A/N: The name of the chapter comes from a line in a Bloc Party song (:
CHAPTER TWO:
In your quietest voice
I bit into the whole-wheat scone in my hand; gradually breaking it down with my teeth, paying more attention to the sugary flavour of blueberries on my tongue than the newspaper that lay in my lap for the past half-hour. My eyes sat on a sentence I had been trying to register for the last ten minutes.
It didn't seem to be working, to say the least.
Chuck had been back in New York for two days but it felt like weeks. I had quickly learnt all the ways that hollow silence and lost moments could line the hours and slow time to a dull drone.
I started leaning into the table, exhausted from yet another sleepless night, almost too tired to catch my own faux paus, straightening into the back of the chair with a frown.
Last night had been ten hours of pure discomfort. I woke in the early hours of the morning to find Chuck's arms wrapped around my hips and the rest of the night had been spent tossing and turning.
Of course he had slept through it all, unwilling even in slumber to let go of me. I had been sick with irony, as I tried for the tenth time to pry his arms off my skin, because he was always the one leaving and not me.
I knew I shouldn't have felt like I did. The father of my child, the man I loved, had come home. In any event, if I were meant to try – to know what to do – I was entirely at a loss.
We were young, I reminded myself, just growing aware of ourselves. Soon we would be ultimately responsible for someone else. It was an adjustment; I knew this all well enough.
If he was scared like I was, the kind of apprehension that kept me up every few days, he didn't show it. Traded in for a casual smile and a backhand touch, his insecurities watered down.
For the first time in my life at only twenty-two, I had no idea what came next. The plan – the one I'd used to get me this far – had disintegrated when I got married – I had forgotten that it only applied to Blair Waldorf and not Blair Bass. Without it, I was building shabby ideas as I went along. There was hardly enough time to test the ground or weigh the options.
It made me nervous to not have a plan, to be plan-less. Waldorf's made a plan, it's just what we did, how we got into law school and threw the best parties. Sure, it was natural, the intelligence and the social status, but nothing was ever as good as it could have been without an idea of what you wanted my mother always said. Know what you want.
All I knew was that I wanted simplicity and by what definition I hardly knew.
Chuck glanced up from his folders, papers spilling onto the table, and ran a hand through his hair. It was soft and shiny, carefully dishevelled.
The man I loved.
We locked eyes, a quiet communication nipping at my flesh – if only I could decipher the meaning.
"What?" My voice was sharp, every muscle in my body tense.
He said nothing, that stupid smirk spreading across his face
He had been watching me for days just as he did now. It made me feel like a bird fluttering against its cage, completely aware of the blue sky that expanded above and yet unable to fly.
Since he had come home I had found any excuse to stay out of the house. I had gone to my classes and then wandered the streets, met up with Serena and finally relented on going back to the penthouse only when I was hungry and utterly sick of pastries and soda.
Chuck had waited patiently, on the cusp of worry, standing to pull me into his arms, kiss me goodnight.
It was always brief, so brief.
After months of living without him there was a shift that came with settling back into our life. Dorota had substantial time off now, coming and going as she pleased. Chuck was the one to hand me my pre-natal vitamins at regular intervals, insist on breakfast, and ask me how I felt every five minutes.
And today it made want to throw something at him, anything. I eyed the fork on my plate and thought of flinging it in his direction. The constant attention made it difficult to concentrate.
"Chuck I swear, if you don't stop right now I'll - I'll - divorce you! Or at least throw something!"
I huffed and I puffed and I could have blown the whole house down if I let all the aggravation in my veins into a single breath.
"Blair," He cautioned, "relax. It's not good for the baby. Besides," He traced the top of his water glass with a pinkie finger, "an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind."
I swallowed hard, my cheeks red in anger. My husband had just tried to dispense wisdom …
He piled the folders into his briefcase, closed it and stood up, heaving it into his palm. Judging rather wisely, by the look on my face, that he would have no luck in extracting any kiss from my lips, he glanced once in my direction and turned towards the door.
