It was the night of December 31st, and Phillip J Fry had just arrived in New York City on a bus from his home state of New Mexico. Meandering around Brooklyn, he found himself heading up the bridge to Manhattan. He looked out onto the city, sun retreating into the river against a cotton-candy sky. The lights of the skyscrapers had began twinkling on one by one. He was glad he made it here, even if he did only decide to move here earlier that same week.

Nice as the view was, he was getting cold, and he had just spent all the money he had left over after the bus ride on a hot dog and a fake rolex a man in an alleyway sold him. Before he had much time to start thinking about where he was going to sleep that night, he noticed a man straddling the bridge railing and looking down into the East River.

"Hey!" Fry blurted out at the man as he stopped walking, "What are you doing up there? Did you lose something in the river?"

The man, obviously about to attempt suicide, was caught off guard at this ridiculous question.

"What!?" he shouted back at Fry.

"I said," Fry yelled back, hands now cupped over his mouth so the stranger could hear him better, "Did you lose something in the river!?"

"Yeah," the man on the bridge replied, full of sarcasm, "I dropped something in the river."

"Dang, I know how that feels," Fry said as he walked up to the man on the railing, "I just lost my watch a little bit ago. Fell right off my wrist and into the gutter. Also, the hot dog I was eating fell into the same gutter when I put it down to look for the watch."

The man, now turned completely around to face Fry, had no idea how to respond. Who was this guy? Was he mocking him?

"I can help you look for it if you want," Fry said with his hand outstretched to the stranger, "but I don't think you'll find it from up there."

The man hesitated before finally meeting Fry's grasp. Fry pulled, and the man leapt down into the yellow glow of the streetlight.

Fry got his first good look at the man since he first started talking to him. He was a little bit shorter than Fry, though not by much, with brown skin and loose waves of black hair that fell just short of his forehead.

"I'm Fry," Fry said, "what's your name?"

"I'm Ben," he hesitated, eyeing Fry suspiciously, "but people call me Bender."

"Nice to meet you. I'm new to the city so I don't know how to get down to the river, but we should probably start there."

"Eh, forget about it. It's been a long day, I'm gonna go grab a drink instead."

Bender expected Fry to get the hint and go his separate way, but instead the redhead gave a simple "okay", put his hands in his pockets, and followed right along.

"So you're new in town, huh?" asked Bender after they'd gotten settled in at the bar.

"Yeah, I just got off the bus today. I guess I have an uncle who's a professor at some university."

"Really?" Bender raised an eyebrow, "No offense, Fry, but you don't exactly strike me as the academic type."

"Yeah, but he also runs some kind of bike delivery company to pay for his research."

"Oh, so he's already hooked you up with a job?"

"Nope. I was going to ask tomorrow."

An hour and a few rounds of drinks later, Fry was obviously not able to handle the amount of liquor Bender was.

"So what did you lose in the river by the way?" Fry slurred.

"Do you really not know? I thought you were pulling some act to talk me off the ledge."

"I, uh," Fry paused for a hiccup, and then laughed at his hiccup, "I don't get it. Did you not lose anything?"

"No, I was up there so I could jump off."

Fry looked at him blankly as he slowly swayed, struggling to piece together the implication.

"To kill myself." Bender eventually relented.

"Whaaaaaat," Fry said as he slowly reared backwards, "why were you doing that?"

Bender groaned. Was he really going to have to get into this touchy feely shit? Under normal circumstances, he probably would have told Fry to forget about it and quickly left after a brusque goodbye. But these weren't exactly normal circumstances, were they? After all, he had just attempted suicide less than an hour ago. And this dim redhead did just technically save his life.

He looked over at Fry, face glazed bright red and wobbling in his barstool, and something about the guy compelled him to let his guard down. Maybe it was because Fry was too drunk to ever remember anything Bender said, or maybe it was because he felt like he could trust him. Whatever the reason, he decided to let someone in. Just this once.

"I don't know. Life is just hard, you know? My parents raised me to believe I could do great things, and I guess I am pretty good at what I do. But I don't always like the person I am."

There was silence. Oh god, Bender thought, why did I just say that?

When was the last time he'd gotten that real with anyone? And yet there he was, spilling his heart out to some stranger?

"Well if it's any consolation," Fry replied after a short pause, sloshing his arm around Bender's shoulder, "I think you're a pretty great guy."

"Geez alright," Bender said, "you've already talked me down. You don't need to do any further convincing."

"No, Bender, I mean it," Fry said as he poked his pointer finger to Bender's chest, "You're my only friend in this whole city. In the whole world, probably. And I'm not just saying that because I'm drunk."

Bender was silent. "I'm your friend?" he replied at last.

"Damn right!" Fry exclaimed, "but also, I am very drunk."

"No shit," Bender replied, "I should probably get you to your hotel before you pass out. It's the least I can do after what you've done for me."

"Oh. I forgot to get a hotel. I also don't have any more money 'cause I spent it all on the watch I bought for 20 bucks."

Bender sighed.

"Alright, well, you can come sleep at my apartment tonight. But just for tonight, ok? I'm not running a charity."