"I don't belive this, two hours, and she's still on the phone after two hours." Macein complained as he came down the stairs into the living room where Daniel and Janet were sitting on the couch and disscusing their plans for the evening. "Is this another one those female things?"
"Yup, afraid so." Daniel sympathized.
"Although it's more like a teenage female thing." Janet added in.
"Yeah thats what I figured."
Just then Cassie came bounding down the stairs. Spotting Macein sitting in one of the Lazy-Boys Cassie walked over and handed him the phone, "Here Ashly wants to talk to you."
Taking the phone Macein, not wanting the others to hear his conversation, retreated to the back deck.
"Hey Ash, whats up?"
"Hey Macein, I'm really sorry but I'm going to have to bail out on going to that New Years party tonight. My little brother's baby sitter had to cancel, because of a family emergency, and my parents already left for Denver and Phoenix is who knows where, so I have to watch Matt tonight. Again I'm so sorry, but I'll find away to make it up to you, I promise."
"Looks it no problem. To be honest I never really wanted to go to that party any way, I was only going because you were, since you would have been the only person there that I really knew."
"Really so you're not mad at me for bailing on you or any thing?"
"No I'm not mad, in fact I'm kind of relived that I don't have to go. Hey you know what, I got an idea why don't you bring Matt over here tonight, I can give you a hand, and we can still hang out together."
"Uh...I don't know..."
"Oh come on please it'll be fun. Besides your little brother adores me, he worships the ground I walk on and you know it."
"I don't know about the ground thing, but he does adore you. Ok I guess we could come over and hang out for a while."
"Good so I'll see you later tonight."
Walking back into the living room, Macein found himself under the gaze of three sets of curious eyes. Knowing what was coming next Macein tried to back peddle and make his escape up the stairs, but unfortunetly Cassie was able to block off his escape and his only other exit routes was being blocked by Janet and Daniel.
"So what exactly did Ashly want?" Cassie, seeing the look of resignation in Macein's eyes, started in on the questioning.
"Nothing, she was just letting me know that she wasn't going to the party tonight, that's all." Macein answered. "She has to baby sit Matt."
"So does that mean you're going to the party by yourself?" Daniel picked up the line of questioning.
"Actually no, I'm not going to go to the party since Ashly won't be there."
"So what do you plan on doing tonight?" Janet inquiered.
"Well I offered to help Ash baby sitt, so she's going to bring Matt over here later, so that we can still hang out. If thats ok."
"It's ok, but if you destroy the house I'm going to have your hide."
==========================
Later that night after Cassie had left to go to some sleep over thing and Daniel and Janet had left on their date, Ashly and Matt showed up at the door. Macein barly had time to get the door all the way open before the body of a six year old came hurddling towards him at full speed. From past experince Macein knew this was coming and braced himself for the impact.
"Macein!" Matt laughed as Macein scooped him up in his arms and swung Matt around before placing him back on the ground. Where Matt proceed to attach himself to one of Macein's legs waiting for a ride.
Of course at seeing this Ashly couldn't help but smile. No matter how many times she saw Macein interact with her little brother it still amazed her to see how well they got along considering the fact that Matt was a pretty shy kid by nature. But from the first day Matt met Macein, he adored the older boy as Macein did the younger boy.
"See I told you he adores me." Macein commented when he saw the amazed look on Ashly's face. "Now what do you say we get out of the doorway and go see what we can scrounge for dinner?"
With Matt still attached to his leg Macein, followed by Ashly, walked into the kitchen. After rumaging around in a few different places, Macein came up with a couple of choices.
"Alright Runt, what do you want to eat: Mac & Cheese or Romen Noodles?" Macein questioned looking down at Matt.
"Both." Matt replied.
"Both? Matt you can't have both." Ashly explained.
"I know, Matt, what do you say we start with the Mac & Cheese and if you're still hungry after that we'll see about the Romen Noddles?" Macein cut in before Matt could start arguing with Ashly. Seeing the node of approvel Macein and Ashly started cooking the Mac & Cheese.
Sitting down at the table Macein waited for Matt to climb up on his lap and then started to eat as well as help Matt from making to big of a mess. About half an hour later Matt had eaten all the Mac & Cheese that he could and was ready to do something else. After hours of playing all kinds of games, anything from airplane to playing with toys, with Matt, Ashly looked at the clock on the wall and noticed that it was only a little less than an hour to midnight, and decided it was time to get Matt settled down for bed.
"Alright Matt time to for you to go get ready for bed." Ashly ordered.
