"You two slept together?"

"Yes."

"I'm only finding out about this now?"

"Yes."

"Did anyone think to tell me this important piece of information? NO!"

"I don't know why you're so upset," Serena said raising an eyebrow at her pacing best friend.

"Because I found out that my ship isn't sinking from my four year old," Blair shot back.

"Your ship?" Serena started to ask but then stopped and focused on the second part of Blair's sentence. "How did you find out from Henry?"

"In case you haven't noticed he has excellent observing skills," Blair said with an air of pride and Serena would have laughed if she wasn't so confused. "You and Nate weren't acting like the godparents he's used to and when he told me how you basically stood on opposite sides of the park when you were together, I realized why Nate was so depressed after your 'coincidental' weekend and why you tensed up so much when I mentioned it and you confirmed it."

"Well when a crazy pregnant lady storms into your room and demands that you tell her exactly what she wants to know, you're meant to tell her exactly what she wants to know," Serena said and Blair scowled and sat on the bed next to Serena.

"I did not storm," Blair said crossing her arms across her chest. "Just wait until you're pregnant, waddling around the room to you will be storming to everyone else."

Serena rolled her eyes, "I've seen you waddle," she said with a smile as her best friend huffed. "That was not waddling."

"Fine, but you're not supposed to be keeping secrets from me," Blair pouted.

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you that I slept with Nate in a drunken haze the night before I signed my divorce papers," Serena said somewhat jokingly. "Or the night before I got engaged."

Blair gasped, her eyes just about ready to pop out of their sockets and Serena looked like she was just barely holding back her tears, so instead of going on the defensive again and wondering how she and Serena stopped telling each other huge things like this she decided it was time to just comfort her.

"Oh S," Blair said as she pushed herself up so she could wrap her arms around Serena and let the blond rest her head against her shoulder. "What are you doing?"

"I think I'm in love with Nate and I have been for a while, but I hate that I feel like that because that would mean that I willingly married a man I wasn't completely sure of and my divorce was only finalized last week and I haven't even spoken to Dan yet because he refuses to take my calls and I feel like I've ruined everything."

Blair stroked Serena's hair and made shushing sounds in an effort to sooth her crying friend. "You haven't ruined everything, you just made a mistake."

"B, marrying Dan wasn't a mistake," Serena said pulling out of Blair's embrace and Blair raised an eyebrow.

"I never said it was S," she said and Serena's eyes opened wide. "Although it looks like you think that is was."

"I didn't want it to be," Serena said wiping her eyes. "I thought I wanted to be with Dan but I called Nate the morning of my wedding."

"I know," Blair said and Serena's head snapped up and she spoke before Blair could say anymore.

"How?" Serena asked because she didn't tell Blair about that phone call and even Henry was not that observant.

"Nate told Chuck and he told me," Blair said like it was obvious. "You and Dan look good on paper, as a romance novel or even a cheesy movie but this is real life and in real life, he hasn't only had eyes for you since he saw you, he's disappointed you so many times over the years, he hasn't done everything he could to protect you when you needed protecting, he's hurt you and you have hurt him and you've been through more than enough to know that your relationship wasn't going to work no matter how hard you tried or how in love you thought you were but you tried it anyway because if you didn't you'd always have asked what if."

"Is that your way of telling me you approve of my short lived marriage," Serena asked, smiling through her tears and Blair shook her head.

"No," Blair said and Serena rolled her eyes. "Marrying your stalker was not a good idea, you still see him as that boy in high school who worshipped the ground you walked on, who made you want to be a better person and leave all your bad habits behind, that's who you wanted to be with and it's taken me a long time but I have come to understand it."

"I hate it when you make sense about Dan and I," Serena mumbled, she knew Blair was right, her idea of Dan and who Dan was couldn't be more different. On their honeymoon without work and others around they were perfect and they were happy and it felt like it could be right but as soon as they stepped back into the city it was like everything snapped back, it felt like every other time they were on the verge of a breakup, tension and realizations of their differences and finally a fight to end it all, only this time there was no fight, there was just silence and papers.

"I know I'm not the biggest fan of you and Dan but I didn't want this to happen S," Blair said and Serena smiled and wiped the new tears. "I didn't want you to hurt like this."

"I know," she said and looked at the tears shining in Blair's eyes. "We are such blubbering messes!"

"Ohk enough of this," Blair said taking a breath and cursing her hormones for making her cry. "I've ignored it for too long, tell me everything that's happening with Nate."

"Nothing's happening with Nate," Serena said sighing. "He's with someone else."

