Chapter Three: And He Liked You For That.
They made it to the party as the hour was closing in on eleven. He didn't really get that part; the whole 'the later you go, the cooler you are' didn't make much sense. But what did he know? Apparently not much. He'd been excited for his first taste of high school partying but it had quickly gone down the drain the second they made it through the front door, as he had a feeling it would. Sam popped in and out of the kitchen, leaving with a bowl of pretzels in her hands and a couple of cans of soda. Then she promptly commandeered the large sofa in the living, much to the occupants' consternation. She also refused to talk to anyone, much to Freddie's consternation. But he knew that that would be expecting too much. Carly and Griffin had disappeared a while ago and so he was left there to defend for himself and no, all that time in the gym wasn't going to help him in high school warfare. Thankfully, he wasn't left twiddling his thumbs for too long because Gibby soon showed up.
"Do I look okay?" was Gibby's first question when they met up outside the Robinsons' home.
"You look the way you always look," Freddie pointed out.
"Yeah, but I never know if that's a good thing or not." And honestly, Freddie didn't know what to say to that because they've never been the type who gave any notice to what was being worn by whom.
"Who cares?"
But they both knew the answer to that. Everyone cared.
Missy's house was a modest two-story in a nice neighborhood, the type of house you wish you grew up in with the dainty little front lawn the porch with the pretty swing. The pool at the back was smaller than he thought it would be but, still, it was a pool and he could imagine his eight-year-old self cannonballing into the blue waters soon followed by a raucous Sam body-slamming into his tiny self. (It was weird how all his childhood memories, real and imagined, involved Sam Puckett who now wanted nothing to do with him.) The party host must have been pleased that no one was swimming but there was a scattering of couples making out in the backyard and some loud laughter coming from a group at the far end.
Inside there was a completely different party going on. There was some sort of dance music blaring through the sound system, the beat steadily reverberating off the walls, the living room had filled up with people, mostly girls, swaying drunkenly to the music. Freddie was quick to note that Sam was no longer spread across the sofa and the only signs that she had even been there at all were the overturned bowl of pretzels and the empty (and severely crumpled) soda cans. The rest of the couch bore the weight of couples displaying varying degrees of wildly inappropriate behavior.
Gibby thought that the party would be good practice ground to use his 'lines' on the 'ladies' which wasn't very well received. In fact, witnesses might describe it as having been ill-received if eye rolls and slaps across the cheek were any indication. But because his best friend was even more socially backward than Freddie, Gibby's having the time of his life.
"This party," Gibby shouted over the music, "Is awesome!"
Freddie laughed at his friend, shaking his head as he watched Gibby shimmy and sway through the crowd of dancing bodies, showing off his 'cool' moves a la Pulp Fiction. "Just don't lose your shirt over this!" It was joke, sure, but he seriously hoped that shirtless Gibby wouldn't be making an appearance.
Thirst was beginning to become a concern and Freddie somehow maneuvered himself to the entrance of the kitchen. Or, rather, what might have been a kitchen at some point in the past but under the layers of junk food, sticky puddles on the floor, plastic cups everywhere, nothing was for certain. There was a small group of four guys in kitchen and they were all huddled over the keg that was stationed near the kitchen sink. Freddie figured it would be best to keep to himself and try his luck with finding some unopened soda can much like Sam had scored earlier in the evening.
Except, stealth wasn't a high school subject and drew attention to himself Freddie did.
"Yo," one of beer guards called out to him, "Benson, right?"
Freddie gulped before turning on his heel, the kitchen suddenly feeling incredibly smaller and suffocating. He quickly recognized one of them to be Jonah, Sam's not boyfriend, and the one who had called out to him was Gary Wolf. This was very much starting to look like something out of Animal Channel where there was prey and there were... predators.
"Yeah," Freddie answered slowly, unsure where this was going.
"Dude, thanks for letting me copy your history notes the other day. Mr. Devlin's been a mean sonofabitch lately."
