Well, no one much seems to care about this fic, but at least there's no pressure to update! If you are reading, please let me know why you're not that enthused or any other criticism. Is it just cause it's set back in season 2? Or just that it's a Blair & Serena and not about any couples in particular? Cause there will probably be some Chair soon.
As always, don't own, blah blah blah.
Serena had lost her usual golden glow as Dean Baraby started to speak. In fact, she looked downright ghostly.
"Next, we have Serena van der Woodson, who would like to dine with..."
"No!"
No one gasped, exactly, but a ripple of attention ran around the room. Blair herself almost jumped. She was expecting Serena to be flustered, to screw up her speech, but not this. Even she didn't know what would come next.
"I'm sorry, Dean Baraby, I just wanted to change my answer."
"Oh, well, that's a little irregular, but why not?" Blair suppressed an eye-roll. Of course why not? Anything for you, Ms. van der Woodsen. Would you like your grapes peeled? Pillow fluffed? How can we mere mortals make your life better?
Ugh.
But what was Serena up to? She couldn't say George Sand now, not after Blair had pointed out how whatever answer she'd prepared would be so much poorer than Blair's for the same person, and not after several people had seen them speaking and Serena might look like she was stealing someone else's idea. So she had to pick someone else.
Apparently, that had occurred to Serena as well, because she was floundering. "It's just that, on reflection, my first answer was a bit silly. He was more of a personal choice, you see. Not someone I'd really want."
"She."
Oh. My. God. Nothing in Blair's life had ever been as good as this moment.
"I'm sorry?"
She might actually die, it was so good.
"You said he was a personal choice, Ms. van der Woodson. And I'm sorry to hear you wouldn't want to dine with her - George Sand always has been rather a favorite of mine. To each his or her own, I suppose." The dean's smile looked a bit strained, as his dream applicant was shown to not only dislike his favorite author, but to be an absolute idiot too.
This was almost better than sex. She could feel the endorphin rush right down to her toes.
"My answer was George Sand?" Serena's look of horror was directed at Blair, who tried to look as shocked as everyone else. As the audience started to murmur a bit, Serena managed to straighten herself out, but the effort it took was visible. "I mean, of course, I apologize. I'd love to have dinner with George Sand." She shook it off and went to what had obviously been her prepared answer.
"George Sand was an influential author in 1800s France. She was a great supporter of the working class and women's rights, and she was admired greatly by other luminaries, but attracted some criticism, most notably from Flaubert. But why I'd choose her to dine with would be because of the freedom she aspired to, casting off traditional gender roles and regularly dressing as a man and smoking in public, and because of her philosophy that "there is only one success in life, to be loved and to love," which I think should be an inspiration to everyone."
"Yes, well that was a fine speech. Very, ah, spontaneous."
"Thank you Dean. Much like Baudelaire, I'm a great admirer."
"Yes, I see quite clearly how much you care about Sand, Ms. van der Woodsen." The dean was being awfully polite, but Blair could see how tightly his jaw was clenched from across the room. She was no longer looking at Serena, as she didn't think she could maintain an innocent facade, but she knew the blonde was fuming, and she didn't even know yet exactly how bad Blair had made her look. Baudelaire, an admirer? Flaubert, a critic? And that quote! Wrong, wrong, and wrong twice more. Serena really should have stuck with what she'd prepared, but no. Not the girl who could do no wrong. It was the first time in twelve years of classes together that Blair had ever known her to not have at least a satisfactory answer, or a way to deflect the question.
But now it was Blair's turn. And she may have done some damage to Serena, but she had in no way made herself the standout applicant of this group yet. This was the moment she would either soar or plummet, her chance to shine.
And if she wanted to shine, there was no better way than to emulate the sparkliest person alive, right?
"Lastly, we have Blair Waldorf. Ms. Waldorf, the person, real or fictional, living or dead, with whom you would most like to have dinner is...
Pete Fairman."
Yes, the chapter title is an awful joke. I laugh at puns. And if you don't care to check out the wikipedia page, Flaubert was the admirer, Baudelaire the critic, and the real quote is "there is only one happiness in life, to love and be loved."