Phone


"Get a job, you asshole!" A vase suddenly made its way flying through the living room. It hit the wall opposite from where it was thrown and smashed to pieces.

"I have a job and I go to school at the same time! What about you?"

Sam and her mother were arguing again, presumably about the fact that both parent and offspring were as they described one another, "deadbeats".

"I don't need to take this crap from you." Pam spat back, throwing another random object carelessly across the living room out of rage. Sam quickly held her arms up in defense as the object made its way toward her, but defended herself unsuccessfully as the object hit her on the head. She stumbled backwards but quickly regained her composure. Pam looked a bit surprised that the object had hit her daughter, but the guilt was quickly replaced with the returning anger.

"That hurt!" Sam yelled, checking for blood. There was none, thankfully. Sam glared at her mother and then groaned, exasperated. She stormed out the door, running down the street. As soon as she reached the curb, she curled up in a ball and started crying. All her frustrations, sadness, and anger was released in a series of groans, moans, sobs and a waterfall of tears. She dug through the pockets of the jacket she was wearing for her cell phone and dialed a phone number she knew by heart.

No answer. Straight to voicemail, in fact.

Sam wiped her tears and tried texting. She waited. She waited one minute but there was no response. She waited five minutes but there was still no response. Sam decidedly gave up when there was no reply after ten minutes of waiting. She rubbed away her tears with her jacket sleeve and Sam decided that she really needed someone right now. She dialed another phone number she knew by heart.

The phone rang.

The phone rang once more.

The phone rang a third time.

"Hey."

The voice form the other end of the line overcame Sam with a wave of relief.

"F-Fredlumps. Where's Carls? She's... S-She's not answering her cell." Sam spoke, trying to mask the fact that she had been crying.

"Late night movie with Spencer. Her phone's probably off."

Sam sniffled. "...Oh."

Freddie heard the sniffle. "What's wrong? Where are you?" Freddie asked, sounding alarmed.

"I'm at home." Sam replied, but decided that wasn't exactly accurate. "Sort of."

Freddie sighed. "Are you sitting on the curb again?"

Sam was surprised Freddie knew her so well. "Yeah. Why?"

"I'll come pick you up. Just stay there."

No less than five minutes later, Freddie rolled up in his silver Camaro. He opened the passenger door from the driver's seat. "Get in," Freddie invited.

Sam obeyed and entered the car. The two sat in the car in the dark, with only a single street light shining any light on them. Freddie turned on the dome light. The inside of the car lit up and Freddie was able to get a better look at the blonde.

Her eyes were red and puffy and her mascara was running down her cheeks. Freddie moved the hair out of Sam's face and tucked it behind her ear, but Sam just moved away from him causing her hair to fall back in front of her face. "Don't."

"You don't." Freddie insisted, moving Sam's hair back out of her face. This time he noticed something. A slight bruise on her temple. "What's this?" Freddie asked, tenderly touching the bruise.

Sam winced as Freddie's warm touch sent a shock up her spine and pain to her head. "It was just an accident," Sam whispered. "She was throwing stuff."

Freddie moved his hand away from Sam's bruise and gently caressed her cheek, wiping away her tears. He sighed somewhat out of pity as he looked at Sam. He smiled earnestly, hoping his goofy grin would be contagious. Sam tried a smile, but it was half-hearted.

"Maybe a smoothie will cheer you up." Freddie offered, starting the car and driving off.

Sam turned to face Freddie, who had his eyes concentrated on the road. She looked at the boy-now-turned-man and just stared at him.

Freddie didn't need to take his eyes off the road to know the girl beside him was burning holes into his face with her stare. "What's up? You're staring at me," he said, almost laughing.

Sam just couldn't wrap her finger around it. Sure, the two were friends and had been friends for their entire middle and high school lives, but Sam never thought the two were actually this close. "You're being really nice to me, Benson. What's the catch?"

Freddie slowly brought the car to a stop as he parked in front of Groovy Smoothies. He turned off the engine and turned to face Sam, a smile on his face. "There's no catch, Sam. I'm just trying to be your friend." He opened the car door and left, but peered his head back in when he realized his blonde friend hadn't moved. "You comin' or what?"

Sam just grinned, following the brunette. The two entered the empty smoothie shop, the bell on the door chiming their entrance.

"We're closed. Come back tomorrow," A worker called, crouched behind the counter.

"Can you make an exception?" Freddie asked, waiting for the worker to stand up.

The worker, otherwise known as T-Bo to all his customers, stood up from behind the counter and looked at the two young adults. "Freddie? Sam? What're you kids doin' here so late?" T-Bo took one look at Sam and noticed something was amiss.

Freddie stepped in front of Sam, causing T-Bo to turn his focus to him instead of Sam. "Can you make an exception?" Freddie repeated, now that T-Bo was somewhat aware of the irregular situation. T-Bo decided it was not the time for questioning and decided to trust Freddie's intentions.

"What can I get for the two of you?" T-Bo asked, an inviting smile on his face.


"How can you be so nice to me?" Sam asked, sipping her smoothie. The two had already made it back to Bushwell Plaza, sitting in the dark on Freddie's couch. Freddie had turned on the television and muted it, as to not awaken his sleeping mother in the next room. The light from the television proved to shed enough light for the two to see.

"What do you mean?" Freddie asked, puzzled by Sam's question.

"I mean, I'm mean to you all the time. So how can you just turn around and be so nice to me? Picking me up from the curb, buying me a smoothie and offering to let me stay here."

Freddie just smiled his usual smile and rolled his eyes. "You're so oblivious, Puckett. Get it through your head: We're like, best friends."

Sam smiled back at the goofy boy. "Yeah, it's true. There's only one other person I'm closer to than you and that's Carls."

Freddie just chuckled.

"What's so funny?" Sam asked, a little annoyed that Freddie would laugh when Sam was being genuine.

Freddie just shook his head. "Nothing. It's just... I think that's the first time you ever actually admitted we were close friends."

"Well, it's almost midnight on a Friday night and we're sitting alone in the dark in your living room. Pretty sure if we were just acquaintances or classmates, we wouldn't be doing this." Sam said, pointing out the obvious. Freddie just laughed and sipped his smoothie.

"Very true."

Sam smiled as Freddie agreed with her and looked at the boyish man. "Still, I'm glad you answered the phone when I called."

Freddie just smiled back warmly. He would never ignore a call from Sam.


A/N: The cheesiness of this fic makes me laugh. :)