Chapter Two: One of the Rotten Ones.
Her pear phone beeped at her for the millionth time that day, causing Sam to groan in frustration. Missy Robinson was having the Party of the Year that night and people were expecting her to make an appearance. Making an appearance anywhere that didn't involve the Bensons' apartment was highly unlikely. Something that seriously sucked as it was Day Three of her chemistry boot camp and she was going a little stir crazy from being cooped up inside every after school. Unfortunately, casa Benson was not a a happening place on a Friday night.
She debated whether or not to torture herself by reading the message. Her message inbox was full of unread texts, just sitting there, mocking her, telling her things about the party that she wouldn't be able to attend. Mama loved a good party and she took little comfort in the knowledge that people would take her absence as a negative mark against the Missy and not her. While it would be supremely delicious to get a one-up on Missy who's been trying to usurp the Ridgeway crown from her, having to deal with the insane blathering on about how much of a bitch Sam was to not have gone did not sound like the icing on the cake.
Maybe it wouldn't hurt to read just one message?
Cautiously, as if her mobile would explode if she handled it too roughly, she took the phone out of her bag. Meh. There were several from Carly undoubtedly wondering what time she'd be making her entrance. The others were from other people in their group of friends probably asking the same thing. She checked her watch. 7:30 it read and she groaned. Seriously? She'd been sitting on the Bensons' living room floor, with chemistry books and notes strewn across the coffee table, for about three hours now. No wonder her butt was going numb and she had a headache the size of Texas. When they were younger, Freddie's mom had told them some rhyming thing about the brain being a muscle that needed to be exercised, too. It had sounded so stupid back then but sweet Jeebus it was all making sense now.
"Texting your boyfriend?" Freddie asked from somewhere behind her, finished with rooting around for who knew what in that nerd lair he had for a room. He shuffled toward the armchair to her right and sat on one of the armrests.
Idly, she wondered if he still had those ridiculous Galaxy Wars bedsheets. Maybe she could take a picture for blackmail purposes? Nah, the nub probably had some stupid on her in way of baby pictures that his mother had obsessively put together in those scrapbooks that her mother a nd Mrs. Benson got into before everything went bleargh-kaput. Or the 'Dark Times' as she referred to it in the rare moment she ever gave it a passing thought. But anyway, yeah, blackmail probably wouldn't work and would most likely end with her being partnerless and that was not a good thing.
A good thing would be passing chemistry. Stupid chemistry.
"My boyfriend?" she echoed when his question finally sank in. She didn't have a boyfriend as far as she knew.
"Jonah."
Oh. "Oh, he's not my boyfriend."
"He's not?"
"He's not," she said with a finality that signaled the demise of that conversation topic. And with that, she began stacking the books and notes in a neat pile. It wasn't really something she'd normally do. Neat? Books and notes? That wasn't her. But she was feeling tired and brain had become decidedly mushy. She needed to get out of there soon.
"What are you doing? We're not yet done."
She rolled her eyes. "Oh, but we are, dork—" She caught the only other occupant of the apartment clear his throat not so inconspicuously. "I mean, guy who likes books and studying and libraries and spends his weekends playing video games?"
"But we haven't even—I haven't even showed you my color-coded chart," he stammered, gesturing toward his bedroom. "It'll help us with scheduling and... you know we only have about a couple of weeks to do this, right? I'd already made sizable progress in the project before we came into this partnership and I need to brief you on what it is exactly—"
"Shut up," Sam cut him off, "We've been at this for a while now. The past two days, I've gone home in a chemistry-induced daze because of all the stuff you've been trying to hammer into my head. I need a break so," she made a show of stuffing her things into her bag, "I'm gonna go now. Mama needs to scrub all this geekiness off her skin."
There was little satisfaction in seeing the nub's face kinda crumble with disappointment. But beggars couldn't be choosers so she took what she could get. It made her a tiny bit better and with that, she got to her feet and slung her bag over her shoulder.
"Fine, but we'll continue this tomorrow morning, bright and early." She couldn't miss the emphasis on the last two words even if she tried.
"Whatever, nu—Benson. I'll see you later."
"Later?"
"Missy's party later."
"I wasn't invited."
