It has been 6 years since Derek and Casey's graduation. Nora and George have divorced, and Nora has custody of the baby boy, Aidan. Casey is back at Queens to get her Masters' Degree in teaching.
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"He has a daughter?"
"Yeah. His wife left after the accident. Her name is Kylie. I have to call her; she wanted to present the divorce papers as soon as he woke up from the coma," Edwin grimaces. "But, it might be a little hard now."
"Why?" Casey asks.
"The doc says he doesn't seem to remember anything of the past six years," Edwin pulls into a parking spot in front of a clean looking apartment building. "Come on in. Meet Alexi."
"Unca Ed!" a little girl, whom Casey judges to be about two years old, exclaims.
"Hey, Alexi!" he swings her into his arms.
"Who's that?" she points towards Casey.
"I'm Casey. I'm a… friend of your uncle, and your daddy."
"You know Daddy?" the doll-faced, auburn-haired girl inquires.
"Yes. I knew him before his accident," Casey smiles at the pint-sized beauty.
"Unca Ed. I wanna go see Daddy," she whines.
"Well, sweetie," Edwin says, "guess what! Daddy's awake, and you're going to go see him tomorrow. You are going to have dinner with your babysitter tonight."
"Are you going to eat with us?" an older lady asks, exiting the apartment.
"Pwease!"
"Not tonight, Lex," he ruffles her bangs affectionately.
"Aww," she pouts.
"Is Miss Casey going to join us?" the woman questions.
"No. I'm going to go with Ed," Casey smiles. "You must be Alexi's babysitter."
"Yes. C'mon, cherie," the woman says, with a French accent.
"Awight. Bye Unca Ed. Bye Casey."
"She's a cutie," Casey comments to Edwin.
"Yeah. Best thing Derek and Kylie ever did together, by a long shot," he mutters.
"I take it the marriage wasn't his finest moment?" Casey asks, sitting in the passenger's seat of Edwin's car.
"No. She was very controlling. Kylie knew what she wanted: a great husband to go with her perfect, glamorous job as a local talk show host. A kid didn't fit her plan, but Derek convinced her to keep the baby. They'd just gotten married, and Kylie apparently didn't think she'd get pregnant, since she was on the pill. Nine months later, Alexi arrived."
"Derek wanted kids?" Casey asks, surprised that he would want to be a father and a rising hockey star.
"Not right away, but he wasn't going to give up his own child," Edwin says, parking. "Casey. You should probably know something."
"What?"
"Alexi's name is actually… Alexi Cassandra Venturi," Edwin says.
"Cassandra? He used my name for his daughter's middle name. And his wife let him?" Casey asks.
"He never told her. Dad knew, and so did Marti and I, but that was it. No one else knew about the importance of the name. I don't think he'd told any of his friends about you," Edwin shrugs.
"He's a good man. I wish I'd seen this side of him in high school."
"That's all he remembers: high school. His memory is gone," Edwin slams the car door. "What are we going to do with Alexi?"
"Ed," Casey says, laying a hand on his arm. "Calm down. Let's go see him, and then we can decide."
"Right," he nods. "He's on the fourth floor."
"Alright. Let's go," she smiles.
Edwin shows her to the room and knocks on the door.
"Who is it?" a deep voice asks. "What do you want? If you're one of those stupid nurses, don't come in…"
"Hey Derek," Edwin says, slipping inside.
"Did you have a growth spurt, Ed? Crap, you're so big!" the eldest Venturi brother says from the hospital bed. "What happened? Those dumb nurses won't tell me a thing."
"You got hit, hard, on the ice," Edwin says.
"Who hit me? Where's Sam? And," Derek pauses, "where are we? This definitely isn't London."
"Derek," Casey says, "You're down in Kingston, near Queens."
"Why? Where's Dad, and Nora, and Smarti?" he asks. "And, who are you?"
"Casey MacDonald," she smirks, imitating his renowned facial expression.
"No way. Case… Casey MacDonald is younger than me, by a half a year, not that much older," Derek says. "Is this some kind of joke, Ed? Are you even Edwin?"
"Derek," Casey snaps. He closes his mouth and stares. "Okay. Now listen to us. You had a hockey accident. It's not high school. It has been six years since we graduated. And I am Casey."
Derek stares at her blankly.
"So much for breaking it to him slowly," Edwin mutters.
"It's true?" Derek stretches, noticing that he, too, had changed since high school.
"It is," his little brother affirms.
