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Nate lets them into his and Chuck's suite. "Chuck's barely ever here these days..." he says quietly. They were quiet the entire way here - not uncomfortably so, but still telling. Still unlike them.

He feels expectant and weirdly nervous when he turns to face her after shutting the door. "Just us," he shrugs.

"Uh oh," she says as lightly as she can, stepping out of her shoes and padding over to Chuck's liquor cabinet in her bare feet.

He drops their stuff onto the sofa and follows her example, trails her to the cabinet in his socks. He leans an elbow on the bar, watches her fill two glasses with Chuck's scotch. "Uh oh," he echoes wryly, smiling a little.

She pushes one glass toward him, takes a long drink from her own and then sets the glass down, shuffling a little bit closer to him so that their elbows bump.

Nate takes a gulp of scotch. He has no clue what is going on right now, but he's got Serena right here and that's enough. He'll go with it. "Nice weather we're having." He teases, quirks his lips.

"Mmhm." She steps even closer, slips her arms around him without really thinking about it and presses her face into his neck. Missed you.

There's a breath he hadn't realized he was holding and then his arms go around her, tugging her closer, his face turning into her hair as he hugs her against him. It's there then - the feeling he was missing before, the one he's been missing all summer, indescribable and filling him up and just right. He closes his eyes and holds her. Love you.

"You seem happy, lately." She swallows. "Happier than this summer, I mean."

"You were gone this summer." He knows that neither here nor there, but he thinks he might know where she's going with that statement - and he'd rather not, he'd rather just hold her.

She sneaks a hand between them and pokes his stomach. "You were busy this summer."

"Busy's good," he whispers, "Busy means no time for thinking."

Serena disentangles herself from the hug, leans with her back against the counter and picks up her glass again, draining the contents in one gulp. "What would you have thought about?"

Nate crosses his arms over his chest when she moves away, "What would I have thought about what?" He leans to the side against the counter, sighs and just says the words, "Is this about Juliet?"

"I don't know. Is it?"

He doesn't even have to think about it. "No. You left and you didn't even e-mail all summer."

"You looked a little occupied, sleeping with every girl in Chuck's little black book."

"I didn't have the Parisian directory to go off of like you did."

"You weren't exactly calling or e-mailing me either, Nathaniel," she spits back at him.

"Would you have noticed if I had?" He snaps.

"Obviously!"

"No! Not obvious!" He makes a motion with his arms, "New guy in every picture! You could'a met three new Nate's!"

"Well you definitely met a new me." She crosses her arms. "She's all blonde."

Nate's mouth drops open for a moment and then he crosses his arms again. "This is about Juliet," he determines before adding more softly, "And she is not."

"You're basically dating me. Only bitchier. And...not me. And it's not..." She trails off and shrugs, shooting him a wounded look.

He drops his arms to his sides, shifting a little closer to her. "That's not true-" he cuts himself off, glances away from her face. "The only way to date you is to have you... and I... don't. I know."

"Because it was too hard." She blows out a quick breath and thinks about pouring herself another drink. "It wasn't supposed to be."

We could have tried harder. The thought makes his eyes sting and he rubs at his face before reaching for the glass and finishing his scotch in one long swallow. "I thought we'd be different too," he admits, refills their glasses.

"And now you have a girlfriend." She wishes he'd stop doing that.

Nate nods slowly, sets the decanter down and picks up his glass. "I like Juliet," he takes a gulp, feels the alcohol's warmth settling in his stomach, "I love you."

She blinks at him."Nate..." she whispers, "Don't."

He takes another sip. "Yeah... I know." Don't.

"Don't..." She shakes her head, doesn't want him to look so sad about it. She hops up onto the counter and kicks gently at his shin. "Maybe it wasn't supposed to work out," she says. "Maybe we just thought it would."

(She knows it's a lie as soon as she says it, but she doesn't take it back because she can't love him too.)

He glares at her kind of resentfully. "That's not what happened." He finishes his scotch, brushes her knee with his hand when he sets the glass down.

She juts her chin out a little, stubbornly. "So tell me what happened." Tell me.

"We gave up." He refills his glass, brings it to his lips, looks at her over the rim, "Was easier."

She watches him for a moment, quietly, and decides that there might be an accusation in there somewhere. "You mean I gave up," she corrects him.

"Yeah." He licks his lips, "Me too though... I just..." he swirls the liquid in his glass a little, "I didn't want to- to fight you to stay if you didn't want- I dunno, maybe I should I have...?"

He looks at her, "Or maybe I did the right thing..." he smiles a little, "I guess it doesn't matter anymore. What are we doing?" He says it on a rush, holds out his glass for her to take a sip from.

