iFocus

You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

-Mark Twain

He didn't even bother knocking, just walked right on in without a greeting of any kind, tossed his bag on the floor, and collapsed on the couch. He didn't take any notice of the crates of paint, the drop cloth, the easel, the stacks of canvas, or the man clad in a paint speckled t-shirt and jeans.

Spencer Shay turned around slowly from the blank canvas in front of him and eyed the teenager that had just taken up residence in his living room. He was just getting started on his newest sculpture. He had planned on creating a ton of different abstract paintings and connecting them together in weird ways to create a "wall o' paintings." He thought he still had a couple of hours of alone time to get started.

"Huh. I gotta start locking that door." He tapped a paint brush against his chin while he stared. Luckily, it was a fresh brush, so he wasn't putting little dots of paint all over his chin. This time. "What's up, kid?"

The teenage boy didn't respond, just gave a small groan in frustration and pulled a pillow over his face. He may have even yelled into the pillow. Spencer wasn't entirely sure about that though. For all Spencer knew, he could have been gasping for air because he was suffocating himself. Those pillows were pretty good at muffling noise.

"Freddie!" He yelled it at the top of his voice, in a similar tone to his panicked, something's on fire, run for your life voice. It was usually pretty effective for getting the attention of people in the apartment. He had extensive experience with which to prove this. It often got his younger sister to drop whatever she was going and race to whatever room his voice came from.

"What? What!" Freddie threw the pillow away from his face and jumped to his feet, eyes darting in every direction. "Where's the fire extinguisher?" Freddie thought that was a fair question given Spencer's tone, but apparently, Spencer did not.

Dropping the tense set of his shoulders, Spencer examined Freddie suspiciously. "Why would you assume something's on fire?"

"You just yelled at me."

"Do I only yell when there's a fire?"

"Well, no, but-"

"Do I have matches or a lighter or a blow torch handy?"

"I don't know..."

"Are there frequent fires here?"

"Do you really want me to answer that?"

"Alright, point to Freddo." The suspicious look stayed on Spencer's face though and he asked, "what are you doing here, and where's my sister, you know, the one teenager who actually lives here?"

"I left her and Sam getting smoothies." And with that announcement, Freddie collapsed back onto the couch. "I needed to think."

"And you came here?"

"My mom's home."

"Ah, then this is a good thinking place." Spencer would not like to be taking a private moment to think about anything under the watchful eyes of Mrs. Benson. She would be taking his temperature and other vital signs if he was quiet for too long.

Under normal circumstances, Spencer would have been content to work on his latest art project without paying any attention to the kid on the couch, but Spencer was having some trouble concentrating. For one thing, Freddie didn't look particularly happy. For another, he kept making these weird little noises in the back of his throat like he was having a conversation with himself that were kind of creepy. And then there was the whole "wall o' paintings," an idea that was turning out to be harder than Spencer thought. He had been standing there staring at the blank canvas for about twenty minutes before the apartment door opened. He just wasn't particularly motivated. He took the few steps over to the couch, thought better of it, and sat himself down on the coffee table.

"Whatcha thinkin' about?"

"Life," Freddie grumbled. Hadn't he said he came here to think? It wasn't like he was looking for someone to talk to. He just wanted to sort out the thoughts in his head.

"Care to be more specific?"

"Do I have to?"

"Is it a girl?"

"Why do you always think it's a girl?"

"Because we're guys. It's always a girl."

Freddie picked at the couch cushion with his fingers, letting the silence stretch for a few beats. "Fine, it's a girl. Not one girl. Just... girls."

"What about them?" Spencer asked in his best counselor voice. He had taken a few classes in psychology at the local community college before he went to law school. Really interesting stuff, but the class work was so boring he had to give it up. That, and the professor wanted to have him committed. She thought Spencer was hiding some deep issues.

"They're confusing."

"Please, continue."

"Can you stop talking like that? It's kind of freaking me out."

Spencer rolled his eyes. "Jeez. You'd think you were Sam or something."

