In Fair Manhattan - Act 2, Scene 4
“Hie to high fortune!”
Act 2, Scene 4
A room in the Waldorf-Rose household.
It was late in the day, and Blair judged the dwindling of the sun by the cast of the cold light on her skin. For all the blood humming in her veins and charging her senses with electricity, it felt like the very break of day, when the world was new again and every little thing she touched was exciting and fresh to the feel. The silks she draped around her body were of various length and color, but each one was modest and chaste - garments she might have felt more at ease in were she sailing on the Mayflower rather than selecting an ensemble for her meeting with the devil.
Penelope, Isabel, and Hazel were due any moment, and they were to be laden with shopping from the usual places lest they desired to be evicted from the Waldorf-Rose penthouse and never again allowed admittance.
Dorota had bothered her just once with a tray of tea 'for her strength', but that had been hours before, when she had been experimenting with her tendrils of hair and worrying over plaits versus sweeping updos, ceramic flatirons or curling wands, face-framing ringlets or flattering wisps cascading from a smooth center part.
The majority of her afternoon had been spent in solitude, a companion she was used to reveling in, and one whose company was not so unwelcome that day. Her mother's incessant inquiries about Lord Marcus Beaton's charms were quite intolerable no matter how many hours were put between them and the masquerade ball, and anything her stepfather or stepbrother were likely say to her would undoubtedly involve concerned looks and pressure about her diet.
Blair turned sideways to examine her reflection in the full-length mirror. She was clad only in a pearly white slip, but the cut and perfect stitching gave away that it had been specifically made for her. Her thoughts strayed, as they had been doing all day, to the memory of Chuck Bass's eyes raking up and down her body, the way they drank in every dip and curve and hitch of her breath. What would he think if he ever saw her in this?
Even to herself and her inexperienced eyes, she looked the part of a virgin sacrifice.
The door creaked open and she heard the clicking of heels down the hall, which meant her loyal handmaidens had discreetly and efficiently delivered her shopping, just as she had requested. She did not wait long before creeping into the hallway to retrieve the bags, hoping silently that no one would come across her and her telling blood red lips and deduce what she was up to.
Beneath the stylish wrapping and pristine folds of black-and-white striped bags were just what Blair had been hoping for: new pearls to compliment her snow white complexion, kitten heels no one had ever seen strapped around her delicate ankles, and new creams and powders in dark shades to leave no doubt as to her womanhood.
A demure Puritanical dress was her ticket out the door. It was gray and boxy, lifeless and trimmed with black, fell to her knees in an unflattering line, ruffled at the wrists, and covered every ounce of her décolletage. She may as well not have hips or a bosom to offer any interested suitor.
Should anyone see her out on the street that night, it would be as the collected and innocuous angel they and their tabloids had built her up to be. What lay beneath the fabric was secret and for one specific set of dark, penetrating eyes.
Her lips parted in a satisfied smile when she examined her perfect curls, and the careful way she had arranged the knot of her pearls to lie between her breasts. The smoky makeup was like nothing she had ever worn, not even at the masquerade ball where she had felt so bold and rebellious in her black eyeliner and puckered bright red lips.
A darker shade created a taunting bow between her smirking dimples, and a trill in her chest notified her that it was quite dark out, and the limousine Chuck had promised to send would be outside momentarily.
If her plan was going as smoothly as she knew it should, Penelope was waiting downstairs with a change of clothes, so that when her lady departed in secret she could assume the role of the restful, responsible maiden. Should her mother or stepfather or even Dorota peer into her dim blue bedroom to check on her slumber, they would indeed find a dark haired body dreaming peacefully between the sheets, her breath even and quiet underneath silken bedclothes. She had been instructed to sleep lightly, and to pull those covers up above her face as she slept with her back to the chamber door - should a crisis come about, Penelope was to text Blair and request she return home for damage control.
The doctors had not given her leave from the tower penthouse, but despite their warnings and protestations, Lady Blair knew a night out in the neon city was precisely what she needed to feel well. Too long had she seen only the walls of her childhood home, been restricted to enjoy nature by way of paned windows and supervised visits to the rooftop garden. That night, she would begin to truly live in ways she had never done, not even before her sickness had overcome her body and chained her to her bed. Chuck Bass was waiting for her, somewhere in Manhattan, and as the clock struck nine, her body hummed louder, pulled taught her muscles like the chord of a violin waiting to be plucked, and she began the perilous journey to the elevator.
At the top of the stairs, Dorota was waiting with a bundle of linens and a disapproving look.
