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Freddie had been driving for an hour now. He had just drove through San Francisco, deciding to take the Pacific Coast Highway for a view of the ocean, no matter how narrow the roads were. He kept the windows down so he could catch a clear glimpse of the moon. It was full tonight.
The conversation he had the night before with his girlfriend, Rowan, was still fresh in his mind.
“Babe, can I ask you something?” Rowan had asked him as he was studying for his upcoming computer science exam. The way she said it made it sound serious, so he looked away from the screen to face her.
“Yeah, what’s up?”
“When do you think we should get married?”
It made him pause for a moment, caught off guard. He felt his heart start pounding, but it didn’t feel like a good thing. “Married?”
She nodded. “Yeah, my parents are so big on getting married early. And they love you, and I don’t know, I think we’ve been together for a while now, right?”
It had only been a year. For him, it had been over in his mind for the past month, but she didn’t know that. He couldn’t see it in himself to say it, since he didn’t really have a reason. Rowan was perfect. She had exceptionally good grades, even at Stanford, she was always there for him when he needed someone to be there, she never made him wait or get angry. She was everything he had thought he wanted in a girl. So why was it that when she said “I love you,” he hadn’t known what to say back?
“Yeah, but, uh…” He glanced around, not sure what to say. “We’re still in school, you know? Don’t you want to finish college first, maybe have enough money before settling down?”
“I mean, that’s true. But you know money doesn’t have to be a reason for us.”
Rowan’s family owned a tech firm that was doing amazingly well. It was actually the exact kind of place he dreamed to work at, which only added to how perfect she was.
He couldn’t even blame Rowan for bringing it up. He had probably seemed like the kind of guy who wanted to get married, work at her family’s company, and have dozens of children all before the age of thirty. And he had to admit, when he was in high school, that might’ve been what he wanted.
He still didn’t know what to say. So instead of saying anything, he took off. That’s what led him to his car, starting the engine and driving somewhere he had wanted to go for the past two years.
Six hours later (and yes, he was ashamed to say he definitely sped the whole way there), he arrived in Los Angeles, in front of Hollywood Arts High School. It was 8am, which was exactly when school started, although he hadn’t planned that, so there were crowds of students entering.
He pulled out his phone and opened his text messages, scrolling all the way to the bottom. Two text messages that he never deleted appeared on his screen as he read them for probably the thousandth time since he had received them. At this point, he had probably realized why he felt so far away from Rowan all the time, but he didn’t want to think about it. He focused on the task at hand.
Assuming Cat was the same age as Sam, she would’ve graduated soon after she left. But her high school is still a good place to start, right? He had no other way of knowing where Sam was.
He wandered the halls until he bumped into a man holding a coconut who strangely resembled both a hippie and a circus act.
“You kids better not be late to my class, or you get to perform first!” he shouted to the kids who were still loitering in the halls. So this man was a teacher here?
Freddie cleared his throat, getting the attention of the man. “Excuse me,” he began.
“Shouldn’t you be getting to class, young man?” he said, raising his eyebrows at him. But there was something about the way he smiled that told Freddie he didn’t care all that much.
“Oh, um, I’m not a student here. I was just wondering, do you happen to know someone named Cat?”
His eyes lit up. “Cat Valentine? That little red-headed bundle of joy graduated a couple years ago, so you won’t find her here.”
“But you do know her, then,” Freddie said, his heart beating faster. “Do you know where I can find her?”
The man eyed him up and down. “Depends on who’s asking.”
“I’m… a friend of a friend’s. All I know is that Cat would know where she is, and the only place I was told to find her was here.” He grimaced. “I guess I’m a couple years late.”
As he took a sip from the coconut he was holding, he nodded. “I don’t know what it is about you that makes me trust you, but I do. One thing I like to remind my students is that too late is better than never, and it’s clear to me that you have an unresolved situation with this friend of yours.” He glanced around him. “And to be completely honest with you, Cat was one to make a lot of strange friends. The fact that she was never kidnapped surprises me every day.”
Freddie assumed the man was going to continue, but instead, he started to walk away.
“Wait!” Freddie exclaimed, making the man look back. “Aren’t you going to tell me where to find her, then?”
“Oh! Yes. Telling you where she lives is very illegal but I can tell you that she frequently eats at Inside Out Burger and visits her grandmother at Elderly Acres. I’ve bumped into her at both places multiple times, so I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s there as we speak. Good day to you, young man.”
