When Alan asked Fangurl to be his girlfriend, everyone in the Dispatch was thrilled, especially me. I knew Alan was a sweet guy who would take care of her. I was so happy to know that my two best friends would get to be together, and would get to possibly one day marry and have kids, which would automatically make me their godfather.
But after the cheering, and after the congratulations were passed around, after clocking out, everyone headed to the local bar to continue the celebration. But not me; no I went back home to my apartment.
Opening the door to the dark flat, I casually tossed my jacket down onto the couch and walked straight into the kitchen. Once I was in the kitchen, I went over to the cabinet and retrieved a bottle of vodka off the top shelf. Popping off the cork, I took a swig of the bitter drink and grimaced as it burned my throat.
Now that I was at home, I could say whatever I felt like saying, and dammit I had a lot to say. I do not think that Alan and Fangurl should be together. I think Fangurl and I need to be together.
I was Fangurl's best friend all through high school, and treated her respectfully and like a sister. I was considered an outcast at the beginning, because I had a hard time trusting and opening up to people. But I remember Fangurl Phantomhive coming up to me at lunch one day and offering to sit next to me underneath one of the trees on school grounds. We became best friends on that day. She introduced me to her friends Grell Sutcliff and William T. Spears the next day, and I attempted to bond with them, but bonded more with Fangurl.
Sophomore year, Fangurl got a lot more girlfriends and introduced me to them, which in turn, I ended up dating most of them before the year was over. That was the beginning of my long line of being a heartbreak to women. Fangurl never showed any signs of jealousy or anger that I was dating her friends, which sort of hit me as strange.
Junior year, I realized that the reason I thought Fangurl's strange signs were strange, was because I had a crush on her. She had been my first, and at times, only friend. She knew all of my strange habits and still accepted me for them. This was also the year Fangurl got her very first boyfriend, Ronald Knox. He was the pitcher on our school baseball team, and everyone loved him. Well, everyone except me.
I was so jealous and upset when Fangurl started dating him that that was when my experimentation with cigarettes and alcohol began. I became so addicted to the nicotine and the taste of vodka that I began to skip classes more to just go to the park to smoke or drink.
Seeing Fangurl and Ronald together made me seethe with anger inside. I knew Ronald was just a stupid kid who couldn't love Fangurl like I could. Finally, I let my jealousy get the best of me, and stopped Ronald in the hall one day and warned him "If you ever hurt her in anyway, if you break her heart or make her cry, I will kick your ass Ronald Knox, do you hear me?"
Ronald pushed me away from him, which I took as an invitation to start a fight so I punched him in the face. He hit me back in the jaw and before we both knew it, we were on the floor hitting each other. I had managed to get him pinned down and was punching him in the chest and face. The rush it was giving me died whenever I heard Fangurl yell "Eric stop it!" She pulled me off of her boyfriend and down the hall to cool down.
That was the first time I'd gotten suspended, and my parents weren't happy at all. They only allowed Fangurl to come see me just to bring me homework and help me study. "Eric what was going through your mind?" she asked one night while we studied.
"I just wanted to tell him to never hurt you or I'd beat him," I replied.
"Eric, Ronald won't hurt me, he's a good guy," Fangurl promised.
"What if there's someone better out there for you?" I wondered.
"Then I'll find him, I'll find my perfect match," Fangurl assured me. She then looked at my face from where Ronald punched me.
He had bruised my face up badly, but it was over Fangurl, so it was worth it. "I'm sorry Ronald hurt you," she whispered.
"It's okay, it'll heal," Eric said. I felt as she put her hand on my face atop the bruise and gently ran her fingers over it. Fangurl smiled at me and hugged me before standing up.
She was about to walk out when she noticed something sticking out from underneath the bed. Bending down, Fangurl picked up a half empty bottle of vodka and two cigarettes with wide eyes. Looking over at me, she asked "Why are these under your bed?"
