AN: This is the point when I know I will lose many of you. But if you have been with me this past half year since I started in this fandom, you will know that I will still write what I think will scare a lot of you away. For those who are leaving, I'll see you in Mr and Mrs Bass LOL

Part 3

It was a day that marked the end of a chapter in their lives that they would forever remember. At the back of the limo, riding to the start of something new. He turned to her with a smile, and she glanced down at where she felt his wrap around hers. She smiled briefly and squeezed back.

"Nervous?" he asked.

But she was wearing her mother's creation—a high-waisted skirt and a loose blouse that finally told her that her mother understood who she was—on the way to her graduation day, riding at the back of the limo where everything exploded—not began—beside the one person she loved. She thanked the twisted fate that brought her to this point, when there was no Yale in the horizon, no black and white future already written. All she knew was she would live with him, eat with him, sleep beside him. Exist. Every day. Every day with Chuck. She would never live another minute without him.

"Ecstatic," she answered. Blair leaned forward and pressed her body to his. With the hand not in his she took a folded slip of paper from her pocket. As she slipped it into his jacket pocket, she met his eyes. Always, when she was this near him, her lips would part in invitation. It was an invitation that he always took, much to her satisfaction.

He kissed her, and her eyes fluttered closed. When he kissed her it was like there was no need to breathe. He breathed for them, and she was fine as long as he was close.

"I just realized," she whispered when their mouths parted, "that for the first time in my life, I have nothing planned. There's nothing at all in the future except for you."

She opened her eyes to see his smirk. He was smug, and she loved that he could be so confident about them. With his forehead against hers, he asked her, "Doesn't it feel good, Blair?" And if she were younger she would have had an outburst of denial. Instead, she nodded. He continued, "Let yourself loose. You're free. We're starting with a clean slate."

No more Nate. No more Jack. No Carter. None of his multitude of women. Her mother's words from long ago, the ones that always made her feel inadequate could be forgotten. The ghost of Bart Bass no longer haunted him.

"Now it's just you and me," he told her.

Blair Waldorf looked up and saw his reflection in the mirror. When he noticed her looking, he gave her a half-cocked smile that was now endearing. She returned his smile with one of her own. He did not walk up to her until she gave one brief nod.

Her permission.

He stood behind her while she sat in front of the dresser in the Baizen guestroom. When Carter placed his hands on her shoulders, she rubbed her cheek against the back of his hand.

"The guests have started to arrive," he told her.

She nodded, then reached for her bottle of perfume. She tipped the bottle to moisten her wrists. Carter took it from her hand, then upended it on his fingers. Very slowly, he drew circles behind her ears. His finger crawled to dip under her dress, and crept to the halo between her breasts. "Carter, you're going to smell like my perfume," she protested.

He leaned over her, and she felt his breath against her ear. "I can't think of a better scent on me than yours."

The words, the look in his eyes as she saw him in the mirror, his touch on her skin. He was there. Always there. He was more than anyone who made promises to stay but never did. She turned in her seat and grasped the front of his suit, pulled him down so that she could kiss him. Carter knelt in front of her, and she placed her arms on his shoulders. She parted her legs so he could press closer, with her heat against his stomach. He cleared his throat and shifted on his knees.

"Will you be okay tonight?"

Her smile was strained, she knew, when she responded. "Why wouldn't I be? It's a chance to reconnect. I haven't seen Serena in ages."

He kissed her jaw. "I wanted to make sure." His hand rested on her thigh, and slowly moved up and down. Like he was soothing her. Like she was a panicked kitten. And there was absolutely no need. She was good. She was recovered.

"I'm not a cure," he said.

Blair looked up from the secondhand book she was reading, and saw Carter with his eyes closed, his head leaned back against the back of the train seat. She waited for him to say more. When he did not, she opened her mouth to respond, but thought better of it. She flipped the page and read the next words.

She glanced out the window at the rapidly moving scenery. Forests and mountains at night. From Bangkok to Laos, with Carter Baizen shifting on his seat in their second class cabin—it was the farthest thing in her mind in that other life. In that other life she had, there was only one constant.

And that was not the face she was looking at then.

Blair lifted up her feet on the seat and returned to her reading.

"Did you hear me, Blair?"

This time, when she lifted her eyes to him, she saw him watching her. He looked at her as if she were pieces of a puzzle that he needed to put back together. "I heard you," she answered. It would be easy to deny that she had any idea what he meant. Instead, she said, "I don't need a cure."

She noticed the tick in his jaw as he stared at her. His gaze shifted to her wrist. She dropped her book and traced the line, very faint now, almost unnoticeable.

"How many countries do we have left?" she asked softly.

"Too many to count," he answered.

She nodded, then picked up her book again and settled in to read. She flipped through pages feeling his eyes on her. Finally, she looked up and saw that he had fallen asleep, his neck twisted some in his attempt to find a comfortable position. She rose from her seat and picked up the thin blanket they had been provided and shook it to cover Carter's form.

"He'll be here."

Him.

The unnamed him.

The him he was never supposed to mention.

And it was like lightning had charged into her body. She dove into his arms. She kissed him. "I need you," she said against his mouth.

Carter dipped his lips to the crook of her neck. She threw back her head, then reached behind her for her zipper. He caught her hands in his and shook his head. "The guests are here, Blair."

"Please," she said, her voice broken.

