The Price

"Hey Casey!" Severide strutted over to the Truck captain just outside his quarters, "Guess what I got?"

"Oh I have a better idea," Matt dryly responded, "let's guess which antibiotics you're taking for whatever it is."

Kelly slapped him on the arm with the tickets in his hand, "Somebody tipped Kidd with two tickets to the Blackhawks game next week. Check out the seating, we'll be right by the ice."

"Us?" Casey asked as he took one of the tickets and looked it over.

"Yeah, we haven't been out to a game in a long time."

Casey stared at the ticket for a minute and bit his bottom lip hesitantly. Then, with much obvious difficulty, he handed the ticket back.

"I'm sorry...I'd really like to go, but I can't," Casey said.

Kelly's smile disappeared and his eyebrows knitted together, "What?"

Casey shrugged, "I can't make it that night, I'm sorry...here, you take Kidd, you two will have a great time."

Kelly almost responded 'Somehow I doubt that'. He loved Stella and she was a lot of fun to be with in general, but he would've rather gone to the game with Casey.

Everybody knew what had happened with Gabby, she was 2,000 miles away in Puerto Rico now, and Casey was picking up the pieces of his life, and trying to appear like everything was fine and normal, but Kelly could tell he was down about the whole thing. When Stella came through with the tickets, everything seemed to click for Kelly, the two of them could go out, have a guys' night out, lift Casey's spirits a bit, take his mind off the pending divorce, have fun like they used to. So this came out of nowhere and dropped on Kelly like a bucket of ice water.

"I really appreciate it, but I'm sorry," Casey told him. "Thanks anyway."

Casey turned and headed down the corridor, and Kelly was left there feeling very confused. And apparently he wasn't the only one. Later on the apparatus floor, Otis and Cruz came up to him and asked what was going on with Casey.

"What do you mean?" Kelly asked.

"He's been acting weird for weeks," Otis said, "and I don't know it's just Gabby leaving, something really seems to be eating at him."

"So why're you asking me? You think I know?" Kelly asked.

"No, but he'd actually talk to you before he would us," Cruz answered.

He hated to admit it, but he knew they had a point. If something was wrong, Casey wasn't about to confide in the men working under him, or the guys on Squad for that matter. But whatever it was, would Casey tell him either?

It wasn't just the game Casey backed out of. Over the next couple weeks Kelly broached the idea of them going out clubbing, or even out to Molly's since neither of them had actually been there for a while. No matter what he suggested, or when he suggested it, Casey couldn't go, for some reason or other, he opted out of all of them, but thanked Kelly for the consideration anyway. Kelly didn't get it, and he asked around one by one to the other guys at 51 to see if anybody had any idea what it was about. Everybody had noticed Casey didn't seem quite himself and he always seemed preoccupied with something, but nobody had any straight answers.

"Hey Kelly," Tony waved him over and told the lieutenant half under his breath, "A couple shifts back Casey got a phone call, whatever it was he started screaming at the guy."

"Did you hear what it was about?" Kelly asked.

Tony shook his head, "He stormed off to his office and shut the door before we could make out any real details. You think he's in some kind of trouble?"

"I don't know," Kelly responded, but he'd made up his mind he was going to find out.

He waited until the next night to stop by Casey's apartment, he knocked on the door and listened.

"Who is it?"

"It's me, can I come in?"

There was a pause. "Kelly?"

"Yeah," Severide rolled his eyes.

"What is it?" Casey asked.

"Can I come in or not?"

There wasn't a response, but he heard Casey walking towards the door and heard the locks being undone.

"What's up?" Casey asked.

Third time. "Can I come in?"

Casey sighed and held the door open.

"Is something wrong?" Matt asked him.

Kelly caught a glimpse of papers scattered all over the coffee table, and responded, "I was going to ask you the same thing."

"What do you mean?" Casey asked.

"I want to know," Kelly turned to face him, "why you've bailed on every single thing I've suggested over the last 2 weeks."

"I've been busy," Casey said, "I told you that."

"Yeah, but I know you're never this busy, something's up, so what is it?" Kelly asked.

"It's none of your business," Casey told him.

"What?" Kelly wanted to know. "I can understand bailing on the game if it was the only thing, but it's not, it's been everything, what's going on with you?"

"Nothing," Casey insisted.

"Then why are you giving me the brushoff all the time?" Kelly asked. "Did I do something to piss you off? Is that why you're avoiding me like the plague?"

"No, that's not it," Casey shook his head.

"Then what is it, Casey?" Kelly asked. "Why don't you want to hang out anymore?"

"Because..."

Kelly hadn't actually thought he'd get an answer out of Casey, but at that word, even though that's where Casey stopped, Kelly felt a glimmer of hope that he'd get to the bottom of this.

Casey looked at the Squad lieutenant and shook his head, and said lowly, "Because I can't afford it."

