I just had to write another Dasey fight. The last one was two chapters ago and I was having withdrawals. Maybe I can sneak a little more romantic tension in there sometime soon. And I figured I didn't have enough Edwin and Lizzie, or everyday things. Just because something's going on doesn't mean everything else will disappear, right? So there's some of that, too. And some drama/mood change Casey, because there's a lot of that on the show, but not too much in my fic. So, here ya'll go. Enjoy.
funnechick: Yeah, I figured Lizzie and Edwin were getting ignored. I'm not sure how detailed I'll get about the whole court thing—I guess it depends on how detailed sounds believable, lol. And I just love Marti; I probably overdo it with her, but I just can't resist. Thanks for reviewing!
Ghostwriter: It's not really the work I was bemoaning, more like the afterword. I'm becoming a comment whore, and I despise myself for it. Sigh, sigh.
Oasis Blackmore: Trevor was a nice guy, but TV way overdoes the whole stereotyping thing. Basically, all modern society does. I could be labeled as the whole punk, emo, goth thing (and probably a lot of other random things too), but the clothes are way overdone on TV and people aren't that one-dimensional. Seriously, I abhor labels. But anyway, I've been writing more filler type things, but I've been trying to make them interesting. Because, honestly, some filler is necessary to the story. And I'm really working on the Dasey thing; I just have to work it in so it sounds believable. So it may go slowly. Thanks for the continued reviews!
atruewriter: Thanks. I'm working on Abby. Don't quite have that whole thing hammered out yet. Hope it all turns out believably. I'll keep up the updates as much as I can.
TragicMiko: Thanks for the encouragement; it's good to know people care!
Disclaimer: I highly doubt the owners of this show have Prob. and Stats homework tonight.
Casey awoke feeling aggravated; a feeling that persisted throughout the morning. She had tried behaving nicely, but by the third explosion of noise from Marti's room she could no longer keep the irritation from her voice. Lizzie had pestered her all morning for information while Edwin snuck into her room to snoop through her things; and Marti was doing goodness knows what in her room. Not to mention the fact that Derek wasn't even awake yet and Katy had already called twice. The stressful anticipation of George's meeting with Abby may have played a role in her frustration as well, but Casey attempted to block that event from her mind. She couldn't deal with the pressure involved at the moment. Since she had already finished her homework, Casey decided cleaning the house may relieve her anxiety—she had inherited compulsive cleaning from her mother. Beginning in her room, Casey soon had her shelves dusted, her floor vacuumed and her books rearranged. As she moved with the vacuum into the hall, Derek's door swung open and he appeared in the doorway, still rumpled from sleep. At least this time he's actually wearing pants, Casey thought with a twinge of embarrassment.
"What's going on?" he asked in exasperation.
"Nothing," Casey replied, raising an eyebrow as if to ask, 'what did you think was going on?'
"Then why are you vacuuming?" he asked in irritation. "Can't you satisfy your control freak tendencies later? I'm trying to sleep," he emphasized the latter statement, as if she were incapable of understanding.
"And I'm trying to clean," Casey told him matter of factly, annoyance creeping into her tone. Turning her back to him, she continued her task. Derek surprised her by stepping on the cord, effectively ripping it from the wall.
"Clean some other time," he told her blatantly, crossing his arms across his chest challengingly.
Marching over to the cord, she plugged in back in, refilling the hall with harsh whirring. "Sleep some other time," she shot back.
"What's your problem?" he asked, walking over to turn the vacuum off. "That time of the month?" he added mockingly.
Attempting to wrestle the handle from Derek, Casey replied scathingly, "No. Living in the same house as you has finally gotten to me."
"Now what could possibly be so bad about living with me?" Derek's ego asked as he firmly held the vacuum away from his struggling stepsister.
"Hmm," she said sarcastically. "You're always late, you're a complete pig, you're an insensitive jerk . . ." the phone rang downstairs, "And Katy has already called twice this morning and talked to me for twenty minutes!" she ended with a growl. "Seriously, Derek, you making out with a girl does not give her the right to pester me all day." Casey liked Katy, she really did, but there was such a thing as too much.
"As if living with you is so easy," Derek had to bite back before asking worriedly, "She's already called twice? How early is it?"
"Eleven," Casey replied shortly, finally gaining control of the vacuum cleaner when Derek loosened his grip. "And what exactly is so wrong with me?" she asked haughtily, protecting the vacuum with her body as Derek noticed it missing.
"Derek!" sounded from the top of the stairs, and both teenagers turned to look at Edwin. "Katy's on the phone."
"I'm busy," he said curtly, turning back to Casey. "Now, Casey," he said sympathetically, attempting a dodge around Casey to reclaim the vacuum. "Do you really want me to answer that question?" Casey moved to protect her prize, blocking Derek's path with her body and pushing him backwards.
"Uh, sorry," Edwin said into the phone. "Derek's busy." After a few moments he quickly interjected, "No, no. He's . . .cleaning? Yeah, he's helping Casey vacuum. But I'm sure he'd love to talk to you later."
"Edwin!" Derek's voice was frustrated as he saw Edwin hang up the phone. Sounding too interested was a bad thing. Especially if a girl was getting clingy.
"Sorry, Derek," Edwin told his brother, laughing despite his fear of being crushed as he took off down the stairs. His brother, however, was too distracted by Casey to give chase.
"Well?" she asked, tapping her foot impatiently, the vacuum lying unclaimed behind her.
