It was now the middle of October and besides glimpses of Blair's hair as she closed her door to her room, Dan had not seen her since Nate and Serena's visit. He had more communication with Serena, who made him into a sort of pen pal, than he did with his ex-girlfriend who lived a few doors down in their dorm. He had attempted to reach out to her the first week that she iced him out, thinking she was perhaps falling back into her homesickness and isolating but he saw her in the library surrounded by other students and realized that the lack of communication was on purpose.

He had to admit, it stung.

"Who cares that she is not talking to you?" Vanessa asked, staring blankly into the screen on one of their video chats. "You broke up and didn't talk to her for over six months, you were fine."

Dan had let out a sigh and told Vanessa that she just didn't get it, but truly it was him that didn't get it. She had had a point- they had not been friends again for very long, so it shouldn't have hurt him as much as it did when she dropped back out of his life. Maybe it was the way that she entered it again like a tornado, blowing through the tenuous friendships he had built the first couple of weeks and leaving him with nothing.

Thankfully Amanda still saw him as some prize to win in the power struggle between her and Blair and took him back into her group of friends from Elon. They had expanded a little bit, grabbing a few of the German foreign students, a girl from Italy and a couple of students from Spain but mostly stay insulated. Dan was on the outer limits of their friendship, and was certain if it wasn't for Amanda that the rest of the group would gladly forget his existence and not tell him when they were going out.

He had made plans with Amelie, one of the few friends he had made outside of Amanda's group to get lunch at the cafeteria. She was German and looking for his help to proof read a paper that she had to turn in. A second set of eyes, she said, as she begged him the night before to just read through it quickly- a cursory glance to make sure she hadn't messed up on any of the phrasing. He had said yes and they had made plans to meet for lunch but he had been waiting outside for 15 minutes for her and had not yet seen her blonde head walk by.

Dan sent her a text as he walked into the cafeteria, his stomach grumbling, and went to find something that looked edible to eat. For the most part, he tried to go get groceries and cook meals for himself but the food at the school wasn't the worst he had. He glanced around the cafeteria, scanning for Amelie, before looking at the food options and paying.

He went to find a table, when he spotted Blair. She was sitting in the middle of a group who seem entranced by her (he knew the feeling well) as she talked. Dan watched as she tilted her head back and laughed at something she said or maybe a reply that someone had said to her. He hadn't realized he had stopped moving until someone brushed by him, shoving their shoulder into his and mumbling a rude comment about his manners.

Dan's phone buzzed.

Amelie had texted: Daniel, my friend. Please do not kill me. I got caught up on the phone with my parents. You know they worry. Will be there in five.

Dan wrote back that he was finding a table and to not rush, his classes were done for the day anyways. Dan found a table that was empty and as an added bonus had a view to Blair's table. She looked to be in good spirits, but he was still bothered that she had ghosted him after that night- especially when he had done nothing wrong.

He left his food on the table, shrugging off his jacket and putting it on the back of the chair and took a deep breath and walked over to Blair's table. She was ignoring him in all the ways she could but he couldn't imagine her WASP manners would let her ignore him in front of her new friends.

"Waldorf," he said, interrupting her as she was talking to the group around her. "You've been avoiding me."

Blair's eyes flashed over to him and he could see her jaw tense as she put on a tight smile to greet him. "Humphrey." It was funny that she could put so much into one word. He could hear how much she didn't want to see him, how she didn't want to have this conversation in her tone and while the Dan she met freshman year of college would have cowered away, he stayed standing at the edge of the circular table.

"You've been avoiding me," he repeated, his hands resting on the top of an empty chair. "Here I was thinking we were becoming friends again."

"You thought wrong," Blair said, tilting her head to the side and smiling up at him. "We're in the middle of something right now, Humphrey. It's rude to interrupt."

Dan's hands tightened on the chair, "All I am looking for is an explanation of why one day we were friends and the next you stopped talking to me. I think I'm at least owed that."

Blair let out a heavy sigh, "Fine, Humphrey. Come to my room at 6 pm sharp and we can discuss. You're inconveniencing me now."

He nodded, letting her harsh words bounce off of him as he retreated back to his table. He had an internal debate with himself as he waited for Amelie. There was Option A, which was to just go to Blair's room when she told him to. Option A meant that he would potentially get answers on why she was showing him her worst self again but it also kept the power solely in her hands.

Option B, which he knew was self destructive and therefore what he shouldn't do even if he wanted to, was to not show up when she demanded. He wasn't sure why he wanted to be Blair's friend again, they hadn't done much besides delay their start of their relationship the last time they had tried to be friends, but Dan would be lying if he said the pull of her orbit wasn't always tugging at him.

"Oh, Daniel," he heard Amelie's voice as she huffed and fell into her chair. "I am so sorry. My sister is having some boy problems at home and she was crying, I didn't want to leave her on the phone."

He smiled at the blonde who looked apologetic as she pulled out her paper from her bag. "It's okay, Amelie. How is she doing?"

"You're so kind for asking," she smiled, touching his hand. "She was okay when we hung up. She might come visit. You should have your Jenny come too. I think they would get along."

"It's a little trickier to get my sister here, I think. Tickets are expensive."

Her face felt and she snapped her fingers, "Darn. I can just imagine her and Sabrina getting along splendidly. I'm so sorry for making you read through this, I don't trust myself to not make a silly mistake."

"From what I read on your last essay, your English is way better than some of my classmates back at home- and we're all English majors. I'm sure you are fine," he said, smiling to reassure her. "Do you want me to take this back to my room and read through it?"

