REMINDER: This story takes place after Desperately Seeking Serena (SAT eppy!). Hence, no video has been delivered to Serena. The sex tape does not exist thus far in the world I'm writing in. Doesn't mean I couldn't add one, but for now, it's not there.
Chapter Eleven
SPOTTED: Show down on the steps of the Met. B and S as BFFs? No more. Word is that S and N carried on behind B's back. B forgave her like a good BFF might, but something else from S's past has shown up to give B problems too. Apparently, B's had it and wants no more. B and S's love fest has become a hate filled extravaganza. And the rest of Constance's royal court has backed their former Queen. Do we spy a return to power on the horizon?
But what about little J? She was spotted stepping out of a shiny new carriage. Is our little J being courted? And if so, by whom? We all know that a Queen needs a King to rule their subjects. Is little J going to give B a run for her crown? And just who is this new love interest?
Never fear, I shall return soon with all the deets. When there's a will, there's a way. You know you love me, XOXO Gossip Girl.
"Care to explain?" Chuck said, waving his phone at her.
Serena sighed. She'd just gotten home after managing to get through a day of glares and stares. She'd managed to avoid Nate entirely although that wouldn't last long considering that the four of them were supposed to be working together against Georgina. Of course, now she couldn't be seen in public with Blair because that would tip Georgie off for sure.
"Not really," Serena said sarcastically. She should have known Chuck would show up and demand answers immediately. She and Blair had made the decision to go through with this without consulting Nate or Chuck first. They knew the boys, especially Chuck, weren't going to like it, but it needed to be done.
They were interrupted when Serena's phone rang.
She held up her hand, "Just a sec."
Chuck sighed in exasperation. He wanted answers now.
"Hey," Serena said softly in greeting.
"I'm so sorry, S!" Blair said. "I didn't mean a word I said, you know that right? I love you, love you, love you! I didn't know the girls would act that way! I don't know how to fix this, but we will, okay? I'm right here for you. I promise!"
"B, it's okay," Serena said softly, trying to soothe Blair. "You couldn't have known how the girls would react. But we did it. We got what we wanted. Georgina should be calling me sometime this evening. We'll know for sure then if it worked."
Chuck raised his brows, the questioning look on his face disappeared into a smirk and he shook his head in amusement.
"And I know you didn't mean any of it, silly," Serena gave a small laugh. "I didn't mean anything I said either. That was the plan. Just relax. I love you too, B."
"I can't believe how well that went," Blair said, finally letting out a deep breath of relief.
"Well, we've had a lot of practice," Serena said with a small laugh.
"True," Blair laughed. "I don't know what to do now. I miss you already and it's only been six hours!"
"I'll be a phone call away, B," Serena promised. "Don't worry. And the thing with the girls? We'll worry about that later, after we've dealt with Georgina. I can deal with that, I've done it before. Let's just worry about one thing at a time, okay?"
"Right," Blair said, though she was still feeling a lot of guilt about doing this to Serena.
Chuck cleared his throat impatiently.
Serena rolled her eyes, "Look, B, I have an unwanted visitor at the moment. Let me handle this and I'll call you back."
They hung up and Serena collapsed on the couch.
"So," Chuck said slowly. "You two staged that?"
"Uh huh," Serena nodded.
"It's all I've heard about all day," Chuck shook his head. "It must've been some fight."
"It was," Serena murmured.
"Did Nate know about this?" he asked.
"Nu uh," Serena shook her head.
"Well, that's something considering I thought we were supposed to be a team on this," Chuck said sarcastically. Though he was glad Nate didn't know because at least Chuck wasn't the only one left out.
"We are a team," Serena insisted. "We just… decided to do it."
"Uh, huh, sure," Chuck said, shaking his head. "And what were you hoping to achieve?"
"For her to leave Blair alone," Serena said.
"Did it work?"
"I won't know until she calls," Serena mumbled.
"Well, in that case, I hope it did work," Chuck said. "Otherwise this all would have been for nothing."
"I know that, Chuck," Serena almost whined, annoyed. "Just do your job and this will all be over."
"Don't you think this is all a little extreme?" he asked. "So Blair will be known to experiment a little with the fairer sex, but that can't be worse than what you just did to yourself."
"Look," Serena snapped, drawing herself up. "She's already been through enough thanks to you. I'm not letting her get hurt again because of me."
"Point taken," he murmured.
"I just hope you know what you're doing," he shook his head. "As to the other, I've got nothing that will be of any real use."
