Chapter 1: Homecoming With a Twist
The lobby of Bushwell Plaza echoed like a giant, polished cave. Marly’s suitcase wheels hit a seam in the marble floor, the thump-thump-thump a percussive beat under the vaulted ceiling’s hum. She hated that sound. It announced her. Every head that subtly turned felt like a judgement, a silent question: Is that Carly Shay’s sister?
She kept her eyes forward, aimed at the bank of elevators. She was just a college student coming home for spring break. Just a girl in jeans and a worn-out sweatshirt, her hair in a practical ponytail. Nothing to see.
Then she saw him.
A man leaning against the brass mailboxes, back to her, studying his phone. Dark suit jacket, shoulders that filled it out properly. Short, tidy hair. Something in the cant of his hips, the easy confidence of his stance, made her breath catch in her throat. Her steps slowed.
He turned.
It was Freddie, but not the Freddie from her memories. The sharp line of a beard defined his jaw, trimmed close. The suit was charcoal grey, tailored, no trace of the cartoonish graphic tees he’d lived in as a teen. He looked… grown. His eyes, though, were the same—warm and a little bit mischievous. They found her immediately, and his lips quirked.
“Miss me, tech girl?”
The old nickname, his special one, delivered in that deeper, calmer voice, unspooled the tension in her shoulders. A smile broke across her face before she could stop it.
“You clean up almost okay,” she said, rolling her suitcase to a stop in front of him.
He pushed off the mailboxes and closed the space between them in two strides. His arms went around her, pulling her into an embrace that was both familiar and thrillingly new. He smelled like cedar and clean cotton, and underneath it, like home. She buried her face in his shoulder, the wool of his jacket soft against her cheek. For a second, in the middle of the bustling lobby, they were in a private pocket of stillness.
“You have no idea,” he murmured into her hair. His hand rubbed a slow circle on her back.
They broke apart, but his hands stayed on her arms. The air between them fizzed.
“How was the train?” he asked.
“Long. Smelly. Full of people having conversations I desperately did not want to hear.” She glanced around. A woman with a small dog was staring. Marly dropped her voice. “You look very corporate. Should I be calling you Mr. Benson now?”
“Only on Tuesdays.” He grinned, the old Freddie flashing through. “Had a client meeting downtown. Didn’t have time to change.”
“I like it,” she said, her fingers brushing a bit of lint from his lapel. A proprietary gesture. She saw him notice it.
“Yeah?” The single word was low, just for her.
“Yeah. Makes you look like a grown-up who might buy me a decent coffee.”
He laughed, the sound swallowed by the lobby’s noise. “Your wish, etcetera. Your place or mine? Spencer’s at a… wellness retreat. Something about aligning his chakras with a theremin.”
“Yours, then. Mom’s probably turned my room into a meditation studio for her crystal collective.” She grabbed her suitcase handle. Freddie’s hand settled over hers, his fingers lacing through her own to take it. The simple contact sent a warm jolt up her arm. They walked toward the elevators, their steps in sync.
“So,” she said, as the elevator doors closed, sealing them in brass and mirrors. “Three whole months. Any closer to telling the world? Or at least, you know, my sister?”
The lightness bled from his expression. He watched the floor numbers blink. “Marly.”
“Don’t ‘Marly’ me. We said we’d talk about it when I got back. I’m back.” She leaned against the wall, facing him. “I’m tired of hiding. I’m not a secret, Freddie. I’m a person.”
“I know that.” He turned to her, his face earnest. “God, you know I know that. It’s not about you being a secret. It’s about the… the asteroid belt of complications that comes with this. With us. Carly—”
“Carly is my sister, not my warden. And she’s your friend. A friend who would want you to be happy.”
“Would she?” He ran a hand through his hair, a gesture of frustration she remembered well. “This isn’t just ‘hey, I’m dating someone.’ This is ‘hey, I’m dating your little sister, the one you still see as a nine-year-old with braces, behind your back for months.’ The math on that blowing up nicely is not great.”
The elevator dinged, opening onto his floor. The familiar hallway, the weird abstract carpet. They walked to his door in a tense silence. He unlocked it and wheeled her suitcase inside.
His apartment was neat, modern. A wall of impressive tech equipment glowed quietly beside a window overlooking the city. It was so him, now. The Freddie who built systems, not just pie-in-the-sky gadgets.
She turned to face him as he shut the door. The apartment was quiet, the lobby’s roar replaced by the low hum of his computers.
“What are you afraid of?” she asked, not unkindly.
“Losing you,” he said, the words quick and raw. “Because if this goes badly, that’s what happens. I lose you, and I probably lose Carly, and Spencer, and this… this whole life I’ve got here. It all ties back to her. To iCarly.”
“That was ten years ago, Freddie. We’re not kids on a web show anymore. You have your own life. I have mine. They don’t have to orbit Carly.” She stepped closer. “I love my sister. But I am so sick of living in her gravitational pull. I want something that’s mine. I want you to be mine. Officially.”
He looked down at her, his conflict plain on his face. He cradled her cheek, his thumb stroking her skin. “You are the bravest person I know.”
“Then be brave with me.”
He kissed her then. It was not a kiss of victory, but of shared fear, of longing, of a promise that was terrifying to make. It tasted like coffee and hope and the lingering bitterness of doubt.
When they parted, they rested their foreheads together.
“Okay,” he breathed, the word warm against her lips. “Okay. We’ll figure out a way to tell her.”
Relief, sweet and sharp, flooded her. She kissed him again, softer this time.
His phone buzzed on the kitchen counter, rattling against the marble. They ignored it. It buzzed again. And again. Insistent.
With a sigh, Freddie pulled back, giving her an apologetic look. He walked over and scooped it up. His brow furrowed at the screen. “It’s Spencer. Like, ten times.”
“Is his chakra stuck?” Marly asked, trying to reel the lightness back in.
Freddie’s face had gone pale. He wasn’t scrolling, he was just staring. “No. It’s… it’s Carly.”
“What about her?”
He looked up, his eyes wide. “She’s here. In the city. She just landed.” He swallowed, the sound loud in the quiet room. “And she’s on her way up.”
He walked her backward, not breaking the kiss, their footwork an uncoordinated, urgent shuffle.