With that, the man turned around abruptly and started running off down the hall. Deciding not to wonder why he was so strange, Freddie made his way back to his car. As he drove to the nearest Inside Out Burger, his eyes had started to feel heavy. He realized he hadn’t slept for almost 24 hours and the long drive here was finally catching up to him.
Deciding to get a bite to eat, he parked the car at Inside Out Burger and went inside, hoping Cat just happened to be here when he needed her to be. He checked his phone as he walked through the doors, just as someone passed him. He thought he saw a flash of blonde hair but when he looked back up, no one was there anymore. It was probably just his eyes deceiving him, considering how tired he was.
He ate his food in silence at a corner table, keeping his eyes trained on the door. He sat there for at least two hours before falling asleep with his head on the table.
“Excuse me, sir?”
His eyes opened gradually to see an employee tapping him on the shoulder. “Sir, I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to ask you to leave. You’re taking up a table.”
He sat up abruptly, rubbing his eyes. “Oh god, I’m so sorry. Have I been here for a while?”
The employee tried to hold back a smile. “You’ve been here since morning, and it’s 2pm.”
Standing from his seat, he sighed. “Sorry about that, I’ll go. Thank you for waking me up.” Gathering up his trash and heading back out to his car, he tried to wake himself up. He went through the drive through of a nearby café and decided Elderly Acres would be his next stop.
Maybe it was something in the air, or maybe he had gotten really, really lucky, but a girl that looked his age with bright red hair was sitting in the lobby of the retirement home, reading a magazine and giggling to herself. He silently thanked the gods that Cat happened to have such a noticeable hair color.
He checked his reflection in the window before approaching her, hoping he didn’t look too much like a hobo, and cleared his throat. She looked up at him, her puppy-like brown eyes staring at him.
Laughing again, she smiled. “Hi. Are you visiting your grandmother too?”
“Um, no. I was wondering, do you happen to be Cat Valentine?”
Her eyebrows furrowed. “Am I in trouble? Whatever Sam did, I had nothing to do with it, I swear!” she exclaimed, covering her eyes with her hands.
“Oh! You must be Cat then, if you know Sam,” he said, feeling energized for the first time in hours. He had no idea how he managed to find her this way, but he liked to think it might’ve been fate.
Cat uncovered her eyes and looked at him again, her eyes widening like she realized something. “Oh my god, you’re Freddork!”
He chuckled to himself, finding it relieving to hear that old nickname again. “Yeah, that’s me. You know me too, then?”
“Yeah, ‘course I do!” she said, her smile returning to her face as she nudged his arm. “You’re in Sam’s PearPhone lockscreen with that other girl… um, Carl?”
Trying to ignore the way his heartbeat rose from knowing that he was still her lockscreen after so long, he smiled at her. “So listen, I’ve been looking for Sam. Is she with you?”
The red-headed girl shook her head quickly. “No, she’s—” She stopped suddenly, tilting her head to look at him. “Wait, I don’t think I should tell you. It’s a secret, but…” Cat leaned into his ear and brought her voice to a whisper. “She doesn’t like you that much.”
He raised an eyebrow at her. “What? Why?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I thought you guys were really close since you’re in her lockscreen, but she calls you a lot of names and always says she hates you.” She looked upset thinking about it. “And whenever she drinks too much alcohol, she says you’re an idiot for taking so long, but I don’t really know what that means. I’ve been trying to get her to stop drinking so much, but she doesn’t budge.”
The thought of Sam getting drunk all the time immediately concerned him. “Trust me, she always said she hated me. That’s our thing. Here, let me show you.” He pulled out his phone and showed Cat the last text messages Sam had sent him.
And I hate you. But I love you too.
It made her giggle again. “I really am the complete opposite of Sam. She has her own place now, but she’s always at my house anyways. You wanna come back with me?”
He nodded, a little too excitedly than he had wanted to admit. “Yes, that would be great. Are you done visiting your grandma?”
She gasped. “How did you know I was visiting my grandma?”
“You asked me if I was too, when I first got here. And there was a strange man at your old high school that told me you would be.”
“That was probably Sikowitz,” she explained, standing up from the couch and leaving the magazine on the table. “I always see him here but I don’t know why.”
