Hey everyone, I'm super sorry for the delayed update. Work and life in general have been kicking me in the face every chance it gets, so my sincerest apologies. I'm hoping to have the next chapter up relatively soon. In the meantime, sorry again for the wait, and I hope you enjoy the latest chapter!

Three years ago

Sam sighed as she packed the last of her belongings into its designated box, taking a look around at the bedroom. This had been her home for such a long time, and now she was just upping and leaving for the rainy skies of Seattle. Her real home. She didn't think she'd ever leave Los Angeles, at least not for a little while longer, but as soon as she heard from Spencer that Carly was finally returning from her Italian sojourn…coupled with Cat graduating from Hollywood Arts and immediately having opportunities lined up for her…it made sense to turn the page on this chapter of her life.

That didn't make the goodbye she was about to say any less emotional or painful.

Sam picked up the box filled with all of her clothes and began to exit the room, stopping only in the doorway to take one last look at it all. Seeing her half of the room now devoid of her things was weird, but she figured that Cat would do something with the open space once she got around to it. Maybe build a shrine to all of her stuffed animals or something. The idea of Cat doing something like that distracted her from the impending sadness that was threatening to wash over her, causing her to smile for a moment.

"So long, room. It was nice knowing you."

She turned on her heel and made her way down the hall to the living room, and it was there that the sadness completely overtook her. Cat stood by the couch, clutching her favorite purple giraffe, doing her best to not break down right then and there and doing a bad job at it. Her lower lip was quivering, her eyes began to glisten with tears that were threatening to fall at any moment, and her entire body was quaking. Placing the box down, the blonde quickly closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around the red head, the two of them letting their tears fall freely as they sobbed in silence.

Sam pulled back after she had somewhat composed herself, pawing at her eyes and sniffling as she forced Cat to look at her, her eyes puffy and as red as her hair. "Cat, look at me, okay? Please?"

Cat did as she was asked, albeit barely, their eyes locking onto one another for a nanosecond before she threw her arms around her roommate's neck, burying her face into the collar of the leather jacket she was wearing. "Do you have to go?", she managed to choke out as the grip she had on the blonde's neck tightened.

It was such a simple yet loaded question, one that Sam didn't feel much like answering. As she began to rub Cat's back in a comforting manner, she let another sigh escape her lips, this one heavier than the last. "I do", she stated simply, causing Cat to let another whimper loose into the room. "But this isn't goodbye, okay? It may seem like that, but it isn't. It's the furthest thing from a goodbye. This is see you later."

She managed to pry Cat off of her, the two of them now making full eye contact, neither one of them sure of what to say to the other. "You hugged me."

"What?", she asked a little incredulously before it finally dawned on her that, yes, she was the one who initiated the hug this time, as opposed to the other way around. "Oh, yeah. Well. Don't get used to it, okay? Consider this a onetime thing."

That only made Cat sob even more, and led to a few more tears sliding down Sam's cheek as well as they resumed hugging, letting the weight and gravity of everything hang in the air for a few more moments. Neither one of them wanted to let go, because they both knew the second that they did, their situation would become a lot more real and they just wanted to hang onto this for a few more seconds.

"Who's gonna help me make soup when I don't remember how to open the can?", Cat asked, earning a laugh from Sam as she finally, and regretfully, let go.

"Who's gonna help me shoot hot dogs at Goomer when he says something stupid?", Sam countered with as Cat followed suit and let go as well. They remained there in silence for a couple of minutes, both of them unsure of what else to say. The sounds of the U-Lug's horn that was carrying all of Sam's stuff back to Seattle rang through the air, causing both of them to jump a little and sigh.

"We're still gonna talk every day, okay? I want to know how everything goes with your singing and acting. And Seattle's only a three hour flight away, so you can definitely come visit whenever you can, and I'll definitely come visit you as much as I can too. It's like I'll have never left. You'll be so sick of me."

