Prologue
They never imagined it like this. He thought of her as an annoying, smart brat. She thought of him as an insensitive, inhumanly jerk. They both wanted their old lives back; they wanted to smile and laugh again. She wanted to see more of her father and he wanted his mother out of his life. But they were young and stupid and didn't know what they wanted. He seemed to only care about keeping his rep up to his standards. All she wanted was to understand why. He teased her and made her life hell both at school and home. She never got back at him. She believed anger was a wasted emotion and hardly ever showed it. She sometimes wanted so badly to just have a normal relationship with him. One in where he didn't hurt her in ways he didn't see. He would nag her to fight back with him, but she would always refuse. He hated that she was so perfect, so smart, so kind, so annoying. Though she wasn't too good at hiding her emotions, he would see the heart-wrenching pain in her eyes from things he didn't know about. She helped him and, when he could, he helped her. He loved her, but she could never know. Yes, Derek Venturi was in love with Casey McDonald. If only they knew half of it.