Author's Note: Inspired by the quote "We'll build our futures together" and written for the one year celebration of Chuck and Blair's anniversary.
Two ravens in the old oak tree
And one for you and one for me
And bluebells in the late December
I see signs now all the time
Burdens and demons thinned his hair and turned it white, twisted his spine until he stoops several inches lower than his original height. Yet joy and happiness are the cause and the clusters of wrinkles around his eyes are the effect because every pull of his lips into a smile deepen the lines across his face.
And he may move ever so slowly – stooped back causing him to shuffle rather than saunter – but he shakes off the hands that reach out to hold him upright and makes his way out of the limo unassisted. Leans against it for support as he waits for the door to open, as he loses the air in his lungs at the sight of her – hair speckled with age held back by a silver comb and hand speckled with age held in the hand of their daughter – in the ornate doorway.
Shuffling steps towards the home they've shared since his twenty-second birthday becoming a sauntering stride as she loops her arm through his, as he stands up straighter despite the pain not because he wants to show off the accessory on his arm but because she is so much more. The bright source of strength and salvation; the singular key to his lifetime of happiness that he could neither buy nor source from anyone else.
And for those who know him best, for those who hover on the sidewalk ready to catch him should he fall, know that it would be more accurate to call him the accessory on her arm. A king ready to bow down to his queen despite the way his knees ache with every step, despite the way his cane cracks against the marble with every step.
"You kept me waiting, Bass," she tells him in a voice just above a whisper, in a voice he must stoop lower to hear. And yet he never misses a syllable. Merely tucks her arm into the crook of his a little tighter and turns his head so that his voice – a higher octave than what it once was – curls around her ear because the words are meant for her and her alone.
"You should know by now that I'm never too far behind. I like playing 'Where's Waldorf?' without any clues."
The softness of her laughter covers up his wheeze of air as they move from one step to the next yet his cough breaks through the softness with a hard, sharp noise and attracts unwanted attention. Her hand curls tighter around his arm and her brow furls in concern, but she waves off the assistance of those moving up the stairs behind them because they lean on each other, because they carry each other, because they support one another and she will help him to the top just as he has done for her – more figuratively than literally – for the past several decades.
And they move slowly together past the family portraits on the wall, past the professional photographs of just the two of them followed by every major addition to their family – sons and daughter, grandsons and granddaughters – towards the room where the candid photographs are assembled on bookshelves and side tables. Smiling faces serving as a testimony to all that they have built together; a vast dynasty that eagerly awaits their arrival in the room at the top of the stairs.
The twenty or so people milling about the room pause in their conversations to offer up their salutations and congratulations in tandem. Voices rising even as they step aside to make room, to create a pathway for the processional of a queen and king coming to claim their thrones. Two identical chairs – backs tall and straight – are set up in the middle of the room so that all those gathered may see them, so that those seated upon the light blue velvet can see those assembled.
The king seats his queen first ignoring the hands that try to cajole him into holding onto theirs in favor of curling his fingers around hers, of bringing her hand to his lips as she beams and glows under the attention of all those assembled. The grandsons and granddaughters – men and women building their own futures off the base assembled by those who came before them – sweep in to give their grandfather and grandmother a hug and a kiss, and their ring leader – the first of the bunch – lingers just a little bit longer in her grandfather's arm sweeping her lips across his cheek and raising her fingers up to straighten his bowtie.
"Two nights away and you still manage to match Grandma," she chuckles in his ear.
"And how are the Pams treating you, Charlotte?"
The merry sound of her laughter in his ear is amplified by the hearing aid nestled in his ear, and he almost misses the way she corrects his choice of name in favor of her nickname or her reply about how that particular trick might be overused, don't you think? His scowl over the name 'Charlie' deepening when she refuses to clue her grandfather in on her tricks and instead steps aside to allow her own father to step into her place.
He lifts his head to look into the eyes of his son – the same dark and deep eyes inherited from his wife – and slowly lifts a shaky hand to accept the glass being offered to him. A short glass filled with a familiar, amber brown liquid that he raises to his nose – senses dulled with age – before pushing the offering back into his eldest son's hand and asking for something else entirely. And Henry lifts his eyebrows – colored like salt and pepper – in surprise.
"I can't leave your mother to drink more than her fair share of the Dom."
"You shouldn't be drinking at all, Daddy," his youngest interrupts sounding like her mother and beating her to the punch.