A smile finally began to form on the red head's lips upon hearing all that Sam had to say. "I could never get sick of you! And whatever you end up doing back home, I wanna know all about it! Every single detail, even the boring ones. And I wanna know how all your friends out there are doing too! Tell them I said hi when you get there!"

The horn sounded again and that meant that their time was quickly running out before Sam had to jet and begin her trek back home. Cat hugged her again, and Sam reciprocated it willingly. "If you ever need anything, tell me and I'll be there for you. I promise, Red."

Cat nodded ruefully as she let go of her now former roommate for the last time, a sad smile spread across her lips. "And if you ever need anything, I'll be there for you too, Sam."

"I promise."

Present day

"You went and texted Cat while I was sleeping!?"

If it were anyone else in the world that had done what Carly did, I would've punched them right in the head and given them about sixteen concussions. But because it's her, I'm doing my best to rein in my anger and rage and try to be civil with her.

"I'm only trying to help!"

"So your idea of helping me is texting Cat behind my back and telling her I got hit by a taco truck!?"

It's not working, clearly.

"I didn't know how else to get her here so quickly!"

I begin to massage my temples, rubbing them in a circular motion, because that's all that's seemingly preventing me from wanting to break Carly's arms off and beat her over the head with them. I could tell she felt really bad about doing what she did, even if she had my best intentions in mind, and I can't stay mad at her for very long but. Damn. A taco truck? It couldn't have been a super charged Prius?

The sound of the door creaking open echoes off of the walls of Spencer's bedroom, and I can see Cat poking her head in in my peripherals. She looked worried, but mostly confused. Like she does when someone asks her paper or plastic at the supermarket. "Um, is everything okay? Did I do something wrong?"

"Noooo, never Kitty Cat. You're perfectly fine. I'm just mad at Carly for lying to you, is all."

"Well when you put it that bluntly, you make it sound like I'm some terrible woman."

"Right now you are so shush."

I could tell Carls wanted to snipe back at me with some snippy response but the look of absolute murder on my face quickly put the kibosh on that. She muttered an 'I'm sorry' and then wrapped her arms around me from behind, which only made Cat's eyes light up as she bum-rushed into the room and soon enough I was a Cat and Carly Sammy (Sam…sandwich…sometimes I crack myself up.) I silently counted to two before loudly announcing that they both had to get off of me, which they thankfully did.

Cat then began poking and prodding me as if I were a dead frog that was to be dissected in a high school science lab somewhere, and I let it go on for a few seconds before grabbing her wrists and holding them up so that she could stop. "Is there a reason why you're doing this?"

"I just wanted to make sure you and your parts were all together still", she said simply, that smile of hers making me shake my head and smile myself. "Looks like they are so hooray! OH!", she then said excitedly, her arms swinging outward, hand slapping my chest. What was it with her and slapping my boobs? "I have to show you something!"

"If it's another stuffed animal I'm going to scream", I say only half-jokingly as she takes me by my hand, which in turn made me latch onto Carly's hand, as the little red headed engine that could but definitely probably shouldn't began to drag us back out into the living room, where she motioned at Dice and Goomer to follow. "Where exactly are you taking us?"

"Okay so you remember that texting competition you won when your hand was glued to my foot and we were supposed to get a speedboat but we got some janky little toy instead and I was really bummed and you said that one day I'll get my speedboat and I said I was gonna get one no matter what!?", she said so quickly and breathlessly that I felt like I needed to take a nap as she dragged us to the elevator.

"Wait, your hand was glued to her foot?", Carly asked incredulously as the door shut.

"Not the point", I mutter, my attention turning back to Cat. "Why can't you just tell us what's going on?"

"You won't believe me if I tell you so I'll just show you!", she exclaimed happily as she hopped in place, unable to contain her excitement.

She was right. I couldn't believe it.

Before us stood, incredulously, a speedboat. Full size. In neon pink.

To say that I was speechless would be an understatement. I was just…in awe.

"I GOT A SPEEDBOAT!", Cat proudly shouted, thrusting her arms outward in a very 'ta da' like manner, smiling from ear to ear as she couldn't contain her giggles. I felt something tugging on the sleeve of my shirt, which was Carly's own way of telling me that she too couldn't believe what she was seeing. I shook my head and rubbed at both of my eyes, and yet it continued to stare me in the face.