"No outstanding warrant for her arrest in Balfour that we could use to get her shipped out of the country?" Serena replied sarcastically. "I thought better of you."
Chuck glared at her for a moment, not appreciating her uncharacteristic wit.
"Plan B. I need to follow her," he finally ground out. "Find out where she's staying and get inside. Find a way to delete all traces of any pictures she has from that night."
Serena sat up quickly, her back ramrod straight as she realized the problem with that statement. "And… how are you going to do that? I thought she was staying at The Palace." That's where she'd gone for her initial confrontation.
"She's been staying some place else now. Call Dan," he said simply. "Get him to set up a get together with our little stalker. I need to follow her home."
"I'm going with you," she insisted. She had to go with him. If he managed to get inside and find the real pictures… shit.
"Suit your self," he shrugged. "We need to follow her tonight."
"I guess Dan can do that," she said slowly, knowing Dan's reluctance to have anything to do with her.
"He's gonna have to," Chuck said firmly. "I leave tomorrow night."
"Crap, that's right," Serena sighed. "How are we supposed to do this without you?"
"Ah, so you actually admit that you need me," he said, smirking.
"Now is not the time," she snapped. Leave it to Chuck to make some sort of innuendo right now, the jerk!
"We follow her tonight and then he'll have to plan something again tomorrow so we can make sure she's gone when we get there," he finished explaining the plan.
"And how do you suppose we get in? If we break down the door or a window, she's gonna know what we did and if she's out with Dan, she'll know that he's on to her," Serena sighed in frustration.
"Sis," he said with a condescending smirk. "Money talks."
"Great, so we're going to bribe our way in?" Serena said.
He nodded.
She was silent for a moment, contemplating.
"We're going to have to make sure whoever it is won't talk anyway," she thought out loud. "And what if she has a backup copy of the photos or something? And…" she slapped her forehead. "Her cell phone! It has the originals. How are we supposed to get that? Chuck, this is never going to work!"
"Relax," he said. "We'll figure it out."
"What? You gonna have Dan borrow her phone and swap out the sim card or something? She'll definitely be tipped off then, and we can't guarantee all the pictures are gone then either!" Serena mouthed off, not seeing how any of this would actually work.
"Not a bad idea," he said with some admiration. Maybe he'd seriously underestimated Serena.
"Ugh!" she threw up her hands when she realized she'd only gotten things more convoluted.
"Just relax," Chuck said, eyes staring at her curiously. "Have him swap out the card, then drop the phone in the toilet or something."
"Because that won't in anyway be suspicious," she said. "Dan does not need her as an enemy."
"Well, who else is going to get the phone?" Chuck inquired.
Serena had a thought and she started to mention it before she shook her head and looked down.
"What?" he asked.
"Nothing," she murmured.
"You had a thought, come on, spill," Chuck said.
"Well… Dan said that Georgina sort of was talking to Jenny…" she trailed off.
"Talking to her? About what?" he asked.
"You know, making friends or whatever," she explained. "But we can't ask Jenny to help. She'd want to know what Georgina has on Blair and I'm not sure whose hands that information would be more dangerous in."
"So don't tell her," he said simply. "Don't involve Blair at all. Jenny thinks you two aren't friends now… because of some person making trouble for her…"
Serena's eyes widened with realization.
"Now you're getting it," he remarked, pleased.
"Appeal to the love," he said the word with disgust, "she has for her brother. Tell Jenny that Georgina's playing Dan but you can't do anything about it because…" he trailed off in thought.
She shook her head. "This isn't going to work. That's too many lies. Plus, Dan doesn't want Jenny to have anything to do with Georgina."
"…she has a snuff video of you and she'll use it," he finished with a satisfied smirk, not even acknowledging her words.
"What?" she exclaimed.
"Jenny hates Blair, not you," he said. "If she thinks that this girl is hurting you or her brother, she's going to want to help. Tell her the truth about what happened last year. Tell her Georgina made a tape. Tell her that you're going to find the tape and erase it, but mention that Georgina has a part of the video streamed onto her phone that she sent to you, which is why you need to get rid of the phone."
"Chuck, that's crazy!" she said.
"Crazy enough to work," he finished.
"So, let me get this straight," she said slowly, thinking about everything they'd just discussed. "Dan's gonna meet her tonight. We will follow her home. I'm going to tell Jenny this huge story to get her on our side. Jenny's going to hang with her tomorrow night while we break into Georgina's place, meanwhile Jenny is going to take care of Georgina's cell phone… and we're going to do all this without getting caught, and without tipping Georgina off about anything until she gets home?"
