Chapter 4: MACLAREN'S INITIATION
Two days after Ted's romantic catastrophe, I got the invitation I'd been waiting for.
"You're coming to MacLaren's tonight." Ted stood in my doorway, still wearing the slightly manic energy of a man who had stolen a blue French horn from a restaurant and given it to a woman who'd kicked him out of her apartment. "Non-negotiable. The gang wants to meet you properly."
"The gang?"
"Marshall, Lily, Robin—you sort of met her through the wall when I was having my emotional breakdown—and Barney. You'll like Barney." He paused. "Actually, you might not like Barney. Nobody likes Barney at first. But he grows on you. Like a fungus. A legendary fungus."
I'd spent the past forty-eight hours unpacking boxes, finalizing the business plan for Red Thread Matchmaking, and trying not to think too hard about the fact that I was living inside a television show. The system had been mercifully quiet, aside from occasional notifications about string patterns I passed on the street.
Going to MacLaren's meant being surrounded by the main cast of a nine-season sitcom. It meant watching Ted and Robin's complicated dance in real-time. It meant meeting Barney Stinson, whose string I'd only glimpsed briefly and couldn't quite read.
"Sure," I said. "What time?"
The bar hit me like a wall of light.
Not the actual lighting—MacLaren's was dim and comfortable, all wood paneling and booth leather and the ambient glow of beer signs. But the strings. God, the strings.
They crisscrossed the room like a laser security grid designed by someone who'd never heard of organization. Red threads connecting the bartender to someone in New Jersey. Pink wisps trailing from a woman at the bar toward three different men, none of whom she was talking to. A thick golden rope binding an elderly couple in the corner booth, so bright it made my eyes water.
I grabbed the edge of the nearest table to steady myself.
"Whoa." Ted caught my arm. "You okay? We haven't even started drinking yet."
"Fine. Just... long day."
[Proximity Alert: High-density romantic connection zone detected.]
[Active connections in range: 47]
[Destined pairs: 12]
[Doomed connections: 23]
[Complicated: 12]
[Recommendation: Reduce visual sensitivity or risk sensory overload.]
I mentally dialed down the string visibility. The threads faded to ghosts, still present but no longer screaming for attention.
Better. Manageable.
"There they are." Ted pointed toward a booth in the back corner. Marshall's enormous frame was unmistakable, and Lily's red hair caught the light as she waved us over.
The booth was already crowded. Marshall had claimed the inside seat, with Lily tucked against him. A woman I recognized from my brief glimpse through the apartment door sat on the outside—Robin Scherbatsky, in the flesh, nursing what looked like a scotch.
And across from them, wearing a suit that probably cost more than my first month's rent, was Barney Stinson.
"The new guy!" Barney stood up, spreading his arms like I was a long-lost relative. "Ted has told me everything about you. Well, not everything. He said you're mysterious. I love mysterious. Mysterious is like regular, but with secrets."
"I'm Ethan." I slid into the booth, instinctively taking the seat with my back to the wall. Clear sightlines to the bar, the entrance, and most of the room. Old habit from my previous life—marketing conferences had taught me to always know where the exits were.
Marshall noticed. "You a spy or something?"
"I just like to see what's coming."
"Smart." He nodded approvingly. "I'm Marshall. This is Lily, my fiancée. And that's Robin, who Ted is definitely not in love with anymore."
"Marshall!" Ted's voice cracked.
Robin just smiled, the kind of smile that said she'd heard this joke before and was tired of it. "Nice to meet you, Ethan. Ted says you're starting a matchmaking business?"
"That's the plan."
"So you're like a professional wingman!" Barney leaned forward, eyes bright with schemes I could almost see forming. "This is perfect. This is legendary. We could team up. I bring the plays, you bring the... whatever it is you bring."
"That's not really what matchmaking is."
"But it could be."
I looked at Barney's string for the first time since entering the bar. It existed—definitely existed—leading away from him toward someone specific. But the destination was obscured, wrapped in something I couldn't penetrate. Like looking at a word through frosted glass.
[String Analysis: Barney Stinson]
[Primary connection: OBSCURED]
[Reason: Multiple competing timelines. Destination not yet determined.]
[Secondary connections: 47 (all temporary, none destined)]
[Note: Subject demonstrates high romantic activity but low commitment capacity. Transformation required before primary match accessible.]