She reaches for his shirt instead, grabs a handful of the fabric and tugs him to stand between her legs. "Skipping English and getting drunk."

Nate loops an arm low around her hips, finishes the drink himself. "Sounds like us..." he sets the glass on the counter, folds his hands together behind her, pulls her forward into him a little, "We're cool like that."

She tilts her head a little and smiles at him before she can help herself. "You're going to kiss me again."

He gives her a half-smile and inches closer, leans towards her, "You have a spidey sense about these things now?"

"You loved me..." she wonders in a whisper, bumping her nose against his, "when we were together...?"

He blinks at her. "Serena..." he whispers back, startled, at a loss as to how to even answer that - yes isn't anywhere near- he huffs a tiny, incredulous laugh, "Always. I- always"

"So, before that? And after?" She reaches for the glass of scotch he poured her and takes a gulp.

He leans into her, kisses her while she has the taste of scotch on her tongue, "And now. And tomorrow. Definition of always, van der Woodsen," he teases.

"That's a long time. A really long time. And you have - "

He cuts her off with a kiss, pulls back and meets her gaze, "What do you want?"

Serena frowns, linking her arms around his neck comfortably. "What d'you mean?"

"When you think about you and always, what do you want?" Am I on the list?

"Hm." She rests her heels against the backs of his knees. "Cheesecake."

Nate smiles and ducks his head a little, feels silly. "Yeah..." he slides a hand up her back, rests his palm against the nape of her neck and he pulls her forward a little, lays his forehead on her shoulder. He shuts his eyes, "Nice choice."

Serena kisses the side of his head, puts her mouth by his ear. "Maybe you can come too."

"I would, if you let me." He turns his face, blinks his eyes open, "I wouldn't even make you share the cheesecake."

She finds his lips with hers, kisses him softly. "There'd be enough to share."

He holds her tighter, kisses back a little fervently. "I do love cheesecake," he murmurs, smiling against her mouth.

"I love you too." She touches his cheek with her fingertips. "Even when I'm not supposed to."

He feels his smile brighten, kisses her again, almost urgently this time. "Maybe..." he breathes, "You're never not supposed to..." He yanks her towards him, sliding her off and against his chest, his arms hooked underneath her, holding her up as he turns them around, grins, "Ever thought of that?"

"Sometimes. Seems kinda crazy, though." She rests her forehead against his and closes her eyes. "Where are you taking me?"

"The couch, the kitchen, my bed, coney island, vegas, the cheesecake factory..." he spins them around slowly again, "Anywhere you want to go?"

"Stay still for a second," she murmurs, hands on his shoulders. "Put me down."

Nate stops, does as she asks and lets her feet fall onto the living room's carpet. He looks into her face curiously, smile fading a little, "Uh oh...?"

She kisses him again. And again and again and again; it feels like what she was looking for all summer. "We can't...just," she tells him quietly, between kisses. "We shouldn't."

He doesn't have to breathe as long as he can kiss her like this forever. When she says something, her voice whispers through his thoughts, and he makes the monumental effort of leaning back, panting and dazed, "Whaa..t? We-" he kisses her again, "Us... we're- yes."

She giggles at the look on his face. "We're what?" she asks teasingly.

He blinks, leans his head against hers for a moment before laughing sheepishly, "Is yes not a thing we can be?" He nuzzles his nose against her cheek, "We can be yes."

"You're yes-ing with somebody else already," she reminds him. "And it can't be me - it can't only be me when you're with someone."

Nate's bottom lip puckers out a little, he can't help it. "I want to be yes-ing with you. I only yes with other people when you don't want to yes with me."

"I can only..." She laughs. "You need not to be with anybody else."

And he stares at her, because this is where he should tell her that she needs to not run off when things get hard, that she needs to not expect him to wait around all alone for whenever she remembers him and comes back, that he can change and-

But he's not going to say any of that, because none of it matters when she's smiling at him like that and he's got his arms wrapped around her like this, "If I wasn't with anybody else, we could be yes-ing?" He wiggles his eyebrows at her, smiling.

"You can't...break up with her because of me."

"Why else would I break up with her?"

"Because it's not right with her. Because it's not working for you. Not because of me." She pokes him in the ribs but the look she's giving him is serious. Understand this.

He tries really hard to not laugh, but a smile slides onto his face. "What if... for instance," he kisses her lightly on the tip of her nose, "It's not right with her, it's not working for me, because she's not you?" He shrugs, "What then?"

"Still." She shakes her head. "Not because of me."

"It's not you... or her, it's me." He nods. There. It's true. He likes Juliet a lot - she's just, not Serena.

"So tell her that, Natie." She steps on his toes.

