I Will Always Love You Read online

  Blair’s eyes lit up as if she’d just had the best idea in the world. It was a look Serena recognized all too well.

  Uh-oh.

  “Come to Yale!” Blair cried. “They have a sailing team.”

  “Could I do that?” Nate wondered. For the past four months, he’d barely read a book. Hell, he’d barely even spoken to anyone except Chips. Even here, it had felt too overwhelming to order breakfast; he was thankful Blair had stepped in. There were too many choices, too many decisions in the real world. He felt like he needed a remedial course in life before he started at an Ivy League university.

  “Of course.” Blair patted him on the knee. “You only just deferred. You could start spring semester. I can e-mail my advisor and ask him to help you pick classes. He’s the best,” Blair said, busily creating a mental list of all the things she had to do. First, she’d have to head to New Haven to find an adorable town house she and Nate could rent. Then, they’d go shopping at ABC Carpet & Home to decorate. She’d have to help him pick the right classes and she’d have to talk to Petra, a nice but way-too-sporty girl from her econ class, to see if she knew any of the sailing guys….

  “How’s the movie biz?” Nate asked Serena, interrupting Blair’s reverie. Blair felt a wave of annoyance ripple through her. Who cared? After all, they were talking about Nate’s future.

  “It’s fine. It’s a lot of sitting around and waiting for something to happen or running from place to place, meeting people you’re never going to see again. I kind of wish I could just lie in the grass somewhere and read books,” Serena mused.

  “College isn’t really about lying around and reading books,” Blair scoffed, placing her hand territorially on Nate’s thigh.

  “I know.” Serena sighed. “I just miss the way it used to be, sometimes.”

  “I don’t,” Blair said as the waiter set their plates of food in front of them. “I feel like our real lives have started. Don’t you agree?” She turned sharply toward Nate and snatched a slice of bacon from his plate.

  Suddenly, Serena couldn’t stand it anymore. If she had to watch them be couply with each other, she at least needed a drink.

  She cocked her head and gestured to the waiter. “A round of mimosas? We’re celebrating!” she announced. All she had to do was pretend she was in a movie, and she’d be able to make it through the rest of breakfast.

  And would that movie be called The Flat Tire on the Perpetual Third Wheel?

  who says you can’t go home?

  “Daniel-san!” Can you get more rocks for the fire pit?” Rufus asked, poking his head out of a lopsided canvas-and-log structure that served as a sweat lodge. Dan had spent the last few days in an upstate New York campsite with Rufus and his motley group of friends: Mika, Herbert, and Ron. Ron preferred to be called Running Rainbow, and when he wasn’t serving as a barista at Starbucks, he taught tai chi for free in Central Park. Mika and Herbert were tall, skinny, bald members of a folk-rock band that played open-mic nights around the city. Rufus had met all three of them at a seminar at the Ninety-second Street Y called Bringing the Age of Aquarius into the Age of the Internet.

  Rufus emerged from the sweat lodge wearing a blue-and-yellow striped towel around his waist and white Crocs. He didn’t seem the least bit cold, despite the fact that the temperature hovered near freezing. Dan was shivering in a Patagonia parka he’d inadvertently stolen from his Evergreen roommate.

  “Okay,” Dan mumbled. They’d only been in the woods for two nights, but it felt like a lifetime, especially since he didn’t even get cell service. He’d wanted to call Vanessa at midnight on New Year’s Eve, but no matter how far away he walked from the campsite, he couldn’t get reception.

  Dan sighed and grabbed a large moss-covered rock, groaning as he picked it up.

  “Here.” He dropped the rock next to Rufus’s Crocs. Inside, Herbert and Mika were banging on bongo drums.

  “Thanks,” Herbert called. “I think we’re ready to begin the ceremony.” He poked his head out of the structure like a puppy in an extra-large doghouse. “And Dan, since you’re the youngest, you can be the dog soldier,” he announced.

  “Excuse me?” Dog soldier?

  “You need to protect the door while we chant away our demons,” Herbert explained. “We have extra animal skins if you get cold.”