"How is this…I just….neon pink?", was all I could get out because something like this shouldn't be happening. How on earth does someone like Cat end up the proud new owner of a goddamn speedboat? How did she even get a boating license? Does she even have her driver's license yet!? I have so many questions and no answers. I didn't even know where to start.

"You brought that thing all the way here to show us? You couldn't have just texted a picture of it?", Carly asked, trying to remain levelheaded but failing. She walked forward and ran her hand along the smooth exterior of the hull, as if she were examining it. "How long ago did you get this?"

"Last week!", she answered as she climbed up the small ladder and began to walk along the small bridge to the steering wheel. "Dice knows a guy and he was able to get me a really good deal on it! Do you like it? Please tell me you do."

I had to admit…it was pretty bitchin'. Hideous color aside, it looked like it was top of the line, like the ones they would race on TV, or at the very least the ones that all those old crones at the docks would own. It definitely gets the Sam Puckett stamp of approval. "I dig it, Red. You did good getting this."

"Where are you gonna stash this thing when you get home to LA?", Carly asked, ever the inquisitive girl that she is. "Isn't it gonna cost you a lot of money to do so? What about gas? And everythi—"

I pressed my hand across her lips to shush her. Just let the kid have her fun with her speedboat, Carls. It was her dream to own one, after all.

"My Nona knows the guy who runs the docks by me, so he's letting me keep it there rent free", she replied happily as she began playing around with the wheel, inviting the two of us to join her on it. "He said he'll help me keep it full and help with the maintenance when I'm not around. Swell guy, that Javier."

"But wait…", Carly said, which only made me groan as loudly as I could. How many times did I have to tell her? The less questions asked when it came to Cat and how she happily and haphazardly skipped through her life, the better. "How did you even get this whole thing down here?"

"I drove her!", Goomer piped in, making us all jump out of our collective skins as his large head popped up from outside the boat, that hilariously doofy smile on his lips as he looked around at the three of us. "I hitched the ol' S.S. Valentine up to my pick up and we droves all the way here!"

S.S. Valentine. She would name it that.

"Yeah but—"

"Wanna see how it rides!?", Cat suddenly blurted out, her eyes filled with frenzy. I knew that look all too well; she wasn't about to take no for an answer right now, especially since it would involve showing off her brand new toy. "Come on, let's do it! It'll be fun, I promise!"

I looked over at Carly, and I could tell that she was about to object, because I knew she wanted to game plan stuff in regards to Fredbag and that god awful woman he calls a fiancée, and all I wanted was to do the exact damn opposite of that right now. I just spent a chunk of my precious day listening to her drone on and on (and on and on and on) about herself. It's a miracle I didn't snap her neck right then. How could she think I'd want to spend even more time talking about her? Does she not know anything about me by now? So, before she could even so much as utter a peep, I pressed my hand over her mouth and turned to Goomer, ready to get this show on the road.

"Let's go! Gooms, fire up the truck and bring this sucker down to the docks! We got an ocean to ride on!"

"Kay kay", he responded eagerly as he rushed up to his truck, before rushing right back, dumbfounded look on his face. "I can't open the door."

"Why not?"

"Cuz I can't find my keys", he answered in that slow southern drawl of his, shrugging his shoulders. "I coulda sworn I had 'em on me when we was upstairs…"

"Wait!", Cat suddenly yelled out, looking around the surrounding area frantically. "Where's Dice?"

…

…

"Did we leave him upstairs?"

…

"Should we report him as a missing child if he's not one of our own?"

….

"Wasn't he right behind you, Gooms?"

….

"THE ELEVATOR!"

So after half an hour, we finally managed to get Dice out of the elevator, to which he was both incredibly grateful that he was, you know, no longer stuck in a metal box, and super hot at us for not realizing he was in there sooner. He was so heated, he even made the mistake of trying to berate Lewbert, telling him that he needed to check on stuff like that more regularly.

