A.N.: Okay, well, I'm not really sure where this story came from, and what it has to do with anything, but I'm kind of fond of it, so I decided to post it on fanfiction. I was inspired to write this when I read Bright Blue Lighters, this short little story by Silent-Entrance, so go check that out, it's in my favorites… after you read this. But this story began to take on a life of its own, and it kind of ran away from me.
Something to keep in mind, at some point towards the end of this story, it kind of seems like Sam's gone insane, but just read on. Everything will be explained it due time. Don't you worry.
And finally, read and review! Reviewing's great, and it really makes me happy when people write out thoughtful reviews for one of my stories. Also, I am the kind of person who answers questions, so if there's anything that any of you don't understand, or confuses you, just ask me through a review. And that will help me too, because it will help me see that I didn't explain it well enough, and perhaps I'll revise later.
So read on! And enjoy!
Sam Puckett received her first fake I.D. for her fifteenth birthday. Her grandpa gave it to her.
Glen Wallace Puckett had been the best forger in the Pacific Northwest for more than twenty years. If you wanted a fake birth certificate, I.D, death certificate, anything… you came to him. He was the best, and absolutely no one could tell that his "merchandise" wasn't perfectly real. Law enforcement officials really, really hated him. He supposed some people might call it irresponsible of him to give his fifteen year old granddaughter a fake I.D., but he knew his granddaughter, and he knew that she'd get one eventually, and although he was long retired, he would die of shame before his own granddaughter carried around an inferior forgery. In any case, he had asked her mother first, and she hadn't cared.
Pam Puckett hadn't really cared about anything for a long time. Except alcohol. And her boyfriend-of-the-week. Sam was rarely at the top of her mind.
Despite Glen Puckett's beliefs, (they weren't exactly fears, the Puckett family definitely wasn't normal and underage drinking was far from the worst thing that any of them had ever done) Sam hadn't really needed the fake identification. While Carly's good influence hadn't stopped Sam from doing bad things, (not by a long shot) it had kept her from the normal destructive teenage patterns of behavior that, at one point, had seemed to be Sam's destiny. But no, Sam Puckett had proved them all wrong. She was destructive in her own completely unique way.
Many people, including Sam's first three therapists, believed that the young rebel was predisposed for bad behavior and self-destruction. Jason Puckett, Sam's father, had been arrested eight different times the last time she had seen him. He was a high school dropout, a runaway, a professional petty criminal, and he did whatever the highest bidder wanted him to do so he could pay off his gambling bills. The last time Sam had seen him was when she was four years old, right before he'd run off with her trampy aunt. Jason's mother had been a high-class madam with a little black book so impressive that no one on the Seattle PD could even get near her. His father was the abovementioned forger. Pam Rossetti, Sam's mother, was a lot like her husband; she was also a runaway and an addict, though she had been addicted to ecstasy and other psychedelic drugs, not gambling, before her daughters had been born. They were both alcoholics. Pam's father, Tony Rossetti, had been in the Italian Mob for a long time before being shot because he was accused of wearing a wire. (He wasn't. It was just a wrinkle.) Her mother had committed suicide. So had Sam's uncle. The achievements of Sam's other uncles included being a conman, a slimy lawyer for petty criminals and a hit-man for the local mob. (Now that she thinks of it, Melanie's really the freak of nature, not her…)
As a matter of fact, when you began laying out the Puckett family history like that, it quickly became less and less entertaining and got more and more horrifying…
Sam's resignation to becoming a total screw-up varied from day to day, mostly due to her abovementioned relationship with Carly. Carly was Sam's morality chain, keeping her from doing anything too illegal or immoral. Most of the time. Occasionally, Sam even let herself believe that she might go somewhere with her life.
The first time Sam used her fake I.D. was not one of those days.
She was just so angry.
Sam wasn't sure why she was feeling the way she did, because everyone had seen this coming for years, but she just couldn't help herself from wanting to shove something or someone. In fact, she did.
Sam stormed down the halls of Ridgeway and saw a seventh grader leering at her. Well, she definitely wasn't going to deal with that today. Pretty soon the young kid was pressed up against the wall and was apologizing profusely, on the verge of tears. Sam laughed, feeling better than she had all day, and pushed him away without a thought. It felt good, like the old days. She got that same rush that she hadn't experienced in years, and wondered for the first time why she had stopped doing things like that. (She knew why though, and it was because one certain nerd had been taking up much of her time for the past year or so, and that rush was so much better.)
Unfortunately, Principal Franklin had witnessed the whole incident and groaned. The old Sam Puckett was back, and that was very, very bad news. "Miss Puckett!" he called out to her retreating form.
"What?" she asked sharply, turning to her principal. This behavior also surprised Ted Franklin because, although Sam had never been, and never would be, an ideal student, the principal and the delinquent had developed an odd sort of friendship over their years of personal Tuesday detentions. But when she talked to him now, she sounded like she was talking to Miss Briggs or Mr. Howard.
"Detention." He said, without any of the usual humor that laced his voice. "All this week."
