This is the Grimmjow POV of my other story, The ER. Once again, this has happened to me in real life; my friend died a few weeks ago due to Choriocarcinoma. So, don't think this can't happen, because it can.
Written for yukidaru, who said it seemed as though The ER was Ulquiorra's love towards Grimmjow and that it seemed like a one-sided relationship.
I shook the martini around in the mixer, looking absentmindedly out over the vibrating throng splayed out in front of me. I poured the apple martini in a glass, pushed it toward some guy who I had no inclination to know, and got some money. Yeah, sure, being a bartender wasn't all that boring, but it wasn't all that fun or life-changing either. This was just a gig for now...I figured I'd find something better later.
My boyfriend Ichigo worked as a dancer here in Dying Sun, the name of this nightclub. And I worked here as a bartender, because I had nothing better to do. What else was I supposed to do in this small godforsaken excuse for a town? I certainly couldn't land a job at the ER or anything. I'm not medically talented, and heck, it takes me like, five minutes just to get a Band-Aid over a papercut. And being the mailman just doesn't have that same ring as 'Grimmjow the Bartender' for me.
"Hey, hot stuff," one man says to me, a guy with brown hair and black eyes who I've never seen before.
"Yeah, not like I can say the same 'bout you." With a hurt look the guy wanders off, and several other people at the bar snicker.
I stretch and yawn. It's three in the morning, and people are still partying like there's no tomorrow. I mean, I can understand the people who want to gawk at the dancers, because don't get me wrong, those dancers are HAWT. Like Ichigo. Except our relationship isn't the kind of relationship that's always described in books, where you fall in true love with someone and you never ever look at anyone else again. It didn't feel like that, which made me think that Ichigo and I would get broken up sometime in the near future. And, in all honesty, it didn't matter to me whether we broke up or not.
I'm a bartender in Dying Sun because Ichigo works here, and because he's needy. Because he doesn't want me to work anywhere else so that he can keep an eye on me to make sure I'm not cheating on him or anything. I'll admit the hours aren't great, working as a bartender here, but it's not actually that bad. You get people drunk and don't get in trouble if they crash their cars later on! Plus you get money for shaking around a mixer with liquor and ice in it. So...I mean, it's pretty easy.
Yeah, sure, there are barfights and all the usual stuff, when someone gets way too drunk and someone says something insulting. And then I have to go and break them up. Sometimes they're violent, like with knives and broken glass and stuff like that, and those times I can get hurt pretty badly. Most of the time, though, they're just punches and stuff, and I can live with that. I'm a tough guy. I mean, I guess you have to be when you're a bartender. You have to know when a person's just drunk enough to totter out the door, but not too drunk that they insinuate a bar fight that has everybody at the bar throwing glass at each other. You have to know how certain people hold their liquor. And all right, I admit it. Sometimes it's really hard to tell. But I figure it's not too bad of a job.
Sure, I've had to go to the ER a few times for stab wounds and stuff like that. That's kind of rare here, because every guy and girl thinks I'm "hot" and should be one of the dancers, and so don't want to hurt me. But then you always get the overly sadistic one who just wants to pierce you, to claim you in some way, and then everything pretty much goes downhill and results in said customer being booted out onto the street. Plus, I couldn't be a dancer anyway. I can't dance worth shit. And doing twirls around a pole in a thong and a pair of jeans doesn't seem like my idea of a good night, thank you very much. Ichigo likes it. I have no idea why.
I'm fascinated with the ER. It's touch and go. It seems a helluva lot more interesting than working as a bartender in a seedy nightclub. Not to mention there's this guy that I've seen around there a few times. I don't know what his name is, where he lives, WHO he is, even, other than the fact that he's an ER surgeon, but he's pretty damn hot. And he looks like the kind of guy I'd click well with.
He's about a head shorter than me, with almost-shoulder-length shaggy black hair. He has these big, dark green eyes that are just adorable, and he has these scars going down from his eyes to the end of his face. I don't know where he got those scars, but goddamn, they're sexy. They make him look like he's crying; they make me want to kiss the "tears" away. There was just something about him, you know? Like when you see that one person on the street that you keep seeing over and over again, then you finally meet up with them at some place, and you get to talking, and you're all, "Whoa! Why didn't we start talking BEFORE?" Yeah. That's how it felt. I really don't know what it was. Sure, he looked sexy and everything, but he had this quiet sort of personality that would support you no matter what you were going through. He had a dry sense of humor, a good head on his shoulders, knew when to be emotional and when to be strong. I can't pinpoint exactly what drew us together, but it may have been something along those lines that first attracted me to him. And I suppose my problems helped us get together, too.
My name is Grimmjow Jeagerjacques. I'm...hmm. Dead, for lack of a better status. I'm not depressed that I'm dead, no. Why, you ask? Because of the man I mentioned in the above paragraph and because of how he changed my life. Let me tell you the story of a certain Mr. Ulquiorra Schiffer, and his brave and courageous struggle to save me during my battle with testicular cancer.
The ER and One Thousand Cranes are strongly related. You'll see, if you read the chapters, that they're highly similar. This is just from Grimmjow's POV.