Chapter Four: Confessions
The mother and daughter stood there, staring at each other. Serena's knees felt as if they could give in at any moment. Her mother being there ruined it; the idea of escape, freedom, detachment from expectations and rules and everything that living on the Upper East Side meant. Lily was a sudden remainder that the fairytale she had lived in the past couple of days was just fantasy, and at some point she would have to wake up from her dream, come back to reality. And that moment came a lot sooner than Serena desired or expected.
She panicked. She knew her mother was here for a reason, and she just didn't want to care what that was. She didn't want to be taken away from Dan, from the little town that became the perfect backdrop for mending their love, from the memories reminisced in the little apartment, and the new memories they made in the few days spent here. She knew she wasn't strong enough to stand up to her mother anymore, at least not then. She needed time to heal, and she doubted her mother understood that. She needed Dan to justify to Lily why they left, because she just couldn't formulate an explanation good enough to wipe the heartbreakingly disappointed look in her mother's eyes.
'Serena, who is it?' he asked from around the corner, as if he heard what she was thinking. He couldn't see the person standing on the other side of the door, and he didn't think it important enough to really care so early in the morning, but when his eyes settled on the familiar figure, any words he could have said were abstained in an instant.
'Well, are you ever going to ask me inside?' Lily asked, her tone tired and annoyed. It matched her eyes.
Serena didn't answer, she just opened the door wider and moved out of the way. As soon as her mother entered, she closed it and turned to Dan. He saw how terrified she looked, how desperate she was for everything to be okay. He gathered her in his arms, holding her reassuringly.
'It's going to be fine, Serena. You'll see,' he whispered to her. How he wanted to believe the words that came out of his mouth, but he wasn't sure about anything concerning Serena's mother anymore. He knew how capable she was of getting what she wanted, and if that was them apart, then she had a history of succeeding.
They walked hand in hand in the small living room, where Lily sat on an armchair. They joined her, sitting on the sofa, side by side. The uncomfortable silence was excruciating, especially for Serena, who would have broken down in sobs if it wasn't for Dan's strong hands keeping hers in his.
'I would love a glass of champagne, thank you, Daniel,' Lily announced, her irritated tone suggesting that he left.
'I'm sorry, Lily, but we have no alcohol in the apartment. I didn't think it right for Serena to be around it, especially so soon after recent events that you might be familiar with,' he responded, sternly. He wanted to be strong. For Serena, to make her feel safe; for Lily, to understand how serious he was about her daughter.
'You know, Dan, when I heard that my daughter went missing from the private centre filled with highly qualified professionals that I poured a lot of money for, I should have known you were behind it. I mean, what on earth were you thinking, disrespecting what I thought best for my daughter! You had no right to go against...'
'Mom, stop!' Serena interrupted, her voice shaking harder than her hands. 'It's not his fault.'
'Serena, be quiet. You don't really have a say in this.'
'That is exactly why I took her out of that place! You completely ignored the fact that Serena might have had an opinion about whether she should have been committed to an institute, you didn't even talk to her about what happened, or what she wanted. You didn't care for anything else except being able to label her as 'sorted' before you were interviewed by some petty journalist about your daughter's supposed overdose. That was not the right way to deal with her. She was terrorized after what happened that night, and all she needed was someone else to talk to, not the same pompous psychiatrist with a white coat and a condescending tone. She needed someone to listen to her, and trust her to be good enough to not have done what everyone else kept accusing her of. I'm sorry to say this, Lily, but I cared about her, while you didn't.'
He waited for the storm to come, for Lily to shout and accuse and decide. But it didn't happen. She looked away, her chin touching her shoulder, and Dan noticed it was trembling.
'It still doesn't give you the right to go against me. I am her mother, and this decision was supposed to be mine, not anyone else's. I thought I was doing the right thing,' she muttered, her voice tinted with hurt. 'I was trying to protect you from the press, but most importantly from yourself,' she said, her tone softening even more. A single tear rolled down her cheek, but Lily wiped the evidence before a second one fell. Her gaze moved towards Serena, and her usually proud and courageous eyes were defeated by soft red rims. 'I was so proud of what you had become, controlled and mature; I thought we were past all the issues that we had before you left for boarding school. The other day, after the Saints and Sinners party, when I was sitting by a hospital bed occupied by my intoxicated daughter, I saw a glimpse of the old Serena, and I didn't want to believe she would ever come back. I was so scared that you were going to go back to your old ways, and I knew I would never let that happen again. I thought you needed help.' Lily wiped her cheek again, and dropped her eyes, focusing them on the intertwined hands of the two adolescents, and as improbable as it seemed, Dan saw one corner of her mouth rising in a sad smile. 'It never occurred to me that you might have needed something else, something you know I am not good at being. Someone you could talk to, confide in, and someone who unconditionally believed in you, even though all odds were against you. Someone like Dan, whom I thank for being here for you, although I don't appreciate his methods of going about it.'
