"Hey, check out the new chick" Sam leaned onto the locker next to Derek, both staring in the same direction; down the hall at the gorgeous new girl.
"What do you think I've been doing for the past five minutes" Derek retorted, not even bothering to turn his head in greeting.
"Heard she's European or something" Sam commented after a few silent moments of very intent examining.
"British actually, she moved here from Bristol a week ago." Ralf pitched in, sidling over to the two, his gaze also fixed on the girl.
Both Sam and Derek turned to look incredulously at him.
"You already know her? She's only been at school for two hours"
"Yeah, two hours but she's already got a date with Brett Jensen" Ralf sighed as he pointed down the hall where the very same Brett Jensen had just started flirting shamelessly with their object of observation.
"What?!" Derek and Sam snap their heads around to watch, rather deflated, as the new girl walks off hand-in-hand with Brett.
"Great," Sam moaned letting his forehead bang against the locker door "what chance do we have against football god and school hero Brett Jensen?! Oh well, I heard there's this other hot new girl in grade 10 maybe we could go check her out" He looked expectantly at his two friends.
"Not before Ralf tells us everything he knows about that British chick." Derek turned almost menacingly to Ralf.
"Well, she's in my homeroom and Mrs. Bridgecamp made her introduce herself and stuff." The latter started recounting happily. "Her name's Lila something and she has this really cute accent" He chuckled amused. Derek just rolled his eyes and headed off to History class.
Thinking that he was just about never going to find out anything about the hot new girl, Derek slumped into his usual chair in the very back of the History classroom. The lesson started, and it turned out that Mr. White had not changed over the summer and was still as boring as ever. Suddenly the door opened and a blushed girl sneaked in causing Derek to straighten slightly in his chair and drop the pencil he had been twirling between his fingers.
"I'm so sorry I'm..wow," she glanced at the clock above the whiteboard "10 minutes late. I got absolutely lost"
Ralf had been right, she really did have a British accent.
"Class," Mr. White started, startled slightly by the sudden interruption "I believe this is Lila West, the new student. How about we all welcome her to History class" He started clapping rather enthusiastically and a couple of people joined in.
A very red Lila now made her way to the only free seat in the classroom; the one right in front of Derek. No one really dared to sit there since Derek was known to shoot very painful spit balls at the back of heads. Derek noticed that Lila was attempting to sink as far down as possible in her chair while at the same time hiding her face behind a text-book. He smirked, leaned back and decided to simply enjoy the view.
At the end of the first day of the new school year, Derek was forced to drive a very excited Casey and Emily home. The two had not shut up about new hairstyles, crushes, couples and break-ups since they had gotten into the car. With a very heavy and annoyed sigh Derek shouted;
"If you don't shut up with the girly talk, I will make you walk home!"
That shut them up… for about a minute. Then Casey whispered intently to Emily;
"So Ems, what about that new girl?" At the ready, Emily pulled out her Hallway Gossip Booklet in which she collected every bit of information she heard about basically everyone.
"Well, her name's Lila Daïty West, but she wants people to call her Dai. When she lived in Bristol she went to this all-girls private school, poor thing. She moved here two weeks ago, alone, and feels lonely because she had to leave her twin brother behind. Oh right, and Brett Jensen has already asked her out for Friday night."
"Oh my god!" Casey squealed excitedly "Brett Jensen, the hottest football player ever?!"
Derek, who had been listening attentively, rolled his eyes at this point and returned his full attention to the road and blocking out the over-excited, very high pitched giggles coming from the backseat.
"But Emily, seriously, listen to this; we both went to all-girls private schools. Maybe we can bond over that! I mean you said she was lonely and I bet her being British and all she would enjoy some sophisticated intelligent conversation."
Derek glanced into the rear view mirror to see Casey beam at Emily who had put on her typical raised-eyebrow sceptical face.
"You don't actually think that you two are gonna turn into besties just cause you both went to private schools. I mean Case, Dai is the new it-girl at our school; I doubt she'll want to hang with people like us."
"Hate to break up this utterly fascinating conversation but its time for you two to get out of my car." Derek made a sarcastic flurry with his hand, as if gesturing to royal highnesses and watched with a smirk as Emily and Casey stumbled out of the car.
The next few days were painfully uneventful, the teachers and the students alike seemed not to have yet been able to shake the apathy of the summer hence not much work was assigned. Not that Derek would have done it anyway.
It did however become evident that Dai was, as Emily had predicted, the new it-girl at school. She had managed what other girls tried for years to do in less than a day; score a date with the star quarterback.
Derek had two classes with her; History, and French. The classes he counted as the probably lamest of his entire schedule. He had hoped and prayed they would share a P.E period, wanting to both impress her with his hockey moves and see her in the traditional short shorts gym uniform. He had however, still not ever talked to her and as Friday came around signalling the end of the week a dejected and defeated feeling had settled in the pit of his stomach.