“My lady, you know you are not well,” she said brusquely, and Blair hoped for the sake of Penelope's position as her most prized friend that she had not been seen waiting downstairs.
“I am taking a walk around the building, that is all.” The lie was smooth and unrehearsed, because Blair had not practiced it - she had honestly counted on leaving the building unseen. “The doctors only said I can't go out, but if I stay inside and don't wander too far, I think it will ease some of my restlessness. I'll be back in ten minutes, no need to worry.”
But her faithful nursemaid was not to be fooled; the flaw in Lady Blair's plan was not waiting until she was safely in Chuck's limousine to apply her makeup and release her hair from its bun.
“I have to tell Lady Eleanor, and she not be pleased...” Dorota's lips thinned and she clenched her eyes shut in disappointment, which pronounced the deep lines in her forehead and around her kind eyes. “You know how your mother feel about your health, my lady. She want only for you to be better.”
Blair frowned and moved closer to the Polish countess, the one woman on the planet she felt she could completely confide in and not worry about what she might say to someone else. “My mother 'want only' for me to be better so she can marry me off to the first soulless pretty face who will have me, so she can foist me off on someone else and let me be their problem. You know I'm right,” she touched Dorota's shoulder when the woman showed signs of protesting. “You know if you don't let me go now, the next time I leave this place will be to go to my wedding to a man I don't love, and I will spend the rest of my life shunted from cage to cage. I will never be happy.”
It was cruel of her, perhaps, to play so heavily on the knowledge that her maid loved her as a daughter and wanted nothing more than her true and utter happiness. The woman had not left her side once in all her young life, had never wavered in her devotion and care; in her dark months of illness, Dorota had brought her soup and cool cloths and read her the fairy stories she had not been able to enjoy since her father's departure for distant France.
The only thing that stood in Dorota's way of letting her young charge be happy was Lady Eleanor Rose, the most terrifying specter in her reality. The woman who would see her fired and deported should she learn that Lady Blair had left the penthouse, and she had done nothing to stop it.
But Blair was so earnest, looked so eager and there were petals in her cheeks, and when she lifted her chin, it was a regal motion that resonated in Dorota's throat and brought forth a choked sob.
“Oh, Lady Blair...” the maid dabbed her eyes with her apron and pursed her lips. “Lord Marcus downstairs to see you, he insist he does not leave until you come down to speak with him.”
Excitement turned to despair on the curve of a dime, and Blair's heart plummeted to her covered knees. He was not a bad man, not a bad match for a marriage, nor was he particularly hideous or a terrible conversationalist; he had money, prestige, a title, lands in England, centuries of breeding and impeccable manners.
He stifled her.
The thought of his hands entwined with hers made her fingers twitch, and a cold feeling settled across her chest as she asked herself the only question that made sense in that instant, “What would Chuck Bass do?”
The red devil had said she would find some way to him that night, and not a single bone in her body approved of sitting with Lord Marcus and pretending to be interested in his transparent attempts at courtship. His lips were cold and hard and unfeeling, like the adoration behind his eyes when he bowed his head to her or kissed her knuckles.
No fire. No feeling. Nothing for her. He would be good for someone else, someone who was really as innocent as she was supposed to be. Someone who hadn't tasted the dark chocolate of Chuck Bass's lips, or heard the smooth, deep pitches of his voice husky and aroused in the shell of their ear.
It was obvious to her in less than five seconds. What would Chuck Bass do? Exactly what Blair Waldorf would do, and that was get out - no matter what means had to justify the ends.
“Dorota,” she whispered tearfully, and the maid drew closer the better to hear. “I will be truthful. I am going to meet Charles Bass, the boy you so deeply disapprove of. I hope that through our meeting, I can mend the discord between his father and my own, and the terrible feuding can cease. It is these terrible disputes between my sweet friends and dear Serena's sweet protégée that are causing me such distress!” Blair dipped her head down and allowed a few well-practiced tears to trickle down her chin and fall into her palms. “I need but to find him, and then I swear upon my honor you will find a well girl sleeping peacefully in my bed.”
Five minutes later, when the British prig had been ushered from the penthouse and told to return at a more appropriate time, Lady Blair Waldorf emerged from the front doors of 1136 5th Ave. with a winning smirk on her ruby red lips and a decidedly womanly swing in her high-heeled gait. The night air ruffled her dutifully coiffed locks and tousled them into a rather more attractive state of imperfection, which suited her mood and made her glad she had chosen her undergarments so well.
The black limousine was waiting for her at the curb, and the note inside read only Meet me at Victrola.
“Honest Nurse, farewell.”