Disclaimer: iCarly is not mine...
We've always been friends, Freddie and me, but it's always been a lot more complicated than just being able to say "that's my friend Freddie". In fact, if I was introducing Freddie to somebody, I'd be more likely to say: "this is Fredweird. If you were thinking he smells like dork, then you'd be right. Oh, and Freddork? I hate you. And Carly will never love you."
Carly's my best friend. She's also the girl that Frednub is 'in love' with. They even dated once, for about a week, but then he broke up with her. Yeah… I was confused too, but the mind of Freddie works in mysterious ways and he had just been hit by a taco truck. Even so, it made me strangely happy that they were no longer boyfriend and girlfriend, which I assume is down to the fact I don't feel like a third wheel anymore.
It's Sunday, and Fredloser and I are on our way home from school. Carly has an after school club (knitting or something unnatural like that) so I'm stuck with the nub. He looks even more annoying that usual today, something about the way he's parted his hair, or the smug expression on his face that I can't read.
"So, Sam…" he breaks the silence slowly, waiting for me to react.
I glare at him and he winces nervously, but doesn't run away like he would have done when we were thirteen (we're sixteen now and age has been kind to Freddie – he's now nearly six foot, whilst I'm only 5'5" – though I would never tell him that). "So?" I ask, pleased I still scare him after so long. He knows by now I'm not gonna hurt him… enough to cause him any long-term damage.
"Are you going to tell me why you and Carls are being so secretive?" He smiles, relaxing into the conversation and it makes me nervous to see how confident he's acting, now he's sure I'm not going to bite his head off.
"Nope," I say, smirking. What Freddork doesn't know is that Carly and I have been planning a surprise birthday party for his seventeenth for weeks now and I am determined to make it the awesomest party there has ever been. It was my idea, but naturally Carly's doing all the work. I have no idea why I want Fredweird's birthday to be so special, but it gives me something to do and an excuse to get away from home – Mom's being even more Mom-ish than normal, which means smashed wine glasses everywhere, weird smells that are probably illegal and a newer, creepier guy each night.
Freddie laughs. "Am I ever going to find out?"
I pretend to consider it, biting my lip and smiling mysteriously at him. After a long pause, I say, "Maybe."
He laughs again. "I might just have to find a way to get it out of you by myself then,' he tells me, his eyes sparkling mischievously.
"Not gonna happen," I say in return, hoping that he won't do the one thing he's always been able to do to get me to do anything he wants. Not that he knows it has that effect on me (I don't know why it does, it just does!) but he still manages to use it a hell of a lot of the time.
He grins wickedly and I know he's gonna do it. "Sam," he starts and I groan inwardly. He looks at me seriously, his chocolate brown eyes burning into my blue ones. Then he says it, "Please, for me?"
Damn.
It's what Carly's always done to get Freddork do something for he, because he luurves her. A few months ago, Freddie tried it on me as a joke (I think), to get me to give him a slice of ham, and for some unexplainable reason, I caved.
I can feel my face going red as I try to stop myself telling him. It should be easy, but it's a lot harder than it sounds to resist his stupid nubbishness. "You'll find out, ok?" I sigh. "But I'm not gonna tell you 'til I have to."
"Ok," he says, satisfied.
"We're nearly at Bushwell," I comment, noticing that we've just passed the Groovy Smoothie. "Mind if I hang at your place until Carly's home? I don't want to–" I pause. Even though Freddie knows all about my mom and what she's like, I'm still way less comfortable talking to him about it than I am with Carly. "I don't want to have to see my mom," I finally admit and he nods understandingly, giving my hand a comforting squeeze which I'd normally punch him for, but I actually find quite… well, nice.
"That's fine," he says.
I nod. I'm kind of glad I have Freddie as a friend, in a weird way. Without him, I'd never have passed all my exams (no, he didn't tutor me, I cheated off him, which he still doesn't know about) and I'd probably still be in juvie (he bailed me out 'cause Mom didn't give a s*** and Carly was on holiday).
"But hey, can we just stop at the Pear store?" he asks, excitedly pointing through the window of his favourite shop in town. "They have this really cool new PearPod and…" I zoned out as he started going all techy on me. My brain is precious to me and I don't want to contaminate it with dork-vibes.
I tell him this and he frowns at me.
"Sam, I thought you agreed you weren't insulting me this week," he says sternly.
"No, you bet me I couldn't, I told you I wasn't making the same mistake twice and then you gave me a wheelbarrow of ham," I correct him. "Seriously, I'm never doing that again. Never insulting you is like… never eating ham." I shudder at this thought.
"But after I gave you the ham, you agreed…" Freddie begins, but then he sighs in defeat and drags me into the store. "Never mind, I can't be bothered to argue with you. I'm gonna get the new PearPod, so come on."
I groan and start going on about how dorky he's being and by the time I'm finished with my moaning, he's already bought it and is dragging me out the store again and onto the busy Seattle street.
"You were ages," I tell him. "I bet Carly's already back by now and wondering where we are. She'll be pissed if we don't hurry up. Stop walking so slowly!" I give him a push and he stumbles forwards, knocking into an angry-looking woman and falling onto the sidewalk while I roll around laughing, nearly in tears.
"Sam," he says, annoyed and I feel his hand brush against my cheek as he comes over to me. When I finally manage to look up at him it only sets me off again and I clutch at my sides trying to stifle my giggles.
Fredfreak starts to walk away, shaking his head at me and reminding me of his mother, which makes it even harder for me to stop laughing. He's still staring at me when he reaches the crossing and I stand up walking towards him.