Freddie knew what Sikowitz had meant about how surprised he was that Cat had never been kidnapped before, because she followed him to his car without any questions. She must have really trusted Sam, or it actually made him a little worried how easily she got into his car.
“Samantha!” Cat called in a singsong voice when they reached her house and opened the front door. “I’m home and I brought a friend!”
The familiar voice rang through his ears like a symphony, and he felt his heart stop for a moment to hear it. “If it’s another senior citizen from Elderly Acres, take him back, Cat!” Sam shouted from somewhere in the house. She appeared from the hallway into the living room, stopping in her tracks when she saw Freddie.
“No, silly,” Cat said, smiling widely. She rushed over to Sam and dragged her over to Freddie by the arm. “It’s your cute ex-boyfriend!”
“Sam,” he said, and it was all he could get out. He had other words planned in his head, but none of them were said, because he suddenly forgot all of them. She didn’t say anything at first, and it was like they didn’t know each other anymore.
Cat sensed the silence and clapped her hands. “Okay, yay! I’m gonna make some popcorn.” She ran off to the kitchen, leaving Sam and Freddie still standing in front of each other. At least Sam hadn’t looked away from him since he got there, but there was a certain hurt behind her eyes that broke his heart.
“Hi,” she finally said. Looking away for the first time, suddenly realizing she had probably been staring, she cleared her throat awkwardly. “What are you doing here?”
It caught him off guard. She had left that message for him in hopes that he’d come, right? Why was she asking him why he was there?
Suddenly, he wondered if he made a mistake. He had a girlfriend, and it had been two years. And now Sam looked like she didn’t even want to see him. What was he doing here?
“I… wanted to see you,” he finally got out. “I missed you.”
“Yeah? It didn’t really seem like it after a while.”
“Sam—” He wasn’t sure exactly what to say. He reached out to grab her arm, making her look at his hand on hers, and then to him. “I just wanted to give you space for a while.”
“Well, you definitely did that.”
“Can we talk, Sam?” he asked her, his face a mix of desperation and frustration.
She sighed, and he couldn’t exactly read the expression on her face. He knew she was upset about something, but he also knew it was temporary, because she nodded. “Cat, we’re gonna be outside, alright?”
“’Kay kay,” Cat responded as the microwave beeped, and she grabbed the popcorn from it. “I’m gonna watch a movie.”
Freddie followed Sam outside, where she closed the door behind them and then leaned against it, looking at him expectantly.
“Listen, I’m sorry it took me so long to come out here—” he began.
“It’s not a big deal,” she interrupted him, avoiding his eyes. She started to fidget with the charm on her necklace, a blue remote that Freddie recognized. “I didn’t expect you to come.”
“Yeah, you did,” he responded. “And I did, too. But things just got complicated, and I didn’t know if you actually wanted me to come anymore, so…”
“Your little girlfriend know you’re here?” she asked, raising her eyebrows.
“How’d you know about her?”
She shrugged. “Carly told me.”
“I didn’t even know you guys still talk.” He felt a pang in his chest, knowing that Carly had been in contact with Sam this entire time and hadn’t told him. To be fair, she was on the east coast for college at NYU, but he still told her about everything going on in his life.
“Yeah, we started video calling every once in a while. I probably owe her more than that, considering I didn’t even tell her I was leaving.” Sam crossed her arms. “You didn’t answer the question.”
“Uh, no, she doesn’t know.” Freddie took a step back and leaned against a pillar. “It’s weird right now, me and her.”
“You don’t have to make shit up, you know.” In reality, Sam had known things between Freddie and his girlfriend had been rocky for a while. The last time she video called Carly, she had told her all about it. Sam had been much more interested than she cared to admit, but it strangely comforted her that Freddie wasn’t completely in love with someone else. It made her heart hurt to even think about it, as selfish as that was.
“I’m not making anything up,” he responded. “I’ve been wanting to come find you for a while. I really did miss you.”
“Well, I guess I missed you too. You still a nerd?” she said, adding on the last part to cover up the first.
It made him smile for the first time during the conversation. “Yeah. You still beat people up?”
“Sometimes.”
“Cat seems to really like you,” he pointed out.
“Well, I never hurt that girl. That would be like beating up a puppy.”
“Look at you, growing all soft.”
“Don’t push it, Fredward.”
