Pierced Through The Heart
Sam closed the door to room 8-C one last time. She leaned against the wood afterward, contemplating what had just occurred. She remained in this position for quite a while. Sam was eventually interrupted by the sound of footsteps bounding down the staircase leading from the second floor of the loft to the first. A dark-haired brunette jogged into the living room.
"So who was that?" Carly said. She had asked Sam to answer the door since she was up in her bedroom, changing her clothes.
"I don't know, some creepy kid," Sam said. "I think he had the wrong room number."
"Oh," Carly said. She analyzed the blonde more closely, sensing that something was amiss. First of all, unless she was seriously mistaken, Sam looked like she had been deep in thought. Sam was never deep in thought, which piqued Carly's curiosity. Secondly...
"Hey, weren't you eating a piece of chicken?"
Sam nodded in acknowledgment, and any hint of musing departed. "Yeah, I dropped it."
Two months later...
Freddie was leaning against his locker, two hands planted firmly on the metal, bawling his eyes out. It was over. It had only lasted sixty-one days, and it was over. Now what was left of his ruined heart lay in shambles inside his chest, a fresh corpse waiting for rigor mortis to set in. So much for love at first sight.
It had taken him a month to get to know Carly well enough. It had taken another month after that to summon the necessary courage to let her know how he felt about her. But it only took forty-five seconds for his hopes and dreams to go down in flames. He hadn't even set it up the way he wanted to. He didn't declare his love for her under the starlight, out on the Bushwell's fire escape, before the stroke of twelve after a long and intimate conversation. Rather, Freddie declared his love for Carly in an empty school hallway, in front of her locker on a Tuesday afternoon.
He had waited forever for the right moment. He considered confessing to her last night, but no one was home in 8-C when he knocked. He considered confessing to her before school, when she was alone at the lockers, but he got cold feet. He considered confessing to her in between fifth and sixth period, but doggone it, girls always traveled in packs. Finally, he considered confessing to her after school let out. Carly however was involved in a million and one clubs, so he couldn't get to her after the final bell. He had to bide his time, wait for her, and strike when the opportunity presented itself.
Drama club, the last on Carly's list, ended at three fourty-five. Freddie had stood outside the door to the auditorium. He navigated the sea of students streaming out of the double-doors, hoping he could catch Carly. Unfortunately, he did. Freddie anticipated making some sort of excuse for why he was still at school, but Carly did not seem to mind. He said he needed to talk to her, and Carly suggested that they swing by the lockers, since she had to grab a textbook she'd forgotten anyway.
In the first, awkward second, Freddie knew he was doomed. Carly had no idea what was coming, and once Freddie uttered those awful three words, the freeze in her facial expression told him everything. Reluctant, gentle, and for some reason still calm, Carly told him that she didn't feel the same way. He was a good friend though. She hoped they could stay friends.
And so he was crying.
"Well," Freddie choked. "So much for that." He hit his fist weakly against his locker. At least he had been spared the indignity of breaking down when all the kids were still here. Few lingered at school this late in the afternoon.
"I just don't get it," Freddie said, once he had captured his breath. "I fell in love with her the second I saw her. Doesn't that mean anything?" Freddie shut his eyes tightly. As his failure began sinking in, he realized how stupid he had been. He honestly thought that because he had instantly fallen in love with Carly, that meant they were destined for one another. Just like in the movies. Sure, they were fiction, but weren't they based on a theoretical premise?
"I'm such an idiot," Freddie said. He had even gone through the effort of calling his mother an hour ago and telling her he had to stay late for a book club meeting. Marissa Benson couldn't object that. The worst part was that now he was stuck alone at school, with no one to comfort him.
"This day can't get any worse."
Fate however, had other things in store for Fredward Benson.
"What are you still doing here?"
Freddie's deceased heart resurrected, beating with the intensity of a drummer from a heavy metal band. There was only one girl's voice he had learned just as well, if not better, than Carly Shay's. Oh no. Not her. Please God, let it be anyone but her. Freddie didn't want to, but he had to turn around and face his inquirer sometime. When he did, his fears were confirmed.
Sam Puckett was standing behind him. In his agony, Freddie had forgotten that sixth-grade detention let out at three forty-five as well. And in the blonde's right hand was yet another piece of fried chicken. This last part truly confounded Freddie. How in the world did Sam get fried chicken on her way from the detention room? Briggs inspected every backpack at the beginning of detention, so she could not have stowed it inside beforehand.
The grief-stricken boy wiped the tears from his eyes. Since their first, dysfunctional encounter, Freddie discovered that Sam hated him more than any resident in the tri-county area. Conversely, Freddie discovered that he felt the same way about Sam. Thus, at this moment with her standing in front of him during his darkest hour, he struggled to find the right words. Sam on the other hand experienced no such difficulty.
