Disclaimer – blah blah I don't own iCarly blah blah insert witty reasoning here.

but you don't know what now to do

cause the chase is all you know

and he stopped running months ago

You've really done it this time.

Truthfully, it's not like anyone can blame you: having to hold something like that in for so long must have grown a sort of impatience in you, the kind that makes your yearning for him even more outstanding than it should have ever been. On occasions it's made you quite crotchety to even look at the boy in fear of bursting open with the obvious lust he used to spring on Carly.

You don't understand how such feelings can even exist inside you without the constant battle between love and hate making you spontaneously combust. Most of the time you can't stand him, what with his stupid knowledge of things no one cares about and love of Galaxy Wars and the way his arm muscles barely fit into his sleeves anymore and how he always –

Okay, you're doing it again.

The kid does have some redeeming qualities about himself though. Like the way he talks to you when Carly's not around, or how he knows exactly what you like on your sandwiches (mostly extra meat) or how he's one of the only people that knows how to handle and deal with you. It's amazing what he's put up with in regards to you in the last four years. If it was anyone else, they would have been long gone a few months in, sporting a few broken limbs and not a single look back. But it wasn't anyone else, and that's what made everything special – it was Freddie, the smart, lovable, goofy, cunning (at times, mostly when under the influence of you) tech boy for your webshow with a crazy mom and a big heart who just happens to know you better than anyone else.

You've had these feelings for him for so long now that you've just began to accept them as a part of your daily life – the sky is blue, the grass is green, I like Freddie just a little bit more than a friend. That's the thing, though: it's not just a little bit more, it's a lotta bit more, and that scares you. Sure, you've had crushes before, meaningless dates, casual flings, but you never took them to heart because you knew they wouldn't last. When things started to change with Freddie – things like a colony of butterflies having a dance party in your stomach whenever he smiled at you instead of you wanting to pound his face in – you knew that this was different, it would make or break things. Things like your friendship.

That's why you waited. What Mama wants, Mama gets – but not with something like this.

It was agony, of course, but in a way, it wasn't that hard to hide. Hear Freddie mention liking a girl, verbally abuse said girl/horrendous excuse for a human being, physically reprimand Freddie for even thinking about liking said girl; that was that, and it was said and done. This time, however, you weren't doing it so Freddie wouldn't humiliate himself in front of the girl, who was almost always ten rungs above him on the social ladder. No, now, it was for you. Each punch was enunciated with a silent plea, a desire to say what you were really feeling. No, Freddie. Notice me. Not her. No, Freddie. Stop being such a nub. Notice me. Notice me.

The way you saw it, though, was that if you were physically abusing him, he was noticing you, and that was perfectly fine with you. In a way, that's how it had always been, especially during his Carly-obsession. Carly will never love you because you're a nub and she is not. You smell like feet and she does not, then. Now, Carly will never love you because I do. It didn't make sense, but had that always been your underlying message? You didn't know it back then, but maybe you really had always felt this way towards him.

Another reason why you didn't dare let him know about your feelings towards him was because you knew he wouldn't return them. It made sense why he liked (loved, or so he claimed) Carly: she was, well, Carly – always the center of attention, perky and good-looking, if at times neurotic and frazzled, and indeed the driving force behind you and Freddie's friendship. It was cliché and something you really didn't like to think about, but why would he like you, Sam Puckett, meat-lover extraordinaire and Ridgeway's go-to girl for a good punch, over Carly? Over anyone, really? You knew it was one of those self-destructive things that would make you have the desire to watch stupid chick flicks (although, you did have a limit: anything but The First Kiss) and eat your weight in chocolate (which didn't seem too bad). According to Sixteen magazine – not that you would ever read it – there's no point in liking a guy who would never go for you. But you're a Puckett, and Pucketts never give up.

And it's not like it didn't take you millenniums to accept it. When you finally came to the realization that yes, you did in fact like Freddie, not just like as a friend, but like-like in that juvenile elementary school sleepover session of Truth or Dare way, it took you all you had not to beat yourself with your butter sock. You couldn't sleep, couldn't focus, couldn't eat – not even Fat Cakes would snap you out of this seemingly never-ending trance. You couldn't like Freddie Benson. It just wasn't the way things were supposed to go. Sure, you'd fall in love someday, after traveling all over the country, working odd jobs, and buying a multitude of miniature ponies, but it was supposed to be with some rich European hunk with an eight-pack – not a childhood friend you occasionally beat up that may or may not have been your first kiss.

But when you finally came to the conclusion that liking Freddie was just something you couldn't control (and yes, you had tried everything from meditation to medication), a storm cloud of anxiety settled into the atmosphere of your mind, and the thunderstorms of thoughts began. A casual brush of your hand with Freddie's, once leading to you yelling at him to keep his hands to himself, now made you slide a few inches away from him and avoid his glances. A high-five between friends was no longer that, and instead an electrifying touch. You became awkward and edgy around him, clumsy and acting as if you were in surprise of your own limbs, always jumping and jittery whenever you hung out, even if it was with Carly too. Not that you'd dare be alone with him – who knows what could come out of your untrusting mouth?