She could feel the distance between them piercing the air like a knife, and she wasn’t sure what to do about it. Seeing him again made her remember everything she had ever felt for him all at once, made her remember how it felt to be with him and to feel his touch, even after all this time. All she wanted to do was pull him close, despite how much she had resented him for taking so long to come down to find her, but she knew she couldn’t. He had a girlfriend, and she knew there was too much between them now.
It was then that she noticed the bags under his eyes and the messiness of his hair that usually didn’t have a single strand out of place. Sometimes she used to ruffle her hand through his hair just to bother him, but she had stopped when it didn’t bother him anymore.
“Hey, did you drive down here? You look kinda tired.”
The timing was perfect because it was that moment that he yawned. She hated to think that he still looked cute when he was tired. “Uh, yeah, I left last night. It was just from Stanford, though, not Seattle.”
She would never tell him, but knowing that he drove here without rest made her want to smile. After she left him and Carly out of the blue, leaving him with nothing but an “I love you” and a text message, he still cared this much about her.
“Alright, let’s go back to my place, so you can get some sleep. Let me just grab some things and let Cat know, okay?”
He nodded, starting to feel tired again, even after his little nap at Inside Out Burger. She came back out and took his keys from him, pushing him into the passenger seat so she could drive. He couldn’t take his eyes off her as she drove. It didn’t feel like it was that long ago when Sam had told him she refused to get her driver’s license if she could just make other people drive her around.
He missed her in his front seat. They used to sneak out of their places in the middle of the night, after he finally figured out how to temporarily disarm his mom’s alarm systems, and he’d drive them to the beach, her in his sweater and their hands clasped the whole way. He could never quite get all the sand out of his car since then, but he didn’t really make an attempt to clean it all up anyways.
His eyes began to close but he kept fighting it, never wanting to lose sight of her. He was tired, but never of her, and he would rather never sleep again if it meant he could watch her drive forever, her blonde hair blowing behind her from the wind through the window.
They arrived at her apartment after a few minutes. She led him inside and grabbed a water bottle from her fridge, tossing it to him. He could barely believe how she was both the same and incredibly different at once. Since when was Sam one to care if someone was tired or thirsty?
“You can pass out on the couch, if you want. And don’t give me shit about it, I can tell you’re tired.”
“But—”
“Relax. We can talk later. I have work soon, so don’t worry about it.”
As much as he wanted to fight back, his exhaustion took over, and he fell asleep.
He woke up to the sound of arguing coming from outside. Sam’s apartment was only on the second floor, so their voices were clear through the open window. It was dark by now, and Freddie checked his phone to see that it was almost midnight.
Looking out the window, he saw Sam with a guy who was a foot and a half taller than her, coming out of a car. She stumbled slightly as she stood up from the passenger seat.
“Alright, Jacob, I’m home. Don’t follow me in.”
“Aw, but Sammy, you sure you don’t want some company? Don’t you feel lonely in that apartment by yourself all the time?”
Freddie knew he had to do something, but he also knew that Sam would’ve taken care of this jerk already if she needed to. And… he would definitely lose in a fight against this guy.
“I’m not by myself,” she responded. “I just needed a ride, so just shut up and leave, okay?”
“Not by yourself? Now, Sammy, you don’t have to lie to me—"
Running his hand along the wall, Freddie found the light switch to the room. He flicked it on, the entire apartment lighting up, making both Sam and the guy she was with look up.
“See?” she said, barely able to mask the surprise on her face. “Don’t make me call the cops again, Jacob.”
He shrugged at that, seeming to lose his energy. “Whatever. Don’t keep showing up like that if you got a little boyfriend now or something.”
Freddie breathed a sigh of relief when he finally got back in his car and drove off, watching Sam walk into the building. A moment later, he heard the front door open and she walked into the living room. Her eyes were barely open as she threw her jacket and bag onto the couch, making her way to the kitchen to grab some water.
“Hey,” she greeted him. “You just wake up?” Her words slurred and he realized she was drunk.
“Yeah,” he responded, making his way over to her. “Are you okay?”
She shrugged. “I’m whatever, I guess. Thanks for helping me get rid of him.”
“Does he give you problems a lot?”
Shaking her head, she downed an entire water bottle before answering. “I do it to myself. He’s this sleazy bartender at the bar down the street and sometimes I let him flirt with me since he doesn’t ID me. Jacob’s a dick, but he’s not really a threat.”
