As soon as Dan stepped out of the elevator, a nasty smell hit his nostrils—a synthetic, burnt sort of odor. He held the back of his hand over his nose, and looked up at Nate with startled eyes.

"Oh," Nate said. "You get used to it pretty fast."

"Well, uh. That's a relief," Dan muttered, walking straight ahead.

The penthouse was trashed. The furniture had been overturned, and bottles and trash were scattered everywhere.

Looking ahead, Dan saw that the pane in the door to the balcony was shattered; only a few jagged chunks of glass remained clinging to the frame. A few feet beyond it, on the deck outside, lay a wooden chair with two broken legs.

He turned his head as he walked into the living area, and noticed that the sculpture in the corner was missing its head. A pile of ashes and cigarette butts rested at its base, and a thick puck of an ashtray lay upside down in its center.

Someone had wrenched the flatscreen off the wall and toppled it onto the floor.

Next to the upside-down television, he saw a crispy black patch on the carpet that seemed to be the origin of the burnt smell. He walked up to it and gave a tentative sniff, and guessed that someone had put out the fire with a bottle of red wine.

He took a few more steps forward and saw that the pool table was almost completely covered with half-empty bottles of scotch, dirty glasses, crumpled bits of rolling papers, loose tobacco, cigarette ends…and drugs. Lots and lots of drugs. There were plastic baggies containing thick clusters of weed, pills (some scattered around the table in haphazard little clusters, some in plastic prescription bottles, none of were labeled "Chuck Bass"—that he was sure of), and a snowy pile of white powder on a broken chunk of mirror, divvied up into thin wobbly lines.

He looked down at the floor and saw a dried rust-colored substance that appeared to be blood. At some point, while it was still wet, someone had walked through it barefoot, swiping a sanguine path towards the bedroom.

Dan looked at Nate and exhaled in a whistle. It was worse than he'd expected.

"Yeah," Nate said in a grim voice.

At that moment, they heard a guttural strain of song rise down the hallway. It grew louder and louder, but the lyrics were half intelligible at best.

And then they saw a silhouette appear at the end of the hall.

Chuck Bass had always had a distinctive walk. He tended to sweep his feet out to the sides and then return them to center, sauntering along at a leisurely pace, as though the entire world were the deck of a luxury yacht that he owned.

Now, though, his gait was unbalanced, seasick; he staggered, as though the floor were rocking underneath him in waves.

When he stepped into the light of the room, they saw that he was barely even dressed—he wore only a stained white t-shirt and blue silk boxers. And maybe it was because his usual garb had a way of making him look much older than he really was—after all, it was a shock to see Chuck Bass in anything less than a tailored three-piece suit—but now, for the first time in years, he looked like a little boy.

His hair was a tousled mess, he hadn't shaved in days, and there was a red tinge around the rims of his eyes, which were staring ahead in a vague, unfocused way. He tottered towards the pool table, not seeming to notice them at all.

"Chuck," Nate said in a weak, half-pleading way.

Chuck looked up and regarded Nate through a tranquilized haze.

"Nathaniel," he drawled. "You're back."

He limped towards Nate, and when they looked down they saw that his right foot was bound with a taut bandage.

"What happened to your foot?" Nate asked in alarm.

Chuck looked down confusedly. "Oh. I think I…stepped in some glass…" he said, as if he were talking about an old injury that had happened years ago.

Jesus Christ, Dan thought, and wondered if there were any point in trying to talk to Chuck in this state. He didn't even seem to notice that he was there.

"Heya, Chuck," he said, lifting his hand in an awkward salute.

Chuck lifted his head and seemed to see Dan for the first time. Almost immediately, his eyes narrowed into angry little slits.

"What is he doing here?" he asked Nate accusingly, his voice suddenly sharper. "Since when does Dan Humphrey have drop-in privileges at the penthouse?"

"Chuck, he just wants to talk to you," Nate said in a diplomatic way.

"I don't feel like talking," Chuck groused. "Especially not to Humphrey Dumphrey."

He surveyed the vast pharmacopoeial spread on the pool table with a pan of his head. "I just feel like…partying," he murmured, and began to limp towards the table.

"Is that all you've been doing for the past four days?" Nate asked in a hopeless voice.

"Pretty much," Chuck sighed, sweeping up a pile of pills with his palm.

