Can't Beat Em, Join Em
by TheBucketWoman
Disclaimer:I do not own Life With Derek, or any of the stuff I reference here like YouTube, That 70s Show, (though I'd like to own Eric Foreman) or Catcher in the Rye.
Chapter Six
Part Eleven: Derek.
I woke up around 11:00 that Sunday and I debated turning around and going back to sleep but I smelled food. So I went downstairs and saw who was cooking and decided I wanted cereal instead. I cannot be bought with pancakes. Even if the smell of them was driving me crazy. I thanked God that there wasn't any bacon.
"Derek," Casey said.
I poked my head into the fridge looking for the milk.
"Derek," she repeated.
I looked at her and saw that the milk was by her elbow so I grabbed it, poured some into my corn flakes, and put it back where I found it.
"Derek, come on," she said. "Talk to me."
"That's burning," I said, pointing at the frying pan.
"Dammit!," she said. I took the opportunity to make my exit. I was taking my cereal upstairs when I heard her yelp. She must have been using the old potholder and burned her hand. I stopped and put my bowl down, but Lizzie got up from the couch to check on her. I waited until she dragged Casey into the living room with some frozen peas on her hand.
"Liz, it's okay," Casey said. "I just used the crappy potholder." Her eyes were streaming, but she didn't look badly hurt. She sat down with Lizzie and Edwin, so I picked up my breakfast and continued on my way upstairs.
"Edwin," I heard Casey say, "why don't you finish the pancakes?"
In my room, I sat on the bed, grabbed the remote and hit the stereo. Emily loaned me her Jeff Buckley CD and it was going to be my mission to be able to play most of it before I died. Listening to it, I was actually starting to enjoy myself a little when I saw a little shopping bag, the kind you get if you're bad at gift-wrapping, on my dresser.
She was pulling out the big guns.
I thought it best not to look at what was in it, but I couldn't help peek at the tag on the handle. It said, Peace Offering? In Casey's big, loopy handwriting.
Do not look in the bag, I thought. By all that is right and holy in the world do not even think of looking in that bag because if you do, you're screwed.
But I wanted to look in the bag. The bag called my name. It knew I was powerless before it.
I picked it up and decided to plop it onto Casey's bed before she had a chance to go upstairs. But I ran into Edwin.
"Not cool," he said.
"Don't care," I said.
"She's crying her head off downstairs, you know," Edwin said.
"So I'm up here," I said. "And anyway, ever since she found out how I am with people crying, she's been using it against me. She can turn it on and off like a faucet."
"Okay, I don't even know where to start to explain what a shitty thing that is to say," Edwin said.
"But it's true," I said.
"Derek," he said. He shook his head like he was disappointed in me. "You've made her crawl enough. You can let her off the hook now."
"I'm not trying to make anyone crawl," I said. "I don't want to see her or talk to her. She fucked me over royally and no amount of pancakes or whatever the hell's in this bag is gonna make me less pissed off."
"So because your nose is out of joint, the rest of us have to suffer," Edwin said. "As usual, it's all about you. The both of you." He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at me. Usually, I'd think that a statement like that merited walking off in a huff, but Edwin wasn't going anywhere.
"What do you want me to say to that, Edwin?" I said. "I didn't ask anyone to pay attention to what was going on. I never brought it up. All I did was sit at the dinner table quietly. People've been telling me to shut up for so many damn years, but the second I do, you can't stand it, can you?"
"So you're gonna keep this up till she leaves for college, or something?" Edwin said.
"Do you see a crystal ball laying around here?" I asked. "I don't even know what's for dinner tonight."
"Cut the crap, Derek," Edwin said. "I'm getting really tired of walking on eggshells around you. The things you do affect everybody else, and you're just too dense to figure that out. Or too self-involved to care. But you need to get your ass downstairs and hash it out with Casey and you need to do it before Dad, Nora and Marti get home."
"Or what?" I said.
That did it. He turned around and left me standing there.
"Such an asshole," he said, as he went to his room. On a typical day, he called me an asshole two or three times, but he meant it this time.