Sam groaned loudly and exaggeratedly, exclaiming to the hallway. "Fine, Teddy, that's just fine!" She soon lost interest in him, though, and went back to holding up her blow-tube, scanning the hallways for a Spencer to paintball.
"And next week too!" he called after her, and Sam responded with an "Okay!" in a sing-song voice, still not looking at him. Ted Franklin sighed, and walked back to his office. Some days it was hopeless to try to reason with Sam Puckett.
Sam stopped scanning the hallways for the oldest Shay when she ran into the couple that was the cause of most of her distress. Although Sam didn't know exactly why the relationship between her best friends was making her so angry, she did know that whenever she was within kicking distance of the two, she had a great urge to break the boy's other leg. (Sam's current theory was that, without the ammunition of Freddie's long-time crush towards Carly, she had lost almost half her arsenal of things to make fun of him for.) But Sam never wanted to hurt Carly, physically or emotionally, so she refrained from telling Carly exactly how much her newest relationship was making Sam want to throw up. (It also helped that Sam knew her best friend, and she knew that the relationship wasn't going to work out. For some reason, though, Sam was almost as upset about the heartbreak she knew Freddie would suffer as she was about the loss of half her Freddie torture arsenal. Maybe she was having a bad day.)
Consequently, Sam put away her blow-tube and put on a smile as she came into the couple's view and said, "Well, good morning, Mr. and Mrs. Benson," with the best amused tone she could muster. Sam's amusement almost became real when she realized how genuine she sounded, and not at all like she wanted to knee Freddie in the balls. Wow, she was an even better liar than even she had given herself credit for.
Carly gave Sam a look, like she wasn't pleased with how amused Sam was with her new relationship and rebuked her with a "Sam!" while Freddie, more annoyed than exasperated, told her to stop.
Then Carly, ever the good girl, heard the faint buzzing sound that Sam had long ago become accustomed to ignoring and hurriedly said "Oh! Second bell! See you after class!" and kissed Freddie faintly on the lips before walking off.
Sam was disgusted inside. They were so cute and sweet and wonderful. They were truly the perfect couple: Freddie and Carly Benson. Both were smart, and fairly popular, and non-psychotic, and… brunette. Ultimately, they were bound to be successful in everything they did, unlike Sam, who was probably destined to mooch off Carly for the rest of her tragically short life, because she'd probably be gunned down by a cop in a drug raid before she even reached thirty. But for Carly and Freddie, the sky was the limit.
Sam knew their relationship wouldn't work out, not now at least, from the way they had gotten together. But, ultimately, Sam knew that Carly was going to miss out on a lot if she never gave into Freddie's love. Not that she'd ever tell Freddie that.
No, the problem with this relationship wasn't the couple. The couple was perfect. What would really be the downfall of the Carly and Freddie relationship was its origins. What Carly was feeling now wasn't real; what she was feeling was gratefulness, admiration, adrenaline, but definitely not love. Carly didn't realize it yet, but she would in a few weeks. She wouldn't like it, and she'd postpone it for as long as she could, but they'd break up. And Freddie would get hurt. Ultimately, their relationship would be the downfall of their friendship and, ironically, their relationship.
Sam debated quickly in her head whether she should allow the couple to take their natural course, but decided she should probably do something. If she let their relationship go the distance, it would probably ruin their chances of getting together forever, which was good, but it would also ruin Carly and Freddie's friendship, which would ruin Sam and Freddie's friendship. (Because, without Carly, what reason would he have to suffer through Sam's abuse?) But, of course, that part didn't matter to Sam… She just wanted Carly to be happy. (Right?)
In any case, Sam was one manipulative bitch and knew that, if everything was going to work out, she needed Freddie to be the one to break up with Carly. A tall order to say the least. She might as well ask Spencer to stop building sculptures or ask Gibby to never take off his shirt in public again. But Sam had a habit of accomplishing the impossible. She quickly ran through a series of complex plans in her head before coming up with one of the most ingenious schemes that she had ever come up with. Perhaps… she should just be straight with him?
Sam watched Carly as she walked away, "Yeah… savor it..." she told Freddie.
"Savor what?" he asked, truthfully having no idea what Sam was getting at, but knowing that it definitely wouldn't be good. It would never be good with Sam.
"The love… the Carly love," Sam turned back to Freddie and taunted him. She grinned.
Freddie huffed, "Jealous?" he teased. He took great satisfaction in the look that crossed his best friend's face.
"Gross!" she said, with absolute disgust.
"Then what's your problem?" Freddie asked. He was really too happy with his current predicament to be angry, but he was slightly curious as to why Sam was trying to mess with their relationship. He knew Sam didn't give a rat's ass about his well-being, but it was out of character for her to be messing with Carly's happiness.
"Not my problem, yours…" She said casually, before turning around and walking towards her locker, hiding her face. She grinned. He was about to follow and question her. Boy did she know how to reel them in… Sam Puckett really was one amazing conman.
"Wait…" he said, limping after her, almost alarmed. Ha! Every single time.
