Freddie took a deep breath and made his way into Hollywood Arts high school. He could not express how much he did not want to be here, he couldn't express how much he didn't want any of the events in the past few months to have happened, but he had no choice. There was no taking back what happened, none of this could be undone, so now he had to live with it. His mother was dead and now he was being forced to move in with his father, who had been absent since Freddie was five, and his younger fiancée. Both of whom act like nothing is wrong and that Freddie's here because he chose to be, instead of some horrible tragedy.
The girls had been understanding with him when he left, or at least they'd tried to be. He knew that they were bummed that he wouldn't be around to film iCarly anymore but they'd both let him go without complaint after he went off at them for being insensitive to his mother's death. Who could really blame him? He didn't want to think about some stupid web show when his mother was dead. He didn't want to think about anything, so he would never guess why his father decided to send him to Hollywood Arts. He didn't want to have to sing, act and dance. He just wanted to sleep all day everyday until he forgot why he slept, until the form of sleep didn't seem like such a compromise to being dead anymore. See Freddie wasn't suicidal but that didn't mean he necessarily enjoyed living anymore. All he could think about was his mother. Yes she'd been over protective and annoying, but she'd been his mother. Until recently she'd been all he had. Freddie used to wish that he could see his father once more, maybe even live with him, but he'd never wanted it like this. Freddie would never see his father again if it meant his mother would come back. But she never would, so for now Freddie was stuck. He just had to do what he could to make it through the day.
Freddie was late for his third period class. He had actually skipped his first two classes and spent the day in the janitor's closet. He knew it probably wasn't the best way to start his first day of school, but Freddie couldn't help it. He didn't want to be around anyone right now. He didn't want to be around anyone ever. Freddie's mother had died three weeks ago and Freddie's Dad had decided to get him enrolled into Hollywood Arts upon the day of his arrival in Hollywood. He'd started school a week later, his father seeing no reason to wait, and already Freddie wished he could leave. Everyone was so talented here, so full of life, that it made Freddie cringe.
He walked into Mr Sikowitz's class and no one even turned to look at him as he entered the room. The class was thoroughly engaged in a conversation about.. coconuts? What the hell were they talking about coconuts for?
Freddie shook his head slightly and cleared his throat. Everyone looked at him in annoyance. "I'm Freddie Benson, I just transferred here." He said making his voice sound lazily confident, though to him his voice sounded strangely hollow.
"Good for you." A girl with raven black hair and blue streaks said sarcastically, staring at him with chilling blue eyes.
Freddie raised his chin and met her hostile glare with one of his own. "You know it." He said slyly and waggled his eyebrows. The African American boy sitting next to the raven haired girl choked back a laugh.
"Sure it is." She replied her voice saturated in sarcasm and she rolled her cool blue eyes.
"Well, Mr Benson welcome to my class." Sikowitz said drawing Freddie's attention back to him. He was a balding man dressed in something a homeless person would wear and he was holding a coconut in one hand. "Now for your first assignment, you must preform the bird scene."
"The bird scene?" Freddie asked and raised his eyebrows. What kind of a stupid name was that?
"Yes. It's a scene each of my students must preform before they are able to act in any plays or other various productions."
Freddie snorted. "Pass."
"Pass?" Sikowitz asked in a confused voice. His brow was furrowed and Freddie was sure he wasn't used to people being rude to him. Well, not students anyway.
"Yeah, pass." Freddie replied lazily, "I'd rather gouge my eyes out with toothpicks than do a stupid bird scene, and as for your plays? You can stick them up your big fat a-"
"Mr Benson!" Sikowitz cut him off, "I'm going to give you one last chance to change your mind."
"No thanks." He replied coolly even though the old Freddie was urging him to just do the damn scene. But he didn't listen to that part of him, he couldn't; not now. Sikowitz said nothing, he did nothing. The raven haired girl was quiet but her eyes followed him as he took his seat.
