A/N- REPOST BECAUSE OOOPS! POSTED IT UNDER FRENCH LOL. Work on 'Nude, With Calla Lilies' is underway, I promise, but I wrote this on Sunday afternoon so I thought I might as well post since I have like a hundred and one more ideas for my beloved Chuck/Blair fics :)

Hope you enjoy, and thank you to everyone who reviewed 'They'll Never Know' :)

Desperation Gets Reaction

They'd blended into one long ago: the Demerol, Vicodin, Oxycontin. Bottles of painkillers stashed in the cabinet above her bathroom mirror, not hidden, because nobody would go in there anyway.

Nobody cares enough.

Their bottles are all the same, equal houses for equal effects.

Sedation had become a habit a long time ago. Now that habit just seems to be a more frequent one.

At least it's better than vodka and speed, she figures.

Cheaper anyway.

But money isn't the problem, and Blair frowns for the thought even entering her head. She's had a lot of thoughts lately, most of them about Chuck and Nate. Some about Serena, Dan, that random Vanessa girl that she hopes will just disappear into whatever poor world she came from.

Vanessa doesn't belong on the Upper East Side.

Neither does she now, really.

The new lip-gloss she'd bought the other day remains on her dresser, sitting neatly next to other brands, next to mascara and chap-stick.

Image is still everything. Always will be in Blair's world.

And yet what really matters, or what really should matter, is overlooked, like the cheapest item in a jewellery store. Nobody wants the cheapest thing.

Feelings are cheap now. Feelings don't matter.

Even if they did, she'd be at the bottom of the pile anyway.

Blair Waldorf isn't supposed to have any, feelings that is, so nobody would care to look.

She thinks Chuck might suspect though.

He should. He's caused enough of them.

She wonders if she'd feel this bad if he hadn't said to her what he had in that hotel lobby.

Doesn't matter now. What's said is said and what's done is done.

Nate and Chuck are done.

Her and Nate are done.

Her and Chuck are done.

It's just not over.

She thinks if maybe she drew a small cut along each wrist, then it would at least be a reminder of the scars each guy had left her with.

But it's too much of a cliché and she's over those.

Maybe.

Or not quite at all.

-

She draws the stick across her lips, pursing them before reapplying and reapplying until her lips start to feel too heavy to keep going.

She thinks that if anyone was there to kiss them, then she'd maybe get away with another coat.

Her room's empty.

Nobody's coming, nobody's home.

Never was really.

Her cell rings and then her heart hammers, just like it does every time she hears the familiar tone. But it's only Serena calling to say that she's running a little late because she's spent the day with Dan, and they've been held up in traffic.

She only feigns easy-going-ness because she's never been one to brush off an apology.

Blair either accepts them, or she doesn't.

This time she can't be bothered not to.

It's unfair really though.

Serena slept with Nate, with her boyfriend. She went away for a year without so much as a phone call, and then waltzed back into Manhattan with newly-highlighted her and instant popularity.

And even Dan fell for her.

That wasn't supposed to happen, she'd ignored him for the earlier fifteen years of his life.

But Serena's life is different to Blair's.

Sometimes she just wishes they weren't friends.

It would be easier.

But probably not, really.

-

Chuck isn't there.

She hears through muttered musings that he's gone back to Monaco for a little while.

He's supposed to be here, after all, he was the founder of Thursday night parties.

She wonders why they've all even bothered to come without him being there.

But then she shakes her head because she's been thinking far too much about someone who should be so insignificant to her.

Chuck was never insignificant.

Not like she was to Nate.

He's here, shooting glares at her from across the room. They only make her angry, because her mind has somehow managed to reason that all she did with Chuck was what Nate did with Serena.

And to be fair, her and Nate had broken up.

Anger is better than sadness, better than emptiness.

But then she watches Serena kiss Dan (why is he actually here?) and she goes back to the emptiness again.

Damn that short-lived adrenaline.

Blair scuppers off to the bathroom with her purse. Nobody notices.

The pills in there don't rattle. She'd taken them out of their bottles to as not to attract attention.

Clever really.

But she kind of wants people to know.

Maybe then someone could save her.

Lord knows she can't save herself.

Blair catches her appearance in the mirror, and if she had the capacity to look past the makeup and the expensive clothes, maybe she'd cry.