"Yeah. Looks like you've been having a…great time," Dan commented wryly.

"What would you know about having a good time, Humphrey?" Lowering his head, Chuck regarded his stash in a contemplative way. "Let's all drop some pills," he suggested in a slow voice.

"I don't think that's a good idea, Chuck," Nate immediately returned.

"Oh come on, Nathaniel," Chuck said seductively. "Back in the day you always used to be down."

With two fingers pointed into a V, he segregated a pair of capsules from the rest. "What about you, Humphrey?" he ventured, not looking at Dan. "In the mood for some MDMA? You always have been a little lacking when it comes to joie de vivre. I never could figure out why you were able to hold Serena's interest for so long…"

Dan cleared his throat.

"A word of warning, though," Chuck suggested in a soft voice, and flicked his eyes over to Nate in an insinuating way. "Nathaniel has a tendency to get a little bicurious when he's rolling..."

Dan glanced at Nate, but Nate just flushed and averted his eyes to the floor. Thus ended the most awkward conversational pause that Dan Humphrey had ever experienced. And that was saying something.

"I'm more in the mood for downers myself," Chuck said in a confidential tone. He reached forward for a decanter of scotch and filled a nearby glass to the brim, sloshing a considerable amount of alcohol onto its felted surface in the process. "Though my supply does need replenishing at the moment," he muttered, leaning over the table to drink directly from the overfilled glass.

"Chuck, we came here because we were worried about you," Dan interjected, eyeing the half-empty glass of scotch—and hoping to finish the conversation while Chuck was still capable of having one.

"You—were worried about me?" Chuck said with muted aggression. "That's not even in the realm of possibility. You don't even like me."

Dan had to search for the right words.

"I'm here for Blair," he settled.

"I don't want to talk about Blair, Humphrey," Chuck replied with a sharp edge to his voice. He picked up the tumbler and threw the rest of the scotch down his throat in one go. "I don't even want to think about her," he slurred, and reached over the table towards the decanter again.

"Okay—Chuck, I don't think you need anything more to drink right now," Nate said. He tried to snatch the scotch away from him, but the other man pushed him away clumsily with one hand.

"Don't tell me what to do, Archibald," he snapped.

He squinted at the two of them and leaned back and forth a couple of times, as if this were necessary to bring their images into clear focus. "Why are you two suddenly a tag-team, anyways?" he grumbled. "Shouldn't you be off dueling over Serena?"

"We're not fighting anymore, Chuck," Nate said. "That was…just a misunderstanding."

This was a lie—and not a very good one at that—but Dan thought it better to let it go.

"Friends shouldn't fight over girls anyways," Nate added as an afterthought.

"Oh, come on, Nathaniel," Chuck said, clearly unconvinced. "We're all gentlemen here. We can all admit that Miss van der Woodsen has her…certain charms. Can't we, Humphrey?".

Glancing at Dan, who was clenching his jaw, Nate quickly moved to change the subject. "We're not here to talk about Serena, Chuck."

"Oh—right," Chuck droned. "You want to talk about your other ex-girlfriend. The one I banged before you did. Blair, I mean. After all, I'd need a spreadsheet to keep track of all of them…"

"Jesus, Chuck, stop antagonizing Nate," Dan cut in angrily. "We're trying to help you out here."

"If you wanted to do that, you should have brought me some more OxyContin," Chuck said, trying to lift the lip of the decanter of scotch directly to his mouth.

Nate snatched it away. "Are you just going to drink yourself into a stupor again?" he said in reproach. "Because eventually you're going to have to sober up and deal with your problems."

"Right now the only problem I have is that you two hens won't stop clucking at me," Chuck said, obviously irritated.

"No—your problem is that you're on the outs with Blair," Dan corrected. "And over the past four days you've done nothing about it but get as fucked up as humanly possible. I mean, seriously—God only knows what you've been taking…and how much of it. It's a miracle you're even still alive."

Chuck looked at him for one standstill moment.

"Fuck off, Humphrey," he rasped, pointing at the center of Dan's chest with undisguised aggression. "Are you really going to stand there and pretend that you're worried about my health? We all know that you can't stand me. So why are you even here?"

Dan let out a bitter laugh. "You know, it's funny—I was just asking myself the exact same question," he admitted. "But, um..." He rubbed the space between his eyes. "Blair asked me to come here and talk to you."

