Please see the very bottom of the review responses for an explanation of a scene in the previous chapter. And a little mini rant from fullxcircle…

Alright then, it's been a while. I had every intention of getting this posted last week before I went out of town, but couldn't make it in time. Casey's part just wouldn't write like Derek's parts do. And speaking of which, I broke up a bunch of Casey's lengthy brooding with some Derek-filled flashbacks, which are in italics. Sorry if this seems wordy, I was struggling!

Enjoy

Summary: After having a serious accident Derek looms around the house unseen, learning things about his family he never expected. [Eventual Dasey

Disclaimer: I own neither Life with Derek nor The Invisible. P.S., don't have any idea how the law system runs in Canada.

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The Invisible

Apprehensive and Scared

The first thing Casey did when she woke up on Monday was stuff her feet into her bunny slippers and shuffle her way towards Derek's room. She wasn't surprised in the least to see his room in the exact condition it had been in when she peered in on Friday night. Casey bit her lip to keep it from quivering as she entered the bathroom and quickly showered. She hadn't had to set her alarm early to get in the line first, she hadn't had to pound on any doors to be heard over music, and she hadn't had any kind of fight over any material thing in the house. In fact, she hadn't spoken one word since her discussion with her parents the previous night.

Just a week ago, she was fighting with her stepbrother over the bathroom, instead of standing in silence as she was today.

"Casey, I get it, you got up early and got the bathroom first and now you're being a princess and taking your sweet time." Derek called through the door. Casey rolled her eyes at her reflection while she patiently removed the hot rollers from her hair. She hated it when he called her 'princess'.

"In case you forgotten, you're not the only one in the house!" Derek called angrily, and Casey laughed. She had said the exact same thing to him just a few days ago when he was hoarding the bathroom. "I'm going to be late for practice!"

Casey ran the pick through her hair and sighed before turning and opening the door. "One," She started, standing in his way so that he couldn't get in the room. "I could only pray that I was the only one in the house. Two, you're always late for practice, and have to take a shower at school afterwards. And three, now you know how I feel!" She walked away from him then with a grin, letting him finally have the bathroom.

What she wouldn't give to fight with Derek today. She knew the instant she walked into the school building there would be questions flying towards her from every angle. Questions about why Derek hadn't called so-and-so, questions about why Derek hadn't met up with who ever. Why wasn't Derek at his locker, why hadn't Derek driven to school, and what did Derek do to make Casey miserable this time?

Casey dried off and quickly dressed, then began dragging a thick-toothed pick through her long brown hair and silently talked herself out of skipping school. Derek missing a day would start a conversation, draw some attention, and lead to false stories, but Casey missing would only result in a call to her mom, and another fight. Besides, there was nothing Casey wanted to do more than get as far away from the lonely feeling in the McDonald-Venturi house.

With a sigh, Casey took her hairdryer out from under the sink to start on her hair. Over the past year, she had become quite good at getting ready in the least amount of time possible, so she wasn't surprised when she came down the stairs all set to go with almost a half an hour left before she had to leave. Everyone else was already in the kitchen, which was normal enough, but what made Casey stop short when she entered the room was the dead silence. George stared through the paper while he held a cup of coffee in his hand, Edwin and Lizzie both wrote a few final answers on their weekend homework and Nora stood with her mug of tea gazing out the window. Once every few seconds Marti's spoon 'clinked' against her bowl as she ate Derek's favorite cereal, but even the smallest child remained silent.

Regaining her composure, Casey continued into the kitchen and made her way straight to the pantry to grab a cereal bar. Feeling as though she would break her glass family if she let the cupboard swing shut and clap against the wood, she manually closed the door and quickly turned away from her family, no longer caring if she was early. It was perfectly normal for Casey to show up early to school, especially when she was having a problem with Derek, so she set out after stuffing her breakfast in her messenger bag.

School today was going to tear her apart. Casey was typically emotional in a normal circumstance, but with Derek missing for the third day and a severe lack of sleep, she was likely to start sobbing at the mention of anything at this point. She was certain that she'd leak the trauma that her family was going through by lunch. Casey bit her lip and watched her feet as she walked, the breakfast bar forgotten in her bag.

Whenever Casey or Derek had to walk to school instead of catching a ride, it took them twenty minutes to get to their respective lockers. Today, though, Casey managed to get there in almost fifteen after speeding up substantially to keep her mind from running. The building was still silent, but luckily unlocked, and Casey's stomach dropped when she realized that the doors were opened early in the fall for morning hockey practice. The last thing she needed was for the coach to find her and start hounding her about where her idiot stepbrother was.

