50 ficlets: Prompts #30, 27, 41, 50, 9
Here are my next five entries for my Life With Derek claim at 50ficlets. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own Life With Derek. At all.
Author's note: I'm probably a little harsher with ratings than is called for, but better safe than sorry? Also, sorry for the delay, school starting and White Soxtober have been keeping me busier than they should have.
Past entries can be found at my table!
#30 - Boys and Girls - PG - 451 words
Derek heard Casey's agitated scream before she came crashing through the front door. He was sitting in his recliner and rolled his eyes as she proceeded to take off all six million of her winter-wear accessories while she ranted, "Do you know what the difference between boys and girls is?!"
Derek grinned. Sometimes she just asked for it. "Well, Case, for those of us who paid attention in anatomy class, girls have these lovely body parts called --"
"Derek?" she asked, cutting him off and looking at him with a confused expression on her face. "Where's Mom?"
"Nora's out grocery shopping with Lizzie and Edwin, and George is taking Marti to tap-dance class."
Casey sighed. "So I'm stuck with you?"
"Oh, trust me, Case, I don't want to hear about your problems any more than you want me here."
She flopped down on the couch, sat silently for a minute, then said, "Well, I have to tell someone."
"Here's a phone," he said, throwing it on her lap.
She ignored it. "What I was saying before, is that boys don't know about what they're feeling as well as girls do."
"I feel that I don't want to hear this."
"For example, when a girl tells her on-again, off-again boyfriend of six months that she loves him, and he stands there in complete silence, it can only prove that he doesn't know how to vocalize his feelings before he doesn't even really know what he's feeling. Which is that he loves me - or her - , too."
Derek looked at her for a second. "Uh-huh," he said. He squinted. "Can I ask you something without you taking it in the wrongest, most dramatic way possible?"
Casey stared at him. "Of course."
"Maybe, just maybe, Max doesn't love you."
Casey shook her head. "Derek, that's stupid."
"No, it's a possibility."
"What, because it's impossible for a guy, any guy, to love me?!"
Derek waved his hands in front of her face. "No, see? That's taking it in the wrong way."
"Because even though Max is cute, and nice, and popular, doesn't mean he can't love me!"
"Casey!" Derek said, frustrated. "God, that's not what I meant! I meant that there are plenty of guys out there who love you, and so it doesn't really matter if Max doesn't. And yes, I said 'if'."
"But I love him," she said sadly.
Derek rolled his eyes. "Then I can't help you."
Casey paused. "You really think there are lots of guys out there who love me?"
Derek's eyes suddenly became focused on the screen. "Anything's possible."
"Like who?"
"Like people out there. Now go find them and let me watch hockey in peace."
---
#27 - Fast Forward - PG - 425 words
"'Where I'm Going To Be In Ten Years'," Derek read on Casey's laptop over her shoulder.
"Derek!" she said, turning around and shoving the unpleasant interruption.
"Your paper's blank," he noted. "So, what, you're not planning on living that long?"
"If you want to live until next year, you'd better stop sneaking up on me."
"No, wait, I can do this," Derek said. He fell comfortably on her bed, earning him a disdainful look. "Casey McDonald will be married, of course, to an incredibly wealthy, good-looking freak, since that's the type you seem to go for. You'll have pumped out a few kids, and you'll already have their names signed up at the most prestigious private schools in the area. You've got the impeccably neat mansion with a white picket fence, and you're the youngest person to go so far in your career. And - oh, yeah. You'll still be making my life hell."
"Oh, come on, Derek," she said, turning back to her computer. "That's ridiculous."
"A white picket fence with a mansion is a little tacky."
"No, you don't really think we'll be talking in ten years, do you?"
Derek was immediately grateful that she was looking at her computer so she couldn't see the look of hurt on his face, but when he couldn't come up with a scathing reply, she continued, "I mean, we'll see each other on holidays, but we're not going to be living together anymore. What are you expecting, for us to call each other every night just to see how our days went?"
He flinched at the uncharacteristically harsh statement. "Well, there you go," he said, unable to keep the bite out of his voice. "There's an essay right there. Talk about how glad you're going to be to get rid of your evil brother Derek."