Oh, yeah. Oh man she was crazy out of it if she forgot that geeks like Benson didn't get to attend parties on Friday nights. She considered him then, giving him a once over from head to toe. Nope. Everything about him just reeked of nerd. It was pathetic. He was pathetic. And maybe... she was starting to feel a little sorry for him.
"Well, it's Missy's party. It's not gonna be much to begin with so it's not like you're missing out." She didn't know what came over her, saying those words, thinking to comfort him.
He shrugged. "I've never been to a high school party."
"Really? You and your geek—I mean friends," she quickly amended, "You don't get down and dirty in a party?"
"Do Galaxy Wars marathons count?"
Okay, in her defense, she totally thought that he was joking. Because... How is something like that not a joke? Honestly, these nubs make it too easy for her sometimes. Anyway, the look on Benson's face kinda made her pause the little laughathon that was going on in her mouth. It was kinda weird, like in the surreal kind of way (if surreal meant what she thought it meant), that she'd never forgotten that look. It had been so familiar once upon a time and was ironic that that look had always been able to police her actions when they were younger. He had always been her gauge for when she pushed someone too far because always seemed to feel everything for everyone. When they were five, she had pushed Timmy Ferguson head first into the sand box and threatened to use him as a trampoline when little Fredward took her by the arm and let the expression on his face speak for him. She had felt immeasurably guilty and she hated that he could do that. But once the friendship was over and junior high began and popularity factored in, she knew that she had to do her best to build up any immunity that she could to that look in his eyes. But she never saw it again. Not even when she gave him a wedgie or shoved him down the bleachers or told everyone that he was a test tube baby and his mother was a cyborg. Never.
Until now, anyway. And she was loathe to admit that it still had the same effect on her. A punch to the gut.
"They don't," she replied gruffly and stomped the remaining the steps to the front door and flung it open. She could hear his hurried footsteps behind her.
"Can I come?"
Sam had heard about moments in one's life that defined the sort of person you were. She wasn't a bad person. Promise. She just enjoyed wielding what power she had and if that power had, maybe, a slightly negative impact on other people—physical or otherwise—then that was just incidental. Right? Plus, Missy's party didn't have the exclusivity that the wannabe always craved but could never pull off. So it didn't really count toward social suicide... especially if she ditched him halfway through. Maybe he might survive...
Wait. Was she actually considering bringing the nub along?
"I don't think so, Fredward."
"Aw, c'mon! You know you haven't done anything as far as holding up your end of the deal."
Crap. His Nubbiness made a good point.
She turned around and leaned against the door frame of the Bensons' front door. "Listen, Benson. I know I'm awesome and all but I don't have enough time to pass chemistry and make you less of a dork. We gotta do this one at a time—"
"Yeeaaah," was the drawled out reply, "I don't think so."
"You don't think so?" Were her ears deceiving her?
"I don't trust you." He had his arms crossed over his chest with a smirk firmly in place.
Crap. His Nubbiness made another good point. She wouldn't trust herself either.
"How about this? We go over to Carly's and you bask in all her loveliness for a couple of hours before she and I head to the party. Because let's face it, Benson, you going to a high school party right now is like a fatty of a lamb asking a pack of wolves if they're hungry."
"That's not fair," he protested lamely.
Sam rolled her eyes, then pushed him to the side and started walking toward his bedroom. "We're in high school. When has high school ever been about what's fair?" She didn't wait for his permission before she slammed the door open, a satisfying bang ringing out when the heavy wood made impact with the wall. A quick beeline for his closet, she threw those doors open with equal force and her brow furrowed as she considered what was before. "Oh man, Fredward."
"What now?" replied the unfortunate guy in question from where he stood, examining what damage Sam did to his wall.
"Please, please, please tell me that your mother doesn't still shop for your clothes."
At least he had the decency to look embarrassed. "Stay out of my things," he warned her as he took a couple of slow steps toward her and Sam fought the urge to form a cross with arms in an effort to ward off the nerd germs.
She threw a hanger at him which clipped his ear. Meh. Her aim's been kinda off lately. "You think I want to do this? I'm scared I'll scratch myself on something and wake up tomorrow morning with braces and a pocket-protector, nerd senses a-tingling. Your mom's a nurse, right? Maybe she has surgical gloves somewhere that I can borrow..."
