Helloooo :) So this is the first part of the story. There will be three chapters and I've already got the second one written so it'll probably be posted tomorrow, but the third is a work in progress.

Even angels have their wicked schemes

And you take that to new extremes

But you'll always be my hero

Even though you've lost your mind

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HOW IT STARTED

Casey recalls falling in love with Derek soon after the event of his mom's death. Although there may be evidence to suggest she had fallen for him way before then, this is the point which she actually chooses to acknowledge.

It was a car accident that did it. His mother was on leave from Spain, back home to London where she would be obtaining the rest of her degree, when some idiot who was tweaked out on meth was speeding backwards on a highway, which caused a full on collision that lead to one of the nastiest pileups the area had seen in years. Miraculously eleven people survived the crash, escaping with major and minor injuries, but two people were killed including Abby, the Venturi kids' mother. Casey, who was around when George and Nora had first received the news, had found out before any of the other kids did. Upon hearing it she immediately felt overwhelmed with sympathy, not being able to bear to fathom the way Derek and Marti and Edwin would react when they found out, but also she felt a strong sense of worry over what would happen to the structure of the family that they had all worked so hard to build. She imagined in a worst case scenario, the house becoming divided and every bond that had formed between the Venturis and the McDonalds being broken as some would be grieving and some would not. Of course Casey didn't want that to happen and she would do everything in her power to hold things together, but then there was the part of her deep down inside that always told her to prepare for the worst.

The funeral service was held three days later at a chapel not too far from where Marti's elementary school was. The service was calm and filled with friends and Venturi relatives, whom Casey had never met before, offering their condolences and best wishes for their family. Afterwards they headed home, along with everyone else for the funeral reception. Upon arrival, Nora immediately headed into the kitchen and got to work warming up food, while George tended to the guests. Lizzie and Edwin took Marti and some of their younger cousins to the backyard to let them play on the plastic playset, but Marti who really didn't feel much like playing merely kicked off her shoes and swung by herself. Casey stuck around downstairs popping in and out of the living room and the kitchen to see if Nora and George needed any help accomodating the guests. Casey talked to a few of them, playing the nice hostess, but mostly they all just asked about Derek. Derek, who she had noticed disappeared into his room as soon as they had gotten into the house.

"Poor dear. They all must be taking it so hard," they would say.

George overheard one of the conversations and asked Casey if she would go check on him, just to see how he was doing. She didn't really think she was the best person to be assigned that task but of course she would do it and she found herself tentatively knocking at his door. When there was no response, she slowly opened it.

"Umm..your dad asked me to check on you," she said. Derek looked up at her and nodded but didn't say anything. He was sitting at his desk in front of his computer, but the monitor was turned off. Casey gave his room a onceover. Everything looked the same as it always did, with the posters and the clothes all over the floor and the messy unmade bed, but Derek himself looked completely different. He was wearing tan khaki pants and a black longsleeved button down shirt and his hair, well instead of the usual shaggy, unstyled bedhead he normally sported, his hair was combed neatly to the side and out of his face. He looked handsome, Casey thought to herself, well if he didn't look so moody and sad.

"Do you need anything? I mean are you hungry or something? There's food downstairs." she told him.

"Nope," he replied, fiddling around in his desk drawers for something. She noticed a carton of cigarettes sitting next to his computer. Immediately she was taken back to a story George had once told the family (against Derek's will) about how he and Derek's mom had found cigarettes in Derek's room when he was eleven. Apparently Abigail was the one who had found them first and before confronting him, she had printed out a huge list containing all the dangerous chemicals found in cigarettes and the side-effects of smoking. She had then taken away every electronic he owned and told him that if he wanted them back he would have to memorize the entire list and recite it for everyone every night after dinner, for a whole week. He had supposedly done well the first two nights but for some reason, maybe it was the shame he felt from disobeying his parents or the stress that came with being deprived of television and his Playstation for far too long, for some reason in the midst of reciting the list he had broken down and cried and apologized and begged his parents not to make him do it anymore. Everyone had gotten a good laugh out of the story, but Derek (even though Edwin, who was six at the time, has confirmed it) still denies that that ever happened.

"You don't have to stay here," he informed her as she stood in the middle of his room amidst all the chaos.

