Sorry that this chapter is so short! It's because it's based entirely around the performance of the Age of Innocence and I didn't want to spend pages just copying lines from the book. I wanted to focus on just a few key scenes, and even then only the important parts otherwise I'd be moving too far away from Dan and Blair. I'll make up for it by having the next chapter up a bit sooner than usual!
"Twenty minutes till curtain!" Julian's voice screeched through the dressing room and could probably be heard in the auditorium as well. But Dan didn't really take any notice, instead he smoothed down his lapels again and took a deep breath. He had got dressed as slowly as he reasonably could, but still was ready long before anyone else and now had nothing to occupy his mind other than the impending performance.
"Nervous?" Nate asked, still fumbling with his waistcoat.
"What would make you ask that?" Dan replied, taking another deep breath. "I am the lead in the school play, a school in which the majority of the other students already hate me and ridicule me at every opportunity."
"Wasn't that kind of the point? You didn't want to be an observer anymore, you wanted to be involved. Besides, even if you screw it up out there, there's only a few more weeks till we graduate."
"That's exactly what I keep telling myself, but it's not all that soothing." Dan mumbled, repeating his first line in his head over and over.
"Maybe what you're really nervous about is doing romantic scenes with Blair." Nate suggested casually, causing Dan to tense up. "What?"
Dan quickly looked around to make sure no one else was in earshot, earning a sceptical eyebrow rise from Nate.
"Something happened, or nearly happened with Blair, or…no, nothing really happened and-"
"Dan!" Nate stopped his rambling. "What happened?"
"We nearly kissed." Dan admitted, as if it were something terrible.
"Nearly kissed?" Nate repeated, still a little sceptical. "You tried to kiss her and she pulled away?"
"No!" Dan quickly denied, a little offended. "She leaned in too! She did!"
"Okay, I believe you." Nate chuckled. "So, what stopped you?"
"Jenny walked in. We haven't really talked since and I…I don't know what it meant. That's what's driving me crazy here. Well, that and the fact that now I have to go on stage and pretend to fall in love with her in front of pretty much everyone I know. Her parents, my parents, her ex-boyfriend," Dan pointed at Nate, "my ex-girlfriend who is also her best friend and now pretty much my step-sister, and the legions of Gossip Girl followers who would go crazy if they found out that anything was going on between me and Blair."
"And Chuck." Nate added.
"And…Chuck?" Dan said in disbelief. "Why is Chuck here?"
"To show support. Something like that." Nate shrugged.
"Yeah and to probably sabotage Blair in some way. You saw what happened when he showed up at dress rehearsals, right?"
"Yeah, but…" Nate trailed off, shrugging again. "I don't think it's about Blair. They haven't even talked since…"
"Since she told him she wanted to be with him?" Dan finished Nate's sentence, reading his hesitance.
"Yeah. Look, don't worry about it, okay? When you're on that stage, you're not Dan and Blair, alright? You're Newland Archer and Ellen Olenska." Nate urged, and Dan hesitantly nodded.
"Yeah. You're right. This is just…"
"Just a school play?" Nate suggested.
"Just a school play." Dan agreed.
"It will be fun." Nate smiled, taking Dan's shoulders and pushing him out of the dressing room.
"Yes, fun." Dan replied robotically. "Just a school play, it may seem terrifying and disagreeable now, but it will make a great memory one day."
"Exactly." Nate finished, pushing Dan towards the other groups of actors that had begun to congregate backstage.
"The great Ute Hagen used to tell actors; 'give birth to the new person you are about to become.'" Julian read from the second page of the speech he had prepared, and Dan tuned out until he sensed from his tone of voice that Julian was wrapping it up. Pretty much like everyone else did. "Remember, being on stage is like standing on the edge of a cliff. What saves you is the love and trust you have in each other. Also my friend, the renowned New York Times theatre critic Charles Isherwood is in the audience. And if you embarrass me I will kill you."
Everyone clapped perfunctorily, faked smiles at their director and then took their places. Dan waited in the wings with Serena, waiting for the cue. She linked her arm in his, ready for their entrance, but didn't look at him.
"Good luck." She whispered right before they took their cue, instantly setting Dan at ease. That sign that maybe they could finally become friends again helped Dan to believe that everything else could turn out alright as well.
Amazingly, once Dan got out there, even with the lights blazing down on him and the hundreds of pairs of eyes watching his every move, he relaxed. He knew his part and once everyone else started taking it seriously too, it was a lot easier to actually act and not just stand there reciting lines.
Dan hadn't even thought about how well it was going until it suddenly stopped going so well. He had done exactly what he was supposed to, sat down in the armchair and stretched out his legs, but as he looked up at Blair he couldn't help but see Blair, not Ellen Olenska like he was supposed to. She had her back to him and with the red filter on the lighting, her hair appeared to be deep mahogany in color, and the skin on her bare back looked bronzed. The soft glow emanating from the vermillion light bulbs hidden in the pretend fireplace outlined her figure and Dan just wanted to reach out and touch her, to place a hand on the small of her back and feel her skin.