"Sam." He sounded annoyed which made her annoyed. Just a few minutes ago he was accusing her of not holding up her end of the deal and now she gets all this grief?
"Dude, I am not bringing you over to Carly's looking like a..." She took note of his raised eyebrow "Um, like a... Well, like you. I can't bring you over looking like that. We needs ta make you purty so you don't embarrass me."
"Ugh, fine." Whee! Sam liked it when people surrendered to her will. "But I'm not wearing skinny jeans."
"Me making you wear skinny jeans is the least of your problems and eww... I hates me a pair of skinny jeans on a guy." She gave him a look that conveyed her disgust before she went through his clothes one by one. This was gonna take a while. "I'll need something to eat. Preferably something of the pork variety. Or junk food. And something with caffeine."
"I have tofu, beet chips and diet Peppy Cola."
"I hate you," she muttered as she pulled out a pair of jeans that didn't look as baggy as the ones he normally wore, "And your little dog, too!"
Sam could hear his chuckle as he left his room and she was determined to kick his ass if he came back with anything that said diet or healthy or whatever. She pulled out a long-sleeved polo shirt that was could probably fit the entire hockey team, plus the coach. Benson seemed to think it was fashionable to wear clothes that were more suited to a person who was double his size.
"The nineties called and they want their wardrobe back!" she shouted, hoping he could hear her from where he was in the apartment.
He did. "They want their joke back, too, Puckett!" he yelled back
She huffed. At least she wasn't the one who owned the super-sized khakis with grandpa-style front pleats. Hah. Unfortunately, fifteen minutes later and she still hasn't found anything promising aside from the not too horrible pair of jeans and a white v-neck shirt that was probably intended as an undershirt given that it appeared to actually fit properly.
But it'll have to do.
...
Thus far, Freddie had only been inside the Shays' apartment three times. One time was when he caught Spencer Shay, Carly's older brother and legal guardian, trying to get his front door open with arms full of grocery bags. The older man showed quite the valiant effort but seeing as how the carton of eggs at the top of one of bags seemed to want to wobble dangerously off balance, Freddie decided to be the good neighbor and help the guy out. The apartment turned out to be larger than their own and a lot more... colorful. The next two times were for when his mother sent him over for equally neighborly things like borrowing a cup of sugar (second time) and then going back and asking if they have brown sugar instead of the white (third time). (They didn't.)
The difference between those three times and this upcoming fourth time was that he was excited then and now, he's nervous. Because those other three times only involved Spencer (although he had always fervently wished for Carly to make an appearance during one of his forays into unmarked territory) and this one time is to see Carly. To actually see her.
He hadn't counted on her boyfriend being there too, though.
"So..." Griffin said slowly as the two of them sat in the Shays' living room while the girls were upstairs giggling over something Carly was showing Sam. Freddie was lounging on the sofa while Griffin occupied the armchair.
"So," Freddie echoed.
"You live next door. I didn't know that."
"Yup."
"Cool."
Silence.
"So..." Griffin began again. "You're helping Sam out with chemistry."
"Yup."
"Cool."
Silence.
"So..."
"So," Freddie repeatedly obediently despite wanting to tear his hair out.
"You work out."
Freddie looked down at his biceps that were now more prominent without the protective layers of clothing. The whole weight lifting thing had been his mother's idea to give him a chance to defend himself "on the dangerous streets of Seattle" and he rather enjoyed having a means to work off tension when school (or his mother) became too hard to deal with.
"Yeah," he replied.
"Cool."
Silence.
Honestly, inasmuch as Freddie would like to steer the conversation toward a more enlightening topic, he was so very much unsure of what was happening. Sure, he was dressed in clothes that Sam had declared to "not stink so much of dork" and so his confidence a little more... well, more. But he still couldn't deny who he was—someone who liked learning and technology and sci-fic/fantasy movies. Oh, and Carly Shay. And this guy was Carly Shay's boyfriend.
How was he supposed to beat out this guy?
It was a universal truth that the dude was a looker. By his calculations, he had roughly a snowball's chance in hell of stealing the guy's girlfriend. Right. Sure, Freddie knew he had stuff going on for him like...
