Serena walked out of the elevator into Chuck and Nate's suite at the empire, threw her bag onto the pool table and flopped down onto a couch next to Nate and kicking off her shoes. He raised an eyebrow at her and paused his game, leaning back onto the couch next to her.

"So what happened," he asked knowing it had to be something big and had to do with Blair if he was the one she was coming to. "Did Blair start it or did you?"

Serena narrowed her eye's playfully at him and sighed, she grabbed the throw pillow from behind her and fluffed it a little placing it on Nate's lap before answering. "Dan actually," Serena said laying her head on the pillow and curling her legs on the couch, Nate watched her and chuckled.

"You finally read the book," Nate said knowingly nodding his head, bringing his left hand to her head so he could run his fingers through her soft hair. "Chuck filled me in on my characters portrayal."

"I didn't read it either," she said looking at the paused game. "The guy I work with read it and one of our clients and they figured out I was 'Sabrina' and I may lose my job because nobody wants to do business with a girl who loves to drink and sleeps with anyone who offers, I'm the bad guy."

"When I was on the phone with him, you and Blair were there, I hope you told him he almost cost you your job," Nate said and Serena nodded, she could fall asleep with his running his fingers through her hair like she used to when they were dating.

"I did," Serena said taking a breath. "Apparently what he did to Blair was worse, so … I just have to find a way to get back into my boss' good books."

"What did he write about Blair, I read like, the first like three chapters and got bored, I was never one for reading anything," Nate said and Serena giggled. "Not funny."

"Pretty funny," she said and he rolled his eyes. "I spoke to the guy about the book, asked for a complete rundown and he sleeps with Blair in the book and since there actually was truth to most of things that happen in the book, Louie is pretty ticked off. He thinks it actually happened."

"Do you think it happened?" Nate asked, pausing for a moment to find the remote so he could put a show on as background noise.

"I don't know," Serena said watching Nate flips through channels before settling on some comedy show, the sound was low enough for them to hear speaking and music but not hear what they were saying. "It could happen, they kissed and kept it from us, who's to say they could hide this from us."

"Well I'm pretty sure Dan's in love with Blair or at least he's got himself convinced he is," Nate said. "I don't think Blair would let it go that far but I guess Dan wants to."

"Yeah," Serena mumbled, smiling slightly as Nate started running his hand through his hair again. "Why are you so upset anyway? When we got the books you were ok with being gay, as ridiculous as that would be."

"It's not the gay part that's bothering me, although that was surprising," Nate said and Serena turned so she was lying on her back and looking up at him, she lightly took his hand in hers, pulling it out of her hair and placing it on her tummy.

"Oh Natie, I'm sure you were a cute gay," Serena said smiling, and then frowning when he didn't smile back. "So what else did he do to you?"

"You'd think I was the guys best friend when he was writing it, he could have at least let the character be me or what he really thought of me, I was combined with Erik, how is that fair?" Nate said frowning. "He even gave Chuck a character of his own and he hates Chuck."

"Maybe it's just because you're boring," Serena said tilting her head up slightly to look at his face, biting her lip to keep from laughing. Nate twisted his mouth and frowned at her.

"That's just mean S I am an awesome brooding hot guy that all the girls want," Nate said buffing up his chest just a little and Serena rolled her eyes.

"Oh sure," Serena said reaching up and patting his cheek

"Yeah, yeah, so what else about the book you, is bothering you?" he asked linking their fingers on her tummy. "There's more isn't there?"

"He knows me, knows that I'm not who I used to be, he doesn't even know who I used to be and yet that is the girl he wrote about, it's frustrating, I've made all this progress and it's just wasted on him, it's like I'm still that drunk teenage girl walking aimlessly on the road, almost getting hit by a car. The girl he didn't know that he was infatuated with all those years ago," she said pouting.

"Well sometimes you are," Nate joked and Serena shook her head, turning it so she could tuck her face into his tummy.

"That is not funny," she groaned, her voice muffled by the fabric of his shirt. "I don't understand."

"What's not to understand, he wrote you as the girl he thought you were before boarding school," Nate said. "I don't think he wanted to have sex with Blair then."

Serena couldn't help but giggle at him, "I just always thought he was the one person who saw me differently, I thought he saw past the drugs and backstabbing and he saw the girl who was trying to change, he saw the pranks Georgina pulled, he knew I wanted to be a different person. I guess I'm not as changed as I'd hoped."

