A/N

I changed the summary because I wasn't sure if it was clear what I was doing. I'm doing two separate parallel universes in this story. One, is a canon universe where Swarkles are divorced and the other is an AU where they stayed together. I'm using song lyrics as prompts. Everything will be revealed eventually. The canon one shots are the odd number chapters and the AU one shots are the even number chapters. This is a canon one and is entirely different from the previous 2016 story. Enjoy!

PS: Thank you FictionWriter91 – your reviews made my day! J

Like to Be You

Can I kiss you or not? Cause I'm not really sure right now of what you want.

2016

It was past midnight. Barney was exhausted. Robin was too. He could tell by the way she kept rubbing her eyes. They were both way too stubborn to admit they were tired and give into the fight though. He forgot what had started this fight. Did he start it, or did she? Barney couldn't even remember.

They seemed to be fighting a lot lately. About everything. It was beyond exhausting. It had started about a few months ago. Around the time Penny was born.

September 2015

Ted had a child. Finally. Penelope Lillian Robin Mosby. Now, he could make all the corny dad jokes he liked without it being weird. Good. Robin and Barney had gone to visit the happy and exhausted couple in the hospital. Both Ted and Tracy had fallen asleep, leaving Robin and Barney with Penny. They didn't mind.

"She's so cute." Robin cooed.

"She looks like Ted." Barney noted.

"Yeah, but she's got Tracy in her too." Robin said.

Barney smiled at his wife. She looked so natural holding a child. What he said next just kind of slipped out. "What do you think about us having one of these someday?"

"What? No! No, Barney. No! We can't!" Robin replied in shock.

"Sorry, but is it so wrong of me to suggest that we have a baby? We've been married for over a year and love each other." He replied.

She looked down at the baby. "I can't Barney. You know I can't. My uterus physically cannot bear a child."

"You know there are other ways of having kids, right? Adoption, surrogacy, IVF-" Barney listed.

"Barney, stop!" Robin cut him off. "You said you were okay not having kids! You said I was all you needed."

"Yeah but…it might be nice." He said. Robin gently put the baby back in her bassinet and then stormed out, angry. She didn't want kids. Barney knew that. He also said he didn't want kids. This wasn't supposed to be a problem they were going to have. This wasn't even a conversation they were supposed to have.

Since then, they never really spoke about having kids again, but Robin knew Barney wanted them. It was the start of all their fights, the ones that broke them up. Kids were the main reason the divorce happened. But, both Barney and Robin vowed not to tell the gang. They didn't need to know every detail.

Back to the present – 2016

Barney at Robin. She was sitting on the couch beside him, lost in her own thoughts. At least she wasn't yelling. Or crying. One night, the fight had been so long and emotionally difficult that she started sobbing. That had scared him. "Robin?" He asked.

"Yeah?" She replied.

"Can we go to bed?" He asked.

"Yeah. That sounds good." She responded, standing up.

He hesitated before following. "Can I kiss you or not? Because I'm not sure what you want." She nodded and he planted a kiss on her lips. When they pulled away she went into the bedroom and he followed.

That was just another night of fights. Another night that years later, he wished he could go back and redo, just to be able to kiss her again.