I started the CD over again and turned it up a little. Edwin didn't get it, but I knew that it was best that I just kept to myself for a little bit.
Part Twelve: Lizzie.
Casey cried for a while, so I tried to play supportive sister. I stayed on the couch and hugged her for a while, until the hiccups started to taper off. I got up to get her some water when I heard Edwin call Derek an asshole and Derek's music get louder. Casey and I looked up when we heard stomping overhead.
Edwin came downstairs, stuffing his wallet into his pocket. "I'm going for a walk," he said. "You with me, Liz?"
Oh God how I wanted out of the house. "Um, I should really—"
"Go ahead Lizzie, it's okay," Casey said.
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah," Casey said. "Go."
So we beat it out of there before she had a chance to change her mind. The both of us tried to button our jackets while running at top speed. We didn't want to be within earshot in case she called us back.
"I think we need a personal day," Edwin said. "Or a personal couple hours as the case may be."
"What'd you have in mind?"
"We can watch the grass grow, I don't care," Edwin said. "I just needed to get out, 'cause those two idiots will keep it up until the end of the world."
I couldn't argue with that. "Let's see if anyone's at the park," I said.
We got there and found Jamie, Teddy and Molly Moscovitz and a couple of other kids, so we got to play a little basketball and just hang out for a while. I think it was just what we needed, even though it seemed like no one told Edwin that there's no tackling in basketball. He kept pouncing on me, and then he'd let me flip him. He seemed to enjoy landing flat on his back on the patch of grass behind the basketball court. Seemed to relieve his stress somehow. I've learned not to ask. But it put the smile back on his face, and mine too, I guess, so that was good. Then he paid for hot chocolate, and that was even better.
"Will the two of you just get it on so I can sell tickets already?" Teddy said. Then I don't know what happened, but somehow my chocolate ended up all down the front of his jeans. He's lucky I didn't pull his belt away so I could dump it directly into his pants. Jamie, for some reason left in all the confusion, so when I looked up, wondering why I didn't hear that screamy laugh of his, he was gone.
"Napkin?" Edwin said, handing Teddy a handful. Teddy stomped off threatening Edwin's and my life and then the two of us were alone.
"Here," Edwin said, trying to hand me his chocolate. "That was awesome."
"I'm good," I said. "You drink it."
But I ended up taking a couple of sips. So that was cool. We sat there for a while enjoying the weather because it was sure to turn really cold any day and we wouldn't be able to hang out over here until April probably.
Then, unfortunately, Edwin looked at his watch and realized it was 4:00 and we probably needed to help with dinner. Plus I had about forty pages of Catcher in the Rye that I needed to read by the next day. Like my life wasn't Catcher in the Rye.
I went to the bus stop. Edwin looked at me like I was crazy.
"You in some kind of hurry?" he asked.
"Guess not," I said.
So we walked the ten blocks back home. When we got there, Mom and George were sitting at the table, drinking coffee, laughing about something. They looked up when they saw the two of us come in.
"You're all sweaty," Mom said. "What'd you guys do?"
Edwin told her, leaving out the part about the hot chocolate and Teddy's pants.
"This was a perfect basketball day," George said. "Nobody wants to play after dinner, do they?"
We gave him a maybe. Edwin kept looking up at the ceiling like he expected it to cave in. He was dying to ask, I could tell. So could Mom.
"They're quiet," Mom said. "I think that's all we can ask for."
"How long do you think they can keep this up?"
"The quiet?" George asked. "Forever would be nice." Mom gave him a dirty look.
"Kidding," he said. "This isn't the type of thing we can stick our noses into." Mom nodded.
"Why not?" Edwin asked.
"I've tried to order them to get along before," George said. "And that was over little stuff. This, for reasons I've yet to figure out, isn't so little. And they're not fighting the way they usually do. Makes me almost miss their usual bickering, actually. But no, Derek is really freezing her out, and if we order him to stop, well you can imagine how much worse it'll be."
"We have to ride it out," Mom said.