It wasn't uncommon for Derek to sleep through practice, and it wouldn't be the first time that Coach Fellers searched her out. In fact, just four days ago, on Thursday, he had found her at her locker and asked about Derek.

"McDonald."

Casey flinched and tore her eyes away from her latest study guide for math class when she heard her last name ground out. Only Derek and gym teachers used her last name in the same manner as a curse word. Turning, she tried a smile out on Coach Fellers. "Hi Coach."

"Venturi wasn't at practice today." The question wasn't voiced, but Casey knew what it was.

As easy as it would be for her to just smile and say, 'Derek wasn't awake when I left for school this morning, he's probably sitting down to Ellen with his fruit loops about now.' Casey just couldn't do it. She wanted, desperately, to get Derek in trouble, but just couldn't bring herself to think of what he'd do back to her.

So instead of ratting him out as the lazy self-seving jerk that he was, Casey sighed and answered, "I left before he did, but I don't think he was feeling well today. I'll bet his dad called him in after first bell, so you didn't get the notice in time."

Never once had Coach Fellers ever said anything else, he always just huffed after she gave him some new rendition of the same answer and stomped off. Casey felt as if he was certain hockey was the most important thing in the world.

"Just like Derek," she muttered and looked back down to her outline.

It took almost forty minutes of silent studying in the library by herself before she finally heard the hallways starting to fill. It took her quite a while to win an argument of whether or not she should try to walk the hallways or stay hidden until the bell rang. Deciding that it'd be less noticeable that Derek wasn't there if she wasn't, she sat staring at her phone until the warning bell rang. She jotted a small note in her planner that the bell was two and a half minutes slow and took her time repacking her bag and heading to class.

She wasn't sure what she was expecting, but she was shocked to see that everything going on in the hallways seemed completely normal. Sam and Ralph were playing football, completely used to Derek both missing practice and the first bell. Emily was down the hallway at their locker searching for something, probably the homework that was due today, with Sheldon waiting patiently behind her. Principal Lassiter walked the halls as if he had all the authority in the world with Tinker following closely, and Kendra and her clique chatted and applied lip gloss with no intention of going to class. Just like every other Monday at SJST High.

No one took time out of their normal routine to stare at Casey, no one took pity, no one started whispering. There was no reason to yet.

She finally managed to uncross her arms, pick her head up and stand straight as she approached Emily and Sheldon.

"Bye, Sheldon," Emily said, giving him a kiss before turning to her best friend. "Morning Casey!" She chirped, finally finding the shredded assignment that was due in less than 3 minutes.

"Morning," Casey answered, trying her hardest to warm her expression enough to feel her eyes brighten.

"I didn't hear a thing from you since Saturday. I take it family stuff occupied the weekend?"

Casey never noticed how loud and quickly her best friend talked. She assumed she was exactly the same. "You could say that again." She answered and hugged her books to her chest as they started towards class. Turning into their first class, Casey sighed and swallowed hard before asking, "How was your weekend?"

Emily didn't answer until they were in their seats in the classroom a moment later, and turned her whole body towards Casey to answer. "It was good. Sheldon and I went to see a movie, and he took me to the ice cream parlor afterwards. It was the first time I've ever let anyone talk me into eating ice cream while it was so cold out."

Casey forced herself to smile, and blinked twice quickly to get the tears over Sheldon being so sweet to go away. "That's great, Em." She started, and turned to dig in her bag for a pen so Emily couldn't see her chin quiver. Not long after, the teacher started his lecture and Casey threw herself into Canadian history instead of her dilemma.

Casey's attention didn't falter until just a few minutes before the bell would ring. She very suddenly got cold enough to send goose bumps down her arms and ball her hands into fists. She set down her pen and clasped both hands together, glancing up to the vents wondering if anyone else had just gotten cold. Everyone seemed to be paying attention still, so she picked up her pen and stuck her free hand in between her knees to warm it.

"You can hear me!" Unbeknownst to Casey, Derek had been standing inches away from her shouting for several minutes now. He had grabbed onto her shoulders and shaken her almost violently right before she got cold. "Casey, you have to help me." He reasoned, after having yelled and screamed at her from all over the room already. "You can totally tell I'm here, and I'm kind of running out of time out there." He crouched down next to her desk, between her and Emily, and looked up to her expectantly.

Casey only continued taking notes. "What the hell do I have to do?" Derek asked meekly.