There was something about how the life had left her eyes while she spoke that made Freddie’s heart break a little more. He had never seen her like this. Sure, he’d seen her drunk before, when they used to steal Spencer’s beers while he was away and watch Drake & Josh reruns. But before, it had only given her more energy than she already had. Now, as she absent-mindedly tossed the water bottle into the sink and dragged herself to her bedroom, she was almost unrecognizable.
She probably didn’t want him to keep talking to her when she was drunk, so he let her go to sleep. He ordered pizza to the apartment after finding her address in a stack of unopened letters on the kitchen counter and video-called Carly.
“Hey,” she answered, smiling. “What’s up?”
“I’m surprised you answered,” he said. “It’s so late, isn’t it almost 3am in New York?”
“Yeah, I’m up studying for a test tomorrow. But it’s a good thing you called, because I needed a break anyways.” She frowned, squinting at the screen. “Where are you? That doesn’t look like your dorm. Are you at Rowan’s?”
“That’s why I called. I’m, uh… I came to visit Sam.”
The pure shock on Carly’s face was so obvious that it radiated through the screen and made Freddie’s throat go dry. “You’re visiting Sam?”
He nodded, not really sure how to get a reason out quite yet.
“Why didn’t you tell me? How did you find her?” The panic in Carly’s eyes was apparent as he watched her mind become clouded with questions.
“I didn’t get a chance to tell you because I just left without really thinking about it. And don’t act like you didn’t tell me that you guys have been in touch since she left.”
Guilt clouded her eyes and she looked away from the camera for a moment. “You talked to her, then? Look, I’m sorry, Freddie. She asked me not to tell you but she didn’t really say why. If it makes you feel better, she made it a point not to tell me where she was. I could talk to her, but I still felt so… far away, I guess.”
“It’s okay, I get it. I don’t really even know if she wants me here, but here I am.”
“Yeah, you wanna tell me why you decided to go after all this time? And you still haven’t told me how you found her.”
He shrugged. “She left me with a way to find her. The day she left, she texted me to let me know where her friend went to high school.”
“High school? Cat probably graduated.”
“She did. It was like a scavenger hunt for me to try and track her down, but I did it.”
“Are you at Sam’s place right now?”
He nodded, looking around him. The place wasn’t anything special. The kitchen was tucked into a corner and the living room took up another, with a single couch and a small TV. But he could see her in all of it. There was a fruit basket full of fat cakes on the kitchen counter that had made him smile when he first noticed it. A picture of him, Sam, Carly, Gibby, and Spencer was framed and sat on the coffee table in front of him. Beside it, another picture of her and Cat.
“Yeah, this is her place. She just got back wasted so she went to sleep. I’ll talk to her more tomorrow.” Sighing, he leaned back into the couch. “And I don’t know why I came.”
“Did something happen with Rowan?” she asked, making him wonder how Carly knew exactly what was on his mind at any given moment. He glanced at her suspiciously, making her roll her eyes. “It was a lucky guess, but I think we both know there’s a reason you went to visit Sam.”
“I don’t know what you mean…” he responded, knowing exactly what she meant.
“Freddie. This is Sam we’re talking about. The only girl you’ve ever been in love with, because I know for a fact that Rowan told you she loved you and your dumbass didn’t say it back.”
“Way to call me out,” he mumbled.
Laughing, she shook her head at him. “Dude, it’s because I’m right.” She met his eyes through the screen for a moment, and it felt like she was reading him. “Listen, I know Rowan isn’t right for you. You think so, too. She’s perfect, and you kinda hate that.”
“I don’t hate that she’s perfect.”
“You hate that she brings you soup when you’re sick. You hate that she calls you every day to say goodnight, and that she reminds you when your doctor’s appointments are, and that her family lives in a cute little white picket fence house in the suburbs.” Carly was surprised at herself for how much she knew what he was thinking, until she realized exactly how obvious it all was now that she knew he went to Sam. He didn’t go for nothing. Sam was always the one to hide her feelings, but when it came to her, Freddie was scared sometimes, too. There was something about Sam that made Freddie forget how to act. She was his weakness.
Freddie knew it, too. When he was still with Sam, he wasn’t afraid to talk about his feelings with her. He told her he loved her the moment he knew. But once they were over, and especially after that last night they had together before she left, he didn’t feel like talking anymore. There was a string that tied him to Sam, and it was losing all its threads. If the last one snapped, he knew she’d be gone from his life forever.
