Chapter Name: Gone

Notes: Not sure if anyone saw on those other stories, but I've been updating other stories rather than this one. I decided a couple nights ago to get an update out for this story, and it hasn't taken very long at all. I hope you don't mind the wait too much.

Thanks to reviewers Snapplelinz (and as always, thank you for your friendship and support), EddieVF, Fanfic-Reader-88, mrmuscle, jackpotdante, pink-strawberry-lemonade, RemDiamond, Darsnider, Cosmos, cameddie, baronvonmilo, Guot (do you mean Somewhere Out There?), F girl, Creddie Forever and Always and Dancing dancer.

"You've got five seconds to open the door before I open in spite of you." His strong deep voice bellowed out through the door and deep into my soul. On the plus side, the massive sharp intake of breath made me realize I was feeling better. Which was great. At least I'd die healthy. Mom would have wanted it that way.

"How do I know you won't hurt me? I know fencing!" My voice cracked unexpectedly at the end of my attempt at toughness.

I heard a belly laugh from the other side of the door, "If Mister or Miss Martinez wanted you hurt, you'd be hurt already."

"You aren't going to hurt me?"

"No. Open the door."

"Fine. But Sam knows people in waste disposal!" I yelled through the door.

"Yeah. Me too. And they owe me favors." I gulped.

I gingerly stepped back to the door. I worked the lock, slowly swinging the door back. I jumped back in case he tried to ninja me before I could run. I could probably get to the fire escape before him, if I managed to grab the lamp and smack him in the head with it.

Instead, Jennifer stood in the frame of the door. She was wearing what I came to call her 'church clothes'.

Very plain. Simple black flats. White shirt. Long black skirt. Hair tied back in a ponytail.

"Er.. hello Fredw.. I mean, Freddie."

What the hell.

"Are you here to taunt me before your goon rolls me up in carpet and throws me off a bridge?"

Jennifer laughed. Not heartily. It trailed off into a sigh.

"I never gave you enough credit for our funny you are. To answer your question no. He's not going to hurt you. He's gone back to the car. May I come in?"

"Uh.. okay."

Jennifer stepped into the room and sat down on the couch.

I took the chair opposite. The afternoon was already fading into evening, I wondered what she wanted to talk about.

"Freddie.. I wanted to talk about us."

"Look, I might have been harsh on you, but I'm not changing my mind." I didn't want to get back with her. No matter what, my choice had been made.

"No that's fine. I wanted to talk about what we said."

"What exactly?"

Jennifer breathed in, "Firstly, that I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what I said about Carly. I know you and here are best friends, and I let my jealously get the better of me. I should have trusted you. I should have trusted her as well."

"Thank you.. I know Carly tried her best, it's a shame you two didn't get on better."

"That was my fault. I didn't open myself. I didn't love thy neighbor. I'm going to try better in the future."

"Good."

"That's not all Freddie. I need to thank you."

"You do? For what? I tore you apart. I took it too far."

Jennifer continued, stony faced, "Not after what I said about Carly. I need to thank you for being a gentleman. I wasn't thinking clearly and I tried to seduce you."

"You did a pretty good job of it."

Jennifer blushed.

"Freddie please," I dropped my head, admonished, "I offered you my body and you refused. I know a lot of girls might be mad at that, but I'm not. I might have lost something so important had it not been you."

"Jennifer.. I'm not sure we really need to be doing this. We both said and did things we were sorry for. I'm not going to go around telling people what happened, ruining your reputation or telling lies. I'm not that kind of guy."

Jennifer put her hands up in the air, palms up by her head, "I know Freddie I know, I'm not doing this because I thought you might tell. I'm doing this because of dad."

"Your father?"

"Yes. When I told him about what happened, the first thing he did was try to organize a hit on you."

"He did what?"

"He was just mad. You don't have to worry. I don't think he would have gone through with it anyway. When I calmed him down, we talked about it. He told me that what you said, much of it was true from what he could see. That I needed to look inside and figure out if I would listen to what you said. That just because we broke up, doesn't mean you were lying."

"I get that, but you don't need my absolution."

