Cousin
"Well…I guess this is it," Freddie said as him and Sam stepped in front of their apartment door. "When we walk though that door, our honeymoon is officially over."
"I know," Sam said, wrapping her arms around him. "Once we go inside, we're officially just some old married couple. We're gonna just have mortgages and bills and boring old people stuff."
"Hey, we still have plenty of fun stuff to look forward to," Freddie chuckled. "We've got our first real house, our first anniversary, starting a family together…"
Sam smiled up at him. "I guess that does sound nice. You know…me and you on the porch of our own home, rocking our little baby to sleep…"
"I can't wait," Freddie whispered, leaning down to kiss her. "We've got our whole life together. I'm so excited."
"Me too," Sam said, kissing him back. "Hey, you know, just because we're not officially on our honeymoon anymore, that doesn't mean we can't at least pretend we still are. At least for a few more hours. We can go inside, lock the door, and spend the rest of the afternoon pretending we're still in that fancy hotel room in
Hawaii."
"That sounds fantastic," Freddie grinned. "Hopefully Carly didn't put all the wedding presents in our bedroom, otherwise they might get in the way of-"
"Oh my God!" Sam suddenly exclaimed. "I-I can't believe it! I completely forgot about those! We still have all our wedding presents to open! Come on, baby! Let's go see what we got!"
"You mean now?" Freddie frowned. "What happened to extending our honeymoon for a few more hours?"
"We can do that any old time," Sam shrugged. "How often do we have an apartment full of wedding presents begging to be open? Let's move, Benson!"
"Yup," Freddie sighed as Sam quickly opened the apartment door and ran inside. "Honeymoon's officially done."
He followed his new wife into the apartment, where a huge pile of presents was waiting for them in the living room.
"Whoa! There's so many!" Sam said eagerly. "Look at all this stuff! Man, this is the best part of this wedding thing!"
"Thanks, baby," Freddie smirked, rolling his eyes.
"I mean…apart from getting to marry you," Sam said quickly, giving him a peck on his cheek. "But tell me you're not even a little excited to open all these."
"Yeah…I guess a huge stack of gifts is cool," Freddie chuckled.
"Let's figure out which ones are from your family first and get those out of the way," Sam said. "They're bound to be lame."
"Hey!" Freddie frowned. "They're your family now too."
"I'm gonna pretend I didn't hear that," Sam said. "Hey! Look how big this one is…man, I wonder what it is."
Just then the couple's door opened and Carly let herself in.
"Hey!" Carly grinned, hurrying over to the couple and hugging them. "Welcome back from your honeymoon!"
"Thanks," Freddie smiled. "Hey, you're just in time. Sam and I are about to open all our wedding gifts."
"Oh good, I was hoping I wouldn't miss that," Carly said.
"Thanks for bringing them back from the wedding," Sam said. "But seriously, let's cut the chit chat. Mamma wants to open presents!"
She picked up a box with gold wrapping paper. "Okay, this one is from your cousin Amanda."
"Well if it's from my cousin, how come you get to open it?" Freddie asked, somewhat amused.
"I thought your family was my family now," Sam smirked.
"And I thought you were choosing not to hear that," Freddie chuckled.
"Well can't I please open it?" Sam begged. "I love ripping the wrapping paper off, and you go all slow to try and 'save the paper'. Please? For your wife?"
"Aw, okay," Freddie said. "Only for my beautiful wife."
"I get the feeling she's gonna be using that one a lot," Carly said to him.
"Probably," Freddie agreed as Sam began to rip the paper off.
"Alright!" Sam said as she tore the last of the wrapping paper off. "Our first wedding gift is…a blender! Hey, what do you know, this is actually useful. I was expecting something as weird as she is."
"Awesome, I can use this to make my health smoothies," Freddie said, examining the appliance.
"Health smoothies?" Carly frowned.