That was why he was so afraid to come find her until he knew there wasn’t much time left.
“It’s that obvious, huh?” he asked, his voice growing quiet.
Carly nodded gently. “And it’s okay. But don’t let Rowan keep thinking everything’s fine when it’s not. And don’t do anything stupid until she does.”
It was her way of warning him not to act too quickly on his feelings for Sam before ending things with Rowan. It had been in the back of his mind this entire time, but only now did he admit it to himself. He came here because Rowan reminded him of everything Sam wasn’t. And he knew what he wanted. He wanted Sam’s eye rolls, her insults, her swearing. He wanted her to call him an idiot and then kiss him against the wall, he wanted her to sneak into his room at 2 in the morning and scream at him that she loved him until he felt a headrush, he wanted to go on night drives with her and feel intoxicated by her laughs and finally come undone again. He hadn’t felt anything for a long time.
“And Freddie?”
His mind had been so busy that he had started to lose focus, the screen in front of him turning blurry. He blinked, and Carly came back into view. “Hm?”
“Sam has been hurt a lot. I think we’ve both made mistakes when it came to her. I don’t want her to get hurt again. Alright?”
He swallowed and the pit in his stomach grew larger. “Yeah.”
“I’m gonna get back to studying. Goodnight. Tell Sam I miss her.”
“I will. Goodnight, Carly.”
After hanging up with her, he laid back down on the couch and counted the holes in the ceiling until the sun rose. Sam shuffled out of her room at around 9am, wearing the same outfit she was in the night before. She seemed confused when she saw him, as if she forgot why he was there.
“Morning,” he said, his voice cracking.
“Morning. Water?” she replied, shaking off the confusion just as quickly as it came.
Getting up from the couch, he joined her on the other side of the counter. She handed him a glass of water before pouring herself one, yawning. “Did you sleep?”
Shrugging, he found that he couldn’t meet her eyes. “I wasn’t tired after my nap, but it’s fine. You have plans today?”
“I have work at night but I’m free during the day. I usually just hang out at Cat’s, I don’t like leaving her alone for too long.”
“Does she have a job?”
“Not really. She volunteers at the retirement home sometimes because she doesn’t like being by herself.”
There was a silence amidst the small talk, like they both realized at the same time how strange it was for them to be talking about nothing with so much in the air. She spotted the water bottle in the sink and laughed to herself, taking it out and tossing it in the trash.
“Hope I didn’t make too much of a mess last night. I’m gonna get ready and then we can head over to Cat’s,” Sam said, disappearing back into her room. When she came back out, she had a new outfit on, a leather jacket and a Penny Tee he recognized. Around her neck, the same necklace she wore every day.
He had given her that necklace, just like he had given her the remote. It was for their one-month anniversary. Smiling to himself as she turned her back to him, he felt grateful that she still wore it.
She grabbed her keys and walked out the door without waiting for him, so he followed her out quickly and shut the door behind them. She finally asked him after five minutes of driving, as she stopped at a red light.
“Why’d you come?” she asked him, feeling grateful that she was driving so she had somewhere to put her hands. If they were on the wheel, they couldn’t visibly shake like she knew they would if she were in the passenger seat.
“I told you already. I came because I missed you,” he answered simply, even if he knew that wasn’t what she meant.
“Why now?” The light turned green and she pressed the gas a little too suddenly. “Don’t you have things to do, places to be… people to be with?”
“I thought that, uh, maybe it would be okay to come now that it had been a while. I didn’t want to come too soon.”
“Two years is too soon for you?” she said, her voice getting a bit louder. Freddie could tell she was frustrated, but he didn’t know what to say that would make things better.
“I’m sorry, Sam. I thought you’d want space.”
“You were the only person I gave any idea where I was, you know. Not Carly, not Spencer, not my mom. You.” She shook her head like she was in disbelief, even though she wasn’t even sure herself why it was making her so angry. “You thought I did that because I didn’t want you to come?”
“I don’t know, I guess I just…” His voice trailed off.
“This would be so much easier if I hated you,” she mumbled, so quietly he would’ve missed it if it wasn’t so silent in the car. She arrived at Cat’s house, pulling into the driveway and cutting the engine. Neither of them moved.
