Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Disclaimer: Don't own anything (sadly).

Casey frowned when she felt a familiar push in her seat from behind her. It had been happening all morning and she was starting to get annoyed. In every class that she had with Derek, he had decided to sit behind her as much as he could just to bug her by either pushing her seat closer to her desk or knocking her hand askew as she wrote her notes in class. He could actually be putting his time to use and pay attention in class. Instead he was putting his energy into drawing up hockey plays (she knew because she saw this every time she turned around to glare at him for nudging her), flirting with the girls around him and occasionally snoozing through lectures. It annoyed her how she had to work so hard to get the grades that she earned when he could easily have the same grades as her if he only applied himself. He just didn't want to. And he said that she was the challenged one. She laughed to herself as she thought about Derek thinking that he was better than she was. As she chuckled to herself again, Casey didn't notice as their Psychology teacher came over to tap her on the shoulder.

"Ms. McDonald? Do you have something that you would like to share with the class?"

Startled, Casey jumped in her seat and flushed before shaking her head no.

"No? Then perhaps you will explain the functions of the Pituitary Gland to the rest of the class?"

Having no other choice but to nod her head yes, Casey explained the functions of the Pituitary Gland to the rest of her bored classmates. She may not be able to figure out Derek and what happens in his mind on a daily basis, but she could always be able to understand the old, reliable pituitary gland.

Leave it to Casey to turn a simple explanation into a five minute speech on the functions of some gland their teacher had called on her to talk about. He hadn't been paying attention because he had been torn between talking to Cindy-what's-her-face beside him and kicking Casey in the butt while also drawing up a hockey play in his notebook. Then all of the sudden Casey was facing the rest of the class babbling about some gland that they had supposedly learned about awhile ago. What was it called? Pituilary? Pituitary Gland? Either way, he was torn between feeling embarrassed that he had made out with the super keener standing before them all and also thinking that she was one of the most humorous people that he knew.

Finally their teacher politely yet firmly said 'thank you' and asked Casey to sit down (she had stood up at some point during her explanation to better face the class and make her point) so that they could continue on like before. Once Casey was seated, Derek went back to nudging her occasionally in the butt. It was funny to see her get all bothered by the simple gesture. As if one nudge was going to completely throw off her note taking for that period and ruin her learning for that entire day. There was also the added bonus that she turned around and gave him a huffy glare if he kicked her enough and that was entertainment in itself to see her scrunched up face before her braid whipped back around as she resumed her diligent note taking.

Maybe he could catch her as the bells rang and jibe her a little bit about her great Pituitary Gland speech. That would give him something to be entertained by next period when he didn't have class with her. He did have class with Cindy-what's-her-face and if she tried to sit by him and talk to him again, he was going to plug his ears with cotton. Her attempts at wittiness were failing and she wasn't interesting unless they were somewhere dark like the movie theatres which was frankly the place that he liked her best. He was a horrible person, he knew.

As the bell rang, he saw Casey drop her 'oh my god I can't live without this planner' organizer and bent to pick it up before following her down the hallway to wherever she was rushing off to. The organizer was very Casey-like with polka dots and hearts on the plastic outside cover. As he casually walked through the halls, he leafed through it and glanced over Casey's neat and loopy handwriting. Though it was weird and he would never admit it to anyone, he had always liked Casey's handwriting.

He had noticed it when she would leave notes for the entire family around the house like reminders to pick up milk or order dinner. She would always write on colorful post-it notes and in various colors of ink. And her handwriting was always so loopy while still retaining Casey's personality with her neatness. Sue him for noticing things like that. His own handwriting was horrendous and personally, he thought it was fitting of his slob-ish behavior.

He continued to leaf through pages until he got to recent days and noticed that she had different notes written down for this coming weekend on both Friday and Saturday. Friday she had Max written down with a heart drawn around it and Derek's game written in on Saturday's slot. Friday night was Max's last football game as a senior in high school and Saturday was Varsity hockey's season opening game. Derek couldn't help but feel a little bit excited that she was coming to his game or had at least written it down in her planner. She must be planning to go if it was written down because Casey didn't' do anything without consulting her planner first and lived by it religiously.

Before he could find her, the bell rang and Derek had to get to class. He smirked as he turned in the opposite direction towards his class. She would just have to live without her precious organizer for one whole period. He wondered how much she would freak out until she got it back.