Friday evening, as the rest of the family was setting the table, Derek stampeded down the stairs, grabbed his favourite leather jacket from the coat hanger and headed for the door.
"Hey hey hey, Derek, where do you think you're going?" George had just entered carrying a stack of plates. "Nora made veggie burgers for us all tonight" He beamed as if he couldn't think of anything more wonderful to eat in the whole entire world of culinary delights
"As tempting as that sounds, I'm gonna be out." And stifling a mocking laugh Derek closed the door behind him.
He had been asked by his boss at Smelly Nelly's to pick up the extra ice-cream machine at the LaFleur Diner, as theirs had broken and Pedro would be needing one the next morning. After talking to the chef at LaFleurs in the kitchen, Derek ambled back into the dining section of the restaurant. Seating himself at a table in the farther corners of the restaurant, he looked around dully at the couples enjoying romantic dinners.
Suddenly he spotted Dai, sitting alone at a table for two. She had her head in her hands and seemed to be crying. Derek quickly looked away, he hated it when girls cried but at least he was glad to know that this time it had nothing to do with him. Instead he tried to look out the window but soon had to admit that he could not just ignore the crying girl. Cautiously he walked over and perched himself gently in the empty chair at the table.
Noticing him she looked up.
"Oh god, I'm so sorry. I must look a right mess." She laughed slightly as she pushed her hair off her forehead, wiped the tears off her face and raised her head to look at him.
"No no, you look great" Derek gulped from nervousness and yet found that he wasn't lying. Dai was wearing a dark blue dress which matched her eyes and her blonde curls were loosely tied together and draped over one shoulder.
She laughed quietly again, looking down this time and running her finger along her fork as if embarrassed by Derek's compliment.
"You're a pretty good liar, I'll give you that" she laughed more sincerely now, as if truly amused.
"Hey, they don't call me Lord of the Lies for nothing" He joked back. For a few moments they both smiled silently. To break the silence, Derek asked the obvious;
"So, what happened to Brett?"
"I sort of dumped him half-way through our date" Again, she chuckled slightly. Seeing Derek's unbelieving look she continued;
"When I moved here from England I thought that I could start over with the guys, you know; do everything right. Brett seemed perfect; good-looking, popular, sweet. Well, our date was a total cock-up." Dai rolled her eyes "The whole time he talked about football and all the records he held in yardage and sacks. I mean I don't even know what yardage and sacks are!" She leaned back in her chair.
"So halfway through the date it suddenly hit me; this was the most awful date I had been in a long time. And then I told Brett that it was absolutely not working out and well, he did a runner."
Dai heaved a sigh;
"I just don't want tonight to be a total waste."
All of a sudden, her face brightened and she sat up, leaning in close to Derek.
"How about you show me around town?!" She beamed
Derek was taken aback, and stuttered something incoherent.
"I mean, come on, the nights still young and I'm new here and have nill orientation, I don't even know where this diner is to be honest. What do you say we go hit the town and do something fun to make tonight memorable?!"
Recovering from his initial shock, Derek suddenly found himself grinning back. As crazy and spontaneous as this was, it also sounded like loads of fun.
"I'll just be a minute" He pronounced as he darted to the kitchen.
The night did indeed prove to be memorable. After dumping the ice-cream machine in the back of his car, Derek took Dai to all his favourite places starting off by hitting up the arcade where they spent hours competing at the pinball machine and the hockey simulator. Later they had dinner at Smelly Nelly's where Derek treated her to the local speciality; double mega burgers with extra onion and after they went to have sundaes at Toni's Ice-Cream Parlour. To round the night off they jumped the gate at the park and skipped pebbles on the pond, digesting the mounds of food they had eaten.
At 11:00 Derek pulled up in front of his house. He helped Dai get out of the car, still laughing and teasing her for losing to him 24:3 at hockey.
"Well, it was honestly a brilliant night." They had gotten to the front door.
"Yeah it was" It was strange but Derek, who in this scenario would usually be thinking about the fastest way to get the girl inside and onto the couch for a make-out session wasn't actually tempted to kiss Dai at all.
"Thanks for saving my Friday night Derek" She smiled at him.
"Yeah well, Lassiter told us to be nice to the loser new kids. I kinda felt obliged." Derek shrugged and earned himself a swift punch from Dai. Still laughing, Derek realized something;
"Wait, how come you know my name" even though they had spent hours together Derek couldn't remember ever formally introducing himself or Dai ever saying his name.