"You told her, didn't you?" Sam asked. Her tone was accusatory more than anything. Still not knowing what to say, Freddie dabbed at his eyes with the edge of his sleeve. "Dude, I told you not to tell her. I told you that she didn't like you back, and that if you told her, you were gonna get rejected."
Freddie rubbed the moisture from his eyes. Sam found out about his feelings for Carly almost right away. Humiliating though it was, he hadn't been completely devastated at first. Sam was Carly's best friend after all. Maybe she could help him out one of these days. He had a hard time believing that one of Carly's friends lacked a good side. Besides, didn't everyone have a soft spot for true love? As it turned out, Sam had neither of these things. She first seized the attention of the entire sixth-grade hallway with a loud yell. She then threatened to tell them about Freddie's crush unless Freddie let her burp in his face. Now he had an aversion to both fried chicken and fish tacos.
"I thought you said that just to be mean," Freddie snapped. This only made Sam angry.
"I did say it just to be mean, but that doesn't mean it wasn't true."
Unable to form a response, Freddie resorted to drying his eyes again. He was running out of tears though, so this was becoming less viable of an option. Remembering that other kids would be coming out of detention too, Freddie anxiously glanced down the hall. Thankfully, there was no one in sight.
"What, you're not even going to say anything back?" Freddie wanted to say a lot of things to Sam. He wanted to condemn her for existing, for stuffing a fried chicken leg down his pants, and for being insanely mean to him, especially right now when his world was in tatters. Freddie said none of these things however. He only felt tired.
"I don't feel like arguing today, okay?" he told her in a resigned manner. He released a big sigh. "I just want to go home and forget this whole day ever happened." Freddie had gotten no further than five paces away from Sam when his plan failed, and he broke down into renewed weeping.
A groan rumbled in Sam's throat. "Ugh, you are without a doubt the most pathetic boy I have ever met!"
"Shut up, okay?" Freddie gasped.
"I can't believe I'm doing this," Sam muttered to herself. She had lots of plans this afternoon, most of which involved causing some sort of damage to Ms. Briggs' property, and she had not scheduled babysitting some depressed nerd. Going against her better judgment, she grabbed Freddie by his collar and began dragging him with her. "Come on."
"Let me go!" Freddie cried. He thrashed with all his might, but Sam was bigger and stronger than him. "Where are you taking me?"
"To get a smoothie," Sam said. "All this crying is making me nauseous and I need something to settle my stomach. Besides," Sam tossed her bone in a nearby waste container. "I'm out of chicken."
Freddie sat back in his chair with his arms crossed and nasty look on his face. Normally, when someone made you accompany them somewhere, especially if you were having a bad day, they would pay for you. Sam Puckett, as Freddie was finding out more and more, was no such someone. She not only forced him to pay for both of their drinks, but the one she ordered was the most expensive item on the menu. The limited-time 'Ridgeway Rainbow Beast' was a one hundred and twenty-eight ounce behemoth of a smoothie blended out of every type of fruit the Groovy Smoothie had in stock. It had taken that weird T-bo guy thirty minutes to make it. To top it all off, Sam made Freddie go back to the counter to get it once it was completed.
"What's the matter, don't like smoothies?" Sam set down her monster-sized cup. Upon doing so, the tabletop groaned, dipping down on Sam's end. Freddie had to admit, it was kind of cool.
"My mom says I can't come here," Freddie said. He might as well tell her the truth. She had just witnessed him sobbing like a preschooler; no point in worrying about his pride. "She says if I drink one of these things, I'll get diabetes."
"Your mom's a psychopath!" Sam exclaimed. All the kids in Freddie's class knew this thanks to an interruption one day by a certain parent clutching a pair of underwear.
"Yeah, well your mom is too!" All the kids in Sam's class knew this thanks to an interruption one day by a certain parent wearing only a pair of underwear.
"No argument there," Sam admitted. She took a long, deep draught from her cup. She then fixed Freddie with her twin sapphire gaze. "So what are you going to do now that Carly rejected you? And don't start crying again!"
Freddie shrugged, staring down at the table. "I don't know."
"You should move on," Sam said. Freddie gazed at her questioningly. "Look, I've known her since the third grade, okay? You're not her type, and if you keep pining after her, you're gonna end up being one miserable pre-teen."
"Are you trying to help me?" Sam's eyebrows furrowed, and any sentimentality Freddie felt toward the blonde fled like a startled pigeon.
"No, I'm trying to help Carly. I don't want you blubbering all over her every two seconds, trying to win her over." The hurt expression on Freddie's face caused Sam to soften her tone. "But it's true. You're not doing yourself any favors by holding onto her."
