Hey all, I know it's been ages since I posted an update. Consequently, this is now even more AU since Sally's already - FINALLY! - out of the picture. I'm really going to try to finish this up before it's even more out of date, but I say that every chapter.
Chapter 4 (I Can't Forget)
Friday proceeded about the same as Thursday, except that Casey spent most of the day in her room working, and Derek always knocked when he needed to talk to her. He had the sense that she was avoiding him for a reason other than her irritation, because she looked more exhausted than angry whenever he saw her. He dismissed it as typical keener stressing about her essays and went about his business - made some lunch, watched some TV, ignored another call from Sally. Edwin had probably told her where he'd gone by now anyway. He wondered if maybe she'd even be jealous of him being alone with Casey. Derek paused, a strange sensation passing over him when he thought of Casey making Sally jealous. Before he could consider what the notion meant, he decided to shake it off and turn back to hockey. He had to stop thinking of Casey that way... not that he'd ever started... ok, less thinking, more hockey.
In the afternoon, Derek spent a little while deciding between a blue cotton dress shirt or a black silk dress shirt to go out that night. He remembered a few clubs from the days when he used to come up here with some older friends, Jimmy, Rob, and Garrett. Jimmy's dad used to live up in Toronto and legally had him on weekends. The problem was neither of them cared to spend any time with each other, but his mother insisted on sending him out to Toronto so she could have her weekends to herself anyway. So, Jimmy would take Derek, Rob, and Garrett (and Garrett's fake ID) up with him, and they'd do whatever the hell they wanted. There were more than a few blurry nights from that era, and a couple of blurry girls as well.
Derek didn't feel so great about that part, but back then the hangovers were just a little worse than the guilt. It was part of the reason Derek didn't party like he used to: he did not react well to alcohol, and it didn't take much for him to forget what he did. Not one to damage his reputation at Thompson High, he would sometimes water down or toss some of the drinks he was given when no one was looking, or chase shots immediately. By the end of the night, the others were too drunk to really notice that he wasn't, or they just thought he could handle his liquor. Sam was the only one who really knew all the backstory.
But those days were over for him; he'd learned his lesson young. Of course, the residual reputation wasn't all bad. He wondered if the Venturi legend would still help him in Toronto.
Better go with the black shirt, he thought. Just in case.
The evening went on and dinner came. Each step-sibling made their own quick meal (mac and cheese for Derek, and herb roasted chicken with rice pilaf for Casey) and ended up sitting at the table together.
Casey cleared her throat. "So, where are you going tonight?"
"A few clubs," Derek said, shrugging. He looked at her curiously. "Why?"
Casey made a frustrated gesture with her fork. "I can't just ask?"
"I just wanted to make sure you weren't thinking of tagging along or something," Derek replied, just as annoyed. He didn't know why she was irritated when he was the one going crazy with sexual frustration. He was starting to wonder how faithful he should stay to Sally tonight, considering the sight of Casey on her bed yesterday had made this a hundred times worse than it was when he got here. Derek didn't want to be a bad guy, but he was no saint either.
Casey was annoyed because she felt like she was going crazy. In her mind, she still had some weird thread of hope that Derek had some harbored feeling for her that he would discover in some miraculous flashback to their night together. Being an avid reader of romance novels had been warping her perspective of things, she decided. The expense of keeping that fantasy alive after years of disappointment was finally starting to weigh on her and she didn't want to feel like this anymore. It'd been over two days spent alone together and Derek was still treating her like an annoying stepsister. Why did she keep holding on to some romantic ending when Derek had never given her any hint of feeling? Maybe this time, she thought, she could finally let this all go when none of it came true.
"I had no intention of following you, Derek." No, this is going to be the night I get over you. This will be the last night I spend wallowing over you. I'm not following you or this demented attraction anymore, Casey decided.
--
Derek pulled into a parking spot near one of the all-ages clubs, in Casey's car. His was running low on gas and, frankly, hers was a lot nicer than the Prince.
