iAm Under Pressure

The next night, Carly could feel Sam crackling with tension whenever Freddie was around. She wasn't talking to him, or even much to Carly.

It was Sam's turn to pull the next movie out of the bra. After she did, saying nothing, she put the movie in and started it up. It began with a several – minutes long sequence of a spaceship piloted by three figures in astronaut uniforms splashing down on the Pacific coast. Much to the surprise of local authorities, when the figures removed their helmets they turned out to be...

"Apes!" Freddie cried.

"Oh, it's one of those," said Carly, trying to sound politely interested. And indeed the title came up: Escape from the Planet of the Apes.

The Apes movies were another passion Sam and Freddie shared with each other but not with Carly. They were known to argue for days over whether the original or rebooted version was better. Sam generally took the position that "reboots suck," but Carly was sure they switched sides every now and then just to keep the argument going.

As the credits sequence rolled, Freddie tried to explain the complicated timestream of the series to Carly until Sam, exasperated, put one hand over his eyes and one over his mouth (why had she touched his mouth?), whispering "Speak No Evil, Benson." Freddie got the point and stopped.

...

Sam realized about halfway into the film, she should not have put it in. Although the movie started out fun and games about talking apes in the human world, as it went on it turned very, very dark. Worse, she knew she really hadn't thought this out when she realized she was watching it with a person who had lost her mother – and the last shot showed a baby ape mournfully calling out "Mama?"

It was stupid, it was dumb...and it was just the kind of thing to hit Carly in the right wrong place to hurt her. Scared, Sam glanced at Freddie; her awkward feelings for him suddenly secondary. Even in the dim light she could see that he'd remembered it too.

His eyes were flitting from Carly's face to the screen and back again.

As the ending got closer Sam tried to make up a reason to stop the film. The trouble was that Carly was no longer feigning her intrigue for the sake of her friends, she'd really gotten caught up in it. So the ending unfolded. Carly's face slowly became motionless but her eyes never left the screen.

When it was over she was openly crying, and angrily hissed at her friends,

"Which one of you put that in the bra?"

Sam opened her mouth and prepared to take a deep breath before speaking, but before she could inhale Freddie said,

"It was me, Carly."

Both girls turned toward him with similar astonished looks on their faces, but for very different reasons.

"Really, Freddie? Really? You know how I feel about -" her voice choked off as Freddie spoke over her.

"I know. I'm so sorry, Carls. I never would've -"

"I mean I know you're a guy but you're supposed to be one of the sensitive ones. Sensitive to stuff like this!"

"I -"

"I think you should leave, Freddie."

His eyes went from her to Sam, who piped in a half – hearted,

"What the hell's wrong with you?"

He looked at her for a beat; then said,

"Okay Carly, if that's what you want."

"It is."

Carly walked stiffly out of the loft studio, in the direction of her bedroom, Sam followed. Just before clearing the door she looked back at him, a smile on her face but "We'll discuss this later" in her eyes.

...

Later:

Freddie was up late, waiting for marshmallow crispy rice treats he'd made to cool, and listening to what he called his "Bed of nails" playlist through speakers. He could do both because his mother was away at another one of her parenting seminars, this one called "Cruel To Be Kind."

Queen and Bowie's "Under Pressure" had begun to play, and he almost didn't hear a soft knocking against the front door. He walked up and looked through the peep hole. A blonde – headed demon stood on the other side. He opened the door and there she was, looking directly at him.

For one of the only times since he'd known her, she looked less than fully confident. He supposed the last time he'd seen her that way was the night they'd broken up in the elevator. He hadn't exactly been at fighting strength that night either.

"Sam." He nodded at her and stepped aside pulling the door open further. She entered without a word. He closed the door and turned to her.

"How's Carly?"

"I finally got her to sleep," she whispered. "She was really...she got pretty fucked up by that movie."

"Yeah, I got th-

"Why did you do that?" She interrupted.

He considered playing the game of asking "do what" but he knew this was not a night for their usual teasing battles.

"Because Carly's your best friend and you need her," he said simply. "Both of you – you would probably do okay without me, but -"

"You think I - " she started to say, impassioned, before stopping and beginning again. "You think iCarly'd be okay without you? I thought we talked about this, remember? I admitted you're as much a part of iCarly as we are."

"Yeah. And then you tried to pull my underwear over my head."

"Good times, good times." Sam said absently and sort of automatically. Then she looked at Freddie and couldn't contain snorting laughter. It would've embarrassed her terribly if she had done that in front of a boy she liked, or even just thought was cute, but this was Freddie.

Not that she didn't like Freddie. They liked each other, they'd just realized it didn't work "that way." So, with that understood...there was nothing wrong with admitting, even if only to herself, that he did look kinda cute.

Glancing at the tray of hardening marshmallows mixed with crispy rice, she raised an eyebrow before looking at him.

"Can I have a taste?"

He didn't say anything at first; she thought he was refusing her.

"Come on, you know I love that taste on my lips; on my tongue."

He knew it.

The very fact she was asking instead of grabbing the whole pan – cooled or not – for herself, confirmed his feeling this was not an ordinary conversation they were having.

He decided to push it. After picking up his Pearphone to check the time, he got a knife out of a drawer and cut a large piece. Turning to look her in the eye, he put the treat in his mouth to take a bite and made a show of how much he enjoyed it.

She was dying and he knew it. He licked (dear god!) his lips. "Mmmmm, I see what you mean. That does taste good."

Another Freddie's voice was rising from the speakers.

Can't we give ourselves one more chance?

Why can't we give love that one more chance?

Why can't we give love…

Looking deep into her eyes, somehow able to do so from a couple steps away from her, he said in a low voice, "Come and get it.

In a couple of steps and half a leap, she was in his arms, her legs wrapped around his torso so they could feel each other, and kissing him over and over, alternating butterfly kisses with longer ones.

"Get down," he whispered, breathing heavily. She did, taking his hand and beginning to move towards his bedroom. Shaking his head, he pulled her by the hand back into his arms, then put his hands around her waist and lifted her onto the counter.

Oh.

With his left hand he pushed her down, while with his right he ran down her side, brushing lightly against her breast and making a whimper escape her mouth before he covered it with his own. Then his hands moved lower and he started unbuttoning her pants.

...

Later, as they sat in bed wearing nothing but sheets and lazily taking great hunks of marshmallow square out of the pan by hand, she asked,

"Why did we ever break up?"

"I never knew."

END

I'll tell ya-I'm afraid this is rushed. That's what happens when you set a deadline with an actual date like, say, wanting to get a Halloween story posted by October 31. I had another movie or two I wanted to get them through, but I hadn't worked out how yet.

So you may feel the story swerves unexpectedly into the saucy and the songfic. Or, maybe you'll think I got away with it. I hope you'll let me know in reviews if you do, or even if you think I should go back and add some "bonus material."

Either way, hope it was better than it was worse.

-BViS