Dan Humphrey. A man so obsessed with his crush he adopted a fake online persona that exposed her deepest darkest secrets, repeatedly spied on her, and essentially ruined her life. But what’s a little sociopathic behavior in the name of true love? Dan may have terrorized (and stalked!) Serena over the course of six Gossip Girl seasons, but in the end he did get the girl! What may be his most punishable offense, however, is the entire short story he wrote devoted to his true love that somehow ends up in the New Yorker. But even the best writers among us have shitty first drafts hiding in a desktop recycling bin somewhere. We unearthed said draft from the laptop of Gossip Girl himself, and you can now read it exclusively here. And of course he wrote it on a typewriter.
An Aphrodite Amongst Manhattan’s Elite
“I have to go,” she said. Her luminous, siren-like tendrils were the last I saw of her before she waltzed out of the room like a California breeze. She’d already waltzed into my heart. This… mystery woman. This goddess of the Upper East Side.
She didn’t even see me lurking in the nearby shadows behind the buffet table, completely unsuspiciously. Then again, why would she? Who was I but a broken Brooklyn bag of trash? She was Jasmine. And I, Aladdin. She was Christie Brinkley. And I? A scruffy, younger, totally cooler Billy Joel. My Uptown Girl. My greatest object of affection.
Her name? Serena. Derided from the Latin serēnus, meaning clear, tranquil. Your gorgeous blue eyes – just that, clear and tranquil. You beautiful lost bird, do you not know where you are? Who you are?
If only she knew how I longed for her, pined for her. How I wrote of her. Not in a super creepy, stalker-like way, never. My words spoke the language of my bare beating heart. Oh, Serena. Notice me. See me. Love me.
Her perfumed skin wafted through the doorway and met my nostrils. “MMMMMM,” I nearly moaned. Intoxicating. A warm, fruity, musk permeated the air. I felt my body involuntarily follow. Beckoned. Like a cartoon sauntering through the air towards a pie in a windowsill.
I followed her down a winding hallway, like a baby deer through a labyrinth. Oh, bring me to your Park Avenue tower, sweet princess. Might I touch a golden strand of your magical, wild mane? Oh please, just grant me one sweet single kiss. And as quickly as she appeared, she was gone. And there I was, alone again, in what appeared to be the coat check closet.
