Lily didn't stay more than another week at Alyx's apartment. She managed to clean her own apartment of its freeloading guest—the raccoon—though, of course, she had to conscientiously scrub every surface until it was clean enough to bring her new sheets, which she had secured as a bribe to leave Barney's place. Now she and the group were reunited, and for the first time since the brunch and the whole intervention, they were complete with Alyx.
MacLaren's smelled of stale beer and freshly unearthed secrets, but that night, the air buzzed with a new energy—a mix of disbelief and macabre delight. At the center of the table sat Alyx, the caregiver, the anchor, the woman who had vanished into her own apartment, with a beer in hand and a genuine, though tired, smile on her lips.
They all looked at her as if she'd grown a second head—a head that told dating stories.
"...so I hear her say, with all the seriousness in the world, 'The problem with abstract expressionism is its lack of narrative structure.' And I thought... this is a disaster. A perfect disaster." Alyx took a sip of her beer, letting her story settle.
"And then?" asked Robin, eyes wide like saucers. Seeing Alyx here, in her territory, telling dating anecdotes, was stranger than seeing Barney quoting romantic poetry.
"Then we spent forty minutes arguing about Rothko vs. Pollock. She accused me of being a soulless formalist, and I accused her of being a sentimentalist who confuses trauma with talent." Alyx smiled, a flash of her old intellectual fire. "It was the most stimulating date I've had in... well, in this lifetime."
The group burst into laughter. Barney, in particular, was fascinated.
"Alyx on the battlefield of love! Or rather, of modern art. So? Was there a second round? A little close-quarters action between brushstrokes?"
Alyx shot him a look that froze him in his tracks. "We ended the debate with a handshake and a mutual promise to never visit the MoMA together. It was... civilized."
"Boring!" corrected Barney, but he was smiling.
It was then that Marshall, who had been listening with a mix of joy for Alyx and a growing pang of discomfort, couldn't hold back any longer.
"Wait, wait, wait. Chloe? Chloe with the copper-red hair who works at 'Things & Coffee' on 78th, who has a teapot tattoo on her ankle?"
Silence fell over the table. All eyes swung from Alyx to Marshall.
Alyx blinked slowly, her smile fading, replaced by an expression of swift calculation as connections clicked audibly in her mind. "Yes. That Chloe. You...?"
Marshall sank into his seat, a blush creeping up his neck. "I went out with her once. Like... three weeks ago."
The revelation was like a bomb of awkward confetti. Ted let out a nervous laugh. Robin murmured an "oh, my god." Lily, seated beside Marshall, stiffened, her fingers gripping her water glass until her knuckles turned white.
Barney, of course, celebrated it as an epic triumph. "I KNEW IT! I knew it! You two have the same pathetic, adorable, and desperately cheesy taste in women! It's like you share a brain... a big, soft, terrible-at-picking-dates brain!"
"Barney," Ted growled.
"Isn't it magnificent! Marshall dates Chloe, who turns out to have 'crazy eyes' according to our imprecise diagnosis. Then Alyx dates Chloe, who turns out to be an art snob with a teapot tattoo! It's the same woman! And you both found her adorable in your own clumsy way! What does that say about you two, huh? What dark similarities lurk beneath the surface?" Barney pointed at them both like a freak show presenter.
Alyx looked at Marshall. There was no anger in her eyes, only a deep curiosity and a hint of something that could be... complicity. "Did you also criticize her collection of vocal jazz vinyl?"
Marshall scratched the back of his neck, embarrassed. "Uh... yeah. I said it was pretentious."
"I told her it was cheesy," Alyx admitted. A small sigh escaped her lips, followed by a low, genuine laugh. "God, it's like dating the echo of oneself, but with breasts and opinions on swing."
The tension broke. Ted and Robin laughed. Even Lily managed a tense smile. Marshall joined the laughter, relieved.
"Sorry, Alyx. I had no idea," said Marshall.
"About what? That we have an identical, pathetic type?" Alyx shrugged, an unusually carefree gesture. "It's useful information. Now I know that if I ever want to date someone who reminds me of you, I just have to look for a woman who talks to plants and cries at artisanal beer commercials."
It was a low blow, but said with such a lack of malice that Marshall could only laugh harder. And for a moment, it was like before—like when the three of them teased each other in the apartment, secure in their affection.
But Lily's gaze was distant. She watched Alyx and Marshall laugh, sharing the private joke of their mutual bad taste. She saw the ease with which Alyx had integrated into the group's dynamic that night—not as the absent friend, but as one of them. And she saw Marshall laughing, his eyes bright, looking at Alyx with a relief and warmth he hadn't directed at her in months.
