Woooow so I picked this back up again! After the devastating murder of our poor ship, plus graduation college, moving across the country and getting a full time job - I haven't been writing at all. I've been lacking in stretching my creative muscle since I started work and I figure hell, why not? Plus, this fic was kind of prophetic. It's now more than ever that Dair need to live on in a different, much more quality universe, no? So, without further ado, here is more Dair/Mad Men! I'm trying to write it as if I were writing their storylines in episodes. I'm trying to pull back on the inner monologue and focus on actions and tone to develop characterization in keeping with the genius of Mad Men, but let me know if something's missing. Also my writing is probably mad rusty. Forgive me! xoxo Air
Blair slumped over her desk, elbows unceremoniously holding her weight upon it. Her palm held her chin as she stared blankly out the window.
"It's snowing," she said plainly, flatly.
The others looked up, the same lethargic expressions across their faces as she had. It had been a grueling month. Playtex was now a distant memory. Blair had presented Don with three concepts for that campaign that she herself had deemed great, not to mention validation from a particularly prickly Peggy who seemed to be jealous.
But BBDO had gotten to them before they'd even had a chance to counter. Pete had been furious, Peggy even more so.
But no matter, she'd gotten a chance to do other work—and the first time she saw one of her slogans in a magazine ad she'd nearly screamed at the hair salon.
"Perfect," Peggy said with a healthy amount of sarcasm.
It was a gray day, sure, but Blair was starting to crush under the eternal cynicism and ennui of her coworkers, and it was too cramped of a space to ignore.
"I've never met anyone who hated the first snowfall of the year before," Blair said in an absentminded way that covered up most of the distaste underneath.
Stan snickered. "If you're implying Peggy's a Grinch, you'd be absolutely on the ball," he said.
Blair smiled a thin, appreciative smile. She could practically hear Peggy's eye roll and anticipated whatever retort she may have—but Ginsburg groaned dramatically before she could delight in the misery of the miserable.
Instead, Peggy chimed in, eyes twinkling playfully. "All right, time to pay-up, Ginsburg," she said and extended an open palm and wiggled her fingers.
Ginsburg dug into his pockets, a sour expression on his face.
"What's going on?" Blair asked.
"The first Christmas reference," Ginsburg said, producing nothing from his pockets. "We had a bet. Look, I don't have any cash. How about I take everyone out for a drink tonight?"
"I don't know," Peggy said.
"Come on," Ginsburg whined. "Since when does a Jew offer to pay for anything? You're missing out on a once in a lifetime chance, I gotta tell ya. Rarer than a freaking comet."
Before Creative could escape to their now much anticipated after work getaway—the anticipation had actually managed to lift spirits—the partners had scheduled a company wide meeting, the first since Blair had started working there.
She didn't think she had yet seen Roger Sterling, Bert Cooper, Don Draper, Lane Pryce and Pete Campbell in one room. It must be important. She side-eyed Joan, who seemed to be ever in the know, and somehow she found she was supremely jealous of that.
"Good news for the holidays my friends," Lane began in a chipper, clipped British accent. "Despite our unfortunate loss of Playtex, we've done exceptionally well over the past few months. Thanks to a healthy competition between Mr. Campbell and Mr. Sterling, we've brought in bounds of business—"
Lane blushed as he was cut off by a sporadic applause. He nodded bashfully.
"We should keep a tally," Don broke in casually and drew a nice bout of laughter.
"However—" Lane continued, clearing his throat.
"Uh-oh," Harry said.
"—we now, here at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, cannot efficiently manage the workload and thus, we will be expanding after the Holidays," he concluded.
"Are you serious?" Peggy asked incredulously.
"Quite, my dear," Lane said.
"Sorry, sweetheart, we all know how much you love avoiding that beatnik boyfriend of yours, but you'll have to go home to the wife in time for dinner like the rest of us," Roger said dryly, drawing his lowball of amber liquid to his lips with a smirk. Peggy glowered at him.
Blair was looking quite forward to a break from the office until New Years.
"Cheers my friend," Nate saluted as low-ball clinked against low-ball. He took a swig and Dan followed by downing his entirely. When he set it down on the round table at his knees he spotted a waiter and raised his finger up to signal another.
"I must admit, it feels good," Dan said. "I think I've only sold about sixty percent of my soul to the devil."
"Ahhh, see that's the problem," Nate admonished as he reached for a cigarette between the material of his suit.
"What is?" Dan asked as a new drink materialized before him.
"You still believe that people have souls," Nate answered. "And speak of the devil!" His eyes swept up and over Dan, who turned in his seat to find two men weaving through the chairs of the bar.
"If it isn't Pete Campbell himself," Nate said and got up to extend a firm handshake.
"Little Nate Archibald, look at you now," Pete said with a warm, if practiced enthusiasm.
