I know I said I would update in the next few days and now it's been like 2 weeks. I suck I'm sorry but I think this is a semi long chapter so hopefully that makes up for it?

DEREKS POINT OF VIEW!

After dropping Casey off, I pull out my phone, not wanting to go back to my apartment alone until I have to pick her up.

"Hey you busy?" I ask when the person on the other line picks up.

"Yeah sure, just finished packing. What's up?" Sam responds.

20 minutes later, Sam and I are playing Babe Raider in his aunt's basement.

"Not that I don't mind kicking your ass at babe raider, but is there a particular reason you wanted to hang out at this exact moment?" Sam asks.

"Can't I see my best friend one last time before he goes back to Toronto and leaves me again?" I say, pretending to clutch my heart out of offense.

"Who knew Derek Venturi was such a sentimental guy? Now what's the real reason?"

"Nothing, I just dropped Case off somewhere and I probably have to pick her up again in 2 hours so I wanted to kill time."

"Ah I see. And where did you drop her off?"

"To get coffee with Jake," I mumble, not taking my eyes away from the screen.

"Hmm. Interesting."

"Can you stop analyzing me? Just because you're a psychology major doesn't mean everything has some deep meaning. I just wanted to play video games," I say with a slight annoyance in my tone. Sam knows me well enough to know I'm not actually annoyed though.

"No no totally, I understand. But are you going to ever explain to me why you didn't tell anybody Casey is your step sister? I've gone along with it for the past year without any questions, I think I deserve an explanation now." Sam asks me, while restarting the game since he beat me once again. Man, did he get better at this game in college? Maybe it has something to do with psychology, he can analyze my next moves or something.

"I don't know, it never came up."

"So Casey came up multiple times, but you never felt the need to say step sister? And all the times you told everybody about your family, you just never mentioned your other step sister? I see."

"Sam," I growl, "What did I just say about analyzing me?"

"I'm not, I'm not. Just asking questions. You're lucky I told Casey to go along with it, were you planning on just throwing her in the middle of your friends and never having it come up?"

"Yeah I guess that was kind of stupid. Thanks for helping me out there, I guess," I say with a smirk and shrug.

"So don't I deserve an explanation as a favor in return?"

"No, sorry," I say while taking a sip of the root beer in front of me.

"Just admit it Derek - you've finally realized your feelings for Casey and you're considering pursuing it now and you didn't want the whole step thing to get in the way or make people around you judge."

I spit out everything in my mouth and pause the game.

"What?!" I say, turning and looking at him, "Where did you get that from?!"

"Please Derek, am I wrong?"

I don't say or do anything besides staring at him with my mouth open out of shock.

"Exactly," he says smirking, clearly proud for figuring it out.

"How did you possibly know that?" I ask, still out of shock.

"Well I always knew you had feelings for her, even in high school. Which is why you hated me dating her, which is why I realized I needed to permanently end things with her. And then I figured you'd finally get together but then Casey went to New York for a year and I wasn't sure anymore. But then every time we talked last year, you'd bring her up and talk about how she was doing, so I knew you were still in touch, so I didn't lose the idea of you two in my head. Once I visited you and realized you'd dropped the step siblings part from your association of her, I had a pretty good idea why."

"So? I could've been in touch with her in like a brother-sister kind of way," I say, cringing at the word 'sister'.

"How much did you talk to Lizzie in the last year?"

I'm stumped at his question for a second until I respond.

"Shut up, that doesn't prove anything."

"Okay well tell me if I'm wrong when I say this is along the lines of what happened: You got to college, you stayed in touch with her, you realized you missed her a lot, got fucked up when you realized how you feel about her, went through some shit in a dark place, finally admitted you have feelings for her to someone else out loud, were secretly happy when your parents said they'd get you a place together, and are now trying to think about how to tell her- oh and you hate that she's hanging out with Jake at this very moment."

I'm staring at Sam amazed. I mean I knew he knew me pretty well, but this is insane.

"Wha- How. How do you possibly know all this?"

"I know you better than I know anybody else in my life Derek. Now, have I finally earned the right to the entire story?"

I have no other option than to give it to him now, otherwise he might figure that part out himself too, so I begin the short recap of what happened in the past year.

—

After I got to Queens, I lived in a dorm where Ben was my room mate. We met Jake through hockey and slowly became close friends with Olivia and Jen joining our friend group.

I got close to Olivia fast, and I thought I'd have feelings for her. She was exactly my type, and we got along so well. But something felt like it was missing and I could never put my finger on what it was. I felt like I was obligated to myself to at least try to pursue something with her, just because that's what I would've done before. So, we started hanging out alone more.

Throughout this time, I was keeping in touch with Casey. We'd text and she'd send me long paragraphs on her day to day life and I'd tell her whatever I could about home and everything I knew was going on.