Anyway, whatever Sam's nonexistent plan was, it was doomed to fail.
"So..." Griffin tried again.
"So."
"You going to Missy's party?"
Ugh. Could someone please stop bringing up the party that he couldn't go to? It made him feel like the little kid who got stuck at an ice cream parlor but couldn't have any. It sucked. He didn't need to be reminded of how lowly his social status was. It was the weekend! He got enough of that during the rest of the week. So he just shrugged and ran his hand through his hair in what hopefully seemed like a Rebel Without A Cause way (which it probably wasn't) and proceeded to lie through his teeth.
"Probably not. Don't feel like it."
It seemed to be the right thing to say because Griffin chuckled. "Yeah, I get what you mean. Missy gets a little too controlling sometimes. Remember her last party?" No. Freddie did not. "When she freaked out because people started jumping in the pool? Missy tried fishing everyone out with the leaf net but then Sam starts dumping all the food in the pool before jumping in, screaming 'I've always wanted to swim in food!'"
Freddie laughed at the vision of Sam doing backstrokes in a saturated fat-infested waters. Yup. That was something only Sam would do.
"So how are you finding Ridgeway so far?"
Huh?
"What do you mean?" Freddie asked slowly, trying not to believe that Griffin was seriously asking that question.
Griffin stretched out his arms and legs, his feet landing on the coffee table, ankles crossed. "Yeah, you're new right?"
"Dude, we've been classmates since the second grade," Freddie answered and tried not to sound too bitter. But it was kinda painful knowing that he has reached the point of being as nonexistent as Sam's plan to make him desirable to Carly. He was invisible. It more than sucked. It was seriously depressing.
"Seriously?" And Griffin genuinely seemed dumbfounded and Freddie couldn't quite decide if it was a good or bad thing. "That's so weird." Griffin was about to say something else when the girls came stomping down the short staircase, whispering into the other's ear as they came to a stop behind the couch.
"How's male bonding time coming along, twerps?" Sam asked and upon turning around to look at her, Freddie noticed that she was carrying an empty plate. A greasy empty plate. "Hope you've been keeping everything PG in here."
"Do you always have to be disgusting?" Freddie's question was meant to be rhetorical but somehow he knew that she'd answer it anyway.
"I'm not disgusting. I'm awesome. There's a difference, Benson."
He was about to launch into an explanation of what rhetorical questions were when Carly sat down beside him on the sofa. Carly Shay. Hee. Rhetorical what? Only when Sam's hand hit the back of his head did he realize that he was staring. Crap. He was supposed to be cool and suave. Not drooling and crazy-eyed. But how was he supposed to remember that when she was smiling at him like that and her hair was all nice and wavy like that and she was winking at her boyfriend like that?
Oh.
Meh.
"We were just talking about Missy's party," Griffin contributed to the conversation and Freddie kinda wished that he didn't because he could feel Sam's eyes boring twin holes into his skull. Before coming over to the Shays', they had agreed not to mention the party. Well, more like she had her hands around his neck and he had no choice but to agree to everything she said.
"Oh, are you going, Freddie?"
As was the norm whenever he attempted to have a conversation with Carly, Freddie opened his mouth and alas, no words were to be had. It was humiliating. He did have an extensive vocabulary that he could boast of but what use was it when he couldn't manage to keep up this conversation. So he closed his mouth again because that was safer and looked less idiotic than just leaving it wide open.
Carly bit on her lower lip, obviously to keep from laughing at his weirdness. Yeah. He didn't blame her.
"Well, you should come with us," she said kindly, earning a groan from Sam.
Griffin seconded the motion. "Yeah, dude. I'll introduce you to our classmates."
"Griffin," Carly admonished her boyfriend and a slight blush painted her cheeks. Man, she was pretty. "Anyway, you should totally go."
Before he could answer, Sam's hand clamped down on her best friend's shoulder. "Carly?" she bit out, "Can I talk to you for a second?"
By the looks of it or, more appropriately, the sounds of it, the conversation between the girls didn't turn out to be very polite. There were raised voices and heated tones and a lot of grunting which he assumed was more Sam than Carly. When they returned to the living room, the brunette looked victorious and the blonde didn't even spare them a glance as she went straight for the kitchen and opened the fridge.