A shot of adrenaline ran through him when Casey turned and almost stared right at him, but he realized shortly afterwards that she was only looking down at her bag. He moved out of the way, letting her pick up her bag and neatly place the notebooks and supplies back in their spots. Derek looked up towards the front of the classroom when the bell rang, and watched everyone start to mill out of the room. This was a lot harder than he thought it would be.

A small portion of Derek's brain still felt weird walking next to his stepsister at school after having spent so long avoiding her, but he stuck to her side as she left the classroom and waited just to the side of the door for Emily to catch up.

"So," Emily started, completely oblivious to Derek walking step for step with them. "If I knew I'd be learning all about the war with America in Canadian history, I'd have taken that class. Then I could be with Sheldon."

Casey almost completely ignored the comment, but managed to reply a few seconds later, "You weren't with Sheldon at registration."

Emily smiled, obviously not affected by Casey's attitude and continued on. "I know. But that doesn't change the fact that our class is ridiculous." Casey shrugged, still hugging her books as she watched her feet take her to period two. "What's up, Case? Getting sick?" Emily stepped closer and wrapped both hands around the upper half of Casey's arm as the walked. "Not enough sleep? Did Der-"

"Yeah-" Casey answered as fast as she could to block Emily's next question. "I didn't sleep well... And I don't feel very good on top of that."

Emily accepted the answer with a nod, even though she knew that wasn't the whole story. She knew that Casey jumped on the pathetic train when she was sick, wearing sweats and stuffing tissues up her sleeve. Her outfit today, a pair of fitted jeans and a brown tee, told the whole school that Casey was in no mood to draw attention to herself. Emily sighed and led Casey into their classroom and to their seats before letting go of her best friend. Something was absolutely off today and it worried Emily.

"Alright, guys," Senora Sanchez said and picked up teacher's edition of the Spanish text, unaware that Derek was sitting just next to it on the corner of the desk. "Please turn to the unit introduction on page 162 and read to your selves. Then read the practices sentences with your partners."

Derek watched as Casey threw a sideways glance to where he was supposed to sit, and saw his usual partner, Sam, decide to partner up with Ralph instead.

"Replaceable," Derek muttered, sliding off of the desk and walking across the room to his desk. He sat on top of it and kept his hard gaze on Casey.

Emily noticed the change in partners as well as Casey's glance, and finally decided to ask what the whole school had been wondering today. "Casey," She said, in a low tone so that their teacher wouldn't hear that they weren't speaking Spanish. "Where's Derek today?"

Casey's eyes snapped over to Emily's and she let out a big sigh before looking down to her text. "I don't know."

Unfortunately, Sam had heard both the question and the answer, and turned towards the two girls in front of him. "Yeah," He started, slightly moving his desk closer to hers. "It's not like him to miss this much without writing and telling me that he's in bed instead of school."

Ralph joined in, no one noticing the look of dread in Casey's eyes, "What'd he do? T.P. Lassiter's house and get thrown in jail? He was supposed to wait for us!" The two boys laughed and bumped fists.

Derek sat on his desk with his arms crossed, staring at Casey intently. He knew for a fact that she was on the verge of tears, recognizing the glassy look of her eyes before even Emily. They were now hounding her, throwing out all the different scenarios that ended with Derek either in jail or at boot camp.

Making his way over to her, Derek placed one hand on her desk and the other behind her on the seat, then leaned over to whisper in her ear. "Listen to me." He said slowly and pulled back slightly when she started, and gasped.

"I have to go." Casey said, leaving the room with her bag, not bothering to get her text book off of her desk.

"Casey!" The teacher called after her, but she just kept going, her white flip flops slapping against her heels the only sound she could hear.

"Case," Derek said quietly from where he was still standing next to her desk. He turned away from staring at the classroom door and looked down at the three students, his three friends.

"Man what's up her skirt?" Ralph asked, keeping his tone hushed to keep Senora Sanchez from looking at the group.

Emily rolled her eyes as she leaned forward and grabbed Casey's book off of the now empty desk. "She's not wearing a skirt, Ralph." She said in an annoyed tone and placed the text book in her own bag. "Something is really wrong with her today."

"Do you really think it was Derek this time?" Sam asked, peering at Emily from under his ski cap. "She's really not acting like he just stole the shower from her today."

Derek sighed and slid into Casey's vacant seat, forgetting that he had made it his mission to get Casey to realize that he was there. Finding out what his friends really thought of his relationship with his stepsister was suddenly more important.

"No." Emily said, and leaned closer to the desk when she caught sight of Senora Sanchez making their way towards them.

"Get back on track, you three." She scolded and stood close to them for a few minutes to make sure they were reading from the text.

