Title: "A Sight to Behold"
Author: Lila
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing: Blair, Blair/Dan
Spoiler: "The Kids Stay in the Picture"
Length: Part I of III
Summary: Chuck isn't the only Upper East Sider who needs to grow up.
Disclaimer: Not mine, just borrowing them for a few paragraphs
Author's Note: Oh man. This is the culmination of: too much Florence and the Machine and the new PJ Harvey. Mourning the loss of LCD Soundsystem. Trying and failing to write "Vampire Diaries" fic. Spring Break and lots of time on my hands. So we have this, four years in the making. Title and cut courtesy of Devendra Banhart. Enjoy.
There are Van der Woodsens on your TV screen.
You watch a parade of them, Lily and Rufus arriving, Eric leaving, and even Serena's dad doing his best not to smile as the flashbulbs light up around him.
Lily's life is falling apart but she's rallied her troops and you know she'll pull through. She's a Van der Woodsen; they always have a way of coming out on top. You're not nearly as worried as you probably should be.
You spot Serena amongst the flashing lights, a determined look pasted on her face as she pushes through the crowd, and you wait for a mess of dark hair and flannel to appear at her side, holding her together and keeping her afloat.
She's alone and you almost don't recognize her, because her world is dissolving around her, and Dan Humphrey isn't riding to the rescue.
You try to tell yourself it isn't something; you can't delude yourself into believing it's nothing.
Turns out, it's your world that falls apart and Dan Humphrey is right in the eye of the storm.
ChuckandBlair, BlairandChuck
Your life has always cycled back to its most important moments and it ends where it started, with your heart on your sleeve and ripe for the plucking, and it gets crushed into a million pieces by the same boy.
You've always known you can't have what you want but it's not fair that you never get what you need either.
You did the heavy lifting. You worked hard. Chuck will never be perfect, but you deserve to win for once.
Your evening ends and there's a dark-haired boy at your side but he's not the right one.
For all your well-placed barbs, you know Dan's not a moron. He got into Yale and NYU and you're loath to admit it, but you have a strong feeling his verbal score might have been higher than yours.
He's spent four years in your company on the Upper East Side – even he can see through something as transparent as an "Up and Comers" section in a book about "Modern Royalty."
He comes anyway, because he knows you'll be there or he wants to impress you or…the reason doesn't matter.
He comes with a brave set to his shoulders and laughter in his smile but it's his eyes that betray what he's feeling inside.
They're soft and kind and they can't stop looking at you. You hear his words, social experiments gone wrong, but you can't move past the way he's watching you: like he means what he says; like he cares about your happiness.
Your kiss might have meant nothing, but it doesn't mean he isn't worth something.
When he you promises you a happy ending, you believe him.
You're done waiting.
Your heart is broken but you patch it back together and get on with your life.
You find a routine: shopping with Serena, renewed interest in your classes, Skype sessions that bridge the ocean between New York and Paris.
Dan stays too.
The Lily mess means he's in Serena's orbit more and the blowup at the photo shoot means he hovers over you.
You're still not friends, but you like not-meeting-up-with-him at Whitney or the Frick and one night there's even a viewing of Rebecca at the loft.
You fall asleep midway through and wake with your head on his shoulder, Manderley aflame and frozen onscreen. You used to think it was beautiful but somewhere in the last year it lost its charm.
Dan is still as a statue beneath you, one arm lazily thrown behind your shoulders, but his eyes are trained on your face.
It's dark and you can't tell what he's thinking but you still know the look in his eyes: soft, warm, kind, forgiving. None of the things you'd see in yourself.
You push up and away from him and his arms drops but he doesn't stop watching you. "I can tell you how it ends," he says softly. "Manderley is destroyed but they get away. They get to start over. That's how it is for all of us."
You don't want to do this here, with him, but he was there when it happened. He's Dan Humphrey and he's not your friend but he might be the only person who understands.
Tears well in your eyes and you blink hard but can't quite keep them from rolling down your cheeks. "I was ready," you whisper. "After what happened…I thought he could give me that much, but I was wrong. I'm always wrong."
"I've been there too. How many times did I try with Serena? It never worked." He reaches up and wipes away a tear and you're too tired to stop him. He's already seen your heart break for Chuck Bass – the least he can do is help you put it back together.
"You didn't go to her that night," you remind him. You'd given him specific instructions and he'd failed to follow them. It's not a detail you'd easily forget.
