Author's Note: Updating these rather slowly, aren't I? I apologize for that.
Title: My Hate Isn't Hate (Your Love Isn't Love Sequel)
Chapter Six: Caged
Sam sat home alone.
Lately, it seemed like she was often alone.
Freddie had often been going out early in the morning and coming back home late into the nights. She knew Freddie's work was important to him, but still; She was getting suspicious.
"What else are you lying to me about?"
"Nothing else, Sam."
Sam sighed as she plopped herself onto the futon with her laptop. A few keystrokes later and she had pulled up the main iCarly-dot-com site which had not been updated in months. She went through the archives and pulled up an older webisode of iCarly, from her high school years. Seeing how young and happy she once looked, she noticed after her father had attempted to murder her, she became frail and weak. She swallowed a large lump in her throat and rubbed away forming tears.
"I'm Sam Puckett. I'm strong," she told herself, clicking on the next iCarly webcast. Sam continued watching the iCarly webcasts until her eyes grew heavy. She eventually dozed off to sleep, with the sounds of hers and Carly's voices resonating from the computer.
"And that's the proper way," "To clean your parents' laptop!"
"Samantha."
Sam jolted awake. She bolted upright, looking at the man now standing in front of her. Sam always saw herself as abnormally strong and fiercely resilient. But standing in front of this man made her feel small. Weak. Inferior.
"W-What are y-you doin' here?" Sam stuttered, looking up at the tall, towering man. She recognized his ugly mug in a split-second. The man stroked at his rugged facial hair and grinned evilly, eyeing the girl maliciously. "H-How did you get in here?"
"Don't y'worry, Samantha, yer still daddy's lil' girl," Richard's voice echoed, as the space around the two of them grew dark.
A nightmare.
Sam gathered what little courage she had and barreled towards her father, determined to put him through the next wall. As expected of most of Sam's nightmares, Richard's presence was merely an illusion. She ran right into Richard and tumbled through him, as if he wasn't even there. As if he was just a hologram. Richard turned around, laughing his usual burly laugh. Somehow, it sounded bitter to Sam. She looked up to the so-called paternal figure and snarled at him.
"You're not real. This is just a dream." she spat, looking away. "I'll wake up and this'll just be another memory in the back of my mind."
Richard's blue eyes glowed like a demon's, his face starting to contort, looking more and more like the monster he was. "Then here's a memory for you," his voice now distorted, much like his demonic face. "Samantha- My face'll be the last y'all ev'r see. I guarantee it."
Sam remembered those words well. It was the very last thing her father uttered to her before he was taken away and put behind bars.
This time Sam jolted awake, she placed her hand on her forehead, wiping away her cold sweat. Her heart beat a million times a minute and the vision of her demonic father was etched into her head.
"It was just a dream," she told herself, sighing deeply. Sam managed to calm herself down by repeatedly reminding herself that her dream is exactly what it was: A dream.
She looked around the small and cramped studio apartment and sighed. Although small and cramped, it still had a certain feeling of home when she was there. Maybe because Freddie was there with her. But being alone in this place, she couldn't help but feel caged.
Freddie massaged the sides of his temple before looking back to his computer screen, covered with numerous sentences and cryptology. He took a sip of his chai latte before going back and typing away at his computer like a super-hacker. He had gotten a large amount of work already done, but if he managed to finish the next pile of work early, he might be able to stay home with Sam for a few days to keep her company more.
Freddie treasured what little time he spent with Sam, but knew that every aching minute in the office meant more money towards cutting the deal with Richard. And cutting the deal with Richard meant Sam would once again have her mother.
Freddie wasn't an idiot. He could see the way Sam changed through high school. Her usual bound of energy, the name-calling and prank-pulling all came to an abrupt end after Richard was put behind bars and Pam was nowhere to be found. Even though they tried for months and months to find her or find someone that could find her, their search showed up with zero results and numerous dead ends.
Sam came to terms with her mother's disappearance but never really got over it. Even after the two started dating, Sam seemed a bit happier with someone there to hold her, but there was always this emptiness in her eyes. Freddie knew that he would never be able to fill the void that was Pam's love for her daughter.
Freddie looked at his watch and it read 11:47. He needed to wrap things up and hurry home. Working alone in that spacious office, in his cubicle, he felt trapped. He felt caged.
The next day, Freddie woke up before the sun rose and began to get ready. He had grown accustomed to waking up early and leaving for work. He made his way to the bathroom, preparing himself for another long day at the office. Freddie twisted the knob on the sink and quickly splashed a handful of water onto his face, waking him up from his grogginess.
Just then, a waking moan could be heard in the next room. Freddie peered his head from the bathroom and looked out to where the futon lay, to see his blonde beauty, shifting under the covers.
"Freddie?" Sam moaned, slowly sitting up and rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. "What time is it? Are you going to work already?"
Freddie decided to step out of the bathroom and greet Sam before having to leave. After all, she was awake now. "It's almost five. Go back to sleep-"
Sam looked over at the clock and turned to Freddie, who stood only in his shirt and boxers. "You've been going to work a helluva lot lately, Freddie. What's going on?"
Freddie tensed up a bit. The last thing he wanted to do was spill the beans about his recent conversations with Richard and the deal that was made between them. He quickly side-stepped the question, going back into the bathroom to get himself groomed. "I'm late for work- Let's talk tonight, after I get home, alright? I'll try to make it back early."
Sam pouted, still obviously suspicious of Freddie's recent behavior. Was he still even going to school? It seemed like all he was doing now was working. "Alright. I might be at the studio. Spencer asked me to draw some new stuff for the upcoming gallery."
