"No, Lily. NO!" Robin interrupts, inadvertently using the same tone she uses when her dogs misbehave. She shakes her head, holding up her hand. "Sorry, but it's not like that. It was an accident."
"Oh come on," Lily's still smiling. "You don't accidentally kiss someone."
"I almost kissed Ted a few weeks ago."
"What?"
Yeah, because that hardly makes it any better! Robin takes a deep breath and tries to wrestle back some control over the conversation. "Look, Barney and me, that's never going to happen. You saw what being in a relationship did to us. Hell, you tried to break us up! I was just feeling…" Robin frowns. What had she been feeling? Tired and emotional? A little low in self esteem? In need an ego boost?
Had she really intended to sleep with Barney?
"I'm still… really upset about Don," she says, hesitantly. It sounds plausible. It is plausible. It's as good an explanation as any for all the random kissing she's been doing. "I mean, we only just broke up, and this time I know… Well, I don't know. That's the trouble. Breaking up with guys is always hard."
"But this is different!" Lily replies. "Barney loves you."
That stings.
"Oh no," Lily tries to correct herself hurriedly. "I don't mean that Don didn't love you. He must have loved you. Even though he took your job and dumped you… Okay, now's the time for shutting up. I'm shutting up now." Lily takes a long sip from her coffee cup, her eyes large and apologetic over the rim.
"Well yeah," Robin huffs. "You're just being creepy with all the shiny-happy over me and Barn. You know that's not… it's just not!" Robin sighs. She almost asks Lily not to tell anybody, then she catches herself. There's no way Lily will be able to keep something like this a secret from Marshall, and no way that it won't eventually get back to Ted somehow. Things have a way of getting back to Ted. So instead she says, "Look, this is no big deal. If you tell Marshall, I'm sure he'll back me up on this. And I'll talk to Ted tonight."
Lily shoots Robin a look and mumbles into her coffee. "It's not Ted you should be talking to. Don't kill the group, sweetie."
"Pft! It's fine," Robin forces herself to smile. "It's Barney. He kisses a dozen stupidly-drunk ridiculously-hot girls a night. He'll understand."
It's fine. It really is. She should thank him. He acted like a gentleman for once in his life.
But why is there still a stone in her chest? Why, when her stomach twists and her eyes prick with annoying tears of frustration, does she think of Barney's bright blue eyes and his boyish smile?
And why, when she thinks about Don, is there only a low, fluttering sensation of relief?
#~- #~a-
Later, when Robin gets home, Ted's on his knees rooting through her DVDs in her bedroom. She stands at the door, hands on hips, and glares at him.
"Oh, hey!" Ted says with a goofy grin. "Looking for Die Hard 4, figured you'd have it?" There's a couple more DVD cases by his feet and she's pretty sure there his.
"Uh, personal space, dude," she protests. "I don't go ransacking your room for… whatever stuff you've got in your drawers. Saying that, ew! Guy stuff!" She laughs.
"Sorry. Look, do you have it or not?"
Reluctantly she pushes him away and finds the movie for him, shoving the box into his hand. "Now scram, before I go get my gun."
He just grins. "Thanks!" He says, then scurries out of her room.
Robin sighs, getting back on to her feet before calling out, "Hey, are you going down to the bar?"
"Nope, got plans," He calls out.
So much for having a quiet talk and subtly steering the conversation to the non-issue kiss with Barney, which definitely doesn't make her feel a little wobbly to think about it.
Definitely not.
"Okay," she says, weakly. It'll be nice to have the apartment to herself for a change.
She might watch Die Hard: The original and the best. Even Barney would agree with that.
God, why does she keep thinking about him? That's just weird. She fishes out her cell phone and checks through her messages. And she tells herself she doesn't feel a pang of disappointment not to see anything from him.