"I learned my lesson. What's the point in trying if the end result is always the same?" His eyes flicker to the screen and back to you. "We don't get to choose who we love but we get to choose what we do with it. No one said moving on is easy, Blair, but it doesn't make it any less avoidable."
You laugh, because this entire conversation is ridiculous – you're taking love advice from a boy who thought he was in love with Vanessa and raised Georgina Sparks' Russian baby as his own. "You're not one to talk, Humphrey."
His fingers drop from your cheek and he holds his hands up in surrender. "I got over my Van der Bass, Waldorf. I'm volunteering my services in helping you do the same."
"Time," you say to him. "All I need is time."
"And maybe a hobby," he says and starts rambling about his writing but you're already tuning him out. You lost "W" and thought you lost a piece of yourself, but you know how to get it back. There are minions to control and secret societies to run – you're done wallowing in your own misery.
You spring from the couch and leave without saying goodbye. He's Dan Humphrey; you know he'll understand.
"I meant painting, or maybe gardening," he calls after your retreating form but you can't hear him over the plans spinning in your mind.
Time is a luxury you have and a cure is what you crave.
A hobby, a distraction, getting over Chuck Bass…Dan has given you exactly what you want.
In the end, you don't need minions or Hamilton House.
You need Dan Humphrey.
Serena's cousin sticks around and there's something not right about her. Her eyes are too open, her hair too shiny, and you don't trust the way she can't stop staring at Dan.
You don't like it.
You're still not friends, but he's wormed his way into your life. You're nothing if not protective of the things that matter to you.
Georgina Sparks and Juliet Sharpe are fresh in your mind, but Brooklyn dominates his and he can't help but seeing the good in people even if you see the warning signs clear as day.
You catch Charlie raiding Serena's closet and you catch her reading a copy of 10-08-05 and you even catch her breaking into the loft but there's always an excuse and Dan has the boundaries of a four-year-old and buys her lies.
You don't have the right evidence but you know better. You're Blair Walfdorf – a hunch is all you need. But he's Dan Humphrey and he has to second guess every threat you neutralize.
"She's new to the city, she's nice, she doesn't know anyone" he protests against the texts you send at rapid speed.
You sigh and grumble under your breath, ignore the eyebrow arching up Dorota's forehead. This isn't love or even like. You just can't stand another crazy bitch winning.
"He said to find a hobby," you tell Dorota as she stands guard while you download Charlie's file from Barnard. "I'm just doing what I do best."
"I have baby!" she reminds you. "I don't think Mr. Daniel want her to grow up with no mother."
You start to correct her but there's a noise and then an admin assistant returning from lunch, and then you're both fleeing down a corridor before you have time to process that Dan stopped being Lonely Boy and turned into a real person.
You find your proof – stalking a professor, suicide attempt, all the Rhodes party tricks – and you take it to Dan and let him decide.
You're tempted to confront Charlie herself, but the Empire is still rubbing salt in wounds slow to heal. You know what it's like to have your choices taken away. You won't do the same to him.
He stares at the evidence in his hands and lets out an enormous sigh. "I don't think I'm ever making a new friend again."
You smile, feel more like yourself. You saved someone you care about. This is who you are.
"Buck up, Humphrey," you say. "It's not like this is the first time you've done something stupid for a blonde girl."
He just shakes his head and reaches for his notebook. "Well, we know how I'll be spending the afternoon."
"My work here is done." You pick up your purse and button your coat. You've been in Brooklyn almost thirty minutes – if you stay any longer it might become a habit.
"Blair," he calls out when you're halfway out the door. You pause and it has nothing to do with his words. A beam of sunlight is falling over his face, highlighting the planes of his cheeks and the gratitude in his dark eyes. He's handsome, startlingly so, and you blink to push the image away. You've have your fill of men with deep, dark eyes. "Thank you," he says.
He doesn't touch you, doesn't ply you with stockings and macaroons or even reach over and touch your hand.
He stares into your eyes as he says the words and they let you know he means what he says.
It means something to you.
You save Dan Humphrey and suddenly he's everywhere.
Coffee before class, tickets to an Epstein screening at the MoMa, a recent printing of Anna Karenina with a new foreword.
You remind him that you don't attend the same school anymore, that you're too old for fairytales, that throwing yourself under train tracks is the exact wrong way to tackle heartbreak, but he doesn't back down.
