A/N: So this isn't anything original, there are fictions like this, plus the Dair fandom on Tumblr are wonderfully pretentious and have great imagination to make manips and AU gifs about Brooklyn Blair and UES Dan. I decided to give myself the right to write this down. I have more to say on this topic, but I can't do it in one shot. So this is how I see it.
When Blair Waldorf starts her school year in the private school Constance Billiard for girls, she has no idea what to expect. She has partial scholarship and the rest of the money is paid from her father. Her parents are divorced for almost a decade and she lives with her mother in her grandparent's town house in Brooklyn. It's not anything extravagant but it's theirs. She loves the place and her mother runs her vintage clothes store in the ground floor that was in the family for years. Her father is a lawyer, not so successful or popular but at least he can cover the rest of the money that the expensive prep school asks for. Blair is exquisitely smart girl, maybe way smarter and literate than most kids her age. When she doesn't study, she helps her mother in the store.
...
Till the first day of the new school year she was a typical teenager, living carefree life in her neighborhood, hanging with her friends. All of a sudden she is front of a school where the students are wearing silly uniforms, clicking on expensive phones and wearing stupid grown up bags that for sure aren't made for books. She squeezes her school bag and already questions herself what the hell she was thinking when she wanted to transfer to this school. She feels like crying and she is so alone. Then this boy she met some months ago on a birthday party is there, but he doesn't even notice her. He hangs with his friends, most of them already stoned and they are laughing. She takes a deep breath, keep repeating in her head that this is what she wanted and that she'll be fine. She walks into the school and already knows that things are wont be easy.
Girls are acting like royalty, and the influential ones are running after a blond doll who wears some shiny head band. She is taller than them and Blair thinks she has already seen her somewhere.
"Hello Jenny" – Younger prep girls are melting when they pass by her, hoping that one day she will pick them to be her minions. The girl is outstanding and sharp, but she really is pretty and Blair now assumes that she is the most popular one. Jenny passes by her with her minions, of course none of them even looks at her. She walks slowly to her locker, opens it and puts some of her belongings inside. Her neighbor starts a conversation with her, some nice girl with big glasses. She informs her about the hierarchy in the school. Soon Blair finds out that the blond is Rufus Humphrey's daughter, the ultra famous rock star, who started a relationship with a woman from the Upper East Side so he decided to settle for a while, at least till his son and daughter graduate.
...
Days and weeks go bay, but Blair can't help but cry her eyes out each day after school. She is lonely, she hasn't made a single friend, and the guy she likes doesn't even know she exists. She knows that the only chance to get involved with Chuck Bass is only if he is drunk or drugged and for sure he won't remember her the next day.
At school there is this golden couple, which causes Blair nausea. They are like models from a teen magazine. She is tall, blonde, well dressed, wears shoes that cost more than Blair's entire wardrobe, and she seems so careless and happy. Her boyfriend has devilishly dark eyes, messy curly hair, almost always wears his uniform shirt unbuttoned and underneath wears some crazy punk bands t-shirts. Like a true teenage rebel, he shoves his classical St. Jude's uniform pants into his black Doc. Martens and has a pierced tongue. It doesn't take a lot for Blair to realize that he is the son of the rock star. She is already annoyed from the fact that he and his sister act as if they own the place.
Serena is actually nice. She talks to Blair, and invites her to go join them on the Met steps on lunch breaks or after school. She is easy going and really puts people in nice mood. Blair can't hide that she is surprised how open minded she is, when she tells her that she and her mother simply love the Humphrey men. Blair can't help but scoff on the fact that her mother is dating her boyfriend's father, but…after all they aren't related, and she tries to put the whole fucked up situation in her head.
Blair Waldorf doesn't even realize how she becomes part of Serena's world.
...
Daniel Humphrey is really a piece of work. He is smart, he really is. But he is used to get things on a silver platter. Or maybe that's the way Blair thinks about him. He annoys her so much, and he for sure is not hiding that he can't stand her. Serena is entertained when they are having little fights. She never forgets to mention his Hollywood behavior, and he always remembers to point out that she smells like Brooklyn. One time she shouts at him that he is semi literate son of a worn out rock star, and that the only reason he is there is because his father is involved with a rich woman. It shuts everyone's mouth around and her words make Dan pick his stuff and leave the school yard. Serena's eyes are filling with tears and Blair realizes that she over reacted. Silently she is a bit proud that she was defending herself and her Brooklyn background.
