Stick
"I'm telling you, I'm definitely winning the science fair this year with this genius creation," Freddie said proudly as he worked on a large contraption in the middle of the Shay's living room.
"Okay…well two questions," Carly said, looking up from her laptop. "One, what is it?"
"Oh, it's a fan-powered generator," Freddie said proudly. "Pretty impressive, right? See, this giant fan here powers this generator, which can produce enough electricity to power three table lamps!"
"Right…" Carly nodded. "Now my second question…why are you building it in the middle of my living room?"
"You think my mom would let me build a generator in my apartment?" Freddie scoffed. "But don't worry; it will be done by tomorrow."
"Alright," Carly sighed. "I guess it is pretty cool. Right Sam? Sam?"
Carly looked over at the blonde, who was fast asleep on the couch.
"Well, at least now she can't make any comments about how geeky my project is," Freddie said.
"What now?" Sam said, waking right up.
"You can sleep through every single one of your alarm clocks, but someone mentions something about insulting Freddie and you wake right up?" Carly chuckled.
"Basically," Sam yawned. She looked down at Freddie's project. "Looks lame, nub."
"Thanks," Freddie said, rolling his eyes.
"Seriously, what is it?" Sam frowned.
"Well if you would've been awake when I was explaining it to Carly, then you would've heard me telling her that I'm building a fan-powered generator that can-"
"Yeah, sounds dumb," Sam cut him off, laying back down on the couch.
"It won't see so dumb once you see this baby in action!" Freddie defended, pulling out three table lamps.
"Oh I'm sure it will," Sam smirked.
"Well, as much as I would love to see how this turns out," Carly sighed, getting to her feet. "I'm late for my pedicure appointment. Sam, this is your last chance to-"
"For the hundredth time, Carly, no!" Sam said. "I go with you once on your birthday, and that's it."
"Fine, I'll go get the dead skin scraped off my feet alone then," Carly huffed, grabbing her purse. "See you guys later."
"Later," Freddie replied as Carly left the apartment. He turned back to his generator.
"What class are you even making that hunk of junk for anyway?" Sam asked.
"Physics; the same class I have with you," Freddie said. "Meaning you have a project to be working on too."
"Well why the school even put me in physics is beyond me," Sam shrugged. "They can't expect me to actually do work in it."
"You have to do the project or you'll fail the class," Freddie said.
"Well then just slap my name on your project and say we worked together," Sam said.
"No!" Freddie exclaimed.
"Come on, you did it last semester for me," Sam said.
"Yes, because we were dating and you pulled the girlfriend card on me!" Freddie said. "You don't get those perks anymore! If you want your name on this project, you have to actually do work."
"Yeah…that's not happening," Sam yawned.
"Then you better figure out your own project," Freddie said firmly.
"Whatever," Sam said, laying back down, her long hair falling off the couch. "I'll buy something offline and pass it off as my own. That's how I've made it this far."
Freddie rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to his project. "Alright, I'm just gonna do one last test run. I think I finally figured out how to make this fan run properly."
"Good, now figure out a way to make your mouth run less," Sam snapped, closing her eyes. "I'm going back to sleep."
Freddie ignored her comment as he continued to fiddle with his project.
"Alright…yes! That should do it for the fan!" Freddie said happily. "Now for the test run…"
He flipped the on switch and instantly his fan began to whirl quickly, causing the three table lamps on the coffee table to slowly light up.
"Ha! It works!" Freddie cheered. "I'm definitely getting my 'A' now!"
But in the midst of his celebration, Freddie failed to notice that Sam's hair was very close to the fan. Suddenly, the ends of her locks got caught in the blades, causing the blonde to scream out in pain.
"Ow!" Sam yelled. "Ow, ow, ow! My hair! Turn your dumb piece of junk off you nub! Now!"
Freddie scrambled to find the power switch and hurriedly turned the device off.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
"No I am not okay!" Sam screamed. "My hair is all tangled in your fan now!"
Freddie looked down and saw that even though the fan was off, Sam's hair was still extremely stuck.
