Psycho Killer (32 page)

But Blair hadn’t made it there. She’d been stopped by a middle-aged woman in a red Chanel suit with a “Save the Birds” button pinned to it.

“Blair Waldorf?” the woman said, smiling her best fundraising smile. “I’m from the Birds of Prey Foundation.”

Talk about bad timing.

Blair stared at the woman’s outstretched palm. Her own right hand was clapped over her mouth, holding in the vomit that threatened to spew out at any moment. She started to remove it, but then a waiter walked by with sizzling skewers of chicken satay, causing her to gag.

Blair squeezed her lips together to keep the puke from seeping out the sides of her mouth. She held out her left hand. It would have to do.

“It’s so wonderful to finally meet you,” the bird woman said. “Although I do have a little confession to make.” She took a step closer, still holding Blair’s hand. “Our birds aren’t really endangered anymore. In fact, the mayor wants to start euthanizing them. Which, of course, we’re against.”

Blair snatched her hand away, unsure of whether to puke all over the woman or stab her with one of the chicken skewers. Both would be messy, and it was such a nice party. Her eyes darted around the crowded room, desperate for help.

There were Rain and Laura, dancing with each other. There was Anthony Avuldsen, handing out tabs of E. There was Charlie Dern, trying to teach a group of Seaton Arms girls how to blow smoke rings by the bar. There was Chuck, holding that little Ginny girl so tight it looked like her boobs might explode.

All the extras were there, but where was her leading man, her savior?

“Blair?”

She turned around and saw Nate pushing his way through the crowd toward her. Nate’s eyes were bloodshot, his face slack, his hair uncombed. He looked more like a forgettable supporting actor than a leading man.

Was this all there was? Was Nate
it
?

Blair didn’t have much choice. She opened her eyes wide, silently asking him for help and praying he’d be up to the job.

The bird woman frowned and turned to see what Blair was staring at. Blair made a dash for the ladies’ room, and Nate stepped in just in time.

Thank God he was so stoned.

“Nate Archibald,” he greeted the woman, shaking her hand. “My mother is a huge fan of birds.”

The woman chortled. What a charming young man. “Well. Perhaps your family would like to make a donation.”

Nate plucked two flutes of champagne off a passing tray. He raised his glass and drank up. Then he raised his other glass and drank that too. “To the birds,” he said, trying to fend off another outbreak of the giggles.

Rain and Laura stood on the edge of the dance floor, tossing their hair around, useless as usual. Nate waved them over.

“Hello, Nate,” said Rain, tottering on five-inch stilettos.

Laura had taken some of Anthony’s E. “I
love
your red suit,” she told the bird woman and gave her a hug.

“Excuse me,” Nate said, and slipped stealthily away.

“Blair?” Nate called, cautiously cracking open the ladies’ room door. “Are you in there?”

Blair was crouched in the end stall. “Damn,” she murmured, wiping her mouth with toilet paper. She stood up and flushed. “I’ll be right out,” she said, waiting for him to leave.

But Nate pushed the ladies’ room door open the rest of the way and stepped inside. On a counter by the sinks were little bottles of Evian, perfume, hairspray, Advil, and hand lotion. He unscrewed a bottle of water and shook a couple of Advil into his palm.

Blair opened the stall door. “You’re still here.”

Nate handed her the pills and the water. “I’m still here,” he repeated.

Blair sipped the water and swallowed the pills. “Thanks. I’m really fine. You can go.”

“You look nice,” Nate said, ignoring her. He reached out and rubbed one of Blair’s bare shoulders. Her skin felt warm and soft, and Nate wished they could just lie down on the cold marble bathroom tile and fall asleep together. And then maybe have sex.

“Thanks.” Blair bit her lower lip. She didn’t want to stab Nate anymore, she wanted to kiss him. “So do you.”

“I’m sorry, Blair. I really am,” Nate began.

Blair nodded and began to cry. Nate pulled a paper towel from the dispenser and handed it to her.

“I think the only real reason I did it… I mean, that I did it with Serena… is because I knew she’d do it,” Nate said, grasping for the
right words. “But it was you I wanted all along. It’s always been you.”

Aw.