"This isn't about absolution Freddie. It's about feeling better about myself. It's about helping myself. When I was lying in bed the night after we broke up, I looked inside myself. I didn't like what I saw. I was mean, spiteful, prideful, rude, deliberately ignorant. I was jealous. I offered myself to you like a cheap harlot. It was only by your good grace that I wasn't taken advantage of."

"I knew you weren't thinking straight. It was just emotions. I don't think of you like that at all."

"I don't want to take someone like you for granted next time. I want to be a better girlfriend. I should have been a better girlfriend for you."

"Jennifer, am I really the best person for this?"

"I need to look at the past if I want to improve the future." She was right, there wasn't really anyone but me. Not when it was about us as a couple.

"What do you want me to do?"

"Well, you said stuff about me.. I want to talk about that."

"Where do you want to start?

With a slight hint of pain she said, "Well, if I recall, you said I cared more about money, that I treated you badly, that I kept ignoring you and pushing you around, that I was boring and unfunny, wanted you just for popularity, and being jealous. Pick one."

"Well... that's what I said."

I looked into her eyes, trying to figure out exactly what to say.. what could I say? I'd torn her apart and thrown her to the lions. I should help her out. That would be fair. She wasn't evil or anything.

"I have to admit I might have said what I said emotionally as well. That I took it too far. I have a tendency to over-react when it comes to Carly, Sam and my mom."

"I understand. Just please do this for me," she said, head down, hands in her lap.

"Can I start with the 'sexual' stuff?" I figured it was probably the easy thing to do. It shouldn't be too hard to get through.

Jennifer was taken aback, her eye's shot open and she blushed. She might have offered it, but there was no way she'd have gone through with it. Not her. I wouldn't have got her shirt off before she'd have changed her mind. Jennifer nodded and I took that as a sign to continue.

"It was pleasant, kissing and making out, but I was kinda hoping after a while we might do more."

Then it hit me. I needed to tell her about Sam.

"Jennifer. I need to confess something as well."

"You do?" She leaned forward in her chair.

"Yeah. I. I cheated on you. With Sam. It happened one morning when she came over to help me look for something Carly had lost. We didn't have sex or anything, but yeah.. we made out and stuff. I cheated on you. It wasn't planned, it was just one time. I'm really sorry. I didn't think I'd be that guy. The cheater. But yeah. I'm sorry." I finished my confession.

She sighed, "It was that meat competition wasn't it. There's no-one on earth named Bob Berkowitz."

"You asked me about after it happened, how come you didn't say anything else?"

"Because they weren't sure. It was just a rumor. They were on their way out and couldn't tell for certain. I didn't want to lose you by starting a fight. Thanks for telling me, but it doesn't really matter to me now. We're not together. I treated you horribly so I can't exactly blame you for kissing another girl."

"Yeah you can. A guy shouldn't cheat. That simple. I was a jerk."

"Maybe if I found out for real back then I might have blamed you, but not now. It's water under the bridge. Let's just move on from it Freddie."

I was surprised at how she just dismissed it all so easily. But I guess we were already broken up and she was moving on so that was an explanation.

"Okay. Now I respect what you believe in, but I didn't like how you never really talked to me about it. You kinda lead me on sometimes. Like, I would think maybe I could do more than just kissing, then you'd knock my hand away. But you wouldn't tell me if it was never going to happen, or if you wanted to wait and stuff. You can't just not talk about kissing and sex. We're too old to just ignore that. It's frustrating. Not because I wasn't getting laid or anything like that, but because I didn't know what you wanted from me. If all you wanted was kissing, I would have been fine. If you wanted me to touch you, do things to you and with you, I would have been okay with that too. I wanted to talk to you. But instead we didn't and I figured I was doing something wrong."

"I see. I'll keep that in mind. It's just with my upbringing we don't really talk about sexy stuff. It makes me feel dirty. I know it's natural.. I need to grow up a bit. I'm sorry you felt like you were doing it wrong or that I wasn't interested."

We continued talking for an hour, talking about all the problems we had. The jealously, my lack of interest in her friends, and vice versa. How we never really shared our interests. How we never really talked. We both apologized, we made our peace with things and we moved on to the next issue. It was the best and most open conversation we ever had. Which kinda sucks when you think about it.

We broke up and then had our heart to heart. If we were like this before, we might still be together.

