You're the One That I Want by Cecily von Ziegesar Page B

all grown up in suburban mall towns where everyone was blond and happy and clean and uncomplicated. Blair felt like a dark-haired, pixie-cutted, stylishly dressed, cynical and jaded alien among them.

    Actually, it was just the sort of ego boost she'd been look-ing forward to. See, I am different and smarter and better than these girls, she told herself. At least she'd never stooped to dyeing her naturally walnut-colored locks blond.

    "Come on, let's start the tour!" Rebecca grabbed Blair's hand like they were four years old and pulled her out of the admissions house. Sun glistened on the Potomac River, and the spires of the university's ancient Jesuit chapel towered majestically from the hilltop. Blair had to admit that the old Georgetown University campus was beautiful, and the town of Georgetown was way nicer and cleaner than New Haven. But it definitely lacked the unique, we're-the-smartest-kids-in-the-class air of Yale.

    "Up ahead on your left you'll see a big modern structure. That's our architectural award-winning Lauinger Library, with the largest collection of . . ." Rebecca walked backwards ahead of Blair down a flagstone walkway, burbling boring facts about Georgetown. Blair ignored her, keeping her eyes focused on the human traffic crisscrossing the main campus. Boys and girls dressed head-to-toe in Brooks Brothers or Ann Taylor marched purposefully toward the library, their Coach bags bulging with books. Blair took schoolwork seri-ously, but it was Saturday. Didn't these people have anything better to do?

    Rebecca stopped suddenly and pressed her palm against her forehead. "Sugar, I am so hungover. This walking back-wards thing is getting me so dizzy, I might puke!"

    Blair wanted to say something about how the entire situa-tion made her want to puke, but then again, so did most situ-ations. "Why don't we just sit down somewhere and have a ... coffee," she suggested, pleased with how normal and friendly she sounded, when what she could really use was a very strong vodka martini.

    Rebecca threw her arms around Blair's neck. "A girl after my own heart!" she squealed. "I'm absolutely addicted to caramel macchiatos, aren't you?"

    Yuck.

    It was only two o'clock. Coffee would have to do. "Is there someplace close by?"

    Rebecca slipped her arm through Blair's. "There sure is!" She whipped out her pink-and-white sparkly Nokia phone. "Just give me a minute to round up the girls. Why not get our Southern Belles partly started earlay?"

    Blair grimaced and fingered the cell phone in her mint green Prada bubble bag. Already she was homesick for Nate. If only she'd borrowed the silver flask he carried around, then she'd at least have a memento of him, and a shot of vodka for her macchiato.

    Rebecca looked up from the little telethon she was having with her friends. She held her hand over the mouthpiece. "They're in a bar already," she whispered, her cheeks flushing a perky, embarrassed pink. "It's down on M Street. Do you mind if we meet them there?"

    "Okay," Blair agreed readily. Give her a cocktail and a cig-arette and she could be happy in almost any company.

    how badly do they want him?

    "Dude, you never told me the coaches were all chicks," Jeremy Scott Tompkinson, one of Nate's best buddies, hissed as he sprinted past Nate to retrieve a long pass.

    Nate twirled his lacrosse stick overhead and waited until Jeremy had overshot before stepping in to catch the pass him-self. It was a show-off kind of maneuver, but it was effective. Besides, he was supposed to be showing off. He tossed the ball back to Jeremy, demonstrating his teamwork skills the way Coach Michaels had asked him to. Then the two boys ran back to center field together.

    "The tall one's the Yale coach. The short one is the Brown admissions chick who interviewed me," Nate explained. "The Brown coach couldn't make it because of a game."

    "But dude, they're all chicks!" Jeremy said again, his shaggy rock star haircut flapping around in the breeze as