Title: "All You Ever Wanted"
Author: Lila
Rating: PG-13
Character/Pairing: Blair, Blair/OMC, Blair/Chuck, various others
Spoiler: "Carnal Knowledge"
Length: one-shot
Summary: Blair can't be the girl her father wants but she can be the person she's always been meant to be.
Disclaimer: Not mine, just borrowing them for a few paragraphs.
Author's Note: Thank you again to everyone supporting this fic. Multi-part stories are hard for me so I appreciate the patience and consistency. This is the chapter where my OMC comes into play, but no worries! My philosophy on original characters in fic is that their purpose is to support existing characters so he won't be taking over the story in any way. Enjoy.
III. You see him out the window. Even when you close the blinds…
She meets Sam her third week of art history.
It's an upper level class but the only one that fits her schedule, and because she's Blair Waldorf and still has a few tricks up her sleeve, she talks her way into a course usually reserved for seniors and juniors.
She might be Blair Waldorf but she's still a college freshman and she's nervous when she walks in the day drop/add ends and her heels clatter against the floorboards and she's the only one wearing a skirt in place of jeans and riding boots.
She pastes on her brightest smile and chooses a seat in the back while everyone else takes a seat in front. They all know each other and spend the few minutes before class chatting about a new art exhibit in New York or what they did the night before, and she takes out a pen and taps impatiently against her notebook. She's getting used to it, but she still hates being out of place.
Five minutes before class starts a tall guy with shaggy brown hair and dark blue eyes drops into the seat beside her.
She does little more than stare. There are four empty rows between herself and any other student and this Dan Humphrey knock-off has chosen the seat to her right. She grits her teeth and turns to him with her brightest smile pasted on her face.
He meets her with a smile of his own. "Is this seat taken?"
She gestures to the near miles of empty seats around them. "It's not, but there are forty other places you could sit." There's some anger, fire in her voice, and it feels good. She's trying change but she doesn't have to lose herself entirely.
He only smiles brighter and leans back in his seat. "There are, but then I wouldn't be sitting next to the prettiest girl in the room."
She can't do more than blink at him before letting out a disgusted laugh. "Does that line actually work?"
"You tell me," he says and holds out a hand. There's a trace of red paint on its back but his fingers are long and tapered and seem otherwise clean. "I'm Sam."
She pauses for a long moment, because she hates artists even as she's trying to embrace all kinds of people, but slides her hand into his. "Blair."
"Nice to meet you," he adds and doesn't release her hand. "So….did it work?"
"Did what work?" she asks and tugs her hand out of his. He doesn't grab it back, but he does wrap his arm around the back of her chair. He's on the skinny side but still somehow broad and she can feel the warmth radiating through his t-shirt. She glances at the crowd that knows each other through and through; it's nice to have someone on her side.
"My line, Blair. Did it work?" She can't help but like the way he says her name, the "R" dropping off at the very end no matter how hard he tries to hide it.
"I don't know," she says lightly. She likes this game; she's missed it. "What can you tell me about this class?"
He picks her hand up again and she surprises herself when she lets him; some of her nerves slip away as he traces her fingers with his. "Armstrong is tough but fair. Do what she says and you'll get the grade you want."
As if on cue, a tall woman with short blonde hair approaches the podium and a hush falls over the room. Some of the other students have studied under her before and she greets them by name, and Blair feels her chest constrict because it's just like Queller or Carr (and every teacher before or after them) because she needs them to like her, to value everything she has to offer. She knows she's beautiful and rich and spoiled; she needs them to know she's smart too.
The syllabus is distributed and explained and she notes the dates her papers are due and her tests will be given, and when the lecture starts she's already scribbling furiously in her notebook.
She feels herself relax as the class continues, as the slides flash in front of her eyes and Armstrong's words lodge in her brain, and stops noticing that her hand is clasped in Sam's.
Class ends and he's still holding on.
"Go out with me," he asks, that genuine smile curving his lips.
She stares at their fingers laced tightly together, feels how easy it is to breathe. She doesn't say no.
---
Sam takes her for coffee on their first date and they spend most of the two hours trying to pretend they have something in common. There isn't much, except art history and a mutual appreciation for watching the snow fall on cold winter nights. Still, neither of them stop trying; she's not ready to give up yet.
"So," he says. "What's your opinion on Vampire Weekend?"