"Oh," she clapped, "would you? That's so kind."

Dan nodded, putting the paper in his bag. "I can do some proofing for you. Are you eating?"

Amelie shook her head, "I'm not hungry yet. I have plans to get an early dinner in town with some of my friends. Do you want to come?"

"I can't," he said. He paused to take a bite of his sandwich, chewy as softly as he could. "I just ran into Blair, she's granted me a meeting."

"Your ex girlfriend?" her eyes twinkled.

Dan nodded, "She's sitting over there."

Amelie pushed her hands on the table and flung up, trying to see who it was that Dan had previously dated. Dan had shown her a picture previously and Amelie looked around the busy cafeteria for a minute before finally spotting the brunette. "Wow, Daniel, she's so pretty," she nodded as she sunk back into her chair. "She was beautiful in the picture but she looks so beautiful in motion. You two must have looked nice together."

His shoulders moved up lazily, "I think a lot of people said she was out of my league."

Amelie playfully hit his thigh with her hand, "Nonsense, Daniel. You are the most self doubting American I've ever met. Aren't all of you supposed to boast about your good looks and money?"

"You've befriended the wrong American if that was what you were hoping for."

Amelie bit her lower lip. She tapped her fingers on the table, "Come to dinner anyways. Just come late. What time are you meeting with her?"

"Six?"

Amelie laughed, a loud boisterous laugh that made people in the cafeteria look over at them. "We're going much later than that. Haven't you gotten used to European eating times yet?"

Dan shook his head still, "I have an early class tomorrow. I should stick around campus."

"Come on, Daniel," Amelie rolled her eyes. "You are only studying in a different country once. Live a little."

"You sound like my friend, Vanessa."

"Then she sounds wise."

Dan knocked lightly on the door to Blair's room. He had decided on Option A, showing up on time and had even gone down to the store and brought with him a peace gift of cheap red wine. It wasn't anything that Blair would have chosen to drink on her own, but Dan didn't have the endless pockets of the Manhattan elite.

Blair flung open the door, she was wearing a different outfit that she had been wearing at lunch. At lunch she had been wearing a sweater over what he thought was a dress with a collar. Now she was dressed casually in tight jeans and a black long sleeve t-shirt. It was the most casual he had ever seen her and also guaranteed that it was more expensive than his entire wardrobe.

"Humphrey." She sounded annoyed, as though she hadn't expected him to show up. He stepped into her room, looking around at a place to sit. There were papers on her desk, he assumed she was doing some kind of homework before he had knocked. "You can sit at the desk," she said, half heartedly pointing to the chair as she sat on her bed. Dan had taken the standard issue duvet that the school had sold to exchange students. Blair had outfitted her bed with a white duvet that looked like he would find it in a plush hotel bed.

"I don't want to take up a lot of your time, Blair," he said. He sat and awkwardly put the bottle of wine on the desk, trying to find a free space for it.

Blair nodded, "Good, Humphrey. I don't have much time for you to waste."

Dan closed his eyes and let out a hard exhale. "Actually," he said, opening them again, "can we cut the bullshit? You've been ignoring me since Serena and Nate's visit. I don't remember doing anything that would cause that and I thought we were getting good again. I thought we were friends."

"I've told you before, Dan," Blair said sharply, "I can't be your friend."

"In the middle of a break up."

"It still stands."

"Why can you be Nate's friend but not mine?"

"You're from Brooklyn-"

Dan interrupted her, "I know I'm from Brooklyn, Blair. We've done this before. We've gone through this. Because I'm from Brooklyn you can't be my friend?"

"If you let me finish," she said, her tone still sharp, "I would have said it's not the same. Nate will always be in my life. Our parents are friends, our lives are intertwined. Being your friend means work. Nate just lazily exists and he's in my life. I have no interest in working to be your friend."

"But you did earlier, when you organized us to go on a day trip with Dakota."

"I told you, I was homesick."

"And you are cured?"

"Yes."

"And I don't get a say into us being friends?"

"They say friendship is a two way street, Humphrey, and I don't want to be part of it. So no, you don't get a say in it."

Dan could feel his frustrations boiling over. He wanted to reach out and shake her, try and get her to talk any sense into this situation. Instead he felt himself rise, his hands shaking besides him. "Alright, then I'm going to go."

"I don't know what you wanted by coming here," Blair responded, not getting up from where she sat.

"I wanted you to tell me what I did that is making you act like this," he said, walking to the door. "I don't get what I did."

It had always been like that with them, she held all the power. Even now, even here thousands of miles away from their lives in New York, she had gotten him to the point where he was willing to beg to be in her life again. While he was having fun with the people he met here, he had more fun when Blair was in his life here. The brief time that they had reconnected and hung out with a group of people, he had felt his cheeks become sore with how much he smiled in her presence. It was corny, he knew and therefore would never voice it, but she made him happier and better and more complete. Even though they couldn't be in a relationship, he wanted to have a relationship with her. He would do anything to fix it.

His hand was on the doorknob as he heard her speak.

"Why do you think you did anything, Humphrey?"

Dan turned on his heel to look at her, his fingers still on the handle. "What?"

Blair slowly turned her head to look up at him, her doe eyes wide and she looked as though the ice around her had melted. "Why," she repeated, enunciating the words, "do you think you did anything?" Dan let the handle go, taking a step back into the room and looking at her. She wouldn't meet his eyes as she pulled a pillow into her lap. "Why do you think it was anything you did, Dan?"