Derek paid his cover and entered a room full of flashing lights in several colors, where he was immediately assaulted by the techno music reverberating around every inch of him. Navigating through the crowd, he managed to find the bar in a raised area on the other side of the dance floor. Derek had a fake ID, but he was driving and had no idea how long he'd be staying anywhere, so he ordered a soda. He turned around to survey the dance floor, but a fourteen-year-old in a glittery blue tube top and black vinyl pants had already sidled up next to him.
"Hey you," she said flirtatiously. Derek stared down at the obviously younger girl, a blonde with roots showing, who was wearing about a pound of make-up. Was she joking?
"Uh, hi," he answered uncomfortably, turning back to the dance floor. He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned back to her with an arched eyebrow.
"Do you wanna dance?" she asked.
"Not right now, thanks though," he said, trying to brush her off politely with a smile.
"That's too bad," the girl said, pouting. "I'm here with one of my girlfriends, and we both think you're really hot." As she spoke, she gestured to a blonde girl, about the same age as her, in a shirt that probably cost fifty dollars for the three inches of fabric she'd gotten, and the same vinyl pants as her friend. Derek smirked. They were learning the game early these days. Still, he wasn't interested in someone Lizzie's age.
Hmm, Lizzie, he thought suddenly, looking around at all the younger girls in the club. We might have to have a talk when I get home...
"Thanks, but uh, no thanks," Derek said to the girl. He finished his soda and walked to another room of the club. He might be in a physical void for the moment, but even he wasn't going to indulge in the barely pubescent STD twins.
The new room was playing hip-hop instead of techno, and the epileptic nightmare of lights had been forsaken for simple dim lighting, but the crowd was pretty much the same: young girls, a few boys the same age mostly acting like idiots, a few creepy older guys. Derek scanned for anyone who might be a few years past their training bra, but it suddenly occurred to him that he was probably the oldest one there aside from some very sketchy looking guys grinding against girls half their age. He wondered why he'd enjoyed these places so much when he was younger.
Probably because I was the fourteen-year-old delinquent. And back then, I didn't have a fake ID.
Derek exited the club and went to find another place he could get into. The first 19+ club didn't accept his ID and he was lucky the bouncer just handed it back to him with a threatening look. After a tip from someone else walking by, he found another club who was a little lighter on the fake IDs. Some of the kids were still a little younger, but they had been people that could believably pass for the age on the ID so that the owners could still claim ignorance.
Derek went to the bar and ordered a light beer. He sipped on it casually as he once again surveyed the room. This was much better. While most people might think he went for the colorful, made-up, short-skirt-wearing type, he actually had a thing for natural, fresh-faced girls like Sally and Sandra. They were definitely outnumbering the former category here, though there were also more men in this club. He waited for someone to approach him for a while, but nothing happened.
Huh, the girls here are pretty shy, he thought.
Leaving the more casual bar area, Derek entered a connecting room with a dance floor. House music played and lights flashed, but not as erratically as they had in the first club. He took a minute to look around before walking over to a group of girls sitting in one of the booths on the side of the dance floor.
"Excuse me ladies, would you mind if I join you?" Derek asked, putting on his most charming smile. He did not get the reaction he expected, however.
"Sorry, we're having a girls night right now," one of the other girls responded with disgust. Derek was caught off-guard but recovered.
"Hey, I understand, I was just looking for someone to dance with and..."
"She said we're alone tonight, okay?" the redhead snapped at him. The three girls rolled their eyes at each other.
Ouch. Derek arched an eyebrow and quickly spun around to make his exit. That's alright, D, they weren't that great anyway. Go for the one-on-one.
The dance floor was not quite full and Derek felt uncomfortable dancing by himself, but he tried to do it anyway. He made his way over to two girls - a redhead with a long skirt and white tank top, and a brunette in a short but classy black dress - dancing together and tapped the brunette on the shoulder.
"Wanna dance?" he shouted over the music.
