A/N: This one is short. I couldn't quite get through the whole day, but I wanted to post something. Sorry it was a CRAZY weekend but more to come really soon. Thanks to all who reviewed. You guys are awesome.
For Mary: who always encourages me to write.
Chapter 21
Friday – part 1
The alarm went off the same as it always did. One single stream of sunlight was shining through the small opening in the curtains. Everything in the room looked the same as every other day he had rolled over and smacked the top of the clock. Except it wasn't. Nothing was the same. The warm body curled into his, silky hair brushing up against his cheek. He never would have believed it was possible to feel so good, so content, so perfect.
The lazy smile played across his face as he shifted up on his arm. His fingers pushed back the hair that had settled over her face. Watching her lip curl up he couldn't help but trace the outline from the corner of her mouth. She rolled slowly over to look up into his eyes. Eyes that shined and smiled out at him. Him, Chuck Bass. He never imagined in his wildest dreams that this was possible. For her to want him as more than just a friend or an occasional lover, it was heaven.
He watched her forehead scrunch up so cute, knowing she couldn't quite figure out what was going through his head and it was making her crazy.
Answering her question before she could ask it, "I was just thinking how good this all feels." Leaning in to place the softest kiss on her lips.
Looking up into his face, she wasn't sure she had ever seen him look truly happy. The thought that she had somehow done that made her chest clench. "Well you better get used to it, because this is how it is going to be from now on." Her voice was firm, that one he heard when she had made her mind up. He knew better than anyone that once she did that it took heaven and earth to change it.
"Yes Ma'am" He leaned down and kissed her. Deepening the kiss, his hand tangling in her hair. She wrapped around him, her fingers stroking up and down his back.
"Beep, Beep, Beep"… Chuck groaned into her neck before rolling over and smacking the alarm again. Snooze just wasn't nearly as long as it should be.
Blair giggled, "You should get going, I wouldn't want to cut into your primping time." One second he was glaring at her the next he launched himself at her, tickling her until she was convulsing in laughs. "Can't breath, stop...stop…"
"Say Chuck is the master." He stopped his assault for a second.
"No."
His fingers renewed their adventure into her sides. "Say it, you know you want to." He was grinning, almost hoping she wouldn't give in.
"All right, I give, I give." She was breathless and panting. He loved seeing her this way, with a huge smile on her face.
He held her pinned down, leaning in close. "You didn't say the magic words."
She grinned up at him, "I love you."
He was jolted if only for a minute. His heart swelled and his chest tightened simultaneously, making it difficult to breath. He hadn't gotten used to this yet. For Chuck all these feelings were so new. He had never told a girl he loved her and now it was apparently something you said as easily as 'good morning'.
His hesitation scared her. "Chuck?" He heard the question in her voice, but had no idea now to answer it.
Suddenly Blair realized that for Chuck this was all completely unfamiliar territory. She told Nate she loved him all the time and he parroted it back to her just like she expected. She should have known that it would be hard for Chuck. He wasn't used to all this intimacy. Well maybe he could teach her a thing or two in the sexual side of the bedroom, but she was going to help him on this part.
"Chuck, you don't have to say anything. I'll just keep telling you until you get used to it. Ok. Now why don't you get ready for school?" She was caressing his cheek, trying to ease what seemed like tension and fear in his eyes.
Finally his stance softened and he pulled her up into a hug until he was sitting in the bed with her in his lap. Whispered into her hair, "I'll figure all this out, just give me some time."
Hugging him tighter, she softly replied, "Take all the time you need, I'm here."
He pulled back and kissed her on the forehead and then got up and went into the bathroom, closing the door.
Chuck kissed her and left for school. Blair sighed knowing this was the last school day that she would spend in the safe confines of the Bass suite. Pushing herself up she went to get the notebook the shrink had her keeping and starting reading over everything she had written.
After a couple of hours of reading and more writing Blair had come to a conclusion. She had to talk to Nate. She realized that seeing Jenny had helped. Well and it was even better that the girl had appeared truly sorry and remorseful. She was pretty sure that Nate would not feel the same.
There was nothing that Blair could do about all the spiteful girls that she had once called friend. Honestly she really didn't care. The thing with Nate was partly her fault, she should never have gone back to him, she knew that now. Looking back, she simply should have stayed with Chuck and trusted him. He could have taken her to the cotillion and everything would have been fine. No outing of her dirty laundry, no fighting between Chuck and Nate, she could have made it all turn out different.
Dr. Rosen had told her to stop dwelling on the past and embrace what you can make of the future. It sounded like a hokey add for the armed forces 'embrace your future'. At this point Blair was willing to give anything a try.
Picking up her phone she texted Serena.
Call me at your next break.
Serena called at 11:03. "Hey B, what's up?"
"S, I need a favor."
"Ok."
"I need you to tell Nate to meet you in Chuck's room as soon as school is out."
"What??"
"Then I need you to distract Chuck for at least half-an-hour."
"Blair are you out of your mind? Why do you want to see Nate? Why can't Chuck know? Are you trying to get Nate back??" Serena's voice was rising so fast she was going to move into a range only dogs could hear soon.
"God No. I don't want Nate back, but I do have to talk to him. I can't do that with Chuck here."
"B I think this is a really bad idea." Serena didn't want to say that Blair didn't seem to do so well with anything if Chuck wasn't around.
"Look Serena I have to come back to school on Monday and I need to do that without having a breakdown, so you need to help me with this." Blair knew that Serena was going to give in, she wasn't someone who took guilt well.
"All right, but I make no promises about how long I can keep Chuck busy. It's not easy keeping him away from you these day."
"I know." Serena could hear the smile in Blair's voice across the airwaves. This seriously had been the strangest week.