I remained quiet. I didn't want Fangurl to find out about my drinking or smoking problems I had. "When did you start?" she asked and I could see tears forming in her eyes.
"A few months ago," I muttered.
"Eric this is wrong, you need to stop doing this," Fangurl advised. "Your liver and lungs are going to hate you if you keep it up."
"Fangurl, this is how I cope with things going on in life," I said.
She silently put down the cigarettes and vodka, hugged me, and left. I didn't talk to her for about a week after that.
Senior year, and we were back to being best friends again. She had dumped Ronald over the summer which made me super happy and as a result, my drinking and smoking went down drastically. I still had this growing crush on Fangurl, to where I could almost say that I loved her.
Well when graduation time came closer, Fangurl came to me and stated "Eric, I like you. More than a friend, would you maybe like be my boyfriend?"
I wanted to say yes. I wanted to take her in my arms and kiss her right there. This was the moment I had been waiting for, but I remember saying "Sorry Fangurl, but I don't feel anything for you except for a friend." It hurt me to say that, but I had to think about what was best for her, and I knew that with my smoking and drinking, that I was the least perfect person for her.
Those last four words broke every piece of her heart and for weeks she was crying and miserable, or at least that's what her brother told me. Fangurl said that she truly loved me, that I was her first crush and her first heartbreak. It hurt to see my best friend so heartbroken and crushed but I didn't know what would be best to do in this situation, so I just ignored her for a little bit until I was sure she'd moved on.
After that, I didn't hear from her for about five years. In that time, I attended the Shinigami training school where I met my other best friend, Alan Humphries. He was so much like Fangurl that I instantly connected with him. Grell Sutcliff, William T. Spears, and even Ronald Knox attended the Shinigami training school with me, and I became close to them.
Grell would mention Fangurl often and talk about how she was living in London still with her brother. I wanted to visit her badly and talk to her, but Grell, Ronald, and William refused to give me her new address. "We don't want you breaking her heart again," Grell said.
"I didn't think she liked me, otherwise I would've never said that," I promised.
"Well what's said is said, and now Fangurl is moving on," William informed.
Working at the Shinigami Dispatch Society has been good for me. It's kept my mind off of certain feelings and emotions, and it's helped keep my mind off of Fangurl.
That is, until last night when Alan invited me over to his apartment to ask me something important. "Is something wrong?" I asked concerningly as we sat down on his couch.
"Well, Eric I like this girl, and I really wanna date her, but I don't know how I should approach it," Alan said nervously.
I smiled and replied "Don't worry, I've had many girlfriends, it gets easier after every one of them."
"But Eric, I really, really like this girl. Have you ever truly had a crush on someone so bad that it almost controlled you?" Alan wondered.
His statement caused me to freeze. I thought back to high school and how I'd let my crush on Fangurl get blown way out of proportion that I started drinking and smoking. Looking at my brunette friend, I stated "I know exactly what that feels like Alan. That happened to me in high school."
"What did you do? Did you ask her out?" he asked, now interested in my story.
"No, I knew I wasn't good enough for her, so I chose not to tell her and instead let her find someone else she could be even happier with," I explained.
"But Eric, what if she loved you back?" Alan wondered.
I stood up. I didn't want to tell Alan anything else about my high school love life, especially anything that involved me talking about my crush with Fangurl. "Alan, just do what I didn't do; follow what your heart tells you."
With that, I left Alan's apartment and began walking back to my own flat. Pulling out a pack of cigarettes, I lit one and felt some stress begin to melt away as the nicotine entered my system. When I returned home, the cigarette was gone and I could hear the full bottle of vodka calling my name from inside.
I awoke this morning with a headache, but took some Advil to help. When I arrived at work, Alan met me in my office. "Eric, good news, I'm going to ask her out today," he said in an excited tone.
"Good for you Alan," I replied with a smile. "So where did you meet her?"
"I met her one day after a reaping. It was raining and she saw me outside of a tea shop where she works and offered me a hot cup of tea since I was wet and cold. We began chatting and I've been going back to see her almost every day for the past three months," Alan explained.