"Hey!" A female voice called to Freddie when he was leaving the class. Sikowitz had asked him to stay behind, and had asked him why he was at this school in the first place if he wasn't going to participate, but he'd eventually had to let Freddie go when Freddie refused to answer any of his questions properly.
"Hey." He said and turned to see the raven haired girl coming up to him.
"I'm Jade." She said and raised one of her pierced eyebrows, "It was entertaining watching you stand up to Sikowitz like that, stupid and uncalled for, but entertaining."
"Oh?" Freddie asked, feigning a mild interest. Jade was a dangerous looking girl, sure, but she was absolutely gorgeous and at any other time in his life Freddie might have been nervous. After all; she definitely wasn't the type of girl Freddie usually talked to, and definitely not the type who would actually choose to come and talk to him. At any other time in his life he may have been concerned about saying the wrong thing or letting his nerves get the better of him. But right then he felt nothing. Nothing but a cool apprehension as he realised what Jade wanted from him.
"Yeah." Jade said and put one hand on her hip. In doing so she pushed back her leather jacket to fully reveal the low cut, body hugging top she was wearing underneath.
And it was just like that.
One minute they were in the hallway staring at each other and the next minute they were in a stall in the girl's bathroom making out. It was one freaking hot make out session too. Definitely not something Freddie had done before. He'd never kissed anyone but Sam before, and she'd never done anything like this. Jade was an animal, Freddie had never been around someone so completely wild in his life.
He'd been hoping her ferocity and passion would make him feel alive, and kissing her was nice, but it didn't give him chills. It didn't make him feel anything other than a strong longing to feel something, to forget about his mother's death. But even as he kissed her, felt her and held her in his arms he still couldn't forget about the pain. It was like it was under every motion he made, spiralling down to his very core and carving him up until there was nothing left.
A make out session was all that had happened between them though and for that some part of Freddie was glad. He wasn't sure how he'd feel if he woke up from this nightmare one day and realised he'd lost his virginity to a complete stranger in the girl's bathroom of his new school. Once they'd finished Freddie stood by the stall he and Jade had been in while Jade fixed her make up.
"You know this was a one time thing right?" Jade asked fixing her hair.
Freddie nodded. "Yeah, I know."
Jade smiled. "Good, because I only did this for some fun." She reapplied her lipstick, "I broke up with my boyfriend about a month ago and I just needed something to take my mind off of it." She turned. "Thanks."
"Sure." Freddie nodded. His voice sounded dead, he felt dead. It was official; if he wanted thrills he would have to look elsewhere.
"How did it go?" Freddie's cousin asked when he came to pick him up from school that day.
Freddie looked out the window. "Fine."
"Did you do what I told you?" He asked pushing his blonde hair out of his blue eyes. Before school started his cousin had thought it would be appropriate to give him dating advice. Freddie had felt it had been a little insensitive since his mother had just died, but it helped Freddie take his mind off of the whole thing so he didn't object.
"Yeah, I did actually."
"And?" Jesse prompted eyeing Freddie curiously. This was the quietest Freddie had ever been with Jesse. Usually Freddie would talk and laugh with his cousin and tell geeky jokes that would make Jesse cringe, but not today. Today he wasn't sure who he was or what he wanted to say.
"And what?" Freddie asked harshly, "You want a freaking play by play?"
"Whoa, chill dude. I was only asking." He replied shaking his head and looking out of the windscreen. Freddie rolled his eyes.
"Yeah whatever." He said and looked out the window. Freddie didn't really see any of his surroundings as they passed him by, his mind was spinning. All he could think about was how things were changing for him, how his life was so different from the life he knew back in Seattle. He found himself wondering whether he liked the way things were going and where his new life in Hollywood would take him.
A/N: I hope you enjoyed this chapter. This was written after a prompt from a user named 'Challenge King'. I've never written an iCarly fanfic before, or a crossover, so I hope I didn't do too bad. :D