It was 9AM on a Tuesday, which meant only one thing - off to the office. My first lecture didn't begin until noon which left enough time to get ready, have the expected bout of morning sickness and head off to art history.
A small swig of mouthwash and a dab or two of coco chanel on my collar would perk me right up.
I would have been excited were it not for the way he dismissed me. My emotions regarded as the hormonal switch in my body and for that I was ready to breathe fire. Burn his arrogance to a crisp with a damned good throw.
But instead, I put down the fork, threw my napkin on the table and waddled to the front door. Much I imagined, like an angry duck would do if provoked, or some type of animal that waddled.
A brief wrinkle of surprise swept over the Basstard's face and then hid beneath his composure, tucked safely away. Maybe, I reasoned to myself, it was the fact that I - a woman almost five months pregnant - had beat a twenty-two year old man to the door not two meters away from where we had been eating.
Otherwise, it may have been how flushed I was from the effort it took.
I rested my hands on my hips, jut my elbows out in defiance and narrowed my eyes. Prepared to fight.
"What is with you?!" I yelled. He stepped forward, prepared to lure me out of the way, much like a snake charming his prey. I stood my ground.
"I have no idea," He said, with nonchalance, "but you're going to tell me?" His words were smooth and sticky. Like honey he could trap you in them and you would spend the rest of your life trying to escape.
I didn't know what to say, not knowing if it was a classic Bass defence or a form of sincerity in increments. Pressing my back to the door I turned my chin up at him, spinning on my heel, "Bite me Basshole."
It was simple, direct and everything I needed to say.
XOXOXO
I stumbled clumsily toward the bedroom, my upper-lip curled in disgust at the tears that trailed down my cheeks. I knew not why I had suddenly gotten so emotional but, then again, I had been this way for a while now.
The pregnancy had made me an open book for anyone to read. No secret password or handshake required as of late.
I hated it. I didn't want Chuck of all people to be able to read me so easily.
Our marriage was disjointed, and the idea of everything falling to pieces was more real to me than it had been the day he had left for France.
To have him – flesh and bone – in front of me, was more complex in existence than the hours I had spent in recent months lying in bed and imagining the plains of his face. Every touch was alive with meaning.
I rolled onto the bedspread, careful of the expanding belly that stuck out a little above my hips and curled over, like a soft wave. I didn't move when I felt Chuck in the room, resisting the urge to sneak a glance at his perch just inside the door.
There was nothing but my discordant sobs falling between us with sharp edges and little direction.
After a while I ran out of tears to cry and silence filled the gaps. I was raw and my eyes were red and puffy but I tried only to absorb my thoughts in the pattern of the bedspread that I had started to trail with my finger.
Chuck crawled up to me slowly, moulding his body to my own. One whole. Only it didn't really feel that way anymore.
"Mrs Bass," I grinned despite myself. Whenever I was upset he used it to remind me that our marriage was the center of his world -I was the only thing that mattered.
The day we were joined in marriage, the first time I heard those words fall from his lips I melted into a heap. Everything clicked into place; I knew then that I hadn't made a mistake. Two simple words that held thousands of "I love you's".
Marriage had been a big step, probably more like a leap, but we had done it. Knowing Bass I couldn't deny that I was worried he might leave me at the alter; suddenly decide that he couldn't devote himself to anyone – something he had believed since childhood. But, he had been there after all, and nothing else mattered.
He had made the promise that he would always be there to keep his promises. Because of this, I never took it for granted whenever it was said.
The seventieth time he had whispered, "Mrs Bass" into my ear on our wedding night, as we made love to each other under the stars, it only grew sweeter. He had confessed to me that nothing felt as destined as the moment he slipped the wedding band on my finger.
"Are you alright?" He said it into my hair, a soft whisper that drifted around us.
I opened my mouth to say something but instead I nodded against the pillow. Chuck pulled a clump of hair away from my neck, pressing his lips to the flesh between my shoulder blades. His touch was cold; the summer heat had left me sweaty, even in my best silk dress.
