Characters: Barney, Ted friendship
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Season 4, aired episodes only
Author's Notes: This is one of my entries to the LJ comm's BroTP drabblethon. Challenge drabble prompt: "You don't understand our love!"

Summary: "You don't understand our love!" Barney talks to Ted, nervously. Humor!

I See What You Did There

"You don't understand our love!" Barney decried, staring down his very good best friend Ted across the booth. His eyebrows were squished together as he tried to convey all the intensity of his totally not-boyfriend-like-but-also-more-than-bro-like feelings for mutual friend Robin to best friend Ted. Or was Robin currently his best friend? Barney traced the thought, pondered the particulars of Awesomely Drunk Ted versus Laser Tag Robin, and tabled the query for further examination at a later date.

Meanwhile, across the table, said friend Ted was staring with open disbelief.

"HAHA!" Barney suddenly laughed, pointing at Ted.

"What?" said Ted.

"Oh my god, your face. Is on fire. That was legendary. You're definitely my best friend, Ted Mosby."

"What?" said Ted.

"Nothing. Anyway, stop gaping, you look like a virgin school marm who just saw her first erection on a twelve year old student in homeroom. I was just messing with you, literally. Robin and I aren't in love or dating or screwing again or anything at all like that, so don't worry and, in fact, don't even think about it another second."

Ted managed to pick out one salient word from that abhorrent tangle. "Again?" he asked.

"Huh?" said Barney.

"You said 'or screwing again'. I thought it was just the one time!"

Barney gulped down a too-large mouthful of his scotch. He rolled his eyes as if Ted had said something horrifically obvious. "Uh, yeah."

"Yeah, what?"

"Yeah to what you said," Barney said, then belatedly added, "...bro."

Ted put his drink on the table, leaned forward, and damn near growled, "Barney, what the hell is going on with you? You've been getting weird, even by your standards, and now you make this lame and incomprehensible joke about you and Robin. And you said 'literally' in the middle of your sentence."

"Uh, no I didn't." Barney rolled his eyes again. "Like I would ever say that. Hah."

"And incorrectly too," Ted pressed. Barney waved a more than slightly tipsy hand at him.

"Whatever, Ted. I'm as awesome as ever, and in fact I'm more amazing than usual today, so I'll kindly ignore your conspiracy theories and pretend you're not just embarrassing us both right now."

Ted sat back against the cushioned wall of the booth. He took a sip of beer, examined his good friend with a level stare, and said, "Barney, something's going on with you, and if you don't tell me now, I'll just get Lily to tell me later."

His good friend's eyes darted quickly to the bar entrance and back. "Nice try, but Lily will tell you nothing. I've purchased her silence."

"Hah, so Lily knows! Oh this will be so easy."

"Fine. I'll pay you five hundred dollars not to pursue this."

"No deal."

"I'm giving you fair warning, Ted!" Barney said with more drama than anyone ought to say anything in a public bar before ten, "Whatever Lily says, you won't like what you hear!"

"Yeah, right," Ted scoffed. "After everything you've done before? How bad can it be?"

Barney managed to look even more uncomfortable when he heard that question, and couldn't help answering. "It's bad! It's really bad. Oh god, Ted, you won't believe how bad it is. So--just--drop it, okay?"

"Fine," Ted said, but he crossed his fingers under the table.

And his feet, just to be safe.