Previously: Freddie and Carly had come up with a plan to get his daughter and Sam in the same room and prove to her that Sam was not Melanie. Carly secretly hoped that this would be an opportunity to clear some of the air between her two friends.
Chapter 26
It was decided that Saturday would be a good time to introduce Alex to her aunt. To start the day, she and her dad would visit Pam Puckett, where the grandmother was prepared to tell the little girl all about her mother and her twin sister's childhood. The parts fit for her to hear, anyway. Next Carly would spend some time with the child and show her some old iCarly clips before taking her upstairs to the studio, aka Sam's current room. While that was happening, Sam and Freddie would have an opportunity, under Spencer's supervision, to work out a enough of their differences to be in the same room without bloodshed before the child arrived and lay out exactly what they were going to tell her.
The visit with Pam went smoothly. Freddie and Alex saw lots of pictures of the twins as kids, many that Freddie hadn't seen before himself. It was apparent that the child understood there was a carbon copy of her mother out there in the world but the young father still had no way of judging how she might react to Sam's presence. Freddie and Alex returned to Bushwell and went to the Shay's apartment. The kid was handed off to Carly in the living room and Freddie made his way up to the third floor via the private elevator. Somehow, he felt like he was being led to his execution knowing Sam was there.
"Hey, Freddie-o." Spencer greeted from the corner by the window. Sam barely looked up from her phone screen. She may have agreed to this whole deal but she was not fond of the idea of having her private space invaded by the likes of Freddie Benson.
"Hey." He answered, quietly. "So, um, Carly's got all kind of old web show clips on the computer downstairs. Not like I haven't showed Alex most of that stuff already but . . . " He shrugged. "She likes it and Carly would have a different perspective than me so it'll probably be funnier."
Sam scoffed under her breath.
"Then I guess we have a little bit. That kid of yours is crazy about Carly." Spencer chuckled and pointed to a chair. "Come on over and sit down so we can get our game plan together."
Unfortunately, the free chair was next to Sam. "Uh, hey Sam." He managed to squeak out as he sat down. "How's it going?"
"Meh." She grunted and continued playing with her phone. After glancing at Spencer and remembering that he had encouraged her to be civil, she finally spoke quietly. "So, that's your kid, huh? My niece? She's a cute little thing. Don't know where the hair color came from though."
"Pam says from your dad. Uh, her name's Alex. Alexandra, but she likes to be called Alex."
"Can't say I blame her. Alexandra makes her sound like some member of a royal family or something. Way too prissy of a name, like Samantha. Where'd you guys ever come up with that?"
"Sam." Spencer quietly warned through clenched teeth, sitting to her immediate left. "Be nice."
"You'd have to ask Mel. Look, I'm sorry for the way she reacted the other night. Um, we never really talked about the fact that there was a chance we were going to run into someone who looks just like her mom."
"Yeah, I guess it might have been a good idea to tell her that." Sam said with typical snark. "But you aren't really known for making good decisions so, well, I pity your kid."
"Sa-am." Spencer again quietly admonished trying to keep positive with a fake smile on his face.
Freddie took no offense, he deserved anything Sam threw at him and he knew it. "I know, believe me. The thing is, I really have tried to avoid any mentions of Melanie for fear of making her upset. I Guess I'm like my mom, trying to protect her from anything that I think will hurt her. I just don't want the kid to end up needing therapy by the time she's in third grade."
"Didn't I warn you about Melanie?" Sam snapped, turning to face him head on. "Years ago, we hadn't even graduated high school yet and you two started dating, I tried to tell you she was going to ruin you, didn't I? Anybody ever listen to good old Sam? Noooo!"
Again, he could do nothing besides take whatever she dished out. "You did."
"And you damn near escaped her once. You dodged a bullet when she broke up with you as soon as you started college. Probably the smartest thing either of you did that year by the sounds of it."
Spencer tried to calm the blonde down. "Sam, come on. This is all ancient history."
Sam would have none of it. She was on a roll and needed to clear the air if she was ever going to be peaceful around this man. She had five years to load both barrels and she intended to point at him and pull the trigger.
"So what do you do? Like a fuckin' moron you go and knock her up. Even when you weren't together with her you screwed her. What the hell were you thinking? Oh wait, you weren't thinking because all the blood flow was going to your crotch instead of your brain."
He had lowered his head and was content to let her get it all off her chest.
"Of course that was pretty much your standard operating procedure as soon as you started college wasn't it?" Sam jumped to her feet and shouted at him. "It's a helluva wonder you even got your degree you were so busy snaking women. You're worse than some old, horny dog. I bet if a girl stopped in front of you, you tried to mount her."
"Alright Sam, that's enough!" Spencer got louder.
"No, Spencer. She's right. I was a terrible person, I did bad things that I'm not proud of, I'm ashamed of myself to this day for the way I acted that summer. But I will tell you this, I did love Melanie. We had a connection, I didn't just sleep with her to get play. I thought we had a future together."
Sam and Spencer both picked up on the past tense of the word love.
However, Freddie's blonde ex would have none of his excuses and kept going. "Which Melanie did you think you had a future with, sweet little adorable Melanie who's taking her medication or unhinged Melanie that forgot to take her happy pills and ran off just like our scuzz ball dad did because she's not playing with a full deck?" Sam cracked and pointed at her head. "You did know she's got a problem, didn't you?"
He had never told anyone beside Carly and his mother about what Pam Puckett told him in confidence. He knew Marissa told no one, and she had no contact with Sam, so it had to be Carly who spilled the beans.