"Although the present tense of 'cambiar' is conjugated with '-ar', the future tense is different because..." Derek grinned as Emily trailed off, watching the teacher leave the area. "She can't keep herself focused on anything for more than three seconds today. And I think she was going to cry before school."

"Well Derek's made her cry before." Sam defended, and Derek scoffed.

"Don't make it sound like I do it everyday, on purpose." Derek said, leaning back in the desk with a frown. "Ok, so I do. But still..."

"Well, she asked me Saturday if I had seen him and that's all she said all weekend. I at least get the 'guess what he did now' speech once or twice before Monday."

"Yeah, ya know, Derek's dad called me on Saturday too and asked me that. I figured Derek just took off with the car and didn't come back in time or something. Did you hear anything on Sunday?"

Derek shook his head at the three of them and stood up to leave them. Because he wanted to sit back and find out that he made Casey cry regularly, and that no one was surprised that he was gone, he had an entire school to search for Casey.

Seeing the hallway with her locker empty, Derek frowned and turned towards the counselor's office. No one was in there either, but Casey's favorite advisor was racking up a pretty admirable high score in online Asteroids. After checking the two girl's bathrooms on the first floor and finding them empty, Derek blew out a breath in aggravation and turned to make his way back to her locker. He made sure that Casey hadn't gone back to class on the way, and found himself standing in front of her closed locker alone.

"Where the hell did she go?" He asked himself quietly, and turned to lean on the locker and look down each direction of the hallway.

A long moment passed before he saw her dart in and out of his sight at the farthest end of the hallway, just outside the main office. Derek grinned and took off down the hallway at a run to catch up with her before he lost her. She was about to turn down another hallway by the time he got to the office, and just before she went around the corner, Derek came to a halt and yelled, "Casey!"

Casey turned with a gasp forceful enough to squeak at the end. Her hair whipped around her face and her grip on the books she hugged faltered and they fell to the floor loudly. Casey stood silently, her cheeks red and her eyes wide, scanning the hallway. She knew she heard Derek- there was no other voice in the world that she was listening for today, and she knew that it was him that just called for her.

Finding no one in the halls, Casey let out a small sob, and bent to pick up her books with shaking hands. It was then that she realized her Spanish book was still sitting back in her classroom. She took a full ten seconds to debate with herself, but finally decided on leaving it. If Emily didn't take it back to the locker, then Senora Sanchez would keep it for her.

Using both hands to slap the front doors to the school open, Casey walked out quickly, only slowing when she crossed the street and was safely on the sidewalk across from the building. She started breathing hard and let her bag slip from her shoulder to hanging off her elbow as she walked an uneven path towards her house. It was several blocks and right now she just didn't feel like she could make it. The bag hit the ground with a light thud, and Casey ignored the two pens that rolled out as she bent and set her books down as well. She put her hands on top of her head and walked in a slow circle, as if she had just run a marathon.

"Casey!"

The sound echoed in her head, and though she knew she was making it up this time, the crispness of it, the realness of it, still kept her heart up in her throat and her eyes scanning all around her wildly.

"It's ok." She told her self, swallowing hard to keep from crying. "It's going to be alright." She stopped and stood on the sidewalk with her hands on her hips. If anyone was watching from the houses she was standing in front of, they would surely think she was insane.

"Ok, Casey." She told her self, bending very slowly to pick up all of her belongings. "Ok." Casey set her jaw and took a moment to compose herself before starting to walk again. Home was close, and she would have to wait to have a panic attack until she was safe inside her own walls.

Derek knew that his arm around Casey as she walked wasn't helping her at all. If anything, it was probably making her feel apprehensive and scared like his touch had before. Derek didn't care. He felt like if he had his hands on her she'd make it home, because right now it seemed like she was going to pass out before she even left sight of the school zone. "Come on Case," He urged. "If you're going to ditch class you're going to have to make it home before you punk out."

Casey tried to ignore the dizziness that settled on top of her and concentrated on the feeling that Derek was following her home. She turned twice to see if he was about to kick her heels between her steps to get her to stumble, and by the time she got home she was almost completely calm again.

The rising panic that nestled itself in the bottom of her stomach on Saturday afternoon still threatened to make her sick, but she was once again back to silently thinking to herself as she walked through the silent house towards her room.

"Sweet," Derek said, rubbing his hands together, watching her go up the stairs from the living room. "I guess if you're going to ignore me and let me continue to die, I'm going to spy on you and see what you do when no one's home."

Figuring she'd go upstairs, change into pajamas and lay down to read, Derek followed her anyways. Maybe she could come up with something saucy for him to enjoy before he died.

