Smosh One Shots and Short Stories

Eventful event II (Ianthony friendship)

Ian and Anthony were now sitting on the bench of Ian's hotel room balcony. They still haven't really started talking much but Ian managed to calm himself down a little. "So you haven't told anyone because you thought you could make it work?", Anthony asked carefully. He wasn't judging and that made Ian willing to talk. "At first, yeah. Now I'm just too scared", he admitted, his voice breaking at the end from all the crying before. "I have to tell them that they are going to lose their jobs like next week and I could've told them earlier but I just didn't because I'm stupid", he rambled on. "You're not stupid. You just said you're scared and that's not stupid, that's valid", Anthony immediately shut down his verbal self-harm.

It was silent for a few moments again. "I don't even know what I am going to do. I should've been looking for jobs or something but I... I can't take it", Ian broke the silence again. "You will find something. It's not like you have no skills to show off. You did found a company and had a leading position for years besides all the creative work you did", Anthony tried to find something positive to say. He immediately got shut down: "And now I fucked my own company up and my life just right with it." Ian felt his friend's arm around his shoulders again and it immediately soothed the rage at himself a little bit. "I'm sure your friends won't be mad for too long. They know you and they will understand sooner or later", Anthony said and kind of spoke for himself at that moment.

"Aren't you mad at me? It's kind of your company too", Ian wanted to know. "I was the one who left. I'm definitely not mad at you about something I didn't want to save back then. Also, I know how hard it is to make these things work on your own. 'Cause that's exactly what I did and I just had to worry about myself for most of the time. You are carrying a good amount of people through all this", Anthony answered honestly. "Yeah and now I let everyone down", Ian just said silently.

"Okay, let's talk some facts. You have your laptop here? Show me some numbers", Anthony finally wanted to get to the core of all this. So Ian got up to go inside. His friend immediately followed and sat down with him and the laptop. Anthony would lie if he said the numbers weren't really bad. Ian wasn't exaggerating. "Wow", Anthony couldn't hold back. Ian just felt so embarrassed all of a sudden. It was like all that was his fault. "Okay, so what did you try? I bet it's a long list, but just start somewhere", Anthony continued to not give up. Ian just sighed. He wouldn't tell him everything. He just couldn't. But he started to tell him a good part of it.

Anthony was just listening crossing things off his own list he had in mind about what could help somehow. But Ian really did try everything. "And I did try to help out... like... myself", he finally ended. "You put your own money into this?", Anthony wanted to be sure he understood correctly. A careful nod was all Ian could do. "So... you are pretty broke too?", he figured concerned. "I guess you could say that", Ian mumbled. There was more to that, but he felt so bad about it that he couldn't make himself confess.

"Well, you do have a problem", Anthony couldn't deny and made Ian laugh helplessly. "Am I really the only one you've told so far?", he then asked and once more received a nod. "Okay, I only see one thing you didn't try", Anthony came up with something. Ian immediately looked up at him in anticipation. "You didn't ask for help", he said and made Ian look away in embarrassment. "It's not too late to ask for help, man. I am definitely in", he added. "You are not. This is a dying company, a sinking ship. Stay out of that", Ian tried to convince his friend otherwise. "It might be a sinking ship, but it's not underwater yet. Tell your people and maybe a couple of them can help in some way too", Anthony stayed positive. "Oh, yeah sure. If someone told me I'll lose my job, the first thing I think of is helping my boss out", Ian sarcastically said. "They are your friends too. Don't forget that", Anthony reminded him.

The two ended up fighting a bit over Anthony helping Smosh out, but they agreed on something: As soon as possible, which appeared to be the next day, they scheduled a company-wide meeting including Anthony to start talking about everything. Ian was incredibly scared of all the reactions and there was no chance he would get any sleep tonight. But Anthony decided to stay up with him and he really didn't do too bad of a job trying to distract him. They had a lot to talk about after all these years.

Part three coming soon