"Why haven't you told me about her yet then?" I wondered.
"Well we've been keeping it on the down low, cuz it's not yet official," Alan said.
There was a knock on my office door. "Alan, there is a girl here to see you," William notified.
"Okay, thank you sir," Alan responded as he stood up and ran down the hall.
William looked at me. "What is it?" I asked, noticing his expression was that of a man who was sorry.
"This won't end well for one of you Slingby," William stated before walking away.
Confused, I stood up and started to go after him before stopping dead in my tracks once I hit the hallway. Alan walked down the hall holding the hand of Fangurl Phantomhive. She saw me and stopped walking. I took in every feature of her. Fangurl looked almost exactly the same as she did in high school.
"Eric, this is my new girlfriend Fangurl. Fangurl, this is my best friend –" Alan started.
"We've met before Alan," I interrupted.
"You have?" the brunette asked.
"We were best friends in high school," Fangurl informed, taking her eyes off me and looking at her boyfriend.
"We still are best friends," I corrected before she looked back at me. "I'm happy that you two are together. You two seem like you deserve each other."
Sitting on my apartment couch, I chugged the last of my vodka before hearing a knock at the door. I opened it up to find Fangurl. "Hi," she said.
"Hi, would you like to come inside?" I offered as I let her step in.
"Thanks," she replied. "I see you still drink and smoke."
"Yeah," I guilt fully agreed.
"So Alan told me that you told him not to make the same mistake you did in high school by not asking out your crush, so I wanna know, who were you crushing on?" Fangurl questioned.
I felt my heart stop. I couldn't tell Fangurl that I had a crush on her in high school; oh who was I kidding? I still have a crush on her. But I couldn't tell her, not now that she was dating Alan. Then I remembered what I had told Alan, and he was right, if I would've just taken the chance in high school, then maybe things would be different between me and Fangurl.
So I sat her down on the couch and seated myself beside her. "Okay, if I tell you, you have to promise you won't get upset," I said.
"Eric, this was someone you knew in high school, of course I'm not gonna get upset," Fangurl promised.
I took a deep breath and looked intensely into her eyes. I wanted to say "I like you Fangurl." But what I instead did was lean forward and kissed her lips gently.
I expected Fangurl to push me away, but instead she pulled me closer by the collar of my work shirt. I could taste white wine on her lips and I knew she could probably taste the vodka and cigarettes on my breath. Slowly, I slid my arms around to her back and pulled her onto my lap.
Fangurl broke the kiss and looked at me. "You were who I liked Fangurl," I stated as I touched her face gently.
"Then why did you tell me the day before we graduated that you only saw me as a friend?" Fangurl wondered.
"Because I knew that I was probably the last person in the world who could make you truly happy. I am an alcoholic, smoking womanizer Fangurl, I knew that someone like me shouldn't be with someone like you," I explained as tears developed behind my green eyes.
Fangurl calmly slid her arms around my neck and kissed me again. I loved feeling her in my arms and near my body; this was almost like a long lost dream that was coming true. "Don't ever think that you're not good enough for me. I would take the Eric I became friends with any day over any other boy."
She ran a hand through my hair before laying her head on my shoulder with her arms still wrapped around me. "What about Alan?" I wondered as I began to kiss her neck.
"I love Alan, as a close friend, but my flame I have for you will never die Eric," Fangurl stated. "I know you treated me amazing as a friend, but how would you treat me as your girlfriend?"
Sweetly, I kissed Fangurl's lips and tasted the faint residue of wine again before whispering "I will take away any hurt that you may have. If there is any path I can venture down that will make you truly happy then I will go down it. You are my best friend and I love you."
I held her in my lap as we kissed one another again. "Please don't ever abandon me again," Fangurl pleaded as she removed my glasses.
Nudging my face against hers, I whispered "Never again will I abandon the precious meaning of my life."