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Keeping true to his words to his stepdaughter, George called Nora to make sure no one had heard from Derek before turning out his desk lamp and leaving his office for the night. Stopping outside of his boss's office, George pulled out the pre-typed memo briefly outlining the details of his situation, and explaining that he wouldn't be in to work for the next few days and slipped it in the 'in' box. This was possibly the longest day he had ever been forced to live through, including the time Edwin fell asleep in the garage on top of the minivan when he was 3 and couldn't be found for several hours.

George parked his car in the front of the police station and sighed. He was almost excited to be able to do something about his missing son, but at the same time he still felt like this was all just a bad dream, or an even worse prank. Checking his voicemail for the fourth time that day and calling Derek's unavailable cell phone just once more, George finally took his keys from the ignition and left his car behind.

Inside the station, a Detective Spencer looked up from his paperwork as his receptionist led George Venturi to the empty chair at his desk. "Mr. Venturi," he greeted and stood up to shake his hand. The detective took in George's appearance and sighed, he was living every parent's worst nightmare. Being a parent to three himself, Bret Spencer was anxious to get started on the case.

"Detective," George greeted back, accepting the hand extended towards him before sitting in the thinly covered seat and looking around. The station wasn't what he was expecting. The interior was almost warming, a dark shade of tan covered all the drywall and wooden trim outlined each wall, window, and doorway. Desks were clumped in the main area, each baring a computer and personal effects. "I'm afraid there's still been no word from my son." George said absently, his eyes locked on a missing persons board on the far wall, plastered with posters showing the faces of men and women of all ages.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Venturi." Spencer said, and George felt it was sincere. "Now is when we take action. I've created the alert and only need confirmation from you to post it. Then we'll need to discuss what you're ready to do about searches, media, and... the worst case scenario."

George sighed and wished he had opted to bring Nora with him. Right now, all he could think about was Derek's face becoming another "have you seen me?" poster on the back of the TV guide. "I want to put the alert out. And can we do one for his car too?" George asked, pulling a sheet with the vehicle information out of his briefcase.

"Of course." Det. Spencer took the sheet and scanned it before setting it down on top of a small stack of papers pertaining to the Venturi boy. "I'll have the alert running across the news today, and I'll make sure Toronto is involved as well."

Half an hour later, George walked back out to his car with his head full of empty reassurances from Detective Spencer and a firm grip on a few papers that had been handed to him. The ride home was short, and before he knew it, the car was in the garage and he was about to face his family.

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There she be. Not as long as the last chapter, but what can I say? Unfortunately, Casey has another part at the beginning of the next chapter that I'll have to kick myself to get through, but there'll be more Casey/Phantom Derek interaction so it'll read/write faster and easier.

Princetongirl: Thanks for the review! Sorry it took so long, I'm hoping to get the next chapter out much quicker.

Sunybee: Aww thanks! All your hopes are very similar to mine :-). Stay tuned to see if they come true! (Oh please, what am I saying 'if'??Lol)

CloudXStrife: I'm totally sorry you had to wait! Thanks for being patient with me, I promise the next chapter will be quicker!

Victoria Alexandra: Update accomplished! Thanks much for the review!

Sudmoonlight: sigh thanks so much. I hope this one was worth it too. I'm not as confident in this chapter as I was the last but hey, every book and every movie has a boring section, right? And don't worry, I decided in the beginning that we're not going down the same suck-path that the movie went. I'd have to kick myself if I did that. Anyway, thanks so much for the review, and thanks for the PM as well. Your patience is amazing!

Unsigned Review: This review was about the hospital care issue. After I posted the chapter, I did some research on the matter. Though I love working in a hospital where my patients don't talk back, the rest of my entire family works in emergency/critical care. Hospitals, as far as the ones my family work in, will treat to the best of their ability, but spending the least amount of money possible. They would be more willing to treat Derek, as a young person, but would still opt to not go beyond supportive care until they knew they'd get a payment.

This story's issue has nothing to do with the ability to pay, and everything to do with the fact that Derek is a no-name to them. This is NOT why "all immigrants and wastes of life on welfare" get treated. And that is NOT how it works in the US. Please, I beg you, to change your opinion, and research your facts, as this was slightly offensive. I happen to have grown up on welfare and had to take a long moment to not take this review personally.

Anyhow, I changed the last chapter only slightly. I left the medical director out, to avoid that nine chapters of legal junk, and I threw some fluids at Derek- basically to keep him alive until Casey can listen to him. No major revamps, just a minor change. Derek's still on his way out the back door.