Disclaimer: As per usual, I do not own Gossip Girl or it's characters, simply the world I put them into.

A/N: This chapter sort of felt like pulling teeth, it came very slowly, but here it is. Again, I have yet to contact my beta because I've just been wanting to get these chapters posted quickly for you guys (since I had a long, long, hiatus) which means that it probably has a couple of errors that no amount of re-reading can fully weed out. I'm also going to be totally shameless right now and encourage you to read my new story, "Rains in Paris" Check it out if you have some time! Anyway, the next few chapters are going to be more 'GASP!' than the others. Hopefully you enjoy it! Reviews are looooved and very, very appreciated. Happy reading (:

I don't see what anyone can see in anyone else but you.
-- The mouldy peaches

Chapter Nine:

With a brief look upwards, Blair was instantly still, acutely aware of the quiet that skirted throughout the house. She tilted her head to the side, Mark still busy with dinner preparation, and quieted her own movements as to detect any echoing of sound.

The last ten minutes had been spent in an almost complete silence …

Stepping away from her perch in the kitchen, Blair slowly walked towards the hallway, intent on hearing anything that might calm the thrumming anxiety that ran through her veins.

The twins, unless previously instructed, were almost always deafening in every day activity. With the consistency of fights and competition and the utter chaos of their schedules, there was hardly a second to hear ones own voice over the racket. It was enough, at times, to rival Madison Square Gardens during one of their nosier concerts.

It was the quiet that held itself against Blair's ribcage tightly. Knowing Tula and Henry, they could very well be up to no good.

The little traits were the ones she most recognized in them. Miniscule actions and habits that told her they were nothing short of what their parents had once been.

Chuck and Blair.

With a Waldorf heart and a Bass charm they were destined to pick up something of the combined past that had led to their very creation.

Blair made her way up the stairs; skimming the wall with her fingertips as she poked her head into Tula's bedroom – empty.

There was nothing but the sound of her own breath and the beating of her heart, as she leaned into Henry's doorway, finding her children flat on their stomachs in a sea of crayons.

Henry looked up from his drawing at the rustling of her footsteps, "Hi mom."

With a smile, Blair walked into the bedroom, pushing away several aqua and yellow crayons with her heel, to sit cross-legged in front of them.

"My darlings," she sighed. "What on earth are you doing being so quiet! Isn't there homework to be done and a racket to be made?"

The tingling fear that spread through her like wildfire had broken itself down into dust. Her children were safe and sound and definitely not snooping about.

"No," Tula drawled, her eyes trained to the picture she was creating. "We wanted to work on pictures for Auntie Serena, Uncle Nate and Auntie Tess."

Blair nodded in understanding, peeking at the pages upside down.

"When's dinner?" Henry inquired. His crayon paused in mid-air as he looked up at his mother.

"Soon," Blair replied. She stood up, bent down to give each of them a kiss on the cheek and started towards the hall. "Both of you need to clean this mess up before Alexander gets here," She called over her shoulder.

"Bu—"Tula began to protest.

"No 'buts'. If you don't clean up your crayons and put them away, neither of you will be ready for dinner. And I'm sure you'd rather be eating with everyone, right?"

"Yes," They answered in unison. The clack and crinkle of crayons and paper quickly followed her instruction, filling the gaps of silence as she returned to the kitchen and the task she had been trying to complete.

Tough love was always the most difficult aspect of parenting, especially when they worked as a team. Henry batting his lashes and lowering his eyes to the floor in a feigned innocence of whatever he might have done, Tula's eyes shining bright, that same smirk on their faces …

She could hardly stand her ground.

An hour later, as Blair poured over a page of math homework in a way Henry could understand, the doorbell rang.

Tula, who had been upstairs deciding upon her dinner outfit, descended the stairs in a simple white dress with a red ribbon tied into her hair.

"You look beautiful my love," Blair praised as she moved into the foyer, putting a stray hair in its place beneath Tula's headband. "Just like a princess."

Tula lit up at this, her favourite book of all time (meaning the last two months) had been the paper bag princess. When they watched Cinderella, an almost weekly routine by now, Tula would hold her breath just as the prince first spotted Cinderella across the ballroom.

Almost like she didn't expect the two characters to fall in love, but the sigh of relief always came when they did and the story carried on as she knew it would.

It reminded Blair of her expertise in Audrey movies, and the hours in which, she had poured over the fairy tale of black-and-white films with a desiring sigh.

Henry strolled up. "Did you put the books away darling?" She asked, running a hand through his hair.

"Yes mom."

The doorbell rang again, "Hey let us in! It's f-f-reezing out here!"

Blair had almost entirely forgotten about the door, which she unlocked and quickly opened with an apologetic laugh, "Sorry. We thought you might be –"

"Dr Evil!" Henry interjected with excitement. He had just watched an Austen Powers movie with Mark a few days prior, against Blair's wishes, and had since taken every verbal opportunity to let everyone know that he'd seen one.

