A/N: Hi! Another story, and I thinks this is my best yet. It's set after their meeting in the very first episode. Please review!
Disclaimer: I don't own Gossip Girl.
A month had passed.
They hadn't seen each other since they met for coffee, two days later after their gallery meeting.
Lily and Bart were over, she decided she just didn't want to be in a relationship at the moment. At least, that's what she told Bart. Maybe, deep down, she wanted to be available because a certain someone had entered her life again. Maybe she expected something would happen with Rufus but she would swallow poison before she admit it. She tried not let that sensation of hope in her chest take over her. She tried to keep herself busy with decorating the penthouse and her kids. But it seemed that everything and everyone she looked at reminded her of him. The music played by cars that passed by her on the streets, the smell of his cologne as she passed someone in a shop, his son. She saw his son a lot now that he was dating Serena. He was good for her, she noticed. Just like Rufus was for you, she thought. She had to see him.
Lily heard Dan telling Serena that he and Jenny would spend the week in Hudson, with Allison. It was Friday, they had probably gone. She knocked on his door twice, not giving that any second thoughts. They had to speak eventually. Right?
He opened it, and looked surprised
"Lily... What happened?" he said, assuiming that if she came to Brooklyn something bad must have occured.
"Uhm, nothing. Nothing, I just thought I'd stop by. If you're not busy. I... I brought wine." She was a little embaressed. What did happen? God she shouldn't have come. To her relief he managed that awkward situation very well.
"Oh, well. Come on in." He gestured with a smile. "I was just thinking on making some food. You can join me."
She thought on saying no, but something caught her from it. "Okay, I'd like that." She smiled.
After an hour and a half of laughing, cooking, eating and reminiscing, they were at the couch still drinking Lily's wine.
"God, I can't believe you remember that." He said between laughs. She admired the wrinkles next to his eyes and remembered how, over twenty years ago, his laugh would be the best think that she heard somedays. His goofy grin that could make her day a hundred times better, Just like now. She couldn't help but smile at the memory.
"Yes well, I would never let myself forget." She said before she could think.
She was flirting with him and they both knew it.
After a moment of silence, he looked away. She thought she saw glimpse of sadness in his eyes but maybe it was nothing. He finished his glass with one gulp and looked at the floor. For some reason, he could no longer look at her in the eye, which was very, very strange to Lily.
"A-Are you ok? Did I say something...-" He stopped her before she could say anything else.
"Why do you want from me?" He glanced at her, the admiration no longer in his eyes. This time she saw hurt, anger. She was not prepared for that question.
What could she possibly say? Why did she want? Him, Lily, you want him, a voice in her head said.
"What? Rufus, I..." She trailed off.
"Why did you leave? Back then. Why did you leave me? What did I do?" His voice was firm but not raised. He did not sounded happy. On the contrary, he sounded hurting, irritated. Heartbroken, even.
"No. You don't get to do this, Rufus." Her shock had passed.
"Do what? Wanting to know why is it that I was left out from your life out of nowhere? I'm not letting you do that to me again, Lily. You..." he shaked his head. "You have no idea what I went though after you left."
She scoffed. "Oh please, you screwed a bunch of with women after I left and the worst part is that you married one of them." She got up from the couch with anger. Why didn't understand that it wasn't exactly a fun time for her either? Lily barely finished her sentence when Rufus spoke sharply:
"No, you wanna know what the worst part is? The worst part is that you didn't even say goodbye. You just didn't show up the next day or the next day." He too stood up and looked at her in the eye. "The worst part is that you didn't even tell me you were leaving. You were just gone." He whispered those last words. Their gaze never broke. "If you leave someone you have to at least tell them why, because what's more painful than being left is knowing you're not worth an explanation".Lily tried to speak, holding back tears but Rufus didn't let her, he was going to say to her everything that passed on his mind in the last twenty years. "And I waited for you for a while. I thought that maybe you were just taking a break, maybe you would come back. But you never did." His voice softened as he said those words but became full with rage again. "So don't try to make me feel guilty for moving on with my life when you were the one who walked away.
Lily felt a pain in her chest as soon as the words left his mouth. She should be mad at him, she thought. She hated to see him like that but she also hated him for not knowing why she had left. How could he anyway? She knew that what she was about to say wasn't fair but she could not help it.
"Why didn't you come look for me then?" She said, a hint of rage in her voice. "If you loved me so much like you are saying why didn't you come look for me?" her voice raised. She didn't know what to do anymore, the pain she was feeling was the same as 20 years ago.
He looked at her as if she was insane. "What?" he asked, incredulous. He came closer to her and narrowed his eyes. "Every night I fell asleep with the thought of you and what I would say if you were there. I wanted to be angry but I couldn't, all I could think of was how much I missed you and what on earth I had done to make you leave." He had tears in his eyes, as did she. "Every morning I woke up in misery because you weren't there anymore. Don't you dare suggest I never loved you, Lily."
A tear scaped Lily's eyes but she quickly wiped it off. "I had to leave, Rufus. You have to understand." She didn't know what to say anymore.
"And you have to understand that I couldn't wait my whole life for someone that would never come back." He yelled.
"But I did! I'm here now." She sounded almost desperate.
"Exactly, and how can I be sure you won't walk away again?" Rufus said looking deeply in her eyes, trying to find an answer in them.
"You can't." she whispered. "And I can't either. But we have to try, Rufus. We have to try."
He broke their gaze and sat down on the couch again, defeated. There was nothing he wanted more than her, he knew that. He was just scared. He hadn't meant to be so harsh but that was how he felt. All the things he had told her were the result of twenty years without her. Then, he realized. He couldn't let himself go through that again.
Lily was now sitting in the couch too, looking at him expectant. Then, she saw him slowly look back at her. Anger no longer in his face. It was almost as if their argument minutes ago hadn't happened. She saw the loft around them turn black. It was as if there was the two of them, like it used to be. He leaned over and pressed his lips on hers. God, she had missed him. His soft lips, sucking on hers was a feeling she thought she would never experience again.
All Lily could think of was finally.
Finally you're here.
A/N: What do you guys think?