Just... yeah.
This fic doesn't deserve a title. Just know that it's an alternate interpretation of "Miracles," since I just saw that episode last night and it gives me feelings. Rated PG-13 for angst. Barney/Ted friendship-ish.
Years later, when you tell this story to the people who weren’t there and don’t know better, he’ll have been awake and lucid and cracking jokes about his bone downstairs being unbroken. Not that husk of a man held together with plaster and painkillers, looking worse than dead as he lay in that hospital bed.
When you tell it, years later, you seem like the ultimate romantic, rushing out the door to propose to Stella as he cheers you on. You make yourself sound like a champion for true love and Barney your noble supporter.
In reality, you took one look at his still form and ran away, unable to face what you’d done to your best friend.
It took Barney three days to wake up, three days where you did everything you could to avoid that room, avoid everyone’s looks of blame, avoid the broken body in the bed. Barney’s real friends sat by his bedside looking for some sign of life. You got them coffee and donuts and kept them going as they stood guard.
But you wouldn’t join them. Every time you looked at him there was a tattoo in your head beating “my fault, my fault, my fault.” Because it was your fault, and every single one of your friends would tell you the same if you ever confessed to them. They all loved Barney, they’d missed him terribly when you decided to cut him out for petty reasons. You’re almost positive they’d still been spending time with him behind your back, not that you would have minded if they’d told you. You wanted him out of your life; if the others were naive enough to keep him in theirs, that was their prerogative.
That was what you’d thought, anyway. Barney betrayed you; he hurt someone you love. He couldn’t stick around after that.
And once you saw how the universe, the entity that’s always been on your side, made Barney pay for his perceived crimes, you couldn’t stick around to watch. You were guilty enough without having to see what you wrought.
So you spent time with Stella, which was less about celebrating your love and more about getting away from that place of death where everything smelled of antiseptic. When your friends dragged you along to the hospital with them, you stayed out in the waiting room, picking through old magazines as Barney’s more loyal friends waited by his bedside, hoping he’d wake up. But you didn’t dare to venture inside that door, not after what you did. You hurt him enough already. You deserve to be the group pariah now, not him.
And then Marshall came out and sat beside you in silence for a long while as you squirmed and tried to will him away with your thoughts. “He woke up,” he told you, “for a few minutes, anyway. He was worried out of his mind for you. He still thought you were dead.”
You said nothing. Your own brush with death hardly mattered compared to what Barney was going through.
Marshall sighed. “Look,” he said in that no-nonsense voice of his, “he wants to see you. I think the next time he wakes up, you ought to be there.”
“He doesn’t want to see me,” you said hoarsely. They were the first words you said all day.
Your eyes were fixed on the floor, but you knew Marshall was looking at you sternly yet sympathetically, in that dad-way that you’d never be able to pull off like him.
“He’s your best friend,” Marshall said softly, like it was a fact.
“No, you’re my best friend,” you corrected, so quietly you could barely hear yourself. But even then, Marshall always understood things a lot better than you did. And he just looked at you like he couldn’t believe you were still holding petty grudges over someone who should be dead. “I’ll go,” you said, feeling smaller than ever.
So that’s when you found yourself falling into the chair by Barney’s bedside, under Lily and Robin’s curious eye, the four of you surrounded by gurgling bags and beeping machines. Barney’s pale, bruised face stood out against the pillows, eyelids closed. And you sat there and said nothing, because there was nothing you could possibly say. You couldn’t beg for his forgiveness even if he were awake, because you didn’t deserve it. You expected him to scream at you the second he woke up.
But you reached for his hand anyway, covering it with your own. His fingers were still warm, and that surprised you. And you felt something stab through your gut, seeing your former friend in so much obvious pain, kept clinging to life with machines and medicine and transfusions.
When you were in your accident, now barely a blip on your mental radar, the things you love flashed before your eyes. You saw Stella, your friends, but you also saw Barney. Barney, who you didn’t want to be friends with anymore. Your stupid heart couldn’t stop caring about him no matter how much you’d wanted it to.