Dan hung in the dead air for an overly long second before Nate remembered his good breeding and introduced the two. It turned out Campbell was an old upper crust family friend—and worked in advertising as well. At Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce no less. He was a junior partner. So when Pete invited them to sit at his pre-reserved table with a slew of porky self-congratulating men Dan soured. He didn't particularly want to talk shop.
So he continued to order his Old Fashioned and listened to tales of racquetball at the country club and lascivious stories of wining and dining clients.
"So any notables under your belt yet, Daniel?" Pete asked.
"That's actually what we're out here celebrating," Nate said. Dan waited for him to explain and was again left hanging in dead, awkward air. Pete's large, beady eyes were looking at him expectantly and yet he said nothing.
"Go on, tell him," Nate said as if encouraging a scared kid to walk the plank of a diving board.
"Uhhhh, yes. Actually," Dan began unceremoniously. "We're celebrating an expansion."
Pete waited. "Of…what?"
"Huh?" Dan blurted out.
"Well Dan here won us Playtex from you, funnily enough. And they liked the slogan so much that they've decided to green light a television ad based on it," Nate explained.
"So you're the man." Pete chuckled and shook his head. "I'm impressed. Tell me. How'd you come up with it? Because I have to say, for a boring old thing like that it really pops."
"That's the kicker," Nate said excitedly. Dan's insides were a mess of confusion at this entire situation.
"Go ahead, he'll love it," Nate said and turned to Pete. "You're going to love this."
Dan cleared his throat, leaned forward and rubbed his hands together. "Well, Pete—" he began. "It's a little ironic—and I can say ironic because I'm a writer—I actually got the idea from one of yours."
Pete's eyes widened. "A defector? Do tell."
"Better," Nate said.
"Nate and I went out one night to do a little…hardware research." That drew a slimy smile from Pete, who undoubtedly understood and approved. "And what are the odds I end up in the powder room with a girl wearing the very bra I was assigned. The very bra it seemed that was in the possession of only BBDO and your very own SDCP." Dan swept back in his seat and let the implication sink in. "I guess your man was doing some field research of her own."
Pete chuckled again. "You smarmy bastard you stole the idea from her?"
"Oh no," Nate said from the peanut gallery. "No no no."
Dan sipped his drink and relished in holding their attention so grippingly. He smiled as he set his drink back down. "She was a sly one. She threw me for a loop I gotta tell you, and I let my suspicions fly."
"Did she…?" Pete asked.
"Not a clue," Dan said. "Anyway, she swore she wasn't pulling a fast one on me and she did this little thing where she led my hand like this—" Dan made a motion with his fingers at his chest. "—and she said….cross my heart." Dan threw up the palms of his hands as if to finish with a "voila".
"Holy shit," Pete said. "That is some story."
Nate began a slow, dramatic clap. "So thank you, Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, for providing your very best inspiration to Daniel over here."
Nate raised a glass for a toast.
After Dan grimaced down his final swig he remembered something.
"Who was she by the way? Do you know her?"
Pete thought for a moment. "If I remember correctly, our new girl, Blair….Waldorf was on Playtex. Her father plays golf with Roger Sterling, the bastard. I don't know anything else other than her ass looks great when she walks by my office."
Pete Campbell winked.
It was New Years Eve in New York City and Blair Waldorf was….at a work party. A work party at Don and Megan Draper's penthouse apartment, which wasn't all that bad, but when you've grown up celebrating the passing of time at the likes of the Waldorf Astoria and The Four Seasons there was something to be missed.
Not to mention her date had cancelled on her last minute, she'd just gotten into an argument with her mother who had called long distance from Paris just to criticize her, and for some reason unknown to man, the man she'd met at a sleazy SoHo bar several months ago was standing fifty feet in front of her.
She was on her fifth glass of champagne.
"You look positively miserable," a velvety voice rang through the bubbly mist that enveloped her head. It was Joan offering her another glass of champagne and an understanding smile.
But Blair didn't feel much like professing her woes. "I prefer to be surrounded by strangers in masks on New Years Eve," she said.
Joan seemed to appreciate this. "My kind of girl. Ten years go. I'll bet you can scoop up a bachelor here somewhere. Even if he's someone else's date."
Blair managed to huff out a smile as Joan playfully nudged an elbow against her arm.
"Who's that?" Blair asked her, nodded over to the man in question, who was schmoozing easily with Pete and Ken.
Blair was preparing herself for playwright or published a novella that caught the eye of the New Yorker. He knows so-and-so and runs in so-and-so's circle.
"I guess that's the new hire. Something…Humphrey," Joan said.
"Dan…" Blair said absentmindedly as she studied him.
"That's it! Did Peggy tell you?"
He was entertaining the hell out of the account men, eliciting a laugh about every fifteen seconds and suddenly Blair felt nauseated.