She blinks, then stares, and wracks her brain for what he could possibly be talking about. "Well, I'm Team Edward," she tries and hopes she chose the right answer.
It's his turn to blink and stare and for a moment she thinks he's going to get up and walk away and forget about the silly girl he took for coffee one fall day, but his face only breaks into the widest smile and his eyes fill with laughter and it's clear he doesn't want to leave her at all. "I like you," he says and leans across the table to cup her face in his hands and press his mouth gently against hers. "I've never met anyone like you. I want to keep knowing you."
Something flutters deep in her belly and she smiles against his mouth. She wants to keep knowing him too.
---
She doesn't know Vampire Weekend but she knows google, and the next morning she sends him an email thanking him for the date. Every sentence includes an oxford comma.
Later that afternoon, there's a copy of "Twilight" waiting for her at the package depot.
It stops mattering that they have nothing in common; it only matters that she likes the way he makes her feel.
---
He isn't Dan Humphrey 2.0.
He has dark hair and big dreams but he's different from the boy who broke her best friend's heart over and over again.
He takes her to local places for dinner and pays in cash and it's not what she's used to but she doesn't complain. Nate took her to every fine restaurant in Manhattan but never listened to anything she said; Chuck bought her everything her heart desired but never valued anything she had to give.
Sam reaches across a table with a paper cloth and holds her hand and doesn't try to change her. He likes her for exactly who she is.
---
She feels herself changing anyway.
She only calls Serena once a day and spends more time with Caitlin, Emily, and Jess.
She starts reading The New York Times headlines before class and stops reading Gossip Girl altogether.
She values her sleep and rolls out of bed with her hair in a ponytail, her face clean and bare. Her mother wouldn't recognize her but she's starting to recognize herself.
She gets a B on her first paper in her freshman English seminar. She cries, and throws things, and even runs a background check on her professor but stops herself before it goes too far. The next day she shows up for office hours with a new strategy in hand. "How can I do better?" she asks and writes down every suggestion her professor makes.
High school is dead and buried. She wants to keep it that way.
---
She and Sam have been dating a month when he knocks on her door with an orange t-shirt in one hand and picket sign in the other.
"The administration wants to cut insurance for dining hall workers," he says and pushes the shirt into her hands. "We're going to protest!"
"We are?" she asks. She's never done anything like this before. The last time she ran a campaign it was to take down a teacher she didn't like. She's never fought a war to benefit anyone other than herself.
She's holding the t-shirt in her hands like a horcrux but he laughs and begins pulling it over her Nanette Lepore dress. "Relax, it's only cotton," he assures her and she lets him pull her arms through the sleeves and smooth the material down her stomach. "Ready to stand up for the little people?"
She isn't ready but she thinks it's something she should do. She holds his hand while he waves his sign and chants with the crowd and towards the end she wraps her fingers around his and fights someone else's war.
Three days later the administration backs down and she emails her father a photo of herself and Sam on the front page of the Yale Daily News.
He tells her how proud he is (and how much he wants to meet the boy standing to her left) and she has to blink back tears because this time she knows he really means it.
---
Protests and petitions aren't her thing but she still wants to help people who aren't herself.
Caitlin and Emily read to school kids on Wednesday afternoons and she doesn't put up much of a fight when the ask her to come with them.
The children give her hugs and kisses and spill juice on her Catherine Malandrino skirt and she doesn't even care. Her heart constricts in her chest from the gratitude in their eyes and when she comes back the following week (and the week after and the week after that) it isn't to work on her grammar.
---
Sam isn't perfect.
He's an artist and she can't help but compare him to Aaron. They even look a bit alike, with the shaggy dark hair and lean builds, and they talk about their art in the same way and she remembers the idiocy Serena went through and it makes her want to throw things.
He spends hours in his studio he should be spending with her.
He's constantly late.
He wears t-shirts with logos she doesn't understand and doesn't find funny. His idea of dressing up is a blazer rather than a hoodie and he only cuts his hair when it's so long he can't see through his bangs.
Everything he owns is stained with paint.
He has trouble admitting he's wrong and can't back down from an argument to save his life. She remembers Ms. Carr (and the three wars she waged on her) and knows it bothers her because she does the same.
He doesn't watch TV and only Netflixes movies she's never heard of and "Flight of the Conchords." After a couple weeks, even she starts believing Australia is the enemy which annoys her because she's always wanted to visit Sydney.
