Lita shook her head in disbelief. "No, you know what, for the first time in the history of our friendship, I'm not going to play along." She grabbed her oversized purse from the bench and started to walk past all the other girls. "This is between the two of you and so it's the two of you that should figure it out."
"Lita!" Blair's face was clear evidence of her shock. "You can't be serious, Serena slept with Nate."
"Yeah she did Blair and honestly, I think it's terrible." Lita turned to Serena. "I'm really disappointed in you, S but this is your battle to fight. I am not a part of this drama." Lita walked past all of her friends. "When you all come to some sort of truce, let me know."
"Who does she think she is?" Kati whispered.
"Seriously, someone's gotten a little too high and mighty." Isobel added in agreement.
Blair stared after her friend for a moment longer before turning to Serena. "You've ruined everything."
"Blair, I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt you." Serena wiped tears from her eyes. She couldn't believe they were having this conversation in front of all of Blair's lackeys not to mention all of the other students that were taking their time walking into the school. "Can we talk about this, in private?"
"No. Stay away from Nate and stay the hell away from me." Blair pulled her sunglass back onto her face and started toward the entrance of the school.
Chuck could barely sit still through his morning classes. When he and Nate arrived at school, after circling the block for a while so Nate could finish smoking, it had taken no time for some of their friends to fill them in on the showdown that had taken place just minutes before their arrival. Chuck had attempted to find Lita but she had already gone into the girls' side, which was off limits during the school day.
He'd gotten a glimpse of her at morning meeting. She'd come in by herself and it was obvious that just about everyone in the chapel was looking to see where she was going to sit. Serena was slouched down in the back row and Blair had taken the girls normal spot in the second row. Lita never hesitated when she came in; she found a seat with her friends from the field hockey team. Her demeanor never wavered, she kept her head held high but Chuck could tell she was upset from the way she kept playing with her bracelet. It was a gold charm bracelet that her parents had given her on her twelfth birthday; it never left her wrist and when she was feeling upset, Lita would finger each of the charms. He'd tried to get her attention after the meeting was over but she'd disappeared into the throng of students filing out of the room.
When the bell rang for lunch, Chuck walked as quickly as he could, without looking ridiculous, to the courtyard where he said he would meet Lita. Before he could find her though, he was intercepted by Blair.
"We need to talk." Blair grabbed his arm and pulled him into a deserted hallway.
"About what, Blair?" Chuck pulled his arm away from her.
"You know what." Blair folded her arms. "You knew he slept with Serena, didn't you?"
"And so what if I did know?" Chuck's tone was low and almost defensive. "Nate is my best friend."
"Well, I'm supposed to be your friend too." Blair snapped. "And you forget that I'm keeping one of your secrets."
Chuck's eyes narrowed. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"I need you to help me destroy Serena and you need me to keep my mouth shut, right?" Blair was pleased to see Chuck looking so uncomfortable. "If you don't want to play, I could always just start confessing things. You know how much Lita values honesty."
"Come on Blair, this is weak, even for you." Chuck growled. "You've shown me all you cards. I could just find Lita right now and tell her everything."
"You could." Blair examined her nails in faux-boredom. "But are you willing to risk upsetting her? I know you're trying out this new and improved Chuck Bass stuff but it's not going to last. You're a womanizing deviant and you shouldn't try to fight it."
"Like you said, Blair, she values honesty." Chuck started to walk away from Blair before she saw just how nervous she was making him.
"This isn't over Chuck." Blair called after him. "You can't keep this up."
"There you are." Lita smiled in relief when she saw Chuck enter the courtyard. "Let's get out of here, please!"
Chuck nodded his head silently and took her hand. They started to walk off campus for lunch. "What's the matter? You look like your morning was even worse than mine."
"No." Chuck shook his head. "I guess I'm just tired. Do you want to talk about this morning? I heard it was a bad scene."
Lita groaned. "It was terrible and dramatic, even for Blair and Serena. Is it common knowledge or something that I'm 'naïve'? or too trusting?"
"What do you mean?" Chuck asked.
"Well, this morning you said I was forgiving Serena too easily and then Blair told me today that she thinks I'm too trusting and forgiving. It just seems like everyone thinks I'm naïve. And maybe I am because I seriously never would have thought that Serena and Nate would do that to Blair."
Chuck was quiet as they entered Lita's favorite lunch spot and took their seats. "I shouldn't have said it like those were bad qualities to have. " Chuck told her truthfully. "Those are things that I love about you and honestly, if you weren't so caring, I think our little friend group would have fallen apart a long time ago."
Lita ran her hands through her hair. "This feels irreparable though. How do you forgive your best friend for sleeping with your boyfriend? I don't even want to see Serena or Nate. Can you believe they would be so stupid and then try to hide it?"
"Actually, I walked in on them." Chuck confessed.
"What?" Lita's eyes widened. "You knew this whole time?"
"Yeah, but what was I supposed to do?" Chuck asked her defensively. "Nate's my best friend, I couldn't exactly tell Blair."
"I guess…" Lita's face showed her disappointment and Chuck felt queasy. He promised her that he was a different person but right now he just felt like the same asshole that was always fucking up.
"I didn't know what else to do." Chuck told her honestly.
"I'm sorry, I'm not trying to make you feel bad, Chuck." Lita took his hand and gave it a squeeze. "I guess I'm just shocked."
"You know how this morning, we were talking about how things were going to be different now?" Chuck looked her in the eyes. His father was right, he had to start changing his ways or he really was going to lose everything that mattered to him. "Well, I don't think I've been completely honest with you. Right after we broke up, I -"
Lita sighed softly. "I don't want to know. The past is the past, Chuck. Right here and right now, I'm telling you that it's all behind us. I don't want a list of all the girls that you've been with."
Chuck sighed in relief. "Are you sure?"
"Trust me; I really don't want to know." Lita told him again. "I would only drive myself crazy. Just knowing that you wanted to be honest with me, is enough. I mean…you never hooked up Serena or Blair, right?"
"Oh God no." Chuck made a face. "No thanks."
Lita laughed. "Then I don't want to know. We're starting fresh."
Chuck kissed her hand. "I'm really lucky to have you."
Lita grinned. "I feel the same way." Lita leaned across the table and kissed him softly.
SPOTTED: B putting S in her place outside of Constance. S is going to have to grovel a lot harder than that to gain B's trust back. But I must say, I'm impressed by L. She stood up to them both for the first time in their long history of friendship. But growing a backbone comes with a price, now who are gonna go to Bergdorf with L? We hope C likes to shop. N is back on the market and the girls are all a flutter. It's not going to be that easy girls, Princess B isn't going to let you swoop in and steal her knight with shining blond hair.