His breath is knocked out of his system when he sees the car hit her. His knees desperately want to give in and fall to the ground, and he feels a horrifying need to scream and cry out, but he forces himself to keep running towards her, help her... Even if he doesn't know what he'll do once he gets by her side.
The driver gets out of the car, starts justifying and explaining, but Dan can't hear a thing. He drops beside her, and picks her up, resting her back against his thighs. The first thing he does is touch his fingers to her neck, and he feels his heart stop as he waits for the beat of hers.
He counts. One... Two... Three... Nothing. He tries again. One... Two... Three... Four...
A faint thump reaches his skin, and he lets out a loud cry of relief. He wipes the hair from her face, and can't help stilling his hands from roaming over her features, her shoulders... Then they instantly drop to her stomach. They caress the rounded surface of it, and he doesn't have a clue what he's waiting for, but he hopes to feel...something.
And he feels nothing.
He's not sure when the ambulance arrives, but he doesn't fight the paramedics as they lift her off his lap and take her away.
He doesn't remember much from the trip to the hospital. He wants to hold her hand, but the woman holding her IV is restricting his access to her. He is obsessed with watching her chest, ensuring it's still moving, making sure it raises and falls, and he feels his breathing eventually tune to the rhythm of hers. It is kind of calming.
It all dissipates once they get to the hospital. Frantic is an understatement for the atmosphere around him. Everyone wears a white coat and they all speak over each other. He runs behind them down the hospital hallways, but finds it hard to keep up. The doctors and nurses shout out numbers, and Dan can swear he hears the word 'foetus' thrown around a couple of times.
Baby. His baby. He still can't believe it.
She is pushed through some double doors, and Dan's entry is blocked.
'We'll let you know how she's doing as soon as she's stable,' a nurse says briefly, following the rest of the emergency entourage.
He's exhausted, and his legs can't take anymore. He collapses in a large leather chair, and his head drops in his hands. He tries not to think, because he doesn't want to allow his brain to focus on anything other than her. He can't start blaming himself just yet.
-xoxo-
He gets up at every doctor that walks out of the double doors, but finds himself sitting down every time. They're not there for him. He glances at his phone; 18 missed calls. Most from Blair. He contemplates calling her, telling her where he is, where she is, but the first person he calls is Lily.
He cannot deal with the panicked way in which she reacts. He is very brief with his words, and his gaze never breaks from those damned doors, and just before he hangs up, he asks Lily to tell whoever she decides is relevant about this. Then he switches his phone off. No distractions.
'Are you here for Serena?' someone asks from behind him, jolting him to his feet.
'Yes, yeah, I'm here for her,' he mutters too quickly. 'I'm...uh...Dan Humphrey.'
'Family relation?' the woman asks, writing his name on her pad.
He swallows. This must have been the only time he was happy to be able to say this. 'Stepbrother. Not for long, though, our parents are splitting up...' He closes his eyes and bites on his cheek. 'Sorry, I tend to ramble when I'm nervous. How is she?'
The nurse doesn't smile at that. 'She is conscious, but asleep. The general anaesthetic took a lot out of her.'
He smiles, and almost laughs, and from the corner of his eye, he can read sympathy in the nurse's eyes. For a brief moment, he forgets about panic and pain, and the relief he's feeling is like a source of energy. The highest he's ever been.
He asks about the baby. And when the nurse doesn't answer, he can feel himself falling. And hitting every branch on the way down.
'Would you like to see Miss van der Woodsen?' he hears, and he nods, the lump in his throat too big to allow words to be uttered.
-xoxo-
Her room is so small around him. So small. There is not enough room. And the air around him is too hot. He looks at the window. It's open. Why is it so damn hot?
He looks all over the room except for in her direction. He looks at the furniture and the walls, and he contemplates over the fact that this was one of the few occasions having money proved useful. She is in the best place she could be. Once they are alone, he allows his eyes to rest on her; and he can hear his heart break for her.
Her hair is messy, and knotted, and her left arm is covered in bruises and cuts. It all feels so surreal, like the worst nightmare he can't quite seem to wake up from. He digs his nails in his palms, but when he opens his eyes, he's still in a hospital room, at the foot of a bed where the most beautiful woman in his world lies. He glances over her blanket, and when he notices the way it still curves around her middle, he lets out a shaky breath. He walks over by her side, and touches it, just to ensure he wasn't wrong. He wasn't.
He feels like he should be happy. But he can't once she's not there to make him so. He watches her sleep, and he experiences the coldest sense of fear he had ever experienced. He realises he could have lost their child, he could have lost her, and a life without her in it... wouldn't be his life anymore. He takes her hand in both of his, and he notices how hard they shake, as he brings them to his lips and kisses her knuckles. He wants to speak to her, although he knows she couldn't hear. He wants to hear her voice, selfishly assure himself she is there. But he has no idea what to say.