"Go to class, crutchy!" She waved him off.
"What problem do I have?" he asked, almost challenging her. Freddie's life was as problem-free as it had ever been. Finally everything was going right for him! And all it took was a Mexican food truck!
Sam turned around, and looked at Freddie seriously. She looked like she was deciding whether or not to tell him, but that was more of her acting. She had already decided. Strangely, though, it was harder to crush the boy's dreams than she thought it would be. "Want the truth?"
"Let's hear it," he said, genuinely wanting to know what she had to say, not knowing what was coming. What was amazing to Sam was that he had no idea. He had no fucking idea that his relationship was all a sham.
"Remember two years ago, when I dated that guy, Eric Mosby, kid with the big nose?" she asked.
"Sure, Noseby Mosby," he nodded, waving at her to continue.
"And remember how he tried to get me to be his girlfriend for like six months, and I kept saying 'Get away from me or I'll kill you'?" she asked again, and he nodded. Freddie remembered thinking at the time that the guy must have had an S&M fetish or something. Why would someone try that hard to date Sam? Sure, she was pretty, but that was countered a hundred times and then some by the fact that she was, you know, sociopathic. It was like his crush on Carly except for the fact that there were no benefits if Sam actually did give in. "And then he bought me a subscription to the Bacons of the World Club, and then, boom, I thought I was in love with the guy?"
Freddie nodded again, "I'm listening…"
"I was never in love with him!" She said truthfully and sincerely, more than anything else in the entire conversation. Now she was speaking from the heart, trying to make him see the truth. "I was in love with the foreign bacon that kept showing up at my door every month!"
Freddie was seriously confused.
"Like a beautiful, greasy dream…" she reminisced, going back to her locker door.
Freddie smiled at his friend's antics, "Uh, I doubt that bacon could make you think that you're in love with someone…"
Sam gave him a look and returned her full attention to him. "You ever had Bolivian bacon?" This was serious business.
"No…" he commented skeptically.
Sam paused. "It changes you…" she said, looking off in the distance. Remembering the flavor.
"Well I didn't buy Carly any foreign bacon. I saved her life!" Freddie remarked confidently, choosing this moment to walk away, convinced that Sam wasn't going to say anything of importance.
"And that's Carly's bacon!" Sam called to Freddie's retreating backside. Freddie turned, and Sam continued, "She's not in love with you! She's in love with what you did!"
Freddie was now starting to get very seriously irked. "You just can't stand the idea of Carly and me as a couple!" he accused.
"Very true, it makes me want to puke up blood…" Sam deadpanned, once more completely sincere. "But still! What I said is true. And you know it!"
Freddie scoffed, "I better get to class."
He walked away, and Sam got a funny feeling in the bottom of her stomach. She knew that angry feeling was going to come back soon, but right now she just sighed and felt… sad. Sam decided to screw school and went back to her locker to get some stuff before going home.
"Here's Spency!" Sam opened the door to see the face of her best friend's eccentric brother with a blow-tube. Sam rolled her eyes and slammed the door of the locker before making sure it stayed locked. He really should stop saying witty things before he blows…
School hadn't even started yet, and Sam was already leaving. She didn't bother going to the nurse and lying, saying that she was sick or something. They would just call her mother, who she knew wasn't awake yet, and who wouldn't wake up just to answer the phone. (Pam Puckett hadn't come home until after Sam had gone to sleep the night before, and Sam didn't really want to think about what she had been doing.) The nurse would end up telling her to go to sleep on one of those uncomfortable bed things, and Sam would end up going back to class within an hour because she would be so bored. Plus, Sam got a certain rush out of breaking the rules and leaving school without permission. Carly would be worried when she didn't show up at lunch, but she'd deal with that later.
On her extraordinarily slow walk home, Sam kept getting more and more anxious. She needed to do something, something bad. She thought of calling her delinquent friends from around her neighborhood who went to Ridgeway's much poorer rival school, Isaac E. Young, but decided that, even though most of them would probably be skipping school as well, she didn't want to be around anyone she knew. She was too angry. In her head, Sam ran through several things she could do to fulfill the void she was feeling and get a taste of the rush she had felt when she shoved that kid up against his locker.
She could steal a car, that wouldn't be that hard, but then she'd probably get arrested. Carly would know something was wrong. (Plus, Sam had been there and done that. Stealing a car when she was ten on a dare had been the first thing that sent her to juvie.) Getting piss drunk would be much too easy. There was so much alcohol around her house that her mother would never notice if some of it went missing. Having sex with a random guy was out of the question not because of any moral dilemmas, but because that seemed just a little too gross to Sam. Drugs were too expensive for what she had on her at the moment. There was only one teenage screw-up cliché left.
Sam crossed the street to enter a 7-Eleven several blocks from her house. She grinned when she saw the clerk. He was the easiest kind of person to manipulate; he had greasy hair, a large helping of pimples sprinkling his face, and a body that Sam was certain she could snap like a twig. Sam was sure that the most action he had ever gotten was alone and looking at women in a dirty magazine. Sam was fifteen, and he might be able to tell, but, with enough charm and the fake I.D. she always kept in her wallet, she knew that he wouldn't say anything.