At the mention of Sam, Freddie rolled his eyes. That girl did not like therapists. "Sorry." Sitting back up on the couch so he can look Spencer in the eye, Freddie tried to explain. "It's just... I don't know. They're just frustrating. I think everything's hopeless and they don't like me because they tell me flat out that they don't have feelings for me, but then they do nice stuff, stuff you wouldn't just do for a normal friend or anything, right? And they do it more than once. But then, they tell me all over again how they don't like me. And then, they're all mad when I want to go out with another girl. No, I don't even want to. She asked me. It's like, they're jealous, but they already said they don't like me. I don't get it."

"I see." Spencer, too late, realized he used his therapist voice again. "Sorry." Clearing his throat, Spencer tapped his chin with his paint brush again. "Have you ever thought that maybe this girl doesn't know what she wants? Maybe she's just as confused as you are."

Freddie doesn't stop to correct Spencer on the "this girl" remark. He's obviously abandoned the idea of his problem being related to girls in general. In fact, he's thinking of a specific set of girls now. "They've made it very clear that they aren't confused."

"How so?"

"Uh, they told me they're not interested, remember?" Freddie gave Spencer an incredulous look.

"People say one thing and think another thing all the time. Well, other people do. I don't. You know, like if I want bacon, I say I want bacon, I don't say I want pancakes. Though pancakes and bacon go really good together..."

"What are you talking about?"

Spencer gave an exaggerated sigh and wiggled his shoulders as though trying to get some of the annoyance out of his body. "You have to use your head!"

"I am using my head."

"No, you're only using your eyes and your ears. You have to go passed that. Use your imagination." Spencer tapped Freddie in the middle of the forehead with the handle of the paintbrush to make his point. Freddie has to purse his lips together at first to keep himself from laughing.

"What? You want me to pretend the girl's a unicorn or something?"

A moment of silence passes while Spencer and Freddie both stare at one another in confusion. This is precisely why Freddie tries not to come to Spencer for advice. He never makes any sense.

"Freddie, you're a weird little dude."

"But you just said-"

"Freddo, I think you're missing out on the big picture here."

"What do you mean?"

"All this stuff you're telling me, it's all so... linear. You think A and B are always going to be just A and B. Sometimes they make C or D or X or meatballs. Life doesn't always make sense." Spencer gestured in the air with his paint brush. "Here, let me show you." Grabbing Freddie's arm, he hauled him over to the piece of canvas set up on the easel between the living room and the kitchen.

Almost tripping on the edge of the drop cloth, Freddie doesn't understand why they are going to use Spencer's art supplies if he's just going to give him nonsensical algebra equations involving meatballs.

"Uh, isn't this for your new-"

"Freddie, I'm trying to teach you something! Would you pay attention!"

Freddie backed away from Spencer slowly after the outburst, not sure if Spencer was having a good day or not now. There was too much yelling going on, even for Spencer. He seemed a little stressed.

"Sorry, Freddo. This is why I never became a teacher." Taking a few calming breaths, Spencer gestured that it was safe for the younger boy to come back. He opened a couple of containers of paint and dipped the paintbrush he was holding into one of them. "Okay, this is how you're looking at the situation." Spencer painted a straight line of bright red from the top of the canvas to the bottom. It never wavered, the brush stroke thick and obvious against the white background. "You see?"

"Yeah, but-"

"Now, when is life ever like that?" Spencer grabbed a new brush and dipped it into the blue paint.

"This is what life is like. You start off at the same spot." He made a dab of blue at the bottom of the red line to illustrate his point.

"And you start off going on your path." The brush streaked up along the red.

"But, what's this? You hit a snag!" Spencer gave an exaggerated jerk of his wrist to the right so that the blue moved slightly away from the red.

"So, you get back on your path after a little bump. But then, something else makes you take a turn. And you wind up all the way back at the beginning." Taking his brush, Spencer curved the blue line wildly away from the red to make a huge loop back to the bottom of the red portion of the line. But where Spencer began the curve from the line, the two paints have blurred together, creating an attractive shade of purple all the way back to the beginning.

"So, you have to start again." He powered the tip of the brush along again, and by now, with the red a bit dry in the thinner strips of paint, Freddie was able to see where the red and blue didn't clearly mix, but existed side by side for a while in one spot, then the blue just layered on top of the red after that. Spencer drove the brush, complete with motorized vehicle sounds, up through the line, passed the bump, and passed the spot where the wild turn took place, to continue on up the red line for a while, a few inches really, before flicking his wrist slightly to the left and taking the blue line away from the red again. This time, he must have hit a still damp spot of paint again, because the red and blue have managed to mix even in the little offshoot, leaving a purple trail that veered sharply away from the original path, though this one is darker than the loop with a little more blue in it than red.