  Dan did a double take. Was this guy serious? Protect the door? Not only was it broad daylight, but the wooded area they were staying in was right next to a farmhouse. What he’d thought had been a rushing river when they’d gotten to the site after dark on New Year’s had actually been the whooshing of cars across a highway. But it was no use arguing. Herbert had already retreated back into the sweat lodge with his bongo drum.

  Dan sighed and sat on a log outside the lodge. Fuck, he was cold. He wondered what Vanessa was doing. Knowing she was in New York while he was here was almost too much to bear.

  Sounds like he’s the negative spirit.

  He pulled a pen and a crumpled receipt from the pocket of his jacket. Maybe he should focus on writing. Maybe suffering would be good for him—he wasn’t going to suffer at all once he and Vanessa were living together. Smoothing out the paper on his thigh, he began to write.

  Sweat, skin heat, cold, wet sweet.

  It was no use. The poem sounded like the beginning of an erotic version of The Cat in the Hat. There was no way he could do this for two more days. Besides, sitting outside and guarding against evil spirits didn’t really equate to bonding time with his dad. That was it. He was going home.

  “Dad?” Dan whispered hesitantly through the canvas-flapped door of the lean-to.

  “What?” Rufus’s wiry hair was slick with sweat and his face was bright red as he swayed back and forth in front of the central fire.

  “I don’t think this is working for me,” Dan said carefully. “I need to see Vanessa.”

  Rufus shook his grizzly head sadly and stood up. Dan cringed. His dad was only wearing a tiny purple Speedo that sagged in the ass. “Are you sure?” he asked, clapping Dan on the shoulder. “Because if you want me to take over dog soldier duty so you can sweat it out, that’d be fine with me. You know, I never believed this New Age crap, but it’s good stuff.”

  Dan shook his head. “I think my spirit guides are telling me to go home,” he said seriously.

  The bongo playing stopped. “Door to the farmhouse is open if you need to call Al’s taxi service,” Running Rainbow yelled, then resumed drumming.

  Rufus shrugged. “You’ll be okay?”

  “Yes. Have fun, Dad!” Dan yelled as he practically sprinted away from the campsite and toward the highway. He didn’t want to wait for Al’s taxi service. He just wanted to go home. Stamping his feet on the asphalt, he put his thumb up.

  A truck slowed down.

  “What do we have here?” The driver leaned out his window. He was missing three front teeth and was probably around sixty. His long bushy hair reminded Dan of pictures of Jerry Garcia in his later years. Was this where all the sixties stoners came to die?

  “I’m heading to the city. New York?” Dan said, trying to play it cool, as if he hitchhiked all the time.

  Jerry Two nodded thoughtfully. “Hop in!” he announced grandly. Dan nodded and took a breath. The cab of the truck smelled like patchouli and jasmine.

  “Bringing my candles to sell in the big city. You ever been to the Union Square greenmarket? I have a booth!” Jerry Two said proudly as he floored the accelerator.

  “Oh?” Dan said politely. At least the cab of the truck was warm. And he really doubted a candle-selling hippie would be a serial killer.

  “Yep. Me and my wife make ’em. You got a wife?” the driver asked companionably.

  “No.” Dan shook his head. He tried to imagine himself and Vanessa in their sixties. Would they still be making poetry and films? “I have a girlfriend, though. I’m going back to the city to see her,” Dan said, surprised at how much information he was volunteering.

  Jerry
Two nodded thoughtfully. “When I was your age, I was already married. My wife’s name is Joan, and she’s just as pretty and smart as the first time I laid eyes on her. When you find a lady like that, you don’t let her go, you know what I mean?”

  “Yes,” Dan mumbled, already antsy to get back to the city. The stretch of highway was practically empty and surrounded on both sides with fields of cows. He wanted to crawl next to Vanessa and feel her body next to his. A poem was forming in his head, and Dan’s fingers were itching to write it down. He pulled his notebook from his duffel and grabbed an ancient Sharpie rolling on the rubber floor mat of the truck. Uncapping the marker, he quickly wrote.

  Dreaming in Technicolor black and white.

  I’m no Technicolor prince, no black-and-white tragedy

  What you see

  Will be us, you me.