Sam walked up to the desk and smiled, placing a hand on her hip. "Hey…" she said, looking at the selection behind him. "Can I have a pack of Marlboros?" she asked, still smiling and looking at him like he was George Clooney instead of Thad, a nineteen year-old high school dropout who had never even kissed a girl. And, yes, Sam could tell all of that from just looking at him and the way he held himself.
"Um… er… uh…" he started, trying to think straight, not knowing what to do. When she stretched, he could see her bare abdomen in between her shirt and low-cut jeans.
"Yes?" she asked innocently, channeling her inner Melanie, not that Melanie would ever smoke. It ruined your finger nails, and your teeth, and your hair, and made you smell like an ashtray. It general, everyone was agreed that smoking was a very bad thing. But Sam didn't care. That's why she was doing it. Sam loved doing bad things.
"Um… I.D.?" he croaked, his voice cracking in a way it probably hadn't in several years. Sam grinned and got out her wallet, knowing that he'd never be able to tell that it was a fake. Sam was very proud of her grandpa and 'J'Mam-Maw'; they weren't just petty criminals like the rest of the Pucketts. They were high-class criminals, or, at least, they had been.
"Here," she handed it to him, fluttering her eyes a little bit like she'd often seen Melanie do.
He looked at it briefly, acknowledging the birth date. "You're eighteen?" he asked.
Sam nodded, "Yep, turning nineteen in April," she said confidently. Looking like you believed it yourself was 95% of lying.
Thad turned and got her the pack of cigarettes. He wrung them up and handed them to Sam after she'd given him the money. His hand brushed hers when he handed her the change, and Sam had to resist the urge to shiver with disgust. He really was gross. "Have a nice day, Mam!" he called after her.
"You too!" she called back without turning around. Sam stood outside the 7-Eleven for a moment and didn't move. She soaked up the rush of doing something that she wasn't supposed to do. That was 95% of it for Sam, the rush. She loved the feeling of being in control and defying authority. She always had. Her mom said that she had done the opposite of what she was told from the cradle. And, in a way, it was like she was claiming her destiny. If she had no choice except ending up as a petty criminal, why not start now?
Carly and Freddie could have their bright, long futures as doctors, or lawyers, or whatever the hell they wanted to be. Sam, however, was just going to have fun for the rest of her life. Sam put away the cigarettes at the bottom of her bag. Maybe she'd smoke them later. Right now, she was going to break her friend Christian out of school, and they were going to graffiti the side of this convenience store. Currently, it seemed much too bare and boring. Thad would probably appreciate the new decorations.
Sam never smoked the cigarettes; she didn't need to. Carly called Sam the next night and told her about what Freddie had said. Carly seemed a bit upset about the whole thing, which Sam felt sorry for, but she couldn't stop herself from grinning wildly. Sam once more stuffed the cigarettes she had been about to smoke towards the bottom of her bag, and threw the one which she had already lit into the trashcan, feeling suddenly very calm and without the need to be one more mess of a teenager in a herd of thousands.
That's not to say it didn't come and bite her in the ass later.
Almost a year later, the whole gang was hanging around the Shay living room, reeling from their most recent adventure with a whole bunch of bratty kids from St. Mary's, the school/church down the street from Bushwell Plaza. It had been an interesting/horrifying week that had bit them all in the ass by the end. Spencer was, of course, having his own, completely different, set of problems.
"Spencer, what did you put in that blue tea?" his little sister asked, making a face and moving her mouth up and down, trying to get rid of the oddly bitter aftertaste of the beverage.
Spencer shrugged sadly, "I bet Kristacia could make awesome blue tea…" he said from his position at the kitchen counter, looking longingly at a picture of them he had uploaded onto SplashFace.
Carly groaned and decided it might be best to ignore her brother, "Hey, Freddie, do you have any gum?" she asked the boy, who was making a face very similar to hers, as he had also consumed Spencer's batch of blue tea.
Freddie quickly checked his jean pockets and shook his head, "No, you should check Sam's bag. I think I saw her chewing gum yesterday while she was barking orders at those young children."
Carly made a face and shivered, a memory suddenly coming back to her, "I don't like looking in Sam's bag. The last time I looked in there I saw… some pretty bad things Freddie, some pretty bad things…"
Freddie laughed, "Oh, go on, I mean, if she has Chinese fireworks in there, I would want to know sooner rather than later…"
Carly gave Freddie a look that told him what he had said wasn't true at all, and that they might be made accomplices in whatever crime Sam was currently committing, but she proceeded to go through Sam's plaid backpack anyway. It was the usual suspects: pliers, a wire-cutter, empty notebooks, lots of Fatcake wrappers, but no gum. She reached deeper into the bag to see if Sam had pushed it to the bottom, and found something rectangular that felt like an opened pack of gum. "Aha!" she called triumphantly, and took it out of the bag.
