A/N: Further proof that I can only write happy things.

Takes place at the end of the season, but sort of ignores most things that have happened lately.

I'm not sure how I feel about this or if it's even in character, so any feedback would be great. Thanks!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything, obviously.

The Future is Now

It's graduation and they have yet to speak, having waltzed around each other for the remainder of the year. After the ceremonial throwing of the caps, photos with family and friends and finally receiving those diplomas, the Upper East Siders go do what Upper East Siders do best, party.

- - - - -

Throwing ridiculous parties is a job usually left to Chuck Bass, and he certainly did not disappoint; the largest suite in the palace has been converted into an ostensible brothel, complete with scantily clad girls, an overflowing bar, and lines of white powder strewn across a deep mahogany table. Tonight, though, he's mostly observing while the masses gorge themselves on the free booze and high-end drugs, relishing in the last party of their high school career. Nate comes over, seating himself in the empty barstool next to Chuck; it's empty, clearly, because when Chuck wants to be alone, people understand and seem to stay away.

"What's up, man?" he asks, a slightly drunken grin slapped across his pretty features, "why aren't you out there with the ladies?"

Chuck glances over as Nate speaks, taking a long sip from the old fashioned glass in his hand, allowing himself to feel the scotch sliding down his throat. "I'm not really in the mood, Nathanial, but why don't you go have a good time. In fact," he pauses, watching intently as the door from one of the bedrooms opens and a mass of blonde hair in a gold dress stumbles gleefully out, clutching a bottle of Cristal. "In fact," he starts again, "I think I see Serena. Go," he motions nonchalantly with an arrogant flick of his wrist, "play with her, or something."

Nate sends an odd glance Chuck's way beneath his carefully furrowed brow, but upon spying the statuesque blonde across the room, all he can do is nod, pick up his glass from the bar, and head over.

Chuck watches with small satisfaction as Serena engulfs Nate in a hug, leading him out into the masses of people to start dancing, still holding onto the bottle of champagne.

- - - - -

He must have been so enthralled watching the blonde pair out on the dance floor that he was completely taken aback when a stream of warm air hit his right air, followed by the sound of a light laugh. Chuck whipped his head around, only to be met with the sight of Blair Waldorf, sitting on the barstool next to him with a hand covering her mouth daintily to hold back a laugh. Her cheeks are flushed a delicate pink, her eyes a touch glassy and her hair, previously perfect at this morning's ceremony, is now strewn about her shoulders in a carefree manner. Chuck looks her over, noting that she looks more relaxed—relaxed in a way that goes beyond the number of martinis she has thrown back thus far. She has changed outfits from the school sanctioned graduation party this afternoon, and is now sporting a black strapless cocktail dress, silver stilettos and around her neck is the necklace, the one he bought her.

"Waldorf," he says warily, "what are you doing?"

"Chuck," she scoffs, "you should know." She pauses, repositioning herself on the stool and flipping a piece of hair off her face and onto her shoulder. Blair leans in close to him, and he can't help but smell the gin on her breath, before speaking again in a slow, deliberate, tone. "I read that blowing in someone's ear makes them horny." She sits back, looking pleased with herself as Chuck takes a moment to pride himself on not having the gall to laugh.

He draws his brow together, bringing a hand up to gently massage his temple as he looks at her with confusion. "Blair, why are you trying to make me horny?"

"I love you," she says flippantly, swallowing the last of her martini with a grimace, "remember?"

He is taken aback by how blunt she is, but he thinks it is more the alcohol talking than Blair talking, but it doesn't stop his throat from constricting as the words pass through her lips—those decadent, ruby red, lips—and he reaches up to his neck to loosen his tie just a bit.

Blair seems undeterred despite his lack of vocal reaction, and so she continues on anyway. "You know, Chuck," she starts again, leaning in close to him once more, "I did a lot of reading on how to make you horny a while ago, when we were going to go to Tuscany, remember?"