"Step," she said automatically, turning to look at him with a confused expression on her face. "Derek, I --"
"Better get writing, Casey," he said, and stormed out of her room.
Later that night, as he was mindlessly playing 'Babe Raider' downstairs, he heard the staircase creaking. Casey carefully sat next to him, clad in her pajamas.
"It's two in the morning," he said as a greeting.
"Couldn't sleep," she said. She hesitated. "Can I play?"
He paused, then smirked. "Only if you want me to beat you."
He turned to look at her just as a relieved smile grew on her face, and it struck him how much he wanted her to be there in ten years. In fifty years. Whenever.
---
#41 - Time and Tide - PG-13 - 242 words
Casey never dreams.
So when she wakes up at 4:32 AM, out of breath, nervously glancing around to make sure that, no, Derek was definitely not in the room, she can't shake it right away. Then again, having dreams where she made out with Derek probably wouldn't have been shaken off easily under any circumstances.
The thing was, it kept happening, time and time again.
It would have been awkward, if it weren't for the fact that every time she was reminded of the increasingly more and more graphic dreams during the day, he managed to infuriate her to the point of forgetting within approximately six seconds.
After she broke up with Noel, the dreams came almost every night. The dreams had little substance except one, where she and Derek were curled up together, fully clothed, on a beach, watching the waves flow in and out. They were alone and it was quiet except for the occasional gull. Derek brought his face down to hers and murmured in her hair, "I love you."
And that was the one she remembered. Not the vivid, exciting ones that would make for a good porno. But the one where time stopped and she felt like it could go on forever. She never wrote about it in her journal (the thought of anyone reading that made her face burn), but sometimes, when she was stressed out and needed someone, anyone, she closed her eyes and remembered.
---
#50 - Give and Take - PG - 330 words
"C'mon, Case, let's go," Derek said, standing in her door frame and tapping his fingers impatiently on the wall.
Casey looked up from her book. "Go...where?" she asked, frowning in confusion.
Derek rolled his eyes. "Sam's, Casey. The pre-playoff picnic?"
Casey shook her head. "Oh, no. I'm not going to that testosterone-drenched eat-a-thon."
"Come on, Casey," he wheedled, giving her his best pitiful eyes. "All the other player's girlfriends are going to be there."
Casey looked around nervously. "Keep your voice down!" she whispered frantically.
"Relax, no one's around. And Sam knows about us, so we're cool."
"And what about the rest of your hockey...peers?"
Derek wondered if he was ever going to get physically damaged from rolling his eyes so much around her. "My team? When there's food involved, they won't even see you." She still looked doubtful. "Fine, bring Emily with to be less suspicious. I really want you there." His voice went serious at the end, and he looked down at his shoes.
Her face softened. "You know, if we just told everyone..."
"Case, we --"
"I know we can't. I'm just saying, it would be easier." She paused. "OK, but you owe me two library study dates."
"Under forty-five minutes each," he bargained.
"Length of stay is at my discretion," she said. "Besides, there's no point in going to the library if you're only going to stay forty-five minutes."
He groaned. "Deal. But I'm making this worth it."
She went back to her book, a content grin on her face. He looked up and down the hallway, saw no one, and entered her room to give her a full-on kiss on the mouth. She let herself give in for a moment, then pulled away. "Door!" she gestured. He moved quickly to shut it.
"So," she said coyly, putting down her book. "You still want to leave right now?" The grin on his face grew as he leaned in.
---
#9 - Touch Me - PG-13 - 530 words
Derek absolutely, flat-out refuses to hug Casey.
(All right, there was that one time, on Christmas, and he was convinced she'd had too much eggnog, because she came tumbling towards him with arms wide open and eyes bright with Christmas cheer. George and Nora were right there, anyway, and he figured a national holiday wouldn't have stopped them from beheading him, so he gave in. Plus, he isn't heartless.)
It's not like he absolutely, flat-out refuses to touch her or anything. Not a day goes by when he doesn't check her in the shoulder, or brush her hand when stealing the remote, or wrestle with her over said remote.
