Going Home

Disclaimer: I don't own iCarly, if I did, I'd be rich and the kids would be sixteen.

Chapter 7 (The Grandmother)


"Who was that woman?" Sarah asked as she lay in her bed. She kicked her feet on the bed and groaned in frustration. "That woman, what was her name? I don't think she ever mentioned it, I told her that my name was Sarah. She had to know Grandma Benson, plus I saw her yesterday again, she was at that man's funeral. I don't know what that man's name was though, it was someone Mom knew…of course I don't know why they were in disguise." Sarah groaned as she sat up in the bed, some time had passed since their arrival and since the time in the cemetery. She didn't know why she couldn't get the woman she met out of her mind. She closed her eyes and thought for a moment, then her eyes shot open. "I wonder…" Sarah shot out of her room and walked upstairs, she headed directly for the attic and found some boxes.

"What are you doing?" A voice asked. Sarah looked over and saw that Alex had followed her into the room. Sarah was following a suspicion that she didn't want her mom to know about, but she couldn't tell Alex, Alex was not someone that could lie and would immediately go to Sam.

"I'm not doing anything important, Alex. Go play with John for a moment."

"But he's playing a video game and won't let me play with him!" Sarah raised her eyebrow and sighed.

"Let me talk to him." Sarah walked with Alex to John's room and found him playing one of his favorite video games. "John?"

"What is it?" John asked as he pressed the buttons on his controller.

"Will you let Alex play with you?"

"Why? Does she want to play?"

"Yes."

"She didn't ask, but I guess she can play, I don't mind." John pressed the pause button and hooked up another controller to the game console. "Come on Alex, you can join in after I'm done with this level!"

"Okay, thanks!" Alex said as she walked into the room. Sarah smiled and left toward the attic. She then opened a box and found a photo album, it was a dusty old album that had been at the bottom of the box. Sarah opened it and found a photo of Sam at a very young age, next to her was Carly and her father was sitting on the floor with a broken toy. Sarah figured that toy was something her mom broke. The photo was titled, 'I met Carly and Freddie.' Apparently, Sam met them at the same time. Sarah flipped through the pages until she found a photo of the woman at the cemetery, obviously a much younger picture, a Christmas one to be exact.

"Christmas is coming soon," Sarah thought as she ran her finger over the photo. Sarah looked at the words underneath, 'Mom' had been scratched out and next to it 'Amy Puckett' was written. "Grandma Puckett," Sarah said under her breath. Sarah heard footsteps and quickly closed the album and put it in the box, she then lay on the floor and put her hands behind her head. She looked over and saw Freddie walk in.

"Hey, what are you doing in here?" Freddie asked.

"I was just thinking about some things, Dad."

"Oh, well you should get out of the attic, it's very dusty."

"Yeah, I'm leaving the attic now." Sarah got up and walked out with Freddie. "I met Grandma and my two Uncles at the cemetery." Sarah looked to the ground and sighed. "Dad, why does Mom not want to see Grandma Puckett, other than the argument they had?"

"Well, really I think your mom is afraid that Amy still hates her and will probably not like you. I don't think so, because I don't know who wouldn't love you." Sarah chuckled and smiled at Freddie.

"Thanks dad." Sarah put her hands in her pocket and walked into her room, she then walked over to her window and looked out. "Grandma Puckett would hate me? Simply because of being a rape child, I'm a rape child so I'm not worth having in this world and I'd never amount to anything?" Sarah sighed and clenched her fists. "No! I'll show her! I'll show her that I can amount to something and I'm very important, I'll make Grandma Puckett love me!" Sarah walked over to her bed and sat down on it. "I'm a rape child and my Mom and Dad both love me, my siblings don't know what that means though. I know what I'll do!"

-NEW SCENE-

Mrs. Puckett sat in her recliner in the living room and patted Ace on the head. She leaned back and closed her eyes as the doorbell rang. "Dale, it's the door, could you get that for me, please?"