The trio drifted off to the side as Nate, Serena and Alex shuffled through the door. It slammed shut as Serena peeled off her son's scarf and jacket and started undoing her own. Nate laughed and ruffled up Henry's hair, "Very funny, Ry."

The twins immediately hugged him as he opened his arms. Nate nearly toppling to the floor in the embrace.

Blair moved towards Alexander. He stood, a little uncertain, on the sidelines. She kneeled down and pulled him into a hug, "Hey you."

"Hi Auntie Blair," Alex was just a year and a half younger than the twins and as beautiful as his parents. With a thick head of blonde hair and Serena's piercing blue eyes it wouldn't be long before he'd be the ladies man of New York City.

Mark appeared behind her, dropping his hand to her waist as she rose, pecking him on the cheek. He raised the other hand for Alex, who high-fived it with considerable strength and ran into his arms, "Uncle Mark!"

Blair locked eyes with Serena who flashed a tiny smile. Her eyes falling towards Tula, who had situated herself behind her mother's legs - just like she had done as a toddler – peeking out from behind Blair's thigh shyly.

"Hi Alex," She muttered, as Blair guided her forward. "Hi," he talked almost as quietly as she had. Henry turned and whispered something into Alex's ear, to which, Alex nodded quickly, "Okay!"

"Come on Tula." He motioned for her to follow as they stood at the bottom of the stairs. She looked once towards Blair, who grinned and prodded her in the back, and then the three children ran up the staircase, disappearing from view.

"Sorry we're late B," Serena said as they were drawn into a group hug. "Traffic was bad."

Blair pulled away and hooked her elbow through theirs, guiding the three of them into the kitchen. Having a chance to catch up with old friends was seemingly rare, and she cherished these moments like the precious diamonds they were.

Traditionally, the three "non-judging breakfast clubbers" got together once a week for Saturday night dinner and dessert, but for the last month schedules couldn't manage to co-ordinate. Serena had been bogged down in every live hour with work and Alex, while Nate had been out of the country on business.

As they entered the kitchen Nate handed Mark, a bottle of wine in a paper bag. "Sorry man, they were all out of white wine."

Mark took the bag, slid the paper down from the bottle, glanced at the label and let out a chuckle. "Red wine is great. We can get stark drunk on this, cheaply but thoroughly."

Blair laughed, swatting her husband's shoulder.

All around them was the heavy aroma of gourmet food. One thing she absolutely adored Mark for was his definite ability to make a damned good meal.

And whenever he did she praised him as such, because she had never been much good at anything but ordering take-out. Even then, it sometimes stood to get complicated.

"So," Blair sat in chair at the dinning-room table, "S, what have you been up to?"

"Just the usual," Serena sighed, sitting down. "Alex was accepted into Sacred Heart, early admission for next year."

"Really?" Blair rested her chin above her hands. She wondered if this was the 'big announcement' the Archibald's had promised tonight. "That's so great! When does he start?"

"September, but I don't think he's that excited." Serena rolled her eyes, "Whatever. This is the necessary step. Nate wants me to keep him in public school, 'let him be rounded', but that's just ridiculous."

Blair looked over at Nate who stood in the kitchen. He was talking to Mark, gesticulating largely with his hands.

"We all went to private school and we ended up fantastically, didn't we S?"

Serena grinned, "As great as could be expected anyway."

Chuck shot up from his pillow in a cold sweat. His eyes searched the darkness of his bedroom as he sat up, rubbing the sweat from his brow. The dream had seemed so real. He needed to be outside. Abby was fast asleep as he slipped into a pair of loafers and slung a housecoat over his shoulders.

There was nothing he needed more than to breathe fresh air, empty his thoughts.

In two weeks he would be in Tokyo, on the other side of the planet. And the only thing he could think of was Blair. Wherever he went, whatever he did she was there with him. Seeing her had unlocked a part of him that he had hidden beneath the thickness of memory.

To think of her as he had for the last eight years, every second of every day, was less painful to him than the images that flowed through his mind now. Of her marriage, her subsequent children, the concrete facts that blatantly explained their years apart in reasonable actions.

As the elevator reached the lobby Chuck fished his cell phone from the folds of his pocket.

"Erin -- yes, I know what time it is -- just get me Mark Hutlen's address."

Nate stood up, casting a glance at the table before him. Everyone looked up from their plates, hands in their laps, waiting patiently for his announcement. Serena grabbed his hand and flashed a smile at Blair, who felt a sliver of worry plant itself in her stomach.

"This dinner is absolutely fantastic; you guys seriously pull these things off, like, amazingly."

Serena had told her over the phone, a day previous, that they had major news to share over dinner. And, despite Blair's best efforts at drawing it out of them, both parties had remained equally tight-lipped until this very moment.