She's far too shallow for that though, or so they all say, and so she just nods and cracks a half smile.

Silly really, keeping up appearances in a bathroom on her own.

But it's as much to fool herself as it is to fool other people, perhaps even a bigger achievement.

Sometimes, when she'd hang out with Chuck, jus kidding around, throwing insults at each other, she's forget that she wasn't really happy.

But now he's not here to be her escape, so the pills are.

She's mixing tonight, something that hasn't happened before.

Still, there's a first time for everything she figures, and as she reaches into her purse for the pills, her fingers brush past the new lip-gloss from earlier.

Lip-gloss and little white pills.

That's a damn cliché alright.

Sounds kinda good though, she concedes.

The room is spinning and it's getting darker, blacker, until she's looking through a tube, and then her head hits against something hard.

The wall probably.

Marble tiles hurt.

Blair doesn't care though, she's forgotten how to care about physical pain.

She wishes she could just scrape her knees instead of breaking her heart though.

It'd be easier.

Anything would be easier than this.

-

Machines are bleeping, sheets folded neatly around her body.

Blair looks down at her arms, tiny, skinny, wires coming off of them.

She really needs to eat something.

Being this skinny can't be attractive.

Serena's in the chair next to her bed, crying, blonde hair falling, tumbling over her shoulders.

And it makes Blair mad.

She just shuts her eyes, because she can't be bothered to explain any of this to the girl next to her. Serena wouldn't understand. She just runs away, or now? Just runs to Dan.

Blair doesn't have anyone to run to.

Her father's in France with his gay lover.

Her Mother's in L.A or London or anywhere on some business trip.

Those trips must be good, Blair figures. Her mother sure seems to prefer being on them to staying home with her.

Serena leaves eventually, because Dan coaxes her out of there with an offer of a hot shower and a change of clothes, probably a little sex thrown in there too.

And Blair's glad actually, because she doesn't feel as empty when she sees them together any more. Just angry.

Not really at Serena, just at life in general.

At herself mostly, even though she tries to pretend that's not the case.

But she's still angry at Nate for being such a fucking hypocrite.

"I know you're awake."

She jerks her head to the left where she sees Chuck shaking his head.

"Nice try, but you can't fool me Waldorf."

"What the hell are you doing here? I thought you were in Monaco."

"I got the first flight I could when I heard."

Something hurts in her chest, and there's a lump in her throat.

And Blair thinks she's breaking. Again.

Because of Chuck. Again.

"So what? You're pretending to care about me now?"

"Drop the ice queen act Blair." He says flatly. "You're not that good at it anymore."

"Screw you."

"You already did remember?"

"I can't believe you'd fly all the way from Monaco to taunt me." Blair replies bitterly. "You've stooped to new lows, even for you."

"I've stooped to new lows? This coming from the girl who took three different kinds of painkillers in a bathroom at my hotel. Tell me, were you trying to kill yourself, or were you just trying to get a reaction?"

"What?"

"Well it's pretty standard script isn't it? Queen B gets dethroned and pushed out of the limelight, nobody there to notice her so she takes a bunch of pills to get people's attention."

"Just leave me alone." She mumbles as convincingly as she can.

Mumbling never convinced anyone, least of all Chuck.

She's kind of secretly glad when he only edges his chair closer. She hadn't wanted him to leave at all.

Far from it.

She'd rather him just wrap his arms around her, lay in that bed beside her because that pain in her chest is still there.

And now there are butterflies in her stomach and she wonders whether it's just a side-effect of last night's excessive pill consumption.

"You don't want me to go anymore than I want to stay." Chuck says simply. "And I suppose you want to know whether your little stunt worked."

"What?"

"Well, my guess is that you wanted a reaction from all of this."

"And?"

"You got one. Gossip Girl is having a field day."

She just shrugs. "Whatever."

"Now come on B, you must be able to think of something better to say than that."

She only shrugs again. "I don't care."

Chuck scoffs. "Of course you care. You wouldn't be here if you didn't."

"And what about you?" Blair demands. "Why are you here?"

"Because as much as I hate to admit it, I felt guilty."

"Well now you know that I'm not dead, you can just jet off back to Monaco."

"You don't want me to do that."

"Excuse me?"