"Blair asked you to talk to me," Chuck replied in an incredulous voice. "What…fucking some other guy wasn't bad enough, so she had to send Dan Humphrey here to talk to me about it? No thanks. You can go back the way you came. And I'm pretty sure that involves a subway car that smells like piss," he added in his nastiest tone.

"Chuck—" Nate began in a horrified voice, but Dan held up his hand.

I'm here for Blair, I'm here for Blair, Dan recited in his brain. Not Chuck—Blair.

"Chuck," he said, trying his best to keep his voice steady and calm, "I wish that I could just do that, but I can't. I promised her that I would make sure you were okay."

"Okay?" Chuck parroted, scowling. "I'm not okay. I'm great. I'm spectacular. Or at least I was until I ran out of pain killers. And you two losers won't even party with me.

"You should have sent over little Jenny instead," he continued, looking at Dan with a flash of wicked inspiration in his eyes. "If memory serves—now, she's a girl who's down to party when she's feeling down…"

Nate's eyes widened into perfect circles. "Dude. Not cool."

Meanwhile, a current of anger surged in Dan's brain and ran down his spine, electrifying his entire body.

And suddenly, instinctively, he grabbed the front of Chuck's shirt and pushed him back against the pool table, knocking several bottles and glasses to the floor in the process.

(Somewhere far away in the background he heard a muffled protest from Nate: "Whoa, whoa, Dan. Chill.")

"If you weren't so pathetic right now I'd beat the shit out of you," he growled at Chuck.

"Go ahead!" Chuck returned in a goading voice. "Please. Hit me. It would break up the monotony of all this fucking talk."

"He's just trying to make you go away," Nate frantically explained to Dan.

"Oh—was I somehow unclear about that?" Chuck replied to Nate in an acidic tone.

He returned his gaze to Dan. "Come on, Humphrey," he urged him. "What are you waiting for? Or are you even capable of hitting someone unless you're sneaking a sucker-punch?"

Dan swallowed, gritting his teeth.

Right now the only thing keeping him from smacking his fist into Chuck's mouth was the fact that he was actively encouraging him to do it.

"Well?" Chuck said with a condescending smirk. "Come on. Let's have it. Let's go."

And at that moment Dan looked into Chuck's eyes and saw something unnerved him.

On the surface of his gaze, there was belligerence, yes. Contempt as well. But underneath it all—despair. And pain.

"Go ahead," Chuck said in a slightly less ensured voice, and fought back a tremble of his lower jaw. "I won't fight back. Beat me to a pulp."

He continued to stare at him, his eyes red-laced and desperate.

He wants me to hit him, Dan realized. He wants to feel anything…other than this.

He felt his fingers relax their grip onto Chuck's shirt, and he released him with a sigh, dropping his hands to his sides.

"Yeah," Chuck said in a disappointed voice. "That's about what I figured."

He turned to the pool table and began to rummage through his stash. "Fuck," he cursed, scattering the pills every which way with downward swing of his fist. "What I'd give for some more OxyContin right now…"

"Chuck, Blair feels terrible about what happened," Dan said in what was intended to be a consoling tone.

"Well, then, maybe she shouldn't have gone off and fucked someone else," Chuck returned with a tinge of vestigial fury.

Then, with a sudden swipe of his arm, he knocked the decanter of scotch onto the floor, where it shattered into thick chunks and tiny, needle-sharp shards of glass.

Nate shot Dan a look of disapproval, and, after glancing at Chuck's bare feet, walked down the hall towards the storage closet.

Dan sighed, realizing that his earlier instincts were correct. There was no way he was going to be able to delve into Chuck and Blair's very real issues while he was in this state. It was a better idea to do damage control—at least for the time being.

"Uh, yeah…about that," he said, shifting his gaze to the floor. "Um, Chuck, you wouldn't by any chance have hired some, uh, guys to follow that guy around—would you?"

There was a pause, during which Nate reentered the room and began to awkwardly sweep the floor. Dan observed him, blinking, and wondered if Nate had ever actually used a broom before.

"What's your point?" Chuck finally muttered.

"It's just that…uh, hold on a sec," Dan said, taking the broom from a rather sheepish-looking Nate and quickly whisking the glass into a small pile. Plucking up an unfurled magazine from underneath a ripped couch cushion, he swept it up and set it aside.

