(A/N: Panic's Ready To Go (Get Me Out Of My Mind), this is a fun one to write for me, it's a little lighter than what I've been writing, and for once, it'll be from Robin's point-of-view 'cause it's more open than the other tracks, so yeah, enjoy, and review if you like it.)
The little things about people are the things that you usually miss out on when you're not reading them right. Sure, you're looking at them, but you're just seeing what they're showing on the outside, and not what they genuinely are.
She pulls a Mosby on him, more than once, and it's been a while, but she realises that the feelings, they don't go away. It's different from the past. With Ted, she always felt safe, but burdened by his expectations of a relationship, and the things he wanted from life. With Barney, it was a lot more about the wild, spontaneous motions and the unexpected. She thought she'd found the balance with Don, someone who understood her undying passion for her work, but of course, he just turned out to be one of those selfish bastards that weren't worth the time.
But she can't deny that she's in love with Barney once more. Just this little thing, is it really little? She runs away from it, because it's the way she's most familiar with, it's what she's best at. She ran away from her father's expectations, she ran away from her best friends in the past, and running away - there's something about being able to let it all go and start afresh that makes it such an appealing option.
The difference between those times and now is that in the past, she always knew where she was going. Right now, she's running away from the person who she has feelings for, the person who makes her feel like everything's alright, the person who tells her she's the most awesome person in the world.
This time, when she runs away, she's running away from reality, she's running away from the future, and she's merely running backwards and restarting everything because the future seems, terrifying, and she knows it's a mistake to go back to the past, but she's afraid. When she's afraid, she likes to go back to what she knows best, and this, it's what she knows best.
They come so close to making the same mistakes as they did in the past.
His hand brushes her thigh once too often in the bar when he's next to her, and when she shoots him a glare, he merely cocks his head to the side and lifts his eyebrow slightly as if to say, "Really?"
When he's sitting opposite her in the booth, he toes her shin lightly, she can feel the softness of his leather shoes, and the cheeky smile that he tries unsuccessfully to suppress, it's there.
They have the late night chats, even though the bar isn't short on quality, it seems like he genuinely wants to know about her day, and he's even cutting down on his bad jokes and ridiculous stories.
He lets slip one or two too many comments about how beautiful she is, and how their sex was up there with the best. He puts his arm around her without a thought, and the way his hand rubs her shoulder absent-mindedly, she gets the feeling that he's doing all these subconsciously, and she likes it.
She stumbles on her own, too. She asks Barney for his jacket when she's cold, even though they all know how particular Barney is about his impeccable Italian suits and them getting wrinkled, and when Ted's got a perfectly clean and freshly-laundered jacket still sitting in its laundry bag.
She puts on sundresses more often than she needs to, and the heels that she knows he likes. She goes without the make-up almost every day when she goes down to the bar, even making the effort to remove it sometimes, because she'd like to hear him tell her that she's still stunning even without the shield that most women wouldn't dare to go without.
She sees the changes in him, the way he seems to care more about the things around him, and all the reasons she gave herself to remind herself that she couldn't be with him, those reasons are suddenly losing their validity by the day.
It's another night, another typical day at the bar. But Marshall and Lily have an elaborate date planned because it's their anniversary, neither Barney nor Robin cared to hear the number, because even though they are changed people, these anniversaries, they still don't hold that much weight in their eyes.
Ted leaves early, because he's flying out to San Francisco the next day for some architect convention, which they don't pay attention to again, because it's Ted, he tells them everything they don't need to know.
Soon enough, it's just the two of them. It's a dangerous situation, she knows, but his eyes, are they bluer tonight?
"Robin, what we have, so maybe I don't know what it is. I'm not good with labels, we both aren't, we talked about it two years ago, and I'm still not comfortable with that stuff. What I do know, is that there's something holding you back. I'm not telling you that I want you to be my girlfriend. I'm content, having you for company at night, to drink scotch with, admire fancy cigars with. I've got to admit, I wasn't ready to have a relationship the last time we were together. But I feel like I'm ready now, and I'm just wondering, if you'd like to cross a road with me."
This time, she doesn't over-think it, she doesn't care about the consequences, what do they matter anymore, anyway, because they're changed people. His hand is on the table, and it's a cliche, but she slips her hand into his and smiles as she whispers, "I think I'm ready to go."