He never really realized why hugging was so off-limits, besides the fact that, gross, it's Casey. It isn't like he wasn't affectionate around Marti, Ed, or Lizzie.
It's fall when he realizes. The leaves crunch in the grass as he walks through the front lawn, just getting back from hockey practice. He hears Casey's voice yell "Derek!" before he even reaches the front stoop. She runs outside to meet him.
He stops and takes a deep breath. He knows what's coming. Predictably enough:
"It was you, wasn't it?" she says accusingly.
"I have no idea what you're talking about." And there it is, the check in the shoulder as he tries to get past her. She doesn't let him.
"You filled Max's locker with...with..."
He breaks, his face smirks. "Condoms?" He can barely keep from laughing.
"And the sign!" she says indignantly. "'Wouldn't want you to reproduce'? Derek, stop laughing!"
"Oh, man, did you see the look on his face?!" Derek guffaws. His laughter dies down a little when he sees that she doesn't find it quite as amusing.
"Why would you even go through the trouble? Max and I broke up weeks ago."
His face turns (slightly) more serious. "Come on, Case. He was drunk at that party and he started spreading rumors about you. It wasn't..." He trails off and finds that he would rather look anywhere than in her eyes right then.
Her face turns softer, her anger fades. "Der..."
"Plus, it's just hilarious to see that guy annoyed," Derek adds quickly before she gets any ideas in her head about chivalry or whatever she goes on about. And maybe if he had looked at her, he would've seen that look in her eyes, and he could've ducked out of the way before her arms go around him and pull him into a hug.
He pulls away almost immediately, but she seems satisfied and skips back into the house, smiling.
The hug wasn't long, but he still remembers the smell of her hair, and the feel of her arms pressed into his back, and the fact that she fit so perfectly against him. And even more, when he plays that scene over and over again in his head that night, he closes his eyes and pretends for a second that they aren't step-siblings at all, and she's just another girl, and he can hold her as much as he wants without the fear of her letting go.
He sighs. Definitely no more hugs.
---
Disclaimer: I don't own Life With Derek. At all.
Author's note: I'm probably a little harsher with ratings than is called for, but better safe than sorry? Also, sorry for the delay, school starting and White Soxtober have been keeping me busier than they should have.
Past entries can be found at my table!
#30 - Boys and Girls - PG - 451 words
Derek heard Casey's agitated scream before she came crashing through the front door. He was sitting in his recliner and rolled his eyes as she proceeded to take off all six million of her winter-wear accessories while she ranted, "Do you know what the difference between boys and girls is?!"
Derek grinned. Sometimes she just asked for it. "Well, Case, for those of us who paid attention in anatomy class, girls have these lovely body parts called --"
"Derek?" she asked, cutting him off and looking at him with a confused expression on her face. "Where's Mom?"
"Nora's out grocery shopping with Lizzie and Edwin, and George is taking Marti to tap-dance class."
Casey sighed. "So I'm stuck with you?"
"Oh, trust me, Case, I don't want to hear about your problems any more than you want me here."
She flopped down on the couch, sat silently for a minute, then said, "Well, I have to tell someone."
"Here's a phone," he said, throwing it on her lap.
She ignored it. "What I was saying before, is that boys don't know about what they're feeling as well as girls do."
"I feel that I don't want to hear this."
"For example, when a girl tells her on-again, off-again boyfriend of six months that she loves him, and he stands there in complete silence, it can only prove that he doesn't know how to vocalize his feelings before he doesn't even really know what he's feeling. Which is that he loves me - or her - , too."
Derek looked at her for a second. "Uh-huh," he said. He squinted. "Can I ask you something without you taking it in the wrongest, most dramatic way possible?"
Casey stared at him. "Of course."
"Maybe, just maybe, Max doesn't love you."
Casey shook her head. "Derek, that's stupid."
"No, it's a possibility."
"What, because it's impossible for a guy, any guy, to love me?!"
Derek waved his hands in front of her face. "No, see? That's taking it in the wrong way."
