I just wanted to say thank you so much for all the follows and reviews in just a few days! I was shocked at how many people are still reading Dasey fanfic, I thought I was the only one honestly. Hope you guys are enjoying it!

The next couple days fly by normally. I spend most the days unpacking my things and getting ahead in my classes. Derek spends most the days outside of the apartment in practice, and since I don't really know anybody else yet or have a car, I spend most the days sitting by myself at home.

I guess whatever weird feeling of sweetness he had towards me temporarily has passed and we're back to coexisting with an occasional bickering over small things.

It's been 3 days since he took me to the roof of the library when he pops his head into my room early in the morning.

"Case, what have you been doing all day while I've been at practices?"

"I don't know, sitting at home. It's not like I have a car or friends."

"Oh." His face drops, "I'm sorry I totally didn't realize, things have been so hectic since practice started again. How about I make it up to you tonight, I'll get ice cream on my way home and we'll watch some stupid movie. I'll even let you pick and then tomorrow we go furniture shopping for couches for the living room? Because I'm seriously tired of sitting on the floor as cozy as it is."

I'm smiling at the prospect of having plans.

"Sure Derek, that sounds good. Why don't we get takeout for dinner too? Or is your practice going to end too late?"

"Uh no practice should be over by like 4, but I promised Olivia we'd get dinner. We always get dinner once every 2-3 weeks to catch up. You're welcome to join us though, I can have her pick you up."

"No, I'm okay. Enjoy your dinner, take your time."

Why do I sound annoyed? Derek is allowed to have plans with whoever he wants, it's not like we had plans to get dinner and he was canceling on me. I did miss out on a whole year of his life.

"Are you sure? I can cancel on her if you wanted to do something."

"No seriously it's okay, we'll do the ice cream and movie after. I have stuff to catch up on anyways," I say lying. "Maybe I'll take a walk to campus and try to make friends or something."

"Okay," he says with a smile, "Don't get yourself killed or something or Nora might seriously kill me considering it hasn't even been a week."

He's out of the room before my pillow is able to hit his face.

—

The walk to campus isn't too bad. Only about ten minutes. I don't know many buildings yet, but I figured I'd walk around and try to find my classes buildings, and maybe even see the inside of the library, since that's technically the only building I know right now.

I'm staring at a campus map trying to find the hall for my Calculus class, when I walk smack into a hard chest and send both of our papers flying. I look up to see Jake, Derek's friend that I had met a few days ago.

"Oh my god sorry I didn't realize where I was going, I didn't mean to mess up your things. Derek would kill me if I started the Klutzilla thing around his friends again."

He laughs while we're bending down to pick up our papers.

"No worries, I'm the one who knows his way around, I should be apologizing to you. What are you doing on campus when classes haven't started yet?"

"I thought I'd find the rooms for my classes beforehand so I'm not late on the first day, and maybe check out the library," I say quietly, realizing how dorky I sound.

"Derek was right, you are a keener," he says with a wide grin, "Here I can at least show you the way to our media for the arts class if that helps."

"Yeah that'd be great! I haven't been able to even locate that building on the map."

"I'm actually a teaching assistant for a summer class in that building, which is where I was walking now if you wanted to come along."

"Really? That's so cool. What class?"

"Introduction to writing, the basic writing course all freshmen take. Most of the class is either incoming sophomores who failed the first time or transfers."

As I walk alongside him, I'm secretly hopeful that I'll meet people who might be in my classes later. I'm so glad I ran into him out of all people.

—

Once I'm back in my apartment, I warm up some leftover pasta while I go sit in my bed to eat while reading emails and looking through pictures from New York. The only furniture in the apartment right now is both of our bedroom furniture so our beds and desk and dresser. As of now we don't have a dining table or living room couch yet.

Of course Derek made sure to get a TV before I came, but he hasn't had time to set it in yet so not sure where we're going to watch the movie. He probably thought of something.

I was tired from walking to campus, and all around campus. I even sat in on Jake's entire class. He was a great teacher and the students seemed to really like him, all thanking him on the way out since it was their last day. I even got this one red-headed girl's number who turned out to be in my calculus class. I start dozing off waiting for Derek to get home.

"Case, psst. Are you awake?" Derek says shaking me.

I don't know how long I've been asleep but when my eyes open I see Derek there with a smile on his face holding 2 cartons of ice cream and 2 giant spoons.

"Am I too late? It's only 9:30 I thought it'd be fine."

Wow I fell asleep at 8:30 PM. I'm embarrassed.

"No sorry I just had a tiring day," I say while getting out of bed and consciously fixing my hair. I see Derek look at my legs when I'm getting out of bed but shrug it off because he's a normal 20 year old male and I am wearing really short shorts.

"How exactly are we planning on watching a TV with no movie?"

"Easy, I have DVD's and my computer in my room, we can watch on my bed," he says while walking over to his room with the ice cream still in his hand. I follow him into his room and take a seat at his desk. He takes off his shirt to change into his pajamas, and I can't deny that I'm surprised at how much his body changed in college.

I guess he noticed me gawking because he turns and gives me a grin before asking if I like what I see. Rolling my eyes, I face the other way while he changes his pants.

I'm staring at all his posters and pictures he has up. There's some typical ones of our whole family, a few with Abby, of course one of just Marti. I'm surprised to see the picture of me and him at graduation hanging up. I remember that picture, we were wearing our graduation gowns and George and my mom asked us to take a picture together. Derek pretended to act disgusted before he actually put his arm around me for the picture and I remember feeling happy that we were almost sort of friends.

"Hello, earth to Casey?"

I turn back around, Derek is changed and under his comforter with his laptop on his lap while patting the spot next to him on his bed, the side closer to the wall. I awkwardly crawl over him before sitting on the comforter while he's picking a movie.

