I think we are all aware that I suck. Like, a lot.
Chapter 33: Gravity
Something always brings me back to you.
It never takes too long.
No matter what I say or do I'll still feel you here 'til the moment I'm gone.
-"Gravity" Sara Bareilles
"It's time."
"Oooh, ominous, Baizen. Really, you took the words right out of the boss's mouth."
"Shut it, Sparks."
Georgina pinched her nose in frustration. "Look, if you're having second thoughts-"
"I'm not," Carter snapped. "We're too close to back down now. Bass is as good as dead." He loosened his necktie before tightening it again, this time in a Windsor knot, and Georgina noticed a distinct sheen across his brow. He was nervous.
"You still haven't told me why you're doing this. You know my reason, and it's only fair-"
"Since when have you cared about what's fair?"
"Since they took my son away from me and forced me into this job," she said quietly, picking at her nails, which hadn't been manicured in months. They were bitten nearly down to the beds, yet another nasty habit Georgina couldn't seem to shake.
Just like her nasty habit of falling in with nasty people.
"You really want to know, don't you?" he asked, his voice equally quiet but with a hint of menace to it. She shrugged, figuring any response she gave would do little to affect his decision to share. "Alright, then," he said, his face breaking into a manic grin. "Truth is, this isn't my first time at the rodeo, Sparks."
"Meaning?"
"I've killed someone before - my dear old dad, actually," he said, taking off his tie completely this time before tossing it into a pile of discarded suit jackets, pants, and dress shirts. "And Bass thinks he has a monopoly on daddy issues."
"You - you what?" Georgina felt her heart drop to her gut. Yes, Carter had always been rough around the edges, but a murderer? He wasn't - he couldn't have-
"Oh, Georgie, you look like someone just told you that Santa isn't real," he said, breaking into her thoughts.
"Explain yourself," she hissed. "Now."
"Well, I'm sure you're aware of what went down between the Buckley family and me."
"Yeah," she said, running a hand through her hair as she racked her brain. "You left Bree Buckley's sister-"
"Cousin."
"Sister, cousin - who gives a shit?" Georgina snapped.
"I do, G. If I die, you'll be next in line to write the memoir on my life, so we have to go through this with as much detail as possible," Carter said, reclining in a chair and kicking his feet up.
"Cousin," Georgina repeated, gritting her teeth at Carter's blatant disconcern for the issues at hand that actually mattered, for instance, the fact that he'd killed his father. "You left her at the altar and were supposed to go work at one of their oil plants in Texas, but Serena somehow got you out of it. Was that accurate enough for you, or should we go through it again?"
The ghost of a smile appeared on Carter's face. "Eh, your specificity leaves much to be desired, but you get points for effort."
"I'm not seeing the relevance, Baizen."
"Patience, young padawan," he drawled, picking at a red thread on the chair and twisting it until it popped free from the seam. "Untimely ripped," he muttered to himself.
"What?"
"Nothing - just something from Macbeth. It doesn't matter." Carter sighed, his eyes returning to meet Georgina's gaze. She didn't like it - the heaviness in his stare, the way his eyes bore right into hers, almost defiantly and certainly unapologetically. "Look, you know what the Buckleys are like, right?"
Georgina assumed it was a rhetorical question - everyone in their social strata knew what the Buckleys were like. "The guys are dicks, the girls are bitches, and they're both relentless."
Carter chuckled. "Yeah, that's one way to put it, but I meant more along the lines of revenge - as in, they don't let chances for it slip away very easily. They were determined to get back at me, and they did. Damn, they did."
Georgina began chewing on her thumb nail, Carter's story intriguing her in spite of herself, and God, it had been a long time since she'd heard anything resembling the gossip she'd been so accustomed to on the Upper East Side. "How?" she asked, her voice fringing on embarrassing in its breathlessness.
"Drug deal - they set the whole thing up."
"They had you sent to prison?"
"I wish," Carter said softly, going back to the thread and twirling it among his fingers until it looked like a trail of blood trickling down his hand. "It was worse than that. The drug lord I hooked up with - well, let's just say he was on the Buckleys' payroll, helped them keep the crime down in certain areas of Texas in exchange for a little bonus cash and freedom from persecution by the police."
"So basically, the Buckleys are the mafia."
At that, Carter laughed. "Basically. Only instead of Italian accents, they have that charming Southern twang."