"And this is where things get really crazy." Spencer doesn't bring his brush back in line with the red right away. Instead, he allowed his fingers to bring the brush up on the white of the canvas even higher, explaining, "Sometimes the path you think you should be on, isn't the one you actually need to be on. And sometimes, there's a conflict."

Spencer quickly crossed the brush back to the right as though brandishing a sword, striking right through the bright red and to the other side before continuing to propel the brush up to the top of the canvas all over again. "And there's always a curveball at the end." So saying, Spencer took the brush, which was almost out of blue paint by this point and looped it back just slightly so that his blue line can come to rest right alongside the top of the red.

"And you wind up right where you are supposed to be."

"Spencer," Freddie said with only a small trace of annoyance, "you realize I have no idea what you're talking about, right?"

"You're the blue paint and Carly's the red paint!" Spencer yelled in frustration. "How was that not clear? I thought we were on the same page!"

"What if I don't want Carly to be the red paint?" Freddie mumbled, half to himself, not thinking Spencer could hear him. Truthfully, he doesn't know if this is about Carly or not anymore. He still likes her, and he probably always will, but he doesn't know if he likes her the same way he used to. This whole topic has come up in his mind only because a girl asked him out, and both of his female best friends didn't like the idea, leaving him wondering why girls are so weird. He didn't understand why he wasn't allowed to date, but they were. He thought Spencer had got that from his thinly veiled complaints.

"I thought this was about Carly. It's not about Carly? But you loo-oove my little sister." His effort to come off as the teasing older brother has failed for once, and he had to snap back into serious mode. "Alright kid, tell me what's going on."

"I don't know. I told you. I'm confused." Taking a minute to breathe in and out and gather his thoughts, the same way he saw Spencer do it, Freddie kept his eyes on the canvas Spencer has marred for his lesson. "Okay, let's say that Carly is the red paint, yeah? And I'm the blue. Look, here." Freddie's finger came to rest directly next to the path of the paint he noticed earlier, where even though the blue is layered in with the red, the two colors don't mix. "That part's really important, isn't it? Even though the colors get together, they're just there. There's no... blending." His face turned almost as red as the paint when it hit him what Spencer might think 'blending' refers to. "They don't make anything new."

Spencer has to hide his smile by cupping his chin in his hand and taking on the classic thinker pose while contemplating Freddie's point. It's a good one. Spencer never thought, when he made himself think about things like this, that Carly and Freddie would ever really be happy together. They really were like those strips of paint. He tried not to allow a lot of his brain power to be wasted on the thought of his sister's paint mixing with anybody else's paint though. It was too strange. Especially if they weren't actually talking about paint. And it kind of grossed him out. She was his little sister.

"Well, what about here?" Spencer pointed to the section where the line has veered off course, where the blue and the red mix to form purple. He squashed the gross thoughts about any kind of blending that formed in his mind with an imaginary mallet.

"Yeah, but that's not really me and Carly now, is it? We're not on the same path. I've gone off to, I don't know, some other place."

"Ooh, like Valerie." Spencer loved that for once he came up with a helpful metaphor.

"No, no." Shaking his head vigorously at the thought of the girl who tried to steal him away only so she could use him on her webshow, Freddie snapped, "Valerie's more like the little bump. A distraction. Barely noticeable."

Both guys stood there and examined the canvas for a few moments, eyes traveling the path Spencer painted.

"I hate to break this to you, kid, but, I don't think you've actually dated this many girls. Maybe I need to paint a new example."

Ignoring Spencer's jab, and suppressing a shudder at what Spencer's line would probably look like in comparison, Freddie started to put the parts of the pathway together in his head. "The bump's Valerie... and this here," he pointed to the area where the blue line is turned purple before going back in a loop to the very beginning, "that's-" He broke off, realizing he can't tell Spencer that point on his line could be his first kiss. He swore he wouldn't speak of it to anyone. She made him swear. Spencer would qualify as an anyone. "Uh, that's someone I- uh- kissed. I didn't date her, but it made me think about some... stuff."