Kelly didn't get it. "What do you mean?"

Instead of answering, Casey stepped over to the coffee table, picked up a piece of paper and handed it to Kelly to read over. He did, and what he was looking at wasn't making any sense.

"What is this?" he asked.

"My bank account," Casey said.

Kelly lowered the paper and looked at Casey, "There's nothing in it."

"Tell me about it."

Maybe he was getting closer to an actual explanation but Kelly still couldn't see it. "Casey, are you in some kind of trouble?"

Casey sighed, "Not anymore."

"What's going on?" Severide asked.

Casey closed his eyes, sighed, then sat down on the couch as he explained, "That's the joint account Gabby and I had, it's officially dead and buried."

"Gabby wiped out your account?" Kelly asked in disbelief.

"It didn't take much, there wasn't much left," Casey told him.

Kelly was still confused. "Left from what?"

From the look on Casey's face, he clearly didn't want to get into this, but he could see there wasn't any way out of it now. He leaned back against the cushions and explained to Kelly, "When Gabby and I first moved in together we got a joint account, it made sense at the time...but..."

"What?" Kelly asked.

"Every other week or so, Gabby would mention something she saw that she just had to have, that she thought we needed for the apartment...new furniture, decor, new clothes, stuff for Louie, stuff for Bria, I told her we needed to keep a better handle on our finances incase anything happened, if there was an emergency...but she always had an answer. It was 'You're an alderman now, we can afford it', 'I co-own a bar, we can afford it', 'You just finished a construction job, we can afford it'..."

"Question? Was this part of what you guys were arguing over when she stormed out?" Kelly asked.

Casey weakly laughed, "No, when I was letting her have it of how she never stopped to take me into consideration for anything in our marriage, that was the one thing that slipped my mind, how she played fast and loose with our money. A few days after Gabby stormed out, I got the monthly statement, we were down to $300 in our account and she took it out when she left."

Kelly felt a rock forming in his stomach as a very unpleasant thought came to mind, "Was that..."

Casey shook his head, "No...Gabby didn't know it but I didn't pour all my money into our account, I kept my old one and kept all the paperwork separate, it was a decent amount of money...was."

Kelly raised an eyebrow inquiringly, "What happened?"

"Last week I got a call from the credit card company," Casey told him. "Gabby maxed out our credit card, to pay that off..." the rest went without saying.

That must've been what the phone call was about that Tony had witnessed. It made sense to Kelly, if he got a call like that out of the blue, he'd be screaming too.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he asked.

"How could I?" Casey replied. "How could I ever tell you or anyone something like that?"

"Do you have anything to run on?" Kelly asked.

Casey nodded, "A few thousand, not great but, it'll keep the rent paid up for the time being. At least I can sleep knowing I'm not in debt and there's no interest compounding on anything, and..."

Kelly watched Casey's eyes as he seemed to zone out for a second. "Matt?"

"I ever tell you...I had an aunt that wound up in bankruptcy court?" Casey asked.

Now it was Kelly who stood there with a blank look on his face. He shook his head and answered, "No, I didn't know that."

"Her husband dipped into the receipts from their small business they ran, didn't tell her, bought three new cars, kept them at a storage unit, then divorced her and left her with the bill...a couple guys from the IRS or whoever, kicked in her door at 6 in the morning and dragged her out in her nightgown. The court let her husband walk away Scot free, she was taken right to jail because she couldn't pay the taxes they owed."

"Man!"

Casey shook his head, "I don't know, I guess they're more subtle about it now...but back then...my parents argued about money all the time and I used to worry we'd be taken away too...wind up in court, in jail...it was one of the reasons why they divorced, because they couldn't stop arguing about how much money they were spending, and on what...it was scary."

"I can see that," Kelly said somberly.

"I've been going over everything," Casey gestured to the papers, "and barring any unexpected problems, any emergencies...it's still going to take me six months to get caught up, bare bones."

Now it all made sense.

"So the reason you kept blowing off going to Molly's or to the clubs was-"

"I didn't want to have to explain why I couldn't afford the cover charge, or the tab," Casey answered. "I'm really sorry, Kelly, you have no idea how embarrassing this is. I've worked my whole life and I have nothing to show for it." He glanced around the apartment, "I cancelled the cable, internet, anything I can live without, I got rid of. I was hoping if some construction jobs came in that I could make a bigger dent in it, but the weather's been shit for construction right now."

Kelly didn't know what to say. He sat down on the couch beside Casey and tried to make sense of all this.

"Do me a favor, will you? Don't tell anyone at 51 about this," Casey said.

Kelly shook his head, "I won't."

The two men sat in silence for a minute just staring ahead, until Kelly broke the silence asking, "So this is what you do all night, just sit around looking at nothing?"

Casey choked on a small laugh. "Pretty much."