"That pretty much sums it up," he said, analyzing every angle.
"So what happens if Dan can't meet with her tonight or Jenny won't help? Or Jenny can't meet with her? Or if the landlord can't be bought? Or if the photos aren't even there!" she ended with a shriek.
"You really need to get laid," he deadpanned. "You're too high strung. Tell Dan he should work on that."
"Ah!" she picked up a couch pillow and threw it at him.
"My point exactly," he laughed, catching the harmless projectile.
"Leave my sex life out of this," she snapped. "And this is never going to work!"
"Yes, it will," he reaffirmed.
"Fine, I just need to run this by Blair first," she finally said. "If she thinks it will work, we'll do it. If not, you're going to need a plan C, C."
He rolled his eyes but just shrugged. If Blair wanted the pictures destroyed, she would agree. He didn't see any other way himself.
"Meanwhile, you're going to have to deal with Nate," he reminded her.
"Gah! Can't you do that for me?" Serena moaned. "I've had too much crap to deal with today."
"Well, I could," Chuck rolled his eyes once again. "Except he's still not talking to me."
"Can't you just work it out or something?" she moaned. "Go and apologize. Beg. Cry a little. Throw yourself at his feet. That worked for me."
He stared at her like she had two heads.
"Don't look at me like that!" she snapped. "You messed it up, now you fix it."
"Because Blair had nothing to do with it?" he asked sarcastically.
"This isn't about Blair and Nate, this is about you and Nate," she said.
"Yeah, well, that's not going to be fixed any time soon," he said.
"I guess I'll call him," she finally sighed. "I'm just glad I didn't run into him today… which was weird. I thought for sure he'd want to know what happened as soon as Gossip Girl posted it."
He shrugged. "He wasn't in school today."
"Why not?"
"I'm not privy to that information anymore," he gave her a pointed look.
"Riiight," she drawled out.
"You can leave now," she dismissed him before leaning back against the couch and twiddling her phone in her hands, waiting for the call she'd been waiting for since her fight with Blair.
"Maybe I should call her…" she thought out loud.
"Word of advice?" he said.
"Hmm?" she muttered.
"Don't call her, and when Georgina calls, don't answer it," he said.
"But… I need to," she said, confused.
"If you call her now, she's going to know it was staged," he explained. "If you were going to call, you should have done it right after the fight so you could yell at her while you were still supposedly angry. Now would just be silly. And if she calls and you answer, she's going to be suspicious too. If you don't answer, she's going to think you're mad at her, which will make the fight seem that much more real."
"How do you know all this?" she asked, perplexed.
"Because it's what I'd think," he said with a shrug. "Call Dan and get him to set things up, then call me with the time and place."
"Fine," she said. She watched him leave, pondering the songs she was going to download on her ipod for tonight's stakeout. Anything to not have to listen to Chuck's 'witty banter' for hours.
"Chuck!" she called out.
He turned, arching an eyebrow.
"…thank you," she managed to say.
He looked momentarily surprised before shrugging, "You're family."
Then he left her with her mouth dropped open in complete shock.
Serena knew that Chuck had been taking this family thing kind of strangely seriously, but deep down she never thought he really got the idea of what family was.
She'd never been more glad to be so wrong.
"Listen Nate, it was all staged, and I'm sorry we didn't tell you about it before we did it, but we just decided at the last minute and I'm so sorry," Serena apologized quickly, hoping that he wouldn't be too ticked.
"Whoa, Serena, slow down," Nate said. "What are you talking about?"
"… haven't you… where have you been all day? Why weren't you in school? And don't you ever read your messages?" she asked, thoroughly confused. Great, now she was going to have to tell him what they did. She really didn't want to have this conversation.
"My dad came home today, I was with him all day," he explained.
"Really?" she felt a pang of guilt that he was going to have to deal with more drama on top of his already massive drama-load. "How is he? How is your mother? How are you?"
"I'm fine, Serena," he laughed. "He's fine. Mom went to the Hampton's early to open the house. Oh, and she's not going to make the wedding, so it'll just be me and Dad… and Vanessa, if that's okay? She can take my mom's place."
"Uh, sure, that's fine…" Serena said softly, reading between the lines. All was not okay with the Archibalds, not if Anne had left the city on the day Howard returned home. Especially not if Anne was willing to miss the wedding of the century too.
And now she had to tell Nate what happened… crap.
"So, what were you talking about? What messages?" he asked. "How's everything going? Do you need my help?"