You used to like being alone with him. You find solace in the times when the two of you would end up on the couch together when Carly hadn't gotten home yet or was on a date or there was some kind of wonderful thing that involved Carly not being there. It was always easy, being alone with Freddie, and there was never a dull moment in your conversations. He made you laugh, and it was never fake (you don't even know how to fake a laugh). You could tell him things you would never tell Carly, like what it felt like to grow up without a father, and he would understand, because he had too, and things like the stupid pranks you used to pull each other, and it was always just so effortless, and you never had to try to have a good time with him.

You can't really pinpoint when it was that you started liking him in this way: it wasn't a specific event, like your first kiss with him, or when you walked in on his and Carly's dance at the Groovy Smoothie, but maybe somewhere in between, that marked the beginning of – all this. It just seemed like one day you had woken up and thought of Freddie in a different light. After all you'd been through, you deemed it appropriate that you should want him in a different way than wanting to beat him up. In a way, you had always liked him, even if previously it had meant liking ruining his life or liking stuffing cheese down his pants. At least you always wanted something to do with him, wanted some kind of reaction out of him directed towards you.

So after everything that's happened – not just in the past few years, but in the past few hours, like the stupid Mood Face app and stupid Carly stupidly thinking you liked stupid Brad and that painfully stupid lie about a stupid two-headed frog – you don't really feel like talking to Freddie when he comes to talk to you, especially because you know it's about the whole Mood Face debacle, and you don't even use that word.

He peeks his head out of the door, a wary look on his face, and says, "Yo yo."

"Carly send you to find me?" You're not big on formalities – especially with this doof.

"Nope."

You scowl. "Oh, so you don't know we had a little argument." It's not a question.

"She told me about your 'little' argument," he says, slipping his hands in his pockets and leaning on the wall opposite the one you're sitting against. "I just said she didn't tell me to come find you."

So it was his choice.

"Good."

"Carly's right," he says, almost like a reflex.

You heave an elongated sigh, rising into a loud groan.

"Groan all you want."

"I don't care what your stupid Pear Pad app says about me being in love. I'm not into Brad like that." It's a tiny hint, and maybe he won't get it, but you're trying and you expect him to as well.

He scoffs. "Lately, every time I tell you that Brad and I are doing something together, you wanna come hang with us."

"And that means I'm in love with him?" For a boy who claimed to be so smart, he was being really stupid.

"Well, you hate me!" He exclaims.

And there it was. The core of your every action, according to him, is based on the fact that you hate him. Sam can't be in love with me, she hates me! No, he'd never even consider it because it's an absurd idea in itself. Maybe it's because you spent so long drilling it into his head that you simply don't like him. Or, maybe it's because society has warped your brains into thinking a girl like you would never fall for a boy like him – yet here you are.

"I never said I hate you."

"Yeah, you have!" His voice goes high with the sheer disbelief that you would ever do anything in regards to him besides hate him. Right. "Like nine hundred times. I still have the birthday card you gave me that says, 'Happy Birthday, I hate you." Your face remains a blank stare (look on the bright side, at least he kept the card). "'Hate, Sam'!"

You sigh, becoming over-exasperated by the minute with his presence. "Just leeeaave."

"Fine, I'll leeeaave," he responds, mocking you.

"Bye!"

"But before I go—"

You're up and all in his face at the snap of a finger. "That's it. Get out of here before I do a double fist dance on your face." You point at the door, enunciating your growing desire for him to leave you alone so you don't have to think about how much you don't actually want him to go.

"You can threaten your double-fist face dancing all you want. But Carly's still right." His tone turns serious, more serious than you'd like it to, and you can practically hear the dramatic piano music playing. "Look, I know it's scary for you to put your feelings out there, because you never know if the person you like is going to like you back. Everyone feels that way. But you never know what might happen if you—"

You don't get to hear the rest of what his cheesy monologue may have become, because you're grabbing his shoulders and closing your eyes and pressing your lips against his and it's a lot better than you thought it would be the second time around. He doesn't kiss back, but he doesn't let go, and that's saying something.

And even though you knew you had just destroyed the fort you had so carefully built around yourself, the feeling of it was more than amazing. Years of denial, months of resistance, all shattered by one kiss that left you feeling invincible. You burned bridges you never meant to make, erasing all of the stupid things you'd done that had been justified by a "better safe than sorry" mantra.

Finally you pull back slowly, never taking your eyes off of his expression, which is currently somewhere in between confusion and surprise. He stutters wordlessly for a moment, blinking. "I…"

"Sorry."

"It's cool."

And really, you weren't that sorry, and you bet that to him, it wasn't that "cool," but you still stay there, standing there, looking at each other for what seems like forever. There's something beyond this, and you know eventually you'll have to talk about it, but you don't want to. You want to stay here, with him, basking in your own victory, for a very long time.

A/N – Just so you know, listening to Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger definitely increases one's motivation to finish a particularly drawn-out fic like this one, unless of course you get easily distracted by the enticing beats and feel the need to dance.

Oh, right, so the inspiration for this fic came from the Death Cab for Cutie song Your Heart Is An Empty Room. The title and the lyrics at the beginning are from said song, and yes, I realize that in the original song, it's she stopped running months ago, but I had to modify it to fit the situation.

Anyways, as a fellow reader of many fics on this site, I do realize how annoying it can get to have the author constantly hounding you to review their work, but then again, as a fellow author of not-that-many fics on these site, an author who studied the last scene of iOMG a lot more closely than she should have, I am begging you humbly for some nice reviews.

– Kait