"Look," he went on. "This guy has some military contacts, and it's…a very bad idea for you to spy on him. I think he could cause some legitimate trouble for you. And that's the last thing you want to have to worry about right now. I mean, look—I know that we're not exactly each other's biggest fans, okay?" (He held up his hands in a conciliatory gesture.) "But I still wouldn't wish that on you. I wouldn't wish it on anyone."

Chuck was silent for a few moments. Then he pushed aside several items on the surface of the pool table, revealing a manila folder stuffed with papers.

"I just wanted to keep him away from Blair," he said in a drained voice. "So I called Andrew, and I told him to send a couple guys to trail him."

Dan edged over to the table and flipped over the cover of the folder. He filed through its contents: newspaper clippings, memorandums, bills, transcripts—and photographs.

His gaze lingered on a black-and-white 8x10. A tuxedo-ed Mack was clasping the hand of his bride, a woman with curly blonde hair and freckles. They were looking into each other's eyes, smiling, radiant with joy.

"I was hoping Andrew would find something—anything," Chuck explained, rubbing his eyes with both hands. "To blackmail him. But he's squeaky-clean…a complete boy scout. He came from a farming family. Went into the army to pay for college and then got a scholarship to MIT. Became a hot-shot engineer, and married his high school sweetheart…who died a few years ago, tragically. And after he got his first high-paying gig the first thing he did was to buy his mom a ranch outside El Paso."

"He's everything I never was," he went on in despair.. "A better man than I'll ever be. It's no wonder that she wants to be with him."

"That's just it, Chuck," Dan tried to interrupt. "She doesn't."

But Chuck didn't seem to have heard him.

"Who was I kidding?" he muttered, tugging on his hair with one hand. "I was never good enough for her. And I never will be," he continued. "I won't even get the chance to try."

"Whoa—buddy," Nate protested. "That's—not even true."

Chuck didn't seem to have heard Nate, either.

"God," he moaned, covering his face with his hands. "I am so completely fucked. She'll move on from me. But I can't. I just can't. Even if she tossed me aside, even if she forgot me completely, I couldn't stop loving her for a day. An hour.

"I have no idea what I'm going to do," he slowly said, and removed his hands from his face to reveal a pair of exhausted, bloodshot eyes.

Then his expression turned cold. "Where the fuck is Wendy with my fucking OxyContin?" he said angrily, and gave a sudden kick to the nearest leg of the pool table. It skidded a couple of inches away with a screech.

"Chuck—" Nate said in a gentle voice, and took his friend by the elbow and led him to the sofa. After making a half-hearted attempt or two to push Nate away, Chuck sank down onto the sofa's one remaining cushion, looking distraught—or, at least, Dan guessed that he looked distraught, since he had once again planted his face into his hands.

"Chuck—you'll see," Nate said, as he righted the coffee table in front of the sofa and sat down on its surface. "All of this is going to turn out all right. You know Blair's not going to end up with this guy. She loves you. And she always will."

Chuck didn't look at Nate. He just stared straight ahead with glazed-over eyes, and shook his head a couple of times, unable to speak.

"Look," Dan said, realizing that this might be his only chance to intercede on Blair's behalf. "Just let her talk to you. Let her try to make amends. Because she wants to. Honestly, I think she'd do just about anything to repair…you know. What she did."

At that moment, the elevator dinged, and they heard the sound of its doors sliding open.

"Finally," Chuck growled, and, setting his hand against the arm of the sofa, began the slow, arduous process of staggering onto his feet.

Dan turned his head towards the penthouse entrance, furrowing his brow, and listened to the approaching clack of high heels on the hardwood floor.

Who could that be, he wondered, as the stranger emerged from the foyer and stepped into the light.

Well. Only the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his entire life.

Her eyes were wide-set, rimmed in kohl, and her lips were full, lined with a ruby tint. Her nose was as tiny as a kitten's, and her red hair fell down around her heart-shaped face in old-fashioned movie-star waves.

Her little black dress—which Dan's mind instinctively abbreviated as an LBD, as a result of suffering though countless fashion commentaries from Blair—clung to her curves perfectly, and she strode across the floor in her four-inch stilettos as if she'd been born with them strapped to her feet.