Freddie saw it coming, but it did nothing to unlame the way he returned Gary's complicated macho handshake thing that men apparently do. (He and Gibby liked to do this two-finger salute. It was simple and easy.) He let out a nervous laugh. There was no clear indication of where this was heading and he didn't like that. What he did like was knowing things.
"You want a beer?" asked one of the guys who couldn't be a high school student. He was impossibly large and hulking and Freddie was pretty sure that the guy could kill him with one hit from that giant fist. It was very perplexing.
Freddie shook his head a little to get rid of the disturbing thoughts. "Uh, yeah," He'd never had a beer before and was honestly curious how it tasted, "Sure, why not?"
"Atta boy, Benson." Jonah clapped him on the back. Hard. It might have dislodged his right lung from its ribcage. "Gotta live a little, you know?"
The door swung behind them followed by a loud, "Jonah! I've been looking everywhere for you!"
"Missy Missy Missy," Jonah singsonged, "Sounds like you need someone to unbunch your panties. Tell me, what color are they?"
Missy stamped her foot indignantly, narrowly missing one of the many puddles of unnamed liquid on the floor. Freddie was somewhat awed at how she was able to still appear elegant despite being pissed off, standing in the middle of chaos and having overly sexualized comments thrown at her.
"Wait, Freddie Benson?" Missy seemed to notice him standing there for the first time and looked at him with a discerning eye from head to toe then back up again. "What are you doing at my party?"
Oh chiz.
"Benson's with us, Missy," Gary offered, lifting his cup in a sort of mock salute, "He's cool, you're cool, we're all cool here."
Freddie held his breath as Missy's fierce eyes narrowed one last time before she turned to face Jonah once again. Jonah, on the other hand, seemed to be basking in all this angry female attention.
"Come on, Jonah." And with that, she turned on her freakishly high heels and stomped out the kitchen.
Jonah let out a low whistle, making the others laugh. "What can I say, boys? I like my bitches crazy!" He gave them an exaggerated bow then left the kitchen.
Freddie was confused. "Where are they going?"
His question was met by more laughter. "Benson, c'mon! Do we really need to give you the birds and bees talk?"
"But what about Sam?"
"Sam Puckett?" Gary reached over for a fresh cup and started filling it up with beer. "Jonah calls himself a 'free agent' which, in layman's terms, means that he is a douchebag. Puckett's a sweet girl when she wants to be, you know?" Freddie almost missed the look of unmistakable warmth on his newly acquired friend's face. Huh. "Anyway, Missy's all right, I guess," Gary continued, "And Valerie's... well, I don't entirely get why Jonah's messing around with her but whatever. To each his own, right?"
Freddie nodded mutely, not trusting himself to speak. Was this how things were done around here? Friends allowed their friends to be jackasses? He wondered briefly if Sam knew about this and quickly decided that Sam was never the type to let this stuff get past her—she'd always taken of herself. For Freddie to worry about her would be rather useless, though, he knew that a small part of him would always look out for her A shiny red plastic cup was placed in his hands and he swirled the contents a little bit before taking a deep breath and drinking. It wasn't that bad. He had expected something acrid and foul-tasting and while it was a little on the bitter side, there was also a bit of a sweet aftertaste there. He drank some more and found it got slightly better with each succeeding swallow. Only when he was half-way through his drink did he pay attention to the conversation that was going on. The three appeared to be talking about something that came as a surprise to Freddie.
"Did you say Nug Nug?" Freddie asked slowly for surely, he wasn't inebriated enough to be hearing things.
"Duh," said The Hulk Masquerading As A High School Student. Seriously. The dude was gigantic. "You know, from Galaxy Wars?"
"Only the best movie in forever?" added Gary whose eyes were wide with disbelief.
Whoa. This was... weird.
"Yeah... I know that, just confused about how you guys know that," Freddie replied, blinking his eyes. "I'm not drunk yet, am I?"