  Dan grinned. It was so obvious. He didn’t need a retreat, what he needed was Vanessa. And he couldn’t wait to have a sex-and-poetry fest as soon as he got home. He leaned back. The vinyl seat squeaked, making a farting noise.

  “You let one rip? Good! I will too!” Jerry Two said. A loud noise emanated from the driver’s seat. Dan wrinkled his nose. It was going to be a longer drive than he thought.

  What some people will do for love!

  nothing can ever go wrong at tiffany… right?

  Blair leaned back against the Frette pillowcases of Serena’s canopy bed. She’d always felt like Serena’s house was her second home—or third home, once she and Nate started dating sophomore year—and had been more than happy to spend the day relaxing and watching endless hours of crappy MTV while Serena was at a shoot for Tea at the Palace or Snacks at the Strand or whatever her movie was called. Now it was almost four o’clock, and she felt kind of gross and bloated from spending the entire day lying in bed and eating Godiva chocolates from one of Serena’s discarded gift baskets. She needed to get out.

  She hadn’t seen Serena since brunch the day before. It was sort of for the best, though. After all, she and Nate couldn’t keep their hands off each other. They’d spent all of yesterday cuddled in Nate’s bed, whispering remember-whens in between kisses and feeding each other eel rolls from Blue Ribbon sushi. She only left Nate’s house because his parents were due home from St. Barts today. It would be enough of a surprise for them to see Nate. She didn’t want them to think the first thing Nate did when he came back was take advantage of the empty house with his girlfriend.

  Wait, girlfriend?

  She sighed and turned off the TV. Ever since she was fifteen and had seen Breakfast at Tiffany’s, she’d played a game with herself called What Would Audrey Do? If Audrey found herself alone at dusk on a cold January day, she’d probably sit near the window of some cozy café like Le Refuge on Eighty-Second Street and people-watch, the whole while blissfully unaware that from behind their menus, everyone was whispering about the charmingly gamine girl. Besides, she’d been back in New York—her city—for almost three days and had barely seen anything besides Nate’s bedroom.

  And it wasn’t like she’d been admiring the décor.

  Blair pulled her Burberry coat from the Eames chair in the corner, exited the building, and automatically turned left, exactly as she had a million times before. She wasn’t sure where she was going, but she’d know when she got there.

  She paused at Seventy-second and Fifth and looked up at the row of limestone buildings standing at attention across the park. The building on the corner was her building, the one she’d lived in for eighteen years of her life. Her gaze traveled upward to the top floor, where a dim light emanated from the room that used to be hers. Suddenly it hit her that she didn’t live here anymore.

  She knew a new family lived there now, one with triplets a few years younger than her. Did they have boyfriends and best friends within walking distance? Did they sit for hours on the steps of the Met, smoking Merits and talking about nothing? Blair had always wanted to grow up, but for the first time, she suddenly felt old.

  As Blair walked east toward Madison, her iPhone rang the familiar strains of the opening bars of “Moon River.”

  She pulled it out of her Lanvin hobo, surprised to see an unfamiliar 212 number flash across the display. She pressed talk, her mind bubbling with possibilities. Was it Nate, ditching his parents to meet her for a Per Se dinner?

  “This is Blair,” she answered curiously.

  “Blair Waldorf?” a surprisingly high man’s voice repeated on the other end of the phone.

  “Yes,” Blair said cautiously.

  “Miss Waldorf, this is Freddie from Tiffany and Company. We have your order here. We close in an hour,” he finished.

  Blair racked her brain. “I don’t think I ordered anything,” Blair began. Unless her father had ordered something for her as a late Christmas present. But he’d already sent her a pair of limited edition snakeskin Christian Louboutins. Besides, she and Harold bonded over shoes or purses, not jewelry. Which could only mean that it was a surprise from Nate.

  “I’ll be by in a few minutes,” she said eagerly, her hand shooting up in the air to hail a taxi.

  “Okay, miss. We’re located at—“

  “I know where you are,” Blair said quickly as she stepped into the first cab that pulled up, stealing it from a harried-looking woman in a chinchilla coat. Blair felt guilty for a moment, but this was an emergency.