"Really," Serena added. "It's always just fantastic."

Mark threaded his fingers through Blair's, a pinkish tint to his cheeks.

"And we just wanted to tell everyone that there's going to be a new addition to the Archibald family come June!"

Everyone clapped and Blair exclaimed, "So you finally finished the paperwork?"

Serena smiled with a nod, "But it did take two years!"

They had been looking to adopt ever since Alexander's fifth birthday. The countless interviews, recommendations and rigorous processing, had done little to deter them from their goal. In little over two months the twins would have a new baby cousin.

After the congratulations had been done, the handshakes, back-slaps and encouraging smiles resting around the table, the conversation started to drift.

"So, Mark," Nate began, "I talked to Emory the other day, he told me about your new deal."

"Ah yes," Mark leaned back into his chair, sipping at a glass of wine. "We just finalized it the other day."

"With Charles Bass, yes?" Blair despised lawyers, and their constant need to converse with one another.

"Mmm."

"Why didn't you fax me the papers? I would have looked them over for you."

"Thanks Nate, but I didn't want to ruin your lovely vacation. See much aside from the boardroom?"

"Hardly," Nate bellowed. "I did, however, get to drive past the leaning tower of Pisa for two weeks."

"How exciting," Mark joked.

Serena looked up from her perch next to Alexander. "Chuck Bass, you said? I think I've heard of him before." Her words were double-edged as she burned holes through Blair's reserve.

Mark draped an arm over the back of his wife's chair. "He went to school with you, didn't he darling?"

Blair dropped her eyes to the empty ice cream bowl in front of her, "I told you already, yes."

"Oh?" Nate feigned surprise, "Interesting."

A pact had been made, a promise breathed in the folds of the past. she wondered if they had forgotten, the way they were prodding at her, secrets spilling across the table in a quiet crawl.

"Yes Nate," She defended, "You were friends with him, you should know."

"Anyway," Serena yelled over her husband, mouth poised to retort, "How did that go?"

"We had a great time."

Blair shot up, starting to collect the empty bowls littering the table. She pushed a strand of hair behind her ear and piled everything into the sink, safely detached from the conversation at hand. If she didn't think about Chuck, if she left him in the past, it was easier than acknowledging his existence as a part of her life.

As half of her children, as a consistent piece of her heart.

Mark. He was just as much a part of her as she was a part of him. They had grown together, loved together, learned together. It all mattered and yet it didn't, underneath everything was the solid basis of secrecy, things he didn't know.

Whispers that would destroy their relationship and rightfully so. The day they had gotten married she had known that there was only so much of herself she could give, fragments of something more that belonged somewhere else entirely. She wished now that she had told him then, given him the choice, but she had been so scared, pregnant and alone.

He would blame her and she would shoulder the blame.

For years they had lived in Brooklyn without a single mention of the Basshole. And, all of the sudden she couldn't go five minutes without hearing about him, everywhere she went, anything she did, he was there with her. It was infuriating. Chuck's recent intrusion on her life had been kept from Nate and Serena for fear of the questions they would raise, the answers they would want, when she had yet to think of any.

And now they were hearing all about it.

Chuck leaned against the cool leather of the limo as they drove towards the Brooklyn Bridge. He had relied solely on the silence in the car to buy him an excuse, a reason for showing up at Blair's doorstep at eleven forty-five on a Saturday night. So far, nothing had come to mind.

The lights of the city passed and faded as they entered Brooklyn. Why had she moved here? Had the past really been enough for Blair Waldorf to trade in her Upper East Side childhood for a life of a bohemian chic who donned woolly, hand-made mittens and complained about modern art?

No. She was still the same Blair he had loved for the past eight years. In her tiny black dress, Manolo's and perfectly pinned-back hair, there was nothing more beautiful than her pale face and long black lashes. Even still, he had noticed the night of the dinner, that she wore an identical red lipstick that had once left stains on a number of shirts he currently kept in the furthermost corners of his closet.

This was crazy, what was he thinking?

"Mr Bass," the driver's voice rose from the front seat as the car slowed to a stop, "We're here sir."

He gazed, eyes lidded, out the tinted windows at the brownstone across the street. All the lights were out except for a dimmed glow in one of the smaller windows.

It did little to rest the nagging voice in the back of his mind, telling him that there was more to be seen than what the surface presented.

But what could it be?

"Back to the house now Timothy, I've seen enough."

"Alright sir." Chuck watched the darkness swallow Blair's street as they moved back onto the freeway. There was one thing he knew – a certian private investigator would be getting a call first thing in the morning.

If only to soothe the suspicions that had danced around in his thoughts since the moment he kissed Blair last week. He couldn't just let her walk away now.

He felt it in his bones, there was something more, something else to be seen, to be heard, to be known. Secrets never stayed secrets for long on the Upper East Side, even if they managed to move into a quaint little house in one of the boroughs.