(no subject)
MAJOR SPOILERS for 613, "Bad News" and 614, "Last Words"
They spend a couple more days in St. Cloud. Judy pinches her cheeks and calls her a whore a few more times, but she also smiles just enough and walks with a thread of relaxation in her shoulders. It makes Lily feel like they're actually making progress in their sham of a mother-daughter-in-law relationship.
It makes Lily feel guilty.
Their third day in Minnesota, Marshall goes outside to toss a basketball around with his brothers, and the four of them sit in silence. Barney keeps fidgeting with his cell phone and Robin keeps looking at him, the line of her body alert and aware like she knows something the rest of them don't. (Lily can tell, because she did all the same things back when she was the one who kept Barney's secrets. It's a weird sort of role-reversal that doesn't intrigue her as much as she thinks it should.)
Ted sits up, shifts. "It'll be okay," he says, and he's talking to everyone, but most of all he's talking to her.
Barney and Robin nod. Lily sits on the couch and peels at the label of her water bottle.
It will be okay. She knows it will, because it has to. But she doesn't know what will happen when they get back to New York, when all the solemn Midwesterners are gone, when their little group splits back into their own lives and it's just her and Marshall alone in an apartment that smells like sewage.
For almost six months all she did was resent Marvin Eriksen. She rolled her eyes and faked her thank yous and threw a fit over a handmade wooden bassinet in the mail.
Why?
Because he was too invested?
Too involved?
Too excited?
Too eager to be a part of their lives and the lives of their children, to be supportive and helpful and all the things she was sure her father would never be?
Because he loved his son too much?
She picks at the flimsy factory glue, and the label comes off, leaving a jagged line of paper on the plastic. She folds it one way, then the other, then in triangles, then into a very tiny paper fan. She crumples it in her hands, smooths it out, and tears it down the middle.
Barney's eyes flicker from his cell phone to her and back again, jittery and uncertain. Robin glances at her sidelong, one corner of her mouth tugging down. Ted stares.
"Lil." He slides an arm around her shoulders, squeezes her once against his side. She blinks up at him and her eyes are suddenly wet. "It's going to be okay. But right now he needs you more than anybody. Otherwise he's never going to survive this."
"I know." She wipes at her eyes and rubs the moisture between her fingers. "I know."
She finds Marshall on his way back inside and hugs him, the same way she had all through the funeral and after, because it was all she could think to do. But this time it feels different, better, like they're finally helping each other instead of just her trying to give him confidence she doesn't have. She clings to the back of his coat and he rocks her from side to side, his lips in her hair.
He says, "Thanks, baby," and for the first time she doesn't feel like it's just a formality.
(He listens to the message over and over again, later. She knew he would, because closure and recovery aren't the same thing, and having one doesn't always mean you'll get the other.
But it's a start.)
They spend a couple more days in St. Cloud. Judy pinches her cheeks and calls her a whore a few more times, but she also smiles just enough and walks with a thread of relaxation in her shoulders. It makes Lily feel like they're actually making progress in their sham of a mother-daughter-in-law relationship.
It makes Lily feel guilty.
Their third day in Minnesota, Marshall goes outside to toss a basketball around with his brothers, and the four of them sit in silence. Barney keeps fidgeting with his cell phone and Robin keeps looking at him, the line of her body alert and aware like she knows something the rest of them don't. (Lily can tell, because she did all the same things back when she was the one who kept Barney's secrets. It's a weird sort of role-reversal that doesn't intrigue her as much as she thinks it should.)
Ted sits up, shifts. "It'll be okay," he says, and he's talking to everyone, but most of all he's talking to her.
Barney and Robin nod. Lily sits on the couch and peels at the label of her water bottle.
It will be okay. She knows it will, because it has to. But she doesn't know what will happen when they get back to New York, when all the solemn Midwesterners are gone, when their little group splits back into their own lives and it's just her and Marshall alone in an apartment that smells like sewage.
For almost six months all she did was resent Marvin Eriksen. She rolled her eyes and faked her thank yous and threw a fit over a handmade wooden bassinet in the mail.
Why?
Because he was too invested?
Too involved?
Too excited?
Too eager to be a part of their lives and the lives of their children, to be supportive and helpful and all the things she was sure her father would never be?
Because he loved his son too much?
She picks at the flimsy factory glue, and the label comes off, leaving a jagged line of paper on the plastic. She folds it one way, then the other, then in triangles, then into a very tiny paper fan. She crumples it in her hands, smooths it out, and tears it down the middle.
Barney's eyes flicker from his cell phone to her and back again, jittery and uncertain. Robin glances at her sidelong, one corner of her mouth tugging down. Ted stares.
"Lil." He slides an arm around her shoulders, squeezes her once against his side. She blinks up at him and her eyes are suddenly wet. "It's going to be okay. But right now he needs you more than anybody. Otherwise he's never going to survive this."
"I know." She wipes at her eyes and rubs the moisture between her fingers. "I know."
She finds Marshall on his way back inside and hugs him, the same way she had all through the funeral and after, because it was all she could think to do. But this time it feels different, better, like they're finally helping each other instead of just her trying to give him confidence she doesn't have. She clings to the back of his coat and he rocks her from side to side, his lips in her hair.
He says, "Thanks, baby," and for the first time she doesn't feel like it's just a formality.
(He listens to the message over and over again, later. She knew he would, because closure and recovery aren't the same thing, and having one doesn't always mean you'll get the other.
But it's a start.)