"You've come a long way from the girl who stole my virginity on a barstool at a wedding," Nate said causing Serena to erupt in a fit of giggles. "You just have to know that you don't need Dan to tell you that you've changed, you've grown S, I've seen it, your mom has seen it, Blair's seen it, Chuck's seen it and since we are the same person Erik's seen it."

Serena smiled up at him, biting down lightly at her lip. "You're going to make me cry," she whispered as a tear slipped out of the corner of her eye and Nate smiled slightly as he wiped it away. "Damn I'm already crying," she said sitting up and turning on the couch so she was sitting cross-legged and facing him.

"That book is a load of crap, I am not gay or two years younger than any of you, you are not a teenage screw up waiting for things to land on her lap, Blair is getting married, she's never going to risk that by sleeping with Dan and Chuck, well as far as the chapter's I've read go, he should know that he has us and we care for him way more than the characters in the book do," Nate said cupping her face and using his thumb to brush a tear away.

Serena sat there frozen, Nate found new ways to surprise her every time she needed him. He never let her down and she was so grateful to him for that, she found herself glancing down to his lips, it's been a long time since she's kissed them.

"Sometimes fiction is just fiction," Nate said he was about to lean in and kiss her when they hear someone clear their voice at the door.

"Sorry to interrupt," Chuck said with a smirk.

"Don't worry about it," Nate said and Chuck nodded moving to sit on Serena's other side, watching as his step sister wiped her eyes dry quickly and shooting him a smile. "I guess you heard my speech."

"I did and I agree," Chuck said leaning back and crossing his legs. "The way Dan perceived our lives is different from the way it actually is, he may have based those characters on us but their lives don't turn out the way ours will."

"How does your story end?" Serena asked, she was wedged between the two boys. "Neither of us bothered reading the entire book."

Chuck chuckled and shook his head, "Of course not," he mocked. "My character kills himself, only to be found days later hanging in a cupboard alone with no-one to miss him."

"That won't happen," Serena said leaning her head on his shoulder. "You love yourself too much."

Nate and Chuck shared a look over Serena's head, a brotherly bond that had been there since they first became friends, a nod to reassure each other that no matter what happened they had each others back.

"I guess Blair's trying to salvage her marriage then," Nate said and Chuck nodded.

"That stupid book is going to ruin our lives and make us insecure again and the characters aren't even who we are, yet they are us," Serena said.

"I'm sure it's not that bad, maybe they'll figure out who we are and then forget about it the moment Gossip Girl spills another nasty secret," Nate said and Serena smiled at him and grabbed his hand.

"You are way too optimistic Nathaniel," Chuck said and Nate smirked.

"One of us has to be," he replied.

Serena sat in the middle of her two best guy friends, she wasn't going to let this book define her and she wasn't going to let it define them, they were her friends no matter what they do to each other. As she listened to Chuck and Nate argue playfully over a million different things she found herself thinking back to simpler times, before engagements and jobs and mistakes, when Blair would be sitting across from her and the four of them would talk till the early hours of the morning about anything they could.

So much has changed since they were teens but they were learning to change, they were learning to grow, she wasn't the emotionally challenged blond girl who loved to party anymore, the girl from the book, Sabrina, she promised herself she wouldn't be and she knew she could keep to that promise, after all with friends like hers how could she not succeed at it.


A/N : I dont own Gossip Girl

I re-uploaded the stry because I realised I spelt Blairs name wrong lol whoops, I was half asleep when I posted this hehe please let me know if there are any more mistakes

So this was written like just now lol I was thinking about the episode when the Inside ccame out and Dan showed himself as the writer and the drama it caused and I just thought that was the perfect moment to show NS even as friends and since I am a heavy NS shipper there are alooooot of hints leaning toward them becoming romantically involved even though this is an NS friendship piece with some Chuck thrown in hehe

I hope you guys enjoyed this, please review and let me know, dont forget to check out Lips of an Angel, it's finally complete and I'm pretty happy with the way it ended.

Like I said this was written really quickly and Im super tired but I couldnt get to sleep until I finished with this so please just let me know what you think.

Thank you for checking out this story

Until next time (^^,)