"But I don't want to go to bed, I'm not tired." Matt protested, while trying to hide a yawn. Not wanting to start an argument Ashly looked to Macein for help.
"Look Runt, Ashly didn't say you had to go to bed, just get ready for bed." Macein crouched down so that he was eye to eye with Matt.
"Yeah but when ever someone tells me to get ready for bed that usally means I have to go to bed."
"We'll not this time. This time you're going to get ready for bed and then we're going to watch a movie. But only after you have your pajamas on, ok?"
With a huge grin on his face Matt went to go get ready for bed. Standing back up Macein turned to find Ashly wearing a grin similar to Matt's. All of the sudden Ashly stepped up and gave Macein a kiss on the cheek.
"What.....what was that for?" Macein stamered momentarily stunned.
"For being able to manipulate my little brother so well."
"Oh..."
Before Macein could say any thing else Matt cam running back dressed in his pajamas ready for bed. Giving him a quick inspection and running through the standard questions like did he brush his teeth, Macein declared Matt ready for bed.
"So tell me what movie are we going to watch?" Matt demanded.
"I don't know, what movie do you want to watch?" Macein replied still feeling a little shell shocked from the kiss that Ashly had given him.
After thinking for a minute Matt ran over to the bag that had his things in it and pulled out a movie coming back he handed it to Macein.
"'Atlantis'....good choice little man. I've never seen this movie so it should be intresting to see."
"You've never seen 'Atlantis' only one of the greatest Disney movies ever made?"
"Nope."
"Well then come on."
Matt grabbed Macein's hand and started dragging him over to the couch, so that they could get the movie started. Putting the movie in the VCR Macein sat down on the couch with Ashly on one side and the arm rest on the other and waited for the movie to start. Not suprisingly Macein found him self being used as a chair once again as Matt crawled up onto Macein's lap, and snuggled up with his back resting against the arm rest and his head on Macein's shoulder.
By the time the movie was over Matt was sound asleep with one of Macein's arms wrapped around him and his other arm was gently wrapped around Ashly's shoulders. Giving Ashly a gentle squeez he gave a slight node of his head towards Matt when Ashly looked up at him. Ashly smiled when she saw Matt sound asleep on Macein's lap, looking for all the world like a little angle, or more like a little devil in disguise, either way he was still cute looking.
"What's up?" Ashly asked when she looked back up at Macein, and noticed the slightly distant look in Macein's eyes.
"What?...Oh nothing I was just thinking about how much that movie reminded me of Daniel it was kind of freaky."
"You know now that I think about it you're right that movie does tend to make one think of Daniel. Maybe it has to do with the whole archaeologist thing."
"Maybe" Macein then thought to himself 'If only you had any idea the real reason this movie reminds me of Daniel.'
Before anything else could be said both Macein and Ashly heard the front door opening. Taking his away from where it was resting on Ashly's shoulders, Macein looked over his shoulder towards the front door, while Ashly sat up straiter. Seeing Janet and Daniel walk through the door Macein motioned for them to be quiet, pointing to the still sleeping Matt and then looked up at the clock, suprised to see that it was almost one in the morning.
"Hey mom, Daniel." Macein greeted them whispering so as not to wake Matt up. "How was your date?"
"Lovely as always." Janet responded.
"And what about you two?"
"We had a great time." Ashly answered. "But I thinks it's time that Matt and I head home."
"I'll walk you." Macein then carefully got up off the couch picking Matt up in his arms and wrapping a blanket he'd pulled off the back of the couch, around Matt. Quickly gathering Matt's things up Ashly, followed by Macein, headed to the door saying her good nights to Daniel and Janet.
"So when do you think Macein will finally work up the nerve to offically ask Ashly out?" Daniel, who stood behind Janet with his arms around her waist and her head resting against his shoulder, asked as they watched the two friends through the front window.
"Hopefully not for along time to come." Janet answered as she turned around in Daniel's arms and gave him a quick kiss. "It's bad enough that Cassie is in the boys are good things stage, I don't need Macein to be in the girls are good things stage too. I don't think I could handle both of them in those stages at the same time, at least not yet any way."
Smiling Daniel just took Janet's hand and led her over to the couch, where they started to make out. After a few moments they heard Macein come through the front door. Appearing in the living room Macein spotted them and shook his head tiredly and headed towards the stairs and bed with a word.
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A/N: Sorry it took me a bit to get this chapter out but I hit a bit of a brick wall when it came to ideas, but I've now got a few its just a matter of finding the time to write them.
Also school will be starting real soon for me so updates may take alot longer then usual.