The first time I visited home from college, I felt really alone at home. Sure I love Marti, I love my dad, I guess I kinda love Edwin. Heck, I love Lizzie and Nora as much as I love Marti and my own mother at this point. But I felt really alone in my own house, it felt quiet and the first night after everybody went to sleep, I ended up hanging out in Casey's room for a while and reminiscing about our fights and schemes.

I called Casey that night and pretended it was a butt dial, but stayed on the phone with her for an hour. After I hung up, I finally fell asleep feeling a little better.

This is the first time I realized I might feel something for her more than step siblings, when I realized how she made that lonely feeling go away and how much I actually missed her.

That's when I realized I was in deep shit.

I can't have feelings for my step sister. Isn't that like illegal or something? No I guess not, we're both 18, not related at all. But I don't know, I loved Lizzie and Nora and I wouldn't want to put myself in a place where they'd be mad at me.

So once I got back to college, I started drinking a lot.

I'd go to parties, and try to hook up with random brunettes that reminded me of Casey but I'd never let it go further than making out once it reached that point because I'd feel gross.

Eventually, Olivia noticed this and asked me to hang out one day. We were sitting on my couch one day, drinking. Her: wine, me: beer.

Until eventually she randomly grabbed my face and started kissing me. I was surprised, but I continued. This is what I was supposed to do right? Here's this girl in front of me, smoking hot blonde, actually intelligent, somebody I can hang out with for hours without getting bored, this would be the perfect way to move on from - well you know who.

But it still didn't feel right. I didn't know how to stop the kissing without making her feel uncomfortable until she pulled back herself.

That's when I noticed she had tears in her eyes.

"Hold up hold up hold up- why are you crying? Am I that bad?" I joked, while completely freaked out since I don't do well with tears.

"No, it's not that. Imwjustnoto-" she starts blubbering, but I clearly couldn't understand her through her crying, which was getting harder.

I got up quickly and got her tissues and came back and sat down next to her on my dorm bed.

"Okay how about you calm down and then tell me what's wrong?" I say, slightly relieved that at least this way the kissing had stopped without me having to make it weird. Dealing with tears is better than dealing with awkward post-kiss situations I think.

"Me and my high school boyfriend dated for 4 years in high school and then decided that we needed some time apart to understand ourselves better and see other people in college, I have a friend attending college with him who told me he's already been on dates and hooked up with girls at parties, while I've been sitting here spending my nights alone in my dorm room crying and watching Rom Com movies," Olivia started explaining.

I tried not to smile, since she's clearly in distress, but I can't help but think how similar her and Casey are when it comes to break ups.

"So I decided I'd try to move on too. But I couldn't get myself to feel anything real for anybody. I thought maybe having one fling of a hook up would make me feel better. And then I thought you were interested in me before, but then you started hooking up with a lot of girls too and drinking a lot and I thought I missed my chance for the hook up so it was now or never when I asked you to hang out today, but I just can't get myself to do it, it feels wrong. I know I'm not dating him anymore but it feels wrong," she says, sniffling while wiping her dripping mascara off the side of her eyes with the tissues I gave her.

Before I have a chance to respond, she starts continuing again.

"And then I also started thinking about how pathetic I am, trying to hook up with this guy before he loses interest in me, while he's clearly on some kind of hook up frenzy right now going through his own shit. And don't get me wrong, I don't think of you as someone to just have a fling with and get over, I did think you're a really sweet guy, but I can't see myself-"

"No it's fine you don't need to explain yourself. I would understand if anybody viewed me that way considering how I've been acting lately," I tell her.

"Yeah, what happened to you? You weren't like this in the beginning of the year."

"I guess I'm kinda in the same boat as you with trying to get over someone. I don't think it's working though. And don't get me wrong, I think you're great too, but I can't see myself liking anybody else either."

"Awwww that is the sweetest thing ever, tell me about her."

So I spent the next hour telling her all about Casey and how she's in New York and I miss her. Just conveniently leaving out the whole step sibling part and telling her how it'd be difficult if we dated, since our families are close and I wouldn't want to ruin it if it didn't work out between us.

She also spends that hour reassuring me that if I feel this strongly for her, I'd be crazy to not give it a chance once she's back. It feels nice to talk about Casey like this, as if it's a normal "boy likes girl, scared of his feelings" situation and she actually makes me feel like it wouldn't be totally crazy if I thought I liked her.

She also tells me all about her ex boyfriend from college, and how upset she's been.

After this, we made a pact to be each other's "rocks" (She chose the term - not me) and we slowly became best friends. I'd hang out with her and make sure she wasn't going crazy being upset over her ex, and she'd hang out with me making sure I'm not drinking a lot and hooking up with random girls.

Life slowly went back to normal, and I came to terms with the fact that I have feelings for her and decided to slowly pursue them once she's back.

—

Sam is looking at me with a stupid grin on his face as I'm finishing up my story. That old sap.

"You'd think that having a whole year to think about this would give me some sort of plan right? Nope, I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing," I say groaning and putting my face in my hands, too embarrassed to look at him after I just talked about all these f-f-f-eelings.