chapter THIRTYSIX.

Blair was afraid that while she'd been holding last night in high regards all day and had been daydreaming incessantly about what would happen next in her rapidly-reviving social life while holed up in AP French, Chuck was just thinking they'd spent the night in Central Park together, silent as they braved the freezing cold weather. . . And nothing more.

She didn't want to assume that everything in her life would just fall into place anymore - she'd done that far too many times to count, and she didn't want to fool herself again.

Which is why, directly after shopping with Kati, Isabel, Penny, Hazel, and Elise, she'd had all her bags sent home and was heading straight to Chuck's penthouse in the Waldorf towncar at the moment, her red-stockinged legs cross as she gazed anxiously out the tinted window. What would Chuck do when he saw her? Slam the door in her face? Run as far away as possible? Scoop her into his arms and kiss her until she couldn't breathe?

She sighed. Too much scenarios.

Blair was completely aware by now that boys and girls thought on entirely different wavelengths, and she knew that while her head had been spinning at the thought of Chuck ever since Central Park, he was probably going about the day like usual, dozing off through classes, flirting with the odd bystander, and smoking weed.

Just the thought made her heart cave in a little.

The door to the Bass penthouse had been left unlocked by its last user, so Blair let herself right in, pulling the door open and stepping inside. She recognized the marble floors and the abstract paintings and the antique furniture immediately - after all, Chuck was one of the children she grew up with, so therefore she knew his house as well as she knew her own - but something about stepping inside its walls with the feeling she currently had fluttering around in her stomach seemed foreign and a bit scary to her.

"Hello?" she called out meekly, her voice a bit uneasy.

The intense silence that permeated throughout the home suggested that it was empty. Blair walked over to a nearby end table. On it was a boquet of hydranges and an exquisitely-framed photograph. Not surprisingly, the photograph was of Chuck and Nate together. It had obviously been taken sometime over the summer because they both had their shirts torn off, revealing their toned and tanned arms. Their hair looked touseled and windblown and they were standing on the deck of Nate's boat, The Charlotte, which he and his dad had built together up in Maine.

Both boys had big grins on their faces and for once it wasn't because they were stoned - it was simply because they were both extremely glad to be spending their summer with each other, because together they were always unstoppable and unbroken. They complimented eachother and they'd grown up together. . . It made sense for them to be best friends. Chuck was strong and manipulative and fearless while Nate was intense and smart and charming.

Blair's heart caved in even more as she gazed down at the picture, realizing now that the sole reason the two boys were no longer friends was because of her. . . It was all her fault.

Swallowing hard, Blair forced away tears of remorse and self-loathe and then set the picture carefully on its stand. She turned on her heel, making her way back to the front door.

What am I doing here? she asked herself, suddenly feeling incredibly foolish. She'd been absolutely crazy to think that she and Chuck would ever be compatible and would ever get back together. . . There was just too much that threatened to seperate them wherever they'd go.

Whenever they were at school, they would always have to face the judgemental and bitter stares of their peers and whenever they'd attend a party together they'd constantly be forced to hear the disgusted whispers of their parents and their 'friends'. . . They'd never be able to work.

Blair shook her head, trying to shove her own voice out of her mind. She grasped the doorknob desperately, but just as she pulled it open she heard footsteps coming down the long, red-carpeted hallway. She wiped the tears that had gathered in her dark brown eyes, shut the door, and turned around to see who it was. And indeed, it was the boy that had plagued her daydreams all during school; the boy whom she could never seem to take her eyes off whenever he entered the room.

As you might have guessed, that boy's name was Charles Bass.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, his hairstyle mimicking that of the one he'd been sporting in the picture: wild. His eyes looked a little bloodshot, but he wasn't smiling goofily like he did whenever he was high - those piercing brown eyes must have been reddish and glassy for some other reason. His crisp white shirt was unbuttoned and he was brandishing a crystal tumbler of scotch in one hand.

Blair's stomach flipped as soon as she saw him and she felt her cheeks heating up with a mixture of enthrallment and embarassment. She cleared her throat and took a few wary steps closer to him. "I, um. . . I came to give you this." She waved his phone under his nose briefly. "You must have dropped it in the grass at the Park."

Chuck looked from Blair's face, to his phone, and then back at her face, without extending an arm to grab the device from her. "That's. . . why you stopped by?" He took a prim sip of scotch and then set it on the ornate, decorative shelf that he stood beside. "You think I'd believe that for one second?" Blair looked lost for a moment. "Oh come on, Waldorf. I know you stole it from me just to have an excuse to come knocking on my door for a visit."

Blair scoffed. "And just when I thought you were toning down your level of conceit, you go and say something like that."

"Oh stop it. You know you love me!"

Blair rolled her eyes and chuckled bitterly. Then she thrust her arm outward, her fingers still clutching his phone. Chuck grinned as if he'd just won some sort of award and then placed his hand over hers, their fingers brushing against eachother as the phone changed persons.

But just as she was about to whirl around and storm out the door and he was about to shove the device back into his pocket and down the rest of his drink, a feeling of electricity and desire ran through their fingertips and instead of turning away from each other, Chuck pulled her closer to him, wrapping his arms around her back and proceeding to kiss her fiercely.

The kiss contained more passion and anger and love than either of them had ever felt and they both felt a little dizzy as soon as it was initiated.

But that didn't stop them from tearing eachother's tops off and walking through the hallway with their eyes closed, bumping into antique statues and Renaissance paintings as they made their way in the vague direction of Chuck's lush bedroom. Blair dug her nails into his chest and his fingers roamed throughout her wavy brown hair, and even though they were a little mad at each other, that madness was converted into love, somehow.

And the rest is history.


Forgiveness. It's a strange and foreign word to some, but to others it comes so easily. . . For B and C, forgiveness is one of the hardest actions to convey. But it's good to see they were able to get over their differences long enough to shove eachother's tongues down their throats and ravish eachother relentlessly - Hey, who's complaining?

you know you love me.
xoxo; gossip girl