Author's NoteI hope you guys like this chapter. It's a lot of chatter, and preparation for the following chapter. It's important, and I don't think it's horribly boring. Maybe it may even hook you more? Lolz. Read and review! I love it more than you know. Express all of your opinions, I encourage it. Thought at times it's painful, it can also show you something you didn't see before causing you to be better than before.

DisclaimerI used to own it. But then I got sued and had to do some time in the insane asylum. Good times.

The morning started with a long yawn and a shockingly quiet Derek. Casey had gone down the stairs, with Edwin and Lizzie giving the oddest looks at her, but blew it off to go eat cereal. She couldn't wait for school to start. Only a couple of days left.

Derek had woken up an hour earlier than Casey, surprising even himself. He called Kendra and told her that he would be able to make it. Today was Friday, and he was to leave at six o' clock.

Edwin and Lizzie barely slept and their dwindling disturbing thoughts on Derek and Casey was to blame. Despite that they woke up even earlier than Derek. Nora and George had gone to work and Marti to Dimi's (Spelling?), they had long since gotten over their fears of their children partying. Casey was trusted and Derek didn't desire the parties as much as the one on one confrontation with girls.

"What are you up this early for?" Derek looked up from the frozen pizza he was about to put in the oven. Casey looked at him expectantly.

"What are you talking to me for?" She gave a small expression of pain, and crossed her arms.

"I thought we solved this last night. Are you going to hold a grudge?" Derek never held grudges. He usually got people back and didn't think on it again.

"No. I haven't gotten you back yet."

"Gotten me back? If anyone should seek revenge it would be me."

"Why do you say that?" Derek moved threateningly close. They still hadn't noticed Edwin and Lizzie listening in from the living room.

"You threw me out of the bathroom naked, insulted me, hurt my feelings, didn't care in general, not to mentions millions of other things in the past…What am I telling you for? You don't care." Derek shrugged his shoulders and smirked. "Besides all I did to you was put chicken all over you and rip your posters. I even cleaned it up for you."

"After I made a threat." Casey stepped closer.

"So?" She turned away from him to get the milk from the fridge. Edwin and Lizzie watched Derek and not Casey. He was looking at Casey in a non-loathing, non-step brother way; His focus was on her butt neatly covered by her skirt. The middle children looked at each other.

He walked behind her and looked like he was going to do something, but she turned around, milk in hand, gave him a funny look and walked around him.

Derek wanted to tell her. He wished he could say all the things that were going on in his head, but he preferred her to mildly hate him for his usual antics. He'd never want her to hate him because he really liked her.

In a random memory he recalled using Kendra as an excuse to impress Casey. Sure Kendra had attracted him with the pierce your heart gaze, but when Casey said that Kendra liked maturity, he was reminded of Casey. At the time his mindset was If I can't get Casey then I can get the next best thing. Someone like Casey. It of course turned out that Kendra like his immaturity and Casey was trying to keep her mind off Derek and on their poetry project. Derek let out a sigh.

Edwin and Lizzie turned back to the TV, thinking nothing interesting would happen anymore. Casey looked up from her bowl of cereal at a thought-entranced Derek.

"I think we need to talk sometime." Derek looked at Casey.

"Talk? I don't think so." Edwin and Lizzie were unable to hear because they had turned up the TV.

"Yeah. We need to talk about the things we've been avoiding." Derek felt a mild panic. He knew, generally, what she wanted to talk about, but he was hoping that she wouldn't ask him outright if he liked her.

"I don't do girly chats Casey." She smiled.

"It's not a girly chat. I wouldn't dare talk to you about boys. It's going to be an informative chat. I have some things that I would like to tell you, and there are a few questions that aren't leaving me alone." Derek didn't think he'd be able to get out of it in the long run, but he could post pone it.

"I'll think about it. I am going out with Kendra tonight anyways." Casey snapped a glance at him. He's back with Kendra?

"Since when are you with Kendra?" She questioned before taking a bite of her cereal.

"I'm not. I'm just going to the movies with her, her brother, and his girlfriend. Me and her are just friends." Casey shook a disbelieving head yes and left the kitchen and sat on Derek's chair in the living room. He saw where she sat and quickly threw the pizza in the oven and went to where she was.

There was a brief silence. Edwin and Lizzie could feel their hearts beating. Casey glared up at him happily, and turned to face the TV.

"You're in my seat."

"I realize that."

"Get up. It's mine."

"You're so greedy." She spoke dreamily, not really paying much attention to him.

"Get up, or I'll make you, and you'll regret it."

"Hit me with your best shot." Lizzie smiled at Casey's comment, but Edwin just looked back and forth between the two elder children.

Just as Derek reached down to her hips to pull her up, a sounding boom resonating throughout the entire household, leaving them in total darkness. Lizzie felt around for the blinds and pulled them up to let light in. It was raining heavily and a blanket of gray flooded the room. Derek had jumped into Casey's lap in fright, their faces terribly close.

Edwin and Lizzie started laughing at him, and Casey tried to push him off frustration. Lizzie tried to turn the TV back on, but it was official; the power was out. Derek got up, but a silence held for an amount of time to take in the rainfall. Lizzie was the first to break the silence.

"So what do we do now?"

"I suppose I'll take a walk." Casey answered. Derek clicked in his fantasies of Casey drenched, fighting in the mud while in rained. It wasn't the fighting, or the fact that she was wet turned him on, it was that she could be dirty with or without him. It was that she was moving and bouncing. It was that side of her he wanted to see. Distressed and messy, returning to animal instincts that made her seem more human, not a woman of higher intelligence.

"In the lightning Casey? If you take an umbrella you're bound to be electrocuted." She shook her head at Lizzie; Derek still lost in arousing thoughts; Edwin fearful but interested.

"I plan to just take a walk in a raincoat. I don't need an umbrella. I can take a shower when I get back. Don't worry." Lizzie was about to protest but Derek started first.

"How about…"He held out his hands exaggeratedly, "How about we all go for a walk?" Derek smiled eagerly at all of them. Casey was utterly confused, and Lizzie was warming up quickly to the idea. Not because she loved walks in the rain, but because Derek was promising things to be viewed for her and Edwin's investigation. Edwin dreaded the idea, and spoke it to the rest.

"I don't want to go! You three can." He smiled weakly. Lizzie gave him a look and when he didn't respond she grabbed his wrist and took him in the kitchen. Derek and Casey looked at each other confused.

"Derek has just asked to have us all go out on a walk. When does he go for leisurely walks?" Edwin shrugged his shoulders. "I'm positive it has something to do with Casey."

"But he asked us to go too."

"So it didn't look too weird." Edwin gave a look of realization and nodded his head.

"What's up with Lizzie?" Derek asked Casey.

"I have no idea. Lately she's been acting funny."

"Like how?" He crossed his arms, intent.

"I don't really know how to describe it. I feel like she's becoming a hermit." He shrugged his shoulders and grabbed her wrist, lifting her to her feet. Casey wiped his hand off. "What? Do you want to seriously take a walk with me?"

"Mainly for the kids." He smirked.

"So you want me to just stay here with you and have no one see what they do? He might not even go if neither of us do." Lizzie said, highly frustrated with Edwin's stubborn behavior.

"Fine! I'll go. I'll go. But you owe me."

"How about great data and a brilliant sister?" Lizzie turned on her heel and left before Ed responded.

The four of them grabbed assorted color raincoats and exited the house. A burst of lightning stung their eyes, but they were unharmed, the thunder echoing in the background.