"Thanks S. I fill you in on everything later. K, Bye"
"Bye." Serena paused and hoped that Blair knew what she was doing. She also considered the fact that Blair had never questioned her ability to get Nate up to the suite. She wasn't sure she shouldn't be bothered by that, but considering she already knew exactly how to do it she left that thought alone. She had much a much bigger problem, and its name was Chuck Bass.
Shortly after 2 Serena sent a text to Nate to meet her at Chuck's. He responded why, she said Chuck wouldn't be there…" just meet me please". Blah. Blah and Nate was in. That settled she moved on to her next plot.
She called Chuck. "Hello?" She heard the "why the hell are you calling me?" in his voice.
"Hey Chuck. So I was thinking about having like a little dinner party tonight, just you and Blair and me and Dan. Kind of a getting back into socializing kind of thing."
"I'm sure she'd like that, why are you telling me and not Blair?"
"Well she was just saying a couple of days ago that when she goes back to school it would be nice to have something to hang onto, you know like a reminder that she could get through everything. I guess we were talking about AA giving out those medallion things."
"What you want me to get her some kind of 'Suicide Survivor – 6 days and counting' medal?"
She rolled her eyes, "No. I just thought maybe you could pick her up something, you know jewelry or something. But if you don't want to I'll get her something myself." Serena knew Chuck well enough to know he didn't like being one-uped. He certainly wasn't going to let Serena get her something and then show up empty handed.
"I get it. Don't worry about it, I'll pick something up for her after school."
"Great, dinner is at 7." Serena was so chipper, she turned and kissed Dan in a way she rarely did in public. When she pulled away he was still looking at her a little oddly.
"I have to get to class, but at some point can you explain to me what just happened."
She laughed and kissed him swiftly before turning to run to class herself. "It was a kiss Dan."
She didn't need to look back to see him roll his eyes. A Blair Waldorf plan was usually just too much to explain on short notice and she wasn't fully sure she understood it herself.
"Daniel, any plans my man." Dan wasn't sure what alarmed him more. Chuck's arm around him on the happy greeting he had just received. A happy Chuck was still just a bit unnerving.
"Um, not really. I was gonna go home and then apparently there is a dinner tonight?"
"Yes, yes. And we my good sir are going to get some niceties for the ladies."
With that he pulled Dan into the limo. Twenty minutes later they were standing behind a counter at Tiffany's. Dan was feeling extremely out of place, especially when the lady at the counter called Chuck by name.
Chuck pointed to a diamond necklace. The lady took it out of the case and laid it on a blue velvet cloth. "It's beautiful, don't you think?" Chuck was fingering the edges and somehow from the look in his eye Dan thought he was imagining that it was already on Blair's neck.
"Um yeah, how much is it?"
The clerk looked up and eyeing him said, forty-two thousand without the matching earrings, of course.
"WHAT?" He couldn't help it. It rolled out of his mouth before he could stop himself.
Chuck looked up then, laughing "Don't worry man, I'll try not to outshine you too much."
Dan just stared at him, "Seriously you are just going to buy her a forty thousand dollar necklace just for the hell of it." His voice was hushed but Chuck suddenly remembered how really different Dan was from the rest of them.
Looking at the clerk he said, "excuse us we'll be right back."
Putting his arm around him and leading him away from other shoppers he tried to explain. "Dan I know it seems really extravagant, but it is all a matter of degrees. Your dad can afford to send you to private school, while some other poor slob has to go to public school, or someone else can't but a new pair of shoes. For me my family is loaded even more than Serena's or Blair's. If I spend forty grand on a necklace it isn't the end of the world, I've seen my Dad buy two million dollar 'I'm sorry I fucked my secretary' rings. It's not like I'm going to do it every day this is for something special. Blair is special."
Dan shook his head, "I get that, I mean I'm trying. Serena is still trying to convince me that a thousand dollars for 'really amazing' shoes isn't stupid. I'm just saying that for this don't you want to get something that has some meaning to it and isn't just shiny and expensive."
Chuck's eyes lit up and his smirk widened, his arm going back around Dan. "You see that is why you are good to have around Brooklyn, always thinking." Dan just shook his head as they continued around the counters.
Then he saw it, Chuck knew it was perfect the minute he laid eyes on it. It was a bracelet but the links were butterflies, each one interlocking with the last. The wings had small marquise diamonds in them and the eyes were emeralds. It was prefect. "That one."
The clerk pulled it out and touching the delicate creature he felt the ones in his stomach beating their wings. "I'll take it." He handed the woman his Black Amex card touching the bracelet one last time before she took it away to wrap.
Turning to Dan with a look of triumph on his face, "Now something for you."
Dan didn't have much money to spend less than a hundred dollars really. "Chuck I don't really need to get Serena anything, this dinner is for Blair."
"Daniel really now, I couldn't let you show up with nothing, Sis would be heartbroken."
Dan cringed; he really hated it when he called her that. Thank god he knew how crazy Chuck was for Blair, and that Blair would kill him if he so much as looked at Serena. Otherwise, he would have insisted Serena move in with him instead of the Basses after the wedding.
"Fine what about that." It was a simple link necklace with a heart on the end. Chuck smiled, "Excellent choice." Motioning to the woman who had been helping them, "That necklace, it's ninety dollars I believe."
Dan was much too busy trying to figure out why he was spending the last money he had in his checking account to buy a necklace for no real occasion that he missed the tone of Chuck's voice. The woman behind the counter however, didn't miss a thing. "Of course, shall I wrap it up?" Dan nodded, too lost in thought to speak.
As they left the woman figured that it was a small price to pay, letting a three hundred and fifty dollar necklace go for ninety when she had sold a twelve thousand dollar bracelet. And if her eavesdropping was correct Chuck Bass had a girlfriend and one with expensive tastes. So she had no doubt her year was about to get much better.