But Carly's happiness expired when she actually looked down into her hands. Her mouth formed an 'O', and she paled considerably. As a matter of fact, so did Sam, who had just walked out of the bathroom and into the Shay's living room. "Ah, crap…" she said silently to herself.
Wait, actually, she had said that out loud…
Carly's head shot up, and Sam suddenly realized that, if looks could kill, she'd be dead.
There was a beat of silence, very uncomfortable silence, where Carly and Sam were looking at each other, neither knowing exactly what to say, but for very different reasons. Freddie was also looking at the duo, his head moving back and forth between the two girls. Like Carly, he was quite shocked and angry to learn that Sam had been keeping this from them, and even a little bit surprised. He didn't know why it surprised him, because it was Sam, but it did. Freddie remained silent, though, because he wasn't sure who was more frightening at that moment, Carly or Sam, and that said a lot. It took a lot for Carly to be scary, and he had never thought that she could beat Sam at her own game. Likewise with Spencer, who viewed Sam as another little sister, was very disappointed with the young delinquent, but he too was more scared of Carly's reaction to it than anything.
Then, suddenly, the silence ended, and it ended in a big way.
"How could you, Sam?" Carly screamed, "How could you do this to yourself?"
Sam started to speak, trying to defend herself, "Now, wait a min-"
"No!" Carly yelled, stopping her best friend mid-sentence. "You're going to be silent! Do you know what these things do to you?" she asked hysterically, holding up one of the cigarettes. "You know what they do to your heart and lungs? You could get lung cancer! Haven't you seen those commercials and those gross things tobacco does to your mouth? I showed you that video of the guy who had to speak through the computer! I know I did!" she threw the cigarette to the ground. "We're gonna get you to stop this! I can't believe you, Sam. How could you do this-?"
Obviously, all of these things were very good points, and Sam generally agreed with them, but, for some reason, she was getting more and more annoyed with everything her best friend was saying. Carly didn't understand her, and she never would! She was perfect, little Carly, and she lived in a perfect, little world. Who did she think she was, telling Sam what to do? Sam may not be Carly, but that didn't mean she wasn't entitled to running her own life. She told Carly as much. "Who the hell do you think you are, Shay?" Sam shouted back, interrupting her. "I can do whatever the hell I want! You're not my mother! And as a matter of fact, she really doesn't give a shit whether I smoke or not!" This was true, even if Sam was actually not a smoker.
Carly looked both affronted and surprised, and she was about to retort angrily when she was once again interrupted by Sam. "I can do whatever the fuck I want, and I can fuck up my life if I want to! It's my choice, and, as a matter of fact, I like being a delinquent! I like doing these things! I am perfectly happy to end up in prison one day, and end up like my awful mother, if it means that I'm going to have fun while doing it! It is my fucking decision, and I don't need anyone telling me what I can or can not do! You guys can go on and continue being perfect and wonderful and whatever, and I'm going to go home and graffiti something, or egg someone's car, or get in a fight with someone for no particular reason! Hell, I can go home and get completely drunk and no one will give a shit, because that's just who I am!"
Carly was now confused, because Sam now seemed to be talking about something completely different. "Sam-" she started, reaching for her friend's shoulder, but Sam jerked away.
"I can do whatever the fuck I want-" Sam repeated in a softer tone, but gritted it out, getting close to Carly's face, grabbing the pack of cigarettes and her bag before leaving the apartment.
Everyone was silent once more. It had been shocking because Sam rarely cursed in Carly's presence, (Carly made both Freddie and Sam put a dollar in the cursing jar whenever they so much as mouthed a four-letter-word) but she had never cursed at Carly. Something was seriously wrong with Sam, and they had seen it coming for more than a week, but they had been ignoring it, assuming everything would eventually go back to normal like it always did.
It had all started the Wednesday before their iCarly broadcast with the Penny Tee auction.
Sam and Freddie were sitting together in the Groovy Smoothie, drinking their smoothies and coming up with ideas for the next iCarly. Freddie was going on about something, as usual, and Sam wasn't listening to him, as usual, but it was for different reasons than the normal, 'He bores the hell out of me' ones. Strangely, she was thinking about their first kiss.
"I'm telling you!" Freddie said with emotion, trying to get one of the girls to finally give in about the subject. He knew Sam would give in when hell froze over, but that didn't stop him from trying. "I really think the iCarly audience would appreciate a real 'Tech Time with Freddie'. I mean, think about it, it's a good percentage of our demographic, people into computers who spend a lot of time online…"
Sam was stilling looking at Freddie's lips, remembering the event more vividly than she usually did. It was fairly out of character for Sam to be on the subject at all, actually, because she wasn't really the sentimental type. She didn't dote on things for too long.