But it is three against two – boys against girls – and a fluke of champagne is passed into his hand by his middle child. A little shaky, a little unsteady, he clinks the glass against hers and raises it to his lips pausing and waiting for just a moment for her to follow suit, which she does because any event worthy of her attention is celebrated with a glass of Dom.
He holds the fluke – half-full because he stopped seeing any part of life with her as half-empty a long time ago – in one hand and holds her hand in the other. Fingers entwined and never let go as members of their family lavish attention on the King and Queen, as an outsider who wants in steps forward and says how much he admires him for sacrificing all the years tied to same ball and chain.
And his voice rumbles low, his eyes flashing bright as he rises to his feet unassisted and explains that it was never a sacrifice. That all the years, the moments between a full head of thick, dark hair and a balding patch of thin, white hair were never a sacrifice.
"She is my past and my present and this is the future we built together. The only sacrifice here would be allowing you to be a part of it because my great-granddaughter deserves better."
Cora's eyes catch his, and the same glassy sparkle he saw far too many times in his wife's eyes are now echoed in those of his great-granddaughter. A sight that fills him with dread because he knows that although she deserves better, that isn't what she wants. A twisted, spirally path that will construct her future even as Cora's grandfather and great uncle step in to remove the roadblock.
And maybe he should step in, council the wayward young man who takes the sweetest word in the English language into something ugly and unpalatable, but his wife has twisted her features into her queenly stare of dismissal and Cora is being wrapped into her grandmother's arms and he chooses to side with the family closing ranks in a way he never had growing up. The party continuing on following the departure of her something – neither boyfriend nor lover, the paternal side of himself hopes – and following hugs of support from the matriarch and patriarch of this family.
"Don't let him get away with it, Cora."
"She won't. She's too much like you."
A complement that makes them both smile because this seventeen-year-old idolizes more than just the crown atop her great-grandmother's head; a complement that distracts the three of them just long enough for the cake to be carried in without notice. The youngest members of their family scurry into their laps to help blow out the candles – an addition made at their request – and little bodies squirm in his arms as he presses kisses against their cheeks, as they reach into his pockets in the hopes of finding a small token of his affection.
Twin, pudgy fingers finding platinum and diamonds and mouths dropping into 'O's at the sight, and he nudges them both with their hands outstretched towards her. Watches her inherit their features rather than the other way around as she lifts the necklace out of their hands and holds it up into the light for her fading eyesight.
"I didn't put anything on hold."
"Mom, since when has Dad ever needed you to put something on hold for him?"
The question causes his smile to slip because the last time he went to a jewelry store and purchased something off her list is no longer as clear as the memory of her purring in his ear for the very first time. A fragment of time lost to old age, and yet he knows that he's never needed clues to find her heart's desire. Anticipates her wants and her needs and her desires once more as fastens the gift around her neck – unsteady hands taking longer than he'd like – and presses his lips against the feverish patch of skin along the slope of her neck just below where the platinum band hits.
And hours later when the party has ended, when he's put his foot down about staying anywhere but in his bed in his house tonight, she will slip under the covers beside him still wearing this new necklace. Fingers sliding up his chest to fondle the pendant at the base of her neck as he moves to wrap his arm around her and she moves to rest her head on his chest.
"You finished the chapter without me," she complains as he turns the page.
"Seventy five years of marriage and you still won't get your own copy," he murmurs as he drops the book open face onto his chest. A deep, rumbling cough tears through him sending worry lines and frowns deepening on her face and cutting off her well-used retort – why have her own when they can share, why read when they can act it out?
"The pneumonia is worse," she says softly.
And her head dips so lowly that he has to slide his fingers under her chin and tilt her head back up so he can see her eyes. So he can see the fear and the concern and watch it all melt away with his assurances that he will be fine, the she needs to have faith that he will never leave her behind.
"I'll go when you tell me to go and not a second sooner. Until then, I'll stay right here planning our future together in the house we raised our children in and in the bed I've shared with you since two thousand and thirteen."
And she pushes ever so slightly with her toes against the mattress to stretch upward, to press her lips against the still formidable line of his jaw. The softness of her skin, the metal of the two rings on her finger presses against his warm cheek as the cool platinum of her new necklace presses against his chest through the fabric of his pajamas.
"I love you, Chuck Bass, and I'm never going to let you go. Our anniversary will not be the last time we sleep together."
"Sleep together or sleep together?"
"Is that all you think about?" She questions with a roll of her eyes.
"With you?" He asks before pausing, before pressing his lips against hers in a soft and tender kiss. "Always. Happy anniversary, beautiful."