"What do you mean he's with someone else?" Blair asked and Serena shrugged thinking back to the last week when she was with Henry at the park and they ran into Nate and then they met Lauren.

"He's been seeing someone since that weekend," Serena said biting the inside of her cheek. "Did Henry skip that part?"

"He told me I just chose to ignore it," Blair said simply and Serena almost laughed. "She's Nate's rebound."

"What if it's something more?"

"Oh please, that boy will never get over you," Blair said waving her hand. "Just run a brush through your hair, put on mascara and a pretty dress and he'll forget all about the new girl."

"You make it sound as if I want the girl out of the picture so I can have Nate to myself," Serena said rolling her eyes and Blair smirked and raised an eyebrow.

"Well don't you?" she asked and Serena just gave Blair a look to say 'you're not supposed to know that'.

"It's too soon to want that," Serena said. "And too late to have it."

"Have you not been listening to what I've been saying?" Blair asked exasperatedly. "It's never too soon or too late to go for what you want and Serena how many times do I have to say it, how many times do you have to see it before you believe that Nate is completely in love with you and he always has been."

"I've been such an idiot," Serena said slapping her hands onto her face, it had always been at the back of her mind but to hear Blair spell it out for her the way she did made Serena want to cry … again.

"You really have S," Blair said patting her hand and Serena laughed because Blair was supposed to be comforting her not being so blunt. "What made you figure that out?"

Serena wasn't sure if Blair was being sarcastic or not but she did know that she needed to say it, if not for Blair to hear than for herself. "I've been using Nate to make myself feel better every time Dan and I fought or when I needed to have fun and he was always there and he never said no and he told me he loved me, I just thought he only loved me now."

"He told you he loved you?" Blair asked, looking at Serena like she grew another head. "How out of the loop have you been keeping me?"

"I thought you would know all of this," Serena said and Blair rolled her eyes.

"Chuck doesn't tell me everything," she said exasperatedly. "Keep talking."

"When I came back from my honeymoon Nate was avoiding me," Serena started and Blair smiled, she remembered wanting to scream at Serena for ignoring what everyone else could see. "I confronted him about it before our play dates with Henry began and he just screamed it at me, and I walked out."

"Oh," Blair gasped that explained his drunken week, she knew it had something to do with Serena, she just didn't realize how much of Serena was involved.

"Oh?" Serena asked and Blair shrugged to tell her that's all she was going to say and to carry on. "Right, ok, well, at the play date Henry made us talk and we did and he told me that he just made it up to stop me from questioning him."

"That idiot," Blair said throwing her head back against the pillow and laughing, what was wrong with Nate. "And you believed that?"

"I was married, I didn't want it to be true," Serena exclaimed, defending herself. "I let it go, Dan and I started fighting about silly things and not so silly things and Chuck gave me the option to leave New York and I took it readily, Dan wasn't so happy about it but I thought it would pass until I got the papers, it's still so unreal, I wasn't going to sign them, I was going to fight him."

"And then Nate came in," Blair said, poking Serena's side and she nodded.

"I called him one night after I got the papers and I was a wreck and all of a sudden there he was at my door, I knew he would come, I didn't even have to ask," Serena said biting her lip. "We went out because I said so and we drank a lot and one thing led to another."

"That's it? One thing led to another?" Blair asked and Serena raised an eyebrow. "That's not usually what you say when you sleep with a guy you now think you're completely in love with."

"I just … When I woke up next to him, I hadn't felt that good in a long time, I felt like myself again when I looked at those papers I didn't feel the dread I felt when I first got them so I signed them," Serena said and Blair nodded. "I sat next to him after that and just thought about everything and I knew that I couldn't have the conversation he was going to want to have when he woke up, I was anxious and terrified just thinking about the questions he might ask, so he woke up I asked him to leave and I think you know the rest."

"So what are you going to do?" Blair asked, letting her finger dance over her rounded tummy, glad she married her soul mate.

"What can I do?" Serena asked running her hands through her hair. "Nate's with Lauren and Dan's gone and I moved in with my best friend and step-brother, I feel like I'm so far back in the past and it's not right to put anyone else through that."

"You're recuperating, I don't think there's anything wrong with that," Blair said raising an eyebrow and Serena smiled and hugged her best friend for helping her through everything.

"I can't believe I'm divorced," Serena said twisting her mouth a little and holding her left hand to her chest with her right.

"You're like our very own Kim Kardashian," Blair said with a smirk and Serena scowled at her. "Well think of it this way, I get to sleep in once the baby is born."

