Edge

"Mom!" Sam called out as her and her fiancé let themselves into her mother's house. "Mom, we're here!"

"Hey," Freddie frowned, sniffing the air. "Is something burning?"

"Nah," Sam replied. "That's just the hot wax she uses to wax her-"

"Okay, okay, sorry I asked," Freddie cringed.

"Hey, what are you two doing here?" Pam asked, coming downstairs lugging a large, cardboard box.

"Oh, here, Pam, let me get that for you," Freddie said, quickly hurrying over to his future mother-in-law and taking the box from her.

"Thanks, Muscles," Pam beamed, giving Freddie's bicep a small squeeze.

"I told you yesterday, mom, we needed to get the addresses of the prisons everybody's in right now so we can send them their wedding invitations," Sam said. "Hopefully nobody gets extra time added onto their sentence because it took us forever to pick a date that worked with all the different release dates."

"Oh right, right," Pam nodded as Freddie set the box down. "I forgot all about that. When you called yesterday it was right before the new plumber I'm seeing came over and after all that we did, I couldn't remember much of-"

"Has it always been your life goal to make me puke?" Sam gagged. "Just get me the addresses and spare me the story of your love life."
"Hey, Pam, what is all this?" Freddie asked, looking in the box he had just set down.

"Just some old photo albums and home movies from the attic," Pam said. "I'm cleaning that out to make room for the tanning bed I'm gonna put in there as part of my in-home island set-up."
"You don't have a tanning bed," Sam frowned.

"Yet," Pam corrected. "It's first prize in the wet t-shirt contest their having down at the dock next week."
"That's for college kids, mom! Not for saggy old ladies!"

"Hey! I am not saggy!" Pam snapped. "I'm perkier than a-"

"Hey, Sam, are these your baby pictures?" Freddie asked, flipping through one of the albums.

"I dunno, I've never looked through these," Sam shrugged, stepping over to him.

"Oh yeah, they are!" Pam nodded. "That's yours and Melanie's baby album. Man…I haven't looked through those in years."

"Aw, you were real cute back then," Freddie chuckled, smiling down at the page.

"Back then?" Sam repeated, raising an eyebrow.

"Er…I mean…back then, like you still are now," Freddie corrected.

"Good boy," Sam smirked.

"I was wondering where I put all this stuff," Pam said, looking through the box. "Wow…it's all here. Your first birthday, your first steps, your trip to the petting zoo…hey! Here's the security tape from the bus with your birth on it!"

"Yeah…you can burn that one," Sam said.

"This is so cool, I've never seen too many pictures of you as a baby," Freddie commented. "I'd like to see some of these videos."

"Well borrow them if you want," Pam said.

"Really?" Freddie grinned.

"Sure, why not?" Pam shrugged.

"Thanks a lot," Sam said, rolling her eyes. "Now he's going to spend the next week watching all of those. Seriously though, mom, we need the prison addresses."

"Yeah, yeah, hold on," Pam said. "I'll be back in a sec."

"You were such a squishy little baby," Freddie laughed as he continued to flip through the photo album.

"You saying I was fat?"

"No," Freddie said. "Aw! There's you in the tub! Hey, you can see that birthmark you have on your-"

"Shut up!" Sam hissed as Freddie continued to laugh.

"I just can't believe your mom has all these nice photo albums," Freddie said. "No offense or anything, but she doesn't really seem like the type to sit there and keep all these pictures in such a nice order."

"Oh, she didn't do all these," Sam said. "Uncle Carmine did. One of his favorite hobbies is scrapbooking. If he's not in prison you can usually find him at the craft store buying new materials."
"Huh…I never would've thought," Freddie said slowly.

"Alright, here's the addresses," Pam said, returning with a slip of paper that she handed off to her daughter.

"You know, Pam, if your want, I can burn these old videocassettes onto DVDs if you want," Freddie said. "That way they'll be easier to store and you can watch them on your laptop or something."

"Look at you, tech stud," Pam grinned. "Pretty and smart."

"Alright, we're getting out of here," Sam said. "Come on, nub."
"Coming," Freddie nodded, picking up the box.

"What, dude! You're not seriously taking all this stuff, are you?" Sam said.

"Um, yes I am!" Freddie said. "Come on, it will be fun to watch your old baby videos together."
"You just want to make fun of me!"

"Well yeah, that too," Freddie chuckled. "But come on, baby, there's a tape in here labeled 'potty training'. I've got to make fun of that! You'd be ashamed of me if I didn't!"

"Well…yeah," Sam sighed. "Fine. I guess watching a few of these won't be that bad."

"And this is my favorite part!" Freddie laughed a week later as him and Carly sat on the couch in his and Sam's living room, watching one of the home videos. "This is where little two-year old Sam cries when she lets go of her balloon. Watch, it's priceless!"

Carly smiled as the small, blonde child on the screen wrinkled her face up and let out a loud wail as her pink balloon floated away. "Boon!" she cried. "My boony!"

"Oh my God!" Carly laughed. "That's adorable!"