  “Fifty-seventh and Fifth,” she said quickly as the cab peeled away from the curb. Maybe Nate had just said his parents were coming home so he could stage an elaborate surprise for her, to show her how truly sorry he was for running away last summer. And a surprise was so sweet—she loved surprises, especially when she knew about them.

  Naturally.

  Blair’s heart thudded in anticipation as the cab turned onto Fifth. Outside, the stately doorman buildings of the Upper East Side gradually gave way to the brightly colored window displays of high-end shops. Garlands of greenery were wrapped around streetlamps and light displays were lit up across the avenue. Blair felt like it was Christmas and her birthday and the Barneys warehouse sale rolled into one.

  “Here’s fine,” Blair said as the cab idled in traffic on Fifty-ninth Street. She could walk a few blocks. She handed the driver a ten from her Prada wallet and slipped out the door.

  She paused in front of the limestone corner building that housed Tiffany & Co.

  A dapper doorman in a three-piece suit pushed the revolving door, and she entered, enjoying the feeling of her Sigerson Morrison boots sinking into the plush carpet. The iconic store was filled with tourists eagerly gawking at the merchandise under thick glass counters. Ordinarily, the bustle would have annoyed her, but she didn’t mind today. She liked how everything in the store felt so alive and exciting, as if anything could happen. She marched over to a customer service desk in the left corner of the room.

  “Hello, I’m Blair Waldorf,” she announced to the tiny man behind the counter. He wore a pink striped French cuffed shirt and a red tie. His robin’s egg blue name tag read FREDDIE. “I believe you called me.”

  “Of course, Miss Waldorf!” he shrieked. He glanced meaningfully over at the beige couches in the corner. Blair followed his gaze, expecting to see Nate. An overweight guy wearing a pink baseball cap on his bald head stood beside two women arguing with each other in French, and a handsome guy in shorts sat with his back to them.

  Blair knew only one guy who wore cargo shorts in the winter, as if he simply wasn’t affected by the cold. And she’d sort of forgotten that he existed.

  “Scout!” Pete looked up and grinned devilishly as he sauntered toward her. It was as if he’d just spotted her across the dining hall.

  “Hi,” Blair said weakly. It wasn’t like she’d forgotten about Pete, exactly, but he certainly hadn’t been front and center on her radar.

  “But what about Costa Rica?” Blair asked, confused. Pete was supposed to be there for another week.

  He shrugged and smiled. “I couldn’t do it. I needed t
o be with you. So I got to thinking…” Pete smiled as he reached into the pocket of his cargo shorts, removed a blue box, and held it out to her.

  “What?” Blair asked, a wave of dizziness hitting her.

  “Open it.” Pete pushed the box into her hands. Fingers trembling, she opened the Tiffany blue cardboard box to find a small black velvet jewelry box. Blair’s heart careened through her chest to the floor.

  Was he proposing? At Tiffany? She’d imagined this was how she’d get engaged a million times. But in all her fantasies, it wasn’t Pete asking her. It was Nate.

  She pried open the hinged lid of the box. There, sitting on a bed of blue satin, was a white gold ring. It was circled by tiny pink sapphires that captured the light.

  “Is this…” Blair began, her fingers trembling.

  “It’s not an engagement ring,” Pete explained hurriedly, reading the shocked expression on Blair’s face. “At least not yet. But I do want you to come on Carlson vacations. I feel like this sort of answers my dad’s ‘no ring, no bring’ rule, don’t you?” he asked with an adorably lopsided smile.

  Around them, tourists craned their necks to see what was going on. One paunchy man had even pulled out his camera phone and was filming the whole incident. Blair wanted to yell at everyone to go away. She gazed into Pete’s ocean blue eyes, unsure of what to do. She knew she didn’t want to touch the ring. She couldn’t.

  “Thanks,” she began weakly, forcing a smile at the customers surrounding her. Four years ago, Nate had bought her an ugly gold heart on a plain black cord. She’d hated the necklace. She loved this ring. But somehow, it wasn’t to be.

  She shut the jewelry box with a deliberate snap. “I can’t.” Her voice broke on the last word. “I just can’t.” Then she turned and walked out the revolving door, not looking back to see the heartbroken look on his face.