He tries to pretend it's not an extraordinary circumstance. People do crazy things in elevators all the time- especially when they're trapped. Poor Brooklyn boys break up with blonde goddesses. James Bond gets fucked. Brilliant and hot doctors hear voices talking to them and terrorists plant bombs. Why should his exchange with Blair Waldorf be any stranger than all of those?
He knows why really. A- She's his ex's best friend. B- She's his enemy's lover. C- He hates her and D- she hates him.
He's desperately trying to rationalize. Which is really nothing productive than rambling except that he's the only one who has to hear it and occasionally Cedric. He knows there is only one reason that his exchange with Blair Waldorf is wrong but he can't bear to admit it. He can't stop thinking about her.
She is poison, plaguing his every thought. His eyes no longer seek out locks of gold in the school court yard but silken strands of brown, held in place with a red ribbon. The color of her eyes pops out to him from the excessively well dressed fray and he knows the heroine of his story no longer has eyes of the sea.
There is guilt in his voice when Serena calls and when she tells him she misses him. He misses her too, but here is something new growing within him, something old being broken. The heart that loved Serena van der Woodsen had filled to the brim and cracked from the inside out. In the pure and true world of his love for her there is no space for his attraction to Blair Waldorf.
He is weakened by the strain of thinking of her. Her gloried imperfections, her magnificent flaws are an obsession. His fascination stems for the same causes as his hate once did and he's more bewildered than he will ever care to acknowledge.
"Cabbage Patch." Her voice is soft and harsh all at the same time and he's looking up from his notebook and drowning in her chocolate eyes.
"Yes." He's thanking the heavens its not a stutter.
"Serena is worried about you," she shifts uncomfortably from one foot to the other, not daring to say "I'm worried, too,"
"She thinks you're moping," she clarifies, because he's gaping at her and his dark eyes seem to be staring straight at her lips, "Look, I know you loved her, but she's feeling guilty about the whole thing with Aaron and wanted met ask you if it was okay for her to date again."
He cuts her off with a sigh, his gaze drifting to the Ivy colored stone wall against which he and Serena shared their first ever kiss. Blair is being nice and it's scary. Much scarier than bitchy Blair and much less fun because he misses the easy way they insult each other.
She's propped one hand on her hip expectantly, chin jutted forward. "It's complicated."
She scoffs at the cliché and tells him that she isn't her to hear him spew out generic crap. She's on a mission and he doesn't ask exactly what that is and she never elaborates so they fall into the old habit of jousting and he rather hates it because her mouth is painted red again and it's moving in the most tantalizing ways.
He asks why she's really here and why she and Serena are friends again. "Could it have anything to do with sleepovers at the Bass mansion?" he wonders out loud and she gasps at his audacity. She walks away and pretends not to know him, just like she always does.
Rufus and Jenny smile sympathetically when Gossip Girl blasts a picture of Aaron and Serena kissing in Times Square. Apparently he convinced her dark haired friend well enough.
Vanessa Abrams kisses him two weeks later and he tries no to pretend her eyes are brown and she tries not to pretend his hair is spun of gold.