The girl shook her head and pointed off to the side of the room. "I'm with my boyfriend!" she shouted back. Derek nodded in understanding and gestured an invitation to the girl's friend.
The redhead gave him a look as though he were a moron. "You just asked her!" she pointed to her friend. "I'm not a leftover!" The two girls turned away.
Derek was trying to figure out if he'd wandered into the local feminist bar as he walked off the dance floor to the bar once again. He sat down on a stool there, still nursing his beer. He suddenly realized that he hadn't told the girls his name. Time to bust out the reputation.
A blonde had just come in and sat at the bar. She looked to be about his age and pretty cute, so he gave her a minute and then timed his approach so that he could pay for her drink.
The blonde turned at the money being passed around her arm. When she saw Derek, she grinned. "Thanks."
"No problem. I'm Derek Venturi, and you are?" He offered his hand.
The blonde shook his hand lightly in response. "Nicole." She stared at him curiously. "Did you say 'Derek Venturi'?"
Derek smiled with relief at the success of his plan. "You've heard of me?" he said, feigning modesty.
"Yes," the blonde answered. "I just don't know where or why. But you look very familiar."
Uh oh.
--
Casey sat on the couch in a camisole and shorts, meditating. Always an overachiever with a flair for the dramatic, Casey had decided that it would be perfectly reasonable to take every way she knew to focus on getting over Derek and cram them all into one Last Night ritual for herself. She had listened to her "Derek song" for what she insisted to herself was the last time. She had made herself a bowl of chocolate chip ice cream and sat down to remind herself, in a rather corny way, how she deserved to be happy and have good things like ice cream and not horribly mean and annoying things like Derek. It sort of helped that when she went to put away her ice cream bowl, she noticed that Derek had taken her car. After starting to throw a fit, she decided instead to take a calming bath in some scented oils, and then meditate.
With her legs folded under her and a picture of Derek having served as part of her candlelight fodder, Casey sat in the dark breathing and repeating affirmations to herself.
"I am a strong woman. I can do anything I want. I can get over this ... no, I am over this meaningless encounter. I will not spend any more unnecessary time thinking about Derek or that night. From this day on, Derek Venturi will not affect me as anything more than an obnoxious, self-centered, inconsiderate..." She stopped and breathed deeply. "I am a strong woman..."
--
Derek parked the car in front of Dennis' house, still shaking his head in disbelief. He was starting to wonder what he'd expected to accomplish with this night out, but whatever it was, it wasn't a face full of Bacardi. He tried to make sense of what had happened back at the bar...
He and Nicole had been having a perfectly normal and flirtatious conversation at the bar, when suddenly her eyes had widened.
"Now I know who you are!" she'd exclaimed in the middle of his sentence about living in London. Before he knew what was happening, he had been doused with a rum and coke and Nicole was grabbing her purse.
"What the hell was that for?" Derek had yelled instinctively.
"For," Nicole had started, then paused before finishing with a smile, "Gabrielle." And then she had just walked out.
"Women," Derek muttered to himself as he tried each key on Casey's keychain to unlock the front door. He didn't know a Gabrielle. At least he didn't think he did. Did he? He wished he hadn't been such a complete ass back when he was younger. He was still trying to think of exactly who Gabrielle was when the door opened to the fiery eyes of a very angry Casey.
At first she'd been relieved to look out the peephole and see that Derek had returned alone, until she reminded herself that she had no reason to be jealous, because she, Casey McDonald, was in no way interested in Derek Venturi any more. Instead she focused on the real issue: her car.
Casey tore the keys from his hand. "I don't remember you asking to take my car," she said with a fake sweetness.
Derek shrugged. "I didn't." He squeezed past her and Casey caught a whiff of the alcohol on him.
"Jesus, Derek, how much did you drink?" she said, following him into the laundry alcove where he removed his shirt.
"Not enough. This was an act of revenge apparently, for someone named Gabrielle that I apparently did something awful to."