"How do you like my funny house?" Blair finally delivered her line. "To me it's like heaven."
Dan hurried his response, worried he had lost a lot of time when he was gazing at her. It quickly became harder for him to recall his lines as the scene continued. When they first started rehearsals, Dan had always found this scene awkward – not because of his feelings for Blair, well not just that, but the way Julian had reworked it. It had been written as the combination of two vital scenes in the book, the scene where Newland first goes to Ellen's house and offers to help her reintegrate back into the New York elite, and the scene where he advises her to get a divorce. Even though Dan knew changes had to be made to adapt the novel into a play, it had taken him a while to get used to, mostly because it rushed the development of feelings between the two characters. But, suddenly it clicked.
"Is New York such a labyrinth?" Blair spoke demurely, now sat beside Dan and her body turned towards him. "I thought it so straight up and down – I like it just for that, big honest labels on everything."
"Everything may be labelled." Dan replied, watching her reactions and trying desperately not to relate every pre-set word they spoke to their real life situation. "But everybody is not. New York society is a very small world compared with the one you've lived in. And it's ruled, in spite of appearances, by a few people with – well, particularly old-fashioned ideas."
"But my freedom – is that nothing?" She responded, placing down the china cup she had been pretending to drink from.
"But aren't you free as air as it is?" Dan paused allowing the scrunching of foil offstage that imitated the fire crackling to fill the silence. "The financial question has been settled. Our legislation may favor divorce, but our social customs do not. The individual, in such cases, is nearly always sacrificed to what is supposed to be the collective interest."
"Very well, I will do what you wish." Blair replied abruptly and turned away. Dan quickly reached out and caught her hands in his, desperate for her to trust in his sincerity when he told her he wanted to help her. "You do help me. Goodnight, my cousin."
Blair withdrew her hands and the curtain fell, the stage was immediately descended upon by the stagehands rearranging the furniture and swapping props. They moved offstage quickly, Blair went out of sight and Dan headed straight to Jenny who had a bottle of water, the script and a towel to wipe his forehead all ready for him.
"You're doing great." Jenny said supportively as Dan downed half the bottle. "I mean, you were doing good, but that last scene…the sexual tension between you and Blair is really convincing."
Dan glared at her, but she continued to smirk at him so he snatched the script out of her hand and pretended to be going over his next scene. Serena quickly came to his side, as they had to make an entrance together again and he took her arm, hoping that with a Blair-free scene he might be able to relax again.
"One third down." He mumbled to himself before heading onto the stage again.
The Blair-free scenes were easy and even the Blair-plus-five-other-people-onstage scenes were easy, once again Dan became enveloped with the task at hand and wasn't hit with another wave of anxiety until it was just the two of them left alone on stage again.
They stood in the same setting as before, the stage lit up in a dark red glow once just as it had before. She stood with her back to him again, but this time she faced the mirror, running her hands over the front of her dress and adjusting little ringlets of the hair that framed her face. He stood behind her watching her reflection, and admiring how, even when no one else could see her but him, she maintained the sophistication and vulnerability of Countess Olenksa unwaveringly.
"You are horribly nervous; you have your own troubles. I know you think the Wellands are unreasonable about your marriage and I of course agree with you." She recited with perfect discipline.
She caught his eye in the mirror, faltering as she smoothed her hand over her hair. Dan watched her slip, even more entranced before, then registered her panic. He had completely spaced out and not yet said his line.
"Yes." He blurted out. "I went to ask May to marry me after Easter."
"May adores you," Blair began again as she turned towards him, "and yet you couldn't convince her?"
"She thinks my impatience is a bad sign. She thinks, in short, I want to marry her at once to get away from someone that I…care for more." Dan purposely delivered this sign slowly, hoping he could fall into the natural rhythm of the scene again. "May guessed the truth. There is another woman – but not the one she thinks."
"Don't make love to me!" She played the shock perfectly and turned away from him again. Dan remembered people laughing at that line over and over in rehearsals, but now there was silence. "Too many people have done that."
"I have never made love to you," he replied as he moved closer to her, and took hold of her arm pressing her to face him, "and I never shall. But you are the woman I would have married if it had been possibly for either one of us."
"Possible for either one of us?" She repeated distastefully. "It's you who has made it impossible."
"I've made it impossible?" Dan responded, falling into the scene and anguish so delicately that he didn't even remember the audience or the others backstage, the whole world had disappeared from his sight. He took her hands in his as he begged for a chance and she disputed every argument he made. Tears formed in her eyes, she screamed at him and he shouted back, then he pleaded again only to be denied once more. Then Penelope, dressed in her maid's uniform and holding a telegram, walked onto the scene and the world came rushing back. It was a strange experience, one that Dan could not understand. He'd deliver his lines and act out his part without thought, forgetting that he was even in a play. It was about Blair, but it wasn't about Blair, because she wasn't being Blair when they walked onto that stage and he certainly wasn't being Dan. But maybe they were just a little bit. Dan didn't have the time to think about it. They were onto the final few scenes now and Dan couldn't wait for it to be over.
