell he thinks he's doing. She, likewise, tells herself the friends-with-benefits story- and turns down the volume on the voice which scoffs that that story's a lie.
But the big things are getting bigger, and those voices are getting louder, and the questions those voices are asking are becoming more important and urgent. There are so many elephants in the room that they're running out of space to breathe.
One morning they wake up together on his couch, stiff limbs entangled. The TV's still on- and she realises that they must have fallen asleep like this. On the couch, with pizza boxes on the floor, without having had sex beforehand. Barney swallows, cracks a few vague jokes then dashes off for a shower- and it's is never mentioned again. Silently, however, they know that's it's changed them. It's one of the moments- little, physical, verbal, big- which steepen the slope that they're sliding down together.
Neither of them knows what's there, but it won't be long before they reach the ground.
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