"Because even though Max is cute, and nice, and popular, doesn't mean he can't love me!"
"Casey!" Derek said, frustrated. "God, that's not what I meant! I meant that there are plenty of guys out there who love you, and so it doesn't really matter if Max doesn't. And yes, I said 'if'."
"But I love him," she said sadly.
Derek rolled his eyes. "Then I can't help you."
Casey paused. "You really think there are lots of guys out there who love me?"
Derek's eyes suddenly became focused on the screen. "Anything's possible."
"Like who?"
"Like people out there. Now go find them and let me watch hockey in peace."
---
#27 - Fast Forward - PG - 425 words
"'Where I'm Going To Be In Ten Years'," Derek read on Casey's laptop over her shoulder.
"Derek!" she said, turning around and shoving the unpleasant interruption.
"Your paper's blank," he noted. "So, what, you're not planning on living that long?"
"If you want to live until next year, you'd better stop sneaking up on me."
"No, wait, I can do this," Derek said. He fell comfortably on her bed, earning him a disdainful look. "Casey McDonald will be married, of course, to an incredibly wealthy, good-looking freak, since that's the type you seem to go for. You'll have pumped out a few kids, and you'll already have their names signed up at the most prestigious private schools in the area. You've got the impeccably neat mansion with a white picket fence, and you're the youngest person to go so far in your career. And - oh, yeah. You'll still be making my life hell."
"Oh, come on, Derek," she said, turning back to her computer. "That's ridiculous."
"A white picket fence with a mansion is a little tacky."
"No, you don't really think we'll be talking in ten years, do you?"
Derek was immediately grateful that she was looking at her computer so she couldn't see the look of hurt on his face, but when he couldn't come up with a scathing reply, she continued, "I mean, we'll see each other on holidays, but we're not going to be living together anymore. What are you expecting, for us to call each other every night just to see how our days went?"
He flinched at the uncharacteristically harsh statement. "Well, there you go," he said, unable to keep the bite out of his voice. "There's an essay right there. Talk about how glad you're going to be to get rid of your evil brother Derek."
"Step," she said automatically, turning to look at him with a confused expression on her face. "Derek, I --"
"Better get writing, Casey," he said, and stormed out of her room.
Later that night, as he was mindlessly playing 'Babe Raider' downstairs, he heard the staircase creaking. Casey carefully sat next to him, clad in her pajamas.
"It's two in the morning," he said as a greeting.
"Couldn't sleep," she said. She hesitated. "Can I play?"
He paused, then smirked. "Only if you want me to beat you."
He turned to look at her just as a relieved smile grew on her face, and it struck him how much he wanted her to be there in ten years. In fifty years. Whenever.
---
#41 - Time and Tide - PG-13 - 242 words
Casey never dreams.
So when she wakes up at 4:32 AM, out of breath, nervously glancing around to make sure that, no, Derek was definitely not in the room, she can't shake it right away. Then again, having dreams where she made out with Derek probably wouldn't have been shaken off easily under any circumstances.
The thing was, it kept happening, time and time again.
It would have been awkward, if it weren't for the fact that every time she was reminded of the increasingly more and more graphic dreams during the day, he managed to infuriate her to the point of forgetting within approximately six seconds.
After she broke up with Noel, the dreams came almost every night. The dreams had little substance except one, where she and Derek were curled up together, fully clothed, on a beach, watching the waves flow in and out. They were alone and it was quiet except for the occasional gull. Derek brought his face down to hers and murmured in her hair, "I love you."
And that was the one she remembered. Not the vivid, exciting ones that would make for a good porno. But the one where time stopped and she felt like it could go on forever. She never wrote about it in her journal (the thought of anyone reading that made her face burn), but sometimes, when she was stressed out and needed someone, anyone, she closed her eyes and remembered.
---
#50 - Give and Take - PG - 330 words
"C'mon, Case, let's go," Derek said, standing in her door frame and tapping his fingers impatiently on the wall.
Casey looked up from her book. "Go...where?" she asked, frowning in confusion.