"I should go, I need to be home soon for dinner. Freddie, I know we're not together and I'm not going to try and get back together with you, I respect your choice, but do you want to be friends?"

Time for the truth. Might as well, this could be the last time we speak, "Jennifer, I already have two best friends. Carly and Sam. Plus Gibby, Reuben and Jeremy. I don't really need another friend. Sorry."

"No, it's okay. I understand. It's for the best anyway I think. If you ever need anything though, call me." She sat up, walked over to me and kissed me on the cheek.

"I'm sorry it turned out like it did. I hope you find happiness."

I stood and showed her out, "I'm sorry as well. If you need to talk about anything more, just email."

"Will do. Goodbye Freddie."

"Goodbye." She closed the door behind her softly. And like that Jennifer was gone.

I sat back on the chair pondering what had just happened. The sun kept falling until the room was growing dark. I yawned, this.. whatever it was had really knocked me about. I think I'll go to bed early tonight.

I watched some TV for a while when I heard a knock on the door.

I looked through the peephole. It was Carly. I opened the door and said hello.

"You wanna come over and have something to eat? Are you feeling any better?"

"Sure. And yes, I am. Thank you."

"Good. I never like seeing you get sick." I shut the door behind me and followed Carly into the Shay's apartment.

"So, guess who I ran into on the way up." She questioned as we made our way across the room. I sat on the chair near the computer. I tapped away on the keyboard, checking out the webshow email. Mostly the usual stuff. Nothing important so I left it.

"Jennifer?"

"Hmm, you wouldn't happen to know anything about that would you?" Carly asked suggestively as she pulled out two glasses and poured some ice tea into them.

She stood opposite me on the bench top waiting for my reply.

"Yeah, she came over. We had a talk."

"You did now did you?"

"Come on Carly give it up, I know when you're playing with me."

Carly smirked, "Alright, ya got me. She apologized to me for being in her words, a witch, to me and Sam when you were dating. Is that what happened with you?"

"Yeah, we talked for an hour or so. I guess we both wanted to get things off our chest. It was refreshing, talking like that. Being open. If we were like that when we were together we probably wouldn't have broken up."

She took a sip of her drink, "So are you like friends now?"

"No. We decided to just break off completely."

"Oh cool. I mean, it's sad you guys broke up, but it's good that you worked it out. It's for the best."

"I think so too." We finished the rest of the drinks. Carly rinsed her glasses. With the sun setting behind her, I could see birds flying past the window. Once she was done we moved to sit down on the couch.

"So, pizza?" Carly asked.

"Sounds great."

Carly pulled out her pearPhone and ordered it. I turned on the TV, looking for something to watch. I settled on a re-run of a Drew And Jerry episode. Carly didn't seem to mind when she put her phone back in her pocket and turned her attention to the TV.

"Where's Sam and Spencer?"

"Spencer's gone to get all the keys and stuff from Mulligan. Sam's borrowing a car from one of her cousins. Making sure he doesn't drive off with it or get it repossessed the day before or anything like that."

"Do you mean borrow or," I inflected my tone, "borrow."

Carly laughed, "I'm pretty sure this is legit. We don't really need two cars, but it's better."

"I meant what I said about making up for the movie night Carls."

She turned to me, "What are you planning?"

"You'll see. It'll be fun I promise."

Carly smiled and laid her head on my shoulder. We watched the episode pass until the pizza came. After we finished the pizza we switched to watching a movie. It was animated, about an evil villain who rescues three orphan girls for his schemes but ends loving them like a father. It was cute. Carly gently made fun of me for releasing a few tears at the end.

Spencer came back just after the movie ended and told us all about the place. I left after, saying I was feeling tired. I wished Carly and Spencer a good night.

The rest of the night passed pretty quickly. As I lay in bed, I knew I had a bit of planning and purchasing to do before the big trip. What I was thinking of doing wasn't fancy, but I did want Carly to really enjoy it.

I fell asleep to the thoughts of standing on the beach looking up at the stars with Carly. I couldn't be sure because the dream left my head as soon as I woke, but I think I might have dreamed about it as well.

I slept the best I have in a long time.

AN: So I know this isn't that much of a chapter, but I would call it a transition rather than a filler. Again, thanks for all the reviews.