Freddie looked at Sam as well, wondering why she was being so quiet. He was waiting for an insult, for her to say something that demeaned him and every idea that he had ever had, but it didn't come. Sam and Freddie's friendship was more solid than ever, and they were now real friends, even without Carly's interference, but the arguing and bickering was just their thing. It was what they did. So it worried him that she wasn't even trying to emasculate him or insult his mother and entire family. "Sam, Sam… Sam!" he exclaimed, waving a hand in front of her face, trying to get her attention. When she looked into his eyes instead of giving him that glazed over look, he continued. "So… what do you think?" he asked.
"What? Oh, yeah, fine," She commented, without much emotion, still not really listening to Freddie.
"Really?" Freddie asked, amazed. Sam was letting him proceed with one of his ideas? Wait… hell wasn't actually freezing over, was it? What did that even mean, and wouldn't that actually be a good thing?
Sam didn't say anything, once more looking at Freddie, but this time with an incredibly confused expression on her face. Frankly, it was creeping Freddie out. He got more and more uncomfortable as the time passed, and became more and more certain that a prank was about to be pulled on him. But he asked her anyway, "You okay, Sam?"
Something was different to Sam about the nub, and it had been for some time, but she couldn't, for the life of her, figure out what it was. She looked Freddie in the eyes, and they shared a long look. Suddenly, she had a moment of great clarity. The clouds had left her mind, and suddenly everything about Freddie was as clear as day to her. It had all happened in a millisecond, and the spell was broken forever. She stopped breathing momentarily.
"No! No! No! No! No!" Sam chanted silently to herself, "This cannot be happening!"
The look on Sam's face had changed from confused to horrified, and Freddie still had no idea what was going on her head.
Freddie was lucky; it was mostly just a lot of cursing.
Everything had dawned on her, and it was too much for the young rebel to accept all at once. Sam now knew what she had been denying for months, something her subconscious had been attempting to repress for as long as possible. Unfortunately, Sam, ever the curious one, had to go and dig for the information. Samantha Puckett, without a shadow of a doubt, had a thing for her nerdy, nubish, best friend, Freddie Benson.
A romantic thing.
Sam cursed inwardly some more and immediately got up from her seat, trying to get away from Freddie as quickly as possible. "I've got to go!" she called back, taking her jacket and backpack with her.
"Wait! Sam!" Freddie called as she made her way for the door, "You didn't pay for your smoothie!"
Sam turned back quickly and indignantly shouted, "I didn't finish it!" before making her final leave from the smoothie place.
Freddie picked up her smoothie. "She did finish it…" he muttered, getting out his wallet.
Sam was feeling very, very sick, and she needed a lot of fresh air, so she walked to the park, not far from Bushwell Plaza, and sat down, trying to breathe deeply. So… she had a thing for Freddie Benson. She refused to use any other adjective for what she was feeling, because "thing" was appropriately vague, and she didn't want to give it any more power than it already had. Anyway, what did this mean? It meant nothing, because it had to. Even if Freddie did like Sam back…
Sam stopped that train of thought right there. Freddie couldn't like her back, based on their past relationship. It was amazing that he still talked to her at all. Plus, the most important factor, Freddie had been in love with Carly for years. Freddie would always love Carly, and why wouldn't he? Like Sam had noted before, Carly was the perfect girl: pretty and prim and just quirky enough, without all of the psychopathic tendencies in Sam which were definitely an acquired taste. And Sam wouldn't change for Freddie. She refused to. If he didn't want to be with a psychotic but lovable teenage delinquent, then that was his fault. She had tried to change for Pete, but that hadn't worked out, and neither would changing for Freddie, assuming that he'd be able to forgive and forget, even with a complete overhaul in personality.
And why should she overhaul her personality? She could do whatever she wanted! She was Sam Puckett!
Sam decided that the best way to proceed would be to just ignore the feelings. Hopefully, they'd go away, and Sam could continue going on as she always had.
Needless to say, that plan of attack didn't exactly work out. The Sam Puckett anger came back, bigger and better than ever. She had to distract herself, had to get over it, and what a better way than to revert back to her old, delinquent, bullying tendencies?
Knowing the truth about why she hated the potential Carly/Freddie relationship so very much didn't really help things at all. It actually made everything a hundred times worse. Instead of being vaguely unhappy whenever she thought about it, it now felt like hell to her. The thought of being around them while they were acting all kissy and cute made her want to vomit. She needed to get over her "thing" by then. So she amped up the old Sam Puckett by… a lot.
The next time Freddie saw Sam, she was basically back to normal, except a hundred times more intense than usual. The whole day she was making everyone around the school miserable, especially Freddie. Boy, did she have a thing for making Freddie miserable. She abused him both physically and emotionally, and it no longer seemed nearly as playful as it had been. Their relationship reverted back to its previous hate-hate status. Freddie seriously had to stop himself from screaming at her in the middle of class at one point.
These were Freddie's dark days.
But Sam's abuse wasn't only towards Freddie. It was towards everyone. She was playing sadistic pranks on the teachers, shoving kids up against their lockers, and stealing their money. (She had also been flirting with Rip-off Rodney, Freddie noticed, which was just weird.) Sam had led several people to breaking down in tears, teachers not excluded, and had been sent to Principal Franklin's office no less than four times. Freddie had heard that she'd broken the vending machine open just so she could take a single Fatcake. (Frankly, what was more worrying was that she'd only stolen one.)