Derek rolled his eyes. "Sam's, Casey. The pre-playoff picnic?"
Casey shook her head. "Oh, no. I'm not going to that testosterone-drenched eat-a-thon."
"Come on, Casey," he wheedled, giving her his best pitiful eyes. "All the other player's girlfriends are going to be there."
Casey looked around nervously. "Keep your voice down!" she whispered frantically.
"Relax, no one's around. And Sam knows about us, so we're cool."
"And what about the rest of your hockey...peers?"
Derek wondered if he was ever going to get physically damaged from rolling his eyes so much around her. "My team? When there's food involved, they won't even see you." She still looked doubtful. "Fine, bring Emily with to be less suspicious. I really want you there." His voice went serious at the end, and he looked down at his shoes.
Her face softened. "You know, if we just told everyone..."
"Case, we --"
"I know we can't. I'm just saying, it would be easier." She paused. "OK, but you owe me two library study dates."
"Under forty-five minutes each," he bargained.
"Length of stay is at my discretion," she said. "Besides, there's no point in going to the library if you're only going to stay forty-five minutes."
He groaned. "Deal. But I'm making this worth it."
She went back to her book, a content grin on her face. He looked up and down the hallway, saw no one, and entered her room to give her a full-on kiss on the mouth. She let herself give in for a moment, then pulled away. "Door!" she gestured. He moved quickly to shut it.
"So," she said coyly, putting down her book. "You still want to leave right now?" The grin on his face grew as he leaned in.
---
#9 - Touch Me - PG-13 - 530 words
Derek absolutely, flat-out refuses to hug Casey.
(All right, there was that one time, on Christmas, and he was convinced she'd had too much eggnog, because she came tumbling towards him with arms wide open and eyes bright with Christmas cheer. George and Nora were right there, anyway, and he figured a national holiday wouldn't have stopped them from beheading him, so he gave in. Plus, he isn't heartless.)
It's not like he absolutely, flat-out refuses to touch her or anything. Not a day goes by when he doesn't check her in the shoulder, or brush her hand when stealing the remote, or wrestle with her over said remote.
He never really realized why hugging was so off-limits, besides the fact that, gross, it's Casey. It isn't like he wasn't affectionate around Marti, Ed, or Lizzie.
It's fall when he realizes. The leaves crunch in the grass as he walks through the front lawn, just getting back from hockey practice. He hears Casey's voice yell "Derek!" before he even reaches the front stoop. She runs outside to meet him.
He stops and takes a deep breath. He knows what's coming. Predictably enough:
"It was you, wasn't it?" she says accusingly.
"I have no idea what you're talking about." And there it is, the check in the shoulder as he tries to get past her. She doesn't let him.
"You filled Max's locker with...with..."
He breaks, his face smirks. "Condoms?" He can barely keep from laughing.
"And the sign!" she says indignantly. "'Wouldn't want you to reproduce'? Derek, stop laughing!"
"Oh, man, did you see the look on his face?!" Derek guffaws. His laughter dies down a little when he sees that she doesn't find it quite as amusing.
"Why would you even go through the trouble? Max and I broke up weeks ago."
His face turns (slightly) more serious. "Come on, Case. He was drunk at that party and he started spreading rumors about you. It wasn't..." He trails off and finds that he would rather look anywhere than in her eyes right then.
Her face turns softer, her anger fades. "Der..."
"Plus, it's just hilarious to see that guy annoyed," Derek adds quickly before she gets any ideas in her head about chivalry or whatever she goes on about. And maybe if he had looked at her, he would've seen that look in her eyes, and he could've ducked out of the way before her arms go around him and pull him into a hug.
He pulls away almost immediately, but she seems satisfied and skips back into the house, smiling.
The hug wasn't long, but he still remembers the smell of her hair, and the feel of her arms pressed into his back, and the fact that she fit so perfectly against him. And even more, when he plays that scene over and over again in his head that night, he closes his eyes and pretends for a second that they aren't step-siblings at all, and she's just another girl, and he can hold her as much as he wants without the fear of her letting go.
He sighs. Definitely no more hugs.
---