A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who reviewed my last story -- I couldn't have asked for a warmer welcome to this fandom! Because of that, I've actually gotten up the courage to post this next one-shot. It's set after "Not So Sweet Sixteen". There was a moment in this episode that caught my eye when I was watching it the second time around. When Nora tells Derek what's wrong with Casey as she's trying to shuffle her out of the house, Derek gets a certain…look in his eye. As if he's thinking carefully about his next words before he tells Casey that her party can't be cancelled. I know others have caught onto this as well, so I apologize if this topic has already been covered in another story on here. There are so many great stories in this fandom that it's hard to keep up with all of them! This is just my take on it, and I hope you enjoy. Please review and let me know what you think!

Disclaimer: I do not own Life With Derek or any of the characters. I'm just briefly borrowing them for my own entertainment and hopefully that of others!

The members of the Venturi-McDonald family filed into the house, sans one. It was nearly one o'clock in the morning, and they were all visibly dragging -- even Marti, who usually had more energy than all of them put together. Edwin was carrying her, and her head drooped against his shoulder sleepily. She had been the most stubborn about seeing Casey that night, and once she had been satisfied that her stepsister really was okay, she had fallen into a peaceful sleep in the car on the way back from the hospital. Edwin headed straight for the stairs, Lizzie trailing closely behind. Derek moved to follow them. He got a foot on the first stair, and had almost believed that he was in the clear. Until he heard…

"Derek."

The tone was all too familiar, but not the voice that used it. His father had had years of practice using that tone of voice on him, but apparently, Nora was a quick study. He winced before turning to face his stepmother. He had really hoped his parents would be too tired to get into his punishment for abducting Casey's birthday party tonight, but apparently they were never too tired to dole out retribution.

"Kitchen."

That was from his father. Apparently their exhaustion was manifesting itself in single-word sentences. Derek followed them through the dining room and into the kitchen, feeling his face settle into its familiar mutinous features for these parental "talks". Nora gestured to one of the barstools.

"Sit."

Derek complied wordlessly, while his dad and Nora rounded the kitchen island to face him. He hoped whatever they had to say, they would say it quickly. Throwing a party was hard work, especially a successful one. And his parties were always a success. He was more than ready to call it a night and get some well-deserved sleep. Too bad he had to wait for his parents to give him a piece of their minds before he could do that.

His father started first. "Derek, of all the insensitive, selfish, inconsiderate things…"

And then, to Derek's surprise, his stepmother cut George off.

"Georgie, let me handle this one."

Derek braced himself, because he remembered the last time Nora had gone off on him, when he hadn't tried to help Casey improve her waitressing skills. He was used to his father's wrath -- he usually managed to tune him out after the first few sentences. But Nora's anger was ten times worse. She managed to bring icky things like emotions and feelings and guilt into it.

He'd take his father's yelling over Nora's guilt trips any day.

"Derek, what you did tonight…"

And now Derek really braced himself, because nothing good could follow that statement.

"…was surprisingly sweet."

Derek blinked. The loud music at the party must have screwed up his hearing, because it almost sounded like his stepmother had used the word "sweet."

"Come again?"

Even George was looking at his wife like she had sprouted another head. Derek himself was considering the possibility of an alternate universe. Maybe the event Casey's birthday had disrupted the time-space continuum so much that Derek had landed in a universe where pranking was actually considered a good thing…

"…Casey was completely distracted, and…"

Whoa, apparently he had missed Nora's explanation of her crazy statement. He waved his hands in the air, stopping her mid-sentence.

"I missed that, Nora. I was still stuck on the word 'sweet', which, by the way, I'd appreciate if you never used to describe me again." Derek could see his father glare at him from the corner of his eye, but he ignored him. "Now, could you start again, at the beginning?"

Nora gave him an exasperated look but complied.

"As I was saying," her tone clearly telling Derek that she was not happy to be repeating herself at this late hour, "I thought it was sweet of you to take Casey's mind off of her surgery by telling her about her surprise birthday party."

George's jaw actually dropped at that. Derek could tell that his father was seriously confused at this point. Derek wished that he was still confused too, but he wasn't. He was surprised, actually. Surprised that his stepmother was a lot more perceptive than he gave her credit for. And unfortunately, in this case, she was right on target. But he still tried to deny it.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Nora. I told Casey about the party for the same reason that I always play pranks on her -- because I can't resist seeing her freak out." Derek punctuated the statement with his trademark smirk, and the angry look on his father's face told him that George had bought his explanation. But the knowing smile on Nora's face told him that his stepmother hadn't.

Damn.

"That's what I thought at first too," Nora told him. "Lord knows you and Casey spend enough time fighting, and this party seemed like it was no different. But I had a lot of time to think while I was in the hospital waiting for Casey to come out of surgery." Nora gave him a pointed look. "I realized that you had absolutely no reason to confess about the party. You could have not mentioned it, and none of us would have been the wiser. We might have found out later on, but you could have avoided immediate punishment, at least.

"And then Casey came out of surgery. She looked so pale, so fragile." Nora paused and drew a deep breath. George rubbed her back in silent comfort. "When she opened her eyes, I thought she would be scared about where she was, what she had gone through. Instead, she just started complaining about you."