"Besides," George said. "The two of them really need to learn that the house doesn't revolve around them."
"Doesn't it?" Edwin said.
George smirked. "Just for that, wiseass, you're doing the dishes."
"And that's unusual, how?" Edwin said. George grabbed the first thing he could, in this case, that potholder that Casey burned herself on, and smacked Edwin's arm with it.
"Don't the two of you have homework?" George said.
Later on, I was finishing up an essay for English and I heard all hell break loose.
Casey tried barging into Derek's room and telling him that she wasn't leaving till they had a conversation. Apparently she's new here.
Derek said something back to her, probably some version of "get lost or else." She said "Or else what," so I must've hit the nail right on the head.
"What're you gonna do, hit me?" she said. That's when I put my homework away and went into the hallway. Edwin was sitting on his steps.
"Derek," she said, sounding a little scared. Then she yelped.
"Crap," Edwin said, moving toward the door.
But then the door opened and Derek, who had Casey over his shoulder, put her down gently in front of her door. Then he turned around and went back into his room, slamming and locking his door without another word.
So there's this video that I saw on YouTube that shows this cat. It's in a shelter or a vet's office, I'm not sure. But its ears are flat against its head and it is yelling for all it's worth. Screaming like it's being murdered. That was Casey. She started to punctuate everything she said to him with a kick to his door.
"I'm sorry! (kick) How many times do I have to freaking (kick) apologize to you? (kick) What do you want me to do? (kick) Tell me and I'll do it (kick)."
We all waited to see if he'd open the door. He didn't. Casey sank to the floor in front of her own room. She sat half in and half out of her room and started crying again. I went over and put a hand on her shoulder but she shook me off.
"Lizzie," Edwin said, cocking his head toward another door. It was Marti's. I didn't even have to ask why. He opened her door and found her sitting on her bed, the tears running down her face. She never could stand fighting.
"Smaaarti," he sing-songed. "Come on, Smarti." He put his arms around her. "Smarti sandwich." He beckoned to me to get on her other side and we did a little group hug.
"Why're you getting all upset over those two dumbasses?" The word dumbass never failed to crack her up, and even now she managed a little giggle. She loved to watch reruns of That 70s Show, especially when Red called someone a dumbass, and Edwin, knowing that, injected a little more gusto into the word.
But it only lasted for a second because we could all still hear Casey. I got up for a second and turned on her radio. Fall Out Boy filled the room. I wondered who let her listen to Fall Out Boy, but that was a question for another day.
"Smarti, look at me," Edwin said. "That's the worst of it, okay? It'll be over soon. Just ride it out." It sounded like the type of thing you said to someone as you held their hair back while they puked. It also sounded so much like George that I had to smile.
"What?" Edwin said.
"Nothing, Daddy," I said. Marti giggled again.
"Oh, so you think it's funny too, huh?"
"Yeah, 'cause you sounded just like Daddy," Marti said.
"Well just for that, you get to do the dishes for me," he said.
"Nice try," Marti said.
Then Edwin made a huge mistake. "So what do you wanna do now, Smarti?"
The three of us ended up braiding Barbie® hair until we got called down for dinner.
Dinner was pretty relaxing, actually. Neither drama queen came downstairs and we had our cold chicken sandwiches in peace.
"I suppose I have to make up trays, now?" I said, after we were finished.
"Nope," Mom said. "This is not a hotel. They want food, they have to come get it."
George who had gone out to the car for something, came back in and said: "It's too cold for basketball. Who wants to beat me at Grand Theft Auto?"
"Do you even have to ask?" Edwin said. Edwin trounced him, and teased him about how his reflexes weren't what they used to be.
"Go to your room!" George said. We laughed.
"No seriously, it's like ten o'clock, you have school tomorrow."
On the way up, Edwin poked his head into Marti's room to see if she was asleep. She wasn't. So we came in for a second.
"And what are you still doing up, young lady?" he said. She giggled.
"Go to sleep," he said, trying to look strict.
"'Night, Smarti," I said.
"And don't let the bedbugs put their foot in your ass," Edwin said.