A/N: Don't expect me to be writing this fandom a lot. It was a floating fancy. I saw the iSaved Your Life episode, and couldn't manage to track down the extended version anywhere, so I wrote this in my frustration at that coupled with the lack of good iCarly fics to placate me. Placed sometime after iSaved Your Life (and, from later references, after iSam's Mom as well), if anyone at all cares about references or timelines. Probably not, but it's habit.

This has more material to be written, so I'll probably at least try to write it into a multi-chap story, but when the next one will be posted is a question mark at the moment. I've never been good with schedules, so I'm not even gonna try. Sorry in advanced for the cliche. Again, floating fancy.

Disclaimer: iCarly is not mine. As with a lot of the fanfiction I write, the characters and basis belong to Nickelodeon. Congrats to them for still having some quality programming every once in a while.

Hey Freddie,
I don't know how you get away with being single. If they made more of you, it wouldn't be too hard selling them off as ready-to-go boyfriends. Speaking of which, how do you get off being so great? Seriously, take a break from being amazing once in a while and give the rest of us a chance.

It started off mostly out of boredom.

Hey Freddie,
You know what? It's a good thing you don't have a girlfriend. You deserve better than the girls at this school. When you find someone who's finally worth your time, you'd better snatch her up. They don't make extras of those any more than they make extras of you. And no, that's not a cheap pick-up line. You deserve better than me too, so no worries.

One letter, scrawled on the back of some ages-old doodle.

Hey Freddie,
Say you could make your own girlfriend. Go to one of those build-your-own-bunny places and stuff yourself one, then bring her to life with some kind of magic known only to geeks. What would she be like? I know what the first response is gonna be, but that's not what I want to hear. And probably not for the reason you're thinking. Really, if you could custom-order a girlfriend specifically for you, what would she be like? Computer-savvy, right? And cute… and not taller than you. Why does that bug guys so much? Though I guess I would be a little freaked out if my boyfriend was shorter than me. I don't know why I want to know so much, because it shouldn't matter. Like I said, I already know your gut response. That should be enough, but you make me second-guess everything. Hey, full circle back to the I'm-not-good-enough bit. Gotta love that.

It was shoved in the back of a boring school notebook, where no one would ever think to look, and slowly, it grew.

Freddie,
If I'm gonna keep writing these, I need to come up with a different way to open it. The "Hey Freddie" thing is a bit repetitive when the letters are so short. This'll work for now I guess, but I can't think of much else to put. I don't want to start it off with "Dear Freddie," that sounds so full of it. I don't say "Dear Freddie" when I'm talking to you; I say "Hey." Besides, who starts a love letter off with "dear?" Oops! I didn't just write that, did I? Oh, that's not what theses are supposed to be! But I guess they're not really supposed to be at all, so what can you do?

Partially, it was because I wasn't entirely sure what he'd meant by "a while"-I mean, "once I'm out of this cast" was clear enough, but it was the "and this whole hero thing blows over" that I was hung up on.

Hola Freddie,
I've decided that if I make it any more personal, it would be too obvious who it was. Not that I plan on delivering these, but if I'm breaking down and calling them love letters, then I don't want my name attached to it. Yours, I'm apparently okay with. Really, what would a love letter without a recipient be? Hardly a love letter. More like an editorial, maybe. And only really, really desperate, really, really lonely people write those. I'm not there yet, and here's hoping I won't get there.

On the outside, everything had gone back to normal; no more hero Freddie, just our good old tech producer Fredward.

Hi Freddie,
I keep thinking that I should have some mushy gushy stuff to write down here. That that's what love's supposed to be about. Something about your piercing brown eyes or how much I want to run my fingers through your hair. I'll admit that maybe I do, but that's honestly more of a friendly thing. I mean, you're handsome, sure. You've grown up a lot, and I'm not gonna pretend that I haven't noticed (at least not here in these strange little love letters), but is it okay if I think of other things first? If I like you for the things that no one ever seems to notice? I wonder some days; how many people have ever let you know just how amazing you are? Regardless, you need to hear it more.

But, to me, he was still a hero.

Hey Freddie,
You know, I turned down a boy today who asked me out. He's the kind that, a year ago, I would have been itching to date. I think I'm setting my sights too high; all I could think about was that he wasn't you. He's probably a little closer to what I deserve, though. I'm not even strong enough to ask you when I know you'd say yes. I'm making both of us suffer… at least, I think. But maybe you've already gotten over me?

I kept thinking, and I started to wonder if maybe he'd been wrong.

Dirkenshnoff Freddie,
These are getting way too depressing. I don't know why they're doing that. I'm not a depressed person. iCarly is my life; I should be a comedy person. I used to be. I'd blame you, but it's not your fault. I'd blame Mexicans, but you wouldn't get that and it would just sound racist. It's probably all my own fault, but that doesn't go along well with my whole non-depressing plan. So I guess I'll just take a page out of Sam's book and blame Gibby.

At first it was shock and guilt and gratitude and a mess of other hormonal teenaged things.

Yo Freddie,
We're reading Shakespeare in English. And you know what? This romance stuff is crap. Why is it that everyone always winds up dying because they love someone? Couldn't he just write one love story with chocolate and flowers and dancing to whatever song is playing in the elevator? That's how I'd want ours to go, if I wasn't too busy feeling guilty.

When it all boiled down to it, though, that wasn't really what was left.

Freddie,
I swear, I don't know what I'd do without you. You're a life-saver. Really, thank you. Thank you so much. This isn't the kind of thing that should make me get the warm fuzzies, but it is. I guess it's just good to know that, however much I don't deserve it, you're willing to jump out in front of buses for me. Even if it wasn't nearly that big of a deal today, it just reminded me. You would.

It was just what had made me realize it.

Senor Benson,
Sorry. In Spanish class. I'm just thinking it's a shame you had to take German. It's cute when you try to roll your R's. Come to think of it, that's probably why you're in German. You never could get much farther than trying. At least there's something you can't do. Now that you've outgrown the wimpy nerdy phase (the wimpy part, at least), your downfalls are a bit farther between. So there's one thing I could do for you. I could teach you to roll your R's.

Freddie cared about me so much-girlfriend or best friend-that he risked his life to save mine.

Hi Freddie,
I think I think too much. That's probably why I need so much help in school; I think too much for my own good. Too much, too fast, at all the wrong times. Lately, I keep thinking about you. The silliest little things catch me off guard at the strangest of moments. Someone will mention iCarly and I'll think about the face you always use on camera, like you're trying to look cool. Or we'll be reading a book in class that I saw you reading a week ago, and I'll start picturing you as one of the characters. Randomly. It probably sounds like I'm obsessive, but I'm not. I only write to you when I'm thinking of you, after all. And I don't write as often as you probably think. It's just something I started to stop all the excess thinking. I can't tell if it's made it better or worse. At the least, I guess it's put my thoughts to use.

Those aren't the kind of guys that they sell a dime a dozen.

Freddie,
I'm being such a coward. I wish theses things would come out when I opened my mouth instead of just when I'm trying to take notes in Physics. What is it about centripetal force that makes my pencil write "Freddie"? And don't you dare bring Freud into this. …See? This is why I should be talking instead of writing. This awkward pause would never happen if it were a conversation. But I keep writing these, not just to you, but like I'd actually send them to you.

Which, eventually, is how I found myself stuffing a piece of ripped and folded notebook paper into the crevice around Freddie's locker.