Blair swallowed. He’d said it just right, exactly the way she’d written it in the scripts in her head. The ones without any brutal stabbings or decaying corpses or severed heads hanging from trees. She put her arms around his neck and let him hold her. His clothes smelled like pot.

Nate pushed her away and looked down into her eyes. “So everything is okay now?” he said. “You still want me?”

Blair caught the reflection of the two of them together in the bathroom mirror. She turned to gaze up into Nate’s gorgeous green eyes and nodded yes.

“But only if you promise never to mention Serena,” she sniffed.

Nate wound a strand of Blair’s hair around his finger and breathed in the scent of her perfume. Behind them a vulture beat its wings against the bathroom window. Nate ignored it. It felt okay, standing there, holding Blair. It felt like something he could do. For now, and maybe forever. He didn’t even need to think about Serena, especially not if she was dead.

“I promise,” Nate said.

And then they kissed—a sad, soft kiss. In her head, Blair could hear the swell of music signaling the end of the film. It had started out a little gory and half the cast was dead, but at least the finale was romantic. The vulture pecked at the glass, staring at them with its beady black eyes.

“Come on.” Blair pulled away and wiped the mascara smudges from her eyes. “Let’s dance.”

Holding hands, they left the ladies’ room. Rain Hoffstetter smiled knowingly as she tottered past on the way in.

“You guys,” she scolded. “Get a room!”

“This band rocks!” Serena shouted at Vanessa over the pounding drum and bass. She wriggled her butt from side to side in her chair, her eyes shining. Dan was having trouble breathing normally. He’d barely touched his drink.

Vanessa smiled, pleased that Serena liked the music. Personally, she hated it, although she’d never tell Ruby. She’d rather lie by herself in the dark listening to Gregorian chant.

Yeehaw!

A girl wearing a red leather vest and black lace leggings was being tossed in the air by the pulsating crowd. Something about her legs looked wrong, like they’d been pulled off and stuck on backwards.

“
You’re such a creep I hate my life you’re such a creep I hate my life you’re such a creep I love your lies!!!!
” Ruby growled into the mic.

“Come on.” Serena stood up. “Let’s dance.”

Vanessa shook her head. “That’s okay,” she said. “I value my life.”

“Dan?” Serena tugged on his tux sleeve. “Come on!”

Dan never, ever danced. He glanced at Vanessa, who raised
her black eyebrows, challenging him.
If you get up and dance right now, you will go straight to the top of my loser list
, her look said.

Dan stood up. Serena grabbed his hand and pushed her way into the throng. Suddenly she whipped around and slammed her whole body against his.

Dan stood there for a moment, unsure how to respond. Then he began to nod his head up and down in time to the beat. All around him people were jumping straight up into the air and slamming into each other. Dan took a deep breath and slammed Serena back, laughing. Serena raised her arms overhead, closed her eyes, and let out a wild banshee yell. Dan closed his eyes too and howled into the din.

The music was so loud, the crowd so crazy, it didn’t matter what they did. It didn’t matter that he couldn’t dance, or that he was the only one in the room wearing a tuxedo—probably the only one in Williamsburg.

He opened his eyes. Serena was smiling at him. She stuck out her tongue and slammed her perfect body into his once again. Dan stumbled backwards, grinning. What mattered was
he was with her
. And he was alive.

Alone at the table, Vanessa finished first her drink and then Dan’s. Finally she got up and went to sit down at the bar.

“Nice shirt,” the bartender remarked when he saw her. Her sister was always talking about how cute he was—early twenties, red hair, long sideburns, and a sly smile.

“Thanks.” Vanessa smiled back. “It’s new.”

“You should wear red more often.” He held his hand out. “I’m Clark. You’re Vanessa, right?”

Vanessa nodded. She wondered if he was just being nice to her because he liked her sister.

“Can I tell you a secret?” He dumped a few different things into a martini shaker and shook it up.

Oh, fuck
, Vanessa thought.
Here’s when he pours out his heart and tells me all about how he’s been in love with Ruby forever, but she doesn’t seem to notice him, and he wants me to play Cupid and blah, blah, blah. Or he’s going to tell me he killed someone once, which would be equally boring
.

These days, who hasn’t?

“What?” she yawned, feigning disinterest.

“Well,” Clark said, “I see you and Ruby come in here all the time.”

Here he goes
, Vanessa thought.