"More like nauseating," Georgina said, noticing that her thumb was left with practically no nail. She really needed to stop gnawing on it.
"Yeah, well, some would also call the twang intimidating - the false sweetness can be a real gut-churner, especially when it's coming out of the mouth of a drug lord who's telling you that you owe him two hundred and fifty grand."
"What the hell? How did you even-"
"Rack up that much debt?" Carter finished. "Well, I wasn't exactly on the cheap stuff, nor was I taking it alone - you'd be surprised at how fast the money can go when you and fifty of your closest friends are snorting it up your nose."
"God, stop," said Georgina, throwing up a hand. "Look, I know I wasn't exactly prim and proper growing up" - at Carter's snort, she threw a pillow at his head, but pressed on - "okay, not even close to prim and proper, but still. That amount of drugs - it's insane."
"Unfortunately, I was a little too out of it to notice how deep I was," Carter said, shaking his head. "I just kept wanting more, and the Buckleys were more than happy to comply with my requests by means of their payrolled supplier." Carter grimaced. "Christ, I don't know why I thought it'd be a good idea to stay in Texas after I'd sent the chloroform and gasoline to Thorpe. Probably to be defiant - to show the Buckleys they'd lost."
"Yeah, the battle," Georgina said. "The war, however, seems to be a very obvious Buckley victory."
"Look," Carter sighed. "I thought the battle was the war, and yes, I'm well aware of my mistake at this point in time, thank you very fucking much." His eyelids fluttered shut briefly, and he rubbed at his temples, seemingly agitated. Georgina couldn't tell whether the annoyance was directed toward her, the Buckleys, or himself. She guessed himself - Carter was by no means a moral pillar, but he had to feel some remorse for what he'd become, or at the very least, regret for making the mistakes that led to his transformation into a killer.
"So then what happened?" she asked softly as Carter's eyes snapped open, somewhat dazed.
"I - I called my parents, learned that they were in Moscow. My dad was doing business there. I told them some bullshit story about wanting another chance, and God, did they eat it up." Carter's voice grew hoarse, almost broken. "I figured I could swipe a few of their credit cards, checkbooks, bank account numbers - anything that could get me the cash I needed to pay off my debt, which I still didn't realize I owed to the Buckleys. I thought it was a group of druggies after me, like that Tuco dude and his buddies in Breaking Bad."
"So you thought you were as good as dead," Georgina guessed.
"Yeah. Yeah, I did," said Carter. He leant back further in the chair, wiping at the sweat on his forehead. "Is it hot in here? Is - is the A/C on?"
"Baizen, it's December in New York. I wasn't aware we needed air conditioning," Georgina said, laughter in her voice in spite of her concern for Carter, which refused to disappear no matter how deranged he seemed. Then again, maybe that was part of the problem - as long as he was sane, she could convince herself that she was too, but if he went off the deep end... She shuddered to think what might happen to her own mind, not to mention the mission.
Everything depended on Carter.
"Turn on the damn air conditioning!" he roared suddenly, leaping up from the chair he'd been lying on only a moment before. "TURN IT ON!"
"Jesus, Baizen. Calm down," she said, her voice not nearly as steady as she would have liked. She walked over to the dial on the wall and clicked it to the cool side. "I'm turning it on, okay? Just - just relax."
"Relax," he scoffed, beginning to pass back and forth in the hotel room. "Yeah, sure. Relax, Carter, it's not as if your entire life is hinging on murdering a guy you've known practically your entire life, right?" He laughed hysterically, his eyes toward the ceiling. "Right, you bastard? God, or whoever you are, you really get a kick out of ruining my life don't you, you sick piece of-"
"Baizen-"
He swung in her direction, and she couldn't help but flinch. "Don't you dare look at me like that," he said, pointing at her in accusation.
"Like what?" she asked, subtly taking a step away from him.
"LIKE YOU FEEL SORRY FOR ME!"
"I don't know what you're-"
"IT'S WRITTEN ALL OVER YOUR FACE!" He laughed again, even more alarmingly deranged this time. "Well, that and fear." He took one last look at her before collapsing into the red chair again. "I'm not going to kill you, Sparks, which I'm surprised you haven't gathered by now. As much as I'm loathe to admit it, I need you."
"Why did you kill your father?" she whispered, before she even realized what she was saying.