I feel too weird getting under the same comforter so I sit pretzel legged next to him while beginning on my ice cream. I'm pleased with his ice cream selection choice, remembering Chunky Monkey was my favorite flavor. He got rocky road for himself I'm assuming, anybody who knows him would know that's his favorite flavor.

"Let me try," he says motioning towards my ice cream while bringing his spoon closer.

"Yeah of course, but don't put your rocky road ice cream spoon into my carton, I don't like when the flavors mix like that."

He rolls his eyes at my particularness and then asks how he's supposed to try the ice cream when he can't use his spoon.

I ponder about it for a second until I finally take a scoop on my own spoon and put it in his mouth without thinking too much about it. He looks surprised but then does the same back with his rocky road ice cream. I think about bringing up the fact that he doesn't care about mixing flavors in his carton so I could've used my own spoon, but he was being nice so need to start an argument.

"Anyways, what movie are we watching?"

"Sorry Case, the only DVD's I have are all horror movies. I forgot about that when I asked this morning. I picked something not too scary though if that helps."

I shudder remembering the last time I watched a horror movie with him but nod agreeing since it's better than no movie at all. I'm feeling cold now with his air conditioning blasting and eating ice cream so I silently get under the comforter with him, both of our backs leaning on pillows against the headboard. He turns off the lights so it's easier to see the laptop screen.

The movie is definitely "not too scary." It's really freaking scary. I'm screaming at every scene, and eventually put my ice cream down on his desk to avoid flinging it all over the bed.

Derek slowly slides his arm behind me. I look at him from the corner of my eye suspiciously.

"What? It'll be easier if you just hide in my shoulder than flinging the comforter up to your face every 2 minutes and knocking the laptop over."

He does have a point.

And that's exactly what I do for the next hour until the movie ends. By the time it's over, I'm completely crawled into his shoulder with my hair covering my face.

"Is it over?"

"Yes Case it's over, you're such a baby," he says laughing, I can tell he's doing his infamous smirk even through the darkness, now that the laptop light was gone.

We're sitting in silence for a little while until I finally gather up the courage to speak.

"Is it okay if I sit here for a little while before I go back to my bed?"

"Are you really that scared?" he says, clearly teasing in his voice.

"Ugh okay never mind," I start getting out of his bed and crossing over him to go back to my own room.

"Relax Case I was joking, we can talk about other stuff until you forget the movie and then you can go back to your bed," he says while grabbing my arm when I was about to get off the bed. Because I was crossing over him, I land on top of him.

This is a weird situation especially considering we're in the dark so I quietly roll back to my spot under the comforter, slightly relieved that he told me to stay because I was terrified to even walk back to my bedroom right now. At least back at home I had Lizzie when I got scared by these movies.

"Okay so what'd you do today?" he says laying down with his head propped up on one hand facing me. I'm laying down looking up at the ceiling to avoid making eye contact even if it's dark, I've never talked to Derek this way before and it's hard not to feel weird about it. Our bodies are slightly touching from the closeness of the bed.

"Well I was walking around campus looking for my classes buildings when I ran into Jake. Literally, ran right into him. And he offered to show me around and even let me sit in on the summer class he was teaching. He also offered to show me the coffee shop tomorrow evening when we meet!"

I can feel Derek's body stiffening next to me, not sure why.

"That's cool," he says with his tone seeming colder than before.

"Well how was your date with Olivia?" I ask trying to change the topic and lighten the mood, although I'm not sure what darkened it in the first place.

"Date? Olivia and I are not dating Case. We're just really good friends and were catching up over food. She helped me with a lot of personal things last year and I helped her through trying to get over someone. These dinners are our way of making sure the other person isn't slipping up."

"Personal things? What kind of personal things were you going through?"

"I'll tell you one day maybe. Tell me about New York, you've barely mentioned it."

"Well, it started off rough. I thought my kiss with Jesse at the end of the summer meant we'd have something when I went to New York but he got there a few weeks before me and had already met a girl by the time I got there."

"Oh shit, that's rough."

"Language," I say narrowing my eyes at him.

"Yeah yeah, but I knew he was a dick. Did you make other friends at least?"

"Yeah some of the girls in the show were really nice, I spent most my time with them and bonding with my dad who I was living with so that was great. But I did miss home."

"Well home missed you too."

—

I have no idea what time I dozed off, but when I wake up it's light outside and I'm still in Derek's bed, I'm all the way against the wall on my side of the bed while he's just a few inches away, taking up the entire bed.

I wake him up with a violent shaking.

"Der-ek!"

"What? I'm not even awake yet, what'd I do wrong?"

"Why didn't you wake me up and send me to my own bed?"

"Well," he's opening his eyes and turning his body over to look at me, "After you fell asleep, very rudely mid conversation I should add, I had 3 options."

"And those were?"

"Either A) I wake you up and you yell at me. B) I go and sleep in your bed, and then you wake up and yell at me. or C) I just sleep next to you, and you wake up and yell at me. And then option C required the least amount of moving, and I was going to get yelled at either way soooo."

"You're an idiot," while rolling my eyes at him.

"You excited to go furniture shopping?" he says while getting out of his bed and getting his things ready for his shower.

"Yes, finally a couch and dining table!"

"Okay how about we go get ready, we'll go to a diner for breakfast, and then shopping day?"

"Sounds good, don't forget I need to be back by 5 PM to go to the coffee place with Jake."

"Yeah yeah," he says shrugging his shoulders. I wonder if he doesn't like Jake or something. He's always been weird about guys I'm hanging out with, but this one is literally HIS friend that he introduced me to. Maybe it's a Sam situation all over.

Before I can ask, he's out of the room to go shower so I go gather my own stuff from my own.