"Well, I'm depressed," Kelly said cynically. "Come on, let's go to Molly's, the drinks are on me."

"Kelly-"

"What? When you get caught up you can pay for me one night."

Casey thought about it, nodded slightly, and grabbed his jacket.

Severide lay awake in his bed staring at the ceiling, thinking. Of all the problems Casey could be having during his separation from Gabby, he'd sure never seen this one coming.

Some things started to occur to him. He'd wondered for years, but never asked because it wasn't any of his business, when they made lieutenant they each got the same pay, and Casey had his construction work on the side, but in all the years they'd known each other, he'd never seen Casey splurge for anything. He had his one truck, for his business and for his day-to-day errands. Wincing at the memories now, he remembered ribbing Casey when they were younger that since he had a lieutenant's salary now, he ought to pop for something roadworthy, something fast and flashy. He smiled faintly as he remembered Casey's cynical response, "Big talk for a guy whose Camaro only has three quarters matching paint on it."

He'd thought about it off and on, and it never seemed to make sense, sure for a long time Casey was with Hallie, and it was always more expensive to be in a relationship than to be single, still, between the two of them, it just seemed like Casey always sat on his money. Now he knew why. He definitely got that there was a lot about Casey's past he didn't casually bring up, he understood that, there was a lot of stuff he didn't willingly volunteer either, but the older they got, he found out more and more just how little he knew about Matt's home life growing up.

Of all the things Gabby could've done, running Casey into debt never entered Kelly's mind. He never gave it any real thought, but hearing it now, he'd seriously thought she had more sense than that. But, he supposed it just went to show how little you could actually know somebody you worked with for several years. Working with them was one thing, living with them was a whole other one. And now Casey was left to pick up the pieces of the mess she'd made that nearly wiped him completely out. And he knew Casey, he wouldn't accept charity, he wouldn't ask for help. But...Kelly scratched his head as he thought, there had to be some way to help him.

Casey unlocked his door and opened it to see who was knocking. Kelly stood outside with a pizza box and a six-pack of beer. "You eaten yet?"

Casey shook his head, "Come on in. What's the occasion?"

"Well I knew you were here doing nothing tonight," Kelly answered as he set the food on the table, and revealed a bag looped over his wrist, "So I brought some movies for us to watch."

"I'm glad you're here," Casey said as he shut the door. "I had a very interesting conversation with my landlord today."

"Oh?"

"Seems that my rent's been paid up for the next two months. Now since I just got the money to pay it today for one month, I was...surprised, to say the least. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?"

The smirk on Kelly's face as he turned around told Casey all he needed to know.

"Kelly-"

"Hey, you'll get caught up that much quicker, what's wrong with it?" Kelly asked.

"I don't want charity."

"It's not charity, it's family," Kelly said. He set the bag on the table, then reached in his jacket and pulled an envelope out of his sleeve, "Now this might be interpreted as charity."

"What is it?" Casey asked skeptically.

"Open it up," Kelly told him.

Casey took the envelope curiously, ripped the flap open, and felt his jaw drop when he saw the hundred dollar bills in it. More than he could immediately count without sorting through them.

"What the hell is this?" Casey asked.

Kelly raised one finger for Casey to hold his questions, reached in his pocket and took out a folded piece of paper and handed it to Casey too. He unfolded it and saw it was a copy of a bill of sale.

His eyes doubled in size. "You sold your motorcycle?"

"I only took it out a couple times a year, let somebody have it that'll get some real use out of it," Kelly said for an explanation.

Casey dropped his hands to his sides and looked at Severide in disbelief, "Kelly, I can't take this."

"Well I'm not taking it back, so you better," Kelly told him.

"Kelly, you didn't have to do this," Casey was still dumbfounded by this sudden revelation.

"No, I didn't have to," Kelly replied. He looked Casey in the eyes and told him, "I wanted to."

Casey shook his head, clearly lost, "I don't even know what to say...I don't...I can't believe you did this. I...I..." Casey suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to sit down before he fainted.

Kelly stepped over to the couch and told Casey, "Now you can get everything hooked back up, and still put some money away."

Casey looked at the envelope in his hand and absently brought his other one up over his mouth. He closed his eyes and shook his head, then looked up at Kelly, "I can't believe you actually did this. Why?"

Kelly shrugged, "What good is it if I can't help my best friend?"

Matt groaned, "Oh, Kelly..."

Severide sat on the arm of the couch and told him, "I wanted to do this, just take it."

"Kelly, I..." a bunch of jumbled incoherent sounds made their way out of Casey's mouth as he tried to talk, but nothing was happening, finally he turned and leaned over and hugged Kelly. "Thank you...you don't know what this means to me."

Kelly leaned over Casey and patted his back and told him, "Come on, let's eat before the pizza gets cold."