He has subscriptions to The Atlantic and The New Yorker and frowns when she uses his computer to check Perez Hilton between classes.
He buys her a map of her own city when she tells him she has no idea where Ludlow Street is; he doesn't bother asking her about Brooklyn or Queens or even Midtown West because he already knows the answer.
He judges everyone and everything but he doesn't judge her.
---
Another month later and she still can't understand why he's dating her.
She's everything he hates, but he won't stop calling and she doesn't stop answering. She likes how she feels with him, like she's on the edge of the world and always about to fall but knows she won't because he's there to catch her.
He asks questions, constantly asks questions, and she finally asks him if she's some kind of psych experiment he's going to blog about.
"I want to know everything about you," he confesses. "Everyone I know is exactly the same. We look alike and dress alike and have all the same interests, and then there's you. You're from New York but know nothing beyond a ten block radius. You wear clothes like something out of a movie. You have no idea how beautiful you are." He pauses, reaches out to trace her cheek. "You don't let anyone in because you're afraid." He kisses her, soft and gentle and tender. "I want to be that person who gets through. Will you let me?"
There's a look in his eyes, like she's the only thing he can see, and she remembers the last time she felt this way, when Nate held her in his arms and told her he loved her the only way he knew how (but not the way she'd wanted ten years long), and she curls her fingers through his hair and kisses him back.
"I trust you," she says and she means it. He isn't perfect but he doesn't need to be. Nate never saw her for who she truly was but she loved him anyway; Chuck always understood her but she could never fully give him her heart. Sam is neither but he's willing to try.
He kisses her harder and wraps his arms tighter around her and she knows this is the night. They've been dating two months and it's time.
It's different with Sam. It isn't awkward like it was with Nate and she doesn't feel like she's slipping out of her own skin the way she did with Chuck, but it feels right.
She doesn't want more.
---
His friends hate her. She's too pretty and too posh, too shallow and too spoiled. She doesn't know McSweeney's and she doesn't worship at the altar of Arcade Fire. She and Serena are spending spring break in St. Bart's while they build houses in Costa Rica. She's afraid to tell them about her trip and when she does, they don't bother to hide the disgust in their eyes.
She doesn't understand. Caitlin and Jess know how she looks and where she vacations and love her anyway. It's college. It's the time to try on a few different people before choosing the right one. She hangs out with girls with bad highlights and inch-long roots and affection for clothes from Urban Outfitters. She reads Chuck Palahniuk and Jonathan Lethem because everyone raves about their genius, and keeps a David Sedaris book beside her bed even though she finds him the opposite of funny. She listens to The National and Spoon and Beirut and Wolf Parade and Bright Eyes and even likes some of them. She can quote "The Office" on command.
She pushes herself to grow; she tries to be the girl her father loves. She can't grasp why his friends refuse to do the same.
One night, a week from Thanksgiving, they're at an off-campus party and she wanders into the kitchen for another beer. There's always vodka at these things but never anything top-shelf and she's taught herself to drink Blue Moon or Magic Hat rather than choke down a Smirnoff and cranberry juice.
"Have you taken a good look at her, Sam? Her outfit tonight probably cost my entire month's rent." Blair instantly recognizes the voice. It's Jordan, Sam's freshman floormate, a lit major with a major chip on her shoulder. "What do you even see in her?"
She pauses in the doorway, out of sight but not out of hearing, and waits for Sam's response. "I can't believe you're judging her on the way she looks," he says. "It has nothing to do with why I'm with her.
"Unless you're hoping her mom is going to finance your art, I'm out of answers."
"I like her," is all he says. "She makes me think about things differently. I like who I am when I'm with her. I like that it's easy to be happy with her."
"Sam," Jordan scoffs but he cuts her off.
"She's my girlfriend, Jordan, and you're my friend. Please don't make me choose."
Jordan storms out of the kitchen and he looks up to see Blair in the doorway, paralyzed like a deer in the headlights. "Hey," he smiles and reaches for her. She buries her face in his neck, breathes him in and feels herself relax. "You heard all that didn't you?"
"Were you serious about what you said?" she asks against his chest. "Jordan was your friend long before you met me. I don't want to come between you."
He pulls back to look in her eyes. "You matter to me. You know that, right?"