"Well, see, Blair and I, well, we sort of had this fight," she tried to explain. "And it was all staged for Georgina so that she would leave Blair alone, but um…"
"Yes?"
"We needed to make sure she believed it, so we decided to spill a little secret we had…" she said. "And now Gossip Girl and the whole school know about us."
"About what?" he asked. "The pictures came out or something?"
"No, Nate," Serena sighed. "Us as in you and me. As in the Shepherd Wedding."
"Oh…"
"Nate, I'm sorry! And it was completely my idea, Blair didn't even want to do it, but I made her and I'm sorry we didn't tell you and—"
"Serena!" he called over her rambling apology. "Serena! It's alright, I'm not mad."
"You're… not?" Serena said, surprised and hopeful.
"I said I would help anyway I could," he explained. "With the stuff with dad, I can't do much. But fending off a rumor from Gossip Girl? Not even a blip on my radar."
"Well, good, I mean… you know what I mean," Serena almost laughed, which she realized was something she hadn't been doing a lot of lately.
"Just do your thing," Nate shrugged through the phone. "I don't think it's possible to make things worse for me, so have at it. And… tell Blair… tell Blair… well, just so you know, if you need my help for anything else, call me."
"I will, Nate," Serena said with a soft smile. He'd been about to say that he would do anything to help Blair too! It might be possible for Nate and Blair to at least become friends again! She hoped she managed to keep hope out of her voice.
"I probably won't be in school for the rest of the week either," he said. "But I'll be sure to keep my phone available, and I'll even read the Gossip Girl message, okay?"
"Okay," Serena said. "Take care, Nate. I hope everything works out with your dad."
"Yeah, me too."
"Absolutely not!"
"Are you sure?" Serena asked softly.
"S, today would have been for nothing then!" Blair exclaimed. "We could have just done this to begin with and not even bothered with the fight!"
"But we don't know what else she could have done to you before we did it," Serena explained. "And she still does have the pictures. We need to get rid of them."
"I know that," Blair said. "But… Jenny? I don't want her anywhere near those photos!"
"Blair, the fight just bought us some time," Serena said, wondering why she was defending Chuck's plan.
"Did it? Has she called?" Blair asked.
"Yes…" Serena trailed off.
"And what did she say? She believed it?" Blair asked.
"I don't know," Serena sighed. "I didn't answer."
"What? Why not?"
"Because Chuck told me not to," Serena winced.
Blair sputtered, "What?"
"He said she would be more likely to believe that it wasn't staged if I didn't answer… make her think I was really mad at her," she explained quickly.
"Well… he has a point," Blair finally obliged.
"So… you really don't want to try to destroy the pictures?" Serena said slowly.
"Of course, I do, but…" Blair sighed too. "He can't see them either. How are you going to make sure he doesn't?"
"I don't know, I'll think of something…" Serena said. "We should at least find out where she's staying right?"
"I guess," Blair said.
"So, I'll call Dan and we'll follow her as planned," Serena said.
"But I still don't like involving Jenny," Blair argued. "And I still don't like the idea of Chuck being there."
"We'll figure out the rest, B," Serena said. She knew Dan wouldn't appreciate her involving Jenny either… she'd have to see if she could figure something else out for tomorrow. "I'll call Dan and set up tonight."
"I hope you and Chuck know what you're doing," Blair finally gave in.
"So do I."
"You will never make a good cop."
"Why? Because I'd rather listen to my music then listen to your endless prattle?" Serena said sarcastically. "Besides, I never wanted to be a cop and sit through boring stake outs and dodge bullets and eat donuts."
"Aw, and here I was attempting to make it authentic," Chuck smirked.
Serena rolled her eyes. She still couldn't believe Chuck had brought gourmet donuts along in the limo. She knew he had a warped sense of humor, but that was just silly.
"Just stay on your side of the limo, and I'll stay on my side," she snapped before putting her ear buds back in place.
"You know," he said loud enough for her to hear over the music, "we'd probably be less conspicuous in a town car or a cab."
She yanked the buds out of her ears. "Well, this was all your idea. Shouldn't you have thought of that before now?" She hadn't even managed to get a half hour of quiet before he got bored and started with her.
He shrugged.
"I forgot about a nightstick too," he shook his head. "I must be slipping."
"As if you need to be wielding a nightstick!" she snapped before she realized how stupid that sentence was.
He smirked in amusement.
"Do not comment on that!" she yelped.
"You make it too easy," he shrugged.
