The silence at MacLaren's was so dense it seemed to absorb even the bar's usual background hum. They sat around their usual table, a group that looked like a collection of defeated statues or beaten puppies. In the center of the table, lying like a trophy of their failure, was Lily's torn banner, its words "WE LOVE YOU, ALYX" barely legible, ripped in half. Robin had picked it up automatically from Alyx's apartment floor as they left.
"Well," Barney began, breaking the silence. "In my defense, the Code Red Protocol had a 0% success rate. Statistically, it was bound to fail."
"It's not the time, Barney," Ted murmured, spinning his beer between his hands without drinking it. In his mind, replaying the damage to his loved ones' relationships from his parents' divorce revelation and the complexity of his relationship with Robin, he found a strange relief in someone else's catastrophe. It was a tangible problem, something he could try to help with, unlike the family ghosts haunting him.
Lily, seated beside Marshall but at a careful distance, couldn't take her eyes off the drawing she had made for Alyx of the three of them together. She had barely been able to talk to her or show her the drawing, which was now crumpled in her purse. "We did it wrong," she whispered, her voice heavy with the same guilt she'd been carrying for months. "We came like a jury to pass sentence, full of evidence, accusations, and a pre-written verdict. It wasn't the time to deliver a blunt 'You're broken, fix yourself.' It wasn't an offering of help, a friendly hand—it was a direct blow."
Marshall, who had been watching the play of light and shadow from the bar's interior lights on his whiskey glass, nodded slowly. "She's right," he said, his voice exhausted. "Alyx was always the one who had and used the instruction manual for our crises. I don't know how, but she always knew when Ted needed a motivational speech, when I needed pizza and a stupid movie, when Barney needed to be reminded he was human... And what did we do when she needed the same thing? We took her manual and just threw it back at her head in multiple copies, using a method we'd barely tested that only seemed to work for us. We didn't see that she needed something gentler."
Robin took a long sip of her beer; the bitter taste seemed appropriate for the moment. "Barney, about the trading statistics..." she began, unable to believe she was asking.
"Was that... just another crazy theory, or... did you see something real?"
Everyone looked at Barney, who had been playing with coasters since they arrived at the bar. Upon hearing the clear question, he stopped fiddling with the coasters and straightened up, adopting an unusually thoughtful expression. "The figures are public, guys. Anyone with basic market knowledge and too much time on their hands—like me—can see it," he said with a dramatic pause.
"Her portfolio is... unnaturally precise. As if she knew which stocks would rise before anyone else did. And while it's not illegal unless you have insider information from the future—which is impossible—unless..." He paused again, unsure whether to continue, his gaze shifting from macabre amusement to genuine perplexity. "Well, it's impossible. But if you saw that panic she showed... that wasn't just because we were meddling. It was a fear of us getting close to something she doesn't want us to know."
"It doesn't matter," Marshall interrupted firmly. "The 'thing' she doesn't want us to know isn't relevant right now. What matters is the why. Why does she feel this way? Why does she believe she deserves to be punished? The earring, the trading, the bruises... Those are all symptoms, not the illness. The illness is the pain she's carrying, and that pain won't let us get close enough to help her heal."
"So, what do we do?" Ted asked. "If a direct intervention failed, but approaching her as friends makes her retreat..."
"We don't chase her," Lily said with sudden clarity. "No more plans, no protocols, no secret missions. We just build a bridge and wait for her to decide to cross it. We show her with small actions that we're here, and we're not trying to fix her, but we want to be there when she decides she can't take it anymore and needs our help completely."
"Small actions?" Barney asked skeptically.
"Like what? Leave cookies at her door? Send her a spa coupon? Leave little candies on the way to the bar or Ted's apartment?"
"No, Barney, she means reminding her we exist outside the drama," Robin said, catching the idea. "You know, a no-pressure text, like 'Saw this article and thought of you,' 'Passed by the old bagel place, miss your complicated orders,' 'Bought a box of donuts, and there's one with chocolate chips and berry filling.' Silly, everyday things that don't require a response. We just need her to know we remember her as she was, not as she is now, even if it's just to share silly daily stuff."
Marshall nodded, a spark of hope lighting up his tired eyes. "And I... I can keep going, maybe just to talk about anything, but not to interrogate her. Or just sit on that bench she has so she knows I'm there, ready to talk, cry, or do nothing—but so she's not alone in that empty room."
"It's a terrible plan," Barney declared, leaning back in his chair. "No charts, no clear payoff, no 'aha!' moment. It's... waiting. And I'm terrible at waiting."
"We all are," Ted sighed. "But it's all we have left. It's what she did for years with us—she waited and helped when we needed it. Now it's our turn."
Meanwhile, as the group contemplated their new plan, Lily, who had fallen silent after giving her idea, thought about her own plan—something she could do for Alyx. Hearing Barney's strange facts, Marshall's story about Alyx breaking down over her earring, and Robin's account of the grueling exercise, she understood that she needed to do something. Something that wasn't a grand declaration but an act of restoration. An act that said, "I remember who you were, and that person is worth it."
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