Then it's like one of those movies, where everything goes into slow motion. Not actual slow motion – things still feel normal time-wise – but I realise what's going to happen and my legs can't propel me forwards fast enough to do something about it.
Freddie steps out into the traffic, his head down now but I can see his glare burning into the ground, probably directed at me. The light's red, but a silver car pushes through it anyway and before I can scream at Freddie to move, there a skidding noise and the next thing I know, there's a crowd of people around something and a tangle of cars right in front of me.
I push through the people, my heart beating irrationally fast.
No, Freddie, no! Stop it, Sam, you've got to be wrong. He got out the way of the car and it's somebody else. There were other people crossing the road with him, right? Yeah, he was closer to the car, but it's Freddie, he can't be…
That's when I see him. He's curled up on the ground and he could be sleeping if it weren't for the deep gash on his forehead that's dripping blood onto the concrete ground as I watch in horror.
It takes me a second to break out of the daze I'm in, but when I do I run over to him and throw my arms around his lifeless – no, it had to be unconscious! – body, sobbing into his stupid t-shirt. I press my hand against his chest, but I can't feel anything – no comforting thumping that signifies his heartbeat. I can always feel it when he's around me and now it's gone.
"Freddie! Freddie! No!" He's not dead, I tell myself. His heartbeat will come back.
People are giving me sympathetic looks but I ignore them. All I can do is cling onto Freddie like if I let go he'll slip away, and listen to the sound of the approaching ambulance.
Rough, firm hands take him away from me and I scream and scream, no longer making any sense. This is so much worse than when he was hit by the taco truck and I don't even know why, but something is telling me that there is something very wrong.
"Are you his friend?" somebody asks.
I can only nod, too focused on finding Freddie again. He's in the back of the ambulance and I jump in too, sitting down beside him and holding his hand. I don't care if they tell me to get off, I'm not leaving him.
Nobody does, so I hold his hand all the way to the hospital.
He looks so peaceful. His face is pale and his eyes are shut delicately, and I hope that he's not in any pain. I wonder if he can hear me.
"Freddie," I sob and for a while that's the only thing I can say. "I'm gonna be seriously pissed if you don't wake up." I sigh heavily, my eyes watering with tears, but I blink them away because if I cry, it's like I'm giving up hope. "Life's so unfair. You survived one crash, why can't that just be it? You're gonna survive this one too, Freddie, I promise. If you don't… I'll kill you." I try to smile but it comes out all wobbly so I stop trying. "Me and Carls were gonna throw you a surprise birthday party, for your seventeenth. That was the secret you were trying to get out of me when we were…" I trail off, wishing we'd stayed in the Pear store one minute longer, or I'd been there to pull him out of the way… "I know I tell you I hate you almost every day and that Carly will never love you but… I don't hate you Freddie, you're my best friend." He was gonna wake up any second and laugh at me for being so gullible, like I would have done with him. He had to. "You can't die now, when you've still got so much you have to do, like make Carly love you. You want that, right?" I winced at the thought of them together, but then I thought of Freddie dead and realised I'd give anything for him to wake up. "Freddie, please you have so many people who love you. Do you really want to be responsible for all those people being sad? Your crazy mom loves you, Carly loves you, Spencer loves you… I love you, so please wake up for us!"
A nurse comes in and I realise we're at the hospital now. Freddie is taken away from me yet again and I begin to really cry now as I sit in the waiting room. Waiting room, it's such a stupid name. Does anybody really need to be reminded that they are waiting? It should be "pretending you're dreaming" room.
My mobile phone begins to ring and I look down to see it's Carly. I pick up and hold it to my ear, no longer crying but still shaking uncontrollably.
"Sam? Where the hell are you and Freddie? You were meant to be back an hour ago and Mrs Benson just ran out into the hall screaming, threw her phone at my head and charged into the elevator," she babbles, sounding a mix of worried, annoyed and confused.
I give a heavy sob and she gasps.
"Sam? What's wrong?"
"F-Freddie," I say, because I can't say anything else.
Carly's voice is getting higher and higher as she panics. "What's happened to Freddie?"
"C-car… Ambulance," I choke out.
"Freddie's been knocked down?" Carly shrieks, understanding what I was trying to say.
Finally, I find my voice. "There was s-so much blood." I'm crying again now and I don't even care that people can see me and are staring. "I can't see him, I'm at the hospital and they took him into a room and nobody will tell me anything. Carly, I–"
"I'm coming," she says, understanding what I'm trying to say.
"Thanks," I say weakly.
Carly and Spencer arrive at the hospital ten minutes later, after Freddie's mom has run screaming through the room and out of sight, and the first thing Carly does when they enter the waiting room is give me a bone-crushing hug. Spencer sinks into the chair next to her and stares blankly at the wall.
"He's convinced he's dreaming," Carly tells me between sobs.
We sit there next to each other, bawling our eyes out until I'm pretty convinced I should have run out of tears. It was nothing like this when he was hit by the truck; we were told that it was only a broken leg almost immediately and allowed to see him pretty quickly.
"Do you think he's ok?" Carly asks.
I shiver. "He has to be," I whisper.
She nods. "He will be," she tells me, hugging me again.
The doctor comes out a few minutes later, her face grave. Bad news. My heart sinks, but I tell myself he's just in a coma or he's got a really bad broken leg. Bad news like that.
That kind of news I can live with, 'cause he'll get better eventually. Carly squeezes my hand reassuringly.
The news isn't so great. I'd give up all the meat in the world to change what she'd just said. But I can't.
Freddie's gone.
A/N: This is my first story on here and it's gonna be multi-chapter.
Tell me what you think so far: REVIEW! :)