"Sorry Amy, I'm a little tied up at the moment!"

"Okay, that's fine." Amy got up and sighed, lately her thoughts had been trailing to that little girl she met. There was just something about her that struck something inside of her, something that had made her stay with the girl in the cemetery when any other person would have left the child to fend for herself. Not only that, but the way she looked was also familiar. Amy opened the door and her eyes grew wide as she saw the girl standing at the door.

"Hi G-Amy, can I call you that or not?"

"You can call me that, it makes me feel old if you use my last name. What are you doing here?"

"My Mom said I could visit."

"Oh, okay…What is your name, dear?"

"Sarah Bale." Sarah smiled and Mrs. Puckett rubbed her chin, Dale walked into the room and stopped in his tracks when he saw Sarah.

"W-Who is that, Amy?" Dale asked.

"Sarah Bale," Amy responded with a somewhat sad sigh. "Sarah, why did your mom allow you to visit a stranger who you don't even know and met at a cemetery?"

"Well I didn't get to thank you properly and she said since you were visiting the grave of a friend of my grandmother, and the fact that you helped me find my brother, she felt you were safe to visit." Amy smiled softly and looked over at Ace who ran over to Sarah and began liking her hand.

"It looks like Ace finds you friendly. Would you like to come in, I actually have some cookies that I've baked."

"How stereotypical, but still nice. I wonder how difficult Grandma will be to win over…Grandpa, why did he turn pale when he saw me, actually Grandma seemed to change slightly as well…back in the cemetery she was looking at me funny when she first saw me." Sarah nodded and stepped in the home. "Thank you." Sarah followed Amy and Dale into the kitchen and Sarah spotted the cookies. They were sugar cookies with chocolate chips and raisins in them. The also had a swirl of marshmallow crème. Sarah licked her lips and eyed them hungrily.

"You can go ahead and eat them, they're straight out of the oven, I put the crème on just a little while ago."

"Thank you very much!" Sarah rushed over and took a bite of one of the cookies. They were so good, she remembered her mother making cookies just like this. "Mmm, these are so good!"

"I'm glad you like them…I don't know why I cook them anymore, nobody really eats them around here." Sarah raised her eyebrow and took another bite.

"Why is that?" Amy looked down and then shrugged it off.

"I guess nobody likes them." Amy crossed her arms and looked away.

"Maybe I should take some home to mom!"

"Y-You probably shouldn't do that," Dale said quickly. "Secret recipe, you know." Dale smiled and Sarah took another bite of the cookie. Amy smiled and walked to the restroom, Dale crossed his arms and looked at Sarah. "You'll have to forgive me, when I first saw you, I thought you looked like someone…someone we knew long ago, she loved those cookies that Amy baked."

"Oh, I can see why, they're so sweet."

"Yeah, but our twins don't like them, one of them is actually allergic to chocolate. Madison hates them for her own reasons, she won't eat a single one and hasn't eaten a single one of those cookies for twelve years. Finally, Ciara…our eldest daughter would eat them every now and then…until she died."

"Oh my…I hope I didn't bring up any painful memories!"

"No, don't worry." Dale smiled and took a cookie, he looked at it and back to Sarah. "I'm sure you'd agree with me, doesn't Amy have the Grandmother's touch?"

"Uh…yeah, I guess so." Sarah quickly thought of something to change the subject. "You know, when I first came here, I met someone and made the mistake of giving that person a wedgie. Mom laughed when I told her but then she told me not to do that again unless I was going to fall in love with the person I did it to..." Dale chuckled and shook his head.

"That's right…she always loved to do that type of stuff."

"Uh…who's 'she' Mr. Puckett?"

"Just someone Amy doesn't like to be mentioned under the roof of this house actually."

"Why? Does she hate that person?"

"Heh, you ought to see for yourself actually. It's Amy, a lot of things tend to happen with her. Sarah Bale, huh? I can't say that I recall anyone with that last name in this city…and I've lived here for my entire life."