"How did you . . . " He squeaked as Spencer looked shocked, the artist had no idea about this part. "Did Carly tell you?"
"Carly didn't have to tell me squat. I knew Mel had issues from the time we about twelve. And looking back, it was clear she always had them. I'm assuming the same with our dad."
Freddie just looked at her funny. How could she possibly have figured this out? Pam told him this information was always kept from Sam.
Somehow she knew he was confused. "I stole one of her pill bottles when she was home to visit and wasn't looking. I checked online to see what the pills were for and it actually explained a lot. It's probably why she went to the special school, not because she was some kind of genius but because she was a whack-job. Speaking of, how'd Marissa take the news that you impregnated your crazy pants on-again off-again college girlfriend?"
"She loves Alex. But she wasn't happy about how she came to be." He simply said truthfully. "Although my mom does have a lot of compassion for Melanie given her issues."
"Psh. That figures. Crazy sticks together." The young lady cracked and sat back down. "You know, that poor kid of yours doesn't stand a chance between your mom's genes and Melanie's and you raising her. My bet is she'll be in Troubled Waters by the time she's ten."
Spencer again tried to get things back on track. "Alright, as much good as this little self guided therapy session is doing both of you, we really need to figure out how we're going to handle Alex when she gets here. We need to convince her that you're really not Melanie."
"Well, she's his kid and even after dating us both, it took him until he was a senior in high school to figure it out." Sam pointed at Freddie. "So, I don't hold out much hope."
"E-nough!" Spencer shouted and jumped up himself. "This is impossible! Sam, I love you like you're my own sister but I'm ashamed of the way you're acting. This isn't some skit on iCarly. This is his little girl's sanity."
Sam went to speak and he held up a finger signaling her to keep quiet. "And I swear to God if you say one more word about his mother's special brand of nutty, I will turn you over my knee and spank you. I don't care if you are twenty-six years old. Can you behave yourself and act remotely mature about this and help us, please?"
Sam sighed. "Alright. I'm sorry, Spence. Maybe Carls is right and me and Fredwad, we do have some issues we need to work out with a good therapist. What do you two nubs need me to do?"
The three went over several facts that Alex needed to know and several subjects that were to be avoided. Carly sent a text to ask if they were ready and soon she and Alex walked off the elevator holding hands.
The little girl chose not to run at Sam or get overly excited this time, so it was clear Carly had spoken with her and that between her, Freddie and Pam some progress was made. Instead Freddie approached the little girl, took her hand and walked her over toward Sam. "Sweetheart, there's someone you should meet. This is your aunt Sam. She is Mommy's twin sister."
"Hello." The kid said quietly, barely making eye contact.
"Hey, kiddo. Wow, you're a cute little thing aren't you? Must get that from our side of the family." Sam said with a smirk, stooping over slightly. "So, you're in about first grade, right?"
"Yeah."
"You like school?" Sam asked. "Have some cool friends?"
"Yeah, school's fun. Not too many friends because we moved and I don't really know a lot of the kids in my new school yet."
"Well, I didn't have a lot of friends when I was your age but Carly over there, she's been my best friend since we were a little older than you. That's when my mom, your grandma, moved us here when I was in second grade."
"Pam says she doesn't like the word grandma. It's for old ladies." The child said firmly. "What about my daddy, weren't you friends with him too?"
Sam's breath was taken away, it had been so many years, almost a decade, since she thought of them as all best friends, the inseparable web show trio. "Uh, yeah. We met your dad in middle school, when him and Cra . . ., er uh, your other grandma moved in across the hall from Carly. And I guess we were pretty good friends for a while there."
Suddenly the girl hugged Sam. "Thanks for being my daddy's friend, Aunt Sam. He's lonely since my mommy left. Do you know if she's ever coming back?"
The young father had to turn his face away from everyone. "Uh, excuse me a minute." He quickly slipped out the studio door and into the privacy of the hallway as tears ran down his face. This had been an emotional morning and it was not getting any easier.
While the females remained in the studio, Spencer soon joined him and put his hand on his shoulder. "You alright there, buddy?"
He sniffed a response. "Yeah. I just, um, this is a lot right now. What Alex told her was so sweet and innocent an - and Sam, what she said about us all being friends, it just loosens up a lot of stuff I forgot about. I missed the girls both so bad, especially Sam."
"I think you two worked out a lot already but, I want you to know if you ever need to talk about any of it, I'm here alright?"
"Thanks, Doctor Feel." Freddie nudged the taller man sideways and rubbed at his own face with the back of his hand. "I'm willing to take you up on that if Sam is."
"You think we should get back in there before those two corrupt your kid?" Spencer suggested with a chuckle, looking through the glass door and seeing the two young women and the little girl laughing it up as they showed her various things in the studio.
"Not so worried about Carly but I'd rather not have Sam teaching her how to use the wedgie bouncer." Freddie chuckled. "Take a deep breath, Freddie. You can do this." He told himself.
"Hey, how about we all sit around and watch a couple of movies and I'll whip up some spaghetti tacos after bit. Nichole's coming over after she gets off work for dinner. She's been bugging me to make them. We can make a whole evening of it."
"You really think that's a good idea? You know, with Sam and all? I mean, just because she's tolerated me this long, doesn't mean she wants to hang out with me all the time."
"I think it's a good opportunity to help you two patch things up. And hey, you only live right across the hall if it gets to be too much, you can slip out."
"You're right. OK, here goes, annnd smiling." Freddie plastered on a happy expression and grabbed the door handle. "Hey you guys, Spencer just had a great idea . . ."