"Why would you …" Serena started to ask but then noticed the look on Blair's face. "You bet on how long my marriage would last?"

"Hey don't be mad at me he suggested it," Blair said laughing at the pissed of look on Serena's face. "Although he did think that it would last more than a year…"

"Blair," Serena screamed and Blair just rolled her eyes.

"Oh don't be so overdramatic," she said waving it off. "It's not like we meddled."

Serena slapped her forehead with the palm of her hand and flopped back onto her bed shaking her head at her friends.

"You're avoiding," Blair said after some time and Serena groaned. "Not talking to me about Nate is only going to help for so long."

"I thought I told you what happened," Serena mumbled.

"You didn't tell me what's going to happen," Blair pointed out and Serena frowned.

"Nothing is going to happen, he's happy without me and I'm here without him and we'll make it work like that," Serena said and Blair laughed as she stood up.

"Come find me when you wake up from this silly dream of yours," she said laughing as she made her way slowly out of the room.


"Who's the new girl Henry's been complaining about and why do I not know what you've been up to?" Chuck asked as he made his way into Nate's office.

"What are you doing here?"

"Talking to you," Chuck said raising an eyebrow at his confused friend and taking a seat. Usually most of their meetings took place in his office at Bass industries but days like today when Chuck knows Nate is avoiding him, he makes the trip down to the Spectator to have a chat with his best friend.

"I can see that but why?" Nate asked raising an eyebrow. "It's the middle of a working day and no-one is in trouble."

"I beg to differ," Chuck said pushing at his suit as he sat down. "Serena is living with Blair and I while her divorce was being finalized and now that it has … well you never have had the best time with Serena have you."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Nate said, scribbling something down onto his notebook, refusing to lift his head to meet Chucks eyes.

"I mean I find it funny that just as she gets divorced you find someone," Chuck says with a smirk. "What's even funnier is that you found this someone the weekend you mysteriously disappeared for a meeting that just happened to be in the same town Serena was in."

Nate sighed and put down his pen, realizing Chuck was not going to give this up. "Maybe another missed chance is a sign that we are not meant to be together and I was kidding myself when I thought that maybe we'd eventually end up together."

"You don't honestly believe that the two of you aren't meant to be, do you?" Chuck asked and Nate groaned. "Why would she sign the divorce papers if she and Humphrey weren't really over? You know her better, you know how much she wants to avoid becoming Lily like that."

"I know that," Nate mumbled. "Maybe it's like their breakups, one of them will realize it was all a mistake and soon the divorce will be forgotten."

"Ah," Chuck said nodding, that's what Nate was afraid of. Nate shot him a sharp look and Chuck smiled. "I should go, but keep in mind Nathaniel that my sister is not going to just let Humphrey waltz back into her life, I think she's finally reached her breaking point."

"Do you have another bet with Blair about how long it will take to get Serena and I together?" Nate asked, because Chuck and Blair were always betting about something.

"No Nathaniel, I lost our bet," he said chuckling. "I just want my best friend to be happy."

Nate held back a smile as Chuck walked out his door and down the hall, he didn't know what Chuck expected him to do about Serena, he loved her but he had no idea what her feelings were toward him, it had been hot and cold for a while and Dan was always in the way but now that Dan was out of her life, possibly forever, it left open this new possibility that maybe …. But who was he kidding, Serena would never love him like that, he didn't even know why he bothered getting his hopes up.


A/N : Wow its been long but like really long lol I am so sorry about the wait, I assumed after my exams I'll have time but the holidays are more stressful and busy than the working days lol

I have written and rewritten this chapter so many times that its felt absolutely boring to me coz I knew what to expect but I hope you guys found this to be somewhat entertaining for the few who are still reading. I'm not sure if this chapter flows, after reading the last chapter I realized it was fine but after such a long time I'm worried that I've messed up the characters a little, please let me know if you find any holes in my story

I'm maybe three or four chapters away from finishing this story, I always knew how it was going to end I just needed the words and subsequent drama to get it there lol but I think I've dragged it all along for way too long

This chapter basically recaps Serena and Nates troubled relationship with a lot of Blair and Chuck because I adore their input and these friendships because the romantic couples on the show were so disappointing I focused a lot on the friendships. I apologize for Henry not being in this chapter, I love that little boy but I didn't know where to put him, I promise he will be back soon though, I cant wait to write him

Hopefully my muse stays around long enough for me to write the next few chapters and end this story the way it needs to be ended and I hope you guys are still with me and still enjoying it

Until Next Time (^^,)