Chapter 2 (Daniel POV):
Daniel strolled out into the living room confidently, knowing that if he turned around he would find Lindsay trailing behind him like a lost puppy dog. Their conversation in her bedroom had gone far better than he could have planned, and now he just needed to put on the finishing touches (i.e. supply her with copious amounts of alcohol) before going in to kiss her- when he knew she'd be dying for it.
Hell, she was probably at that point already, but he wanted to initiate things with Lindsay when she was more relaxed, loosened up. Doing so usually made for a better make-out session, one with fewer interruptions or hesitations; that he knew. Given how anxious Lindsay seemed when talking to him, he wondered how many beers it was going to take to get her to that point. A few, probably. But the alcohol, or what Daniel finally had to assume was a lack thereof, was creating a problem.
He'd never bought a keg that was so weak. Forty-five bucks they'd paid and they got Stroh's, their usual brand. But he'd downed four beers already and wasn't so much as feeling buzzed, which forced him to believe that they'd gotten ripped off, that the company had watered it down so that they could squeeze out more profit or something. It pissed him off, but he was determined not to let the shitty diluted beer affect his chances tonight. Half the alcohol just means we need to drink twice as much, he thought. At least, I think.
He was making a beeline for the keg when he happened to glance off to his right. In his line of vision he caught sight of long blond hair, and out of habit, or perhaps instinct, he turned toward it. He was right, the color and length exactly matched the hair of his ex-girlfriend (of only a couple of days). While he had initially dismissed the blonde girl at first, likely because she was sitting next to a guy and looked like she was clearly half of a couple, a double-take with his eyes revealed to him that it was Kim after all, sitting so close to some random dude that she was practically in his lap.
What. A. Slut.
The feelings of rage were overwhelming; Daniel literally lost control of the rest of his emotions as his anger overtook him. His heart raced, his eyes narrowed, his lips pursed, his fists balled, and he found himself furious as his mind filled up with increasingly offensive words to describe Kim for doing this to him. Slut. Bitch. Whore. He whirled around, his body's instinctive defense; his eyes needed to be as far away from what they just saw as possible.
For a moment, he had forgotten that Lindsay was still following so closely behind him. His sudden stop and change in direction meant that by the time he faced her she was almost on top of him. He had startled her, and now Lindsay's questioning eyes as she observed his face made him realize that he needed to pull it together- ASAP. He had allowed himself to completely lose his cool there for a second, to get rattled, and that was simply not okay- it wasn't him, it never had been. Daniel quickly tried to mask his expression, to focus his thoughts on the girl that was standing in front of him now as opposed to the one behind him. Lindsay was into him, and he sure as hell wasn't going to get further with her if he seemed hung up on his ex all evening. He needed to get his mind in a better place. Daniel attempted to smile, and he tried to force the naked images of Lindsay back into his brain that just a few minutes ago he had been trying so hard to push out. He was an eighteen-year-old guy; it wasn't that tough. But before he could get too lost in his thoughts, he realized he probably ought to say something. "Hey," he said to Lindsay. It was the best that he could come up with, under the circumstances.
It must have been good enough. After a brief hesitation, Lindsay actually reached up and touched him, nervously running her hand over the muscles of his shoulder. "Hey. Um, so are you all right?"
Despite Lindsay's trembling fingers, her touch soothed and excited him all at once. It felt amazing. Her hand was quivering a bit just like her body was when he touched her earlier, but nothing like what he hoped it would do when he got her alone later. He felt himself let out a breath, relax, be happy. "Yeah. Now I am. Better than ever, in fact," he said. Fuck Kim, he thought to himself, I don't need her. Fuck her and that douchebag she's talking to. Lindsay's way smarter, and hotter, than she is anyway.
To Daniel, Lindsay seemed to look relieved that whatever had bothered him for a second didn't seem to linger. "Me, too," she agreed. Much to his disappointment, though, she pulled her hand away from his shoulder.
But her touches had already sent Daniel's fantasies back into overdrive. Sure, he hadn't forgotten what he had just seen- not even close. In fact, he knew that on some level everything that he was going to try with Lindsay later tonight was probably now going to have an ulterior motive- making Kim insanely jealous. But really, what had just happened didn't ultimately change his game plan. He had gotten his few seconds to be mad, but now it was time to get back to his agenda. Now where were we? You were getting her a beer, so she would feel more relaxed before you went in for the kill.
