It was midday at Ridgeway, and Gibby was feeling very annoyed. It wasn't just because Sam had stuffed a muffin down his pants, or because she'd insisted he owed her a muffin. No, Gibby was mostly annoyed because everyone around him refused to look past the fourth wall.
He wasn't quite sure when he first started ignoring the fourth wall, but it had definitely made his life simpler in the long run. Long trips across town had turned into short strolls between sets; anything he could think of was readily available in the props department; and, more recently, he was beginning to take control of his own reality as well. Nothing major - just small changes to suit his purposes, or to remove obstacles from his day to day life (except Sam, who had stubbornly refused to stop existing). While a day in Gibby's life had previously meant teasings and wedgies, he was now privy to a comfortable day of non sequiturs and no responsibilities. People who would have laughed at him now embraced his eccentricity, and would happily spend whole minutes in his company. Of course, they would still ignore him if Carly, Sam or Freddie were around, but it was step in the right direction, and he should have been delighted.
Should have been. But recently, he'd just found himself getting more and more frustrated with the sheer idiocy people showed in their close-mindedness. He'd tried to explain it - oh, he had tried - but still everyone refused to believe him. Even when he took a shortcut across the set between Carly's room and the Groovy Smoothie, she assumed he'd hidden the smoothie behind her door and laughed it off as another silly Gibby joke.
"Look, Gibby," she'd said. "If what you're saying is true, then why can't I do it?"
Well, she had him there. For whatever reason, the fourth wall remained obstinently solid for everyone but him, and no amount of arguing would change that. He'd considered physically dragging someone through - probably Spencer, he was the most likely to go along with it - but eventually decided that it probably wasn't worth the risk. Who knew what might happen? His friends spent their lives in very precarious states of mind as it was, and being dragged out of their idea of reality could prove too much for them. No, better to just keep it to himself and try to use it to his advantage.
But still, he couldn't help feeling annoyed. After all, all they had to do was look...