Meredith and Derek sat down at the dinner table waiting for Derek's mum to bring over the dinner. When suddenly all that could be heard was the sound of feet, lots of feet running down the stairs. Derek stood up and began to introduce everyone.

"Meredith these are my four sisters." Derek pointed to the first one on the left."
"This is Nancy she is 14. This is Kathy she is 12, This is Annabelle she is 10 and last but not least my baby sister Amelia who is 8."
Meredith removed her hand from under the table and waved at everyone, Derek's sisters all smiled and said hello.

The meeting was interrupted by the arrival of Carolyn as she walked through the doors with a very large pot of Spaghetti Bolognaise, everyone suddenly heard Derek's stomach grumble, Meredith let out a small giggle. Derek wiped his head around and looked at Meredith he had never heard a sound like it, it was as if Whitney Houston or someone was singing in his ears.

Dinner passed around and it was time for Meredith to leave, Meredith and Derek said their goodbyes before Carolyn drove Meredith home.

"Thank you for having me for dinner Mrs Shepherd."

"Oh, Meredith your more than welcome, we love having Derek's friends over, oh and please Meredith dear stop calling me Mrs Shepherd, its Carolyn.

"Okay, thank you very much for dinner, Carolyn."

"Is your mum home dear?"

"No not yet she will be soon." Meredith lied.

"Okay then dear, look forward to seeing you soon." Mrs Shepherd replied

"Thank you very much for dinner." Meredith then made her way out of the car and into her home.

Meanwhile Derek began to make his way up to bed when his mother walked through the door.

''I'm off to bed mum." Derek said as he turned around and then proceeded to run up the stairs.

"Ok Derek, be up there soon." Carolyn replied.
"It's ok mum, you don't need to come up." Derek said now running up the stairs.
"I am coming up, there is no use arguing with me." Carolyn yelled up the stairs, she did not get a reply.

Derek changed into his pyjamas and walked into the bathroom across the hall from his bedroom and began to brush his teeth, comb his hair and use the toilet. Once finished he made his way back into his bedroom and pulled the covers down and hopped in. His mother came through the door holding a glass of water.

"Here you go Der, I know how you get thirsty sometimes."
"Thanks mum, but what did you want to say to me, I have school tomorrow and its quite late."
"I just wanted to say, Meredith is a keeper. Goodnight dear." Carolyn planted a kiss on the top of his head and pushed herself off his bed and walked out of Derek's bed.

Derek lay awake that night thinking about what his mother had been saying, he definitely knew he like Meredith. He never thought it would happen, especially at the young crisp age of 12, he had a crush, a serious school girl butterfly when they walk into the room crush.

Derek rolled over and decided he had to get some rest if it was all possible.

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP
Was the sound of Meredith's alarm at 6.30 in the morning. Meredith groaned and rolled over to check the time and make sure it really was 6.30.
Meredith sat up in bed and pulled the cover away from her, put her feet into her fluffy pink slippers and made her way over to the window to see if her parents car was there. She felt her heart sink when there was no car outside the window she was really hoping that she could tell her parents about her first day at school.
Meredith made her way out of her bedroom still packed up in boxes and into the bathroom that was attached to her bedroom.

A couple of blocks away Derek stirred himself awake leapt out of bed and got dressed.

He ran down the stairs and out the front door of his house without even saying good morning to his mother. Derek had never been this excited to go back to school before , he had met this intriguing young girl.

Meredith saw that her parents were not in the drive at home. She went down to the garage and took out her pale pink bike and blue helmet and began to ride to school. Meredith didn't really like riding to school but it was the only other option than walking two kilometres to school which would take almost an hour. Meredith only had half an hour to school started.

Derek power walked through the school building with 15 minutes until class started, hoping that Meredith would be there sorting out her books or something. He walked down the long corridor, looked out at the other high schoolers who made their way to their lockers to grab their books for the first period.

He walked down a smaller corridor and saw her standing there looking puzzled.

"Morning Meredith, you look quite puzzled."
"Oh yeah… I just forgot where my locker is, you know because of the no names or numbers. The lockers are just plain old grey doors one after another, and I really need to find my locker to put my books in. Oh and I just totally embarrassed myself by rambling."

Derek couldn't help but chuckle, its fine.

Meredith got her book and began to walk to class with Derek in tow.