“And you never come up to the bar and talk to me. But I’ve kind of had a crush on you since I first saw you.”

She stared at him. Was he joking?

Clark poured the drink out of the martini shaker into a short little glass and squeezed a few limes into it. He pushed it toward her. “Try that,” he said. “It’s on the house.”

Vanessa picked up the glass and tasted it. It was sweet and sour at the same time, and she couldn’t taste any alcohol.

“I could drink about ten of these,” she admitted.

“Don’t,” Clark warned.

Vanessa put the empty glass down. Serena and Dan could slam their pretty asses off for all she cared. “Why the fuck not?”

Clark replaced the glass with a bottle of water. He leaned toward her and whispered softly in her ear. “Because I want to kiss you and I want you to remember it.”

The
Kiss Me or Die
DJ had a thing for Celine Dion. Gorgeously dressed couples held on to each other and swayed slowly to the
diva’s yelping cries, barely moving beneath the soft lights. The air smelled of candle wax, raw fish, and cigarette smoke. The party wasn’t the rocking slam-fest that some had hoped for, but it wasn’t too terribly dull. There was still plenty of booze, nothing had caught fire, no one had been murdered, and the cops hadn’t shown up to card people. Secretly everyone in attendance felt they had something to celebrate—that they had survived.

Eyes closed, Nate and Blair held each other, her cheek against his chest, his lips brushing the top of her head. Blair had put her brain on pause and her head was full of static. She was tired of dreaming up movies and killing people. Right now, real life suited her just fine.

A few couples away, Chuck had his hands full of Jenny Humphrey. Jenny wished the DJ would bring up the tempo. She bobbed up and down, trying to dance as fast as she could to keep Chuck from groping her, but when she moved her shoulders just so, her boobs bounced out of her dress and bumped against Chuck’s chin.

Chuck was delighted. He wound his arms around her waist and shimmied her off the dance floor, straight into the ladies’ room.

“What are we doing?” Jenny demanded, confused. She gazed up into his eyes. She knew Chuck was friends with Serena and Blair, and she wanted to trust him. But he still hadn’t asked her what her name was. In fact, he’d barely spoken to her at all.

“I just want to kiss you.” Chuck bent his head down and enveloped her mouth in his. His leather eye patch dug into her cheek. His muscular tongue rammed against her teeth with such force that Jenny let out a little cry.

Relenting, she opened her mouth and let him thrust his tongue deep into her throat. She had kissed boys before, playing games at parties. But she’d never tongue-kissed.
Is this what it’s supposed
to feel like
? she wondered, frightened. She reached up and pushed against Chuck’s chest, pulling her head away, desperate for air.

“I have to go to the bathroom,” she mumbled, stumbling backwards into a stall and locking the door.

She could see Chuck’s feet, standing outside the stall. “All right,” he said. “But I’m not finished with you yet.”

Jenny sat down on the toilet seat without pulling up her dress and pretended to pee. Then she stood up and flushed.

“All done?” Chuck called.

Jenny didn’t answer. Her mind was racing. What should she do? Anxiously, she reached inside her little black handbag for her phone.

Chuck crouched down to look under the stall door. What was she doing in there, the little tease? He crawled forward on his hands and knees. “All right,” he said. “That’s it, I’m coming in.”

Jenny closed her eyes and backed against the stall wall. Quickly, she pressed the buttons for Dan’s number into her cell phone, praying that he’d answer.

Ruby’s band was on their last song. Serena and Dan were slick with sweat. Dan had some new moves down. He was in the middle of a hip jab to the side with a squat-jump slam into his neighbor when his cell phone vibrated in his pocket.

“Damn,” he said, pulling it out.

It was a text from his sister.

Bad bad party. Please take me home!

Dan tapped Serena on the arm and pointed to his phone. “Sorry,” he shouted over the music. He pushed his way through the
throng, putting his hand over his free ear as he called Jenny back.

“Dan?” Her voice sounded very small and scared and far away. “I need your help. Please come get me?”

“Now?” Dan shouted. He looked up. Serena was pushing her way toward him, looking beautiful and sweaty and perfect and gorgeous, the spattered blood of the other slam dancers smeared like rouge on her cheeks.

“Please, Dan?” Jenny pleaded.