AN: SPOILER ALERT! If you have not seen iSaved Your Life yet, do not read this unless you WANT to be spoiled! I'm dedicating this to my friend Krystle aka Lucky-Starz06, with a special shout-out to MoonlightDreamz for her help even though she's never seen iCarly.
"Carly! Freddie is staring at your butt," Sam yells out in the middle of the Groovy Smoothie.
"What! No I'm not!" Freddie argues back in defense.
"Sure you weren't Fredward," Sam laughs as she pats him on his head before catching up to Carly; who has long since chosen to ignore her two friends as they bicker back and forth shortly after leaving school.
"Hey T-Bo can I get blueberry-banana bonanza," Carly asks the man behind the counter as she hands him three dollars. "If you guys are done I'll be over here," she says, pointing to an empty table by the window.
"What can I get you two?" T-Bo asks politely.
"I'll get a strawberry splat," Freddie says, handing T-Bo his debit card.
"I'll have a berry-berry blitz," Sam orders, grabbing Freddie's drink from T-Bo and walking away to sit with Carly.
"Sam, that's mine! You forgot to pay!" Freddie yells after her.
"Me. Paying? Now that's comical," Sam laughs as she takes a sip of Freddie's smoothie pointedly while he watches her angrily.
Freddie begrudgingly pays for both his and Sam's drinks and grumbles to himself on the way back to the table. He shoves her drink in her face and quickly snatches his own before she can steal another sip.
"You owe me Puckett," He says, before slipping into silence as the two girls chat away about the new boy in their math class, Carlos or whatever his name was, he doesn't really care.
The three leave thirty minutes later to head to the Shay's apartment. They turn a corner when Sam gets bored and as a prank steals Freddie's backpack from the shoulder he has it dangling from, and runs across the street taunting him. Freddie runs after her, like she had planned, leaving Carly in the middle of the street yelling at both of them to cut it out. She stands there with her arms crossed as she watches Freddie chase after Sam. Sam disappears around a corner and that's when Freddie gives up and walks back to where Carly stood waiting.
Before Freddie can cross the street, a speeding taco truck rounds the corner where Sam has just run and barrels straight for Carly. Carly panics and stands in the street staring at the truck, her legs paralyzed by fear. Freddie looks past her at the truck as the driver tries desperately to stop and makes a split second decision. He darts out into the middle of the street and pushes Carly away from the impending danger. Carly falls to the ground in a daze as the truck misses hitting her by a foot. Freddie isn't as lucky though when the truck fishtails to a stop and sends Freddie flying towards the curb in a heap.
He is vaguely aware of someone screaming his name as he fights to stay conscious. In the end, he loses this battle with the sirens of an ambulance as his last memory; all that matters is that his last vision was of Carly, alive.
Sam has gotten far before she realizes that Freddie hasn't been following her, so she turns back knowing that she has won again. She smiles to herself as she rounds the corner where she has left her friends, and her smile fades quickly when she sees the flashing lights of an ambulance and two cop cars. She fights her instinct to run from the cops with her growing worry for her friends. She hasn't been gone for that long, so she isn't sure what has happened. She walks up to one of the cops, surveying the scene and taps him on the shoulder. She again fights the urge to run when the cop turns around; it is one who is frequently after her when she gets into trouble.
"What happened?" She asks timidly as she cranes her neck to search for any sight of her friends.
"Ah, Ms. Puckett. We were just about to look for you, there seems to have been an accident-" The cop began only to be interrupted by a blur of brown hair engulfing Sam in a huge hug.
"Sam! The truck! It hit Freddie! Freddie has been hit by a truck! He saved me!" Carly sobs into Sam's hair.
"What?!" Sam screeches, startling her best friend.
"After you ran away with his backpack he turned around and was about to come over to me, but then that taco truck came around the corner," Carly explains after gaining some composure. "The truck was heading straight for me and I panicked. My legs felt like they were glued to the middle of the road. I was staring at the truck and then all of a sudden Freddie runs out and pushes me away. I fell and I heard the truck's brakes squealing and I heard a loud crash when the truck tipped and I look over and I see Freddie lying down on the curb. I ran over and he was passed out and then the truck driver came over and told me he had already called 911."
"Are you alright?" Sam asks calmly.
"Yeah, I guess so."
"Have you called Spencer already?" Sam asks being unusually rational in a crisis.
"Um no, not yet, I will now."
"Don't bother, I'll go get him," Sam answers, hugging her friend tight in reassurance.
