Chapter 1
Casey looked at her alarm clock. It was eight a.m. Something felt bad – really bad. She checked her cell phone to see if it was the Saturday prank again and maybe her clock had been set wrong on purpose, but it was just a Friday morning.
She found out what felt funny as soon as she tried to sit up. Her legs were tied to the ends of the bed with two pieces of cloth.
Meanwhile, Derek was smirking and counted the seconds until he heard, "De-rek!"
As soon as she managed to get herself untied, she ran downstairs, tripping down the last few and Derek couldn't hold his laughter in. This only made things worse for Derek's situation as Casey grabbed the cordless phone and threw it at his head.
"You stupid jerk," she told him as she glared.
Derek waited for her to get ready so that he could drive her to school as usual. The drive was silent, but he could feel her giving him death glares from the passenger seat. As soon as they arrived, she got out of the car and slammed the car door. He saw her storming through the school doors.
"What did Derek do this morning?" Emily asked as she noticed her best friend's usual morning foul mood. Casey told her what he had done, including every single detail and exaggerating, being the drama queen she was.
When she went to Paul, she told him that this was definitely the last straw. Paul couldn't help but laugh.
"Casey, you always say that it's the last straw," he told her, "But you know that you will never be able to handle Derek."
She sat down looking defeated, "I know." Her blue eyes shot down to Paul's desk as she played around with a piece of paper which he had on the desk.
After lunchtime, Casey went to her locker as usual. She heard a familiar scream of rage. She looked to her right and saw Tinker, soaked with orange soda. Just at that moment, she felt something in her hand and looked at it. It was an empty plastic bottle of orange soda. She looked back and saw Derek smirking at the end of the corridor. Before she knew it, the principal arrived at the scene.
"Casey McDonald, my office...now!"
"But, I-"
"No buts!" he said, "Follow me. NOW!"
Casey followed him. Derek had struck again, and she knew he would be winning…as he always did of course. He was the king of pranks but he rarely got in trouble for it.
The principal asked Casey why she would do something like that to Tinker.
"But you don't understand sir! I didn't do it. I would never do something so horrible to anyone – not even to the worst guy or girl on Earth, let alone to Tinker!"
"How am I supposed to believe you, when you were holding that bottle in your hand?"
"I don't know, but I know that someone shoved that bottle into my hand."
"Detention," he told her, "Here's a note."
As he was writing the note, the door open and Derek barged in.
"Hello Mr.Venturi. Care to knock?" he asked him.
Casey glared at Derek.
"Um, sir, Casey didn't do it. I admit. I did it and I shoved the bottle into her hand."
"That I can believe," the principal said, "Fine. Derek – detention. Casey you're not in detention anymore."
"If you wouldn't mind, I would still like to stay. I mean, I don't have a ride home anyway and I could wait for Derek and do my homework during the detention hour."
"Fine, then I'll write you permission slip to stay after school," The principal told her.
Casey couldn't believe she was doing this. She was actually staying for detention because Derek had stood up for her.
Detention arrived, and Casey went to class. It was only Derek and her. Derek was sitting at the far back and she sat somewhere in the middle. She took out her history textbook and some sheets to write on She really needed to get that essay started.
She could hear Derek fidgeting from the back of the class. After about five minutes, she had only written the introduction and that was when she heard Derek pick up all of his stuff and make his way towards her. He threw his stuff on the table next to hers.
"I need your help Case," he said.
"How come?" she asked him.
"I-I've done my history essay, but I have some problems with the sentences and the spelling."
She could see him blush.
"Want me to check it for you?" she asked.
"Would you do that?" he asked her.
She took the essay from his hands and looked at it. She found a number of mistakes which she corrected in pencil and then she took one of her own blank sheets and wrote some simple grammatical rules which seemed to trouble him.
"These will help you every time you have some problems with
grammar," she told him.
"Hey, thanks…" he replied.
"Am I crazy or did Derek Venturi just thank me?"
"Yes and yes," he replied.
She hit him playfully on his arm for telling her that she was crazy and then she returned to her essay.
After having finished half of it she noticed him staring at her. He was sitting with his arms folded on the table and his head on top of them. As their eyes locked, his shot down to the table.
Casey felt herself blushing but she didn't know why.
She only had her conclusion to write, when a janitor came to the class and told them that it was time for them to leave.
As they were packing their things, Derek said, "Hey Space case, thanks for staying for detention."
"Oh my gosh," Casey replied.
"What?" he asked as he looked at her widened eyes.
"The others are going on their trip today!! They're leaving in half an hour!"
They ran to the car and he drove as fast as he could without exceeding the limit. When they arrived, they barged in through the door.
They had asked not to go on this family trip to George's mum's house for the weekend because Derek was invited to the greatest party of the year and Casey had promised Emily that they would work on their science project as hard as they could that weekend because they only had a week left until their presentation. George and Nora had agreed but they had made Casey and Derek promise to stay out of each other's way or at least to get along as well as they could. Casey and Derek had agreed even though they knew it was far from what would really happen.
"Casey! Derek! Where have you been?" Nora asked.
"I was in detention and Casey stayed because she needed a ride."
"Look, Marti's sick with fever and we need you two to watch her."
"That's ok. Emily and I will work here for the project and so Marti won't have to be alone," Casey told her mother.
It was time for George, Nora, Lizzie and Edwin to leave. Casey hugged all of them and Derek gave Edwin a noogie. As soon as they left, Derek went up to check on Marti. She was in bed drawing something on a piece of blank paper.
"What's that Smarti?" he asked her.
"It's you and Casey and me and Edwin and Lizzie," she replied.
He kissed her on top of her hair and then went back downstairs. Casey was sitting on the couch with her jeans rolled up and she seemed to be examining something on her lower shin. He sat down next to her.
"What are you looking at?" he asked.
"Nothing," she replied.
He looked at her leg. There was a round bruise.
"What's that?"
"It's the bruise from having the cloth tied around my leg too long," Casey told him.
"I'm really sorry Casey," he said. She looked him in the eyes and she saw sincerity. For a moment she felt her heart melt and there was a connection but then he tore his eyes away from her and switched on the TV as she went to the bathroom to apply something to the bruise.
After finishing her history essay and her chemistry assignment, Casey called Emily to check whether it was ok to work at her house instead of Emily's because of Marti. Derek ordered some pizza and Casey and him ate together while they saved some to take upstairs to Marti. Although she didn't feel hungry, Derek fed her the pizza and she ate it without complaining.
Derek and Casey watched a movie. She was sitting on the couch as usual and he was sitting in his chair. This was something which only happened every once in a while – they rarely agreed on movies. Casey felt her eyes flutter open. She looked to her left. Derek was sleeping in his chair. They had both fallen asleep during the movie, apparently.
Casey nudged Derek and asked him to check what time it was. He said it was one am. They went up to their rooms and for the first time in their lives said a regular, civil, 'good night' to each other.