"Yeah," Sam sighed. "While we were in Hawaii, the hotel we stayed at served these veggie smoothies every night down in the lobby that are supposed to be real good for you, and the nub went and got addicted to them."
"They have wheatgrass in them," Freddie nodded. "T-Bo should try to add them to his menu."
"Oh baby, you know what you should try in them, actually?" Sam said. "Kale."
"Kale?"
"Yeah, when Melanie was down here for the wedding, she told me she makes herself strawberry-kale smoothies every morning," Sam nodded. "Apparently it's tasteless in drinks, but it still has all the vitamins and stuff that you'd get from any other vegetable. I'll pick some up and make one for you."
"Okay, thanks," Freddie smiled.
"Alright, time for the next gift," Sam said, looking around the room. "Let's see…oh! I wanna open this one."
"Um, Sam?" Carly said as Sam picked up a flat box. "Don't you think you should at least take turns with Freddie with opening the gifts? I mean…they are his too?"
Sam looked over at her husband. "You wanna open some?"
"Well…a little," Freddie nodded.
Sam handed him the gift. "Here. Just-Just don't drive me crazy taking ten minutes to get past the wrapping paper."
"I'll do my best," Freddie promised.
"Who's that one from?" Carly asked.
"Uncle Carmine!" Sam said, looking at the label. "Sweet! It's bound to be a good gift."
"A good gift he obtained legally, right?" Freddie frowned.
"Oh just open it, Fredwash!" Sam said, thumping the back of his head.
Freddie carefully unwrapped the package and opened the box to reveal an odd looking wreath.
"Er…wow," Freddie said slowly. "This-This is…nice."
"Oh my God!" Sam gasped, picking up the wreath in her hands. "This is a Puckett Wreath!"
"A what?" Freddie said.
"They're this big tradition in my family," Sam explained. "They're supposed to bring you good luck. You give them to someone once they've proven themselves to be real Pucketts, which is harder than it sounds. If you hang this wreath in your house, it keeps bad spirits away and brings you a happy life. Plus, cops always get distracted by them, so if they ever come by your house, it gives you a few minutes to hide things."
"Wow, that-that's really cool," Freddie said. "My family doesn't really have any traditions like that."
"Well lucky for you, my family has a ton of them," Sam said.
"You know what? Let's hang this right by our front door," Freddie said. "It'll be the first thing someone sees when they walk in."
"Really?" Sam said.
"Sure," Freddie nodded. "I think it will look perfect there."
"Aw, now you guys will have good luck for the rest of your lives," Carly smiled as Freddie stood up to hang to wreath. "That's such a sweet gift from a man who almost flipped the buffet table at your reception…"
"Hey, Gibby shouldn't have tried to cut him in line," Sam shrugged. "Alright I'm opening this giant one here next."
"Whoa, that one's nearly as big as you are," Freddie said as Sam began to drag it towards her. "Who's it from?"
"Um…oh God," Sam frowned. "Your mom."
"This ought to be interesting," Carly said as Sam tore open the package.
"It's probably some weird disinfectant chiz," Sam mumbled. "Or divorce papers."
"She wouldn't do that," Freddie said rolling her eyes.
"Have you met the woman?" Sam smirked, looking inside the box.
"What is it?" Carly asked.
"A whole bunch of stuff," Sam said, digging inside. "Let's see…we have a copy of The Kitchen Aid to Cooking Without Sugar, Fat, or Carbs, a gift certificate to Cleaners Central, some anti-tick spray…hey! Look at this, baby, she gave me your Double Poo contracts! There's a little note here with them, hang on… 'Dear Samantha, as Freddie's wife, it is now your duty to make sure he double poos every night.'. Oh man, I'm keeping these!"
"We're burning them," Freddie said firmly.
"What else have we got in here," Sam said as she continued to look. "A bunch of marriage counseling DVDs…nice. A bunch of diagrams on how to work a broom and…oh!"
She held up a small baby onsie that said I Love My Grandma on it.
"Wow," Carly chuckled. "She's sure not subtle."