"We're expected downstairs."

"We've lived our lives without them just fine," she said, batting her lashes at him. "Just a quick one."

He assessed her with liquid blue eyes, and then shook his head. He dropped a kiss on the corner of her lips. "No quick ones. You did say I know how to please a woman."

She pushed away from him and stood up stiffly.

He was so eager to face the Upper East Side, and she wanted to call him out on it. They were fine; they were alright away from this. She had never wanted to come back, never wanted to see the familiar streets. Life was better sleeping in one country only to wake up in another. They were doing well. As long as they were away from New York, they would be perfect.

"Just go, Carter. I'll follow." And then he was on her, wrapping his arms around her waist, pulling her to him. "What else do you want?" she asked, her voice cold.

He sighed. Blair knew defeat when she saw one, and she was so familiar with it in his eyes that she recognized it at once. His arms unraveled from her waist, and his hands spread down to grasp her hips. She felt him harden against her ass.

"Because I love you," he said easily.

She nodded, sucking in her breath when he reached down and pulled down her panties. "I need you," she responded. Blair turned her head to look down at him.

She pulled him with her towards the bed. She lay down, and he settled on top of her, lifting up her gown to give him access. His mouth was hot, was warm, was now familiar. He dipped his tongue in the hollow of her throat.

She closed her eyes. When he entered her, she released a breath and smiled.

It was as if his eyes lit up. She sat back in her seat, far away from him at the back row. Their names were so far apart it was impossible to sit through the entire ceremony. But she did see, from the side of Constance, the profile of his face.

Knew exactly when he saw her note.

'The face of all the world is changed since first I heard the footsteps of thy soul.'

He craned his neck and when he saw her, he gave her a look that told her there would be no rest that night.

When she first read it in eighth grade, and learned that it had been written by a poetess about her husband, and explored the rest of the sonnets of the book, she had thought them impossible. And she had been a romantic. But love like that—it did not exist.

Until she woke up that morning and stretched, then noticed Chuck lying out her clothes for graduation on the space in the bed that he had vacated.

"You're awake."

She nodded, and he immediately leaned close for a kiss. She pursed her lips, because she had only just woken up, hadn't had time to brush her teeth. Pursing her lips did not work, and his tongue and mouth were persistent.

"Chuck—"

"There are no words, Blair," he said.

There were no words. She had aced every exam in the book, and there was no way anything could encompass how much she loved him. But she swore she would find the words.

When she did, stolen from a book that had never been intended for publication, she scribbled them on a piece of paper to give him. And the sonnet, or the circumstance, would have, she acknowledged, not mattered or made sense to him. But she had sworn he would know.

The moment graduation was over, she was the first one he went to. Her lips curved as he approached holding the slip of paper. And she flushed, suddenly embarrassed.

It was not them.

But sometimes, when he looked at her, it almost seemed like it was.

"Forget I gave you that," she stammered, and moved to reach for the slip of paper.

He had a self-satisfied look on his face. He caught her by her waist and asked, "Why would I?"

"Chuck, don't. It wouldn't make sense to you."

And he held her close. She swore he could hear the way her heart beat rapidly. Her parents were waiting for her, and Serena's family waited for him. He leaned down, and said to her, "Of course it was. I may have sometimes paid a certain group to take my exams for me, but I'm not illiterate, Blair."

She released her breath, looked at him uncertainly.

"You rocked my world too," he said, grinning.

Her father waved to her from his spot beside Roman. She nodded and waved back. "I'll see you tonight," she told Chuck.

She turned to go to her family. He caught her hand and tugged her back towards him, and kissed her on the lips. "I love you."

The words fell over her, and she had to close her eyes for a beat. "I love you too," she responded.

It was as close to walking into your own dream.

Many of the Baizen guests turned when she walked into the party on Carter's arm. Many of the younger members were abuzz. It was almost as if no time had passed by. She glanced at her companion, and his face had taken on a cold, smug expression that she had not noticed on him for so long. While they roamed around the world, whenever he spoke to her, he was a different man.

She tightened her hold on his arm. Curiously, he turned to look at her. And right in front of her eyes, the ice in his blue eyes vanished.

"Am I still her?" she whispered.

And it was testament to where they were that he was able to answer. "You're still you."

Herself. Was it Blair from that other life? Or was she the Blair he had pieced back together?

He cupped her cheeks with both hands and pressed a kiss on her lips in front of everyone. "My father's calling me. I'll be right back."

She took a glass of champagne from one of the waiters. She waited in front of the full length windows. Blair watched from afar as Carter approached Mr Baizen. When Carter looked down on the floor, she willed him to raise his head. And he did, gave her a small wave.

And then there was this scent.

This presence.

And it was him.

Blair started to walk towards Carter when she heard the words, felt warm breath in her ear.

"Waldorf—"

She spoke immediately, "I will not listen to you," she warned, without even looking. "I don't want you near me."

"Let me explain."

"No," she said coldly. "Please leave me alone."

She shuddered at his lips against her ear. "You forgive me," he said. And then his lips were on the nape of her neck, and she almost sobbed out loud. "Because whatever they told you, you still love me."

She closed her eyes. "I'm begging you," she started. And even then, she could not say the name. "Please leave. Please."

The precise moment that he left, she knew. Without thinking, without looking, without checking.

It was just a little bit colder.

tbc