The name made Casey stop in her tracks. "Who?" she asked, and held her breath for the answer.
Derek continued casually as he wiped at his chest with one of the towels nearby. "I was talking to this girl Nicole, totally normal, until she freaks out and throws a drink on me to avenge some friend I don't even know. I mean, I think I don't..." he said, furrowing his brow.
Before she knew what she was doing, Casey had rushed up to him. The thoughts flew out of Derek's head once more as the scents from Casey's bath surrounded him and her hands pressed against his chest.
"Are you sure?" Casey asked earnestly.
Derek wasn't really sure of anything right now as Casey's eyes caught his with a sort of desperation he hadn't really seen before. Not toward him anyway. It seemed like she wanted something from him... no, wait.. like she wanted... him. His eyes took in the shape of her body once again, her silky camisole floating across the smooth skin of her chest. He looked into her eyes again, and felt a familiar longing.
Casey backed away when she realized what she was doing. Damn it, I'm not supposed to care about this anymore!
"Uh, sorry," she muttered and ran upstairs.
Derek felt suddenly cold as Casey's feminine warmth disappeared. He stayed in shock for a second, thinking about how surreal this night had been so far. That could not have been lust in Casey's eyes, no way. He thought he must be hallucinating because it'd been so long since he saw that kind of raw emotion for him. Sally certainly never looked at him that way. He had asked himself just before what going out clubbing in Toronto was meant to help, and it occurred to him now what had been missing for him recently: pure, honest need. It was probably stupid of him to think he'd find that in some liquor-soaked hole in the wall, but never in a million years did he think he'd see it in Casey.
Derek found himself at the bottom of the stairs, becoming aware of the soft music drifting from Casey's room.
I don't get you
I can't forget what you've forgotten, all along
I've never been so alone
Don't cry out
Cease fire
He didn't really think about what would happen or what could go wrong if he went up there. He never really thought about those things. He just kind of wanted to see if he was imagining all this.
Casey was pacing across her room. She had vented to Nicole a few times after that night in the parking lot; lamenting how she'd used her fake name and how she wished she could meet Derek again, but she wasn't sure how to find him and didn't want to go chasing some boy who was two hours away. It was probably this regret that made her such a determined person later. Anyway, she hadn't found out his last name until she met him again at the pre-marriage dinner, and she'd immediately called Nicole to tell her. They had grown apart by that time, and it was one of their last conversations, but Nicole had apparently remembered this information.
She heard a knock on her door and froze. She honestly didn't know if she should see Derek now or not. She was so disappointed in herself that all her work tonight had gone right out the window because of a chiseled chest and the slim chance that Derek might have remembered some feeling for her. If he ever had any.
Another knock, more hesitant now. It did her no good to hide, Casey guessed. She couldn't get away from someone she lived with. Not for another year anyway. Hesitantly, she walked to the door and opened it.
"Yeah?" she asked as casually as she could.
"Hey." His voice came out rougher than he'd expected. She was still in her skimpy pajamas and he felt his body involuntarily ache for her again.
Casey fought the menagerie of fantasies that tried to play themselves out in her head. How many times had she daydreamed about a moment just like this: both of them half-clothed, no one around, just feet from a bed, as he approached her with a deep, gruff voice full of desire like the one he'd... just...used?
No no no, not happening.
The silence seemed to go on forever.
"Um, did you want something?" Casey finally asked, toying with one of her rings. Damn it, she was playing into her damn fantasies again, damn it Casey, damn it!
Derek was just as confused as she was, because the answer to that question was scaring him. "I, um, uh..." he continued to stutter until she looked up at him again. She pursed her lips into a sort of expectant pout, and Derek found himself mesmerized.
Your fascination with naked walls of silk and skin
With no conditions
I needed you to notice...
"Yeah," he said quietly, and, feeling like a complete lunatic, he leaned down to meet her perfect pink mouth.
That's all I wanted
Don't cry out
Cease fire