Hurricane

And I've surrendered all that's left of me;

But you and I won't ever cease,

If we cannot agree.

"I hate you."

Blair thought that if she said it, if she said it out loud, maybe she could convince herself it was actually true. That maybe the words could rebuild the walls that had been falling to pieces all day, ever since they'd signed that ridiculous peace treaty.

Peace? When had peace ever existed between Blair Cornelia Waldorf and Charles Bartholomew Bass? He was right—as much as she loathed admitting it—they could never be friends. Being friends meant polite amicability; social niceties exchanged at society functions.

Not dark eyes pinning her to the ground with love and lust and a million shades in-between.

Not sparks that multiplied into butterflies at the mere brush of his fingers on hers.

So she told him she hated him, because the alternative meant she was still vulnerable, still weak, still pathetically in love with him.

"I've never hated anyone more."

"Every nerve ending in my body is electrified by hatred," she told him, knowing it was a horrible mistake to take even one step closer, but she couldn't help herself—her feet seemed to move without her mind realizing what they were doing. As if they were two magnets drawn together by the laws of nature and the universe. All you had to do was give them a little flip and instead of being repelled, they were undeniably attracted. Black and white, ying and yang, up and down, hot and cold, Chuck and Blair . . .

Blair wondered if perhaps their fight against the inevitable had always been futile.

"There is a fiery pit of hate burning inside me ready to explode."

Blair understood what he meant—except that her feelings weren't a bomb that couldn't be diffused—they were a hurricane pounding away, relentless and inexorable, on walls that were crumbling every second that passed. Her throat was suddenly parched, and she swallowed, feeling her heart pounding, the blood beating hot and thick under her skin.

"So it's settled then."

"We're settled."

It was over the moment he touched her. After all, she'd demanded a "No touching," clause for a reason. Water didn't just seep through the cracks of the crumbling, shaking walls, it exploded, and as she watched his eyes grow wide, as if he hadn't even contemplated doing this unthinkable thing, she thought maybe explosive had been the right term all along.

In the aftermath of the cataclysm, her skin damp against the satiny wood of the piano, her head nestled in the crook of his neck, their perfectly synced heavy breathing unbearably loud in the dark silence of the Waldorf penthouse, Blair couldn't help but contemplate the very thin line between love and hate.

She'd asked Serena once, "How far is too far? Where is the place you can't come back from?"

Serena had tried to tell her that such a place existed—that it definitely existed in conjunction with Jack Bass, and Blair had tried to listen. Had tried to believe.

Had forced herself to accept that doing such a thing, even thinking of such a thing, meant that she had slid too far into the dark side to continue loving a man like Chuck Bass.

Just as she could still feel the imprint of his hand from their truce handshake, Blair could still feel the sting of her palm on his face when she'd drawn that line in the sand. Serena had been right; there were depths that you should never plumb. Acts done, even in the name of love, that should be left undone.

Her fingers digging into his skin, his arms wrapped around her as if he could not bear to let her go, Blair was forced to finally admit that Serena had been wrong. Blair had done the unthinkable, had committed the action that should have killed and ruined her love of Chuck Bass forever, but in the end, only the opposite was true.

He was in her blood, and under her skin, and buried so deeply inside her that she could no longer figure out where she left off and he began.

"I . . ." Chuck seemed speechless, and Blair thought he might say the one thing that would bring her down once and for all, so she finished his sentence the only way she could.

"I still hate you," she murmured against his skin, the words an unholy benediction to a union that should have ended once and for all.

"I'll always hate you," Chuck murmured into the damp curtain of her hair, and Blair couldn't help but wonder how long before they ceased being such flagrant liars.

Before they ceased pretending that while their minds and bodies might disagree, their souls had never been in anything but perfect, unadulterated accord.

"Hate me again," Blair breathed out, and she didn't miss the way his fingers tightened on her flesh, the way her own legs pulled him in closer.

Lies, misunderstandings, disagreements—all that faded to the back of her mind—as lips and teeth and hands began to tell her the truth all over again.

AN: Dialogue taken from 3x17, "Inglorious Bassterds" and 4x07, "War at the Roses."