Want to take Mook out for a walk with me?? Aaron asked Blair through her closed bedroom door. It was Wednesday afternoon and she?d been holed up in her room since Monday, only opening the door to receive the brie-and-tomato baguettes and mugs of hot chocolate Myrtle brought her at ten and five o?clock. She?d even conned the family doctor into writing her a note excusing her from school for the week. She wasn?t sick exactly, the doctor assured her mother. Schools like Constance just worked their girls too hard, especially the seniors, and then there was all that additional pressure to get into one of the best colleges. Blair simply needed a few days of rest and she?d be herself again. Well, not exactly. Blair was using her few days of rest to reinvent herself all over again. Like Madonna. Aaron pushed open the door and poked his head inside her room. The air was pungent with the chemical odor of cigarette smoke mixed with minty mouthwash. Blair?s head was wrapped in a black-and-pink Pucci scarf, and she was lounging on the bed with her bare ankles crossed, wearing a white terrycloth robe and smoking a Merit Ultra Light through a long black cigarette holder. The look was very Greta-Garbo-in-hiding, which was exactly the effect she was going for. Across the room,The Great Gatsby starring Robert Redford and Mia Farrow played silently on TV. Blair puffed on her cigarette, staring dramatically into the near distance. She couldn?t bear to look at Aaron because he was wearing his Harvard sweatshirt again, as if he?d specifically dressed to piss her off. She?d already ripped her Yale pendant off the canopy over her bed and thrown it out her bedroom window along with her father?s old Yale sweatshirt. ?If you don?t mind, I?d like you to please get the fuck out of my room.? ?I was just leaving,? Aaron replied. ?Hey, have you talked to Serena lately?? Blair shook her head. ?Why?? ?No reason,? Aaron shrugged uncomfortably. He?d been hanging out with his buddies in Scarsdale since Friday night and hadn?t seen or talked to Serena since the Les Best show. He pulled a tin of herbal cigarettes out of his back pocket and tossed them onto Blair?s bed. ?Try those,? he advised. ?They?re 100 percent natural and they smell way better than that mass-produced shit.? Blair kicked the tin onto the floor. ?Have a nice walk.? Aaron pulled her bedroom door closed behind him and headed outside with Mookie. He entered the park at Seventy-second Street, taking the path that led to a little wooden footbridge over a stream that fed into the lake. Every now and then Mookie stopped to dig furiously in the snow with his brown-and-white paws, as if he were looking for a doggie toy he?d dropped there last summer. Then eventually he?d give up and trot on again. A petite blond in dark sunglasses and a blue Yankees cap jogged by wearing an I LOVEAARONT-shirt over her red velour tracksuit; the same I LOVEAARONT-shirt that Serena had worn at the Les Best show. Aaron was pretty sure th............