It was easier to fall into the cracks, to dive into the darkness with his touch.
"What –"
"Please," He begged, sorrow tipping the ends of his mouth, "Let's not talk about it right now."
I saw us then as I knew we were, dangling off the edge of a cliff, wondering whether or not we should keep climbing or descend towards the ground into the arms of safety. But to me he was the arms of safety, the need for love and we kept on climbing.
I thought of what the next step would be, about the future and where "we" were headed.
Was there even anywhere to go?
"Are we cut out for this Chuck, do you think we'll make it?"
There were so many unaccounted days that stretched through our relationship. Hours we couldn't get back.
It wasn't easy to pick up and start all over again but we would have to do it.
He breathed into my shoulder, his palm flat against my collarbone. My skin prickled gooseflesh where his breath mingled with my body. The vulnerability hung above our heads, a change in direction, a wind that pushed us towards each other.
"Everything is going so fast," I continued, brushing away the tracks of dried tears.
I thought of the baby, school and our marriage. In little over a year I'd become a sophomore at NYU, a wife, and in a matter of months I'd be someone's mother. I wanted him to know that it mattered to me, that it felt just as fast as it was.
"What do you mean?" His voice was low, his eyebrows furrowed. Chuck had said it mostly to himself but I answered anyway, afraid to leave it without explanation.
"I don't know –"Was all that came out of my mouth, like some kind of blabbering idiot, who should have kept her mouth shut.
He sat up quickly, his weight shifted to the corner of the bed, bending to put his head in his hands. Exhaling long and slow he rubbed at his face, hiding from view. There was always something to hide, empty columns of nothing, protected just for protections sake.
I struggled in pulling myself up, resting against the headboard. He glanced sideways at my silhouette as I folded my hands over my stomach and looked, trying to appear content and patient, at the ceiling.
If I couldn't be honest with my husband, completely and totally truthful, then who could I be honest with? And if that wasn't how a normal marriage worked I didn't care – it's how I wanted mine to be.
Eleanor had been exceptional as a designer, she had her moments as a parent, but in terms of her marriage to daddy, well - it hadn't exactly been based on a grain of truth. I never wanted to be in that situation, I had vowed I wouldn't.
I wasn't even sure that I was still the same Blair he had left in New York one April day. I had learned to make sense of things that held little explanation, finding strength in myself where I least expected it.
"I know you're hurt," The silence broke with his hoarse, scratched whispers, "and that it's my fault. I don't pretend to be perfect; I hardly know anything really. There are only a few things you can really tell that I know," He was still bent into his lap, talking through his hands.
"Number one – the biggest most important thing – is that I love you. Blair Cornelia Waldorf-Bass, Bass-Waldorf, just Bass, it doesn't matter. I've loved you for a long time and I'm going to keep loving you and needing you. To be your husband is the best thing that's happened to me in a long time."
His words were fast, tumbling out. I reached for his shoulder and he turned towards me, taking my hand and leaning into me, pressing his head on my chest.
The Bass that everyone knew was a far cry from the man I saw now, the man I needed. Soft and full of truth, the part I had given myself to without even blinking
He looked up at me and our eyes met, "I love you so much, and if you're asking me whether or not I think that we're moving too fast, the answer is no. None of this feels rushed, it just feels right."
I sighed, one hand threaded through his and the other resting on his clean-shaven cheek. Could I forgive him, just forget? No, I couldn't ask myself to do that. Maybe it was just something I'd have to live with, my anger otherwise would simply go to waste, ruin the moments we could have together if I just let it go.
Everything about Chuck was so strong. Like a tidal wave he ebbed closer to my mouth, a hairsbreadth away, and then his lips were on mine, a gentle request, and every doubt was washed away in one swift motion, carried out to sea.
"I love you too" I confessed into his parted lips, my eyes closed as his tongue mingled with my own. I had almost forgotten how he tasted. His hand ran through my hair, down my chest and onto the crest of my belly.
"We can do this Mrs Bass, we already are."
TBC