"Well do something!" Sam snapped. "It's pulling my hair still! And I can't even move. Oh my God…I'm stuck to a nerd machine!"
"Calm down, calm down, I can get your hair out," Freddie said. "Er…I think."
"You think? Listen, Fredbutt, you have about five seconds to get my hair out of this fan before I-"
"Alright, just stay still," Freddie said, trying to carefully free Sam's hair. But it was no use; even after close to twenty minutes of trying, her hair still remained tightly wound around the fan blades.
"Um…you're still kind of stuck," Freddie said lamely.
Sam glared at him. "Oh…if I could move I swear you'd be hanging out the window by your underpants right now."
"It's okay, we'll just have to cut your hair," Freddie said. "That's all. Now where does Spencer keep his scissors?"
"Have you completely lost it?" Sam exclaimed. "You are not cutting my hair!"
"Why not?"
"It's my hair!"
"Since when do you care about your hair?" Freddie scoffed. "I've seen you lick barbecue sauce out of it."
"If you cut even one strand of my hair you're a goner," Sam said firmly.
"Well then I don't know what to do, Sam!"
"You better figure out something!" Sam said. "This is all your fault! See, look what science does!"
"Sam, I'll get your hair out of here," Freddie told her. "I promise."
…..
"How can your hair be this tangled?" Freddie groaned three hours later as yet another attempt to free Sam's hair had failed. "Man, this fan really must've been going fast. I know you probably want to take this generator and throw it at me right now, but even you've got to be impressed by the speed of the fan."
"Sorry, what was that?" Sam said. "I was busy plotting your murder in my head."
"Still feeling violent, got it," Freddie sighed.
"Haven't you made even a little bit of progress?" Sam asked.
"No," Freddie said. "I've tried everything I can think of. I tried taking the fan apart, I tried putting oil on the blade, I tried sliding your hair out…hey, doesn't peanut butter do something in these situations?"
"That's for if you get gum in your hair!" Sam yelled.
"Oh…"
"You know, before this whole thing, I thought you were a pretty annoying dude," Sam said. "But now you might have just passed up Gibby. Seriously, do you have any idea how uncomfortable this is? My hair is being pulled, my neck hurts from having it in this awkward position, I've had to pee really badly for the past hour-"
"Want me to bring you a bucket or something?" Freddie offered.
Sam simple glared at him.
"Never mind," Freddie mumbled. "But…I hate to say it, but I really think our only option at this point is cutting your hair."
"No!"
"Well then you're going to be stuck to this fan forever!" Freddie pointed out. "I-I'm sorry but I don't see any other way."
Sam let out a moan.
"I-I think if I just cut a little bit from the bottom here, I can get the rest out," Freddie said. "And-And if you want, I'll pay for you to get a real haircut to fix any damage I do!"
"You better believe you will," Sam muttered. She took a deep breath. "Fine…go get the scissors."
Freddie got up and grabbed a pair of scissors from the kitchen. He returned to Sam's side and looked down at the task at hand.
"I-I'm really sorry about all of this," Freddie said. "Look, if you want, um, you can put your name on my project for class. I mean you suffered enough because of it…"
"You're just trying to keep me from beating your face in when I get out of here, aren't you?" Sam said, rolling her eyes.
"No, I'm actually genuinely sorry!" Freddie said. "But, um, yes, it would be nice if you could refrain from any face beating."
"Well…okay, I guess if you put my name on this project, I'll spare you the beating," Sam agreed. "It will save me the hassle of finding something to turn in."
"Great," Freddie said. "Well…here I go then."
He carefully snipped the end of Sam's hair. Just as he had hoped, he was able to free the rest of Sam's locks after he cut that portion off.
"Finally! I'm free!" Sam exclaimed as she stood up at last. She looked down at the ends of her hair. "Well…how bad does it look?"
"Honestly, I can hardly tell your hair was cut at all," Freddie said. "It still looks great-fine. Your hair looks fine."
"Really? It doesn't look like it was just caught in a fan for four hours?" Sam asked.
"Not at all," Freddie chuckled. "Seriously, it looks really gr-fine. Just…Just fine."
