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The sea was cold and the sun was setting. It had been at least a week since Squidward killed himself. And ever sense then, things have gone to hell.
At first, things didn't seem so bad. Squidward missed a day at work, so what? Maybe he was sick? Or maybe he was just being lazy again. Either way, you can't run a restaurant without a cashier. So of course, Spongebob was sent out to check up on Squidward. Spongebob wasn't expecting to see anything too horrible, but once he entered the house, It didn't take long until the police were called.
Ever since then, Spongebob completely shut down. He spent the majority of his time in his house, only leaving when he needed to get food. He didn't even want to work anymore. After all, he had much more important things to do, like sleeping way too much, and crying, and watching tv, and crying, and missing his friend, and crying.
Despite what it seemed, his lack of productivity made him feel like a complete failure. But he just couldn't get himself to be productive, no matter how much he wanted to. What made matters worse was that he felt tired almost all the time. In fact, he was tired right now. So he decided to go upstairs and take a nap, even though it was still bright outside.
Squidward stared at himself in horror and confusion.
"How?"
That's all Squidward could say. How the hell could this happen to him? He just wanted to die. He just wanted to move on from his horrible life. But here he was, dead and awake. Staring at himself in the mirror for what felt like an eternity. He never thought that he would be disturbed by his own face.
Perhaps he should have seen this coming. After all, he knew that ghosts existed. So coming back after dying made sense to him. But why did he have to look so weird? Why did he have to look so monsterous? Why did he have to have super duper spooky hyper realistic eyes?
Squidward hated the way that he looked. But a small part of him just wanted to get out of his decaying house. In an attempt to calm himself down. But he also worried that if someone saw him, they would scream at him like an annoying five year old, call the fuzz, and then he'd get sent to a laboratory to be horrifically experimented on. Like in the movies. And he obviously didn't want that to happen. But even if it didn't happen, he couldn't see why people screaming in terror over his appearance would be very fun.
That was, until he remembered that Spongebob existed. Scaring random people didn't feel like the best idea, but scaring Spongebob? Now that would be fun.
It didn't take long until the middle of the night arrived. It was the perfect time for a certain someone to break into Spongebob's house and then shock him. Convienently, Spongebob was awake. Which would make scaring him a little bit easier, sense he didn't have to waste time trying to wake him up.
Spongebob was rotting in his bed, lying on his back, and blankly staring at the wall. He had a dream that he could barely remember. But he had a feeling that it involved Squidward in some sort of way, which gave him a warm and bittersweet feeling.
Suddenly, his door creaked. He was a little bit startled by this, and he slowley stood up a little to get a better look. Then the door creaked even more.
"Gary? Is that you?" Spongebob asked as he sleepily rubbed his eyes. There was a dark shadow in his room that was slowly getting bigger. Then, the door finally opened all the way. Spongebob could clearly see who was in his room now. And it wasn't Gary.
Spongebob's heart sank once he realized who was in front of him. It was the friend that he's been grieving over for what felt like forever, Squidward. Spongebob teared up at the sight. His throat ached, and he felt like he was about to fall from a building. But at the same time, he never felt happier in his entire life. He couldn't help but smile stupidly.
Squidward ignored Spongebob's grin and waved his arms up in the air. He made a pretty underwhelming growling sound, in an attempt to scare him, only for Spongebob to violently dart towards him. Squidward flinched a little. He started to worry that he might have scared Spongebob so badly, he set him into a fight or flight responce.
But instead of being met a punch in the face like he expected. Squidward was met with a hug, and the sound of crying. Loud, annoying, ugly crying. At first Squidward was confused, but it didn't take long for him to realize why Spongebob was crying. Squidward didn't know how he didn't see this coming, and he felt like an idiot for it. Because of course Spongebob would react like this. "Spongebob, I'm fine, you can shut up now.".
Spongebob's crying softened a little, and the room went morbidly quiet. "I'm sorry it's just, I'm so happy you're here. I care about you so much." Spongebob sniffled. His words caused Squidward to feel a surge of guilt wash over him. He really didn't think that anyone would care if he died. Not even Spongebob. But he was wrong, dead wrong.
Squidward reluctantly hugged Spongebob back. Not just to comfort Spongebob but also to comfort himself. As he was starting to get a bit emotional as well, even if he'd hate to admit it. Squidward was wishing that this went the way he planned. Why couldn't Spongebob just scream in fear like a normal person? It would have been funny, Squidward would've had a good laugh, and then they'd both move on. But no, that didn't happen. Because Spongebob loved him. The fact that someone cared about him so much, caused his eyes to sting a bit with tears.
"Squiddy? Are you crying?"
"No!"
...
"Okay, maybe a little."