Takes place after episode 2x18, The Age of Dissonance. It explores Blair and her current struggles, in a slightly different way. It is slightly un- Blair.

The Truth about her Diamonds

She was petty, scheming and sometimes even heartless. People feared her, loathed her, and never crossed her. She just had to wear the diamond incrusted headband and people's worlds crumbled around her. She was powerful; she was the Queen B.

To the outside world she was a Park Avenue Princess, who wore Tiffany's and Chanel, who aspired to get into Yale. To the outside world she was perfect. Inside she was crumbling, her world was slowly falling apart.

As she sat at her dresser staring at her reflection in the mirror, she removed her diamond Tiffany's hair band and placed it on the dresser in front of her. She stared at her reflection, hating the person staring back at her, she felt the muscles in her stomach contract and clench,as she quickly got up and ran to the bathroom,she felt her muscles give way and she placed her head over the porcelain bowl and let it all out.

"Miss Blair?" she heard Dorota speak from outside the door, as she rinsed her face riding it from the makeup that graced her pale skin.

"Is everything okay Miss Blair?" Dorota continued.

"Yes Dorota, Please just leave now!" she spoke abruptly; a slight evidence of venom could be noted in her voice.

She suddenly felt her muscles contract again as she heard the fait footsteps of her maid walk away. The disgust rising in her throat as she quickly undressed riding herself of her dress and high heels and placing a simple robe around her fragile body. She pushed her hair out of her face and placed it on top of her head in a messy bun.

She walked back to sit in front of the mirror again, her very own form of personal torture, she stared again at the image she hated more than anything, herself. Her broken, venerable; face staring back at her with hate. She picked up the head band she had placed on the dresser before and wrenched the first diamond of it, that was for Chuck she thought, she then proceeded to pull the next four of after this, one for Serena, Nate, her mum, and her dad. She noticed her fingers were bruised slightly from the wrenching and she found that her one was bleeding as she moved to place the diamonds in the bin beside her.

She placed the head band back on her head minus the diamonds. Then picked up her bin, placing her headbands, scarfs, jewellery and other material items in the bin as well disposing of things that made up the old her, she didn't want them anymore, she didn't want any of it anymore. She wanted, well that was the question. What did she want? She thought sinking into the sheets of her bed.

--

She couldn't believe that she was here, but after walking up this morning it had been the only place she had wanted to go. She had felt drawn to it somehow. She walked up to the door of the Brooklyn loft and drew in a large, sharp breath before knocking; and found that she was relieved to find who answered it; a thought that came as quite a shock to her.

--

"Blair?" Dan Humphrey asked as in surprise, not just because she was their but due to her sudden change in physical appearance, he had seen her less than 12 hours at the Age of Innocence play, and after the incident with Rachel he hadn't expected Blair Waldorf to ever want to see him again, and had found himself quite content with the thought. He took in her change in appearance, noticing how plain she looked, just wearing jeans and a plain black top, gone was the clink of her high heels, as he saw a pair of flat shoes present on her feet. She didn't have a hand bag with her and even her usually extravagant headband was just plain black, and her hair was up placed atop her head just in a bun. It still looked somewhat like Blair Waldorf.

"Listen Dan" maybe not she did just call him Dan.

"Can I come in? I know this is odd and all but I had nowhere else to go and well-"he moved out of her way and unlike the other times, gone was the dominance, and in its place was sadness and well something he couldn't quite pick up on.

"Was there something in particular you wanted Blair?" he asked letting his curiosity get the better of him.

"To apologise" she said, with what he picked up on as sincerity.

"Really Dan" she continued, "I am sorry for, well everything. You didn't deserve the way I treated you" she finished; he just stood there stunned, for a moment.

"Are you part of some 12 step program?" he asked after some contemplation. She laughed the first real laugh he had ever heard in her, and shook her head.

"No, not technically, although you would be the first step on the 'Blair Waldorf cleans up her act train'" she spoke softly. They sat for a second, neither of them speaking, unsure of what to say.

"I should go" Blair said getting up and moving to the door.

"Wait" Dan spoke, "stay, I was just about to make hot chocolate anyway and well it's kind of a sad drink to have alone" he said with a soft smile, continuing he said,

"Consider it another of your 12 steps" he said lightly

"Haha" her voice was deadpan, "However I guess hot chocolate never hurt anyone, unless you toy with it Humphrey" she said looking at him pointedly.

"Now why would I do that?" he asked as he walked into the kitchen of the loft, a small smirk playing on his lips.

--

"To the beginning of a beautiful-"she cut him off

"If you say friendship Humphrey, I will hit you" she said with a smirk.

"Evening, I was going to say evening" he said as they clinked their coffee mugs together.

"Blair?" he asked letting curiosity get to him again. She looked over at him and nodded,

"What happened to your head band?" he asked finally, he had noticed that her head band had white marks on it form where he had assumed were glue marks, and well it was odd, beucase she never let anything he had seen have a speck of dirt or anything like that on anything she owned.

"Oh" she said "I just decide I didn't need the diamonds on it anymore, they were making me someone that I didn't want to be anymore" she stopped.

"Yeah" he said taking a sip of his drink, "and who was that?" she looked at him as if she was deciding whether she should tell him of not.

"An insecure, horrible, mean and quite frankly bitch of a person. It gave people these unrealistic expectations of me, and well I couldn't live like that anymore" she said taking in a sharp intake of breath.

"You got all that from a few diamonds" he asked. She smiled at his question.

"Yes" she said simply and he smiled back at her and she watched as he just drank his drink in silence. Someday, maybe she would tell him the truth that the diamonds were just a metaphor for her old life. But for now she was perfectly content with the just sitting here with Dan Humphrey drinking her hot chocolate not discussing, the truth about her diamonds.