Casey begins to say something, but one of the machines begins to beep out an alarm. Derek's head falls back onto his pillow, his eyes rolling backwards.
Casey steps towards him. "Ed. Get a nurse," she commands.
"Right," he says, almost tripping over himself to get out the door. "Nurse!"
The nurse enters the room, followed by Edwin and a doctor.
"Let's get out of Dr. Frasier's way," the nurse herds Casey and Edwin away from Derek's hospital bed.
"Is he okay? He's not going to go back into the coma again, is he?" Edwin asks frantically.
"Ed," Casey says in a seemingly calm voice. "Let them do their job."
"How can you stand there and not be scared?" he turned on her. "C'mon, Case, he was your step-brother."
"Edwin," she snaps, "don't you dare tell me that I'm not scared for him. Believe me, Ed," her voice quivers, "I'm scared for Derek. And, it's not just because my mom and your dad used to be married. It's because he's Derek, and I…"
"What? You what?"
"I…" she stutters. "Love him… As the brother I never actually had," she hurriedly adds on.
"What?" Derek chokes out, blinking as he opened his eyes. "Case, I'm your step-brother. But, then again, it's the same difference, isn't it?"
"Derek," she smirks at him, hiding her jubilance at his awakening. "You fainted as soon as you set eyes on my beauty."
"Pshaw," he denies it. "Yeah, right. I think it was having to see your ugly mug every morning that got me sent here in the first place. How long was I out? Ed, where's dad? When's the grad party? I know it has to be soon. Ed?" he looks at his little brother, who was in the corner, hyperventilating.
The nurse turns to help Edwin, and the doctor snags Casey's arm. "Are you family?" the petite woman asks.
"Former step-sister," Casey says quietly. "His dad, and my mom, got a divorce, about a year after our graduation.
"Once you're done here, I'd like to talk to you. Visiting hours end in a couple of minutes, so could you stop tomorrow? I don't think Edwin could handle it right now."
"Thanks," Casey bows her head in gratitude as the doctor walks away.
"Hey, Space-Case, what's up with Ed?" Derek asks, sounding almost concerned for his brother.
Casey smiled ruefully, knowing that, deep-down, Derek loved Edwin just as much as he loved Marti. "He's just had a rough couple of months," she says, sting down in a chair next to him, self-conscious of the fuzzy blue sweater that had been just fine for dinner with Edwin… but for this? With Derek?
"Case?" Derek pulls her hair, grasping a curl between his fingers. "Spacey, what's going on? Why are you old?"
"De-rek! You're older too, you know. You said so yourself Venturi," Casey smiles falling back into their routine quite nicely.
"Yeah. Seriously, Case. What happened?" he releases the lock of her hair.
"Ed would be the better one to ask," she stands up abruptly. "I'll go and get him."
Derek grasps her hand. "Ed's so…young. Well…not anymore. I want to hear it from you," he smiles. A split-second later, he frowns, remembering what had happened earlier, before graduation. "Sis."
Casey grimaces. "Alright.
"You were getting ready for hockey. You'd graduated Queens with a bunch of hockey and film credits. You were going to play for Toronto. Actually, you had the year you graduated college. This past year was going to be your big year; your second year was the one where you would be the star."
"Wait, what? What year is it? Casey," he says hoarsely, "quit joking around. We just graduated high school."
"No, Derek, we didn't. It's been six years since graduation. You play for Toronto. I'm back at Queens for my Masters for teaching."
"You're gonna be a teacher? Figures, keener," he mutters, moving his wrist slowly so he wouldn't mess up the IV. "So, what? I've been on the Maple Leaf's for two years and I don't remember?"
"Actually you were only on the team one year. In the first pre-season game, you got hit pretty hard. You went down on the ice and suffered a concussion. You've been in a coma for a year and a half."
"Then how come I can't remember anything from the past six years?"
Mr. Venturi," the nurse turns to glare at Derek. "Calm down. Visiting hours are over, and your family is going to have to leave."
Derek lifts his hand to flip her off, but Casey slaps his hand down.
She then stands up. "I'm leaving, Derek. I'll be back tomorrow."
"Case," he says a wild look of panic in his eyes.
"Mr. Venturi, you will be fine," the nurse interjects. "Your brother needs to go home and have a nice long rest. Your sister could probably use one too."
"Step-sister," Derek says, glaring at Casey, as if challenging her.
"Same difference," the nurse waves her hand.
"No," Casey says quietly. "It's not."
Derek stares at her, surprised.