Casey, for some reason, started to babble. "Well are you sure you don't want anything? I know my mom's not the best cook in the world but other people brought stuff too, like your Aunt Raye I think? She brought a casserole which looked pretty good...actually I got to meet a lot of your relatives. They seemed really nice, but they were all asking about you... That's really why I came up here, we all noticed you were gone and your dad wanted me to make sure you were all right...but of course you're not all right. Maybe it would be good for you to go downstairs and talk to some people? It might make you feel better or at least let them know that you're okay. Or maybe...you probably just want to be left alone right?"

Derek didn't say anything, just looked at the floor. Casey played with her hands nervously.

"Of course you want to be left alone. Obviously I don't know how to take a hint." She took a deep breath, apologized and waved briefly before leaving, feeling like an idiot. He was probably irritated just by the sound of her voice, and she had this annoying tendency to go on and on and on...no wonder he disliked her so much. She turned to leave and get as far away from him as possible, because that was what she had figured that he wanted, but her trek into the hallway was interrupted.

"Wait," Derek said, prompting her to pause and turn around.

"That annoying, fast-talky thing you do-it's kind of amusing," he admitted. And Casey closed his door behind her and decided to stay with him. She realized that what he wanted was a distraction, and she supposed she could be that or whatever else he needed because that was what family did for each other. That was why Casey found herself still in his room later that night, still in her black funeral dress sitting on top of his bed, with bare legs and bare feet tucked underneath her, flipping through his old sports magazines and asking him random questions about players and teams and stats that he realized, but pretty much already knew she had no clue about. (He regarded her as hopeless on more than one occasion but became determined to teach her). At some point he felt the need for a cigarette and popped one into his mouth, reaching for a lighter.

Casey thought back to elementary school and all those JUST SAY NO lectures she'd seen. She began to recite: "Ammonia, which is used in household cleaners, cyanide and carbon monoxide which are both poisonous, methoprene, formalydehyde..."

"What?"

"DDT, arsenic, nicotine..." she continued.

Derek leaned back in his chair and groaned, "God, please shut up."

She laughed lightly, and swears the corner of his lips curved up slightly into a smile.

That night she fell asleep, by accident on the bed next to Derek. It had gotten to the point where it was so late that she could barely keep her eyes open and she was just comfortable enough to forget where she was. In the morning she woke up before he did and quietly slipped out. The first thing she did was change out of her dress and have a nice, hot shower. When she got out she decided to make breakfast, letting the smell of her homemade buttermilk pancakes wake everyone up. The parents emerged first and were very grateful, greeting her with hugs and sad smiles. Then came Lizzie, Edwin and Marti. They ate breakfast together quietly that morning and Casey made sure to set aside a plate for Derek, who had yet to come downstairs. In private, Casey gave George a status update on Derek that didn't surprise him. They were all grieving, George just knew Derek would be handling his in a different way than the others.

As Casey had predicted, over the course of the next few days, a division in the family had occured. But fortunately, it wasn't the division that she had feared it would be. Instead of a division by last names, it was more of a division by age group which actually ended up bringing their family closer. As fate should have it, Edwin, who was a lot stronger than he usually let on, along with Lizzie took on the task of looking after Marti. George, who really did have trouble getting over the death of his first wife and mother of his three children, had Nora to help him through it. And who did that leave? Derek and Casey.

Casey ended up spending way more time with Derek than she thought that either of them would be able to stand. After his mom's death Derek decided he would take some time off school, it seeming even less important to him then than it had before. Nobody seemed to object to this except for maybe the girls at Thompson, who Casey had to admit had gotten to be a bit ridiculous. It seemed every cheerleader or female with a pulse wanted Derek to know just how sorry they were for his loss and that if there was anything he needed, all he had to do was ask. They had also taken to sending her home with various baked goods, like brownies, lemon squares and at one time an entire red velvet cake (which Casey had to carry all the way to her car).

"Here ya go," she'd said, setting the large container, along with others down on his desk. "That is from Thalia."

"Who?"

"Tan skin, brown eyes...I believe you guys went on a date last year."

"Oh yeah," he said, sort of remembering. Casey rolled her eyes at him "What? You know I'm no good with names."

After school Casey always brought Derek his assignments and let him borrow her notes to try to do them. They would share whatever desserts Casey had brought home, courtesy of the female population at school, and Casey would try to explain the notes and go over everything he had missed in the classes that they normally shared together. Though Derek didn't seem to care enough to put forth an actual effort towards understanding his schoolwork (Casey soon felt the frustration she imagined most of his teachers felt) she did manage to keep him from failing.

