For those of you have sensed it Ronan is definitely an antagonist in this story as you will start to see even more obviously in this chapter. Loving all your reviews so far.

iAm Not Okay

Chapter Four

As it turned out Freddie had become friends with Ronan Morris. And the guys he hung out with in class. Though Freddie wasn't completely sure about these friends; they didn't have all that much in common. Freddie had to bite his tongue whenever he started to say something about his computer or homework. A few slip ups had received strange looks and required quick cover ups

So why stay friends with them. It did have its advantages. He was definitely the most popular nerd at Ridgeway. Not that he hadn't had friends before, despite what Sam may have said, but now the people who said hey to him in the hallways weren't just fellow academic club members. The guys from class, students that were considered well liked throughout the school, and not to mention the growing amount of girls who seemed to find him attractive.

But that point did bring up another negative. Maybe it was being brought up by a solely maternal influence; or maybe it was the side effects of your two best friends being female. Not only could he not act like Ronan did around girls but he just wasn't okay with it.

So of course he didn't understand why so many girls were okay with it. Maybe they liked the attention? Maybe they liked when guys talked about them like they were objects? He didn't get it so he didn't say anything. If one of the many girls Ronan and his friends approached acted insulted he probably would have said something.

And this situation did arise one day but Ronan approached the two girls who weren't going to need Freddie's help.

You see Carly and Sam were never okay with guys entering their personal space uninvited. Carly would promptly tell you to step back; Freddie knew this from experience. Sam was less polite and if she felt you were standing to close, or heaven forbid, actually touching her, she caused you enough pain that you no longer came within twenty feet of her.

It was during lunch one day that Ronan learned this for himself.

"Sam do you want my cookie?" Carly was sitting next to Freddie and across the table from Sam. She was holding out the chocolate chip cookie from her lunch bag. Sam took the cookie slowly.

"What's up, you've never given me your cookie before, it's your favorite part." Carly almost always packed a cookie with her lunch and at least once a week Sam would ask if she could have it. Carly never gave in though; usually she warded off Sam with half of her sandwich or whatever else she brought for lunch.

"I'm just trying to eat healthier I guess." Now Sam and Freddie were both looking at her like she was crazy.

"You eat plenty healthy, more so then any teenager willingly eats." Freddie gestured to her lunch. A turkey wrap, an apple, baked potato chips, water.

"Remember that movie we watched in health a couple weeks ago?" Carly asked. Sam shook her head. "You know the one with the guy who ate nothing but fast food for a whole month," Sam continued to shake her head.

"Must have been asleep."

"Rebecca Berkowitz had to leave the room when the guy threw up."

"Oh yeah," Sam said as the light bulb finally went on in her head. "That poor queasy girl."

"Well anyways I think the movie has me all grossed out," Freddie shrugged and went back to his food, Sam made a comment about never giving up junk food before consuming the cookie in just a two bites.

"Hey Benson," Freddie looked up. Ronan had dropped in to the seat across from him and next to Sam. "What's up man?"

"Nothing much." Freddie noticed that Sam was suddenly looking annoyed. The smile that had come with the unexpected cookie was replaced with a scowl.

"You wanna hang after school, Coach is leaving the gym open."

"Can't, I've got an AV club meeting later."

"Seriously Benson?" Ronan snickered. "You can re-dork-ify yourself after, the gym is only going to be open a couple of hours."

"Sorry man but the teachers are having us download this new software to the computers in the school lab."

Freddie didn't miss the eye roll Ronan gave but choose to ignore it.

"What about you Puckett, you can spot me." The boy winked and Freddie counted all the mistakes Ronan made in the next few seconds. He threw his arm over Sam's shoulders, stole one of the French fries off her lunch tray and made an inappropriate comment. You see the spotter stood over you while you were lifting on the weight bench and as Freddie found out earlier in class this week if a girl was spotting for you, you had a very clear view of said girl's chest.

Ronan had broken three rules in a matter of three seconds. You don't touch Sam, you don't eat Sam's food and you don't treat Sam like anything less than a lady no matter how un-lady like she acts.

This was why Ronan found himself sitting on the cafeteria floor a second later due to a painful elbow to the gut.

"I've got plans Morris." Ronan stood slowly, smirking through the pain that they all know he was pretending he wasn't in.

"What a shame," he went to reach for her shoulder again but seemed to think better of it. His eyes moved across the table to the brunette girl. "Carly right?" She nodded. She sensed Sam's annoyance with their guest and proceeded with some caution. Sam didn't seem to like him but he was a friend of Freddie's so how bad could he be.

"Well Carly you are completely welcome to join as it seems your friends are both occupied later," Ronan looked over Carly and Freddie once more. As he turned to leave his hand brushed over Sam's shoulder, pushing her hair back, she spun around to hit him but he was already out of arm's reach and shouting a goodbye over his shoulder.

Sam didn't like Ronan or his friends. She didn't like that Freddie was friends with them. She understood why he was of course; they raised his social status, something he never cared a whole lot about but who didn't like a little extra attention when it made them feel good about themselves.

But they were jerks; and yeah coming from her that was a little hypocritical but as of recently Sam was jerkish to fewer people; other jerks, stupid people, people who deserved it and Freddie when she was bored or trying to keep a sense of normalcy between them. Sometimes she felt she was being too nice to him and that was just weird.

Not to mention Ronan really wasn't Freddie's friend. Sam figured this out after a few more of their classes had passed and they never went back to their arm wrestling match. She knew why Freddie wasn't bringing it up; he didn't usually go out of his way to embarrass himself. But Sam and Ronan were the only ones who knew he wouldn't. Ronan never brought it up because he knew the chances of him loosing were high. If he befriended Freddie then it wouldn't be so weird to not bring up the match again.

Sam mentioned this to him one day. Freddie had been distracted helping Gibby with something and Ronan was far enough from his friends that the conversation wouldn't be over heard.

She'd casually pointed out that he hadn't challenged Freddie to a rematch and he nonchalantly brushed it off saying there was no reason to continue a match when they already knew the outcome.

"Don't want to lose to a nerd, Morris." Sam smirked. Ronan stood nearly a foot taller than her but with the way she radiated confidence he may as well been a foot shorter than her.

"Guess that's something we have in common."

In Ronan's defense he was standing up to her better than most. He didn't flinch when she stepped closer but Sam figured it was his ego manipulating her actions to what worked for him. It was the only explanation she could give for why he would think it was okay to touch her.

That was the first time he did; sure it was just her arm that he ran his hand down but accompanied by the look in his eyes she knew he was just getting started. That he didn't just want to touch her arm and that she needed to put a stop to it now.

She had bent back his arm, twisted it painfully and pushed him roughly against the wall. She didn't say a word. When he had steadied himself and turned back to her he looked a little disgruntled but traded it for an amused smile instead. Sam was so irritated with him that she spun on her heel and stomped off to join Freddie and Gibby.

Neither boy noticed that through the rest of class Ronan stared at Sam and she glared at him in return.

After that class Ronan would go out of his way to put himself in her presence and subtly enter her personal bubble so that no one really thought twice about it. He was less covert about gawking at her and when he could get away with it making a rude comment or two. In fact if he made one more remark about any part of her she was going to break his legs; even if they were in the middle of class.

Hope you liked this chapter as much as you liked the past few. I know its a little shorter than the others but you'll get another update on Saturday and maybe even a special extra update for Valentines Day if I don't decide to write (don't have time to write) a one-shot for the occasion.