Nate slept with her best friend and lied to her and tossed her out like yesterday's trash; Chuck sold her deepest secret to Gossip Girl and tried to ruin her life. Sam only wants to put her first. She looks up and his face is a blur because of the tears catching in her eyes. "No one has ever stood up for me like that before."
He smiles and dark hair falls messily over his brow. "That's because you didn't know me." He leans in and kisses her, soft and gentle and tender, and she thinks she wants to keep knowing him forever.
---
They go their separate ways for Thanksgiving.
Serena already knows every detail of her relationship with Sam but Dorota doesn't and together they fill in all the missing pieces.
She has lunch with Nate and compliments him on his tan but doesn't talk about Sam. Instead, she lets him tell her about the West Coast and she tells him about the protests and concerts and the art history major she just declared and he leans back in his chair and blinks a few times.
"What?" she asks. "Is it my hair?"
"College is really good for you."
It takes her a moment to answer and it's only the truth that spills from her lips. "I never thought my life would be like this but it's really good. I think I was in a rut. I needed to try something new."
He peers at her across the table and this time she thinks it really is her hair. "You're not going to wear Birkenstocks and stop shaving your legs, right?"
She laughs, a real laugh. "Please! I'm still me. Just because I study old paintings and occasionally wear sneakers doesn't mean I'm not the same Blair Waldorf."
Her father begs to differ. He and Roman fly in the on Thanksgiving morning and over bites of pumpkin pie he says the same thing. "You seem different, Blair-Bear. What are they doing to you at that alma mater of mine?"
She knows he means Sam but she sticks to the basics: her friends, her dorm, her classes, etc. He finally goes for broke and asks about the boy making his daughter so happy and she can't keep the smile off her face when she talks about him. It doesn't fade for the rest of the visit.
She spends the following days shopping with Serena and catching up with her mother and revisiting a world she almost forgot existed. Until she's home she doesn't realize how much she loves New York.
She has tea with Lily and brunch with Eric and Jonathan. It's not until Cyrus' driver is taking her back to school that she realizes she didn't see Chuck at all.
---
Thanksgiving break ends on a Sunday and they spend all of Monday in bed.
It's the first time she's skipped a class and she feels guilty, for half a second, but then Sam kisses her and traces the rim of her bellybutton with his fingers and she practically forgets her own name.
She realizes how much she missed him and how much he missed her and it hits her like a ton of bricks. This is what a relationship is supposed to be. This is what she didn't have all those years, with Nate and Chuck and even Marcus; this is what she's always wanted.
She wraps her arms tighter around Sam. She doesn't want to let go.
---
One night during finals she and Caitlin take a break and watch fifteen minutes of "Love Story" on TCM.
"I call bullshit," Caitlin says in disgust. "Do you really think love means never having to say you're sorry?"
Her heart constricts from the memory of Chuck breaking it over and over again. "I think if you truly love someone, you try not to hurt them in the first place."
"Have you ever been in love?"
She's never talked about her romantic past before. Her business is no one's but her own and she keeps her cards close to her vest. Nate wore her pin but it should have never been his; she never gave Chuck a thing but her action spoke louder than words. "Once," she whispers and the morning after prom slips into her mind. "It didn't work out."
"What happened?" Caitlin looks afraid to ask but the story is too juicy not to know the ending.
She closes her eyes and he's brushing her hair from her face and whispering the only three words she ever wanted him to say. "He never said I'm sorry."
Caitlin looks confused but doesn't push the conversation further. They turn off the movie and turn back to their books but Blair can't concentrate. Caitlin asked about love and her boyfriend of ten years never crossed her mind.
It's an hour before she realizes her current boyfriend didn't make the cut either.
---
Serena throws a party for New Year's Eve and it's exactly like old times.
Lily is out of town and everyone who's anyone is crowded into the penthouse and Serena traipses about with a martini in her hand, wearing a dress that's cut too low in front and too high at the knee, blonde hair spilling down her back like spun gold.
It's a good party. The alcohol flows and the food is just right and she's even happy to see the vestiges of her former life. Hazel/Iz/Penelope descend on her like couture-clad vultures and she's surprised by how much she enjoys being with them. They're still the same and she appreciates the consistency. Everything else has changed; it's nice to find something is just as she left it.