Casey was internally freaking and trying to keep it from becoming external. She could not, repeat could not have lost her organizer. On most days, between dealing with schoolwork, the pressures of dating Max and the pressures of being tortured by Derek, that organizer was one of the only things besides Emily that kept her sane. The last time she had it was in Psychology and then all of the sudden it had vanished. She had probably left it there and would have to backtrack and retrieve it after her Biology class was over. Hopefully no one had looked through it or thrown it away or anything. Then she'd really be screwed.

"Casey!" Sheldon hissed from across the aisle. "Stop having such a forlorn look on your face! Emily's jabbing me and asking me to find out what's wrong!" Casey leaned back in her seat to look past Sheldon to Emily and give her the thumbs up sign. She then turned back to the board and tried really hard not to think about her little organizer all alone in the world without anyone to protect it. Some stupid freshman was probably abusing it and all she would find left was tattered pages and promises of organization and burden free days. She sighed again forlornly while Sheldon and Emily gave each other worried looks again.

"Casey!" Now where could her planner have gone off? Oh yes, Psychology classroom.

"Casey! Jesus woman you walk fast!" Emily puffed as she tried to keep up with a fast walking Casey. She was on a mission to rescue her poor little organizer.

"Where are you going so fast? In case you haven't noticed in the three-ish years you've been going here, the cafeteria is that way. You know, the general area where Sheldon is currently waving like a lunatic to us." Emily couldn't help but stare a minute at her boyfriend before running off after a still distracted Casey.

"FREEZE woman! Tell me where you are going!"

"I lost my organizer and I need to find it. You didn't by chance see it or pick it up by accident did you?!" Casey was nearly in hysterics. She needed that organizer, damn it.

"Err… it wouldn't so happen to be the organizer that you always have on you would it?" When Casey gave her a 'duh!' face and kept walking, Emily called out, "well, it wouldn't be the one that Derek is currently holding, is it?" This is sure to end badly Emily thought badly before taking a few steps back wards and trying to step in front of Derek before Casey could get to him first. She hadn't completely spotted him yet in the crowded hallway, but it was only a matter of time. Casey had eyes like laser beams when it came to matters like this.

"YOU!" Casey shrilled. Oh great, she had noticed.

"If you are as smart as I think you are Derek, you'll either give me that planner right now, or you'll run." Emily stated to a very bewildered Derek.

"But I was trying to find her to…oh hi Casey…" For the first time in Emily's life, she was witnessing Derek looking very, very frightened. And surprisingly, it was because of Casey McDonald. Who knew?

"Casey, this isn't what it seems. You just need to be rational and listen for a minute." Derek knew he was talking out of his ass, anything to get the rage out of her eyes at whatever it was she thought he did. All he knew was that one minute he was looking for her so that he could finally give her back the organizer (he had made her sweat enough) and the next thing he knew, she was looking like a bat out of hell. He wasn't sure what he did but he assumed it was because of the planner.

"I didn't take it, I swear! Well not technically…" Okay so this wasn't helping his case and she was still glaring at him like he had just done the worst thing imaginable. Except to Casey, this was one of the worst things imaginable. He groaned, he wasn't going to win either way. She was so pissy looking.

"Are you going to let me explain, or are you going to glare at me and throw a hissy fit?" When she didn't reply except to snatch her planner back from him and then look at him expectantly with a 'well?' look on her face he took that as a sign that the princess had deemed it acceptable for the peasant to speak.

"Okay, so I found your stupid organizer on the floor after Psych class and picked it up. I know you can't live, breathe or function without that organizer so I tried to find you in the hallway to give it back. But you walk so fast that I couldn't find you and I had to go to my own class. You survived one period without it and have it back now safe and sound. End of story, Derek saved the day. The end." He embellished the ending with a bow and dipped an imaginary hat towards her to see if she was up to smiling yet. When he saw her smile he relaxed a little until going completely stiff again as her arms found their way around his middle.

"Hey! Casey, I DON'T do hugging. Get OFF." She rolled her eyes at him as he tried to get away from her hug in public.

"Whatever Derek. Thanks for my organizer." She said before winking at him and turning to walk off to lunch with Emily and Sheldon.

Did she just wink at him? Did he just think that it cute that dorky Casey just winked at him?

Later that evening Casey was almost wishing that she didn't have her organizer back just yet. Having her organizer there reminded her constantly that she had to do an essay for French and finish her Calculus homework. It was already 9pm, which meant that it would be another late night for her. On nights like this, she really wanted to go back in time and kick herself for thinking that she could handle 2 extra subjects as a senior in high school when she planned her schedule in the summer. As she suppressed a yawn, she tried to pep herself up by repeating I don't need sleep over and over again in her head. This failed however as she yawned in the middle of her mantra and fell forward, face first, onto her desk.

