Will Not Remember, Cannot Forget

It’s amusing. So very enjoyable. Her obvious confusion. His evident discomfort. So deliciously entertaining.

And Serena, stupid little clueless Serena, laughing like a banshee. Like this is all a big joke. And it is really. A big terrible joke at Blair Waldorf’s expense. So go on laughing, S. Laugh at her.

Georgina certainly is. She’s not showing it, of course. But she is laughing just the same.

“What did she mean?” Blair says. She’s looking at him with those doe eyes. “You’re not a vir –” She breaks off, unable to complete the thought. And Chuck just stands there helpless, stricken dumb, too naive to realize that his silence is an answer all on its own.

Silly boy.

“Who?” Blair demands. Her mouth is set in a determined line, her eyes intense. “Who?” she repeats. Her voice is softer, so quiet that one almost has to strain to hear it, to catch the faint tremor in the word.

Georgina knows her cue when she hears it.

She steps up behind Chuck, smiles shyly, meets Blair’s gaze. That’s all it takes.

The brunette’s eyes are suddenly somehow empty. Something small and beautiful and precious within the depths of those chocolate orbs, some hidden desire unknown even to her is gone.

Chuck sees the hurt in her expression. Georgina can tell by the way his body straightens. He’s rallying, preparing to speak. He gulps in a noisy breath. Finally finds his voice, starts to say something, anything. But it is too late.

Blair doesn’t hear him, doesn’t want to hear him. Her vacant eyes are blinking too rapidly. Mechanically, her hand covers her mouth. Then she’s hastily making her way to the bathroom while Chuck stands there paralyzed, gaping after her like an idiot.

From the circle of Nate’s arms, Serena turns to watch her friend disappear. The laughter dies on her glossy lips.

“Is B okay?” she says drunkenly.

Georgina feels a twinge of annoyance. The fair haired girl really has no tolerance for alcohol. It’s terribly embarrassing.

“Don’t worry S. Everything’s fine,” Georgina assures the blonde before she can begin to pull away from Nate. “I’ve got it. Stay right where you are.”

Right in Nate’s embrace, she thinks with a smirk as Serena leans back against the golden boy’s chest. He snuggles into her, content to have her there, unconcerned that his girlfriend has just fled the room.

Such a catch. Definitely a keeper.

Georgina smiles down at the two of them and goes to follow Blair. She deliberately brushes against Chuck as she passes him. He stiffens, flinching away from her. In the doorway, she glances back at him. His expression is pained. Then he meets her gaze. His face closes down, becomes guarded, giving away nothing. Except for that haunted expression he can’t yet conceal in his eyes.

He’s learning.

She laughs, watches him recoil slightly from the sound, and turns towards the bathroom. She knows what she’ll find before she gets there. The door is firmly shut. Pressing her ear against it, she faintly hears the tap running into the sink. But over that, punctuating the steady rhythm of falling water, another sound.

Gagging.

Georgina is a connoisseur of the tragic. And this, the expelling of half-formed hopes into a porcelain bowl, is exquisite. Almost transcendent. It has an almost musical quality.

Then a hand is grabbing her arm, roughly shoving her away from the door.

“What are you doing?” Chuck hisses.

Oh goody.

She meets his indignant eyes, grins at him. His jaw tightens but he refuses to back down. Arching one slim brow, she stalks towards him with an exaggerated sway of her hips. The movement is sinuous, slinky, almost feline. She watches as his resolve weakens, wavers, dies.

He backpedals until he is bumps into the wall. His breaths are strained, wheezing. He sounds like an asthmatic in need of an inhaler. Pitiful.

She reaches out to trace the buttons up his shirt. He shrinks away from the contact. Her hand thrusts forward, fisting in the smooth fabric.

“Don’t ever touch me like that again. You understand?” Georgina warns. Her voice is low, dangerous. When he doesn’t respond, she leans into him, flattens against him.

A second later, Blair emerges from the bathroom. Pristine. Polished. Like she hasn’t just had her fingers down her throat. Her overly bright eyes the only indication that perhaps everything is not quite copasetic.

She’s good, Georgina muses.

Then the Upper East Side princess spots them together, and Georgina takes it all back. The poor girl isn’t that good.

“Sorry. Excuse me,” she mumbles as she tries to escape the sight of them pressed like lovers against the wall.

Chuck’s expression, watching Blair go, is a mirror of dismay. Pleased, Georgina steps back and watches him start after her. This should be fun.