"Why wouldn't I know your name?" Dai retorted, "You're the infamous Derek, plus you sit behind me in history"
They both cracked smiles at each other, and then there was this shifty silent pause in which Derek would have usually gone in for a kiss, but instead;
"Oh, hey, want me to give you a lift home?" He asked gesturing towards the Prince.
"No no, it's ok. I only live like 5 blocks down."
And then she was gone, with a final goodbye wave from half-way down the street.
"De-REK!"
As soon as he got inside, he was greeted by Casey's angelically sweet and soft voice.
"Where have you been?!" Casey stood in front of him, almost threateningly; arms crossed and scowl firmly in place. Derek hung up his jacket and leapt into his chair, completely ignoring her.
"Derek, we were sort of worried you know. It is kind of late" George appeared next to Casey, egged on by furtive looks from Nora.
"I was working, believe it or not." Derek grinned as he saw the surprised expressions on everyone's faces.
"Well, at first I was, and then I met a girl." Grinning even wider as his father rolled his eyes and Nora let out a heavy sigh, Derek headed up the stairs, taking two at a time to shake off Casey whom he was sure would trail him all the way to his room.
"So, who is she then?!"
He had not been wrong. Casey stormed in just as Derek slumped onto his bed.
"None of your business, not that I'd tell you even if it were" He retorted, pointing a finger at his door and giving her the unmistakable 'get out of my room' grimace. Casey let out an exasperated grunt and stomped out muttering under her breath. Still grinning, Derek stretched himself out on his bed.
The rest of the weekend Derek spent in tumult. The next morning he woke up, convinced that the last night had been but a dream; or had he really spent it with the hottest, most popular girl at school?! By Saturday this uncertainty had been replaced by sheer paranoia; what if she had just been playing a joke on him and would be laughing with the football team about how one of his favourite arcade games consisted of hitting gofers with tennis rackets?.
Monday morning in the car his mind was completely consumed with figuring out how to act when he met Dai at school that day.
"Uhm, earth to Derek. You just drove right past Emily." From the backseat, Casey tapped Derek vigorously on the shoulder.
All morning Derek only saw Dai once. It was actually more of a fleeting glimpse as she passed by, surrounded by a group of babbling girls, but he could have sworn he distinctly saw her smile at him.
It all happened during lunch; Derek was sitting at his usual table with Sam and Ralf, discussing last night's hockey match when he suddenly felt someone's hand on his shoulder. He looked over just in time to see Dai seat herself in the empty spot next to him.
"God, I really hope you don't mind me sitting here" she started "I can't stand that lot anymore." She cast a dark look over her shoulder at the gossiping bunch of tarted up girls that had been crowding her earlier.
"I honestly think talking to them kills brain cells" She rolled her eyes.
Suddenly she froze, having noticed Ralf and Sam gaping at her from the other side of the table.
Cringing, she asked rather apologetically;
"Oh wow, sorry, are they your friends?"
"No no, don't worry about it. It's common knowledge that bunch has negative IQ's." Sam had finally come out of his momentary stupor. Dai smiled at him and Derek saw, bemused, that his friend smiled back rather dazedly.
Turning to Derek, Dai commented;
"Oh by the way Derek, I looked up some youtube hockey videos and I still think that soccer kicks more arse."
This was met by cries of outrage from the rest of the table and led them into a very entertaining, and enthusiastic lunch debate.
"You can't seriously be telling me the girl you went out with Friday was Dai West?!" Casey nearly shouted as she met Derek at the Prince after school.
"Uhh, no I actually didn't tell you anything, but yeah it was Dai" he gave her a mocking smile.
"How do you do it?" Casey suddenly asked, throwing her arms in the air and staring at Derek in angry fascination.
"I mean, I haven't even been introduced to her, and you've already gone out on a date!"
"Oh my poor, confused step-sis, when will you learn? Venturis are just genetically superior to MacDonalds." With another mocking smile he opened the car door and got in.
Derek was unlocking the front door when he finally admitted;
"Besides, it wasn't a date. We're just friends"
Casey looked almost incredulously at her step-brother, then snorted with laughter.
"Riiight" she burst out, "you're just friends with her. Derek you're never JUST friends with girls, ever!"
It had been a few years since the MacDonalds had merged with the Venturis and Derek and Casey had established a rather intimate sibling relationship, despite constant bickering. It was this that made him comfortable enough to confide in her.
"No really, I see her as a friend. I mean we're way too similar to go out, you know; like and like doesn't date well and for some reason I don't really want her to be my girlfriend."
"Well," Casey said, recognizing the rare brother-and-sister moment and hanging up her pink overcoat, "that would make you the only guy in school who doesn't."
Derek let out a laugh;
"Someone sounds jealous" he raised an interrogating eyebrow at his step-sister who proceeded to throw a pillow at him.