His three new friends laughed and they all clapped him on the back. Ow. Then proceeded, for the next half-hour or so, to discuss all Galaxy Wars films, sharing favorite scenes and bemoaning some poor plot points. Girls came in and fawned over Gary who politely turned them away with a good-natured smile and the excuse of wanting to spend time with his 'boys'. While Freddie always knew that he was a boy (something like anatomy was hard to miss), his evolution into one of Gary's 'boys' was abrupt and surprising. In fact, he felt like he missed entirely how the entire thing had transpired. It was odd. Not that he was complaining because he was enjoying himself immensely. Still, he was feeling quite proud of himself. He was holding his own and not at all like Sam had assumed things would go down. He didn't even have to invite Gibby—
He had forgotten about Gibby. He sent a quick text message to his best friend, telling him to come to the kitchen, where it was... safe. Well, relatively safe, Freddie amended quickly in his head after watching High School Hulk crush a soda can against his forehead.
Five minutes later and Gibby was pushing his way through the kitchen, decidedly shirtless. The limp garment hung from his hand and his chest displayed, instead, an unattractive sheen of sweat.
"Shirtless dude," said the guy who Freddie had yet to learn the name of, "All right." He gave Gibby a high-five. "My dad totally has a shirt like that!"
Freddie cringed but then realized that all his assumptions about what would be considered the wrong or right thing to say had been pretty much inaccurate. So instead of Gibby dressing up like a middle-aged father with a teenager being a bad thing, it wasn't like that at all. Everything in this realm of reality was confusing to Freddie who had the habit of calculating everything. He watched as the guys started playfully dissing each other, Gibby quickly getting a handle on things and thankfully pulling his shirt back on.
Freddie's ringtone pierced through the air and he groaned when he saw that it was his mother calling him. Of course. The only other person who ever called him regularly was standing beside him. He signaled to the other guys that he was just going to take the call outside which resulted in some silly catcalls. If they only knew. Freddie ran up the stairs to the second floor, hoping to find a quiet place where he could take the call. He was about to open one bedroom door when the image of him walking in on a couple made his hand stop. Fortunately the next door didn't appear to have a lock on it and he correctly guessed it to be a closet.
"Mom?" he said into his mobile after slipping inside the tiny room. "How's work? How's the hospital? How's working in the hospital?" He winced. Man, he should really stop blathering on whenever he became nervous.
"It's fine, thank you for asking. I just wanted to know how you were doing. I really do dislike having to work this shift because I hardly get to see you anymore, but I'm switching shifts next week so everything will be back to normal." His mother sounded sad but he couldn't help but be a little depressed himself at the thought of once again having to put up with her constant babying. "Now, it's getting late. Do get to bed soon, all right? Don't spend all your time in front of your computer."
He obediently agreed and bid his mother goodbye. He wasn't sure how he was going to get around tutoring Sam at his place now that—
"Are you fucking kidding me, Jonah?"
He'd know that voice anywhere. Sam. And Jonah? Oh chiz.
"Missy?" He could hear Sam hiss the name like a curse. "What the fuck, Jonah?"
"C'mon, Sammy. You know you're number one." Freddie almost threw up. Was this guy for real?
"Number one? Are you effin' serious? I practically catch you with your pants around your ankles and you're telling me that I'm your number one? Do I look stupid?" A heavy thud against the wall followed Sam's rant, followed by a squeak of pain.
"Okay, fine. So maybe no one's number one; but you're certainly tied for number two!"
What followed that asinine statement was a string of expletives that would have had his mother rushing to the confessional just for hearing them accompanied by one very male shout and then another, much louder, one.
"Don't you even think of coming near me again," Sam spat and Freddie assumed that the hurried footsteps that went down the stairs belonged to her.
Freddie cracked the door open and through the small sliver saw Jonah (still groaning) slip into one of the doors, letting the door click behind him. The coast was clear, but Freddie still wasn't sure of what he'd just witnessed. Or heard, really. His thought immediately went to Sam. She would probably be on the warpath right now and that wouldn't bode well for the well-being of the greater Seattle area.
Oh chiz.
