tw: abuse, eating disorder (it's only mentioned in passing, but it's still there)

It lasts three weeks.

For three weeks, Blair has everything she thought she wanted. Chuck, a ring on her finger, an important job. She has it all.

But then, the honeymoon phase is over.

It's ironic, in a way, that the honeymoon phase ended right before they actually go on their honeymoon. It's not ironic, however, how the honeymoon phase only lasted while the investigation about Bart's death was open.

In the month they passed at the private island Chuck bought for her, a whole month when they didn't have evil fathers to take down, best friends to scheme against or someone to threaten their love, they also didn't have much to talk about. It was very discomforting for Blair to realize that without the hurdles, there was not much left between the two of them.

When they come back to Manhattan Blair hopes - no, prays - things will go back to normal. And they do, in a way. Chuck is back to belittling her and making her feel like she's betraying him every time she stands up for herself. Their normal was never functional anyway.

Then, it's time for the Waldorf Designs' summer/spring collection's reveal and Chuck can't go. In reality, he doesn't want to go, but he comes up with something about a meeting he can't get off of, like he isn't the owner and CEO of Bass Industries and can do whatever he wants, including changing the time of a meeting.

Blair is tired of fighting, so she lets it go. She learned, very harshly, that fairytales are only good for books and real life is hard and unfair. Blair wants pure and simple love, but pure and simple love doesn't seem to want her. The only one who seems to want her, only her, is Chuck and that's a big part of the reason she chose him.

(She often wondered, during the time she was with Nate and then with Dan, how long it would take for them to go back to Serena. Not very long, the answer turned out to be.)

So, if she has to put her head down and accept Chuck at his worst (which is pretty much all of the time) to be loved, she will do it. All she ever wanted was to be loved, after all.

And it's not all that bad. She is not afraid of Chuck; she knows he would never actually hurt her. Except for the times he did, that is.

She sees Dan in the gaps between the models walking the lopsided (the new intern's fault) runway at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. The flowy pastel fabrics catches everyone's attention, except hers. She has been seeing them for the last few months, from concept to construction to try-ons. She knows them, it's nothing new; she has a reason not to be entranced by them. He, however, has no business in looking at her instead of looking at the dresses. (Looking at her like she did more than coming up with some design ideas; looking at her like she matters.) She is only looking back at him because he is looking at her, she reasons. She chose Chuck, after all.

Later, under the cherry trees, Dan will tell her she is losing her classicist tendencies if she's hosting her mother's company's line reveal at Brooklyn and she will tell him it's the new intern's fault. It will be only half a lie.

He will then ask about Chuck, and Blair will say he is busy. She will ask about Serena, and he will answer with a dismissive hand gesture, a sign their relationship has already started to crack, as it often goes after a while for them. She won't ask how he got an invite to the reveal; she knows it's the new intern's fault. The intern is Jenny Humphrey, after all.

After a long moment of silence, Dan will ask if she's happy and Blair will say she is. It will be a whole lie.

Half an hour later, he will be pinning her against the brick wall of a dirt alleyway, his hands holding her up by her thighs, hot on her skin. Blair will think, for a brief moment, about how easily Dan can be seduced and how so much of his problems arise from that.

(But whatever will happen between them won't be a seduction. They just can't help but want to kiss each other when they are in such proximity, that's all. And a kiss often leads to something more, especially when they are not interrupted.)

Blair will suck on his neck forcibly, wanting to mark him, needing to mark him.

"Good luck explaining that to Serena," she will say in a ragged breath.

"You like that, don't you?" Dan will ask as he trusts into her. "You like that I would leave her for you. You like that I love you and not her."

Blair will look at him, at his sharp jawline and elegant cheekbones. She will raise a hand to his face and gently trace his features with her fingers. "I never meant to hurt you," she will say while using her legs to lock him into her. "I just wish you'd never wanted to hurt me either."

(She knows very well it wasn't exactly what happened when he was with Serena over a year ago; she knows very well it's not a seduction if you have to be manipulated into it. It doesn't mean it didn't hurt all the same. It doesn't mean there is anything she can do about it now.)

It will only happen once. Blair will come up with excuses for it; will call it closure, will say it didn't mean anything, really. She will keep lying to herself and will never tell Chuck what happened. Not even when she eventually learns that his meeting was with one of his secretaries, a bubbly 18-year-old, fresh off high school. She will be so disgusted she won't even need to shove a finger down her throat to puke. But she still won't tell him. She won't share any of her happiness with Chuck if she can help it.

By the time she has had enough and thinks about divorcing, she will learn she is pregnant. She will think about the last time she was pregnant and what leaving led to. So she will stay. She will stay as her child is born and learns to walk and talk. She will stay because she has no other choice, really. She had another choice once and she didn't take it. She will forever regret that.

She will cry herself to sleep the nights Chuck is away - most of them - and won't be able to sleep at all the nights he is close. When Blair said she was tired of fairytales, she never meant she wanted a nightmare instead.

(She will get her happy ending eventually. With Henry and Dan and their twin girls, Audrey and Katharine. With summers in Paris and winters in the Alps. With laughter and love and happiness. And it will last much more than three weeks.)

I don't know what this is, really. I had the idea for Dan and Blair's tryst and built the whole thing around that. Then I realized it was too bleak and had to give my babies a happy ending.

English is not my first language, I'm sorry for the mistakes!

Title is from Lucy Rose's song Morai. Morai being the Greek God in control of our fates.