Disclaimer: I don't own iCarly, and I don't own the characters. I also want to emphasize that the items and game described later in this chapter are purely hypothetical and are done so only for the purpose of fictional comedy. They should not be imitated in any way. Seriously, anyone who would actually try to play dart golf is an effing moron, plain and simple, and such a person would be wholly deserving of the Darwin Award potentially coming their way. Lawn darts were banned for damn good reasons.

Anyway, here endeth the stern safety rant. On with the comedy...


The Pucketts' living room couch was covered in black garbage bags, and upon it sprawled Sam and Freddie, side by side, their clothing and bodies encrusted head-to-toe in white splotches of dried joint compound.

"How did you suddenly get so good at glop tennis?" Sam asked as she turned her head to face Freddie.

"Been practicing a little," Freddie said as he faced her with a wry smirk.

"I can't believe it went all the way to five sets and a tiebreaker," Sam said, wide-eyed.

"Get used to it. I'm catching up," Freddie gloated while mussing Sam's crusty hair.

"I still beat you, though," Sam added with a playful shove on his arm.

"Barely." Freddie paused. "At least the wall's patched up now, and this gunk sponged off everything else in the room easily."

"Doesn't seem to wipe off us easy, though. Too bad we can't take showers again 'till the wall dries and we can get the tiles back on," Sam said.

"Yeah. Looks like we're stuck being filthy until tonight." A discomfiting thought suddenly crossed Freddie's mind. "Hey, Sam?"

"Yeah?"

"You sure this stuff isn't, like, toxic if it's left on the skin for a while like this?" he asked.

"Pshhh – Beats the hell outta me," Sam responded nonchalantly.

"That's reassuring," Freddie said grimly. "So now that we're stuck here, what do we do?"

"I could still use a good shoulder rub," Sam suggested hopefully while pointing to her left side.

"Well . . ." Freddie hesitated.

"Please?" she said smilingly while batting her eyelids and thinking, let's see if this works again.

"Well, alright. But just this once," he insisted sternly.

Sam repositioned herself on the sofa. "Start rubbin', boy," she commanded.

"You could be a little more polite than that, you know," Freddie countered.

"Dearest Fredward," Sam began in a mock posh accent, "prithee wouldst thou please apply thine delicate wussy fingers to mine neck and shoulders?"

"I'm just not gonna catch a break here, am I?" he asked with a grin.

"Nope. Now get crackin'," she insisted.

Freddie put his hands on Sam's shoulders. "Where's it hurt?" he asked.

"Right where your left thumb is," Sam answered. She made a small circular motion with her left shoulder socket. "That's about as far as I can move it and be comfortable."

Freddie began kneading at and around the spot Sam indicated. "Oh-ho-ho-ho-yeah!" Sam uttered with delight.

"Now try moving it again," Freddie said as he stopped massaging her shoulder.

Sam repeated her arm motion in a slightly wider arc. "Wow, it's feeling a bit better already," she said, impressed.

"That's good," Freddie said. "It means you didn't tear anything; it's probably just a bad sprain. Let me see if I can't loosen things up some more," he continued as he began rubbing her shoulder again.

"Oooh – Hey, how did you get so good at this?" Sam asked.

"My mom used to make me help out with that charity, 'Massage The Elderly.' You know, the one that's supposed to help old people become less irritating," he answered.

"That's some creepy chiz right there," she said with a thousand yard stare.

"Yeah. Yeah; it really is," Freddie said as he grimaced and shuddered as memories of his forced volunteerism came flooding back. He began kneading Sam's left shoulder harder before moving on to both her shoulders and her neck.

It wasn't long before Sam had closed both of her eyes and was biting her bottom lip. "Ohhh . . .right there . . . oh yeaaaah . . . that's the stu-u-u-uff . . . ye-he-he-hesss . . . Ooohooohooohooohoooooooo . . . I LIKE you," she purred.

Sam's eyes shot open widely the instant she realized what she'd just said. "I mean – I like having you around as my personal massage peon! Hate your guts, of course. Goes without sayin'," she continued. "Well – keep rubbin'," she said with a quick glance back at Freddie.

After a few more minutes of massaging, Freddie stopped and asked Sam, "How's it now?"

She circled her left arm even further than before. "A LOT better. Thanks, Fredison!"

Freddie sat back on the sofa with his hands interlocked behind his head and a wide smile on his face. "So now what do we do?" he asked.

"Don't know," Sam replied. "Movie?"

"Sounds good to me," Freddie said as he got up off the sofa and walked into the hallway. "They're all in your mom's closet, right?" he shouted back to her.

Sam suddenly remembered the recent additions Pam made to her movie collection, bolted from the sofa, and ran after Freddie. "Uh, no, no!" she shouted desperately. "Not anymore! We moved them to –"

It was too late. Freddie was already in the closet rifling through the DVD stack. "Uh, Sam?" he asked with innocent curiosity. "What are European Fun Guys 8 and European Fun Guys 12 supposed to be?"