Quickly making up his mind, he began starting to push his way through the crowd, looking for those blonde curls attached to a small yet dangerous girl. He found her along the side of the house where he and Gibby saw a few kids smoking earlier. She was the only one there and he wouldn't put it past her to have scared the others away so that she could have a bit of peace. She leaned against the wall of the house, eyes closed though her face was tilted to the sky.
"Whoever you are, go away."
And no matter how many times his mother had told him to follow warning signs, he decided to ignore this one. "Everything okay?" he asked tentatively.
Sam opens one eye, sees him standing there and closes it again. "Was it just me or did I not just tell you to go away?"
"It was just you." He shrugged his shoulders. It's only a few steps until he's standing in front of her. "You okay? You know you can talk to me, right? I mean, no one's around so it's not like—"
"Okay, shut up for a second before you end up saying something that will give me no choice but to hurt you."
He promptly shut his mouth.
"All right then," she began, her eyes opened and he can see the slight hesitation in the blue depths, "Promise not tell anyone?"
"Who would I tell?" Because, really, who would he tell? Gibby? Who would Gibby tell? His little brother?
"That's a good point," she conceded. Taking a deep breath, she continued, "I can't stand this."
"This?" He wasn't quite following. What he had expected was her going on a rant about how guys were dumb and how Jonah was a dickhead or just something that looked very similar to an angry rhino. And this wasn't it. Instead it was sort of like... a lonely penguin. He really needed to stop watching the Animal Channel.
Sam gestured toward the rest of the party. "This?" she repeated, clearly exasperated with his slow pick-up. "I don't know..." Her eyes closed again. "I'm just tired, I guess."
"You wanna go home? Lemme bring you home."
She shook her head, a sardonic laugh escaping her lips. "Oh man, Fredward. Why are you so effing nice? Always so nice. It's disgusting. You shouldn't be nice. Being mean? That's easier. So much easier..." He didn't have the heart to tell that she was babbling. Neither did he have the guts, really. He figured pointing out such a fact would likely warrant a torrent of punches and kicks from the blonde.
"You're not—"
"Mean?" Both eyes were open once again. He recognized the challenging look she gave him, as if daring him to continue. "That's rich coming from you... I'm hardly kind or virtuous. That's Carly, the love of your life. Me? I'm the bitch. And everyone hates a bitch."
"They don't hate you."
"Well, they don't like me." She shrugged and her eyelids went heavy until they shut completely. "It's okay. I don't like them. So it's fair and all that chiz."
Chiz. Hearing her say that word made him chuckle. "I thought high school wasn't about being fair."
"Somehow I knew you were gonna say that. You always use my own words against me."
"Well," he lifted his hand to scratch the back of head, "For what it's worth, I don't hate you." He didn't know how long he wanted to be able to tell her that. Too long, maybe, because it'd been stuck in his head for as long as he can remember. Perhaps, once upon a time, they had convinced themselves that they did and acted accordingly. But they weren't the ones at fault. He'd realized that somewhere along the way. They were the... victims. If they could even call themselves that. Or maybe just the leftovers. He'd never been sure.
He copied her stance, back against the wall, eyes silently mapping out the stars. It was a clear night and it seemed that all the stars were in attendance as they twinkled at him. What a weird and unexpected night.
"Nice. Fredward Benson doesn't hate me. That's exactly what I wanted for Christmas."
"A sarcastic reply from Sam Puckett. What a surprise."
...
"The public library?"
Sam stood outside the imposing structure, eyes blinking rapidly in disbelief. She turned to the nub beside her and immediately whacked him over the head, rewarding her ears with a groan.
"What the hell was that for?" asked Fredward 'Books Give Me Orgasms' Benson. Seriously. A library? Did he want to kill her? There was absolutely nothing more disgusting than this.
She shook her head adamantly. "There's absolutely no way I'm going to go in there. I know you get off on, like, the smell of old books or like the glue they use to bind the pages together or whatever but I am going to kill you if you force me to enter that gawdawful building." She turned on her heel and then started walking briskly down the street. Okay, so maybe she was running. Really, really fast. What? She just hated libraries, okay?