Interesting. Barney had a soulmate somewhere, but the system couldn't show me who until something changed in him. Until he became someone capable of that connection.
"Earth to Ethan." Lily was watching me with those sharp green eyes. "You spaced out there."
"Sorry. Lot of people in here. Taking it all in."
"You do that a lot," she said. "The spacing out thing. Ted mentioned it."
"Lily." Marshall's tone was gentle but warning.
"I'm just observing! It's what I do. I'm an observer."
"She means she's nosy," Robin said. "She's incredibly nosy. It's her whole thing."
"I prefer 'attentive.'"
The conversation flowed around me as I settled into the booth. Ted and Robin were doing their dance—he watched her when she wasn't looking, she watched him when he was. Their strings flickered between them, bright one moment, dim the next. Unstable. Unresolved.
Marshall and Lily were the anchor of the group. Every time someone said something potentially awkward, one of them would smooth it over. Their string pulsed steadily between them, gold-red and impossibly solid. The 94.7% couple, serving as the foundation for everyone else's chaos.
And Barney was... Barney. He told three stories in twenty minutes, each more outlandish than the last. He ordered a round of shots nobody asked for. He tried to convince me that his job was "please" (which I knew from the show was actually an acronym for something corporate and vaguely sinister).
By the third drink, I was starting to relax. These were real people, not characters. They had depth and contradictions and moments of genuine warmth that no script could capture. Marshall laughed with his whole body. Lily's suspicious glances were softening into something like acceptance. Robin was funnier than I expected, with a dry wit that cut through Barney's bombast.
And Ted... Ted was exactly what I'd seen in the hallway. A hopeless romantic who believed so hard in love that it made him stupid. But the believing was genuine. You couldn't fake that kind of earnestness.
"So, matchmaker." Robin finished her scotch and set the glass down with a decisive click. "Can you tell if I'm gonna die alone?"
She was joking. Mostly.
I looked at her strings. The bright one leading to Ted—unstable, flickering, not destined but also not impossible. The faint one trailing toward Barney, so thin I could barely see it. And others, fainter still, leading to people I couldn't identify.
[Robin Scherbatsky: String Analysis]
[Primary: Ted Mosby (67% compatibility, status: complicated)]
[Secondary: Barney Stinson (compatibility: calculating... timeline dependent)]
[Tertiary: Multiple potential connections, none currently actualized]
[Note: Subject demonstrates avoidant attachment patterns. Career prioritization may delay romantic resolution.]
"Nobody dies alone," I said carefully. "Some people just take longer to figure out what they actually want."
Robin's expression shifted—something flickered behind her eyes that might have been surprise or relief or just the alcohol hitting.
"That's surprisingly deep for a guy who's known me for an hour."
"I've had practice."
Barney slapped the table. "Okay, enough with the philosophical stuff. Matchmaker, I have a challenge for you."
"I'm not a matchmaker yet. I haven't matched anyone."
"Semantics." He pointed toward the bar. "See that blonde? The one with the friend? What are my chances?"
I looked. A woman in her late twenties, attractive, laughing at something her friend said. Her string led away from the bar, toward the east. Queens, maybe. Definitely not toward the man in the expensive suit sitting across from me.
[Target: Jessica (surname unknown)]
[Primary connection: Located in Queens. Accountant. 78% compatibility.]
[Attraction to Barney Stinson: 0%]
[Note: Subject has stated preference for "genuine" men. Barney Stinson does not currently qualify.]
"Zero," I said.
Barney's grin widened. "Challenge accepted."
He was out of the booth before anyone could stop him. I watched him approach the blonde—Jessica, apparently—with the confidence of a man who had never been told no. Or rather, had been told no so many times that he'd stopped hearing it.
"This is gonna be good." Marshall pulled out his phone. "I'm timing it."
"Twenty bucks says under five minutes," Lily said.
"I'll take that action. Barney's been practicing his magic tricks."
Robin caught my eye. "You really think he has zero chance?"
"I think that woman is waiting for someone specific, and it's not him."
"How can you tell?"
Because I can literally see the red string connecting her to a man in Queens, I didn't say. "Body language. The way she's positioned toward the door, not the bar. She's meeting someone, not looking for someone."
Robin studied me for a long moment. "You're weird."
"I get that a lot."
At the bar, Barney had produced a deck of cards from somewhere. Jessica's friend looked mildly entertained. Jessica looked like she was calculating how to escape without causing a scene.