That's when Chuck Bass notices her and tells his friend Nate that they should do a little social experiment.
...
Nate dates Blair for almost five months and according to the plan he was supposed to get her to bed by far. Chuck thinks that he is just an idiot, but Nate (besides the fact that he really wants to take her to bed) doesn't want to do it the way Chuck usually does – forcing her or getting her drunk.
Serena and Blair are very close friends, but what Blair doesn't know is that Serena and Nate liked each other for years. And no matter who they date, they always go back to each other. Yes, Serena is head over heels with Dan, yes they practically live together and can consume their love anytime they want, it doesn't mean that she is not seeing Nate.
When Blair finds out, she spends two days at home crying and refuses to go back to school, because everyone knows about Nate and Serena and yes, they are laughing at the poor Brooklyn girl (who though that stood a chance with Serena). Everyone but Humphrey. That week when it happens, he is in L.A with his sister visiting their mother. When he comes back, no one actually cares to tell him. He finds out probably the last, and they break up (first break up among the many).
Chuck is there for her, at first all he wants is to use the strict and uptight Brooklyn girl, but with time he falls for her. He is a sadist as he says, and his love is more like a punishment. She sticks to him the entire time they are in high school, completely blind to anything else.
With time she forgives Serena. With time Dan forgives Serena too, and they are on again off again. One time he asks her what Blair sees in Chuck. Yes, they used to smoke weed together and getting very drunk together, but…he has no respect for him whatsoever.
What most people don't know is that the son of the rock star, the Hollywood damaged kid, the spoiled brat is actually very emotional and has good heart. He writes in his spare time and doesn't really show what he wrote to anyone.
Serena doesn't really know what to say to him. She hardly realizes (she is that vain) that her now ex boyfriend asks a little too much about Blair from Brooklyn.
...
Serena goes to California the summer before college. Chuck is somewhere in Europe with Nate. None of them actually care about school anymore. Blair's hard work hasn't been rewarded with Yale. Dan's too. They both end up on NUY. He makes sure she knows not to talk to him in public, now when she actually isn't wearing the uniform, but some idiotic bohemian dress, brown boots and Indian accessories. She rolls her eyes and makes him know that it is fine with her.
Things are getting weird. Not that girls aren't practically dying to be with him, melting when he asks if they have a lighter, but it seems Blair is actually getting popular too. People like to hang out with her, she finds more people that aren't snobs or spoiled rock star's offsprings. He hates the fact that people don't give a shit if his father is some old rock star, a hotter version of Mick Jagger (the hell, they don't even know who his father is, and for sure he doesn't expect that from Hannah Montana generations). One day he finds out about a roof top college party, but he isn't invited. It's literally the first time for him to be treated like he is no one. So he does the next best thing – he swallows his pride and walks to the table where Blair sits with her new friends and asks her if she wants to be his date. She looks at him as if he is insane. But after all, she wasn't raised to be a bitch, so she politely says yes and takes Humphrey to the party. He criticizes half the way about the location, the shitty pretentious band that is too loud which is bad for their hearing…Blair is a few steps higher on the stairs and he notices that the girl actually has killer ass and legs. In one moment as they are climbing the stairs, she turns around a bit annoyed from his constant complains.
"Ok, so, you wanted to come here, it's not that bad" – She confronts him. He looks up into her eyes, then his gaze unconsciously falls down on her lips.
"I just have a feeling that I got on the wrong foot here, I wanna start again. So…thanks for bringing me Waldrof" – He says a bit embarrassed.
"Yeah, well…" – She sighs, realizing that the guy she spent half her time arguing at school isn't so bad. – "I would just like to think if I needed it, somebody would do the same thing for me, but let's be honest we both know it wouldn't be you." – She forces a smile and turns around, but then she changes her mind and faces him again. – "Oh and…no skull necklaces in college" – She takes of his well known skull necklace, that's hanging around his neck and tosses it behind him. Half St. Jude was talking that he got it personally from Marilyn Manson. He just looks behind and doesn't do anything. From that day, Dan Humphrey never wore a skull necklace or any clothes with skeletons, again.
...