His eyes flashed. "Because he caught me trying to take the money. He caught me, and he knew right away what I needed it for - told me he was going to send me back to the States, make sure I went to prison. I - I couldn't go back without the two hundred and fifty thousand; otherwise, I thought I'd be dead within an hour." He smirked without any humor to it. "Knowing the Buckleys, that might've been the plan all along."
"So you considered the murder of your own father a viable solution?"
"Look, we can't all be like Saint Georgina, alright?" he barked, his voice cracking. "We were on an uncrowded street, I saw a deserted alley, and I shot him with a handgun I'd managed to swipe from some homeless guy. I didn't have a choice-"
"You always have a choice, Baizen, and-"
"Do we really have to call it murder, anyway?" he interrupted, ignoring her completely. "That word makes it sound so...despicable."
"IS THERE A KIND OF MURDER OTHER THAN DESPICABLE?" Georgina screeched, suddenly unable to bear being in the same room as him. She didn't care that she needed him for the mission, or that he was likely her best bet to getting Milo back; he was a murderer, a monster, and she'd be damned if she became one, too. She grabbed her jacket and purse, the mantra need to get out of here need to leave need to go go go, running through her brain as she headed for the door.
Carter, as usual, was one step ahead of her. "You can't leave me here," he said, his voice soft but intimidating - the threat was apparent. "Not until we're done."
"We are done, Baizen. Don't you get that?" Her heart hammered in her chest as she spoke.
"We're not," he growled. "Get this through your thick skull - we're not done, not until I say so. The people who are behind this operation - they have footage of me shooting my father, and if that weren't damning enough, they somehow know all about the Buckleys and my drug money, too." He drew nearer still, and she could smell the sweat on his face and the whiskey on his breath - the first stung her eyes; the second, her nose. "This is my only chance to be free. So sit your ass down, and get ready to do the damn job."
...
Eleanor Waldorf was hardly one to associate with people she considered beneath her, but this was a special - or rather, a not so special - occasion. Hospitals within a twenty mile-radius of Manhattan were obviously out of the question, because she could run into absolutely anyone there, which is how Eleanor found herself in Middle-of-Nowhere, New York, the snow slowly drifting down to fill the cracks in the parking lot she was standing in.
It wasn't as if she was afraid; no, Eleanor was not one to be fearful of much, a trait which she was glad had been passed down to her daughter. She was just...disturbed by the sheer lack of taste she was seeing in the exterior design of the hospital.
For Blair, she reminded herself, taking a step forward. For Cyrus.
For your grandchild.
She quickened her pace, entering the waiting room, where fluorescent lights provided a coldness to the room and drab walls were decorated with similarly drab paintings of cats. The sheer amount of beige was enough to make her consider leaving the place immediately.
"Ms. Stockton?"
Eleanor raised her head. "Yes, Jo Stockton. That's me," she said, rising from her chair.
"The doctor will see you now."
She nodded and followed the nurse, who kept eyeing her Chanel purse as if attempting to discern its legitimacy.
"I can assure you, I do not purchase fakes," Eleanor said snidely, only feeling a slight pang of guilt when the nurse blushed and mumbled an apology. It was enough that she was here; she didn't need to be nice to the staff too, now did she?
After the nurse left her in another room - equally bland, equally cat-themed - her cell phone began to ring, and she hesitated only briefly before answering.
"Hello, Jack."
"Hello to you, Mrs. Rose," she heard him reply. "Hey, I never noticed that before - we're Jack and Rose!"
"In that case, can we skip to the part where you die in the icy water?" she asked, annoyed already with the younger Bass brother.
"Now is that any way to treat your dear partner in crime?" He paused for a moment. "I guess this makes us more Bonnie and Clyde than Jack and Rose, then, huh?"
"I guess you should get to the point," Eleanor snapped.
"Alright, then. Look, I got you out of the financial mess with Waldorf Designs, didn't I?"
"Yes, illegally," she hissed into the phone, keeping her voice down. In some ways, it was a godsend being in this dump of a hospital - there were no security cameras in any of the patients' rooms.
"Semantics," Jack answered casually. "The point is, I got you out of that mess, and now I'm getting you out of this one."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"It means I have a doctor lined up to meet you. The best in the state, and he's coming to you today," answered Jack.
Eleanor wasn't sure why she'd told Jack about her illness in the first place - she'd been going through a list of everything going horribly wrong in her life at the time, and it happened to slip out. Once it did, however, she realized how much she'd been aching to talk to someone about it, even if that someone was a slimy rat. Though, that wasn't fair. As much additional trouble as Jack had gotten her into, he was nice enough, if not somewhat exuberant both in dress and personality.