Freddie sat down at the lunch table, across from Carly. They shared a look. "Sam…" they said at the same time.
"Is Sam okay?" Freddie asked, "Did she mention anything to you? Because I was with her yesterday, and she was acting weird, and now today…" his voice wondered off.
"Today…" Carly agreed, absentmindedly playing with her gross cafeteria mashed potatoes. "You know, I had three teachers come up to me today and ask me to deal with Sam! Who do they think I am? Sam's keeper?" Freddie gave Carly a look, and Carly sighed. "I guess you're right, but I really have no idea what's wrong with her this time. You know, I could've sworn I heard her ordering Chinese fireworks over the phone after third period today! Chinese fireworks! I mean, why would Sam possibly need Chinese fireworks?"
Carly and Freddie looked at each other, then off into the distance, imagining a scenario where Sam and Chinese fireworks would make sense. They looked back at each other, realizing that there was no way to spin that to make it look good. "How much money do we have left in the Sam Puckett Legal Defense Fund?" he asked her hurriedly.
Carly thought about it for a second before saying, "Not enough, we're low after that incident with Sam and the Mexican ambassador…"
Freddie played with his own food, "Time for another fund-raiser…"
Sam dropped her lunch on the table next to Carly as they finished talking. She gave them a suspicious look. Freddie was a little too good at looking innocent, but Carly could never completely fool her. Sam's eyes narrowed at her food, and she hacked at the mashed potatoes with a little more force than necessary.
The Penny Tee incident was just another outlet for Sam's anger, but it was by far the most horrifying. When Carly and Freddie saw what Sam was doing in the basement, they couldn't help but be a little disgusted by Sam. Sam had always been bad. She was born that way, and neither of her best friends thought that anything could ever make her act differently. But there had always been a reason for her doing bad things. Not good reasons, mind you, but reasons all the same. The whole 'child slave labor' thing was completely unnecessary, and Sam seemed more sadistic and… evil than she ever had before.
Freddie had seen all different sides of Sam. Not even Gibby had suffered the same kind of abuse Freddie had at the hands of Ridgeway's most infamous bully. Sam had beat him up, emasculated him, insulted his family and called him some vicious names, but Sam had never seemed evil to Freddie. This was different, bad different.
Freddie shivered. He had just imagined Sam as a super-villain. That would be one story he would have no desire to be a part of. (Though… spandex? Hm…?)
Speaking of super-heroes and super-villains, Freddie went home the night after he'd first seen Sam's sweat-shop and watched The Dark Knight. Marissa Benson wasn't home, and Freddie wanted to watch something that she wouldn't approve of. The Dark Knight was as adventurous as he got; his mother thought it was too scary for sixteen-year-old boys. At one point, one of the characters said that old saying, "The night is always darkest before the dawn," and it now seemed extremely appropriate to Freddie. Sam had been getting darker and darker all week until she had finally cracked in the form of screaming at Carly. (Hopefully it was appropriate. Freddie sincerely hoped that the dawn was about to arrive, because he couldn't imagine Sam getting any darker.)
Seconds after Sam had stormed out of the Shay apartment, Spencer, Carly and Freddie were all still standing there with their mouths opened, not really sure what had just happened. None of them had ever seen Sam so… tortured, if that was the right word. She was really, really upset, and they had no idea why, but it had to be serious.
Carly was standing there, looking kind of lost, not knowing what to do, but decided to go after her friend. As she made her way to the door, she felt a hand on her arm. She looked back to see Freddie holding her back, "I have to go talk to her, Freddie!" Carly said, trying to get out of his grasp.
Freddie grimaced at his friend. "Carls, I better be the one to go," Freddie loved Carly dearly. He really did, but, frankly, sometimes the very intelligent girl lacked a great deal of tact. Plus, more importantly, she was much too easy to lie to. She might allow Sam to bury everything back down again, and that wouldn't be healthy for anybody. Carly wouldn't even know anything was wrong. Sam couldn't pull that crap as easily on Freddie.
"You sure?" Carly asked, worried about Sam, but also about Freddie's safety.
Freddie laughed without much humor, trying to calm his friend's fears. "Yeah, I'll be fine. My bones must be made of iron by now or something. Anyway, it might be nice for her to beat someone up who isn't going to call the police." He smiled at Carly faintly, but she didn't look like she found it very funny. In any case, she patted Freddie on the shoulder and ushered him out of the apartment.
Freddie turned the corner to go to the main elevator, thinking that she was probably heading home, but he stopped in his tracks when he saw Sam there, sitting at the base of the wall with her head in her knees, breathing deeply. Freddie made his way to her, really hoping that she wasn't crying. He could deal with an angry Sam, but a crying Sam? Not so much…
Freddie confirmed that Sam wasn't crying when she looked up at him after he'd slid down the wall next to her. The look she gave him attempted to be a glare, but it seemed like she couldn't quite make it. "You're not Carly…" she commented softly.
