The Art of Pretending

Chapter Thirty

Blair POV.
•••

We are laying back on the bed. "So what if were dating?" I asked him. "Let's pretend, we've been dating and it's almost the end of high school." He laughed. "Humor me," I give him a slight shove.

"Ok, it's the end of high school. We are at what? Let's say we are at prom."

"Did we take cheesy pictures?"

"Yes, we took them with all the guys too. We even took one of all of us carrying you."

"That's unrealistic." I laugh, "I wouldn't let you guys carry me. You'd all drop me."

"I would never drop you."

"Let's say the guys were carrying you in the picture." I suggest

"No way, I don't want Carter and Noah's slimy hands near my butt."

"Whatever," I laugh and roll my eyes. "What would our plans be for after high school?"

"College." He smirked at me.

"No, with us dipshit."

"Is that your favorite word?"

"To call you? Yes. So what would our plans be?"

"We'd take over the world baby." Grayson grins and kisses my cheek.

I give him a slight shove and laugh, "I'm serious."

"Well," he sighed and smiled at me. "We go to college." My head was now pressed against his chest. "Then, when we are ready, we'd get married."

"You'd want to marry me?" I give him an amused smile.

"If we were in love, of course I'd want to marry you." I had almost forgotten that we were pretending, almost until he said that sentence. If we were in love.

"But what if I'm too much to handle, and we break up?"

"Then I guess I'll just date a girl whose easier to handle." He laughs while I shove him away. He quickly pulls me back, pulling me against his chest. "If we break up...then I would beg for you to take me back."

"Why am I not doing the begging?" I laugh.

"Because if we break up, you're probably the one who broke up with me." Grayson smiled looking down at me. "I'm not stupid enough to break up with a girl like you." Just stupid enough to not love, I thought.

"Even if we do break up," He continued. "We will always get back together, because you're my person and I'm yours" I smile. "And that's something special."

"You're my person." I look up at him.

"You're my person." He smiled back. Realization hit me and before I could stop myself, tears started falling.

"I wish it were true." He wipes the tear from my eye.

"You are my person Blair, that much is true. And I do love you."

"Just not enough."

"I wish I did."

"I'm going to be ok." I promise him, wiping away my own tears now.

"You're going to be ok b." He went on, "If we got married, we'd have a lot of kids. We would play kickball, like you did when you were younger. We'd make a whole big event out of it. And our kids? They would love you. Even if I say I'm their favorite, we both know you'd be. And then we will grow old together, like you said you wanted. And we won't be fuck ups."

I look at him and smile. "And we won't be fuck ups." I repeated. What a nice life, and it could of been true. I would of loved to grow old and ugly with him. But if only we weren't pretending, and if only she didn't exist.

He leans over and looks at the alarm clock. "Come on, we are going to miss the count down."

We get up and head out the door. We are walking to the stairs when someone yells, "Count down is about to happen!" Grayson stops dead on his tracts. I look over to see what he was looking at, at the bottom of the stairs there she is standing. The girl that we pretend moments ago didn't exist. Ashlyn. She looks frantic, as if she was looking for him and needed to see him before the count down. And I knew right then, why she was here. She wanted to be with him, they weren't over. And Grayson realized that too.

Grayson turns his head and looks at me with a guilty expression. "Blair..."

"Go to her," I smile. "It's ok, we'll be ok." I repeated words I said only a week before. He gives me a smile and turns.

"5..." People shouted. Grayson hurries down the stairs towards her.

"4..."

"3..." He's almost to her.

"2..."

"1..." Now he is standing in front of her, not knowing what to do. She looks up at me, probably questioning what she should do too. I give a small smile, and nod my head towards him.

"Happy New Year's!" Everyone yells. I don't know who kissed who, maybe they both went in at the same time. But there they were, kissing. Two people in love, kissing on New Years.  Confirming what they both wanted.

And then I realize something, that's the end of our story. We aren't going to end up together, it's as clear as day. I didn't realize the whole time, it wasn't my story, it was theirs. I was just a chapter in their book. Just the obstacle they had to overcome.

I could stay, fight more. Make it more difficult for them. But why fight a battle you know you'll lose?

Here I was, loving a boy who will always love her.

He's kissed me, and I thought it was different. But maybe he was imagining her lips against his the whole time. I was pretending we were in love, but maybe he was pretending I was her. I can't keep fighting for someone who doesn't want me. It's better to be alone, than with be in a relationship with someone who rather be with someone else.

So I give up. Here is me waving my white flag. This is the end of our chapter, our not so great love story. Does it suck? Yes. But it's the sad reality, not everyone you love will love you back.

But I'll be ok, because yes I'm broken now, but I'll heal. And maybe I'll fall in love again. Maybe I'll get married and have kids with someone who loves me and only me.

I thought about the feeling I got months ago. The feeling that I was going to die. I remember how I didn't care about dying, but now it's different. Now I didn't want to die.

Grayson had helped me realize that. He helped me realize that their was more in life. He helped me realize I wasn't always going to be the broken girl I thought I would be. We promised not to fix each other, but he did fix me. Even if he didn't know, and even if he didn't have try. He did fix me.

I know he doesn't want me, I know I won't get him, and that's ok. Because now I know what it's like to live. And now that's exactly what I'm going to do.

•••
The End.