Needless to say, ol' Lewbs didn't take to that all too kindly.

We've been on the water for an hour and Dice is still shell shocked.

"Where did you learn to ride this thing?", I asked as I tried nudging Dice, who just kept blankly staring off into the distance, as if he was searching for some greater meaning to life. "And how have you not blown it up yet?"

She shook her head and happily hummed a song as she searched for the answer. And then it just came to her suddenly, like so many of her ideas, good and bad. "Oh! Javier showed me! Spent an entire day with me showing me all the little things and all. Swell guy, that Javier."

I couldn't help but laugh as I began imagining Cat driving this poor dude crazy with all her questions and her overall quirkiness, all while she just smiled and wondered why he was getting more and more agitated. "So tell me all about how you've been! It's been like what, a year and a half since I last saw you? What goes on in the life of Sam Puckle?"

Carly tilted her head to the side, mouthing 'Puckle?' to herself while Goomer cackled hysterically, and I pinched the bridge of my nose, trying not to flip out at the continued butchering of my last name. "Cat, how many times do I have to go over this with you?"

"Go over what?"

"That my last name isn't Puckle, or Pumpkin, or Pickle, or Pooka, or Pompom, its PUCKETT. P-U-ckett."

"P-U? But you don't smell."

I slapped my forehead. I can't believe I lived with this woman as long as I did and didn't beat her over the head with a Hooked on Sonants book…

"I mean, the ocean kinda smells but it's a good smell…"

"Cat, can you stop smelling the Pacific Ocean for a moment and focus."

"But it kinda smells like tuna fish!"

"If I promise to have Carly make you some tuna, will you pay attention for two seconds?"

"When did I get dragged into this?"

I shushed Carls and placed my hands on Cat's tiny shoulders, making her look me in the eye. "I'm only going to say this one last time, okay? My last name is Puckett. Remember when you told me that Jade shaved your hair all off because you waxed her eyebrows off?"

She gasped, bringing her hands up to her mouth as her eyes grew wide, almost like her namesake animal. "Y-yes…"

"If you call me anything other than Sam Puckett, I'll make sure your hair never grows back."

Now, would I ever actually do that to her? Shoosh no, I actually like Cat. But is it okay to instill that fear into her and make her think I would? Hell yeah. And would I actually do that to my worst enemies? Now that I think about it…

"No, Sam, you can't shave Alyssa's hair off while she's asleep", Carly butted in almost on que, making me roll my eyes. That girl has gotta stop swimming around in my head like that, it's starting to get annoying. I went to speak up but it was her turn to shush me. "I don't care how funny it would be, it's wrong on so many levels."

"Try telling Jade that…", Cat murmured as she protectively stroked her precious red locks. "And who's Alyssa and why does Sam want to shave her head?"

Before I could even interject and make up some blatant lie, Carly beat me to the punch and blurted out the words 'Freddie's fiancée', which of course made everyone on the boat turn and look at me (even Dice emerged from his Lewbert-induced stupor) and all I want to do right now is jump overboard and begin swimming to shore. It shouldn't be that long of a swim right? I can do it. If I jump now I can get back before nightfall…

"You didn't tell me that Freddie was engaged!", Cat exclaimed as she slapped my arm (I say slapped verrrrry loosely), her face a mixture of shock and excitement that quickly turns back into confusion. "Wait, that's a bad thing, isn't it?"

All I could manage at that point was a short, curt nod, while Carly placed a comforting hand on my shoulder. "We didn't find out about it until yesterday. He just showed up and was like, 'Long time no talk, by the way here's my fiancée who looks like the dollar store version of Sam, hope that's okay!' It was all very sudden."

I sighed and nodded, looking up toward the sky for a moment before my eyes landed on Cat, who looked like she was either about to scream or cry. Or both. "Dollar store version of Sam?"