She stopped a couple of blocks down where there was a small park and sat down on one of the benches, positive that there was no way the nub—
"What was that all about?"
Sam closed her eyes and prayed. Hey, God, if you do exist—and I'm hoping you are because this is turning out to be the universe's best prank ever—could you please get rid of the dork? Oh, and I need to pass chemistry. Thanks! Aaaand maybe you could throw in some money? Like a million or so. If not, maybe like a lifetime supply of ham. Okay, thanks again!
Oh, if only life were that easy. The SupahNubbah sat beside her on the bench, a clear sign that he was still living and that she still needed his help to pass chemistry. No money or ham either. Her weekend was proving to be crap.
"I don't like libraries, okay?"
"Why don't you—"
Exasperated with his badgering, Sam pushed him off the bench and onto the ground. "I just don't, okay? Can we go somewhere else? Like, to your place or something? I take back everything I said about you living in a nerd lair and your mother keeping dead corpses in your hallway closet to practice CPR."
"What?"
Okay, she could see how he might find that offensive. "Well, at least now everyone thinks that your mother is an expert at CPR," she pointed out and the look in his eyes made her rethink the logic of having done so. "What? Is that not a good thing? People like being experts at stuff, right? I mean, don't you enjoy being an expert at nubbiness?"
Hmm. She should seriously learn how to quit while already ahead. But she's Sam Puckett. She's not a quitter. Instead she took in the twerp's glare as he pushed himself off the ground and back on the seat next to her and continued, "Don't give me that look. I'm just trying to speed things up by making assumptions. Stop looking at me like that!"
"Like what?"
"I don't know!" She gestured at his face. "You have naturally sad eyebrows, so stop!"
The nub reached up to touch his eyebrows self-consciously. Did he really not know that? His eyebrows were part of what made the whole guilt trippy look thing seem so... guiltifying. And shut up. She knew that wasn't a word. It should be, though. Maybe if she wrote to the dictionary company—
"I do not have naturally sad eyebrows!" Benson whined, much like a seven-year-old not allowed to watch his Saturday morning cartoons.
Oh chiz. She totally missed her Saturday morning cartoons. Her life officially sucked.
"The girl's right. Ya got yerself a pair of sad lookin' eyebrows there, kid," said a hobo who was suddenly standing in front of them and flashing them a remarkably toothless grin.
Sam grinned up at the hobo who had come out of nowhere to support her statement. Because those really were sad eyebrows. Half of her wanted to knit a scarf for his eyebrows to make them happy and other half recognized the fact that knitting required effort and this whole situation with the chemistry thing and blahblahblah (everything else) had her all efforted out. Besides, he was back to wearing his shapeless mountains that he liked to call clothes. Apparently, dorks took some sort of vow of dweebiness.
She high-fived the hobo, which was probably not a very hygienic thing to do. Geeky McGeekerson made this face that looked like he wanted to puke so any regret she might have felt was quickly erased.
"That's disgusting, you know," Freddie said as they watched the hobo walk away.
"Your face is disgusting," she answered automatically. "All right, c'mon, let's just go over to your place." She slipped her bag which had fallen onto the bench back on her shoulder. She was about to stand when she felt a hand clamp down on her wrist. "Huh. I'm sorry, but since when did you think it was okay to touch me?"
He quickly took his hand off her and was smart enough to look sheepish. "We can't go back to my place; my mom's there."
Oh. Oh chiz.
"You haven't told her yet, have you?" she asked even though she already knew the answer to that. He shook his head. "Well, I haven't told mine either so..."
"And you're scared of libraries."
"Libraries are creepy! With their millions of books that have millions of words! Creepy! How am I the only person who sees this?"
He snorted. At her. "Because you're ridiculous?"
"Your face is ridiculous!" she yelled then hit his shoulder. Hard. And he ends up on the ground. Again. What? Wasn't her fault the nerd was weak.
"Okay, you gotta stop doing that!"
