"When there's nothing left to burn you have to set yourself on fire" - Stars, "Your Ex-Lover is Dead"

He finally finds her in the spare bedroom at the end of the hall. It's dark in the room, and it's only because of the gray winter light leeching through the blinds that he can make out her silhouette. She is sitting on the edge of the bed, huddled down over her knees; she is pressing her hands to her face. She is sobbing so hard that her chest is shaking up and down, so hard that she has to fight against her sobbing to breathe. After one mighty gasp, she lets out a long, drawn-out, wounded sound that hurts his heart to hear.

He approaches her, and, after a moment's hesitation, touches her softly on the back. She jerks away as if his hand has burned her and stares up at him with reddened eyes.

"Sorry, Serena," he quickly says. "I didn't mean to startle you. I just saw that you were missing, and…"

He trails off, feeling like an intruder to her pain. Like any other of the funeral guests currently crowding the van der Woodsen apartment, eating canapés and gossiping under their breath about the family inheritance.

"It's okay," she chokes out, wiping at her eyes and cheeks with the flats of her fingers.

He shifts his weight from foot to foot. "If you want to be alone, I understand," he offers in a low voice.

He hopes against hope that she won't ask him to leave. Not yet. Because he does not want to walk out of this room, does not want to make his way through the crowd towards the door.

Not with them there.

Serena's face twists, her chin trembles, and she looks up at him and shakes her head several times—no, no, no—and without another word he sits down on the bed next to her and takes her into his arms.

She lets out a soft, grateful moan and presses her face into his shoulder. He can feel her fingertips digging into his back, her hot wet tears on the side of his neck. He closes his eyes and rocks her torso back and forth, losing himself in the sway and pitch of their concordant bodies.

Several minutes go by, and he's no longer sure who's comforting whom.

"She didn't have to come here with him," Serena suddenly mutters into his shoulder. "Did you see them?" She swallows hard. "They were holding hands. They were smiling."

He tightens his jaw and says nothing.

"I tried so hard to understand," she whispers against his neck. "I tried so hard to be…okay. But I don't, and I can't. I just…can't." Her body starts to shake in anger, and her voice rises to a higher pitch. "How could she do this to me?" she cries. "How could she do this to you?"

Chuck blinks back tears. "I don't know, Serena," he answers in a tight voice. "I just…I don't know."

He'd agonized over the same question for several sleepless nights. He had tortured himself, thinking over everything he'd ever done, anything that could have warranted this. He had tried to figure out why Blair's love for him had simply disappeared.

And finally, finally, he'd come to the realization that there was no use in trying to make sense of it. Because it just didn't make any sense.

"I don't even know who she is anymore," Serena says in a flat, despairing voice. "I feel like…" She pauses. "The Blair I loved is gone," she whimpers, and begins to cry again.

He strokes her back as she sobs into his shoulder.

He'd thought that Serena was in love with Dan. He'd assumed that this was what had wounded her so deeply. The incontrovertible evidence that her first true love just didn't love her anymore.

But now he realizes that he was wrong.

Blair's the one who's broken her heart. Just like she's broken his.

"Stay with me, Chuck," she begs him, tightening her arms around his body. "Stay with me until everyone else leaves." She wipes her eyes on his shoulder like a small child. "Please."

"Of course I'll stay," he whispers to her. And then adds, with a sad little smile, "Where else do I have to be?"

A/N: I'm sorry to say that I've lost my inspiration to continue my C/B fics in light of the fuckery that is currently the show. I can only hope that everything that's happened post 5x10 is some horrible coma nightmare of Chuck's. Or maybe the entire season is Dan's fanfiction of a novel. I have no idea! Either way, I am tired of seeing Blair behave like a complete lunatic, Dan act like a complete douche, and Chuck and Serena suffering heartbreak after heartbreak week after week after week. Thus, this fanfic.

It will not be as complicated as my other multichapters. More like a series of Chuck and Serena scenes than a fully worked-out narrative. I have some general ideas for what I want to happen but I am open to suggestions from the reading public (that's you), so feel free to leave reviews. It is also unbetaed, because my beta is asleep. (Sorry, M! But email me if you have any suggestions!)

Maybe when this season ends I'll find the inspiration to finish Criminal, but at this point I just can't do it, even though it's AU. Sorry guys.

I will always, always want Chuck and Blair to be together...but not this version of Blair, who pledged her eternal love to Chuck only to marry another man in front of him, and then fall in love with yet another man three episodes later. I just can't do it. If that makes me a bad shipper, so be it.