"Is he…Creative?" Blair said and swallowed the lump in her throat.
"Bingo! Pete stole him from BBDO. I think he's a catch…aesthetically speaking," Joan said in that bombshell voice of hers which was just enough to send Blair excusing herself to the ladies' room.
Her breaths were shallow. They were rapid and shallow and she gripped the His and Hers sink and steadied herself in front of the mirror. It was hard. She was drunk. She could hear the muffled chords of "The Taxman" playing through the walls. Breathing. In. Out. Deep. Into the diaphragm.
Soon a welcome stasis settled around her and the sink and the mirror. She stared blankly ahead, barely making a correlation to her own being and the gold eye shadowed lids gleaming back at her. Without conscious thought she brought the tips of her fingers to her heart and made a criss-cross tracing against her dress.
"Son of a bitch," she whispered and squeezed the sink harder until her knuckles turned white.
She lost her grip when the latch of the door jolted open and she jumped to attention.
"Oh, so sorry," Pete Campbell's voice filled the small room. He made a move to pull the door shut where he had disturbed the threshold of the bathroom but paused and stuck his head inside. It bobbled there without a body and looked utterly bizarre to Blair. "Are you all right?" he asked, dripping with concern.
Blair's lips were sealed shut, so she gave a curt nod.
"My word, you look completely white," he observed and hurried into the room and shut the door behind him.
"I'm fine, really," Blair said and lifted her head high. "Just…" she waived her hand carelessly in the air. "Too much champagne."
The nonchalant act backfired on her when her heel wobbled and her ankle rolled. Suddenly she felt a reaffirming hand snake around her waist and steady her.
"Whoa there," Pete said. He brushed a loose strand of hair behind her ear and lingered, taking time to break his eye contact. "Here," he said softly and finally turned away. He returned with a glass of water from the tap and he took his time slipping his hand from it even after she had assured its safe handoff into her own grasp.
"Thank you," she said and placed the glass down.
"You're exquisite," he hummed and leaned forward some more, hovered over her so she had to bend her back to retain some personal space.
Blair, who was accustomed to such attention (if not any follow through), had the sense to dance a sly smile across her lips. "I know," she said impishly.
"And not too modest," he observed and moved closer. "I like that in a woman."
She could feel his breath. "Mr. Campbell," she began and brought two fingers to his lips to stop their descent. "If you're looking to be rewarded for your kindness—"
"From what I've heard a reward system isn't necessary to—"
"What you've heard?" Blair countered in alarm.
"Calm down, I won't say a peep," Pete admonished. "Cross my heart."
And then he softly traced a criss-cross symbol right above her heaving chest.
Needing to escape from the constant performance of charming his new bosses and colleagues, Dan had managed to slip away to the sidewalk outside of the Drapers' apartment complex for a cigarette.
He'd just started humming Bob Dylan's "Pledging My Time" when a flurry of shimmering gold barreled through the glass doors and right passed him. A pretty mess of a brunette desperate for a cab, but she had no coat.
Dan watched her for a minute, minding his own business as her desperation bled out of her and into the erratic movements of her extended arm. After another minute he felt a pang of guilt at remaining a spectator.
He stepped forward. "Uhhh, miss? Pardon me, but I don't think you'll flag down a cab like that, no matter how pretty you may be—"
She whipped around suddenly to face him and "—oh! Hi," he said at the sight of Blair Waldorf's clumped mascara and red nose facing him. He'd been eyeing her all night; it was just like him not to have even noticed what she was wearing. The line of her jaw, the deep pools of her eyes, rosy cheeks and her entitled pout had occupied him just fine as he had kept tabs on her as if that would somehow contain her from noticing him. He thought it had, actually.
"Hi?" she asked sardonically. "Hi?"
Dan was lost. He furrowed his brow and raised the hand holding his cigarette into a brusque waive.
"Let me get one thing clear, Dan…it is…Dan, correct?" she asked.
"It is," he said, confused by her aggressiveness.
Blair yanked the cigarette from between his fingers and threw it to the side of the street. She tilted towards him like a lion ready to pounce into an attack. All he could see were the black pupils of her eyes.
"You don't say hi to me. You don't say anything to me. We don't speak. Ever. I see you in the office in two days and you mean nothing to me but a fly on the wall. You have something to say about my pitches, you address the room as a whole. You do not—under any circumstances—request the same project that I am on. And that means even if it's goddamn Chevrolet, do you understand?"
"Listen, I—" he began.
"Do you understand?" she repeated, slowly and forcefully with each syllable.
Dan threw up his hands in surrender. "I do," he said quietly and pivoted away, finished with his smoke break and decided it was best he found the party again before midnight.
It turned out the clock struck twelve while he was waiting for the elevator. He could see her through the lobby's glass windows still waiting for a cab.
Hello 1967.
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