“You don’t hate me, then? Even now?” he asked her, his eyes staring straight ahead.
“I wish I did,” she said, her voice unwavering despite how loudly her heart was pounding. “But for some reason I can’t.”
“I don’t hate you either.” He sighed. He loved her. That’s how he felt. They both knew it. “You know—"
Before he could finish his sentence, she cut him off, knowing he would regret what he was about to say.
“Don’t say it,” she interrupted. “You don’t get to say that.” It was the way he almost said it again, the way those three treacherous words almost left his lips again that made her want to tell him everything she never said.
“I—”
“No. You don’t get to say that after two years of forgetting I exist,” she said as she felt her heart rate rising and her cheeks growing warm. “Not after I used to think you made me feel like I mattered, not after waiting until you have a girlfriend who doesn’t even know you’re here.”
He knew if he spoke, it would only make things worse. So he stayed quiet, his eyes traveling to the ceiling.
Sam leaned back in her seat. “You know how hard it was for me to leave Seattle?”
“No, I guess I don’t.” His voice was clipped, and it made him sound mad, but it was only because he was trying not to slip up his words.
“It was hard. I didn’t want to leave you and Carly and my whole life behind just because something shitty happened to me. And I know I made it kinda hard to find me, but you made me think you cared, and I waited until I realized you didn’t. So… you don’t get to just show up now and act like you still love me just to hurt me all over again.”
She wasn’t shouting like she usually would. At this point, she was tired of shouting. She used to yell at him until her throat hurt, scream until he told her it would be okay. But right now, she just wanted him to listen to her.
It was the first time she had made him feel this way. Like he couldn’t figure her out. He always knew her like the back of his hand, he knew her more than she knew herself. Now he didn’t know her at all, and maybe that was what she wanted.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you, Sam.” He looked over at her for the first time since they got into the car, and he regretted it immediately. Her blue eyes were dark again. He didn’t look away. “I waited because I didn’t think you’d want to see me when we weren’t even together anymore.”
“Well, friends can break your heart too.”
“You don’t think you hurt me too?” he said, furrowing his eyebrows together. “You don’t think after you told me you loved me again and then left before I even woke up that it broke my heart too? Or how hard it is for me now to hear you say that you don’t believe I ever loved you, even after everything?”
“If you did, you would’ve showed it.”
“I could say the same for you.” He sighed. “We both know we just suck at it.”
They stayed like that for a minute, parked in Cat’s driveway and staring at her front door through the window. The same pain they felt from their breakup lingered in the air, the silence made up of the love they had for each other that would last forever, and the way they still knew it would never work. It wasn’t as easy as a promise.
Sam knew she was too much of a mess for her promises to be anything but empty. She had always felt like she didn’t amount to much. She spent most of her childhood being ignored by her only parent. Then, she spent most of her friendship with the only guy she had ever loved, insulting him and making him think she never cared about him. Even when she started to care so much that it made her kinda sick. And then, once she finally got him, she let him go. She ran away.
Freddie was stuck in a cycle of being too afraid to do what he really wanted. There was something about Sam that made him want to stay. She made him want to pull his hair out, but he had never known how much he loved the thrill of it until he didn’t feel it anymore. But when she told him they weren’t right, he believed her, even if it wasn’t what he really thought. He was never one to go after what he loved, and the idea of risking everything he had ever known for her scared him more than he had hoped.
“Sorry,” she said first, breaking the silence. It reminded him of the second (third?) time they kissed, when she had revealed his feelings to him and followed it with an apology.
It made him laugh to himself. “Me too.”
“What’s funny?” She wasn’t mad that he laughed because she found it a little funny herself. Of course, she remembered that day just as vividly as he did, but she had no idea it was what he thought of too.
“Just… us.” He wanted to choose his words carefully this time, since he was never all that great at it. “How we thought we had it all figured out when we were sixteen because we were in love, but we just kept going in circles instead.”
“Yeah.” Part of her wanted to forget about the way she knew he deserved better than her and just give in. She wanted to take his face in her hands and kiss him like she used to. It would be the easy way out. She glanced at him from the corner of her eye, shaking her head to get rid of the idea. “So… what’s up with you and that girlfriend?”
He laughed, but she could hear the pain in it. It was a forced laugh, and it didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“It’s complicated, I guess. She, uh, asked me about marriage the other day.”