He rocks back on his heels so that she tilts forward into him. "I will," he says seriously and then adds teasingly, "I'm a little distracted right now though..."

"You have to tell her...before anything," she insists.

"Yeah, okay..." he nods seriously, but doesn't let her go. "I just-" he rolls his eyes a little embarrassedly, "Missed you."

"I missed you too," she says softly. "All summer, every day and every night, and I was going to...but then I got back and you had...her."

He tilts his head a little, "I thought I... should. Have her. Have something. Because I can't- nobody should, stay the same... right?" He's actually not so sure about that all of sudden.

"So I thought I should be different and I-" he stops, smiles, "But now I'm here," he squeezes her a little, "I always end up here because this is just where I want to be." It's really that simple.

"We could stay the same." It kind of sounds like a Taylor Swift song but she doesn't mind. "I'd be okay with that."

He smiles widens, "Same is looking like a really great thing." He curls a strand of her hair around his finger "Obviously I didn't give same enough credit."

She pulls her hair free. "Break up with her." She's never really given him orders, especially not about other girls, but Juliet is too fake-nice and Serena had Nate about a decade and a half before she ever did.

Nate grins, makes a show of patting his pockets looking for his phone, "Yes, Ma'am." But then instead of pulling his phone out, he bends down and quickly throws her up over his shoulder, picking her up and moving towards his room.

"Nate!" she gasps his name, squealing. "Put me down," she giggles.

Nate laughs. "Yup, totally going to do that." He spins her around once before carefully lowering her down onto his bed. He hops on the mattress next to her, grins, "See."

Serena laughs, lying back and stretching her arms up over her head. "You're drunk," she determines.

His gaze trails lazily up her form as she stretches, drinking in the sight of her. "Yeah..." he says easily, leans on his side facing her, watching her, "I'm drunk." On you.

She laughs again, rolling over so that she's facing him. "Wanna know something funny?"

He gives her a half-grin and moves a hand to nudge her playfully in the shoulder, "Yeah," he meets her gaze, "Tell me."

"Paris and Blair and all her romantic ideas were rubbing off on me this summer, and I kept thinking...maybe you'd show up. Maybe you'd just get on a plane and show up all of a sudden." She bites her lip, buries her face halfway into his pillow. "I guess I could have gotten on a plane and come back home."

Nate's smile softens, "That's not funny." He watches her for a moment and then lowers his chin into the corner of his pillow, peers at her and says sincerely, "I know you think I broke up with you, but that's- that's not how it felt. It felt like you broke up with me and- and it hurt."

He stares at the pillow, "I didn't think- all summer, I really didn't that you would- that you'd want that, me... to do that. Maybe you wanted... Dan to do that. I don't know."

"I didn't want that." She frowns at him a little. "And I didn't break up with you."

He rolls his eyes, shifts his gaze back to her, "Then how did we end up broken up? 'cause I didn't break up with you."

She blinks at him, slow and lazy. "I don't know," she says quietly. They should probably figure that out. "I'm sorry, though. About Dan. I was mad at you and I was hurt and...confused." She touches his mouth with her fingertips, looks at him through her lashes as she says, "I needed you to do that, you know? But you didn't. And he did."

Nate pulls back from her touch, "I'm sorry. I really am." He sits up abruptly, anxious suddenly, "But that's- we're different people. That's going to happen. He'll do something and I won't or I'll do something and he won't and it's just... going to happen." He doesn't know what else to say.

"I know." She doesn't move. "But I asked you to, and you didn't."

"You asked me to be on your side and I was." He tilts his head a little, "I'm always on your side."

"I know," she breathes, trying to smile at him. "My dad just wasn't."

That look on her face, that kind of-broken smile, it makes his chest ache. He shifts closer to her and lies back down, stretches out alongside her and lays an arm over her, tugs her closer to him into a half-hug. "He'll be sorry too."

She smiles more genuinely and cuddles closer, tucks her head under his chin and kisses a spot just below his collarbone (thank you), decides to believe him.

He ducks his head, trails soft kisses down the side of her, up her chin and to her lips, deepens the kiss for a moment and then kisses the corner of her mouth, her cheek, "Can I say it now...?" He kisses the tip of her nose and then leans back the slightest bit to look at her, smiles.

"No." She kisses him to make sure he doesn't and then giggles, nods and kisses him again. "Yes."

He laughs, kisses her back after she says yes. "Okay," he smirks, "Brace yourself." He clears his throat dramatically, "I..." he drawls, waggles his eyebrows at her before saying on a rush, "Don't really like cheesecake."