"How do you know where I am?"
"Simple - I had someone hack into patient databases for hospitals within sixty miles of Manhattan then searched for Audrey Hepburn pseudonyms - figured that you'd pay tribute to Blair, get all sentimental on me." He chuckled. "As always, Uncle Jack was right."
"Yes, well, Uncle Jack, I appreciate it, but I'm perfectly fine-"
"Yeah, now you are, thanks to me. For my payment in gratitude, I'd like to be invited to whatever soiree you're going to throw for your darling daughter and my nephew."
"I don't know if that's-"
"Oh, it's fine," he interjected. "We're all friends now. You know what they say; the friends that sleep together, stay together."
"Funny, I've never heard that one," she said, though she wasn't going to put up a fight. She couldn't deny that she owed him at least an invitation. "I'll send your invite to your office as soon as I get home."
"I look forward to it. Have a good one, the Rose to my Jack, the Bonnie to my Clyde, the-"
She hung up before he could continue and sighed, rubbing her eyes wearily. She didn't look up when she heard the door open.
"Ms. Stockton? Are you ready to begin radiation?"
Blair. Cyrus. Grandchild.
"As ready as I'll ever be."
...
Dan had grown used to his routine with Charlie - they'd wake up together, drink coffee together, get bagels together, even sit together on the couch for hours as Dan wrote and she filled out job and acting applications, breaking up the time with additional food runs.
It was becoming suffocating.
He was most honest with himself in the moments when Charlie was gone. Only then could he admit to how much he missed Vanessa. She had been completely right about him, about everything. He was going to come crawling back to her soon, and he couldn't even find it within himself to be ashamed. She'd been the most constant thing in his life for a few years now, and he was slowly realizing that she'd also been the best thing - she had her faults, of course, but who didn't? And she had the ability to diminish his faults while bringing out the most admirable parts of his personality.
He needed her.
Ever since she'd left, he'd been lost, missing the parts of himself he used to be proud of - his empathy, for one thing, along with his consideration, his kindness; God, even his dignity had walked out with Vanessa.
Had he really attempted to hit on Blair, who had been clearly wrapped up in Chuck?
Been horrible to Serena, aka "Sabrina," the girl he'd claimed to love at the time?
Forgotten about Nate entirely, and gotten in the way of his relationship with Serena, whom Nate truly cared for?
And Chuck... he hadn't seen Chuck since the accident, hadn't even bothered to call or text him.
He'd become the very person he'd grown up despising - someone power hungry, entitled, selfish, and, like Blair had pointed out that day in the library, completely judgmental, except when he had to look in the mirror.
"Dan?" a voice called, interrupting his internal monologue.
Please don't be Charlie.
"Dan, it's Jenny! Where are you?"
Dan exhaled in relief. "My room!"
His little sister walked in, her light blonde hair looking immaculate, her face natural and fresh. He'd missed this Jenny - he supposed he wasn't the only Humphrey who'd lost themselves over the past few years.
God, He'd been so sure he could handle it, that he wouldn't conform to the stereotypes and pressures of the misleadingly glamorous world Serena pulled him into, but he absolutely did. At least Jenny seemed to have everything figured out...
Maybe there was hope for him yet.
"Look what I got in the mail today," Jenny said, lifting an ivory square of cardstock.
"What is that?" he asked wearily, unsure of what Jenny would say and unsure if he wanted to know.
"An invitation to Blair and Chuck's wedding party," she said excitedly, plopping herself on the bed and crossing her legs. "I did the calligraphy myself," she added proudly.
"Wonderful," Dan said sarcastically, though Jenny didn't appear to notice.
"And unlike freshman year, I got paid in money instead of an invitation for myself," she said with a laugh. "Blair's been insanely cool lately. Like, she even offered to let me help with the baby's nursery!"
"Wonderful," Dan repeated, his tone even flatter than before. This time, Jenny stopped turning the invitation in her hands and swiveled her stance to face him.
"Look, Dan, I know you're not exactly on the best of terms with Blair, Chuck, or anyone really," she said frankly, holding up a hand when Dan attempted to interrupt. "But I still think there's a chance for you to reconcile with the people you used to care about, to be the brother I used to care about, instead of a guy whose only similarity to the old Dan is his love of plaid." She folded her arms and blew her bangs out of her eyes. "I'm not trying to be harsh, okay? I'm saying this because I miss you, like actual you, not this asshole author masquerading as my brother."