And when Barney stirred, his fingers shifting under yours, mumbling your name under his breath, somehow that’s when you knew you were forgiven, and that everything would be all right.
Years later, when you tell this story to the people who weren’t there and don’t know better, he’ll have been awake and lucid and cracking jokes about his bone downstairs being unbroken. Not that husk of a man held together with plaster and painkillers, looking worse than dead as he lay in that hospital bed.
When you tell it, years later, you seem like the ultimate romantic, rushing out the door to propose to Stella as he cheers you on. You make yourself sound like a champion for true love and Barney your noble supporter.
In reality, you took one look at his still form and ran away, unable to face what you’d done to your best friend.
It took Barney three days to wake up, three days where you did everything you could to avoid that room, avoid everyone’s looks of blame, avoid the broken body in the bed. Barney’s real friends sat by his bedside looking for some sign of life. You got them coffee and donuts and kept them going as they stood guard.
But you wouldn’t join them. Every time you looked at him there was a tattoo in your head beating “my fault, my fault, my fault.” Because it was your fault, and every single one of your friends would tell you the same if you ever confessed to them. They all loved Barney, they’d missed him terribly when you decided to cut him out for petty reasons. You’re almost positive they’d still been spending time with him behind your back, not that you would have minded if they’d told you. You wanted him out of your life; if the others were naive enough to keep him in theirs, that was their prerogative.
That was what you’d thought, anyway. Barney betrayed you; he hurt someone you love. He couldn’t stick around after that.
And once you saw how the universe, the entity that’s always been on your side, made Barney pay for his perceived crimes, you couldn’t stick around to watch. You were guilty enough without having to see what you wrought.
So you spent time with Stella, which was less about celebrating your love and more about getting away from that place of death where everything smelled of antiseptic. When your friends dragged you along to the hospital with them, you stayed out in the waiting room, picking through old magazines as Barney’s more loyal friends waited by his bedside, hoping he’d wake up. But you didn’t dare to venture inside that door, not after what you did. You hurt him enough already. You deserve to be the group pariah now, not him.
And then Marshall came out and sat beside you in silence for a long while as you squirmed and tried to will him away with your thoughts. “He woke up,” he told you, “for a few minutes, anyway. He was worried out of his mind for you. He still thought you were dead.”
You said nothing. Your own brush with death hardly mattered compared to what Barney was going through.
Marshall sighed. “Look,” he said in that no-nonsense voice of his, “he wants to see you. I think the next time he wakes up, you ought to be there.”
“He doesn’t want to see me,” you said hoarsely. They were the first words you said all day.
Your eyes were fixed on the floor, but you knew Marshall was looking at you sternly yet sympathetically, in that dad-way that you’d never be able to pull off like him.
“He’s your best friend,” Marshall said softly, like it was a fact.
“No, you’re my best friend,” you corrected, so quietly you could barely hear yourself. But even then, Marshall always understood things a lot better than you did. And he just looked at you like he couldn’t believe you were still holding petty grudges over someone who should be dead. “I’ll go,” you said, feeling smaller than ever.
So that’s when you found yourself falling into the chair by Barney’s bedside, under Lily and Robin’s curious eye, the four of you surrounded by gurgling bags and beeping machines. Barney’s pale, bruised face stood out against the pillows, eyelids closed. And you sat there and said nothing, because there was nothing you could possibly say. You couldn’t beg for his forgiveness even if he were awake, because you didn’t deserve it. You expected him to scream at you the second he woke up.
But you reached for his hand anyway, covering it with your own. His fingers were still warm, and that surprised you. And you felt something stab through your gut, seeing your former friend in so much obvious pain, kept clinging to life with machines and medicine and transfusions.
When you were in your accident, now barely a blip on your mental radar, the things you love flashed before your eyes. You saw Stella, your friends, but you also saw Barney. Barney, who you didn’t want to be friends with anymore. Your stupid heart couldn’t stop caring about him no matter how much you’d wanted it to.
And when Barney stirred, his fingers shifting under yours, mumbling your name under his breath, somehow that’s when you knew you were forgiven, and that everything would be all right.