Mesmerized, he watched her body undulate as she approached, and he did an involuntary double take at Nate when he rose from his perch on the coffee table and walked up to her as if her presence were nothing out of the ordinary.

"Hey Nate," said the red-haired goddess in a soft, sad sort of voice.

"Hey Wendy."

"Thanks for coming."

"Thanks for calling," Nate returned gratefully.

"Hey," Dan blurted out with a gauche wave of his hand—and instantly reprimanded himself for being the biggest dork in the world. "Uh...I'm Dan."

Wendy looked at him skeptically. "Who's he?" she asked Nate.

Dan felt his soul shrivel up like a worm on the sidewalk on a hot summer day.

"Uh—" Nate was about to explain, but Chuck was already shoving him out of the way and stumbling up to Wendy.

"Took you long enough. Pills," he demanded, holding out his hand.

"Hey," Wendy said, a note of warning in her voice. "Just because you're hurting right now doesn't mean you get to be an asshole to me."

Chuck didn't apologize—but he didn't say anything else to her either. He simply stood there and waited. Dan supposed that this was a sufficient display of remorse, since Wendy, after a short pause, reached into a little purse dangling from her wrist and handed Chuck a prescription bottle. He snatched it away from her and opened it as he walked towards the pool table, shaking out several pills onto his palm.

"Don't take so many at once," Wendy pleaded.

Chuck paid her no attention, and swallowed the pills with the help of yet another overflowing tumbler of scotch. Grabbing the decanter by its slender neck, he walked over to the couch and collapsed onto it, splashing the amber liquid all over the floor and down the front of his white shirt.

Wendy stood in front of him. "Are you done?" she asked impatiently, cocking a hand against her hip. "Because what you really need to do right now is sleep."

"I will in a minute," Chuck replied crossly. "Just as soon as the pills kick in."

"Well. In that case, I'm going to leave before you start up with the rambling again," Wendy declared, and Dan's heart sank as she turned towards the door.

Chuck's hand reached out and grasped her wrist like a striking snake.

"Stay," he ordered.

"Chuck, it's Friday night," she reminded him, exasperated. "I have to work. I can't keep blowing off all my other clients to take care of you."

"Donald Trump can reschedule," Chuck said angrily. "I'll pay you whatever you want."

Given her testiness earlier, Dan was expecting Wendy to snap at him—but, to his surprise, she paused for a moment, and tucking a strand of her flame-red hair behind her ear, squatted down in front of Chuck. Laying her hand gently on his knee, she locked her eyes with his.

"You have people here who you don't have to pay," she said in a slow, emphatic voice. "Stop pushing them away."

Chuck regarded her for a moment, his callous expression beginning to crumble at the edges of his face.

"Just until I fall asleep," he negotiated, suddenly looking like a little boy again.

Wendy sighed. "Okay."

Chuck's eyes rolled back into his head. He began to nod off, but jerked his head back up with a start.

"Well, that should take about another thirty seconds," she remarked wryly. "Nate, can you get him to bed?"

"Sure, Wendy," Nate said compliantly, hooking his arm under Chuck's shoulders and guiding him onto his feet.

"Don't leave until I fall asleep," Chuck murmured over his shoulder to Wendy as Nate steered him out of the room.

"I won't," she assured him.

They left the room, and Dan found himself standing there with Wendy, alone.

He opened his mouth, and tried—and failed—to think of something clever to say.

She regarded him for a moment, the corner of her mouth tipping upwards with a hint of amusement. "Well, I don't know about you, Dan, but I could use a cigarette right now," she remarked. She jerked her head towards the balcony. "Keep me company?"

Later on, he realized that he must have said something out loud - "sure," "no problem," something like that. But inside of him there was only one word.

Yes.

—

"So what's been going on?" Wendy said as soon as they stepped outside, dodging the broken glass that lay all over the deck of the balcony.

She reached into her purse, extricating a cigarette—which she pursed between her lips—and a lighter—which she flicked into flame in front of her face, momentarily illuminating the beauty of her features.

"Oh, you know," Dan said in a put-on tone of nonchalance, relieved that a half-coherent sentence was coming out of his mouth for a change. "Just your usual Friday night at the Bass palace. Chuck breaking things. Talking shit. Trying to get me to punch him in the face. Oh—and making some bizarre homoerotic insinuations about Nate on ecstasy…"

Wendy's expression softened into something resembling nostalgia. "Oh, yeah," she murmured with a little knowing smirk. "Now that was a fun night."

