Observation
Freddie Benson sat at an empty table, watching couples everywhere dance throughout the dance floor. His eyes fell to the couple of the evening, Jodi and Gordon, who both looked just as happy as two people could be. As crazy and awkward as they both were, Freddie had to admit, they seemed to make a pretty good couple; they seemed to really love one another, at least.
Freddie let out a small sigh. He wondered if he'd ever be lucky enough to find a woman who would make him beam the way Gordon was right now as he looked into Jodi's eyes. He really hoped so.
"How goes it, nub?" Sam asked, joining him at the table with a large plate of shrimp. "For such a lame wedding, at least this thing has decent food."
"Yeah, because that's the point of a wedding," Freddie said, rolling his eyes. "The food."
"It should be," Sam scoffed. "It's gonna be the whole point of mine. I don't care about the dress or the flowers or anything else. All I know is I want a fifty-foot buffet table filled with twelve kinds of ham, more fried chicken than I can imagine, and enough tarter sauce to fill a lifeboat. Oh, and my cake needs to be good too."
"Glad to see your priorities are in order," Freddie said. He looked back at Gordon and Jodi. "So you think you're gonna get married then?"
"Excuse me?" Sam snapped, swatting his shoulder. "Why wouldn't I? You saying I'm not attractive?"
"No," Freddie said quickly. "I just…it seems crazy, doesn't it?"
"What does?" Sam asked.
"I mean, Jodi and Gordon are going to be spending the rest of their lives together," Freddie said. "That's a huge commitment. They must really love each other, you know?"
"I guess," Sam said. "I mean they're both freakish enough for each other."
"I wonder if we'll ever be like that…" Freddie said softly.
"Huh?" Sam frowned.
"Well, um, not-not us," Freddie corrected at once. "I mean I wonder if I'll ever find a girl who I love enough to want to spend my whole life with and if you'll find a guy that you love enough to do that with."
"Oh," Sam said. "Well, I guess we will…won't we?"
"I dunno," Freddie shrugged. "I mean we haven't yet, have we?"
"Um, no, but we're also sixteen," Sam scoffed. "Who the heck falls in love at sixteen? You know, other than those fairy tale chicks."
"It's possible," Freddie defended. "You hear of people marrying their high school sweethearts all the time!"
"Whatever," Sam said, shaking her head. "Fine, I guess it's possible. But that's so unlikely…Alright, enough of this gushy talk. I'm about to puke up my shrimp."
"Charming," Freddie chuckled. "Hey, where are Spence and Carly?"
"Eh, everyone's busy congratulating Carly on her song," Sam said. "And Spencer is flirting with one of Jodi's cousin's out back, so it looks like we're gonna be stuck here awhile."
"Wonderful," Freddie sighed. "Well, can I have a shrimp?"
"Absolutely not."
"Yeah, I figured," Freddie mumbled. He glanced back over at the dance floor. "Hey…I wonder what their story is."
"Whose story?"
"Jodi and Gordon's," Freddie said. "You know, like how they met and stuff."
"Ugh, are you still on this junk?" Sam moaned. "God, you're just like talking to Carly. Why are you so mushy all of the sudden?"
"It's a wedding!" Freddie defended. "Excuse me for having an emotion other than hungry here!"
"Dork," Sam said, rolling her eyes.
"What, you're not curious as to how those two got here?" Freddie asked.
"I know how they got here," Sam said. "Gordon proposed on our show, forced us to come here to this lame state, peed his pants, and bam! Here we are."
"No, I mean…how do you think he met Jodi?" Freddie asked. "You think they went to school together and dated there? Or do you think he just spotted her one day when he was out and knew he wanted to marry her."
"Okay…do you hear yourself?" Sam laughed. "You sound like you were just ripped from a chick flick. Did your mom make you watch soap operas with her again?"
"No!" Freddie said.
Sam gave him a knowing look.
"Okay…yeah," Freddie muttered.
"God, you're a mess," Sam said, shaking her head. She popped another piece of shrimp into her mouth. "Well, for what it's worth, I doubt Gordon just spotted Jodi and suddenly got this urge to marry her. That doesn't happen in real life."
"You don't think so?"
"Of course not!" Sam said. "Nobody just meets someone and falls in love with them right there."
"So you don't believe in love at first sight?" Freddie asked.
"God on," Sam replied. "Wait…do you?"
"Well…yeah," Freddie nodded. "Come on, you don't think that when you meet the right person you'll just, well, know?"
"Uh, no," Sam said firmly. "How can you possibly fall for someone when you don't even know them! They could be a murderer or-or a bank robber or a salesperson for all you know!"
"Yeah, but-"
"Or what if they're just weird?" Sam continued. "Or they have a ton of annoying habits that you can't stand? You wouldn't know that just be looking at someone."
"I guess, but-"
"Or what if there's someone out there who you would have a ton in common with or would have a lot of fun with," Sam went on. "But you never got to find all that out because you passed them up?"
"Wow…I-I didn't know you felt so strongly about this," Freddie said, a little taken aback.
"Yeah, well, it's…it's just a thought," Sam shrugged, calming down a bit. "Forget about it."
"No, I think…I think you may have a point," Freddie said slowly. "Actually, now that I think about it, this whole thing kind of reminds me about my crush on Carly."
"How?" Sam asked.