"Would you just shut up!" she yelled.
"But, sis, this is the perfect opportunity for us to bond," he said, feigning innocence.
"Chuck!" she hollered.
"Fine," he settled back into his seat and stared out the window toward the coffee house Dan had gotten Georgina to go to. Poetry readings? How lame was that? He knew Georgina had to be getting bored by now. He wouldn't be surprised if she left sooner rather than later.
He looked at Serena who was effectively ignoring him again with her stupid ipod.
He shrugged. Well, he was bored, so….
Serena sniffed the air a minute later and turned to look at him in shock.
"What are you doing?"
He took a slow drag on the blunt and blew out the sweet smoke before looking at her.
"What does it look like?"
"Chuck! You are not smoking pot right now!" she squealed.
"It would seem that I am," he smirked before taking another drag.
"What is wrong with you!" she squeaked. She would snatch it from him and throw it out the window if she wasn't so worried about the real police seeing a lighted herbal projectile let loose out of her hand.
"Nothing now," he lazily grinned.
She hit him hard in the arm. "Put that out!"
"Ow," he said, grabbing his arm. "Stay on your side, sis," he said, making fun of her earlier words.
"Well, keep your smoke on your side!" she hollered.
"I could roll down the window," he suggested.
"No!" she smacked his hand that was reaching for the automatic window switch.
"Suit your self," he shrugged and relaxed again, attempting to ignore her.
"Chuck!"
"Do you mind?" he said. "I'm trying to get some peace and quiet here."
"Argh!" she exclaimed before relocating to the other end of the limo.
Great, she thought. Now she was getting baked with Chuck Bass.
Blair was right, this was a stupid idea.
Tell me what can you want?
You've got it all.
She wished. She didn't have it all. Not even close.
Things are real in a handshake.
Rest my bones these days in a different way.
Cherish the change; it may not stay.
Change was never good. And resting bones… well, she'd rested with plenty of guys in many different ways. But, it felt good being back in the Upper East Side; the only problem was that things had changed far too much. She couldn't rest the way she used to, knowing that Serena wasn't her friend. And now, it looked like she never would be again.
Serena hadn't answered her phone call earlier, which meant that she was probably furious that she'd lost Blair because of Georgina.
Georgina had read the little blogger's update. She was suspicious at first, but the fact that Blair had revealed that little secret about Serena and Nate, well, that sort of told her that it was very real. Snow White would never want to be humiliated like that. She wouldn't want people to know that her best friend and boyfriend had played her for a fool.
And then there was the added fact that Serena hadn't answered when she called.
I remember your dress,
Like dreams when you wake with a sudden start.
You're beside me in the dark,
Wrapped in my arms.
Oh, so that's how he was resting his bones differently. She shrugged. She could care less about his wet dreams. She looked at the scruffy dark haired guy on the stage. Yes, she really could care less about his wet dreams.
Love is being entranced in a glance,
To muster up courage when you're flustered,
To stumble on the words you prepare.
Everyone knew you couldn't define love, she thought with disgust. She'd given up on finding that elusive thing years ago. Love didn't exist. It was like religion. People needed something to believe in, so they believed in love. When in reality, that was lust talking buddy-boy.
Georgina didn't believe in anything, except the friendship she had with Serena van der Woodsen. And even now that was gone.
People lived and people hurt and people died.
That was the only thing she'd learned in life. It was time for Serena to learn that hard lesson too. It was time for Serena to give up on stupid things like love.
Don't worry about the money that went down the drain
Because the best things in life are free.
Everyone in the coffee house started clapping as the guy left the stage. Georgina just stared back and forth between the stage and the crowd, especially Dan, unable to believe they were clapping at that mess.
The rest of the poem was intriguing and thought provoking, but the end was just campy. And people were clapping?
The host came up to announce a ten minute break and she saw this as her chance.
"You know, Dan, I'm not really feeling well tonight," she said. And she hadn't gotten any further with stupid Dan Humphrey either. She'd been pleased when he invited her out, until she realized it was a poetry reading, gag! She didn't know how in the world she was going to manipulate things with him to get him in bed—because, of course, that was the end game here.
It was pissing her off actually. He actually seemed to worship the ground Serena walked on. How could Georgina compete with that? Especially when he thought she had a boyfriend too? Maybe she was going to have to give 'Jack', her imaginary boyfriend, the boot…
"What's wrong?" he pretended concern. "Are you okay?"
"No…" she shook her head, deciding to go ahead with her idea. "Jack and I broke up."