"No," Freddie said softly, smiling as Sam passed him the onsie. "She's really not."
"It's so cute," Sam said. "And little…You think…You think one day we'll have a baby that actually fits in that?"
"Crazy to think about…isn't it?" Freddie smiled.
"Yeah," Sam whispered, carefully folding up the onsie. She cleared her throat. "So…let's keep going then. Hey, let's open those two there. The ones in the purple wrapping paper."
"Finally!" Carly beamed as Freddie picked up the presents. "Those are from me and Spencer. I had to wrap his for him when I did mine because you know him and wrapping paper. He always winds up getting tangled in the stuff…But his is the taller one."
Freddie opened up the package and pulled out a beautiful looking vase.
"Whoa, this is nice," Freddie said. "Did he sculpt this himself?"
"Uh-huh," Carly nodded. "But look closer at it."
"Hey…it's covered in our wedding invitations!" Sam grinned.
Sure enough, the vase had been meticulously plastered with copies of the invitations Sam and Freddie had sent out to their guests.
"Holy chiz, that's awesome!" Freddie said.
"After I sent out all your invitations, Spencer asked if he could have the extra ones to do that," Carly explained. "Pretty neat, huh?"
"Shoosh yeah," Sam nodded. "Man, this would look great right here in the living room."
"Uh-huh," Freddie agreed. "We can fill it with fresh flowers and it will light up the whole room. We'll have to get them from the flower shop for now, but when we get a house with a real backyard I was thinking maybe I can start a garden and we can grow our own!"
"That doesn't sound half-lame," Sam laughed. "Good thinking, Frednub."
"Okay, now open mine!" Carly said eagerly. "Go on!"
"Alright, Carls, chill," Sam smirked.
She opened up the gift from her best friend, which was a large picture frame that was so enormous Sam had to use both hands to hold it up.
Inside the beautiful silver frame were dozens of perfectly positioned pictures from over the years. There was Sam and Freddie when they were twelve years old at Spencer's apartment; Sam making bunny ears behind Freddie's head as she laughed at the camera. There was the two of them after their first iCarly webcast, with the tears still visible in Freddie's eyes from the wedgie Sam had just given him. And then, next to all those, were pictures from their senior prom, with Freddie carefully placing a corsage on Sam's wrist as Sam tried to hide her smile. There were images from various dates; Sam and Freddie's MIT graduation and him at Sam's Washington State ceremony. And there, smack in the center, was a photograph of them at the altar from their wedding only five days prior.
"Unbelievable," Freddie said quietly as he stared down the frame. "This-This is our whole life."
"Yup," Carly said. "I kept trying to figure out the perfect gift to get you guys. I mean, what do you give to your two best friends for their wedding? I spent hours at Pottery Barrels and Bed, Bath and Bewilderments but I couldn't find anything. But then I was hanging out at Spencer's one day and I found this stuff and it just hit me."
"Carly, this is…wow," Sam said, nearly at a lost for words. "Thank you."
"What are those slips of paper in the corner?" Freddie asked, looking at the photo collage, where two strips of notebook paper were positioned in between a picture of Sam and Freddie sharing a Love Smoothie and the two of them at the beach.
"Oh, those?" Carly grinned. "Well…do you remember when we were thirteen and you two were in your 'I can't stand to be around you for more than ten-seconds' phase?"
Sam grinned. "Yeah. Man…if anybody had told me back then I'd be married to this doof…"
"Right back at you," Freddie smirked, leaning over to kiss her.
"Alright, well, I can see you two are still in the 'I can't stand to be around you for more than ten-seconds without kissing you' phase," Carly chuckled.
"So what's with the papers?" Sam asked as she pulled away from Freddie.
"Well, we were playing the lame kids game where you figure out if you're living in a house or a mansion, if you're gonna have one kid or thirty, have a pet dog or a rattlesnake. And it turned out…both of you got each other as their future spouse."