Freddie hollered back a confirmation from the bathroom, just as Sam managed to doze back to sleep.
The bell attached to the door chimed as it was swung open. Spencer diverted his attention from his work to greet the person walking in.
"Hey, Sam. You here to work on some paintings?"
"You know it, Spence." Sam smiled back, ready to work. Sam found drawing and painting to be a great outlet to express herself and her emotions. And let's face it: It's far less illegal than setting various government-owned things on fire or hijacking a Fat Cake truck.
She decided to illustrate the emotions that she had been feeling lately. Art was all about emotion, so why not utilize her emotions into something that can put food on the table? She took out a fresh new canvas and a nice set of paints and began her piece.
Spencer walked into the room with two mugs of fresh coffee. He set them on a nearby table and gently gripped Sam's shoulder. "Hey. You've been working for a while," Spencer stated. "It's already nighttime."
Sam looked up from her painting and looked towards the window. The outside was now illuminated by streetlights and the moonlight. Where had the time gone? "How long as I painting for?"
Spencer looked at his wristwatch and gave a slight shrug. "Maybe 5 hours? You haven't had anything to eat. Want to hit a burger place or something?" Spencer asked, offering Sam her coffee.
Sam just shook her head, proceeding to take a sip of the joe. "No thanks. Freddie said he would try to get home early, so maybe I should be getting home. He did say he wanted to talk about something."
Suddenly, as if on cue, Sam's phone rang. She answered I quickly, happy to see Freddie's number displayed on the screen. But her happy face quickly went away as she heard the news from Freddie. Spencer saw the troubling look upon Sam's face and approached her. "Alright. No, I understand. I'll talk to you later, then." Sam hung up the phone as Spencer put a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"He's staying late again?" Spencer asked. Sam just nodded silently, her eyes full of sadness. Spencer set his mug on the table and brought the small blonde into a friendly hug, comforting her.
"What are you doing?" Sam asked, as if she didn't know what a hug was.
Spencer just grinned, looking down at Sam. "Just giving you a much-deserved hug. Besides, it looked like you needed one."
Sam then shared the same grin as Spencer, thankful that he was there for support. Especially with Carly absent. "Thanks, Spence. You always know how to make me feel better."
"Aw." Spencer brought Sam in for another hug, but this time something was different. As he pulled away and looked into Sam's eyes, he could tell there was something very different. It was no longer just a friendly hug. Sam looked up at Spencer with confused eyes, not exactly sure what was going to happen next. But her confused eyes turned into shocked eyes as Spencer leaned in for a kiss.
Just as Spencer's lips brushed up against Sam's own, she swiftly brought her hand across his face, slapping him away. "Spencer! What the hell do you think you're doing?"
Spencer still looked a bit taken aback, either from the kiss or the slap or a combination of the two. He could not manage to utter any words. "Um..."
"You know that I'm with Freddie!"
Spencer's confused expression turned into a more angry one. He grimaced at the thought of Freddie. "I'm better than Freddie! I wouldn't just leave you alone at night, making you cry and all those other things he's doing to you." Spencer argued. "I wouldn't ignore you or neglect you! I would be there for you, to hold you in my arms!"
Sam looked at Spencer with shock and disgust, slamming the coffee mug onto the table before grabbing up her coat and storming out. She didn't hear Spencer calling out for her, so she didn't stop. She huffed briskly through the nighttime crowds, pushing her way towards home as quickly as possible. It wasn't until she pushed past the wrong guy, who didn't take kindly to her rude behavior. He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her towards him to get her attention.
"Watch where yer goin', lil' lady!" growled the man.
Sam took one look at the man and all the color from her face just left. "D-Dad?"
The man looked a bit surprised by the greeting, but upon closer inspection he recognized the girl. "Samantha?" the man said with a slight smile, almost relieved to see the girl.
Sam was now the one a bit surprised. It finally hit her. "... Uncle Carmine?"
"Well, who else woulddit be, silly girl?" Carmine laughed huskily, almost similar to Richard's own laugh.
"I thought you were my dad. You two are twins, after all."
Carmine just nodded. "True, true. But still- it's good t'see ya, Sammy. I was gettin' a lil' worried 'bout you, girl."
Sam almost felt sick to her stomach, talking to her uncle. She didn't have too much of a problem with the man himself, but he just looked too much like her father. "Anyway, I'm in a rush to get home, Uncle. I'll see you around."
"Sure, sure."
Carmine watched Sam make her way down the sidewalk, blending in with the rest of the crowd. Carmine picked up a light grocery bag that he had previously placed on the ground and made his way back home to his own residence. As he strolled up to his abode he walked down a flight of stairs, opening the door to a basement-type room.
"Hoo, boy. You'll never guess who I ran into on m'way home. It was a bit'uva doozy, I'll tell you what." Carmine laughed, flipping on a single light and throwing the grocery bag onto a bare table. He looked across the basement at the lone person in the room, sitting on a dining chair in the dark, holding a family photo.
"W-Who?" the person coughed.
"Yer lil' girl." Carmine picked up a nearby flashlight and shined it towards the lone person. "She's the spittin' image of ya, Sis."
Tears rolled down the woman's face, as the flashlight illuminated just enough light for her to look at the family photo of herself with her two daughters. The chains around her wrists jangled as she brought the photo to her chest, clutching it tightly. She was so glad that her little girl was safe. That her girls weren't caged.
Author's Note: Ah. Yes. That's right. She's alive.