"Uh, Case? You okay? You're acting even more spacey than usual, which is odd." Derek appeared in her doorway in his pajamas, presumably to bug her. "You know, Max called earlier twice but no one could rouse you from your zone. Marti even came in your room yelling twice and you barely even glanced at her."

Casey mumbled something from her position face down on her desk. She could feel the wood of her desk aligning with her face and the coolness was starting to feel really good against her pounding headache. She hadn't realized that she had such a bad migraine until that moment.

"Derek, if you're going to bug me, can you wait until tomorrow, I have a lot of work and I have a bad headache." Derek's eyebrows scrunched in confusion. She never usually gave up this easily. She must be really exhausted.

"Come here" he said sitting down on her bed.

"What?" she mumbled again from the desk. Maybe she would just fall asleep here. It really was comfortable if she forgot about the position her neck was in.

"Casey, you'll break your neck that way, come here for a minute and take a quick break." He rose up to his feet again and pulled her away from the desk over to a sitting position on her bed. Then he began to knead the muscles in her shoulders, neck and upper back. She stiffened before relaxing and sighing happily. As he loosened a particularly stiff knot in her neck, she moaned softly and let her head fall forward. It was all Derek could do not to replace his hands with his lips instead. Now wasn't really the time even though he really, really wanted to kiss her all of the sudden.

"You're really good at this. Did you go to massage school or something?" Casey joked as Derek moved away from her neck and back into her shoulders.

"No, I just kind of picked it up from hockey and having the trainers work on me after games and stuff. Plus," he smirked though she couldn't see, "it comes in handy for times like these."

"Or for when you want to give a 'massage' to one of your 'special friends'" she said in reply.

"Mmhmmm, this is handy in those times too, Case." Silence ensued as Derek's hands worked their magic and Casey let herself relax for the first time in hours. It was a while before either of them spoke.

"Oh, so why were you kicking me in class all day? It was really annoying all day."

"You're fun to bug Case. Haven't you figured that out yet?"

"So really this means: 'I can't be nice to you for more than 10 minutes at a time'"

"Pretty much, your 10 minutes are up in 30 seconds. Just a friendly warning." His hands slowed and moved to play with the end of her long braid instead.

"Oh yeah? What happens then? Should I take cover? Duck and hide?" She smirked at their playful banter. She liked when they were like this instead of the normal biting tone their banter usually had.

"More like proceed with caution." He smirked before taking her lips in a fervent kiss. He pulled her close as their tongues met and entwined themselves. Before Casey could grasp what was happening, she felt herself falling forward as Derek fell backward onto her bed letting out an 'oomph' into her mouth. She giggled making him smile and break from her lips as he turned his attention instead to her neck. Unlike Max, Derek didn't bite down painfully in a 'I'm gonna mark you' sort of way. Instead he trailed slow kissed from her collarbone up to behind her ear where he seemed to be enjoying her earlobe. He couldn't help but laugh into her skin as she pressed herself closer to him to allow him better access.

"Derek" she panted and shifted to kiss his neck.

"Hmmmm?" he mumbled from his ministrations in her neck. He was very, very occupied.

"Maybe we should, you know, stop." When he didn't respond and only seemed to still be fascinated by her earlobe, she moved again and bit down on his earlobe instead.

"Will that make you stop?" she laughed. He groaned and nuzzled her neck.

"Not really. It was kind of hot."

"Come on, seriously, we have to stop. I'm pretty sure that's all the 'practice' I need for one night. It's definitely all the practice I can take." She mumbled as an afterthought.

Derek smiled cockily.

"Can't take the heat McDonald?"

"Oh just get off me, Venturi." She groaned and shoved at him.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm going, I'm going. But don't forget that you'll miss my sexiness when you are shriveled up in bed all alone tonight." He smirked before she could hit him with a pillow on his way out.

With her door shut and locked, Casey found that she no longer had a headache or any little aches at all. On the other side of the door, Derek smiled to himself as he heard Casey's computer chair squeak and her fingers move on the keyboard. So her headache went away after all.

Please review guys! Reviews let me know that people are actually reading this story and motivate me to write more (like what I'm doing at 2am right now :D ) So review, review, review! It means so much to me!!