"More for me, then." She kisses him again, deeper this time, pressing herself as close as possible. She bites at his lower lip, arches her eyebrows at him. "Or maybe I can persuade you to like it."

"Mhmh..." he breathes, "You are very... persuasive." He tangles their legs together, presses a smiling kiss to her mouth, "Use your powers for good, beautiful one. Have mercy."

"You let me go all summer without you; I don't know if you deserve any mercy."

"I do..." he whispers, "I haven't watched Finding Nemo or eaten a Pop-Tart all summer."

She gives him a skeptical look. "You must have had one."

"No," he says very seriously, "Not even one, they made me- nope." He shakes his head, brushes their noses together.

"They made you what?" She hooks one of her legs over his.

"Fat." He deadpans. "Or miss you a lot, more than normal missing-you, so much I couldn't eat it, " he gives her a little smile, "One or the other."

She grins. "We should go to Paris. And bring Pop Tarts, because I don't think they have them there. And do summer all over."

He laughs, kisses her for being so adorable and brilliant and her. "Let's do it. Summer's always been my favorite anyway." He nods, "Do-over."

Serena nods. "We'll just wear sweaters if it's cold."

"Or stay inside... under sheets."

"Or on top of sheets." She kisses his neck. "You can warm me up, can't you?"

"Yeah..." he laughs lowly, "I'll be your snuggie."

"Mmhm." She smiles against his skin. "Lucky me."

"Lucky me," he mumbles, turns his face into her hair, whispers, "Love you," into her ear, like it's a secret.

"I missed hearing that," she whispers back. "Saying that."

He smiles against her temple, "I love you, love you, love you." He laughs hoarsely, "Let's summer in Paris for Christmas."

"That sounds so perfect." She holds up a hand, smallest finger extended. "Pinkie swear it."

Nate hooks his pinky finger with hers, gives their hands a shake, "Cross my heart." He licks his lips, "We'll watch movies and pretend to be tourists and eat Pop-Tarts and pick our classes for next semester together..."

She scrunches up her nose. "That's very forward-thinking of you."

"Not very forward," he fiddles with a few strands of her hair, "Just a little forward..."

"And what about now?" she asks, tilting her chin up a bit.

"We're skipping English and getting drunk." He echoes her words back to her.

"English is over now and you're tipsy."

"And I'm in love with you and I'm breaking up with my girlfriend." He recaps.

Serena pouts. "She's not really your girlfriend..."

Nate smiles fondly at her, slips his fingers deeper in her hair. "She's not. She's just someone that-" he shrugs, "I have to break up with."

"Now?" Serena suggests optimistically, batting her eyelashes at him.

"Do you want me to text her?" It's not quite as teasing as it should be, too much of a say-the-word sentiment behind the words - and he squishes half his face into the pillow, feels a little bad. Juliet deserves more than that.

She takes his hand and tangles their fingers. "Kind of." It seems a little mean, very high school, or she would have said yes.

He takes a peek at their joined hands, but doesn't lift his head, "That's not very nice," he mumbles, "You don't like her...?" He thinks to ask suddenly, "Why?"

"Because she's jealous of me," Serena says automatically, and then self-corrects, "Or I'm jealous of her. Or something."

"Or something." He agrees with a half-smile, slips his other arm underneath her and pulls her tighter against him, "My phone's in my pocket."

She laughs, slipping one arm out of their pretzel of limbs and hooking her thumb into one of his pockets. "Which one?"

He grins, tilts over a little, "Back pocket."

She kisses him lazily as she reaches around and pulls his phone out of his pocket. The screen of it is already lit up and she turns it around to show Nate. "She texted you first."

Nate glances at it, but his hands are tangled up in Serena's hair, against her skin, and he'd really rather not move. "What's she say?" He asks and gives her charming grin in hopes she'll read it to him.

"Hm, I think the basic gist is that she saw us - Gossip Girl saw us. Earlier. Outside."

"Oh..." he sighs a little, "I guess..." he gives her a sheepish smile, "Text back, sorry?" He laughs, "I dunno. Does it sound like she's dumping me? Let me see?" He cuddles her a little closer, arches up a bit to glance at the screen.

"I'm not going to text her back, that's horrible." She sighs and huffs at him, "Stop dating people who aren't me."

He reluctantly untangles a hand from her hair and takes the phone, then he tosses it on the bed, "Stop leaving me."

She gives him a gentle push onto his back and moves so that she can sit on him, her hands against his chest. "I will if you will," she offers, eyes on his face.

Nate looks up at her, smiling, a little bit awed by this entire afternoon. He holds up a hand, the smallest finger extended, "Pinkie swear."

She hooks their fingers together and nods. "Deal." She leans down to kiss him.

.tbc.