Elephants Never Forget,
Chapter Two (without a name because wow naming chapters sounds like a lot of effort)
Expensiveimagination
(A/N: Thanks to my anon who was like 'hurry up bitch you can't leave it like this' because yeah, you were right. BUT YOU DEFINITELY WEREN'T RIGHT WHEN YOU SAID THAT BLAIR WAS PREGNANT WITH CHUCK'S BABY BECAUSE NO.)
(...No offense.)
Because it's been ages, this is what happened at the end of the last chapter:
Yeah, no, he thinks. This year, this year, Christmas is going to be good.
Late at night on December the twenty-fifth he'll walk along an Upper East Side street cursing to himself about Blair freaking Waldorf.
"Merry fucking Christmas," he snorts to no one, grabbing the package he'd wrapped up in his jacket for her and hurling it into the street.
And he doesn't hear it, but a little ceramic elephant cracks into pieces.
But that's later. First there's Christmas dinner. (And Chuck, a separation and a pregnancy to announce.)
(...Later.)
He and Blair agree to just meet at Lily and Rufus's- "You'd be going past their house to get to mine, Humphrey, it would be pointless." "Just trying for a little solidarity here, Blair." "I'll meet you there," she says before hanging up- and so by the time he gets there- five... ten... ok, fine, twenty minutes late, Blair's the one that opens the door up onto him, tapping a heeled foot impatiently with a scowl on her face.
"Do you know how long I've been here for, Humphrey?"
"Well no, not precisely," he says, shouldering past her and then doubling back, remembering to kiss her on the cheek because it's Christmas, leaning back with a grin on his face that her lips twitch upwards at. "But I'm guessing around half an hour."
"Try five minutes," snorts his father, walking into the lobby, passing Dan a drink.
"Coke?" He asks, looking at his glass in bemusement. "Coke in the Van-der-bass-Rhodes-Humphrey house at Christmas?"
"Problem?" Rufus asks him, cocking an eyebrow.
"No, just surprised is all."
"Well," Rufus smiles, "Pregnant women can't drink."
That's when Dan drops his wine glass, his mouth open as he looks at Blair.
"Oh god no, Humphrey. Try again."
"Pregnant," he asks Lily in surprise.
"I know," she agrees, looking every bit as shocked as Dan. "I know," She says again, this time with a emotional little laugh.
And Dan thinks about it, really thinks about Lily and Rufus with their son somewhere out there in the world and how long they fought to find each other, and fought their own feelings to get where they are today.
And he believes, truly believes, smiling brightly at his step-mother, that even at 49 and 50, no one deserves this more than his dad and Lily.
"So that's a no to menopause in the Rhodes family, then." Blair just comments.
From somewhere in the kitchen, Rufus snorts.
What his dad doesn't tell him- and Dan doesn't blame him, because hey, all of a sudden his wife's pregnant- is that they have another family member visiting for Christmas that Dan and Blair don't know about.
(Three guesses as to who, Dan thinks sarcastically.)
(Yeah.)
(Dan only needs the one guess, actually.)
"Dan," Chuck nods. "Blair."
...And isn't this awkward? Chuck seeing Dan and Blair together, sitting on the couch having Christmas with Dan's parents.
(Later, he'll say to Blair with amusement that he didn't believe it. Her and lost little lonely boy. "I don't know how little and lost he is now," Blair will tell Chuck, rolling her eyes. "Well of course not. He's found you.")
But for now, they're all silent.
And then there's turkey with cranberry sauce that his dad puts down in the centre of the table with a manly, proud smile that shows everyone there just who made it.
"Wow dad, thanks, the sauce looks a bit iffy though."
"Hush," is all Rufus says, ruffling his son's hair and ignoring Dan's protests about him being too old for that.
"I feel thirty right now, making you eleven and therefore the perfect age for that, Daniel," Lily adds as she puts out the last dish, taking her seat.
"Well you'll always be seventeen and scrawny to me, Humphrey," Chuck adds, raising his glass.
"You too, Charlie Trout," Dan smirks, raising his glass.
Chuck just smiles, and Blair feels a little tension leave her shoulders.
"Have you talked to Serena today?" Blair asks Lily as she finishes off her dinner. "Because I haven't managed to get a hold of her."
"Ah," Lily says, pausing. "That would be because of the bad reception at her grandmother's house."
"CeeCee's? Aren't her and Josh at his parents' place?"
"...Her and Josh aren't exactly..." Lily trails off.
"Oh my god." Blair says. And it's not even because she's surprised, but because- "She didn't even tell me! What- when did this-"
"They only decided- well Serena only decided to leave- yesterday," Chuck tells her smoothly.
"You knew? You knew before me?"
Chuck doesn't say anything, just looks at her. In fact, the only people that do look lost are her and Dan, Dan's face screwed up in confusion as he looks back and forth between Chuck and Blair.
"Right," Blair says, "Of course. Naturally she'd tell you, Chuck, before me, her best friend."
Chuck just snorts, "Serena and I both know who your best friend is."
Blair just blinks.
"Dan," he sighs, like this is easy to understand, and she's making it difficult. "You replaced Serena with Dan when she got married."
And really, it is easy to understand, and she and Dan are making it difficult.
Still, that doesn't stop the two of them asking him,
"What."
After that, and Dan and Blair trading deer-in-the-headlights looks with each other, Blair snaps into action, grabbing Chuck's collar and physically dragging him out of his seat- and away from his sweet potatoes, which, really, "Was that necessary, Blair,"- upstairs into what used to be the study and is now-
A baby's room.