Serena took her hands out of Dan's comforting hold and walked over to her mother, kneeling by her feet.
'Mom, since I came back from boarding school, I have been killing myself to prove to everyone that I am not the uncontrollable teenage girl I used to be. I wanted to show people I changed, and the person I wanted to prove it to the most was you. And it hurt that after all this time it was so easy for you to believe the worst about me and commit me to an institution. It's so frustrating that you don't trust me, that you chose to believe anyone else except for me. I don't know what else to do to earn your trust.' Tears rolled down her cheeks too, but they didn't stop her from speaking. She needed her mom to hear all of this, in order for their relationship to ever go back to a relative normal.
'I am so sorry, sweetheart,' Lily said, taking her daughter's hands into hers. 'You have to understand how scared I was. I could have lost you that night. I wasn't thinking clearly and I would have done anything to protect you, even if that meant locking you up in a psychiatric centre.'
'I understand,' Serena said, and let her lips smile weakly as Lily kissed the top of her knuckles. She wasn't sure exactly what it was that she understood, but she was willing to let it go, at least for now. She didn't have the energy to fight.
'I'm sorry I doubted you. I never should have, but how was I supposed to know that anyone would be as immoral as to do what Juliet did to you. I am sorry you had to go through that, honey.' She smoothed Serena's hair, just like she had done many times before, when Serena was still a child.
'Wait, how do you know about what Juliet did?' Serena asked, looking up at her mother again. She wiped the tears off her face, feeling her eyes heavy with emotions. She was confused at what happened; she couldn't explain it to anyone, every scenario she had in mind sounded like some evil master plan, and all of the evidence was against her. She was angry at how much distress and misery Juliet had caused her family, and she wished she understood what reason she had to cause it. She was subconsciously worried about Dan. Why, she couldn't say, but she feared that once he heard the truth of what happened that night his blind belief in her would be destroyed, and she would lose him again. She tried to prevent that by sitting next to him, gripping onto his hands as hard as she could. She hoped that that way, he wouldn't be able to leave. He looked at her, sensing that she was distressed, and although he didn't guess her motives, he let her know that he was there and she didn't need to worry. She smiled half-heartedly at him, but didn't let go.
Lily watched her daughter sit beside who she intuited was now her boyfriend. In the few seconds it took them to share the little moment, she worried about their relationship. What would everybody say about Serena dating her step-brother? What would that mean for her and Rufus? How will Serena take it once her fantasy romance is broken down again by the unfortunate situation they were in? She didn't have the heart to ruin it. She wouldn't meddle in their relationship ever again. She always knew that Dan would have a special place in Serena's heart, and she truly believed that they deserved another chance. They deserved to relive what were once the best moments of Serena's life, until fate would stop it.
She barely noticed her daughter staring at her expectantly, and she began explaining the events of that wretched night.
'Well, Jenny confessed to Blair about being behind the operation. She told her she was working with Vanessa for Juliet. They dressed up in the same dress as you and entered the party under your name, but Vanessa wasn't with them. I really don't understand how they managed to do that, but that's irrelevant now. Jenny told Blair that she kissed Nate while Juliet kissed Dan, which I don't know how was supposed to turn them against you.'
He dropped his head, ashamed and angry. He was played, and he almost let that ruin things with Serena. He had been so stupid. 'I'm so sorry, Serena,' Dan whispered once Lily finished that last sentence. It wasn't enough; 'sorry'. Was there a word good enough to describe the remorse he felt? 'So much for always believing in you... I'm sorry, I...'
She put her hands over his cheeks, forcing him to look at her. 'You have nothing to apologise for. You couldn't have known...' she reassured him, rubbing her thumbs over the skin she could reach. It felt ironic to him, that she would be the one comforting him, when he was the one in the wrong. Why could she forgive him for not believing in her, which was something he prided himself in doing, when he took exactly two seconds to condemn her at that party?
'Jenny saw Blair and Chuck go somewhere together, and she was the one to drop the curtain and expose them, which upset Blair,' Lily continued, and Serena took hold of Dan's fingers again. 'It went hand-in-hand with Juliet's plan, which was to basically have everyone you cared about hate you. To distance you from anyone that mattered in your life. On the surface, it seems so childish, and immature, but her motives were darker than that.
