CHAPTER 7 - Acute

Controlled: The survivor appears to be without emotion and acts as if "nothing happened" and "everything is fine".

Two days later Chuck was sitting in their living room and reading a book Lily brought him this morning: "The truth about Rape". Accordingly to the book after the attack every victim can be classified as one of three persons. It was obvious that the pattern "controlled" applied to Blair.

Thinking of her made his skin crawl. She had been released from the hospital just 3 hours ago and was already buried into her Laptop. She wanted to check her emails and assign the workflow to her co-workers. Chuck was okay with that – For now.

"Baby,…", Chuck looked at her anxious, "I need some sleep. Are you okay with that?"

"CHUCK! Sure! Everything is just fine!" , she stated sourly. He stood up and walked over to her. He was bending done to kiss her forehead when he suddenly realized what he was doing. Aside from holding hands in the hospital twice there hadn't been any physical contact between them. Detective Mulholland told him he shouldn't force her. It was so unfamiliar to him that he needed to focus on that objective really hard.

When she herself realized he was drawing back from kissing her forehead a sob escaped her: "It's because… because of him? Isn't it?"

"Blair…"

"It's because of what he did to me!"

"Blair, no…"

"I disgust you!"

"No, never, Blair…"

"Then why won't you even touch me? Why do you handle me as I am noxious?"

"Blair… I thought… I thought…"

"You hate me." "Nevermind", she continued, "I hate you too!"

"Blair…"

"No, its okay. I get it. You want someone beautiful, delicate and… untouched."

"Blair-Baby…"

"Yeah, yeah I know – Not like your father's sweaty old horses"

This was enough for Chuck. He interrupted her harshly: "STOP IT, NOW, Blair"

She was surprised by his change of mood.

"Blair… I thought… I thought… you didn't want me to touch you."

He closed the gap between them and pulled her in for a hug. He kissed her forehead charily. "I love you, Blair. Nothing will ever change that."

Silent tears were running down her cheeks. Not because of what had happened to her. Her sadness had taken the form of tears, because she couldn't reciprocate Chuck's "I-love-you". She did love Chuck. More than she was ever thinking a human being could love something. It just didn't felt appropriate to her now.


She appreciated an elevator ding. Somebody was entering their penthouse. Suddenly she was sitting stiff as poker in her armchair. Her neck hairs stood up. Her breathing became shorter.