As said before, they ended up spending a lot of time together. Derek did seem to be finding a way to deal with losing his mom but, as everyone did, he had his good days and his bad days, and the only person who was allowed to see him on his bad days was Casey. She could always tell the days where he was really depressed and had spent the entire day in his room, thinking about his mom because those were the days where he was especially quiet, she'd notice, letting her talk his ear off, and those were the nights where he would flat out ask her if she'd stay with him without making up some excuse. And whenever he asked her, Casey always said that she would and she always did. Sometimes at night she'd let him kiss her and Derek would fall asleep holding her hand or with his arm around her like he was afraid of losing her, like at any moment she could leave him, drift away without any warning and he wouldn't be able to stop it. But she always stayed with him until the morning and before she left she made sure to wake him up to let him know so there wouldn't be any surprises. She'd kiss him goodbye and quietly exit to go get ready for school. If anyone noticed that there was something going on between them, they didn't let on. Or maybe they didn't really care.

After a month had passed, Derek's grace period had ended. A letter was sent home from the school notifying their parents that he had almost reached the maximum number of absences allowed and that if he didn't return he really would fail the year. Derek took the news with a grain of salt but made it clear that the only reason he was going back was because he had to. By that time he and Casey's relationship had grown and been established (at least by the two of them) as doing the whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing, which Casey didn't mind one bit. Things were good between them. They had fallen into a routine that seemed to work for both of them, where they were just always together. It eventually got to the point where George and Nora couldn't ignore it anymore. One day Casey overheard their parents talking about them.

"We should say something George," her mother said. It was after dinner and she and George were in the kitchen, having just cleared the table and now working on the dishes. Casey stood outside the doorway that led from the dining room to the kitchen, listening.

"I don't know Nora, maybe it really isn't that big a deal," George said. "I mean they're just kids."

"That's exactly my point. Casey hasn't slept in her own room in-I don't know, how long do you think this has been going on? That's an awfully serious relationship for two teenagers, don't you agree?"

Outside Casey bit her lip, a blush creeping up her neck.

George responded, "Yes, I see your point, and I can see why you'd be worried. But, I don't know, they're both good kids right? I mean we know Casey is, and she and Derek have always kind of balanced each other out. I think Casey might be good for him, ya know? She always has been."

Casey felt something inside her chest warm up. It was a moment before Nora responded. Casey peeked into the kitchen and saw her mother give George a soft smile and touch his shoulder.

"I know he's had a rough couple of weeks Georgie. And Casey has been really good with him."

"I'm just saying, we can't exactly keep them apart can we? History shows what good that does for parents."

"I agree with you. But what kind of parents would we be if we allowed them to share a bed. There are definitely consequences to that kind of behavior."

He sighed. "That's true. So do you think we should give them..'the talk'?"

"That would give me a bit of piece of mind..."

Casey groaned.

'The Talk' came soon thereafter and it was inevitably uncomfortable, probably for both parties. But afterwards, after Nora explained to Casey all the dangers of moving too fast in relationships, Nora did something that surprised her. She hugged Casey and told her how proud she was of her.

Casey was a little confused. "For what?"

Her mother suddenly got very emotional. "For growing up to be so responsible. You're the one we never have to worry about because we know you'll always make the right choices."

Casey smiled and took her mother's compliment and later realized that she and Derek had been given their parents' blessings to begin dating or be together, whatever they wanted to call it. And their younger siblings seemed to approve as well. When they told Edwin, at first his eyes went wide in disbelief. Then his face settled into a lazy grin, as he declared that he totally saw this coming and that it was about time it happened. This type of (not so shocking) shock seemed to be just what their family needed to pull them out of their funk, and it made Casey feel good.

"Just try not to move too fast okay Casey? If you've never been in love before, well the first time can be a bit overwhelming," Nora had told her daughter after they had finished their talk. But Casey was too happy to see any real meaning in her words. She understood what she meant about it being overwhelming though, because she felt it, absolutely in every inch of her body whenever she was with him. Maybe it was that nurturing instinct that supposedly every girl possessed, but with Derek and after everything he'd been through, she found herself wanting to look after him, to protect him from anything that could ever hurt him. She'd fallen for him...hard.

(And Derek loved her too, she knew for a fact because one night, before they'd fallen asleep he'd accidentally let it slip).

Disclaimer: The italicized words in the beginning aren't mine. They belong to Rihanna. Also the characters in this story aren't mine either.