"Would you excuse us for a minute?" Casey asks, forcing a smile.
The nurse narrows her eyes. "Five minutes, and you're out of the building."
"Thank you. Derek," she turns towards her oldest ex-step-brother. "It'll be fine."
"Promise."
"What?" her nose scrunches up.
"Promise me, Case. Promise me that you'll come back. I'm not going to stay here with my head stuck in the year 2009."
"Derek," Casey murmurs. She frowns and clears her throat, expelling the soft, breathy quality from her voice. "I promise. Now, sleep. You need it just as much as Edwin."
"Yeah," he smiles genuinely. "Thanks, Casey."
"Mmm-hmm. See you tomorrow, Derek." Casey finds herself smiling back before she heads towards Edwin's car. She stops to tell Dr. Frasier that she'd be back tomorrow to talk.
"Ed, are you okay now?" Casey asks, familiar with panic attacks of her own.
"I'm fine," he mutters, red-cheeked. "The nurse kicked me out."
"Yeah, me too. I have to talk to Dr. Frasier tomorrow."
"What about?"
"Oh, nothing important, I'm sure. She would've told you if it was," Casey reassures him.
"Yeah, you're right. Do you still want to get something to eat?"
"Ed, it's almost nine!"
"So?"
"I forgot," Casey laughs. "You Venturis would eat at three in the morning if you were hungry."
"Hey, I'm always hungry," Edwin grins, looking a lot like Derek.
"Uh-huh. If you treat me to an ice cream, then I'm game," she hints.
"That's cool with me," he pulls out of the parking lot. "I've missed you, Casey, and Lizzie. And, Nora, of course."
"Lizzie took the divorce hard. She'd changed a lot when we lived with you; all of her old friends weren't the type of people she hung out with in London. She missed her soccer friends, and you."
"Marti took it the hardest, out of all of us, I'd say," Edwin nods. "I think she was really getting used to having a mom again. You want to know something?" He pauses.
Casey nods, catching his eyes.
"I think that Marti always thought of Nora as her mom, instead of our real mom."
"Well, it is understandable," Casey says, going into teacher mode. "After all, she grew up with Nora around. She was still pretty little when Abby left."
"I do too."
Casey looks to him in confusion, "What?"
"I," he says haltingly, "think of Nora as my mom. Not Abby. Is that horrible?"
"No," he takes off her seatbelt, and hugs her youngest step-brother. "Ed, you're not slighting Abby. She chose to be out of your life, and your siblings' lives, not the other way around."
"Thanks, Casey."
"Something's still bothering you," she pulls back, looking into his dark eyes that were brewing with emotion.
"I think of you as a sister, Casey, and the baby—"
"Aidan."
"Yeah, Aidan is my brother…"
"But you don't think of Lizzie as a sister?"
He turns red and opens his mouth to say something, but someone knocks on the car window in the parking lot of the ice cream parlor.
Edwin rolls down the window and looks up at the menacing figure.
"Casey," a begging voice says. "Just forgive me, please."
"Christopher?" Edwin and Casey say together.
"And, dude, stay away from my girlfriend," he states angrily.
"Chris. Get this through your head. I. Am. NOT your girlfriend, not anymore." Casey glares at him. "Leave me and my step-brother alone."
"Wait, he's your step brother?" Christopher asks.
"Yeah, I am," Edwin says, rolling up his window and pulling away from Chris. "Casey, I want you to stay away from him."
"Yes, brother," she smiles. "I guess I never realized how much I really missed you guys."
"We missed you too, Casey. Our house lapsed back into chaos. Marti's a moody fifteen-year-old."
"Ours went back into the orderly, all vegetarian healthy boring lifestyle. I'm kinda worried about Aidan."
"What is he now, five?" Edwin asks.
"Six in two months. He reminds me of Marti. He actually looks like George."
"Blonde?"
"Oh, yeah," Casey smiles happily. "But, he has the same blue eyes as me. His hair is wavy, like Derek's."
"He had a hard time adjusting to Aidan. I did too, honestly."
"So did Lizzie. I mean, we'd never been connected by blood."
"And now, with Aidan… we are."
"It's different, isn't it?" Casey pats his hand.
"Yeah, but not with you and me. I mean…"
"I get it. We've always been siblings."
"Yeah," he grins.
"Sooo. You and Lizzie?"
Edwin's smile drops from his face. "Uhh."
"It's okay," Casey holds up her hand to stop any further comments. "I could always tell."
"What?"
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