Freddie resumed staring at the table. He chewed over the blonde's words. He played the failed confession over inside his head, embracing all the thoughts and feelings he experienced since that first, crushing blow. Sam could very well be right. Judging from her reaction earlier, Carly certainly didn't seem like Freddie's type. If he didn't let go of his feelings, he could end up reliving this afternoon over and over again. He could cut his losses now and move on to hopefully greener pastures. There were still a lot of other girls at Ridgeway. And yet...
"No," Freddie said. The calm certainty in his voice surprised even himself. He almost wanted to laugh at his unexpected, newfound faith. In his anguish, he had found strength. Or so he thought.
"I'm not giving up." Freddie stared confidently at his blonde nemesis.
In that moment, if Freddie were not so impressed by his own emotional resilience, if he were not so utterly convinced that Sam hated him more than any living organism known to man, he might have caught the hurt look that flitted across Sam's features. For the briefest of flashes, her guard collapsed. It wasn't until years later that this random image popped again in Freddie's head, and that he understood what it meant.
"Maybe she doesn't like me now," Freddie continued. "But it doesn't always have to be like that. If I give up today, I'll never have a chance. I'll never know that if I had held out just a little longer, one day she'd like me back."
"Suit yourself," Sam said. She rose out of her seat. "Just don't come crying to me and expect to be taken out for smoothies again."
"I paid for both of us!"
"Eh, you know what I mean." Sam locked her hands together and stretched high into the air. Freddie got out of his chair too. Sam's underreaction to what he said irked him. He was starting to feel like himself again.
"It was love at first sight!" Freddie insisted. "It has to mean something."
Sam seemed to almost pause at this, but instead just shook her head. "Whatever nubs. Come on, let's bail. If anyone sees me here with you, I'm going to have to move to Yakima."
"Wait, don't you want to finish your..." Freddie trailed off. His mouth hung open. Somehow, during the course of their short discussion, Sam had finished all one hundred and twenty-eight ounces of her Ridgeway Rainbow Beast. Freddie knew that Sam had a voracious appetite, but this had to be some kind of record.
"That answer your question? Now c'mon, let's..."
It was Sam's turn to trail off. She had put one foot forward, and was now frozen in place. She placed a hand on her lower abdomen. "On second thought."
Freddie grinned. "Gotta–"
"So bad!"
Sam dashed toward the restrooms.
Fifteen minutes later, a very weary Sam exited the girl's bathroom and walked by the table where Fredward Benson was waiting. The bangs hanging over her forehead were moist. She looked like she had just been through a marathon.
"Nice pee?" Freddie was still wearing that smug grin. Sam couldn't even manage the energy to glare at him. Her eyes were dazed, like she had just seen something from another dimension.
"It wouldn't stop," Sam intoned. "It just wouldn't stop. Never... in my entire–"
"Okay, don't want to hear anymore," Freddie said, covering his ears. He watched as the blonde shuffled past him. She was heading toward the exit.
After Sam had opened the door through a combination of blunt force and inertia, once she was standing out on the sidewalk, something peculiar happened. It had been cloudy that entire day, with the promise of thunderstorms later in the evening. Right then however, at that exact moment, a single ray of light pierced through the heart of the cloud layer, and poured down on Samantha Puckett. It illuminated the girl with all its radiance, until her hair became nothing more than a yellow, molten flame. She became so bright, Freddie had to shield his eyes.
"Are you coming?" Sam may have been exhausted, but she was no less impatient. At her behest, Freddie lowered his shield and saw that the fiery vision had vanished. Sam was just Sam again. He shook off the odd illusion and followed her out the door.
"What were you looking at back there?" Sam asked when they had gotten halfway to the Bushwell. This was after Sam had threatened to beat Freddie within an inch of his life if he told anyone about their little therapy session, and after Freddie decided to tell his mom that someone from the book club dropped him off.
"Nothing."
Sam eyed the brown-haired boy out of the corner of her eye. Something unreadable lurked behind those sapphire twins. "You better not fall in love with me too."
Freddie scoffed at this. "Yeah right. Like that'll ever happen."
Disclaimer - I do not own iCarly, it's characters, nor any other shows, characters, music, and/or movies that may be referenced.
AN: Hello my lovelies. Thanks so much for all the reviews! Just so you know, this story will be composed of a series of events/scenes in Freddie and Sam's progressing relationship. Not quite a singular plot-line, but they will definitely build on one another. They'll be in chronological order, and will all lead up to the finale that I will call 'The Thunderbolt.' You'll find out more about what that entails later. And no, I am NOT talking about the Pokemon move, lol!