Dan opened his mouth, only to discover he was at a loss for words.

"Are you a friend of Chuck's?" Wendy went on, as she turned up her elbow and held her cigarette aloft. "He's never mentioned you before."

"Uh—no. Not exactly. We….well, Chuck and I actually don't like each other very much. At all, really. It's just…I'm friends with Blair."

"Aha," Wendy said, raising her eyebrows. "Blair."

"You…you know her?"

"I know of her," she corrected with a little smile. "Can't say I've ever had the privilege of meeting Miss Waldorf."

"So…I guess…Chuck's mentioned some things to you..."

"Chuck and I go way back, Dan," Wendy explained. "When it comes to him, I know pretty much everything that's worth knowing."

"So you know about…what happened with Blair," Dan ventured.

"Yeah," she replied, a tinge of disappointment creeping into her voice.

"I'm guessing that's…why he called you? Because of Blair?"

"Dan—" Wendy replied, as if she were saying something painfully obvious. "Blair's the only reason he ever calls me anymore."

There was a short pause, during which she took a slow, ruminative drag on her cigarette, and seemed to be rehearsing what she was going to say next.

Dan watched her face as she inhaled, the red glowing end of her cigarette wobbling in the twilight. He wasn't exactly surprised that Chuck had been seeing a high-class prostitute over the past few days. But even though he was...well, not entirely outside of his rights, so to speak, considering Blair's recent entanglement with Mack—he was worried about how Blair would take it. After all—Chuck hadn't just been seeing a call girl, but one with whom he apparently had a longstanding…relationship.

Though what that relationship was, exactly…he couldn't really say.

"You know," Wendy finally broke the silence, exhaling out a haze of smoke, "I once watched this documentary about autism on YouTube. It was really interesting—it said that the sensation of being embraced has this…calming effect on autistic people. But the problem is…they're so introverted, that getting that close to another human being really freaks them out. So this woman with autism invented this….hugging machine. It clasps you. And you get the calming sensation without the…you know. Unwanted intimacy.

"That's what I am to Chuck," she continued. "Whenever he needs help calming down, but can't deal with being close to people—he calls me."

"Well. I imagine you do a little more than…you know. Hug him."

Dear God, he realized. I actually just said that out loud.

Wendy widened her eyes at him and let out a laugh. "You think?" she asked, teasing.

"Sorry…" Dan flailed. "I just…"

"Hey, no problem, friend," she said, lifting her cigarette to her smiling lips. "I am aware of what I do for a living."

Dan exhaled in relief.

"And that is how it used to be," Wendy continued, her eyes skimming over the distance thoughtfully. "Get in, get him off, go home. But not this time."

"You mean…you haven't been…" Dan searched for a euphemism.

Wendy shook her head. "It's just been a total weep-a-thon," she remarked in an unusually cold tone, and inhaled on her cigarette again.

Dan felt a surge of relief in his chest. "Are you…disappointed or something?" he asked.

"Having sex with someone is lot easier then dealing with their actual problems," she said in a wry voice. "And Chuck's got a lot of those."

"Huh. Yeah—twenty-year-old billionaires…they really have it rough," Dan returned in a bitter voice. "You know, what with the….being born into a life of privilege…never having to deal with consequences of their behavior…going on self-destructive binges…and destroying all of the people around them in the process," he finished. "That sort of thing."

Wendy looked at him and let out an incredulous noise.

"Look," she began. "I don't know you, Dan. But, Jesus—if you think that money makes everything easy, you're even more naïve than I thought."

Dan opened his mouth to retort, but she didn't give him the chance.

"He's the most love-starved person I've ever met," she went on, "and I meet a lot of them in my line of work. This latest debacle with Blair has really put him through the wringer."

"You know, he hasn't always been that great to her—" Dan tried to counter.

"Believe me, I know," Wendy interrupted. "I don't envy her, either. I don't imagine he's an easy man to love."

She took one final drag off her cigarette, and flicked it off of the balcony into the street below.

"By the way," she said in an edgy voice as she turned around, "the next time you talk to Blair…I'd rather you didn't mention me."

"Oh?" Dan was not surprised.