"Oh, no, wow," he said. "I'm sorry."
"Yeah, well," she looked away as if she was upset. She really should have been an actress. "It had to end sometime… I just really thought… he was the one, you know?"
"I'm really sorry," he managed to say, not sure what else he was supposed to say. He knew from Serena that Georgina didn't really have a boyfriend, so obviously he was getting the tears and lies as part of some new plot. The pit of his stomach dropped. He didn't know how to handle bitchy manipulative females.
Sure, he could handle Blair, but he didn't have to pretend to like her—even though she wasn't that horrible. Plus, he was realizing that Georgina made Blair look like an angel.
"Could I just hang out with you someplace quiet? Go for a walk? Or to the park? Or back to your loft?" she said, stifling a mock sob.
"I really wish I could," he said apologetically. "But I promised Dad I would get home early. He's been working on that VH1 thing all week and he has an interview tomorrow that he wants me to help him prep for."
Well, that was a big whopper of a lie. He impressed himself with it. He just needed to get away from her and send her on her way. He didn't like Serena being stuck in a limo with Chuck for too long.
"That's too bad," she said morosely. Damn it, why wasn't this working?
"I'm really sorry," he said again, for lack of a better thing to say. "Want me to get you a cab? See you home?"
She shook her head tearfully. "No, I'll just walk. I'll be okay."
"Are you sure?" he cursed. Walking was going to make it more difficult for Serena and Chuck to follow her. "You don't know what kind of crazies might be out there just waiting in the shadows."
"The crazies don't bother me," she said. The crazies should be scared of her, she smirked to herself.
Dan managed a nod and followed her to the exit. Well, his job was done… but the following part; that was going to be difficult. Why couldn't she have just taken a cab home?
Shit.
"Shit!"
"What?"
"She's walking," Chuck said, putting the butt out quickly. "Didn't you tell him to make sure she got a cab or something?"
"Well obviously she wanted to walk!" she complained. She went to the door and started to open it.
"What are you doing?" he grabbed the door handle before she could push it.
"Following her!"
"In that outfit and with that hair?" he said, eyeing her blue dress and flyaway perfect blonde hair.
"What's wrong with my hair?" she said, startled.
"She'll recognize you in an instant if she looked over her shoulder," he slapped her hand away. "I'll go."
He opened the door and she grabbed his arm.
"What?" he said impatiently.
She grabbed his scarf and pulled it off. "Now she won't recognize you."
"Be careful with that," he said, before leaving.
She tossed it away from her onto the seat.
Ew.
"What are you doing here?"
"I had to come and find out what's going on," Blair said. "I couldn't sit at home anymore."
"Well, I don't know what's going on," Serena sighed, tossing her bag and the box of donuts on the hall table. She was glad to be home.
"Right," Blair rolled her eyes.
"Chuck just scampered off after her when she left," Serena muttered. "He wouldn't let me follow her by foot because he didn't want her to recognize me. I haven't heard from him yet, and I'm too afraid to call him because I don't know if he remembered to turn his cell phone off, and he was high so he might have, and if I call him and he's near her, she might hear it."
Blair just stared at her for a full moment.
Then she couldn't help it. She started laughing.
"Blair!"
"He… he… he… went walking?" Blair collapsed on the couch. "Chuck Bass is walking all over New York City?"
Serena started to smile too, seeing the hilarity in that.
"How… How…" Blair tried to catch her breath. "How long ago did he leave?"
"About an hour?" she said.
"And… he was high?" Blair started laughing again. "How high was he?"
"High enough to tell me to take care of his scarf?" she shrugged, holding the disgusting thing up.
Blair burst out laughing. She couldn't help it. It had been so long since she'd had a real laugh.
Serena threw the scarf at her. "You take it."
"I don't want that," Blair squealed, throwing the thing right back at Serena. "He asked you to protect it. So you must! Protect it with your life!" She dissolved into laughter again.
Serena held the thing away from her, dangling it by her thumb and pointer finger. "I really don't see the appeal."
"Don't mock the scarf," a different voice mumbled.
Blair stopped laughing almost immediately when she saw none other than Chuck Bass himself standing in the entryway. She looked away and flicked an imaginary piece of lint off her skirt.
"So? Did you find out where she lives?" Serena asked impatiently, throwing his scarf at him.
Chuck took his most prized possession and wrapped it back around his neck, glancing in the mirror on the wall across the room to make sure it was just so.
"Mission accomplished."
To be continued…
Poem:
Untitled work by Ed Westwick
