I think Casey felt such a bond toward my dad because he didn't have very many fatherly figures in his life. Most of his childhood, it was just Eleanor and then Micah came into the picture when we were fourteen at about the exact same as I did. But Micah was still young, only twenty two at the time and definitely wasn't ready to be a role model for a growing teen, even though he tried his best.

So because Casey didn't have a father, I shared mine and at some point down the line, he just kind of became our dad. He even started doing some things with just Casey when I didn't want to go. They would go on fishing trips together without me and I was always so curious about what they talked about on those trips.

I didn't mind sharing, especially since I adopted Eleanor as my sister and he had to share too. For the four years of our friendship, we adopted each other's broken families and it all became a beautiful mess but it was also kind of cohesive and it worked.

Which is why I wasn't surprised at all when Casey wanted to come bowling with me, my dad, and Diana on Tuesday. When we arrived at the bowling alley, he was practically bursting with excitement and even though my dad was not much of a hugger, Casey barreled into his body so quickly that he didn't really have a choice in the matter.

"Wow, I didn't even get an introduction like that," I teased him as I reached around them to see Diana, who stood laughing beside my dad. She was a tall, lean woman with olive skin and light brown hair peppered with some gray. "Hi, I'm Josie. It's so nice to finally meet you."

"You too," she smiled politely at me and then glanced at the two hugging men. "And this is Casey, I take it?"

"Oh, no this is just some guy. No idea who it is," I said jokingly. "He's probably harmless. I hope."

"I'm going to go get us drinks. Is beer okay for everybody?" Diana asked and then we all nodded and she headed toward the bar.

"It's good to see you too, Casey," my dad said with a warm little laugh. "It is you, right? I can hardly recognize you, you've tripled in size."

"It's amazing what late stage puberty can do to a person," he responded, even though I knew he worked out and I didn't know why he would put it all on puberty when he had clearly worked hard to create all that he had going on. But knowing Casey, the working out really was just for the routine of it, to burn some stress, and the body that followed was a side effect of that.

"Diana's cute," I told my dad. "But how's your lady friend going to take it when you get beat by your own daughter?"

He let out a deep, throaty laugh and patted my shoulder. "I don't think we'll ever have to worry about that, kiddo."

I returned his laugh with one of my own and said, "Don't underestimate me. I learned from the best."

"The best is still the best," he assured me with just as much competitiveness as me. He was the one I got it from after all. At the lane, we all started trading our regular shoes for bowling shoes.

"Well, I already know that I'm in for a humiliating game. I probably haven't bowled since the last time I came with you guys," Casey said, tying up the rented bowling shoes. "So I'm definitely going to be rusty. You'll have to go easy on me, Mickey."

Dad laughed and gave Casey a sympathetic pat on his shoulder as a way to say 'no way in hell, bud' because my dad never went easy on anybody, not when it came to bowling.

"Why didn't you bring Rebecca?" I asked Casey as Diana returned to the table with four beers in one of those drink holders and then started putting on her own pair of rental shoes.

He glanced in my direction before quickly averting his gaze to the floor. "She's busy studying. And I don't think she'd want to come bowling, really. She's kind of a germaphobe."

"Wouldn't want to let her see you get totally annihilated anyway," I teased him.

"I almost forgot how competitive you can get, Josie," Casey said, looking very amused as my dad started the game, grabbing his engraved bowling ball and heading for the lane.

"I've bowled with Mickey enough times now to know exactly where she gets that from," Diana chimed in, flashing some doe eyes at my father's back as he stepped toward the lane, throwing the ball behind his back and then swinging it forward until it rolled furiously into the pins, knocking them all down. Diana and Casey cheered for him. I booed.

"So I hear that you're a scientist, Casey?" Diana asked after taking a drink from her beer and I was getting up to take my turn as second on the list.

"He just received an award for working on some really long, hard project," I informed Diana as I bit back a little grin, because I just could not help myself, and then I rolled the ball down the lane and watched as it veered too far left and only knocked down eight pins. My dad laughed, purposefully loud for me to hear and I flipped him the bird.

"I was doing research on Candida albicans. I work at Bionet Labs with a focus in botany," Casey continued saying to Diana as I waited for my ball to return.

"It's all very nerdy," I added. "Dad said that you're in marketing?"

"Well, I work for human resources at a marketing agency," she told me. "It pays the bills, you know, but nothing too exciting."

"She's really good at knitting," my dad added for her. "She makes the most beautiful blankets."

My ball was spit back out of the machine, so I grabbed it and took my second turn, getting a spare.

"I tried knitting once but I gave up pretty quickly. I still have the half-finished scarf sitting in my living room, just in case I ever want to try again," I said as Casey stood to take his turn at the lane. "But it'll probably just sit there collecting dust for all of eternity."

"I could teach you sometime, if you want," Diana offered, which pleased my dad. He'd never been one for PDA as far as I knew, but he casually reached over and rested his arm around her shoulders. I had to bite back a smile, because I knew that I couldn't make a big deal about it or it would scare him off.

"That sounds amazing," I lied. I would hate to try knitting again, but I would love to spend more time with Diana because she was clearly becoming an important part of my dad's life.

"Mickey, do you still have those turtles?" Casey asked curiously. "What were their names?"

"Jelly and Darwin," I answered for him. I still remembered the day they brought the two turtles home from a fishing trip and Casey was ecstatic. He got to name Darwin, I named Jelly.

"They died a couple of years ago," my dad added. "I'm done with pets now."

"Oh, he says that now, but when he met my dog, he fell in love immediately," Diana said with a teasing roll of her eyes.

"Same with my cat," I said with a laugh. "He's not a pet person anymore, until he actually sees a pet and then it changes his mind completely. I think Dad is the only person that Tulip likes in the entire world, including me."

"He just spoils my Archie to the bone. Every time he visits, he's got something new for him. And when I ran out of room to put all the toys, he built me a chest with Archie's name engraved on it so that he could keep filling it with toys."

"He really chews through those toys so fast. He rips through everything, so I keep buying him new ones," my dad tried to justify himself without looking like a total softy, but we all knew that's exactly what he was.

We bowled two games and in both of them, my dad took the lead, I was a close second, Diana was a far out third, and Casey hung so far back that we could barely see him anymore. He wasn't as competitive as me and my dad though, so he took the humiliating loss like a champ.

After we said goodbye to my dad and Diana, I stood on the curb between the bowling alley and its parking lot with Casey.

"That was so much fun," he told me with a wide grin. "Your dad is so great."

"Yeah. He is."

"When can I see you again?" he asked me, as if he thought that if he didn't plan something now, maybe I could slip through his fingers.

"Um, well I have a rough draft of the Silas article almost done. Just a very rough outline of the details we have so far. I was going to drop off your copy with Eleanor, but I could bring it over sometime on Saturday."

"I'm usually with Rebecca most weekends, but I'll see what I can do."

"Casey, don't blow off your fiancee to hang out with me," I rolled my eyes at him. "I'll just drop it off at your door. We can hang out another time."

"Is it stupid that I feel like if I don't get some sort of plan down in writing that you might change your mind and not show up again?" he asked me nervously, his cheeks turning a light pink.

"Yes, it's stupid. I'm here, okay?" I reminded him. "I'm cautious, but if you don't give me a reason to run, then I'm here."

"Okay." That seemed to relax him a little bit. "I will see you later then, Josie."

I started heading toward my car, offering him one last wave. "Bye, Casey. See you later."