Prologue
If you try hard enough; you might be able to find the words to describe what you are feeling. If you try hard enough; with enough introspection, with enough penitence, it all might mean something. You are looking for a truth; any truth. You weave for yourself a narrative; a narrative of the tragic hero, whose intentions and actions are always separated by an ocean of circumstance. But you are not the hero of your story. And you are not alone because of your sacrifice. You are alone…
Because you are a coward.
-The Ten Thousand Forest, Daniel Humphrey
Every beat bounced off the wall and hit her like a tranquilizer. Every note a poisonous arrow, every chord an opiate of the soul. Sweat and oil mixed with body glitter and musky cologne as the concoction fought their way into her breath. Every exhale; a purging, every inhale; a battle. She couldn't tell if she was swaying to the music any longer but she was okay, at least for now. Her constant blinking had caused her to become disoriented, or maybe it was the blow. But it wasn't because she was Serena Van Der Woodsen and she knew this most familiar of sensations and this was not it. The cocaine was laced with something else.
She could feel the men move through her, past her. She could feel their hands on her body. Some were more adventurous than others, some were outright daring. Most were voyeurs and passive. Not many were daring enough to approach the blonde beauty, obviously too good for them, directly. But everyone wanted a touch. Her hands fought off the unwanted interactions as best they could but there were too many and the dance floor was packed too tight.
She manoeuvred her way into a crowd of girls. She kept at least one girl between her and her part-time assailants. In her mind she tried to keep a sense of time. In her mind, she tried to string one thought before it was lost to another. It was a fight between the pounding external sensory barrage and her every thought rushing a million miles an hour from the abyss of her subconscious into words and just as fast back again.
She watched the horizon of the sea of bodies rhythmically flowing to the deafening beats of the music. Her vision, constantly obstructed by the changing of the lights, he'll be here, she kept telling himself. He always comes.
What had she discarded? What had they left to the fates? Were they wrong? What greed overtook them? What spell had they fallen under?
Surely it was as much his decision as it was hers. Surely he missed her as much as she had missed him. Surely, she wasn't alone in this suffering. But he had always been different than her. His instinct wasn't self-destructive. His every wound, his every scar, fuelled his goodness and spawned more goodness. Had she only been afraid to be exposed by him?
She had known cowards; or she had known those who she had considered cowards. Vanessa, Juliet, Chuck. Was she one?
His words had rung in her heart and haunted her for the long cold nights since that fateful day. She told herself, he couldn't have known. She told herself, that it was a mere confidence. But The Ten Thousand Forest, was all her worst fears come true, even if she didn't know it then. She was alone… and maybe it was because she was the coward.
The girl who has everything, has the most to lose. How had he known? How could he have known?
She was angry that he didn't tell her. She was angry that he had written that at all. But she was heartbroken because it was true. Now, three thousand miles away from her home, with her friends working on some drug lords in a dark, malign, nightclub, she was just scared.
It was his dark hair that she noticed first. Not a second later, he emerged from the sea of bodies, familiar, beautiful, and haunting. His intense eyes pierced her own gaze and caught her in the rhythm. Apparently she had been dancing. She was just too stoned to notice. Dan grabbed her by the hand and led her out of the crowd.
It had taken her 45 minutes to calm down. She sat, in the passenger seat of a black BMW breathing heavily. Her bare shoulders covered by his blazer that he had offered her. She turned her head and looked back at the club she had just stepped out of. She could still hear the faint rhythms and beats of the music inside.
For 45 minutes they sat in silence. Dan, now dressed in a dark purple shirt and a black tie with his sleeves rolled up, had his hands placed on the wheel, his eyes closed. It may have been three years but this wasn't new. She knew this look; or rather she had seen it before. It was the look of a man who didn't want you to know what he was thinking.
"I'm… I'm sorry." Serena finally broke the silence. "I… I know you didn't want to hear from me—"
"Serena." He interrupted in a solid and calm voice. "What are you doing?"