They exchanged no words as the headed back on the stage whilst the curtain was still down. He gave her his hand as she climbed into the carriage, then joined her, watching her intently as she opened her fan and covered half her face before the curtain rose again.
"Do you know – I hardly remembered you?" He said once the music had begun.
"Hardly remembered me?" She asked, gazing out towards the audience.
"I mean…how shall I explain? It's always so. Each time you happen to me all over again." He said confidently as she peered in his direction over the top of her fan, then quickly looked elsewhere. "You must see that this can't last."
"What can't?" She projected into the audience.
"Our being together," he replied as he took hold of her forearm and undid the button of her glove, "and not being together."
He placed a kiss on her wrist and felt her arm tremble.
"No." She paused to swallow. "You ought not to have come today."
Dan reached for her, his fingertips grazing her cheek when he finally made contact. They had never kissed in rehearsals, Blair had refused to and that was more than okay with Dan, because he didn't know how to kiss someone he had feelings for but was pretending he didn't have feelings for whilst acting like he was in love with them. She begrudgingly turned towards him, she had wanted to avoid this for as long as she could, but they couldn't anymore. Suddenly she moved forward and placed a perfectly chaste kiss on his lips.
Dan didn't even have the time to kiss her back. He looked to her and saw the fear in her eyes, and recognized her vulnerability from before and then he was back in that closet. Just the two of them, not putting on an act or trying to be anything other than what they were. Except, this time Jenny wasn't going to interrupt them. He kissed her, his fingers threading into her hair as he pulled her closer, his thumb resting under her ear. She kissed him back, opening her mouth as he slipped his tongue into her mouth. He felt her clutching his lapels, pulling him closer as he ran his hand down her neck. Then came the sound of applause. With his forehead pressed to Blair's, he slowly opened his eyes. The curtain had already fallen, but somehow the whole world had come rushing back, intruding on their private moment. Blair pushed past him to get out of the carriage, Dan was too shell-shocked to go after her. He retrieved his top hat from the carriage, then ambled off the stage to be met by Serena.
"Wow." She said with a tight mouthed smile.
"Thanks." Dan replied breathlessly. "Bet you didn't know that I was such a good actor."
"No. Wow at the fact that it took me this long to figure out that you like Blair." She explained with another tight smile and Dan realized that she trying not to laugh.
"What? Nah, I-"
"Dan," she stopped him, "you don't have to admit it to me, but don't bother denying it. Come on, we don't want to miss our cue."
Dan conceded, stood at her side and sleepwalked through the next five scenes before the play was finally over. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't spectacular. Dan just wanted it over, he just wanted one moment to himself to breathe. When they took their final bow, Blair dug her nails into his hand and he smiled his through the pain. So, he took it she was angry, but in the dressing room afterwards, everyone else was celebrating the success. Once Dan had changed, Nate approached him with a big fat grin.
"Now that wasn't so bad, was it?" He asked gleefully.
"No, but I'm glad it's over. Look, I'm feeling a little claustrophobic and I just want to get out of here, okay?" Dan explained, hoping Nate wouldn't be offended that he was in a hurry to leave.
"Okay, no problem." Nate replied. "But, I just feel like I should warn you…I mean, I see that you are not in the mood to talk about it, but you do realize that that kiss is going to be all over Gossip Girl by now, right?"
"What? How?" Dan asked, stopping in his tracks.
"Well…" Nate stuttered, a little surprised. "Didn't you notice all the flashes from people taking pictures with their phones?"
"No." Dan said apprehensively.
"Oh. It's just…Blair Waldorf and Dan Humphrey kissing? Even if it is for a play, yeah…Gossip Girl is going to have a field day."
Dan nodded in understanding, then knocked Nate on the arm as he made his way out to sweet, sweet oxygen. He headed to the side of the street, knowing that his dad and the others would be waiting in the foyer for him to join them, but he just wanted one moment.
He heard laughing and turned to see Blair hugging her dad further on down the street as they waited for their car service. Her dad had a huge smile on his face and from the way that Blair glowed, Dan knew that he must have been showering her with compliments. He didn't know what the kiss meant, and in that moment it didn't matter. Blair was experiencing a rare moment of real happiness with one of the people that she cared about the most. Dan wouldn't want anything that happened between the two of them to ruin that, but before he could consider that his presence alone could ruin that moment for her, she spotted him.
Their car pulled up and Harold moved to open the door for her, while Blair stood and watched Dan, for once she seemed as equally off-balance as he did. Like she was trying to read him before she could decide how to act. Dan smiled at her and she considered it for a moment, then smiled back. A genuine smile that grew wider, as she rolled her eyes and turned her head to the side, laughing timidly because she didn't know how else to react. She glanced back at him one more time, offering one last smile before she climbed into the car. Harold climbed in after her and Dan watched them drive away. As the car passed him, he wondered if she was gazing back out at him through the tinted windows and accepted that he'd probably never know.