She realizes he is so much more than a child who was growing up in private jets and was watching his father's band mates fucking groupies. He realizes she has more class than any girl he has ever met. The problem is…Serena is always around and he can't help himself. They share the pain of children whose parents are divorced and one time she almost makes him cry when she talks about the way her father was never there. From a movie on a lonely holiday night to an actual weekly agenda with French cinema, they slowly start to grow fond of each other. At first he makes sure she doesn't think they are friends and on his surprise (usually girls were too clingy with him, trying too hard to become part of his world) she is all right with that.
People start to suspect. Dan and Blair are seen very often together. His father writes a song, and it become an instant hit. He says it was inspired from events from his youth and Dan can't help but find himself in the lyrics. He writes down how he feels, not mentioning names, so when Serena accidentally reads what he wrote in his small pocket notebook, she is so overwhelmed and she says that she loves him and asks him to give her another chance. He pretends that that night next to him is Blair.
...
He and Serena break up again. Rufus and Lily too and the Humphreys move to even bigger and more expensive penthouse on Park Avenue.
Chuck and Blair are no longer together for a long time and it doesn't seem it'll change any time soon. He is somewhere in Paris (Jenny is in Paris too, studying fashion design, he bothers her very often, until one day she falls for his charm).
People now are convinced that Dan and Blair are a thing. She minds that, because Serena is her best friend. Her mother teases her the whole time about the celebrity kid. His maid who is like a mother to him, asks questions all the time and he has to argue with her to prove her wrong.
For a while, Blair tries to avoid him. He doesn't call her, absolutely sure that he is just confused. He loves Serena and everyone knows that. Blair is just someone he loves to watches movies with, discussing literature and criticizing world politics.
That day they stood each other up over an exhibition, playing tough when in fact they were mortified because all the assumptions people were making about them were had big chances to become real.
...
After a party they both attended to, Blair wanders aimlessly through the city, fighting her thoughts that her brain constantly serves her in those past months. She just has to be sure tonight. Her legs are taking her to the building where Dan lives and the doorman lets her in (he already knows who she is, even he thinks she is involved with the kid). When she walks into the Humphrey penthouse, she realizes it was a stupid idea. He looks at her a bit surprised and when she asks the idiotic question if Serena was there she wants to slap herself (they aren't together you idiot, what would she do here?)
"What's going on, is everything ok?" – He asks with slightly arrogant tone. After all he's Dan Humphrey, he always talks that way. She sighs, and decides to be honest with him.
"I've been walking around the city all night, with one all consuming, paralyzing thought." – She starts, her voice a bit shaky and her heart pounds like it never did with Chuck.
"Why I'm walking around the city, when I live in Brooklyn?" – He gives her a little smile that she can't read if it's cynical or honest. And damn it, he looks so good. Black pants, black semi unbuttoned shirt and one of his necklaces peeping from underneath. His hair is still a bit messy, but in a good way…and his two day scruff isn't helping her.
"What if my mom and your maid were right? What if there is another reason we are keeping us a secret?"
"Another reason like what?" – She notices that he is nervous too. He tries to keep his cool, but he loses it.
"Plausible deniability? Dan, we kept us a secret, because we were afraid there was something more" – She encourages herself and takes two small steps towards him.
"You need to go back to Brooklyn" – He commands, but actually he is scared. In another situation she'd call him a real pussy, but now she can't because she is scared too.
"Not until I know for sure they were wrong" – She is surprised from herself. Yes she was with Chuck Bass, yes she was always brave and sharp, but this is different. – "That there is nothing between us"
"I can guarantee it" – His voice is now softer. It encourages her to put her hand on his arm and he looks down on her hand.
"But so you are secure in that knowledge, what did you have in mind?" – He asks, trying to sound manly.
"Just one kiss" – She is aware that after that night she'd want to slap herself. She is maybe not an Upper East Side lady, but she never asked anyone for this so far.
"I suppose that would work" – He replies. The hell, it's not a first time for girls to beg him to make out with him, why the fuck is he scared now?!
"One kiss and that's that" – She says hearing her voice as if she is semi deaf.
"One kiss and that's that" – He repeats as if he tries to convince himself that that is really that.
"So?" – She nervously blinks few times.
"So?" – He says and he clears his throat.
All of a sudden her courage is gone and she doesn't know how to perform the kiss she asked for. She looks at him, confused, all their fights from high school are coming to surface of her memory and before she knows, he grabs her waist with one and her neck with another hand "Oh for crying out loud Waldorf!" he mumbles and he crushes his lips on her.
tbc