"Well, when I moved in across the hall, the second I saw Carly, I told myself right away that I loved her and that she was the most perfect girl I could ever imagine," Freddie said. "Remember?"
"Yes, I remember your pathetic days of chasing her," Sam said. "You were an even bigger nerd then than you are now."
"Well, anyway, now that I've had all these years to actually get to know her, I-I guess I realized that I don't really love her," Freddie said. "At least not in the way I thought."
"See?" Sam said. She paused for a moment. "Wait…so-so you're not into Carly anymore?"
"Nah," Freddie chuckled. "I haven't been for awhile, actually. Sure, she's cute and she's really nice and peppy but…I dunno, I just couldn't see myself actually being married to her."
"Huh," Sam nodded thoughtfully.
"Yeah…I dunno," Freddie continued. "I guess now that I think about it…you're right. You can't fall for someone just at first glance. You've got to actually get to know who they are before you can know if you love them. But…man, it would be so much easier if there was someway you could just know."
"Yeah, it would be," Sam agreed. "It would save a lot of awkward dates. But it would also take all the fun out of everything…" She finished the last piece of shrimp on her place. "Well, you've successfully bored me, Benson. I'm gonna go check out that chicken tender platter back at the buffet. I'll see you later when you've hopefully gotten all this love and romance garbage out of your system."
"See you," Freddie said as Sam got to her feet and walked off.
He turned back to Jodi and Gordon, who were still laughing and dancing together. Unable to help himself, Freddie stood up and headed over to the couple.
"Er, Gordon?" Freddie said, clearing his throat. "Jodi?"
"Oh, hiya there, Freddie!" Gordon said, releasing his new bride and throwing his arms around Freddie. "Gee, thanks again for being my best man today. I'll never forget this."
"Yeah…and neither will your brother," Freddie mumbled under his breath. "Um, anyway, I-I was wondering if you two would mind if I just asked you a question."
"Oh sure, we love questions!" Jodi nodded eagerly. "Especially from Internet celebrities."
"Right," Freddie said. "Well, um, see, I-I was wondering how-how you guys knew you loved each other. Did you just know? Or did it take you time?"
Jodi and Gordon looked at each other and laughed.
"Oh gee, this story is always a hoot to tell," Gordon chuckled.
"It sure is," Jodie cackled, causing Freddie to cringe slightly.
"Well can I hear it?" Freddie asked.
"Well sweet yippy you can!" Gordon nodded. "It all started back in college. Jodi and I were both on the cheerleading squad."
"You-You were?" Freddie frowned.
"Uh-huh, we were part of the mascot crew!" Jodi beamed.
"Ah," Freddie nodded. "So that's where you two fell in love?"
"Funnily enough, no," Gordon said. "We knew of each other, but we didn't really know each other. See, I cheered at the basketball games and Jodi cheered at the baseball games. But during our sophomore year, we both got to cheer at our school's big chess tournament-"
"-And then that's when you figured it out?" Freddie asked.
"Oh no, we couldn't stand each other at first," Jodi said, lovingly putting her arm around Gordon.
"True story," Gordon nodded. "Jodi stole my spot on the pyramid and I vowed I'd never forgive her."
"And Gordon kept taking my parts of all our cheers," Jodi added. "Oh…he was such an enthusiastic yeller."
"But…how-how did you two get from hating each other to here?" Freddie asked.
"Well, eventually, we learned to tolerate each other," Gordon explained. "All of the cheerleaders were pretty tight and hung out together all the time, so we saw each other a lot."
"And soon we even went from tolerating each other to liking each other," Jodi said. "By junior year we were really close friends. We could talk for hours about Shakespeare and our favorite brands of cheese."
"And then, by senior year, we were dating," Gordon said, smiling at the fond memory. "It was a long process, but we got there, didn't we buttercup?"
"We sure did, my little Gordon-Bear," Jodi beamed, throwing her arms around Gordon.
"Huh…" Freddie said thoughtfully. "Wow, um, thanks you guys. That-That's really helpful."
"No problem, best man," Gordon said happily. "Oh hey, you want to dance with us? We know some real fun jigs that are for three people!"
"Yeah…that's okay," Freddie said quickly. "My, um, doctor actually recommended I don't dance…Ever. Well, um…bye!"
And with that Freddie quickly turned and headed away. As he was walking though, he nearly collided with someone.
"Sam?" Freddie said as he caught his balance.
"There you are!" Sam said. "Dude, come with me, you'll never guess what they have out back!"
"What?" Freddie asked.
"A golf course!" Sam said excitedly. "A real fancy one! I just stole some meatballs from the buffet. Wanna go have a real round of meat golf?"
"Uh, duh," Freddie said at once. "Let's go!"
"You know, inventing that game was the best idea the two of us have ever had together," Sam said as she led Freddie outside. "Man, I would've never thought we could come up with anything worthwhile together. I mean, we used to not even be able to be around each other for more than ten minutes without fighting. Now we can usually last a couple of hours…let's remember to throw that in Carly's face next time she calls us immature."
Freddie stopped in his tracks and simply stared at Sam.
Sam gave him an odd look. "What?"
"Oh, um, nothing," Freddie said, quickly recovering. "I just…there was a bug in your hair. But-But now it's gone."
"Oh," Sam shrugged. "Well hurry it up, nub. The golf course is just around the corner."
"Right," Freddie said as they started back up their pace again. "Right…"