“Marriage?” she repeated, trying not to show too much of a reaction. “That’s some serious chiz.”
“Yeah,” he said, his response mixed with a scoff. “She’s just so put together and I still forget I’m in college already sometimes. I can’t even explain it. It’s like, there’s nothing wrong, but nothing feels right either.”
It was her turn to laugh this time, a memory of her own flashing across her mind.
“What?” he asked, noticing the sparkle in her eyes.
“Well, if we’re being all honest,” she said, meeting his eyes and finally feeling the comfort that she always used to feel around him. “It reminds me of when you and Carly had that thing for, like, three days.”
“What do you mean?”
“She was your dream. Thirteen-year-old you would’ve jumped at the chance to be with her, but when you finally were… nothing felt right. Am I wrong?”
“No, you’re not.” He smiled. “You were the one that made me realize it.”
“Yeah, and you should thank me for it.” She couldn’t help but smile back at him. “Otherwise, she would’ve broken your little heart when she realized how she actually felt.”
“Like you did?”
“Oh, please, Fredward. Ours was mutual.”
“The breakup?”
“No, the heartbreak.” Her smile turned sad.
His eyes averted and his voice grew quiet. “You coming back to Seattle anytime soon?”
That was the big question. The reason why, at the end of the day, he came to find her. He wanted her to give him a reason to go after what he wanted. He hoped that if she wanted to come home, then he could bring her home.
She didn’t actually know the answer. She hadn’t thought about it since she left, only looking forward. Going back to Seattle was something she wasn’t sure she was ready for, as much as she missed her old life. She missed doing iCarly, seeing her best friends every day, crashing on the Shays’ couch when she didn’t feel like going home. She missed the days she didn’t turn to alcohol to fix her problems, the days she didn’t have to deal with assholes at the bar, the days she could still see the boy she loved even if they weren’t together anymore. But Freddie and Carly were both in college now, and it wouldn’t be the same again.
She missed it, but she was also worried that going back meant going in the wrong direction. She had left for a reason, and she didn’t want to make the same mistakes again. And she still loved Freddie, she probably always would, but he had a life that he was building with someone else. Sure, she had been the one to stop him from falling too hard for someone that wasn’t meant to be, back when he was with Carly. But she didn’t feel like it was her place anymore. She didn’t fit into his life like she used to, and it was for the best if she wasn’t there to see it.
“I don’t think so,” she answered finally, sighing. “I can’t leave Cat on her own right now, and I got a job and a place. You guys are busy. And I love Carls, but I don’t know how I feel about the fact that she kissed my ex-boyfriend just because she felt like it.” Sam was only half-joking.
Freddie was trying to process it all at once, but the callout threw him off. “You knew about that?”
She shrugged. “Gibby told me. She doesn’t know that I found out. Heard she went to Italy with her dad for a few months and… well, I guess you know what happened.”
“It was a long time ago, but I don’t know why she did it. I still don’t.”
“I mean, it’s not that big of a deal. It just made me think maybe I moved out here for the better. I think for now we’re better off video-calling. And don’t be getting a big head about it either. Anyone sane would get mad at their best friend for that.”
Chuckling, he nodded. “I’ll try my best.”
Suddenly, Cat emerged onto the driveway, running towards them while being chased by two kids. “Are you guys gonna keep sitting here or are you gonna help me? These kids I’m babysitting have been chasing me all the way from Inside Out Burger!”
Getting out of the car, Sam and Freddie grabbed the children and pulled them back into the house. Cat was out of breath as she collapsed onto the couch, fanning herself with a pillow.
“Oh my god, these children have so much energy,” she said, panting.
“Hey, kids!” Sam shouted to them. “If you guys calm down and go get your backpacks, we can go to Bots for lunch and get as many fried pork fingers as you want, does that sound good?”
“Yeah!” they said in unison, giggling and disappearing into the hallway.
“Since when were you so good with kids?” Freddie asked her incredulously. He couldn’t help but be impressed. The Sam he used to know was never this patient.
“There’s a lot about me you don’t know anymore,” she said simply. Looking over at him, she smiled. His hair was soft and messy, the way she used to like it. “I’ll be here for a while. But if you want, you can stay for a couple days before you head back. We can grab some dinner and you can tell me all about your nerd stuff, yeah?”
“Sounds like a plan, Puckett.”