"Oh," Blair says, standing next to her ex-husband in a room with a crib and yellow walls, boxes of infant items piled up against the wall.
It hurts more than it should, and she finds herself gripping Chuck's hand all of a sudden, because... This could have been them.
Instead she's 30 and divorced- she supposes that's better than what she was, 28 and divorced- but it's not even that that's bothering her, it's- it's-
"Have I been a bad friend?" She asks him quietly. "Why- why would Serena go to you?"
Chuck just sighs.
"Because I know what it's like to ruin a marriage, and you don't."
Blair's face falls. "Chuck, you didn't... You didn't ruin us, alright?" She says softly, cupping the sides of his face. "We both did that."
He returns the gesture, staring at her. "I know, but it was mostly me, and Serena's feeling a lot of guilt right now, and I don't think she wanted to have to face up to you with that."
"Me?" Blair laughs. "It's like the two of you are trying to paint me off as a saint or something."
"Not a saint," Chuck tells her sadly, tucking her bob behind her ear. "Just an innocent victim."
And then, because they're Chuck and Blair and always will be, even if they'll never be Chuck and Blair together again, he kisses her.
Just chastely, but it's enough for Dan to see through the half-opened door when he comes in to check on them.
And then, feeling more burnt than he has any right to be, he grabs his coat and slips out the front door, telling his dad that he needs to make a call.
And he's never been more thankful at his father's refusal to question him as he walks out of his house, into the street on Christmas night.
Blair doesn't hear Dan leave, but asks for him when she and Chuck come downstairs, Chuck sitting down and getting right back into Christmas dinner, pulling out a flask from his jacket.
Of course.
"He's just gone to make a call." Rufus tells her, coming back in from seeing Dan out to sit with Chuck and Lily.
"Outside." Blair asks incredulously. "He's gone to make a call outside."
"He took his coat, too, after he came downstairs, if you're collecting clues in the mystery," Rufus adds, and oh, there we go, that's where Dan gets it from.
And then Blair realizes just what she's been told.
Dan was upstairs. Dan was probably looking for her. Dan left.
"Shit," she says suddenly, high-tailing it out of the penthouse without grabbing her bag or her coat and without saying any goodbyes.
There's plenty of time to be gracious later, she thinks as she gets into the elevator.
"Dan!" Blair calls as she runs out onto the dark street, spotting a lone figure further down the block of Lily and Rufus' building. "Dan, for gods sakes- Dan- stop running away from me!" She screeches.
"Waldorf, leave me alone." He says, not turning to face her, but slowing to a stop so that she can catch up.
It's ten-o-clock at night, nearly boxing day, nearly not Christmas, and she's sort of annoyed.
"Why so pissy, Humphrey?" She asks him, jogging- and doesn't that sound stupid, Queen B running after lonely boy- around his side so that they're face to face on the sidewalk. "And why on earth did you just call me Waldorf?"
"Well last time I checked it was your name," he deflects, rolling his eyes. "Unless it's going to be Bass again, in which case, please, send me an wedding invite."
"I-" and then Blair laughs. "So that is what this is about."
Dan just scowls, avoiding her eyes and looking down the Avenue instead. The coloured fairy lights that seem to decorate all of New York's buildings at the moment are reflecting in his eyes, she notices.
"Dan, I'm not getting back together with Chuck."
There's a little twitch to Dan's head, like he wants to focus on her, but he lets on nothing else.
"We were married," Blair sighs, shaking her head. "I'll always love Chuck just like you'll always love Serena."
"That's the thing Blair, I don't love Serena. Not even a little bit, alright?"
"Well that's just not true," she snaps. "I saw you on the day of their wedding," Blair tells him, and there's no need to explain who 'they' are. "I saw your face, and I sure as hell saw the devastation there, Dan."
"That wasn't devastation!" He says, throwing his hands in the air frustratedly.
"Yes it was, Dan! And that's how I'll feel if Chuck ever gets married again too! Because for me he's always going to be twenty-four and kneeling on one knee, and it hurts me to see - it hurts me every time I see him- that he isn't there, isn't that man anymore! So sue me, alienate me and pretend like we're 24 or 17 again and send me away already, will you, for kissing him! Because this passive aggressive bullshit you're pulling on me right now, I can't be bothered with it." Blair spits.
And then,
"...I bought you an elephant." Dan mumbles.
"I- what?" Blair asks, dumbfounded.
She was expecting him to yell, to call her out on accusing him of being in love with Serena a little more, she was even prepared to have him profess his love for her or something, but then again, it's like she said.
They're not seventeen. They're not twenty-four. Dan and Blair are thirty now, and most of the time, they act it.
Dan sighs. "I bought you a little ceramic elephant."
Blair blinks. "After I told you that no one likes them."
"Exactly."
Blair swallows, because for some reason this isn't... funny.
"Why."
"Because I love you," he shrugs. "...And then I threw it down the street."
She can't help but laugh at that one. "The elephant, or our love?"
"The elephant," Dan says somberly, "I threw the elephant, not our-" Dan freezes, realizing what she's said. "...Our love?"
"Yes, Humphrey," she sighs, like it's 2008 and she's having to drag him through how-you-plot-against-Georgina lessons again.
Some things never change.
"Our love."
But then again, some things really, really do.
ugh. Hope that's ok (it's pretty average, I know, but hey.)
A review a day sends good karma your way, bros.