She hasn’t gotten far when he catches up to her. She turns to him. Her face once again a mask of composed serenity.

“Did you want something, Chuck?” she says.
.
“I just…” he fumbles for words. So cute. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Blair… You ran to the bathroom. I thought maybe – ”

“Oh, that. I just had too much champagne,” she says. It’s a lie. Her eyes are doing that thing where they don’t match her mouth. An obvious tell. Blair Waldorf should never play poker.

“Please, Blair,” Chuck says knowingly.

“I’m fine, Bass. Really,” she insists.

“You sure?” he says, a touch of anger darkening his voice. He reaches towards her. Extends one finger to touch her face. Holds it up like a brand in front of her protesting gaze. And there caught on the tip of his finger, shimmering like a diamond in the light, is a solitary tear.

Blair looks at it uncomprehendingly. Her brows knit in a show of puzzlement, like the existence of the tear baffles her.

“I must have had something in my eye,” she says dismissively, avoiding his gaze. She takes a step forward. Almost immediately Chuck moves in front of her, blocking the path.

“You are not fine,” he grinds out.

She tries to side step him, but he prevents her by bracing one palm against each wall. She glares at him, and he glares back. For a long moment, it’s a stalemate, then he softens, drops his arms.

“Blair, talk to me,” he begs.

“There’s nothing to talk about Chuck,” she denies.

Once again, she attempts to move past him. This time he doesn’t try to stop her. He watches her retreating back for a second.

“Blair, about Georgina – ” he calls out after her.

She whirls suddenly. That facade of poised perfection finally slips.

“I don’t ever want to hear about you and Georgina!” she practically spits, cold fury burning in her eyes, her face taut and pale. Chuck reels back as if slapped. Then she’s gone, muffled footsteps trailing in her wake as she flees down the hallway.

For a second Georgina thinks he might go after her, but no. She watches him collapse in upon himself, sliding down the wall.

“Sad little Chucky,” Georgina teases, looking down at him as he hugs his knees to his chest.

He raises his head to look at her. Tears are brimming in his eyes. “I hate you,” he says simply without preamble.

“Now, now Chucky. You might hurt my feelings.”

“You don’t have feelings,” he sneers.

“Oh but I do,” she whispers with mockery. “It’s just that I don’t care. Unlike you. But don’t worry, Chucky dear. Soon you won’t care either. Soon you’ll be just like me.”

His face screws up in disgust. “I’ll never be like you,” he declares. But there’s a moment’s hesitancy before he speaks, a second in which his claim loses all conviction, and his words ring hollow. He’s afraid of becoming her.

She smiles at that. A slow, lazy, patronizing smile. “Whatever lies comfort you.”

“Please go,” he says defeated. “Just leave.”

“Anything you say Chucky,” she says sweetly, then adds, almost as an afterthought, “I’ll see you later.”

He blinks, and the tears so long threatening to spill forth finally do. They roll down his angelic face, an unspoiled visage of grief and despair. So ethereal in its perfection, the sight catches her breath. Beautiful.

She leaves him there, crumbled upon the floor, and returns to the main room. Unsurprisingly, Blair and Nate are gone. Only Serena remains, lying in a happily intoxicated lump on the couch.

“Let’s go S,” Georgina tells her. “I think Chuck wants to be alone.”

On the ride home, she lets Serena babble about inconsequential bullshit and even feigns that she is interested. She pays the cabbie extra to just drive them in circles so that the blonde can sober up a little. She needs her to be able to remember.

She waits until they are inside, after she’s checked that Lily has not miraculously decided to be a mother today of all days, after she’s gotten a few cups of coffee and some bread into her giggling protégé. She has to be sure.

Finally, she’s certain.

“Serena?” she whispers.

The blonde looks up at her. Georgina clutches her hand.

Showtime.

“I – ” she manages to choke out. She takes a shaky breath. Then her face crumples. Scalding tears escape her eyes. A harsh cry erupts from her throat. Serena’s arms are wrapping around her as her shoulders shake with sobs.

Sobbing is so close to laughing really.

“Oh my God! What’s wrong?” Serena asks in confusion. Georgina smirks into the golden hair obscuring her face.

She pulls away. Her lashes are spiked with tears. Mascara runs in dirty tracks down her cheeks. Her lips quiver. She looks into Serena’s earnest face. At the concern etched there. So trusting.

“I have to tell you something,” she gasps, “…about Chuck.”