Chuck nods slowly, a smirk slipping up onto his lips in spite of his best efforts otherwise. "What else did you learn, Blair?" he whispers, bringing his lips up close to her jaw so that she too can feel his hot breath against her skin. All this time without any contact, physical or otherwise really, and now this sudden influx of Blair, right in front of him, being sexy, confident, and funny, has made Chuck acutely aware of what he really has been missing, and how much he misses her.

"Well," she begins, voice dropping as she casts a furtive glance around to make sure nobody is watching. "I did some research on a variety of," she pauses, asking her addled brain to find the right word, "positions. Positions that I thought you would like. And," she continues, reaching up across her chest with her right hand to tug down the top of her dress, revealing a black lace bra, "I bought some new things, too."

A drunk Blair is a bolder Blair, and while Chuck normally enjoys her more brazen self, this time her attitude is actually making him think. Before he can respond to her comment—or tear his eyes away from the swath of porcelain skin she revealed only moments ago—Blair seems to think he has waited too long to answer, and is done with this exchange.

"But you don't want me anymore, clearly. I'm a horse, right?" Her voice is shaky and tears threaten to fall. She pushes the empty martini glass to the back of the bar, uncrosses her legs and gets up, preparing to walk away. However, in a moment of sheer clumsiness—undoubtedly coupled with her high heels and the alcohol—Blair stumbles, falling sideways, landing on one knee with her head practically in Chuck's lap. The tears start coming, then, a slow steady stream that is almost unnoticeable since she doesn't change or contort her features at all.

"Come on, Blair," says Chuck slowly, a hint of softness in his velvety voice, as he helps her up, slings an arm around her waist and begins walking with her towards the door.

Blair remains silent, allowing herself to be helped, and they almost make it out of the suite without running into any obstacles. As Chuck reaches to open the door, though, it flies open before he can grasp the handle, revealing a confused and breathless Dan Humphrey. Chuck's eyes immediately narrow, dragging his gaze all the way from the boy's dirty Converse up to meet his face.

"Can I help you," he drawls, immediately returning from Chuck to Chuck Bass.

"Nate called," Dan says hurriedly, holding up his cell phone for emphasis, "he said Serena's really out of control and he needed some help getting her to calm down and get to bed." Chuck arches an eyebrow, glancing back into the party to find that Serena has now climbed atop the glass coffee table (having lost the bottle of Cristal and replaced it with one of Stoli) and now let out a squeal at the sight of Dan in the doorway. Dan shrugs sheepishly, moving past Chuck and Blair towards the center of the room to deal with the blonde.

The pair of brunettes, then, made it out into the hall, down to the end and Chuck presses the button for the elevator. He felt Blair next to him move, stand up a little straighter, and reach her hand up to her face and wipe away the stray tears, attempting to fix her slightly smudged make up. She looks up at him the same moment that he looks down. Blair opens her mouth to speak, but Chuck merely presses his forefinger delicately onto her lips, urging her not to speak. He leans down, pressing a soft kiss to her temple just as the elevator sounds that it has arrived.

The doors part and they enter, being greeted by a few older couples, evidently coming from the charity gala that Chuck knew was being held in one of the ballrooms downstairs. "Eighteenth floor," he says rather politely, on account of being unable to reach the buttons from where he was standing. A middle-aged woman next to the wall in a low cut green dress presses it for him, flashing him a smile and a wink as she does, which causes Blair to emit a relatively un-ladylike snort.

They reach the floor quickly enough and as Chuck guides Blair out of the elevator with a gentle hand on the small of her back, she turns her head around to look back at the other woman. "Don't hit on my boyfriend, lady!" she yells back as the gilded doors slid shut.

"Boyfriend?" Chuck asks with a ghost of a laugh as he unlocks the door to 1812. It hadn't seen much use lately, or at least since Chuck had moved in with the Van der Woodsen's.

"Well, you know," says Blair as she takes a seat on the edge of the bed and begins to take of her shoes, "in case you ever stop being so stubborn, I'd like to preemptively eliminate any competition." She laughs, the sound giving away the fact that there was still quite a bit of alcohol in her system.