"Oh, uh, that's, just . . . nothing. Um, you know that guy at the convenience store who makes the stupid pirate movies? Yeah, they're . . . uh . . . his crap. My mom got 'em thinking . . . thinking . . . they'd be good for some bizarre reason . . . Total schlock . . . Not worth watchin' . . . You'd be bored to death two minutes in . . . so don't even bother!" Sam stammered.

"Oh. Okay then," Freddie said, putting the discs back in the stack.

Sam exhaled deeply and unevenly. "Hey," she said to him, recovering quickly, "how about I show you my BRILLIANT new money making idea instead! Come on!" And with that, she ran over to her bedroom.

"Oh, boy," Freddie said warily as he followed. "At least it can't be worse than the Penny-Tee fiasco."

"No, this is guaranteed to succeed where that failed!" she gloated, and she handed him a small, but heavy, metal spike and an array of plastic fins.

Freddie examined the items in each hand. "Wait," he said as he fitted them together. "These things screw together and make . . . SAM! This is a lawn dart!"

"Yup," she said proudly.

"They're totally illegal!" he objected.

"Yeah, for almost 25 years now, except for those chizzy all-plastic ones you can still get in Vancouver that nobody wants," she agreed.

"You can't make or sell lawn darts! This is WORSE than the Penny-Tee fiasco!" Freddie said.

"No, wait," Sam replied, "here's the brilliant part: you can't make lawn darts, but you can," she continued as she snatched the dart from Freddie's hands and unscrewed it, "make and sell 'Sammie's Shiny Spikes' and 'Puckett's Fun Fins!' If somebody chooses to buy both items and chooses to put them together even though they're sold separately . . . Well, there's nothing I can do about the personal choices other people make."

Freddie gaped dumbfoundedly at Sam.

"Well, whadaya think?" she asked, grinning.

"I think," Freddie said measuredly, "you have the ethical sense of a great business leader."

"Thanks!" Sam said with a smile as her eyes lit up.

"I didn't mean that as a compliment!" Freddie objected.

"Whatever," Sam continued as her eyes darkened again. "Look, when somebody tries to sell a set of old lawn darts, they can go for a hundred bucks or more, 'cause back when they were banned some consumer safety dweebs said all the existing ones should be destroyed for some dumb reason. There aren't many left. I could make a killing off of this!"

"I'm sure some killing would be involved," Freddie said darkly.

"Sooo . . . I've made a prototype set here. Wanna help me test 'em out?" she asked hopefully.

"Sam, I'm not playing lawn darts with you!"

"Don't have to – here's the other brilliant part: The old lawn dart game was boring. Basically just horseshoes. Yugh," she said disgustedly. "Know what else is boring? Golf. Know what's more boring? Disc golf. Know what'd be totally awesome instead? Lawn dart golf!"

"Lawn dart golf," Freddie repeated in disbelief.

"Yeah! The one I handed you is for mid-range shots. I've got a driver," she said as she held up a gargantuan dart, "and a putter," she continued while hoisting a small dart, "over here, too. How much cooler would golf be if it had the constant potential for sudden death and catastrophic maiming for everybody within a hundred yards?"

"Sam," Freddie said sternly, "this isn't just beyond the pale; this is beyond what I thought was YOUR pale, too."

Sam looked deflated. "Really?"

"Really," Freddie replied as he looked her straight in the eyes.

"That's weird," she said, looking off to Freddie's side. "Carly, Spencer, Gibby, Tasha, and Wendy all said exactly the same thing when I ran this past each of them."

"Well," Freddie said, "there's a reason for that. Most people don't find delight in the maiming and deaths of others."

"Really?" Sam asked in innocent disbelief.

"Really," Freddie repeated as though he was speaking to a first grader.

"Huh," she paused, lost in thought. "Then explain NASCAR."

"I don't think anybody can explain NASCAR, Sam."

Sam sighed. "Well, okay. If dart golf is out, now what should we do?"

"I'm willing to give European Fun Guys 8 a shot. Maybe it could be one of those 'so bad it's good' kind of things," Freddie said as he walked back in the direction of the DVDs.

"Oh no!" Sam shouted as she ran after him. "NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!"

"What's the big deal?" Freddie asked as she caught up to him.

An idea flashed in Sam's head. "Tell you what," she said, with a quasi-seductive tone lurking in her voice as she put her hands on Freddie's shoulders. "I have a better idea. That massage you gave me was really, really, amazing. I really, really wanna return the favor. How's that?" she asked, leaning into his ear as she began rubbing.

"That is kinda nice," Freddie said apprehensively, wondering where this could possibly be going.

"Yeah," Sam continued as she kneaded his shoulders. "You just relax, and let me do my thing . . . There . . . And after a while of this, then, maybe . . ." Sam's grip on Freddie's shoulders tightened into a Vulcan nerve pinch as she cooed softly in his ear. "We can take a nap."

Freddie slumped to the floor, unconscious, with a thud.

"I really didn't wanna have to do that," she told Freddie's unresponsive form as she grabbed the European Fun Guys DVDs, hid them in her mom's underwear drawer, and dragged him back to the sofa.

Despite her bad shoulder, she managed, with difficulty, to pull Freddie up onto the sofa. Sitting for a few moments with an unconscious Freddie propped against her, Sam looked around the room, shrugged, and began giving him a massage.