"I get it," Dan said finally. "I get it. I - I'm not the guy I used to be, and believe me, I miss being him. He was...so much better a person than I am now."
"Yeah, he was," Jenny said frankly, shrugging her thin shoulders and placing another invitation by his side. "But who says that just because we get lost that we can't find our way back again?"
...
Good morning, Upper East Siders!
It's been a while hasn't it? In my defense, I've been pretty busy - my brother and best friend got married, not to mention everything that happened earlier this winter. I've realized, however, that if B can balance marriage, friendship, and school work, and still have time for a position at Girls, Inc. then I have no excuse to not write a little blog post.
And that's exactly what I want to talk about - excuses and what makes something excusable. For instance, is it excusable that right now, I'm eating my boyfriend's Swedish fish without his knowledge? I would say yes - I haven't eaten all day, and he left them right on my desk.
But there are some things that no amount of words can ever excuse, and what are we supposed to do then? What if we're the one who's been hurt? What if we're the one who's done the hurting?
What if no excuse is good enough for our mistake?
In that case, words become simply sounds, void of meaning, and thoughts - well, thinking good things never really gets you anywhere, does it? So if what we think and say no longer make a difference, that leaves us with action - working to earn whatever forgiveness we want until whoever we've hurt truly believes we've earned it, until we can convince ourselves that we've earned it.
So if you've lied or cheated or betrayed someone, I promise you, there is still hope. As long as people retain the capacity to forgive - and I think they will, because we will also forever retain the capacity to fail - then an action, no matter how inexcusable, is forgivable.
And if you're the one who's been lied to, cheated on, or betrayed, I promise you, there is still hope for you, too. You need that hope - the hope that the world isn't a cruel place, that humans are not a cruel species. It might sound crazy, but one of the best ways to prove it is forgiving the person who caused you to doubt human nature in the first place. Nine times out of ten, they'll become someone worthy of your forgiveness.
I suppose that New Year's Eve has me feeling this way - new beginnings and fresh starts have always appealed to me, though maybe that's mostly because I've found myself in situations in which I desperately need one. But you know what?
I've never stopped trying to earn them.
Here's to the New Year.
SVDW
...
"Your blog post today was kind of amazing."
"Kind of amazing?"
Nate laughed, wrapping an arm around Serena's waist. "Completely amazing."
"Much better," she said, pecking his cheek.
"Hey, Serena?"
"Hey, Nate?"
He grinned. "You've earned it."
She knew exactly what he was referring to - the second, third, fourth, every chance he'd given her - and she was helpless to stop the prick of tears to her eyes. She may have earned those chances, but she would never entirely deserve Nate. He had the biggest heart of anyone she'd ever known. "You mean that?" she whispered.
"Wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it," he said simply, squeezing her closer.
"Love you."
"Love you, too," Nate said easily. "Now, I believe we have a party to attend."
...
"I'm going to get fat soon," Blair moaned, rubbing her stomach, which didn't appear to be any rounder than usual. Yet.
"First of all," drawled Chuck from the bathroom. "Being pregnant is not the same thing as being fat, and second of all, even if you were fat, you would still be you." He popped his head out to grin at her. "Which, in case you didn't catch my meaning, means you would still be beautiful."
She smiled back and walked over to straighten his bowtie. "How do you do that?"
"Do what?"
"Make me feel better in exactly the right way - with words or..." She paused and smirked. "Other things. You're the only one who's ever been able to do it."
He shrugged, a small smile still on his face. "You did it for me for years - still are. Once I figured out how to return the favor, I never wanted to stop."
"The words part or the not-words part?" Blair asked slyly, rubbing a hand down chest.
"Well, I had to wait a while for the latter, but now, I would say both," he replied, slipping into the jacket Blair held out for him. "You look stunning, by the way."
She looked down at the powder blue, sequined masterpiece. The long sleeves and floor-length skirt of the dress were delicate and beautifully crafted, and she had completed the look with an equally sparkly headband. "Thank you. It's Elie Saab."
"It's perfect," said Chuck. "Are you ready to go?"
"As long as it's with you," she said, placing her palms on his cheeks. "I'd follow you anywhere."
...
You hold me without touch.
You keep me without chains.
I never wanted anything so much than to drown in your love and not feel your reign.
...
Until next time - xoxo