She takes off running but makes the trip back when she notices that the overturned taco truck has been left unattended. She doubles back, grabbing two soft shell tacos and begins her sprint to Bushwell Plaza again. She runs past Lewbert, ignoring his shrill protests about food in his lobby. By passing the elevator, Sam takes the stairs two at a time until she reaches the Shay's floor. She pauses in front of the door and catches her breath before barging into the Shay's apartment.
"Freddie's hurt!" Sam yells at a surprised Spencer.
"What happened?" He asks anxiously.
"A big taco truck came around the corner and Freddie ran out and pushed Carly out of the way." She explains frantically.
Spencer just stares at her blankly for a second as she finishes her explanation. She pulls out one of the tacos and proceeds to eat it.
He stares at the teenage girl in front of him curiously wondering what he should say.
"Is that a taco from the truck that hit Freddie?" Spencer asks, settling on this question.
"Well, me being hungry isn't going to help him!" She yells at the baffled Spencer.
He continues to stare at her before speaking again.
"Where is Carly?" He asks.
"I'll take you there," Sam says, urgently taking his hand and pulls him out the door.
Sam continues to drag him out of Bushwell and down the street as an ambulance passes them, presumably carrying Freddie to Seattle General. They round the corner and see Carly talking to the same cop. At this moment Spencer yanks his arm from Sam's grasp and jogs to where his little sister stands.
"Carly, are you alright?" Spencer asks frantically, examining her body for any possible sign that she wasn't.
"I'm fine, just a few bruises and scratches," she answers, pointing to her grazed knees and palms, shrugging listlessly.
"Oh, thank God," Spencer sighs while hugging his sister gingerly.
Carly doesn't hug her older brother back, but stares ahead at the overturned taco truck with a glazed blank look in her brown eyes. Sam looks at her best friend curiously, wondering what she was thinking about but never asking out loud.
"Officer is it alright if I bring her home now? Do you need her for anything?" Spencer asks separating himself from his sister.
"Of course you can. She was checked out by the paramedics earlier –" The officer begins.
Sam tunes him out and focuses on Carly who is visibly shaken by the earlier events. She stands staring at a spot on the sidewalk opposite them; a spot that looked to be stained with a small puddle of blood, Freddie's blood. Sam gets the chills as the image of a limp Freddie Benson fills her mind. He was slumped over the sidewalk like a ragdoll, and as much as Sam liked causing the nerd pain she didn't like this image, not one bit.
She fights back tears as she follows the Shays back to Bushwell. The three of them travel in silence and pay no mind to Lewbert as he voices his disapproval of people in his lobby. Sam feels another surge of tears as she stands in front of the Bensons' door but fights them back again as they enter the apartment just as quietly.
Carly immediately collapses on the futon and sobs into a cushion. Sam joins her using a blanket that is draped over the back of the futon to hide her face. Spencer sits between the two and lets them cry not wanting to get in the middle of it. After a few minutes the girls' cries die down to sniffles and Spencer takes that as his cue to speak up.
"I'm going to make some dinner now. Sam, will you going to be staying?" He asks the puffy eyed blonde.
She nods not trusting herself to speak as she unburies herself from the blanket. Carly lays the cushion back in its place and stares straight ahead with the same glazed look she had been wearing since the accident. Sam reaches over to give her friend a hug but is shocked when Carly flinches upon contact.
"Sorry," Carly croaks as she finally comes back down to earth.
Carly puts on a small smile and returns Sam's hug before excusing herself to the bathroom. Sam stands up and joins Spencer in the kitchen where he is preparing spaghetti tacos in an attempt to cheer them up. It works a little as Sam's stomach growls audibly.
Carly comes back 15 minutes later and sits down next to Sam at the table. Spencer hasn't placed the food on the table yet when Carly speaks up.
"What are we having?" she asks a little of her usual pep in her voice.
"Spaghetti tacos!" Spencer announces brandishing a platter of meat balls, taco shells, and various toppings.
Carly's face drops at the sight of the tacos. She pushes her chair back scraping it against the floor as she runs up the stairs to her room.
Spencer looks after his sister puzzled before Sam connects the dots with one word: Tacos.
AN: I began this as a present to my friend Krystle for Christmas…that didn't pan out for me. Everything I wrote was too cliché for my tastes. Then the infamous iSaved Your Life promo aired and inspiration struck and this is it. This is part one of my take on iSaved Your Life and what SHOULD have happened in my opinion. I'd appreciate your feedback please. I'm working on part 2 as we speak and let me assure you that I will not be sleeping tonight until the whole story is finished and published. I will admit though that since seeing the episode tonight I'm now far from done but I hope you do enjoy my take on its events.