"Admit it Blair, you need me."

He's right, she does really.

But at this stage, it could be anyone saying these words and she'd have to agree.

She needs anything she can get right now.

"I don't need anybody."

She's not sure why the words that come out of her mouth aren't the same as the ones in her head.

"Fine." He shrugs with a raised eyebrow. "Have it your way. But I'll stay here just in case."

"Just in case of what?"

"In case you stop trying to kid yourself."

"I'm not kidding myself."

"Whatever."

He stares at her, his eyes never flickering, never darting across the room when he hears a sound from outside, never eyeing the flowers that Serena had left earlier. And as much as she wants to, Blair can't make her eyes leave his.

She thinks she might be close to crying, because her vision has started to cloud and she can't quite see him as clearly as she had been able to.

Maybe that's just the medication.

Or the effects from last night.

Either way, his lip seems to be twitching, not into a smile or a smirk, but as though he might cry.

Now she's nothing short of terrified.

She hadn't meant any of this to affect him, she was just desperate.

Desperation gets reaction.

"Stop staring at me." He says, his eyes still fixed on hers.

Maybe he's embarrassed.

Or he just wants to make things go back to the way they were before any of this.

"I'm staring? You're the one who's staring at me!"

"Love yourself much?"

"And you don't?"

"Not any more."

His eyes move then, they shut, blocking her out and she wishes they hadn't said anything. Now she's even more frightened than before, if that's possible.

Anything's possible now.

So Blair shuts her own eyes, because she feels like she shouldn't be looking at him, like she's breaking some kind of unwritten rule. She only opens them again when she feels her bed shift and he's leant against her, almost in a movie scene kind of way.

If this wasn't her life she'd laugh.

"Did I do this to you?"

She doesn't like the serious tone in his voice. Chuck isn't serious about anything.

"Did I make you do this?" He asks again, his hand resting against her leg.

It feels nice, comfortable.

It's the nicest thing she's felt in weeks.

And it's in a damn hospital bed.

Still, someone's got to keep the clichés going.

She shakes her head slowly, truthfully. "No."

"Then what…"

"I was just…" She wants to say sad, empty, broken. But those words are too vulnerable for Blair Waldorf and so she finishes with "Stupid."

His eyes are looking intently at hers. He knows she's lying.

"If I hadn't have said those things to you…"

"It wouldn't have made a difference." Blair cuts in. She can't bare him to finish that sentence.

"So there's time for me to apologize?"

No

"If you want to."

She won't make it look like she cares. That's not her style.

"I was out of line." He tells her, inching a little closer, partly because half of his body is hanging of the edge of the bed, partly because she doesn't make an effort to move away when he touches her.

"I shouldn't have said what I did, I should…Do you know how it feels to be in love with someone and have them only acknowledge you when they've exhausted every other option?"

Yes

"I didn't…wait." She turns to him, her lip trembling because she's not sure whether her ears are playing games with her.

It wouldn't surprise her. Everyone else plays games.

"You're in love with me?"

Chuck only nods.

"No, no, you can't be. You don't."

"See? You have no idea what it's like to be shot down again and again while you watch that person cry over someone else."

"I'm not crying over him."

"Then what is it?" Chuck asks. "Because it's not me."

She doesn't have an answer for that, because it is him. But now her lips won't form the words she wants, and he's getting up, leaving, going back to Monaco probably.

"See?" She's crying now. Again. Half-shouting at him. "See this is what you do. You walk away from me, just because I can't tell you what you want to hear."

"And what do you think I want to hear?"

"If you want me to say those words, then I can't." She cries. "I said them once to him, and it's not happening again."

"That's not what I want from you Blair."

"Then what?"

He shrugs, stupid as it might be. "I just want you."

She's not sure there's words to respond with.

She's not even sure if she's meant to respond, because the truth is, she won't give herself to him, not properly, not fully, not ever, most likely.

But her lips are doing that thing where they don't seem to be connected to her brain, because when she realises what she's doing, she's pressed against him in that tiny bed, lips together, hands together, her hair knotted, the back of his neck soft, cologne musky.

She's in a hospital bed after overdosing on painkillers.

And it might have been the saddest thing she'd heard. But it's the happiest she's been in a long time.

Desperation gets reaction.

And those damn clichés just keep coming.