You walked into the hallway of the Grump house. New Year's Eve. A Night of lasts. More than anyone really knew. It was about 7:00pm and Suzy grabbed your shoulder. "Are you coming to our party tonight?" she gleamed a smiled and her eyes glittered brighter than any diamonds.

"No," you answered, trying to swallow the lump in your throat, grimacing, "I'm not really feeling all that well. I think I'm gonna go home and take some medicine." This was it. Now was the time. As she gave a pout and was about to object, you push a letter into her hands. "Please, make sure Dan gets this tonight. He doesn't have to read it or anything, just... give it to him tonight."

She nodded and grinned. She patted you on the shoulder before wishing you good health and says goodbye for the last time... this year, she adds. "See you next year!" she yells with a giggle as you walk to your car, choking back tears. She didn't realize that goodbye was not just for this year, but for the next.

You drove home. Got everything ready. And you waited.

~Third Person Perspective~

It was about 11:00pm when everybody finally gathered together in the main room of the Grump household. Dan smiled at Suzy, who gave him a gasp. "I have something for you! It's from [y/n]!"

Dan frowned. "Why isn't she here?"

"She was feeling sick or something," Suzy explained, handing him the letter, "She said not to feel obligated to read it now or anything."

Despite the warning, Dan opened the letter and walked into Arin and Suzy's bedroom, where he could read quietly. Whatever [y/n] has to say, it must be important, if she wrote it down in a letter, he thought. He opened the letter and it read:

Dear Danny,

I'm doing it at midnight tonight. Something I should have done long before I ever met you and the Grumps. My heart has been hurting more deeply than ever before and there seems to be only one way to stop it: to make my heart stop. What better way to end your life than to just end the year, right? This isn't your fault, Dan. It's none of your faults. You are my hero. I love the hell out of you. God, I wish I could have mustered up the courage to tell you that during my life. Every time I saw your goddamn handsome face or heard your incredible singing voice, I melted. But even the best heroes can't save people from what is within themselves. You could never save me from myself. I'm too far gone. I partly hope you don't read this until years from now. I hope you find this when you're old and grey and you can't remember my name anymore. Maybe with a lovely woman that is so beautiful that you don't even remember that I existed. If that would make you happy, that would be when I would want you to find this. Long after they find my body rotting in my apartment, stinking up the couch after I've taken the eight dozen pills I've gotten lined up, as well as the booze and the cough syrup. I'm ready to die, Dan. Thanks for making my life a little more bearable.

All my love until the end,
[y/n]

Tears trickled down Dan's face as he crumpled the note and shoved it into his pocket. He yelled at Suzy that he had an emergency to attend to and that he had to go and he sprinted out the door to his car, where he sped to your apartment.

~Your Perspective~

You sat on the couch, the second bottle of beer already half gone. You wanted to make sure there was already alcohol in your system to ensure that nothing could go haywire. You felt drowsy from the drunken daze you were in. You glanced at the clock. 11:24pm. You really wanted to go for the 'started dying at Midnight' so you took a big sip out of the bottle. You glanced at all the prescription medications lined up in front of you. Four different bottles of pills with a large bottle of that nasty tasting cough syrup that they had given you when you'd had pneumonia. You thought for a moment about how Dan took care of you that day at his apartment, and Barry made you soup and...

No. No time for good memories. They began to blur in a haze from your mind anyways as you downed the rest of the beer. You glance at the clock again. 11:27pm now. Time isn't going nearly fast enough, and you're tempted to just swallow every last pill then and there. When the clock reaches 11:30pm, you reach for the first bottle of pills, but after you get it open, you throw it on the ground in shock. You hear a loud scream and pounding at the door.

"[Y/N]! OPEN THE DOOR! JESUS CHRIST, PLEASE LET ME IN!" a familiar voice shouted from the other side as fists banged on the wood. The lump in your throat was too big to let you respond vocally, so you tried to get up, but the alcohol was really getting to you.

"GODDAMN IT, [Y/N]! PLEASE! DON'T TELL ME I'M TOO LATE, PLEASE!" a sob, this time, broke free from the screech. Kicking could be heard coming from outside the apartment, and you laid on the couch, too dizzy to move. How many pill bottles were there? There looked to be eight now.

"DON'T DO THIS TO ME! DON'T... DON'T, PLEASE! I CAN'T... [Y/N] PLEASE OPEN THE DOOR AND LET ME AT LEAST SEE YOU. I WANNA TALK TO YOU; I WANNA HELP YOU. LET ME HELP YOU!" The cries became more desperate with each and every sentence before they disappeared. You scoffed to your drunken self. He didn't really care. He's gone. You were right about him not being able to save you. You reached out for one of the many pill bottles and finally managed to grab one, without much grace. You spilled half of them on the floor, but you didn't care.

You didn't hear Dan talking to your neighbor about a spare key. You didn't hear the click of the lock. You didn't hear the footsteps. You didn't know Dan was in your apartment until he called your name and carefully took the pills from your hands. He sat next to you on the couch and you tried to maintain eye contact with one of him, though there seemed to be three. All three of him were crying. All three of him pulled you into a tight embrace, where you only felt one chest and one heartbeat and only felt one Dan. His arms around you were secure enough that you knew you couldn't escape his grasp by any means.

"[Y/n], w-why? Please, why the fuck would you think that you should do this? I'm in love with you. I want you by my side every fucking moment of the rest of my life. I sure as hell don't know what I'd do without you." He kissed your head, and tears were running from both your eyes and his. "I can't believe that you've felt like this. I can't believe I haven't been... been good enough to you."

"No." You say, "You've been... gooood... enough." You take a deep breath and try your best not to slur your words, although thinking straight is increasingly difficult with this much alcohol in your system. "I'm ... jussst... not good," was all you could manage to say before sobbing into his shirt.

"You can't actually believe that. You've brought so much to the table by working with us! You brighten my day just when you smile. Everything about you is good. Except this. Thinking that you're not good is not good, but that's the only not good thing."

His wording made the two of you laugh for a moment. And in that moment, you forgot that moments ago you were planning on ending your life. You forgot that you had been feeling so bad about yourself that you drank two full bottles of beer and were nearly going to shove your face full of pills. And you forgot about the letter.

But then you remembered. Despite your intoxication, you remembered, and you tried to mumble where he could understand you:

"So youuu... you r-read it."

Dan looked at you, confused.

"You ... rrread the lllletterrr. How el...else would you haaaavve known to c-come here?"

Dan gulped and nodded. You nestle yourself tighter against his chest.

"Thank you." You whisper. "Thanksss for saving me, Daaan." And you slowly drift to a temporary sleep, knowing that you will wake up in the New Year... happy and alive.

Willing to live.