"You remember that time when I tricked you with my twin sister, Melanie?", a shiver running up and down my spine at the mere mention of her name while Cat nodded, a tiny scowl on her face at the mention of that sore subject. "Well, this dishrag Alyssa is exactly like Mel, except worse, somehow. And nobody is as bad as Mel."

"I find that hard to believe…"

That was when Carls leaned in and whispered something into Cat's ear, and her mood did an immediate 180 and she looked as if someone had told her that her hair was stupid or something. "Are you serious?"

"Yup, just nonchalantly takes his card and spends all his money like he doesn't bust his butt for it."

"That…that…"

"C'mon Kitty Cat, you know you wanna say it."

"That skunkbag!"

"Miss Cat!", Goomer gasped as he turned around in his seat. "I didn't know you were capable of such language! Dice shouldn't be hearing that, Miss Cat."

"I'm almost seventeen! I'm practically an adult!", he exclaimed bewilderedly, while Gooms shook his head and mouthed something to me about Dice being in denial or something ridiculous. It was always so hard to tell what was running through that brain of his.

"How could she just do something like that?", Cat asked, snapping me back to reality. "Carly told me that her mom and dad pay for everything too? What's her flippin' issue?"

I shrugged my shoulders, my palms turned upwards as I had no answer for why Alyssa was literally the worst human being on the face of the earth. Congrats, Briggs, you've finally been knocked off your perch for shittiest woman ever. "I don't even know, nor do I really care. It just sucks that Fredbag is being treated like some second class citizen in his own relationship. I can't stand him anymore, but not even he deserves someone as terrible as that pushing him around."

And then, almost on cue, both Carly and Sam spoke out, "Oh, so you're the only one who should be pushing him around?", which made both of them look at each other with weird smiles, before Cat blurted out something about a jinx and how Carls owed her a Peppy Cola. I can already tell that having the two them are gonna become real fast friends this weekend. Carly's bad enough on her own sometimes, but now she's gonna have Cat feeding into her madness and bouncing off of it with her own? Fuck me, right?

"I know what we can do!", she then yelled, making me nearly jump out of my skin as she clapped her hands excitedly and began giggling that giggle of hers. I knew that giggle. She was thinking of something (probably not thinking too hard, but whatever), and I could tell that I wasn't gonna like it, nope, not one bit, not at all, no siree. "I know how we can get that jerk away from Freddie!"

My head shot up with alarm; was she suggesting what I think she was suggesting?

"And how do you propose we do that?", Carly asked with intrigue, clearly wanting to hear what had to be said.

"Well, Tori and Jade and all the rest of my friends from Hollywood Arts are getting here tonight! Isn't tonight the rehearsal dinner?", she asked, to which we both nodded. "Perfect! When they get here, I'll let you all in on the plan!"

"Why can't ya just let us in on it now?", Goomer asks, his drawl heavier than normal.

"Because I'm still thinking of it!", Cat responds, which makes us all collectively groan except for Carly, who's already in her ear again and whispering about what they can do. I turn around to face the back of the boat, wanting nothing to do with this at all. I just wanna be back on dry land and then make a run for it and hide somewhere. V will understand if I skip out on the wedding, right? I know Spencer won't care. Yeah! I'll just take a train to nowhere and camp out somewhere for the rest of the weekend. Nobody'll miss me, right? Right?

"If you try and run when we get back home, I'll find you and make you sit through a TED talk about saving the environment."

I glare at Carly before closing my eyes and shaking my head. "Can we just get back to land already? So you two can plan my life out for me and make me as miserable as possible?"

"Kay kay", Cat replied as she turned around in her seat and turned the key in the ignition, the motor whirring to life. Except it then quickly shorted out and died. Cat tried again. Nothing.

"Why isn't it turning on?"

…

…

"Cat, what does 'E' mean?"

…..

…

"Um…I think we're out of gas."

Kill me.

And that's that! I wanted to break away from the Sam & Freddie drama for a bit and have some fun with Sam, Cat and Carly all together in the same place. Next chapter is a big one, with the rehearsal dinner and the rest of the Victorious gang arriving! Who knows what'll happen with all of them together? See ya soon!