He apologizes a couple of times, his voice broken and weak, and he's grateful she can't hear him. He wouldn't want her to see him so pathetic.
He runs his fingers through her hair, smoothing her blond strands, framing them around her face. He stares at her, long and deep, and he honestly can't believe he ignored her when she told him she loved him. Serena van der Woodsen, the girl of his dreams, the inspiration behind everything he's written, was chasing after him. And he had the ignorance and the stupidity to turn his back on it. Reject her. Since when did he become such an ungrateful idiot?
He notices a black, swollen bruise on her shoulder, and he touched the tips of his fingers over it, hoping to take her pain away. She stirs, her nose scrunching up, and he laughs softly to himself at how...cute...she looks.
She moans a little, and he hovers over her, fresh tears he doesn't notice falling down his cheeks once her eyes blink twice before opening.
'Dan?' she asks, her voice rough and groggy, and he can't quite help the smile creeping on his face.
'Hey, S. How are you feeling?' He touches his palm to her cheek. It honestly surprises him when her hand holds his tighter against her face.
'Tired. Really tired. And hungry.' He laughs, and she doesn't understand why she smiles at the sound of it, but it just happens.
She runs her free hand down her body, and rests it on the tip of her stomach. 'It's still here. Good,' she states, and lets out a weak breath, watching him smile above her. She feels slight happiness...
And then she remembers she's angry at him, and he...hates...her, and she takes her hand away from his quicker than if it would have burnt her. Tears spring to her eyes, and she turns her head away from him, resting her cheek on the pillow.
'Serena...' He grips her chin with his thumb, and forces her gaze back on his.
He sits beside her when he notices she's crying.
'I don't know what got over me... For a moment, I forgot this morning, or last night, or whenever it happened. I'm so-'
'Don't you dare apologize.' He sighs and takes the hand nearest to him in between both of his. He feels her try to pull away. But he tightens his grip. He's not going to let her go. Not anymore.
'Dan, just because you're here, doesn't mean anything about me, about us, will change. What's done is done, and maybe it is better this way. All we ever do is hurt each other...'
'No, all we ever do is compromise, and I'm done with that! Serena, I won't ask for your forgiveness, because I know I have no right to. I have to earn it. But right now, inside of you, there is a human being growing, that is half yours, but also half mine. A baby that I came so close to losing; a baby I realised I don't want to lose. I don't want to know that my child is growing and living anywhere else but under my watch. By my side. I want this, Serena. I want to have this baby. The only thing I will ask of you is to not take this away from me. To give me the chance—'
'I can't have a baby with someone who hates me, Dan; with someone who doesn't love me. I'm not strong enough to raise this child by myself...'
'None of that is true. And you know it. If you care about me even –'
Her eyes close tightly, but it seems like she can still see him and the harder she tightens, the clearer the image becomes.
'You can't say that to me. You know how much I care. And you can't keep doing this. I've been alone so far, I'll be alone from now on.' Their gazes lock, and it hurts her to see him so...destroyed... 'If it's any consolation to you, Rick and Donna are really amazing people...'
-xoxo-
He paces outside her door for half an hour before a nurse comes to check on her. He's nervous for her, and he's nervous for their baby, and he's angry about the fact that there seems to be nothing he can do about the fact that in five months he'll be the father of someone else's child.
'She's asking for you,' he hears, and the nurse has to say it again for the words to register fully in his confused brain. 'We're having an ultrasound,' she explains, and Dan shoots Serena a look that lacked understanding.
She glances away from him. 'I thought you deserve to be here for this.'
A surreal experience. Something so... perfect and beautiful and fragile. A miracle. The screen shows the perfect outline of a tiny, tiny, human being, with a head that is disproportionate to their body, and barely noticeable fingers and toes. In the deafening silence of the room, a loud thud echoes around them, followed by a quick another, and the nurse smiles. Serena's fingers brush lightly against the tips of his, and his gaze shoots directly at her. Her forehead is slightly creased in the middle, her nose is scrunched up, and her bottom lip quivers a little, so he is forward and strong for her, and holds her fingers tightly in his palm. He smiles down at her, even if the fact that he can see a drop of water make its way down her cheek makes him want to cry, too.
He tries to focus his attention back on the screen, but he can't help watching her from the corner of his eye, as she cries in silence.
'This right here is your baby. You are very lucky, Serena. The impact could have damaged it irreparably. But it's looking healthy and so well developed, I could tell you the gender, should you wish to know.'
When Dan looks at Serena again, eyes wide in surprise and a weird pain in his chest caused by a strong sense of anticipation, her face is turned away from the screen. Her eyes are shut tightly, her chest convulsing weakly with suppressed sobs. It became too much.
He looks at the nurse in a way that leaves little room for misunderstanding, and once the screen is off, the room as silent as before, and the nurse exits, he allows her to hide her face in his chest, and just cry.
A/N: So, this is another chapter, and I'm not sure everyone will like it. Next chapter coming up soon. Thanks for reading! xx