So sorry I haven't updated in AGES! After the last gossip girl episode, it felt weird writing about Chuck and Blair in a storyline that wasn't that. I cried like a baby when Chuck and Blair hugged, but I didn't know how to continue this story when the "real" Chuck and Blair were going through such painful issues. Anyway, here it is. PLEASE read and review!!!!!!! XOXO
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Chuck was there within the hour. Dorota hadn't announced him, with her usual cry, distain masking the glee in her voice as she proclaimed "Mr. Chuck here to see you!" But Blair knew, as soon as the door to her room opened again, as soon as the air was heavy with the smell of his cologne. He sat down next to her, and she didn't lift her face from the pillow, didn't even move. She was suffocating, her face buried in silk, and she knew all she had to do was look at him and she'd be able to breathe again. But she didn't want to look. She didn't deserve him. Of this she was sure. Her mother's words rang in her ears. He'd leave her. She turned the idea over and over in her head, wondering how she could make it hurt less when it finally happened. Chuck sat down, and the mattress curved beneath her, absorbing his weight. "Blair," he said softly. He reached out hesitantly, stroking her arm, her hair, leaning down to press a kiss into the back of her head. Tears slid down Blair's cheeks for no reason, wetting the pillow beneath her, pressing their cool salt onto her face. How had he become so whole, so healed? He had been broken when his father died, hollowed out. He had been broken long before that, too. And now he was here, staying with her, saying all the right things all the time, looking at her with love that she surely didn't deserve. And now she was bringing his child into the world, and she wasn't worthy. Maybe she was broken, not good enough. Maybe she was throwing her life away, and he'd leave her anyway, because he was too good, too beautiful, too healed to want her. A sob broke free from her tight throat, and a fresh wave of tears flowed into the already-damp silk of her pillow. She felt Chuck shift, swinging his legs up onto the side of the bed to lie down next to her. He pushed her hear away from her face, exposing one cheek, the rest of her face buried. He leaned down. "Blair?" He said again, the question evident in his voice. He brushed his lips – already close enough to her ear that he barely had to whisper – down to the hollow behind her ear, and kissed it softly, three times. He pulled away when she didn't move. "Blair, I'm sorry that Gossip Girl found out before you were ready. But it would have come out eventually." He paused. "It doesn't really have to change anything." How was it that those words, those exact words that Serena had said only hours ago, sounded so right on his lips? Her heart swelled with this realization. It would have come out eventually. This want't the worst thing in the world. It was far, far from the worst thing that could be happening to them. But just as quickly as the hope arose, warming her chest, making her palms tingle, a nagging, internal voice crushed it. This is how it started. This is how it always started. One thing goes wrong, then another. Her mother had called it, and so it would come. She was pregnant, and she'd become fat, fat with a baby, fat with responsibility he didn't want. It would push him over the edge – he'd leave. Worse, cheat. She didn't know if she could handle the pain. Not when she was carrying his baby. The seed that her mother had planted grew, twisting poisoned tendrils around her heart, and she was met with a fiery determination that went against everything her mind and heart were telling her. She'd end it. Suddenly she was sure she had to. She sat up suddenly, crazed with the agony of knowing that he'd leave her, utterly convinced she had to beat him to it. "Go away, Chuck," she said looking down at him, her voice icy, but quivering slightly. He sat up too, so they were face to face, and she could feel his hot breath on her cheeks. His lips parted in surprise, and she spoke before he had a chance to. "This isn't about Gossip Girl," she continued. "It's about us." His brow furrowed, suddenly, as if he realized what she was about to do. "Blair, stop." He said, his voice low, threatening. But his hand reached out for her elbow as if to steady her, his touch soft and reassuring. She shook it off, and it fell down to clutch her wrist, anchored there. Why was he making this so hard? "Look, Chuck!" she said, shouting now, her body shaking with sharp, unexplained tremors. "You never planned to be a father! I know you don't want this, so I'm relieving you of your responsibilities. You are free. Free to be with other girls, free to leave and never see me again." His eyes locked into hers, and fire burned behind their dark surfaces. She dropped her eyes, unable to match the intensity of his gaze. His voice was soft, and the tenderness behind it surprised her. "Blair, what – " he stopped to regain his composure, and started again, agony seeping through his words. "What have I ever done to make you think I didn't want this? To make you think I didn't want you, or," he paused. "our baby?" Blair longed to tell him what her mother had said, but she felr a fresh wave of tears threaten to fall, and the most horrible words she could imagine bubbling up in her throat. She pushed the tears back, and let the words spill over. "You wouldn't know how to be a good father anyway." She saw the anger flash in his eyes the same moment his outstretched hand dropped from her twisting wrist. He was up before she had a second to realize what she had said, and she watched him leave, as if in slow motion, tracing patterns on the back of his jacket with her eyes, watched the door swing shut for the second time that day, and waited in the silence of the half a second before her world came crumbling down around her.
