The scene was set.

Spencer was attempting to make a replica of the Statue of Liberty out of Fat Cakes and toothpicks (he claimed it represented the consumerism of America, but everybody knew he had made an unfortunate purchase of five crates of Fat Cakes, thanks to the crush he had on that grocery store checkout lady). Sam was digging in the refrigerator. Freddie was...well, what was Freddie doing? On a normal day, he would have been upstairs, making small adjustments to the equipment strewn around the room. That day was no normal day, however. On a normal day, Carly would have been smiling and talking to all of them, binding them together, making everything make just a little more sense...

Oh, there she comes now.

This was no normal day. Today, Carly Shay was freakin' furious.

iMove On

When she entered the room, Freddie did his best to be invisible. To no avail, naturally.

He wondered if he'd live to see the light of his laptop ever again.

It was possible that Carly's eyes were glowing red. Her anger was quiet, though, unlike Sam's. This was worse. She walked over to the couch (where Freddie was shrinking) with stilted step, almost trancelike.

"I need to talk to you," she said. The milk that Sam had pulled out of the fridge curdled.

Freddie bowed his head, accepting his fate. "Aw, just go on and kill me now," he muttered, swiping a hand over his brow. He was sweating. Just great.

He could hear her breath catch. He met her eyes. She didn't look as furious as he'd thought. Instead she seemed...sad. Upset? His heart sank. The last thing he'd wanted was to make her feel bad. He stood up and followed her, finding it impossible not to notice that he was just the tiniest bit taller than her now.

Sam watched them go, but said nothing as she bit into her pork chop. Freddie almost sent a look her way begging for help, but decided this might hurt him more than help him. Spencer, engrossed in his fatty sculpture, didn't even notice as the pair entered the elevator.

The machinery hummed. Freddie was unsure why Carly thought that the studio was the best place to kill him. He opened his mouth to say this, but she gave him such a look of mixed resentment and sadness that he closed his mouth immediately. When the elevator stopped its motion, she led him to a bean bag, seating herself across from him.

For a second, the two merely looked at each other. He cleared his throat nervously. She didn't break her gaze.

"You ruined my date."

He didn't want to see her face as she pronounced this.

"I really liked Dustin," she said, her voice cracking a little. "Why would you do that, Freddie?"

"I-"

"I mean, you're one of my best friends. But this little crush you have on me is getting out of hand."

Could he do anything else except agree?

She took a deep breath and brushed her dark hair out of her eyes. His heart was pounding.

"Freddie, either you get over me or we can't be friends anymore."

Everything stopped.

Rehearsal that day had just been going through the motions. Even Sam wasn't quite as crazy as usual.

Freddie left that day without a word. What could he possibly say to Carly after she gave him that...that ultimatum? They'd been friends for years now, and sure, she'd said before that he needed to get over her, that they couldn't just keep on with this lopsided relationship, but she'd never actually seemed to mean it. She'd never taken action against him. This was...this was...

Kind of what he deserved.

Maybe following her on her date with Dustin had been going to far. After all, Freddie had already warned her about Dustin. Filled her fortune cookie with "Stay away from blonde men" when they got Chinese takeout after the webshow the other day. He'd even tried to convince Spencer that Dustin was bad news. He'd really done as much as could be expected of him.

But Freddie liked to go the extra mile, especially for Carly. He couldn't just get an A—he needed an A-plus. It wasn't enough for him to simply warn her. He'd heard the gossip about Dustin, even if Carly had insisted on closing her ears to it. To leave her unprotected with such a...a man-floozy...

So maybe he shouldn't have followed her. Maybe he shouldn't have hid under the next booth, bribed everybody else in the restaurant, and orchestrated the entire date to be catastrophic at best.

What could he do now? Obviously, he couldn't get over her. He'd tried, from time to time, and had only ended up liking (loving, he wanted to say) her even more.

Lie to her! a voice from somewhere inside his mind commanded. Pretend you're over her.

"I couldn't do that to Carly," he argued, loudly enough that had his mother been home instead of picking up "necessities" at the store she would have taken him to see a shrink (again).

But what other choice did he have?