"Well what?" Derek asked.
"What's wrong with me?" she burst out, obviously ticked that he had forgotten their line of conversation.
"Right," Derek said absently, mentally catching up. "But to tell you would just be cruel, wouldn't it?" He gave her a puppy dog frown, staring at her pityingly.
"As if you have the mental capacity to hurt my feelings," she retorted with a skeptical snort.
"Because your insults were just so biting," he shot back sarcastically. "I don't know how I'll ever recover."
At that moment another burst of sound emitted from Marti's room.
Derek questioned, looking at Casey curiously. "What is that?"
"I have no idea. But whatever it is she's been doing it all morning." Casey inwardly marveled at the speed at which their argument dissipated. Actually, as she followed Derek toward Marti's room, she found she was feeling much better. All she needed to straighten her emotions was to get lost in the familiar rhythms of a fight with Derek. Funny, she thought absently as Derek stopped in front of his little sister's bedroom, arguments with Derek usually set my emotions in turmoil.
"Dad and Nora haven't been up here, have they?" Derek asked her. If their parents had been up there, whatever Marti was doing probably wasn't dangerous.
"No," Casey replied slowly as she thought through the ramifications of Marti being unsupervised. Why had all responsible thought abandoned her earlier?
Knocking lightly, Derek pushed the door open. "Smarti?"
"Smerek!" she called happily in greeting. "Look, I invented a game." Demonstrating, she catapulted off the chair onto the bed across the room. She had set a random assortment of items on a sheet strung between the two pieces of furniture, so that if she missed her target she would hit the sheet and cause a ruckus. Glancing at the pillows cushioning the fall, Casey deemed the game odd but safe.
"Cool," Derek told his sister as she landed happily on the bed. Shaking his head, he pulled the door shut and Marti returned to her game.
Derek made his way downstairs to eat breakfast and Casey followed with the vacuum. Since her feelings of stress were gone, she no longer needed the distraction of cleaning. Well, maybe I can just dust that lampshade, she thought in mild disgust, catching sight of the forgotten fixture as she put away the vacuum.
As she made her way to the living room, Lizzie stopped her. "Casey, can I talk to you?"
"Sure, Liz. What's up?" Casey adopted her best 'helpful sister' face as she sat on the couch, which was miraculously vacant.
"Well, I didn't want to say anything yesterday, because last night was . . ." she trailed off, at a loss for an accurate description. Casey nodded understandingly, then smiled in encouragement. "I like a boy," Lizzie said suddenly, cringing as the words escaped her mouth and quickly burying her face in the couch cushions.
"What?" Casey asked excitedly. "Really?" Composing herself for Lizzie's sake, Casey asked with just a tinge of excitement, "So? Who is he?"
Lizzie peeked up slowly, finally revealing her face to have an actual conversation with her sister.
"He's in my math class. He sits behind me."
Casey noticed Lizzie mentally debating whether or not to continue. "Well?" she encouraged.
"I think he likes me too," Lizzie said quickly and self-consciously.
"Lizzie, that's great!" Casey told her, clapping in excitement.
"You really think so? What if he asks me out? Should I say yes?" Lizzie looked up at her sister, worried. For all her skills in perception, Lizzie often sought encouragement from her sister in personal matters.
"Go for it," Casey told her, smiling at the thought of first boyfriends. Childhood boyfriends were fond and funny memories to help remember growing up, and Casey wholeheartedly approved of . . . whoever it was.
"Thanks, Casey," Lizzie told her sister, sounding relieved. "You're the best."
"Anytime," Casey told her as Lizzie jumped off the couch. Grabbing her soccer ball, Lizzie raced up to her room, tossing the ball back and forth between her palms. Casey sat back, satisfied and excited for her sister.
"It won't last, you know," came a voice from behind, and Casey whirled in surprise.
"Edwin!" she rebuked when she saw him sitting on the bottom stair, watching her. "Were you spying?" Edwin shrugged, and Casey abandoned that line of conversation in order to pursue her curiosity. "Why won't it last?" she asked, giving him a skeptic look.
"Because she doesn't really like him," he replied matter of factly.
"Edwin! How can you say that? Of course she likes him!"
"Casey, Casey, Casey." Edwin shook his head. "You know your sister well, but I know her too. She doesn't really like him because she's just looking for attention."
"What?" Casey asked disbelievingly. "Lizzie wouldn't use someone like that!"
"No, she wouldn't," Edwin agreed. "Unless she didn't know she was doing it. I've seen it time and time again. She's redistributing her desire for affection onto someone who will return them. People do it all the time."
"But Lizzie doesn't need to do that," Casey defended slowly. "We notice her."
"Sometimes we do, sometimes we don't," Edwin told her. "All I know is, Lizzie feels left out so she's found someone to include her." Pulling himself up, Edwin gave her one last thought. "It's not a bad thing for Lizzie to get a boyfriend. Just make sure when it ends, you're there for her." Casey watched him leave, her bubble of joy popped suddenly and cruelly. Did she really ignore her sister? True, a lot had been going on lately, but had she lost sight of important things to focus on her own feelings of curiosity and determination? As Casey decided to keep an eye on Lizzie, she thought of everything she had promised herself lately. Looking out for her mom, helping Derek despite his wishes and their inability to get along, and watching Lizzie? I'm getting in over my head.
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Not the longest chapter, but I try to go for updates more than length. Plus, it seemed like a good place to stop. I'll try to have more up tomorrow. Two days at the latest.