Midnight nears and she's alone. Sam is in Boston with his friends and she knows he'll call the moment the clock strikes 12:01 but she wishes she didn't have to usher in 2010 by herself.
The countdown begins and a hand grips her waist. The room is crowded and the only light is the glow of the TV but she doesn't have to see to know who it is. The ball drops in Times Square and the crowd screams and streamers burst and confetti falls around them and Chuck presses his mouth to hers.
It's not the barest touch of his lips to hers. His mouth is hard and hot and when she gasps his tongue tangles with hers. She isn't surprised; Chuck has always taken more than she's been able to give.
When they pull back her phone is vibrating in her left hand and she's breathless, flushed, and she wishes it weren't so dark so she could read the look in his eyes. All she can see is the rise and fall of his chest and the faint smudge of lipgloss on his mouth and she turns her back to talk to Sam rather than fall six months into the past.
It's the next morning before she sees him again. She's wearing Serena's clothes and leaving to change before brunch. She finds him in kitchen, barefoot and clad in a bathrobe, his hair still wet from his shower. It's bright in the daylight and there's no mistaking the pain in his eyes when he looks up from pouring coffee to find she's still in his house.
She knows she should go. It was New Year's Eve; everyone kisses someone else at midnight. Except she's Blair and he's Chuck and a kiss is never just a kiss between them.
"Why did you kiss me last night?"
He puts down the coffee pot and raises his eyes to meet hers. They're hooded and blank, but the tense set of his jaw gives him away. "It was New Year's Eve. Kissing at midnight is what people do."
"You could have kissed any girl in that room. Why did you choose me?"
He looks down and grips his mug and she can see the steam rising. It has to hurt but he doesn't let go. She knows the feeling; being with him always was exquisite torture. "There's this look in your eyes," he says softly. "I've never seen it before, not even when you were with Nate." He keeps his hands on the mug but looks up to meet her eyes. "You're happy, Blair. I wanted some of it for myself."
Her fingers tremble at her sides and she can't help but fall two years into the past, the way he stayed by her side when Nate wanted to be anywhere but with her and kissed her shoulder with such tenderness she thought she melt on contact. He has the same look in his eyes and she can't stop herself from walking the six steps between them and pressing her mouth to his.
It's over in an instant but not before his hands push away the coffee mug and reach up to cup her face. His mouth brushes against hers, feather light and gentle, and when she pulls back she can breathe but there are tears in her eyes. "I'm happy," she confirms. "I want you to be happy too but it can't be with me."
She's gone before he can protest and walks the ten blocks despite the cold. When she arrives home, her mouth still burns.
---
Sam comes to visit the week after New Year's Eve. Her family loves him. She's not surprised. There's a lot to love about him; she's well on her way to loving him too.
Cyrus thinks he's the greatest thing to ever happen to her and he immediately hits it off with Aaron. They tour his studio and check out another installation (not the Bedford Avenue Gallery) and talk art in ways that make her ears bleed but her heart happy because she loves seeing him so excited.
Serena and Nate are on vacation and Hazel/Iz/Penelope aren't important enough for an introduction so she mostly keeps him to herself. They eat at her favorite restaurants and tour her favorite stores and he doesn't say a word about the $500.00 dress she buys or the $50.00 entrees at lunch. He leans back in his chair and smiles and says he likes visiting her world. She kisses him across the table, out in public where anyone can see (but no one cares because Gossip Girl has new minions now), just to prove he's real.
She tells him about Chuck his third night in town, in the middle of "Roman Holiday."
"I kissed someone on New Year's," she says and waits for him to leave her in the dust. She pauses, sucks in a fearful breath. "It won't happen again."
"Not that I want my girl kissing another guy, but if you hadn't said anything, I'd have never found out. Why did you tell me?"
She's confused and doesn't understand. She and Nate ended because she lied to him and she couldn't stay with Chuck because he couldn't stop betraying her trust. She owes it to Sam to always be honest. "You're my boyfriend and I did something I shouldn't have done. I had to tell you."
"You're not going to do it again, right?"
She remembers the agony in Chuck's eyes when she walked away from him (again) and the way her heart constricted in her chest in ways that had nothing to do with the walk. "Never." She means it. The past is the past; she's trying to move forward.
He reaches up to brush her hair from her face. "It was New Year's Eve. Crazy stuff always happens."
He kisses her and her mouth burns but not in the same way.
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