"Ugh, are you still watching those stupid videos?" Sam groaned as she walked into the room.

"Sam, these are just so great!" Freddie said. "I mean I'm finding out so much about you! I never would've guessed that you used to be afraid of that big, scary garden hose or that you used to love dancing around in your little pink tutu singing Old McDonald."
"That's on here?" Carly exclaimed. "I want to see that one!"

"Carly!" Sam yelled.

"I-I mean…nope, I still wanna see it," Carly said.

"Sam, what's so wrong with me watching some old videos of you as a little kid?" Freddie asked. "Am I not allowed to wanna know how my beautiful fiancée grew into the perfect woman she is now?"
"Oh don't hand me that garbage, Benson!" Sam snapped. "You're just happy you finally have material to mock me with!"
"That's not true," Freddie said.

"It isn't?" Carly frowned.

"Well…okay, it is," Freddie grinned. "But don't you think after fifteen years of enduring humiliation from her I deserve a chance? Oh! Oh here's the part where little Sam has such a lovely tea party with all of her nice dollies."

Sam glared at him for a moment before there was a knock at the door.

"Who's that?" Carly asked as Freddie paused the video.

"Oh, just someone I've been expecting," Sam said brightly, stepping over to the door. She opened up and Marissa stepped into the apartment carrying three large boxes in her arm.

"Marissa!" Sam exclaimed happily, taking the boxes from her future mother-in-law and setting them down before throwing her arms around the woman. "I'm so glad you could come!"

"Oh, well, hello Samantha," Marissa replied, a bit surprised by this warm greeting.

"Mom?" Freddie frowned, standing up. "What-What are you doing here?"

"I called her," Sam said brightly.

"You called my mom?" Freddie said suspiciously.

"That's right," Sam nodded.

"Yes, I must say, it was somewhat of a pleasant surprise," Marissa nodded. "Samantha called my this morning asking me to bring over some of your old baby albums and home videos I had."
"She what?"

"Yeah," Sam said. "I mean why wouldn't I want to see how my handsome fiancé grew into the perfect man he is today?"

"Oh…she totally used your own words against you," Carly said.

"I got that, Carls!" Freddie snapped.

"Well lucky for you, I have every moment of Freddie's childhood documented," Marissa said, handing Sam a stack of photo albums. "You'll be able to see everything; his first time using the big boy potty, his first ballet recital, his first tick bath…which video would you like to start with?"
"I don't know," Sam said, looking as though Christmas had come a month early. "They all just sound so wonderful!"

"Well there's plenty here for you to choose from," Marissa said. "Now, I'll need all this back as soon as possible of course. I watch them all on Friday nights while I'm making fruit sauce."
"Oh Marissa, I know!" Sam said. "Why don't you stay here and watch Freddie's baby videos with us! I bet you have a ton of great commentary to add too!"

"Oh, you-you really want me to stay?" Marissa asked.

"Of course," Sam said sweetly. "You are going to be my mother-in-law soon."

"Oh, I-I suppose that's true," Marissa nodded. "Well okay then! We'll start with Freddie's first Easter, when I dressed him up as the most adorable little bunny. Oh, and his Easter bonnet! Now it may look a little feminine, but it really was the most darling thing!"

"I'll go make us some snacks," Sam beamed, heading into the kitchen.

"Um, I'll go with you," Freddie said, quickly scrambling to his feet.

He followed his fiancée into the kitchen. "Sam! I-I can't believe you called my mom! You know she has more baby pictures and videos of me than the press has pictures of the Kardashains!"

"You gave me no choice," Sam said simply. "You should know you can't wear the humiliation pants in this relationship. I hope you enjoyed it while it lasted."

"You're –You're-well you know what?" Freddie said. "Fine. Enjoy watching me in a pink, frilly Easter bonnet. But when we have our own kids, the first video they'll ever see is the one of you trying to take a bath in the toilet!"

"No!" Sam snapped. "The first one they'll ever see is that one of you at the Mr. Polite pageant your mom entered you in!"

Freddie rolled his eyes. "I can't believe I didn't burn all these stupid videos when I had the chance….my mom just had to go and get every embarrassing moment of my life on film!"

"Well you think I'm glad my mom did that same thing?" Sam said. "Figures that the one parenting thing she actually did right!"

"When we have our own kids, we're not going to do any of this," Freddie said firmly. "We're not going to leave this stuff for them to be humiliated by later!"

"That's right," Sam nodded. "No pictures, no videos…no nothing!"

The two were silent for a moment.

"You-You think we're actually going to stick to that?" Freddie finally asked slowly.

"Nope," Sam chuckled. "Probably not. We'll be just as bad as our moms were. You'll probably be even worse with all your fancy little cameras."

"Well…okay," Freddie said. "So we'll have a ton of pictures and videos. But we'll make sure it's nothing embarrassing."

"Yeah," Sam agreed. "We're not going to humiliate our kids, that's for sure."

"Definitely not," Freddie nodded. "We're going to be cool parents."

"Totally," Sam smiled, leaning up to give him a quick kiss. "The coolest."