"Hey! I-I remember that!" Freddie said. "Yeah! I was more scared about that then the fact that I was going to have a career as an alligator wrestler."
"And I almost threw up the bacon I was eating," Sam smiled.
"You both made this huge scene about how the game was stupid and how there was no way that was ever gonna happen," Carly said. "And just for fun, me and Spencer kept teasing you both about it, saying it was destiny."
"You guys were real jerks," Sam said, rolling her eyes. "Laughing it up while I was gagging my guts up."
"Yeah, that wasn't funny," Freddie said. "I had nightmares for a week!"
"Well the cable was out; why do you think we were playing that game in the first place?" Carly said. "We needed entertainment! But anyway, to try and shut us up, you told us that there was no possible way you'd ever, ever marry each other."
"Ah, irony," Freddie sighed.
"And to prove your point," Carly continued. "You both drew up these little pacts."
"No way!" Sam laughed. "Yeah, I-I totally remember this now! Look, baby, mine says: 'If I ever marry Fredward Benson, the world's biggest geek and loser, I, Sam Puckett, will become a vegetarian."
"Oh my God!" Freddie guffawed. "And mine said: "If I ever marry Sam Puckett, I, Freddie Benson, will massage Spencer Shay's feet every week for the rest of his life."
"Yup," Carly said, shaking her head. "You two were both so convinced that you'd never be more than enemies that you went and made these crazy agreements."
"And look," Sam gasped, staring down at the opposite corner of the frame, where, on two much more elegant slips of paper, were her and Freddie's wedding vows.
"I've never been so happy to eat my words in my life," Freddie whispered, squeezing Sam's hand.
"Neither have I," Sam agreed. She looked back over to Carly. "Carls, this-this is seriously perfect."
"We're gonna hang it right in our bedroom," Freddie nodded.
"I'm glad you guys like it," Carly said as the friends all hugged.
"We love it," Sam said softly. She quickly cleared her throat. "Okay, well, let's get to the rest of these gifts!"
"Yeah, before Sam starts crying," Freddie smirked.
"You think just because you're my husband now, I won't give you a wedgie?" Sam snapped. "Because I'll do it, Fredwash!"
…
"We have enough wrapping paper here to wallpaper this place three times," Freddie said an hour later after the couple had opened up their last present. "Of course we can't do anything with it because somebody refused to open it neatly."
"What were we gonna do with six tons of wrapping paper?" Sam asked as she looked at the new silverware set they had gotten from Wendy.
"You guys should get all the stuff that you want to exchange set aside," Carly said. "That way you can take it back to the store and get some stuff you'd really like."
"What are we taking back?" Sam asked.
"Well we got three toasters," Freddie said.
"So?" Sam shrugged. "We'll need them. Sometimes I really crave toast."
"Three toasters worth of toast?"
"I-I'll just leave that for you two to discuss," Carly said quickly. "Actually, I better get out of here. I promised Spencer I'd help him with this new sculpture he's working on. You two should swing by later; he'll want to see you now that you're back from your honeymoon."
"We will," Sam promised. "See you later, Carly."
As Carly left the apartment, Freddie put an arm around his wife.
"So," Freddie said. "Honeymoon's over…wedding presents are all opened. I guess that's it then."
Sam shrugged. "I guess."
"What's up?" Freddie asked, recognizing that Sam was thinking deeply about something.
"Nothing," Sam said, giving him a small smile. "It's just…wow, Freddie. All this stuff…it-it just made me realize…we-we're really starting our lives together, aren't we? This is a whole new chapter!"
"You're just realizing that?" Freddie laughed. "What did you think we had that wedding for."
"Shut up," Sam said, rolling her eyes as she playfully swatted his arm.
Freddie kissed her temple. "It's exciting, isn't it?"
"It really is," Sam nodded. She picked up one of the toasters and handed it to Freddie. "Now why don't you be a good husband and go test this baby out. I could go for that toast now."