"Sam and I thought—"
"Nyeah." The weird sound came from the kitchen and that clued Freddie to the fact that the sentiment was not, in fact, shared by Sam.
"—that maybe you'd like to come with us? It'll be fun!" Carly looked genuinely excited with the idea of him tagging along and she looked so pretty when she smiled at him like that. He files that smile away into a cabinet in the back of his head. This was a rare occurrence that should be properly documented.
He groaned inwardly at his trail of thought. He was such a nerd.
"If it's no trouble," he said slowly.
"It's no trouble at all," the love of his life insisted
"Yeah, dude. It'll be fun," the love his life's boyfriend added. "I heard Jonah scored a keg or something. It'll be great."
"Jonah?"
Freddie watched as Carly raised an eyebrow, her curious eyes focused on the girl moving around in the kitchen. There was also some worry there and Freddie couldn't help but feel a little worried himself. He didn't even know what that was about. It wasn't hard to deduct that it had to do with Sam and Jonah but as Sam earlier insisted, they weren't together. And he believed her, despite the rumored numerous times the two had been caught in compromising situations. He never did believe them and not just because they were rumors but... part of him had just always known that it wasn't true.
Sam made another alien sound that was a cross between a grunt and a snort—a snurt? But that was enough to convey her unwillingness to offer her two cents to the conversation.
The next two hours were divided accordingly: flipping through the three hundred or so channels offered by the Shays' cable (Freddie had to restrain himself from asking about the History channel by biting on his hand) and then arguing about what kind of pizza to get (baconbaconbaconhamhamham was Sam's insistence, even placing her fingers in her ears, refusing to hear anything else), order the pizza Sam wanted, waiting for it to get delivered and then eating said pizza. Freddie then decided that there wasn't much difference between popular kids and unpopular ones. Pizza and television? Seriously?
In an effort to score brownie points, he offers to help cleanup and ends up washing the few dishes they used. He was in the middle of rinsing when Sam walked over. She had changed out of the shirt she was in earlier (probably due to the fact that her poor etiquette caused her spill hot sauce all over) and had on a pristine white tank top that he surmised belonged to Carly because it was a little too tight around the chest. Not that he noticed. Well, yeah, he noticed. But not that he was looking. Okay, he was looking. But he was a guy with the eyes of a guy. They tend to wander.
It was slightly unnerving how she stood there, watching him as he was finishing up with the dishes in silence. When he was done with the chore, he wiped his hands on the dishrag and turned to face her expectantly.
She sighed. "Don't you have like a friend or something?"
"Are you insinuating something?"
"Whoa, heel boy. I was only gonna ask if you have a friend that can tag-along? That way you don't end up being the only nerdling there and, I don't know," her shoulders lifted in a tiny shrug, "I figure you'll stick out like a sore thumb if you end up in a sad little corner with no one to talk to."
He was a little stunned. It was a surprisingly thoughtful of Sam to have suggested that. And then he realized that that probably meant that she and her friends would be abandoning ship (the ship, in this case, being him) once they got to party. He tried not to feel offended. It still meant something that they were gonna let him come with them. Right?
So he nodded a little stiffly and replied, "Yeah, I can call someone."
...
Author's Note:
Thank you to all the reviews! I've been trying to reply to all the reviews but I have some stuff to deal with that's been taking up my time. I'll try to reply soon, though and I hope this chapter didn't disappoint anyone.
This turned out longer than I expected and it didn't even include the actual party. I'm actually torn about writing the party scene into the beginning of the next chapter. I should probably decide on that soon, too, seeing as how I should get to writing it.
Since I know some will ask, I will address the Sam-Freddie rift in either one of the next two chapters. And no, it has nothing to do with Carly. :] Dun dun dun dun! Can someone guess?
None of my stuff is beta-ed! If anyone wants to volunteer/recommend a beta-reader then I would be enormously grateful!
Songs: She's So Lovely by Scouting for Girls, I Am Not A Robot by Marina and the Diamonds, Little Trouble Girl by Sonic Youth