"Who'd you kiss?" interrupted Spencer. He was genuinely curious because he distinctly remembered not too long ago that there was a big uproar over Freddie having not kissed anyone yet. There may have even been fireworks involved. Or not. Just a meatball fight. And Freddie missing some school in embarrassment. Spencer may have had his suspicions about this kiss, but he doesn't voice them because Freddie looks distinctly uncomfortable.

"It doesn't matter. All that matters is that she's a loop back to Carly." Freddie's face is carefully closed off when making that statement. He's never been as good of a liar as his friends. "And then, I'm back on the path, heading for where I think I'm supposed to be, but, then, something happens, and I'm way over here." His face clouded while he looked at the purple line that fades to the almost normal blue off to the side, going up the canvas all on its own. If he looks at the line carefully though, he can see that the blue never goes completely back to being normal blue. Once it was transformed to purple at that first loop, lines of purple are threaded all through the remainder of the blue line. Even at the top where the blue rests against the red. It isn't completely flush against the red, there's this little sliver of white between the two lines. And the blue has those same threads of purple through it. "Ah, butter," he groaned.

"What? What is it?" Spencer, thinking Freddie had to have had some sort of breakthrough, leaned in close to the canvas to examine it. He doesn't see what it is that Freddie sees though. Or if he does, it doesn't hold the same significance for him as it does for the other boy.

But before Freddie can answer, the front door opens and two teenage girls stroll inside with Styrofoam cups clutched in their hands. The brunette has two, and she's clearly been doing most of the talking for a while. They both ditch their bags in a pile by the door.

"I'm telling you, Sam, you have got to stop yelling at T-bo. He's gonna ban us."

"He's not gonna ban us, Carls. We're his best customers." The blond takes a sip from her smoothie to make her point.

"We?" Carly arches her eyebrows in surprise.

"Okay, fine, you're his best customer." It's a well known fact that Sam doesn't pay for anything unless she absolutely has to. Most of her smoothie runs are funded by Carly or Freddie, or even Spencer, or on occasion, her favorite target to bully because he puts up with it, Gibby. It's usually pretty easy to steal Gibby's wallet.

As if sensing that they are being watched, both of them look over at the living room to find Freddie and Spencer staring at them, their bodies blocking a mostly blank piece of canvas save for a few scribbles of paint. Spencer has two paintbrushes clutched in one hand and Freddie looks like he might be sick.

"What are you guys up to?" Carly asked, walking up and handing a smoothie over to Spencer with Sam following close behind.

"Oh, we're painting Freddie," Spencer explained before his mouth started to fight to find the straw. Though he probably should, he doesn't have the presence of mind to anticipate the reaction that phrase will get from the smallest person now in the room.

"Sounds like fun. Can I try?" Sam grabbed the paintbrushes from Spencer before anyone could stop her, and holding them in one hand, she dragged them across Freddie's face. "Huh. Not as fun as I thought it would be." After dropping the brushes in Spencer's outstretched hand again, she made her way into the kitchen, calling, "got any ham?" over her shoulder.

"Sa-am!"

"Don't get your antibacterial underpants in a bunch, Freddifer. It'll wash off." She didn't even turn around to say it, she was so confident that there wouldn't be any retaliation.

Spencer had to try very hard not to laugh when he saw that Sam had indeed painted right across Freddie's face, and at some point during the quick movement, the brushes became crossed. What started out as two red and blue lines on one side of his nose is nothing but a purple mass on the other. And that's when Freddie's confusion clicked for Spencer. He thought the image on Freddie's face might be a better one than the lines on his canvas because it's more clear cut, though he doesn't make that point to Freddie, who has lost interest in the lesson and walked into the kitchen to complain to his tormentor rather than go home and wash the paint from his skin.

A/N: The quote at the top of the story is something I have on one of the bulletin boards in my room. Yes, boards, and yes, they have many quotes on them. I like quotes. It served as the basis for my inspiration, the idea that a lot of people only see what's right in front of them instead of going deeper. Though, I have to admit, since I've re-watched all of the first season on Netflix a few weeks back (you can stream it on the site if you have an account), the episode where Spencer tries to teach Carly about art also provided some inspiration. That, and I wanted to try writing Spencer. Hope you guys enjoyed it. Also, this would have been up a while ago, but I have no internet at home right now. I'm cursed. Seriously.