"No, I'm not," he agreed. Neither of them said anything for a moment, and Freddie decided to break the silence. "What happened?" he asked.
Sam sighed, and she tried to avoid the question, knowing that she couldn't tell him. "You know, it's really none of your business…" she started.
Unsurprisingly, that didn't work. "Oh, come on, Sam…" Freddie said, not angrily, but not without force either, "Why would you start smoking?" he asked, figuring that would be a good place to start. It was the most pressing matter at hand, in any case.
Sam rolled her eyes, "I didn't. Those cigarettes are nearly a year old. I just felt like trying out my fake I.D. one day, but I never actually smoked them."
Freddie could tell that was probably not the whole truth, but, strangely, he believed her when she said that she had never smoked them. "So… why didn't you tell Carly that?"
Sam closed her eyes tightly and leaned into her knees again, "I couldn't," she muttered and then looked up once more, "I don't know why, but I just couldn't. She started yelling at me, and I just started getting so angry. I got so angry! I didn't want Carly to know the truth anymore. It's what people expect of me, anyway, so why not give it to them?" she asked, more to herself than Freddie this time. "I don't want to be Carly anyway…"
Freddie didn't really know what Sam was talking about, but he felt it was connected to that rant she had just had in the Shay apartment. "No one wants you to be Carly, Sam. And what do people expect of you?" he asked.
Sam chose to ignore the first part of his statement and decided to just answer his question, "I'm a screw-up, Freddie, from a long line of screw-ups, so people expect me to, you know, screw-up! It's in my blood." Sam looked away from Freddie again, and Freddie decided to stay silent and let Sam get out everything she had to say. "My life's not going anywhere, Freddie, and I know that. That's okay." She sighed sadly, "I know that I won't go to college, and that I'll probably end up being a petty criminal for a living, crashing on you and Carly's couch whenever I need a place to stay. I know that I'll probably end up being gunned down by a cop in a drug raid or something before I even reach thirty, and what does it really matter? I'm not going to end up being a productive member of society… Well, Freddie, why don't I just claim my destiny right now? I can start being a petty criminal like my father before I even graduate, if I graduate…"
Freddie was absolutely horrified at what Sam was saying, and it showed on his face. How could Sam think that? "Sam! How can you talk like that? None of that's true! You, Sam Puckett, are not a screw-up, and you could probably do anything if you put your mind to it," Sam rolled her eyes, he sounded like such a mom. "Don't make that face! It's true! With the exception of right now, you are the most confident person I've ever met, and you are definitely the most determined. I have never seen you try to do something that you didn't succeed at, and that's why I admire you." Freddie nudged Sam playfully, "Plus, even if you do choose to become a petty criminal for the rest of your life, you know Carly and I will have your back no matter what."
Sam tried to glare at him again, tried to get angry, but it just wasn't going to happen. Unfortunately, this episode was just making her love him more and more, and, yes, she had just said love. They shared a look for only a few moments, but it felt like more to Sam. Eventually, she stood up and offered Freddie her hand. He accepted it, and pretty soon they were both standing. "So… that's it?" he asked. "That's what's been bothering you this whole week?"
Sam thought about it for a second and said, "Well, that and boy problems…"
"Oh…" Freddie said, understanding. That wasn't really his area of his expertise, but he did have an opinion on it. "Well, if he wants you to be more like Carly, then he's not worth it. I'd drop him if I were you. We don't want another Pete situation on our hands. Sam Puckett is good enough as she is."
Sam couldn't help but smile a little. "Thanks. And thanks for this too, but tell Carly I'm probably going to head home now anyway. Tell her everything's fine."
Freddie couldn't help but stay a little worried, "But we'll see you tomorrow, right?"
Sam nodded and said, "Sure," before walking back towards the elevator. Freddie stood there, watching her go. She turned back at the last second. "Freddie?" she asked.
"Yes, Sam?" Sam looked unsure of whether she should say anything, but decided to proceed anyway. She needed to know, and who better to get information from than the world's authority?
"Does it get easier?" she asked, "Loving someone who doesn't love you back?"
Freddie looked at her strangely, and was silent for a moment, deliberating what to say, before proceeding with her question. "Yes," he said finally, with a lot of thought, "It does."
Sam breathed and nodded, thanking him, before turning back to the elevator, which had just opened.
Freddie was getting this strange feeling in his stomach. He didn't know why it mattered, but it really did. It was coming from that area in his brain which was always clouded with confusion, the Sam area. But he needed her to know. "Sam!" he called, and she raised her eyebrows, waiting for an explanation.
"Just so you know," he said, "I don't like Carly like that anymore."
Sam nodded and found herself repressing a smile, but she didn't want to read too much into it. "Okay." She said softly.
The elevator doors closed, and Freddie sighed, going back into the Shay apartment to calm Carly down. He was getting this weird feeling, and he really wanted it to go away. Things were so much simpler when he was in love with Carly and hated her best friend… But he was pretty sure that she was worth it.