"All this time…I should have seen it coming," he explains while he gathers mugs for tea and a bowl for popcorn. He's wearing plaid and jeans, but spring is coming and the first few buttons of his shirt have been left undone. He plays soccer with Nate sometimes and you can see its effect, the slight rounding of muscle cresting under the exposed skin.
You look away and turn back to his dvd collection. "Sometimes you're slow on the uptake, Humphrey," you remind him. Four years and he still hasn't learned. You kind of like it about him. You can't remember a time you believed in people so easily.
He comes up beside you, slides a mug of chamomile across the counter. "I never thought I'd matter enough to be worth saving."
You don't have an answer. You've saved him before – for Serena, Serena, Serena, Serena – but Charlie worships her cousin. You did this just for him. You shrug, burn your tongue on the cup of tea you're suddenly gulping down.
"I don't like watching Tati alone."
When you glance up at him he's watching you with those warm, dark eyes, amusement crinkling their corners. "Of course," he says and reaches for the dvd you chose: Bogie, romance, an affair gone wrong.
"I've never seen this one," you say, wrap your hands tighter around the steaming mug of tea. It burns but it's a good distraction. "Is it any good?"
The amusement spreads, creeping into the curve of his mouth. "Why don't you see for yourself?" He plops down on the couch and you curl beside him, a healthy six inches of space between you. You tuck your bare legs under your skirt and it pools around your calves, soft, cool silk spreading over your skin.
It brushes his arm and he pauses, takes a breath, but quickly realigns and turns on the dvd player. You ignore his reaction. He was raised in Brooklyn. You wouldn't expect any other response to the finer things that make up your life.
The movie is good. Darker and more depressing than Bogart's usual fare, but you don't mind. You need a change of pace.
You're awake when it ends, eyes fixed on the tv, but he isn't watching the screen because he's watching you.
There are many questions you could ask – is your hair a mess? did your mascara run? why is he such a weirdo? – but you don't say a word because you already know the answer. You've known the answer for weeks, since you ended things with Chuck and he stood there, eyes soft like a wounded puppy's. You've see those eyes before. They were never for you but you know what they mean all the same.
He takes a breath and his dark eyes go wide, but he still reaches forward and brushes your hair back from your face.
You don't stop him. You don't hit him. You can't deny the way the air suddenly leaves you chest when his fingers rest over the curve of your cheek.
You know he's going to kiss you. You know it before it happens and you know how easy it would be to stop it, but you don't. You've been kissed by him before and it made you fall deeper in love with Chuck Bass. He can kiss you as many times as he wants and it won't change how you feel.
It changes everything.
His mouth is as soft and warm as his eyes and something flutters deep in your belly. You tell yourself to kill those butterflies dead, but he cups your face in his hands and they leap to life.
His jaw is scratchy and the angle isn't great but you don't want him to stop. You like the way he feels, the way he tastes, the way he sighs a little when you open your mouth and feel his tongue against yours.
It lasts a minute, maybe more, and his cheeks are bright red when you pull away. You're both a little breathless but you're Blair Waldorf and you've shown him enough weakness. You set your mouth into a harsh line and tell the butterflies to stop fluttering but nothing you can do will calm the rapid beat of your heart.
"Explain yourself," you demand and keep your expression blank even when the words come out a little shaky.
One hand is still resting on your shoulder and it slips up the column of your throat, pressing gently at the pulse point and making you gasp. "I lied," he finally says. "That kiss – it didn't mean nothing. It meant something then and now it means everything."
"Humphrey," you start but he silences you with another kiss. This one is gentle, just a brush of his lips over yours, but the fluttering starts again in your belly and it's enough to make you stop talking.
"There's something here," he says. "Maybe it wasn't there before but it's here now."
You try to defend yourself. "I take issue with insane blondes ruining people's lives."
He ignores you and gestures around the loft. "I reorganized all my books. I wrote a terrible short story. I even tried to write a song. The point is I can't stop thinking about you and I'm ready to stop fighting it."
His final words are the ones that make you take notice. Four years you loved Chuck and it was never enough. Jack Bass laughs at you, Jenny Humphrey too, and you want to cry because it's not fair. It's just not fair. All the times you bent and broke for someone else and you still can't have what should be yours.
"This isn't what I want," you say and you're sure the words hurt but he only smiles.
"Maybe I'll be what you need."
Four years you loved Chuck and he only succeed in breaking your heart. You can't move on with your life if you're living in the past.
This time, you're the one to tangle a hand through dark curls and draw his mouth to yours.
You can't see happily ever after with Dan Humphrey but it's worth a try.
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