The jealousy didn't come as a torrent, but as a slow, cold seepage. It wasn't the possessive, dramatic jealousy of her early days back. It was quieter and deeper. It was the fear of being replaced, not just in Marshall's heart, but in the very nucleus of that three-person dynamic that had been her home. What if the two of them, through this absurd Chloe connection, found a way to move forward... without her?
The conversation drifted to other topics, but Lily barely listened. Her mind was in Marshall's apartment, spying on that date with Chloe, feeling the icy panic of seeing how "normal" and attractive she was. And now Alyx had seen her too, talked to her, dated her. It was as if her greatest fear was materializing in a comedy of errors. Both Marshall and Alyx were moving, growing, connecting... and their paths, by chance, had crossed at the same woman.
When the group dispersed, Lily found herself walking home with Marshall under the yellowish glow of streetlights. The early autumn air was crisp, and she wore a jacket that still faintly smelled of Alyx's perfume, borrowed in a gesture of care that now felt bittersweet.
"That was weird, huh? The Chloe thing," said Marshall, breaking the silence.
"Yeah, very weird." Lily shoved her hands in her pockets. "Did you... like her? Chloe, I mean."
Marshall thought for a moment. "It was... pleasant. Different. But it wasn't... it wasn't this." He made a vague gesture between them. "It wasn't complicated. And it wasn't... familiar."
Lily nodded, swallowing hard. "Alyx seemed... good. Better."
"Yeah." Marshall smiled a little sadly. "She's finding her way. With brushes and disastrous dates."
"And you, Marshall?" The question came out before she could stop it, loaded with all the vulnerability she'd been holding back. "Are you finding your way?"
Marshall stopped and turned to her. His face, illuminated by a neon sign, looked more mature, more marked than she remembered. He was no longer the big kid with dreams of being an environmental lawyer. He was a man who had been split in two and was trying to glue the pieces back together carefully.
"I think... I'm trying not to get lost," he said at last, his voice low. "All this time, I've been trying to be who I was before you left, or who I thought I should be afterward: the single guy in Barney-style, Brad's friend... But I'm neither of those. I'm just... me. A guy who likes brunch and who misses... misses the complexity."
Lily felt her eyes well up with tears. "I miss the complexity too, Marshall. I miss the mess. I miss coming home and not knowing if I'll find you arguing with Alyx over who left the dirty dishes, or if the two of you will be planning a ridiculous themed dinner for my birthday." She took a deep breath. "I miss being an 'us.' But not just a two-person 'us.' The 'us' of three. It was... it was a home."
Marshall looked at her, and for the first time since her return, Lily saw no defense, no resentment in his eyes. She saw recognition—the same pain, the same longing for that fractured structure that had held them up.
"It was a home," he whispered. "And we destroyed it."
"I destroyed it," Lily corrected, not looking away.
Marshall didn't deny it. He nodded slowly. "Yes. But I... I collapsed afterward. And I let Alyx carry everything. I destroyed her too."
It was the first time they'd said it out loud with such clarity and without accusations. The guilt was no longer a weapon; it was a weight they shared.
"Do you think... it can be rebuilt?" asked Lily, her voice barely a thread of sound. "Not the same, not all at once, but... something? Something that acknowledges the cracks but can still hold us up?"
Marshall looked down the empty street as if the answer were written on the asphalt. "I don't know, Lil. It's... terrifying. To trust again, to risk that level of... entanglement after all the damage."
"I know," she said. "But what I have now... the raccoon, the meaningless jobs, spying on your dates... that's scary too. It's more scary." She took a step closer without touching him. "I'm not asking you to forget, or for us to go back to how it was. I'm just asking... that we consider the possibility of seeing if, step by step, very slowly, we can find a way to be an 'us' again. All three of us, with all the scars in plain view."
The silence that followed wasn't uncomfortable. It was dense, charged with nine years of history between them and, more importantly, six of those years shared with someone else, plus six months of pain and a fragile, tenuous hope.
Marshall extended his hand—not to take hers, but for her to place hers on top, as they used to do when they needed a point of contact, an anchor.
Lily placed her hand on his. It was cold.
"Step by step," Marshall repeated, his voice firm. "No rush, no expectations. And... with Alyx deciding each step for herself. We can't plan this for her."
"Of course not," said Lily, and for the first time, she meant it. It wasn't about getting Marshall back; it was about rebuilding something that included all three of them, but from a new place.
A place of choice, not obligation.
They walked the rest of the way home in silence, but Lily's hand remained on Marshall's. It wasn't a clasp; it was a tacit promise. And somewhere in the city, in her silent apartment, Alyx looked at her canvas, where the scaffolding now supported the first clear strokes of a new building.
A building that, unbeknownst to her, would soon have to make room for two familiar ghosts asking permission to come back inside.
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