"Honestly? There hasn't been anyone with that last name in your entire years of living here?"

"Yeah, that's true." Dale started to walk out of the kitchen and stopped momentarily. "Have fun with your…have fun with Amy." Sarah nodded as Dale left the room, she walked out and found Amy walking around.

"Did I mention that I'm glad you like those?" Amy asked.

"Yes." Sarah looked around and sighed. "So, is anybody else here?"

"My daughter doesn't stay in my house for very long. She has her big social life and visits her friends all the time, hell, she doesn't spend more than ten minutes in this house. My two sons aren't always here either because they have so much they're involved with in school and a bunch of other things…Now my oldest daughter…" Tears fell from Amy's eyes and she sat on the couch. "My entire family is falling apart!"

"Uh…no it's not, I'm sure it's not!"

"All my children hate me. Make note that all of them hate me."

"I'm sure that's not true Mrs. Puckett."

"No, you don't understand. Twelve years ago…something really bad happened, it's old news though…"

"Well…maybe we should do something fun. We could go have some smoothies?"

"She loved smoothies, I guess we could do that."

"Ugh, anything to keep her memory off of who I think it's on. I don't want to make her in a bad mood or do something wrong."

"I haven't met your splendid mother yet, have I? I probably should ask her if it's okay that I drive you around."

"No! Uh…I mean, she's absolutely fine with me spending time with you, she trusts you."

"Are you sure?"

"Okay, that may not be one hundred percent truthful and she'd probably not be too thrilled that I'm spending any time with my Grandma, but I want to get to know her and let her know that I am an okay person, not just a person who can't amount to anything because I'm a rape child. I know a few who were, mom and I attended several sessions with them, I even learned about several important people who were rape children."

"God, it has to be horrible…to have a mother as evil as I am."

"Who said you were evil?" Sarah sat on the couch and smiled. "Hey, did you know I'm a dancer? I hope one day, I'll become a famous ballet dancer, that's a good goal to achieve, don't you think?"

"I think if you set your mind to it, you can be whatever you want to be."

"Amy, can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"What do you think of those conceived in rape? Do you think their moms should have abortions? Do you think the child is incapable of growing up right and they won't amount to anything at all? Is there no hope for someone conceived through rape?" Sarah hid the fact that tears were threatening to leave her eyes. "Are rape children evil?"

"If you want a simple answer…no. You seem fascinated with that topic though."

"What if I told you that my mom was raped, she...wasn't faced with a decision to have an abortion and decided right off the bat that she wanted to keep me. I love her unconditionally, especially knowing the pain that she went through considering my birth. For the longest time, I thought I was ugly, stupid, horrendous and that I wouldn't be capable of anything. I actually at one point of time thought I should give up on dancing and all my life long dreams and goals."

"Never, don't ever do that…" Amy sighed and crossed her arms. "You, you are a very beautiful girl, no matter how you were conceived. You already seem like a smart girl as well, you tell your mom that she has a great daughter and is lucky to have one like you. You tell her that she's raising you just right and I want you to know that you'll always be something great to your mother, your friends, the world. You are not evil, you are not ugly, you are unique in every possible way. Of course, my words don't mean much too many people these days, most of them stopped listening to me. Even my husband doesn't particularly care what I say anymore, and it's my own fault too. For being a poor mother and letting everything that could go wrong, go wrong."

"Thanks, that means a lot more than you think, coming from someone like you. You shouldn't look down on yourself though, I think you're a decent woman who was probably misunderstood during, whatever it was that happened."

"Thank you…did you want to go for ice cream?"

"Actually, a walk in the park sounds like fun."

"We can do both, and maybe you can show me some of those dance moves!"

"Oh yeah, I'd love to do that!"


There's the end of the chapter, Dale seemed suspicious, didn't he. Looks like Sarah's spending some time with the grandma in secret, wonder what will happen next. Stick around!