Charade
After she reads 'Inside', she goes all the way to Brooklyn, bangs on the door so loud that he swears the God she definitely woke up the whole neighbourhood, throws the book into his face and leaves.
He considers going after her, but since Blair Waldorf has this habit of staying up extremely late to finish books, it is now three in the morning and he really just wants to go back to his warm, comfy bed and continue sleeping and - honestly - the cold streets of Brooklyn don't seem exactly appealing at the moment; especially if Blair has already taken off in a taxi or a limo or a ride of some kind.
So he just sighs, picks up the book from the floor, grabs some frozen peas for his head and heads back to sleep.
(Get it? Heads; when he got hit in the head by a b- oh, would you give him a break it's three in the fucking morning for crying out loud.)
When he wakes up, he picks up his phone and realises it has been bombarded by texts and angry voice mails from Blair.
"I cannot believe what yo-"
Message deleted.
"How could you wr-"
Message deleted.
"I'm honestly surprised at how that even became a bestseller in the first place, Humphrey. I've never read that much c-"
Message deleted.
"I am not in love with you."
He pauses. This time, he doesn't press the delete button but continues listening to the voicemail, no matter how much he doesn't want to listen to it.
"I'm not stupid and I know all those characters are based on us and I am not in love with you so just take all of what you wrote and shove it in a trash bin because I. am not. in love. with you."
He listens to the message one more time before he deletes it.
He tries to ignore the pain in his chest. Maybe it's just indigestion.
Here's the thing with Daniel Humphrey; he has this look. This look he gives her every time she tells him that they're not friends and that they'll never be friends and that just because they've seen a movie - or, well, a lot of movies - together doesn't mean that they're best friends and that he's the only person who ever completely understood her.
He has this look that screams "whatever helps you sleep at night" and it just gets on her nerves. It gets on her nerves because it makes her question everything she's ever said or thought because she might actually be deluding herself and Daniel Humphrey might actually be her friend.
As soon as that though crosses her mind, she calls Dorota and tells her she's decided that it was time to go shopping.
(They end up feeding geese at Central Park.)
He calls her that night even if it's not actually movie night with the excuse that he's bored and has this sudden desire to watch 'Roman Holiday' and she knows he's just doing that to make her happy or probably make sure that next movie night they're not watching anything with Audrey Hepburn in it.
She lies back on her bed pillows, puts him on speaker as she dims the lights and turns on the movie on her laptop, turning up the volume.
"You don't really have a sudden desire to watch 'When In Rome', do you, Humphrey?", she asks him and he's silent for a moment.
Dan sighs. "Consider me willingly wanting to watch an Audrey Hepburn movie which we've both already seen about a million times as my way of apologising for 'Inside'.", he says and it takes her a few seconds to figure out what to reply.
Reading 'Inside' was definitely not one of the best experiences of her life. Finding out that Dan's book was actually on the top of New York Times' bestseller list made her eager to read it and, to be honest, she was even a bit proud of him for getting such positive critiques. But, going into it, she was prepared to read a love letter to Serena Van Der Woodsen or something and not about the secrets of the Upper East Side and an epic but non-existent love story between the fictional characters obviously based on her and Dan.
'Inside' basically made her re-evaluate everything in her life, especially her friendship with Dan.
"I really don't want to talk about that, Dan.", she says. "I over-reacted because of a piece of fiction and nothing more. So lets just watch the movie."
After a brief silence, Dan replies. "Okay."
And, for the rest of the night, Blair lets herself be happy, if only a little.
Blair ignores him for a week.
She doesn't text him or call him or even talk to him for a total of seven days and he kind of knows why; she's scared. She's scared of whatever is going on between them and it's easier for Blair to just not return his calls than to look him in the eyes and call him a friend.
It's not the first time she's done this - not answered his calls for days after movie night - but this time, he just can't take it anymore.
Because as she's in her flat in the Upper East Side, avoiding him and not even wanting to consider him a friend, he's in his apartment in Brooklyn desperately calling her over and over and over again, feeling a lot more than friendship when it comes to her.
So, he takes a cab to the Upper East Side, questioning his decision the whole way and even considers going back home the entire elevator ride to her flat but when the doors open, he exits the lifts surely.
It takes a few moments for her to come down the stairs and, as soon as she's close enough to him, he kisses her without a second thought to it, not letting her say a word.
He's surprised when she kisses him back but deepens the kiss and lets himself enjoy the moment while it lasts.
When he pulls out of the kiss, his lungs seeking oxygen, he half-expects Blair to slap him.
She doesn't. "Why-", she goes to asks as his palms are still cupping her cheeks and he's so fucking close to her he needs to concentrate really hard in an attempt to not kiss her again.
"I love you, Blair.", he answers. "I love you and I don't care about what happens now. I love you and everything I wrote in 'Inside', I meant it. Dylan is desperately, hopelessly, in love with Claire."
He pauses and Blair's just looking at him. He wants her to say something but another part of him wants her to just stay silent because all of this was a ridiculous idea and it hopes that they could just move on with their lives as if this never happened.
"Dan..", she says and for a moment he lets himself hope. "Humphrey.", she continues firmly and his hope disappears. "I don't-"
"No.", he shakes his head. "B-"
"I'm not Claire and you're not Dylan and we're not in love."
"Blair, no.", he says. "Please, don't-"
"I don't love you.", she says and his whole world breaks. "I don't love you.", her voice breaks on the words.
He lets his hands fall down to his hips. "Why are you doing this?"
"I don't-"
"Why won't you let yourself be happy, Blair? Why do you keep denying everything that's going on between us?", he asks as the tone of his voice rises. "You keep putting up this charade of being distant and cold as a way of not getting hurt but I won't hurt you, Blair.", he says. "I promise.", he takes her hands in one of his and uses his other to cup her cheek. She closes her eyes to his touch. "I promise.", he repeats.
And no matter how many times Blair tells him she doesn't love him, Dan won't belive her.
"I don't-", she goes to say but she doesn't even believe it herself anymore.
He cuts her off with a kiss and, God, it feels so good.
Somehow, 'I don't love you' turns into "I love you I love you I love you".
Daniel Humphrey is desperately, hopelessly, in love with Blair Waldorf and she loves him, too.