Nora smiled at Derek, getting misty-eyed. "You gave her that. You gave her something to take her mind off everything so that she would focus on her anger at you, and not be afraid of her surgery or what might happen to her."

Derek felt his gut clench at the sight of Nora's tears. "You're reading too much into it, Nora," he told her gruffly. But Nora just shook her head, her gaze solemn.

"Don't lie about this, Derek. Please."

He couldn't resist the look that she was giving him. No one could. Derek's shoulders slumped forward in defeat and he stared hard at the ground. "She looked like she was in so much pain," he said, his voice so low that they could barely hear him. He took a deep breath, then looked up at his parents again. "I figured if she was mad at me, she wouldn't think about the pain."

The confession left a burning feeling in the pit of his stomach. He didn't like admitting to doing something nice, especially for Casey. The looks his parents were giving him, and the long pause that followed his statement, definitely didn't help either.

"That was very…noble…of you, Derek," George said slowly, as if the words felt foreign to him. Which they probably did, because Derek didn't think he had ever heard his father utter those words to him before. But whereas most kids would have felt pride at hearing something like that from a parent, Derek just felt more ill at ease. It was time to end this conversation.

Now.

"So does this mean I won't be punished?" he asked his parents, erasing any sign of concern from his face with a cocky smirk. His father's look turned to one of disappointment again, but Nora merely raised an eyebrow.

Damn, he really couldn't get anything past her.

However, Nora apparently decided to take pity on him, because she didn't question him further about his motives for wanting to be nice to Casey. Derek nearly breathed a sigh of relief, until he heard what she had to say next.

"Even though you used the party to take Casey's mind off of her surgery, Derek, the fact remains that you went against her wishes and planned the party in the first place. And while I agree that Casey's fear of surprise parties may be a bit…irrational, you should have still respected the fact that it was her sixteenth birthday and she had the right to celebrate it any way she wanted."

"Especially after she went through so much trouble to plan a party for your sixteenth birthday," George interjected pointedly.

Nora nodded in agreement with her husband's statement before continuing. "So, your punishment is this: you are going to plan Casey's belated birthday party for her, however she wants it. You will handle the costs, the details, everything. Even if you don't like her ideas, you will go along with them. Understand?"

Habit made Derek start to automatically protest, but one look from George had him subsiding. Nora's gaze softened again as she looked at her stepson.

"I promised Casey we would make her birthday extra-special for her after everything she had to go through tonight. Please don't let me down, Derek."

He had been right -- Nora definitely knew how to drive the guilt home. Against his will, he felt himself nodding at her in reluctant acceptance.

George wrapped an arm around his wife's shoulders and squeezed her gently. "It's been a long day for all of us. Now that that's settled, what do you say we call it a night?"

Nora leaned against him slightly, grateful for the support. The day had been one of extremes, from the excitement of her eldest daughter's big day, to the sheer terror of watching her being wheeled into the operating room. All she wanted to do now was sleep, and to go see Casey again first thing in the morning. She allowed George to lead her towards the basement stairs. Just as they were about to head down, Derek's voice stopped them.

"Is she going to be okay?"

For the first time that she could ever remember, Nora thought that she heard a hint of real fear in her stepson's voice. When they had all visited Casey earlier, she could tell that Edwin, Lizzie, and Marti had all been incredibly worried about her. But Derek had been too busy keeping Casey's spirits up, with the fake doctor's outfit, the video of the party, and Max's surprise visit. Nora had never even considered that he might be worried about Casey too.

Nora slipped out from George's arm and walked back to Derek. Then she did something that she had never done before.

She wrapped her arms around her stepson and hugged him tightly.

Derek went completely stiff at first contact, but when she didn't release him, he slowly relaxed. Then, because it somehow seemed more natural than he thought it would, his arms came up to wrap around Nora as well. They held onto each other for a moment, before Nora whispered in his ear.

"She's going to be fine. We'll go see her in the morning, together."

Derek nodded into her shoulder, then pulled away. There was only so much hugging a guy could take. He slipped off of the barstool and nodded at both of his parents, his face once again an unreadable mask.

"I'm off to bed."

He shuffled out of the kitchen without another word. Nora walked back to George, who wrapped his arm snugly around her again. He tipped his head towards her, his gaze slightly bemused.

"Do you think he even realizes how much he cares about her?"

"No more than she realizes it," Nora answered. "Lord knows what will happen when they both actually figure it out."

"Is it too much to hope for that they'll both be grown up and moved out of the house by then?"

Nora laughed lightly. "Not at the rate they're going, Georgie." She squeezed his waist affectionately. "But that's one of the reasons I fell in love with you -- you're always the optimist."

George grinned at her ruefully as they descended the stairs, hugging her tightly to his side. Whatever feelings may have been underlying what Derek did for Casey tonight, he was just going to appreciate the fact that his son had actually done something nice for a change. And he was definitely going to enjoy watching Casey punish Derek once she was feeling better.

George was still smiling at the thought as he fell asleep that night, completely and utterly exhausted.

A/N continued: I hope you guys enjoyed this! I apologize if I misspoke when saying that Nora had never hugged Derek before -- I haven't been able to watch all of the episodes yet, so I don't know if she has or not, but I don't recall ever seeing that happen. And I just couldn't resist putting that scene in here.

Please review and let me know what you thought of this!