After Jenny confessed to Blair, they came to see me. They told me everything; I have to admit, I was so distressed by your little disappearing act, I didn't believe them at first. But Jenny showed me proof; your mask. She told me after that, Juliet disappeared without a word. Blair was furious. She kept shouting at Jenny, at me, repeating over and over how stupid it was of everyone to believe Juliet. She said that people were just generally blind if they ever mistook you for 'this social climber from Brooklyn or that poor liar with better hair than expected', her words, not mine. She was so angry, that she made Jenny wear your mask again, to ask me whether I would have fallen for the disguise. But when Jenny put on the mask, she started coughing and became unstable on her feet. I took it off, asked her what happened, and she said it smelled funny. When I smelled it, the scent was familiar, and only later I remember smelling it once again before. Your dress reeked of it when I was called into hospital one night, five years ago, after you suffered that overdose. I'm not sure how much you remember, after the procedures, and pills, and...' Lily stopped when she saw a glimpse of Serena's face. It was something she clearly wasn't proud of, something that she wanted to forget, which explained the pained, mortified look on her face. Lily waited for one moment, allowing Serena to shake the memories from her mind, to detach herself from the past. It wasn't important enought to worry about it at that moment. What mattered then was the future.
Serena tried to avoid Dan's eyes; she didn't want to see if he was disappointed in her, now that he heard yet another story about her youth that she desperately tried to keep a secret.
Her mom broke the deafening silence. 'It all happened very fast after that. I couldn't remember the name of the drug, but I still went to the police and showed them the mask. Jenny told them the story, and they carried out some drug tests, which came out as positive; the thing in the mask was called 'Ether' or something like that. They asked us questions; a ton of them, and asked for our statements. They even got a hold of Nate, as his past with Juliet was somehow important. They alerted the Interpol, organised search parties all around New York, the neighbouring cities and states, and soon they found her. She was trying to catch a train from Connecticut to Massachussets. Five interrogations later, it finally occurred to them that they could perform a lie detector test on her, and they asked me to write some of the questions. It doesn't matter what I asked, what matters is that she confessed to everything Jenny told us, and to taking you to a cheap motel room, where she stuffed you with countless other drugs, and she planted some more pills around you, to make it seem like you used them. Let's just say that this ended with some mug shots, an orange plastic outfit, and a jail cell occupied by Miss Sharp. It's over now, Serena,' he mother said, soothingly.
Serena nodded, and hid her face in Dan's chest, overwhelmed by the truth. Dan rubbed her back affectionately, drawing large circles on the shirt she wore. He realised that the way they were both dressed, Serena in his shirt, and him in only slacks, could have hinted to Lily that something might have happened between them last night, but he didn't feel like explaining anything just yet. At that moment, all he wanted was to be with Serena, be that someone she could lean on while dealing with all that stuff that upset her greatly.
'Anyway, as soon as Juliet was behind bars, I had to come and get you back to New York. The police still needs your statement before anything can go to court, and they need it as soon as possible. Everyone is waiting for you to, you know, apologise to you. Blair especially. She is so sorry about how she acted, and she is desperate to make things up with you. You need to give her a chance to. You need to come home.'
Serena shook her head against Dan's chest, and he felt hot, fresh tears spread over his skin. He tightened his grip on her, and kissed the top of her head, comforting her. He let her cry; he knew she needed to, after all the drama, and the fear, and the pressure and tension. Now that it was all over, she needed to cry it all out of her system. He was just there for her, and she was grateful for that.
'Does she really have to go back now? I mean, can't we stay here the three weeks we rented this apartment for, allow Serena to finally relax, recharge her batteries, most importantly, heal, and then have her deal with whatever it is waiting for her at home. Isn't that wiser?'
'Well, the police department doesn't think it is. They need her statement now, so that the case doesn't lose importance in court. Please, darling, understand. After we're done with the trial, you and Dan can go on another vacation, if you want to. But for right now, you are needed in New York.'
Dan sighed. He hated the fact that he agreed with Lily on this. As much as he understood how important it was for Serena to escape, he knew it was more so that she returned to the city to put an end to Juliet. 'Serena, I know you won't want to hear this, but maybe it is better for us to return. Think about it, if you give your statement, then everything is over for good. And we'll go away somewhere, just the two of us, for however long you want, just to escape. I know how much that means to you. Just consider it, please. It is for the best.'
They were right, but it just annoyed her that she knew they were. She didn't want to leave yet; she loved the simplicity, the unpretentiousness of this place. The calm feeling when little grains of sand would slide between her toes. But she had to; if she went back to New York, then Juliet could be forgotten, and her and Dan could start fresh. They could be a couple again.
She took her time in communicating her decision, just to lie against his chest a minute longer, just to delay the terrifying concept of returning home. Eventually, she muttered a simple 'okay'.
A/N: Okay, okay, I know. Long, boring chapter. I'm not proud of it, but I felt it was needed to do a bit of explanation. I hope it didn't disappoint too much, and that you keep reading my story. I really appreciate it. Thank you! Xx
PS. Sorry about the layout of the story, it's crap and makes it really hard to read, but I have NO IDEA how to separate the paragraphs or put indents or whatever. I have tried, I just can't do it on here. Sorry .