"Good to know, I suppose," muses Chuck as he looks around the room, suddenly unsure of what to do. He brought Blair up here and away from the party because she was too drunk and he didn't need her to be taken advantage of by some other boy on her last night of high school. He could have just put her in a cab and sent her home, or brought her home in the limo, but he did none of those things and instead brought her here, for reasons that are still unclear.

Chuck pulls off his jacket, folding it and laying it on the leather wing-backed chair in the living room, allowing his purple silk tie to join it moments later. Going over to the bar, he gets a glass of water and heads over towards the bed, wordlessly handing the glass to Blair. Nodding, she accepts it from him and takes a greedy sip. The effects of the booze and the high of graduation are starting to wear off, and Blair can't hide the yawn that overtakes her. Setting the glass down on the bedside table, she crawls up to the top of the bed and slides under the covers, her eyes fluttering shut the moment her head hits the pillow.

"Thanks for watching out for me, Chuck, even if you pretend you don't care," she says, voice muffled as she spoke into the soft feather pillow.

"I'll always care, Waldorf," responds Chuck after a moment, lying down on his back on the other side of the bed.

Blair rolls over as she feels his weight next to hers, resting her head on his shoulder. "I know," she says with a soft sigh as sleep begins to overtake her, "and I know one day, in the future, it will be okay and everybody else will know too."

With that, she succumbs to sleep as her breathing becomes heavy and measured, her muscles relaxing as she sinks a bit deeper into the bed. Chuck presses a kiss into her hair, inhaling the scent of her lavender shampoo, as he too closes his eyes, silently ruminating on her words.

- - - - -

As the morning light crept into the room, sneaking in through the partially opened blinds, Blair woke up in an unfamiliar location. She sat up and looked around, and upon realizing she was in Chuck's suite, the memories of the previous night came flooding back. The bed felt suspiciously cold, and she turned to look at the pillow next to her. She was greeted with a piece of white paper, the logo for The Palace Hotel stamped on the top of the stationary in gold. With a deep breath in, Blair picked up the piece of paper, inwardly hoping that Chuck's penchant for leaving notes had ended, and perhaps this one was from room service or something, but his unmistakable handwriting told her that it was indeed from him.

The future is now.

- Chuck

A small smile tugged at the corners of her lips as she climbed out of the bed, pulling her dress down and touching the necklace that adorned her décolletage as she traipsed into the living room. She spotted him sitting in the ridiculous leather chair, sipping from a mug of coffee and reading over the business section of the Times. Blair walked over and stood in front of him, holding up the note for him to see.

"Yes?" he asked, raising an eyebrow quizzically at her. It was almost perfect, his airs of nonchalance, but the smug grin on his lips gave it all away. Blair pulled the newspaper from his grasp, throwing it onto the floor as she leaned down, bringing her hand to his cheek and kissing him full on the lips. He responded immediately, kissing her back and pulling her up to sit delicately on his lap, her legs slung over the arm of the chair.

They broke apart after a moment and Blair looked up at him, parting her lips to speak. "Stop leaving me notes, you jerk," she quipped, adoration evident in her voice.

"Oh," replied Chuck, feigning concern. "So that means you don't want this one, then?" he teased, pulling another envelope out from behind him.

Blair snatched the paper from his hand, tearing into the gold envelope. She opened the letter. Reading what was written, she looked up at him and read it once again, almost in disbelief. There it was, as clear as day, in a letter that bested even an acceptance letter from Yale. Three words. Eight letters. Everything she wanted.

I love you.

She kissed him softly, holding onto the collar of his dress shirt—the same one from last night—as she did. "Say it," she whispered as they pulled away. "All you have to do is say it."

He nodded, pursing his lips together before bringing his hand up to stroke her cheek and taking a deep breath in. "Blair Waldorf, I love you."

She grinned wildly, kissing him fiercely as soon as the words left his mouth. "You're right," she whispered against his lips, "the future is now."

End.