Inspired by Roman Holiday and Rihanna.
Princess Of China
Why do they keep giving dinners, galas, saint's day celebrations every day of the week? There's going to be a permanent ridge above her eyebrows from her tiara, the one that slips down a little more every other minute. Then there's the delicate balance of eating – enough of the seven or eight courses that any journalists presents won't be after the palace exclusive on the princess' 'eating disorder', but not so much that she won't fit into her dress for the next dinner.
The next gala.
The next saint's day celebration required her to go down on her knees and pray to the paparazzi.
Tonight is a supposedly informal gathering, and all that means is that commoners are invited too. They have to be luxury yacht-worthy, custom suit-worthy, black card-worthy commoners, but they're commoners all the same: untitled, unholy. She is Her Highness, and Grace Kelly is her kith and kin.
So she pushes the diamonds back above her hairline, digging the combs into her scalp. The Cartier pendants in her ears swing. Her smile is as dazzling as the gemstones.
They announce her as Her Serene Highness Blair Cornelia, Princess of Monaco.
Sophie opens the dancing with Louis, that's only tradition. Blair stays off to one side and taps her foot but doesn't dare ease out of her shoes to alleviate the pressure on the balls of her feet. She's been standing for three hours straight, welcoming, gossiping, lying, but princesses don't show discomfort. They don't cough, they don't sneeze. They keep their knees firmly pressed together to swing their legs out of a car, and their knees wide apart when an heir is required.
Princesses will grit their teeth and act their part and think about hot ginger sugar scrub treatments later.
Then he's there, at her side, all in black but for the shirtfront, the pocket square, the cravat. Not all in black, in fact. He's a businessman – English?
"Your Highness."
American.
"Mr…"
He doesn't bow. She suspects he's affronted she doesn't know him by reputation.
"I'm Chuck Bass."
There's no invitation, but they dance together anyway.
It's only tradition.
"Where are you from, Mr Bass?"
"New York."
"New York?" Her hand grips his shoulder too hard, suddenly electrified. "Tell me about New York. It's been so long…"
"It's snowing."
They're simple words, easily spoken, but she can feel him returning her grasp, firm, almost familiar on her waist. She looks into his eyes, slanting where hers are wide, cool and in control. She needs something from him, and he's a businessman. He's supplying what she demands. Maybe that means something deeper too, that he's supplying something she needs with his hold on her waist, the sudden turn that makes her head spin. It's part of the dance, of course, nothing more.
When the music stops, he kisses her hand: electrifying. A kind of handshake from a pauper (a New York-worthy, second glance-worthy pauper) to a princess.
He's Chuck Bass.
She should know him by reputation.
She'll see him again.
.
The world has to change before Blair wakes with a start, heart thumping.
"What is it?"
It's Chuck, warm, familiar, his arm wrapped around her as it has been all night, as it is every night, the pulse in his wrist against the pulse in her chest. He mumbles, half to the pillow, eyes half-shut – still interested, since that's what she needs of him.
"It's snowing," she murmurs, and her head drops back to the pillow.
Fin.