"I'll stop when your face stops looking like that!" Sam growled and then shoved him for good measure. Plus, it made her feel good. Yeah. That totally made her feel better and it helped her think better, too. "Okay, this is easy. We gotta find a place that we can crash and not be bothered while we do all this nerderrific stuff—" She caught the nub raise his eyebrow, despite having just taken another tumble to the ground."Fine! Chemistry stuff! Happy?"
He certainly looked pleased. "How about a friend's house?" he suggested and Sam knew exactly what he was going to say next. "Maybe, I don't know... Carly's place?" The hope in his eyes almost inspired a puke-a-thon in her mouth. And he called her disgusting?
"Yeah, not gonna work, Fredward. Carly's over in Yakima, visiting her granddad."
"Well, don't you have anyone else you can call?"
"Wendy, but she's spending the day with her boyfriend." And Sam wished that the nub would seriously stop asking questions. Because the truth was, beyond Carly, she didn't trust anyone else. Wendy was a good friend, sure, but when push came to shove, she wasn't too sure if Wendy'd stick around.
Sam Puckett, didn't have friends. She had followers, but friends were rare.
"I suppose we can go to Gibby's," Freddie suggested slowly as if he were somehow scared of her reaction.
"Gibby's? I don't think I've heard of that place before. Do they have ribs?"
He looked at her like she grew an extra arm. Well, chiz. An extra arm would be awesome. "Gibby?" he said, even slower this time. Right. Like that would help him make more sense. "My best friend?"
"No bells a-ringing."
"You like giving him wedgies?"
"I like giving wedgies in general."
"He likes taking his shirt off?"
"Ooooh." Yup. Definitely conjured up a visual she did not want to have. "No, thank you."
"No, thank you?" he repeated. "What's that supposed to mean?"
She readjusted the strap of her bag over her shoulder and brushed the hair from her forehead. Then, she started walking away. She liked walking away. She was good at that. Usually, though, people didn't have the guts to follow after her. Except she should really start to learn that the dipthong didn't act like everyone else and shouldn't be surprised when he began falling into step with her.
"Listen, can you forget about your 'reputation' for a second and be logical about this instead?"
"How about Skybucks?" she said determinedly. There was no way she was going to end up at the house of shirtless freak. No. Way. Plus, she caught him a couple of times hanging around Build-A-Bra. That was not right.
"Too noisy. Plus, that requires money that I don't want to spend."
"Saving up for Valentine's Day with Carly?"
He threw his hands up in the air. "Will you stop deflecting?"
"I will as soon as I figure out what you that means, grandpa!" Sam yelled, once again bringing a little disorder to Seattle.
He frowned. "Look, Gibby's place is awesome. He has this super cool set-up in his room and they have high speed wireless internet..." She shot him a disparaging look. What an awful nubby salesman. "And all the Fat Cakes and Peppy Cola that you can consume?" That's more like it.
"Fine. Lead the way, your Geekiness." She ignored the glare he gave her. Her phone in her back pocket had vibrated and she pulled it out to see who the message was from.
It was from her mom.
Your father called. Said he wanted to speak to you soon.
Oh chiz.
...
Author's Note:
Thank you for all those who have reviewed! Y'all are awesome! :] And a shout-out to Bacon because Bacon doesn't have an ffdotnet account so I have no way of sending Bacon a message of thanks for Bacon's reviews who has been reviewing since my first story. Hee. :D Bacon! Also to Butterfree, who never fails to lend some insight into what I write and I've always appreciated that.
Also, drink responsibly!
Oh, and man, my chapters are getting longer.
iLost My Mind promo anyone? First of all, AUGUST? Someone please tell me that that was a joke. Second of all, eek! Two kisses. Seddie overload :D Third and last, this totally eclipsed iParty with Victorious which did nothing to sate my Seddie cravings. I have my own theories on what happens but yeah. I'll just wait :/ Balls.
Songs: First Love by Adele, Let It Be Me by Ray LaMontagne, Cornerstone by Artic Monkeys (has anyone listened to their latest album? While I'm still a fan, I do miss their sound from the first two albums. The first one had been epic and Flourescent Adolescent? C'mon!)