"All right, I'm going to go get us that beer now." Not that a cup is going to make all that much difference, Daniel vented in his head. He gestured behind him in the general direction of the keg, but before he turned around again decided to voice his concern about the beer's alcohol content to Lindsay. "Hey, you notice that the beer seems really weak? Should I get you more than one cup?" He half said it in jest, yet he was hoping that Lindsay might take him up on it, accelerate his process of getting her to feel totally wild and uninhibited.
No such luck. "Nah, that's okay," she replied. "One cup is fine." Lindsay did seem a little tipsy at times this evening. But usually alcohol lowered inhibitions; with Lindsay, it hadn't happened quite yet. She had reached out to him, but her touch seemed reserved, restrained.
Daniel nodded. No shocker there. He supposed he was just going to have to turn on the charm a little more. "All right, Linds, I'll be right back, 'kay?"
"'Kay."
Daniel turned back around and walked towards the keg. There was quite the gathering of people around it (no shit that people would need to keep refilling their beers as the alcohol wasn't doing nearly as much as it should have been in his opinion), and Daniel sighed and stepped to the back of the line. A couple of other people immediately got in line behind him.
Somewhat Lindsay-free for the first time in a little while (she was halfway across the room and the people behind him in line shielded her from him somewhat), Daniel decided to sneak one more glance in the direction of the couch, where that slut of an ex-girlfriend of his was probably wasting no time in moving on to her next piece of meat. For a second, he saw the entangled limbs and horizontal torsos and assumed that Kim and her new douchebag were already making out. But when he realized that the couple on the couch was a different one entirely, the relief only lasted a second before the even bigger sense of dread kicked in.
They disappeared. Probably found a room where they could be alone. The skank.
Never mind that his ultimate goal for the evening was to do the exact same thing with Lindsay. This realization that Kim was off in an attempt to most likely bang this new guy triggered a second wave of anger, and he was only grateful that he wasn't standing directly in front of Lindsay when it happened. It was similar to the first one, but this time, at least he just looked pissed off over the line to the keg, or something. After a few moments it seemed to pass somewhat, but he knew right then that he wouldn't be able to just stand there and wait for beer anymore. He ventured to glance back towards Lindsay. Thankfully she wasn't looking in his direction, instead glancing over towards where Millie and Nick were now talking near the piano. She was still alone.
He wasn't going to have long- Lindsay would eventually discover if he had left. But the people immediately behind him might conceal his absence for a couple of minutes; make it harder for Lindsay to spot that he was no longer there. He slipped out of the line and quickly darted back towards the hallway from where he and Lindsay had just appeared a few minutes ago.
As Daniel slowly crept down the hall, he listened closely for sounds escaping from the closed doors on either side, carefully putting his ear to each door before moving on. There wasn't a single open door in the whole place, but that didn't altogether surprise him. After all the watery beer someone would of course be pissing in the Weir family bathroom, and the bedrooms were a no-brainer- these parties usually turned into make-out fests. In fact, one of the reasons he was bummed that Lindsay had seemed so tense was that they were already in her bedroom, and Daniel was worried they would lose it to some other couple if they left. Sure enough, Lindsay's bedroom door was now shut when he knew that they had left it open just a few minutes ago when they had exited her room to get their beer.
For a second, Daniel wondered if Kim and her new loser actually had the guts to go into Lindsay's room to mess around. It should have been obvious that since it was Lindsay's house, she had dibs on it with whomever she ended up making out with at the end of the evening- in this case, him. He wondered if Kim had even taken a second from her lovey-dovey conversation with new douche to see how close he and Lindsay were standing to each other. God, he hoped so.
Daniel had no idea what he would do if he actually heard Kim's voice from behind one of the bedroom doors. Burst in, busting the lock? Punch new douche in the face? Or maybe just laugh at them; tell Kim that he had already found someone better. Slam the door back in her face when she started to scream back at him (or in a more ideal scenario, when she started to cry).
But he didn't have time to figure it out, because the voice that he heard from back in the family room was louder than any murmurings or groans he could have heard through a bedroom door.
"Hey, you wanna go?"