I ordered nachos. The waiter—a tired-looking guy in his thirties whose string led to someone in this very building—nodded and disappeared.
The night continued. Barney crashed and burned with Jessica, regrouped, and tried again with a new approach. Ted told a long story about architecture that made Robin's eyes glaze over but also made her smile in a way that suggested she found his pretentiousness endearing. Marshall and Lily debated the merits of different cheese types for their wedding catering, which was apparently an ongoing war.
And I sat in my corner of the booth, back to the wall, watching the strings pulse and shift and tangle around people who had no idea what they were part of.
"Host appears to be successfully integrating with subject group. Social bonding activity detected. Recommendation: maintain regular contact to maximize observation opportunities and potential quest completions."
The nachos arrived. Perfect—crispy, cheesy, exactly the right amount of jalapeño. Small victories.
Around eleven, Barney finally gave up on Jessica and her friend. He slid back into the booth with the wounded dignity of a general who'd lost a battle but not the war.
"Okay, matchmaker." He jabbed a finger at me. "You got lucky. But I want answers. How did you know?"
"Know what?"
"That I'd fail. You said zero percent. You were right. Nobody's right about zero percent."
"I have a system."
Marshall laughed. "A system? What, like counting cards?"
"Something like that."
Barney's eyes narrowed. For just a moment, beneath the showmanship, I saw something sharper. Something that explained how he'd risen to whatever mysterious position he held at Goliath National Bank.
"I'm gonna figure you out, Ethan Cole."
"Good luck."
The bar started to thin out. Ted and Robin were still talking, their heads close together despite the empty space in the booth. Marshall and Lily were making noises about leaving, their perfectly-matched strings already pulling them toward home.
And across the room, Jessica's friend—Karen, I'd heard her name—was heading toward the bathroom. She stopped next to my section of the booth.
"Hey." She glanced at Barney, then back at me. "Your friend is... persistent."
"He's not really my friend. More of a situation."
She laughed. The kind of laugh that suggested she appreciated someone who could make a joke without trying too hard.
"What do you do? When you're not... situationing?"
"I'm starting a matchmaking business. Boutique service for people tired of dating apps."
Her eyes lit up. "Wait, seriously? Like actually?"
"Red Thread Matchmaking. Just getting started."
"That's..." She glanced at the bar, at the place where Barney was nursing his wounded pride. "That's actually interesting. I've been single for two years and every app is the same. Swipe right, small talk, ghost. Repeat."
Her string pulsed. Leading east. Brooklyn. Someone she hadn't met yet.
"You should call me sometime," I said. "If you're interested."
"You have a card?"
I did not have a card. I had just realized, in this exact moment, that starting a business required business cards and I had none.
"I have a napkin."
I grabbed one from the table, borrowed Ted's pen without asking, and wrote: Red Thread Matchmaking - Ethan Cole and my phone number.
Karen took it. Studied it. Smiled.
"I might just do that."
She walked back to her friend. Jessica was already putting on her coat, ready to leave. Ready to go home to her string's destination in Queens.
Barney appeared at my elbow.
"How." It wasn't a question. "How did you get her number? You didn't even try. You sat here eating nachos and she came to you."
"I wasn't trying to sleep with her."
"That's—" He stopped. Processed. "That's the worst advice I've ever heard. And also, somehow, it worked. I hate you."
"You'll get over it."
"Probably not." But he was almost smiling. "You're coming back here, right? Tomorrow?"
"Maybe."
"Definitely. We're definitely doing this again."
He left to settle his tab. Ted was still talking to Robin. Marshall and Lily were already halfway to the door, hands intertwined, their golden-red string practically glowing.
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
"Hi, is this the matchmaker? It's Karen from the bar. My friend thought I was crazy for taking a napkin, but I looked you up and you're real. I'm serious about this. When can we meet?"
I stared at the message.
First potential client. First real step toward making this business work.
"How's Friday afternoon?" I typed back. "I'll send you the address."
The address would be my apartment, which still looked like a storage unit had exploded in it. I had two days to make it presentable.
But I had a client.
A real client.
The system chimed softly.
[Quest Progress: Make Your First Match]
[Client acquired. Next step: Identify compatible partner. Match successfully.]
I finished my last nacho and headed for the door.
Behind me, Ted was finally saying goodnight to Robin. Their strings flickered between them—bright, dim, bright again.
Nine years of that flickering. I wondered if I'd get used to it.
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