"I think you'll agree that it's better for all parties involved if Blair Waldorf remains blissfully unaware of my existence," Wendy remarked. "I don't much fancy the idea of getting caught between the two of them."

"I…well. I completely understand," Dan said, wishing he could be so lucky.

Wendy's phone let out a sudden peep.

"Excuse me," she said, holding up a finger, and took her phone from her purse and stepped a few feet away from him.

"Jeremy," Dan heard her purr into the receiver. "I know, I know—I'm running late. But look…I promise I'll stay over for breakfast this time. Is that okay with you, baby? ….good. Glad to hear it. Yes—crêpes do sound lovely. Okay. I promise—I'll be over ASAP. Okay. Ciao, handsome."

She pressed a button on her phone and dropped it back into her purse.

"Busy night?" he asked.

Wendy rolled her eyes. "I only have one appointment," she said. "He's booked me every Friday night for the past six weeks. And he's a good-looking kid, and he's ridiculously sweet—but I swear to God, I'm starting to think that it's not worth the trouble. The poor thing is obviously head over heels in love with me. He's driving my assistant insane…she can barely keep track of all his calls…"

She sighed and raised her hands in a gesture of frustration. "I'm supposed to be providing a very simple service," she explained. "But I always end up having to deal with everyone's insecurities and neuroses and daddy-doesn't-love-me issues."

Dan laughed. "I think I…can imagine why that might get annoying after a while," he said.

"Ehh," Wendy said with a shrug. "I should stop complaining. I mean—it's an occupational hazard. Transference, I mean."

She paused for a moment. "I just refuse to lie," she said—softly, as though it were only an afterthought, but something told Dan otherwise.

She checked the time on her phone. "I really do need to go," she said. "Jeremy's been really anxious to see me, and he's kind of…delicate, and I don't want to keep him waiting any longer."

She turned towards the door to the balcony. "Chuck has to have passed out by now, right?" she asked.

"Well, if he's not dead, I'm sure that OxyContin knocked him right out," Dan conjectured in a joking way.

"Hmm," Wendy hummed. "Well—actually, they were only sugar pills." Smiling, she tipped her finger to her lips in a "shh" gesture. "But don't tell Chuck that, or they won't work."

They heard the crunch of breaking glass, and turned their heads to see Nate step out onto the littered deck.

"Is he finally asleep?" she asked.

"Yeah," Nate said. "He had quite a bit to say about Blair before he passed out, though…"

"Well, that's hardly anything out of the ordinary," Wendy said in a dry voice.

She pulled the strap of her purse over her shoulder.

"Time for me to go," she declared to the two men. "Nate—please. Call me if you need me. But, um, honestly—I hope that you won't have to."

"I hope so, too," Nate said sadly.

Wendy walked up to him, looking him in the eyes, and pressed her hand to his shoulder in an affectionate way. "Thanks again for coming back," she said.

"Hey—no problem."

Wendy turned back to glance at Dan. "See you around," she said over her shoulder.

Dan coughed. "Yeah. Uh—nice to meet you and everything."

And with that, Wendy was walking away, texting out a message with two thumbs (to Jeremy, no doubt, Dan thought) as she disappeared into the penthouse door.

Nate sighed. He ran his hands over his face and through his hair, and walked up to the railing of the balcony. He leaned against it, surveying the Manhattan cityscape with an unreadable expression. After watching him for a moment, Dan crept up to his right and mimicked him, laying his elbows against the rail.

A loaded silence fell between the two of them.

"So….what now?" Nate asked, still looking straight ahead.

"Well," Dan began haltingly. "I'm thinking…we need to figure out a way to get Chuck and Blair back together."

Nate nodded several times.

"I mean—if not for their own psychological health…then for ours," Dan added.

Nate let out a short, breathy laugh. "Yeah," he confirmed.

There was another beat of silence.

Nate broke it.

"So…." he said slowly, looking at Dan over his shoulder. "Do you want to call Serena? Or should I?"

A/N: I smell a plot coming on...

What did you think of this chapter, guys? Do you think Dan and Nate will be able to keep up their little alliance with Serena in the picture? Will Blair ever be able to convince Chuck that she really does love him? Or will Mack...or Wendy...do something to complicate matters?

Let me know what you think and where you want it to go! I always try to take my reviews into accounts when planning out future chapters. :)