BOND

33.

I don't wanna waste your time

When I think about us

No more waiting for the moment

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Elena ran her fingers through the front strands of Daniel's hair and immediately pulled them back with disgust imprinted on her face, "Put in hair gel, not bathe in it!" she wiped her hand on the sweatshirt she had borrowed from Joey.

After school, he had taken her to Cups and Co. where they ran into Daniel. Joey needed to be at Mark's house anyway to get the party started, so Elena and Daniel had taken off together to his house. Over an hour of video games, she had caught him up on everything that was going on, reminding him time and again that the information could never leave the room.

Now she was getting him ready for the date he had with Taylor. They would miss the party but celebration for a two year milestone for their relationship took priority.

"Why do we have to go there anyway?" Daniel groaned for the umpteenth time for having to dress up. "Joey took you to McDonald's and made it look cute," he smirked at her, aware that it was a touchy topic.

She tugged at his hair a bit too forcefully, eliciting a high pitched protest from him, "That was because I didn't want to go to someplace fancy." She punched his stomach, hurting herself more than he probably felt. "And Taylor wants to go all out. And besides, that was a first date, this is," she gave him an appraising look, "A very big deal."

Daniel shoved himself close to the bathroom mirror, wiping off the excess gel, "What about me though? I don't want to go there." He turned back to her to get his tie done properly.

"You're going to tell her that?" Elena shot him an overly sweet smile, already sure of the answer.

"Steakhouse it is."

Despite his protests she knew how much he was looking forward to seeing Taylor. She could have asked him for dinner on the moon and he would have dragged his ass without any complaints.

Elena's phone buzzed with a text and he read it off for her. "Will Daniel drop you off or should I come over? From Sofia The First." He looked up at her, confused. "Isn't that a Disney princess?"

She took the phone from him, laughing, "It's Joey. The whole blue eyes thing," she offered as an explanation.

Apprehension achieved, Daniel rechecked his pocket to make sure he still had the gift for Taylor.

"T's ready Daniel, time to go," Elena said. "Meet me outside." She headed out, already dialing up Joey.

"Hey!" he sounded breathless.

"Hi," she replied bemusedly. "What's got you so tired?" she held the phone away from her ear as he trailed off into a long stream of curses followed by Ben's name.

"Sorry." She could almost see him rubbing a hand across his face in exhaustion. "This is the third time the keg's almost fallen down."

She smiled. Just because the boys worked well together didn't mean that they didn't get on each other's nerves. "How long do you have till people come over?"

He relayed the question and she caught part of the answer in Alex's voice. "Couple of hours," Joey replied.

"Should I come over?" she asked, not sure how much help she would be with lifting up stuff, but the boys could definitely use some calm energy.