Author's Note: Well, here's the second and final chapter. Hope you enjoy.

Disclaimer: Stephen Hillenburg and Nickelodeon Studios own everything related to "Spongebob Squarepants" except for Dr. Cascade, who is mine.

Chapter 2: Open Arms

Squidward woke up, but kept his eyes closed at first, just like the morning before. He waited for the blast of a foghorn, as if it were his cue to get up. Finally, the loud alarm clock sounded next door, and Squidward opened his eyes in excitement and ran to the window and opened it to greet Spongebob. Maybe it had been all a dream.

"Spongebob?" he called out to his neighbor's open window. No one answered, so he called again.

"Spongebob, please answer me!"

He waited, but all that answered was the alarm clock going off again.

Squidward closed his window and sank down to the floor. The alarm clock must have already been set for the next day, and no one had stopped by and turned it off. It had really happened. Squidward pulled his four knees close to him and wrapped his arms around them, closing his eyes tightly, and quietly sobbing. He decided he wasn't going to work that day. He sat and cried, bringing forth years of suppressed emotions, expressing bottled up feelings, bringing it all to the surface, no longer holding anything back.

Soon the phone rang.

Squidward slowly rose and trudged to his nightstand to answer the phone.

"H-hello?" he said shakily.

"Mister Squidward?"

"Hi, Mr. Krabs," Squidward said, his voice still quivering.

"How…are you doing, Mister Squidward?"

"I'm… doing better, sir."

"Listen," Mr. Krabs told him, "I really don't want to come into work today, and I don't think you do, either. So let's just leave the Krusty Krab closed today and you can have an extra vacation day with pay."

"Thank you, Mr. Krabs," Squidward brightened a little. That was a relief. And to know that Mr. Krabs really did care…

"No problem, lad," Mr. Krabs answered, "so, are you sure you're all right?"

"Yes. I-think I'll be fine," though Squidward wasn't so sure.

Squidward found he didn't have an appetite around lunch time, and he was scarcely able to eat much. He tried to lose himself in his Fancy Living Digest, and then he tried painting, and then playing the clarinet. He finally gave up taking his mind away from it. He couldn't do it just yet.

"Why him?" he asked aloud, "he was only twenty-six…" Squidward thought for a moment, then he realized-he would have given his own life for Spongebob. For a while before, Squidward had felt his life was over at age thirty, that it was going to be only an uphill climb and not get any easier, but Spongebob had turned him around. Spongebob had shown him different…Squidward squeezed his eyes shut.

"Goodbye, little brother," Squidward whispered.

Someone knocked at the door.

"Squidward? Are you home?" a familiar female voice with a Southern accent called.

"Coming," the octopus called back listlessly. He got up from his recliner and shuffled to the door. He opened it to reveal the only mammalian resident of Bikini Bottom. Sandy Cheeks only looked despondently at Squidward for a moment, and then spoke.

"Howdy, Squidward," Sandy's usually bubbly voice was trembling, "I'm uh…sure you heard about Spongebob."

Squidward's eyes fell to the ground and he nodded slowly.

"Well," Sandy went on, "I've been next door trying to comfort Patrick, and well, he said he'd feel much better if the two of us played Eels and Escalators with him. It would mean a lot to both of us if you could come, Squidward."

They gave each other a long, deep stare of mutual pain, and then Sandy burst into tears. She collapsed to her hands and knees and her shoulders shook rapidly.

"S-Squidward…I can't…do this."

"Do what?" he asked, kneeling down beside her.

"I'm…t-trying to…stay strong for Patrick," she looked up at him with tear-ridden eyes, "'cause he-he's been best friends with Spongebob forever and all, but I can't hold this in…" She beat the ground with her fist.

At first, Squidward had thought he was sick of crying, but seeing Sandy react brought the tears forth again. He wrapped his arms around her and began sobbing himself. Sandy brought herself upright on her knees and hugged Squidward back. They both knelt and cried together, and both were happy to not cry alone. Finally Squidward spoke.

"Maybe if you showed Patrick you felt the same way, it would help him feel better as well as you," he offered, getting to his feet and helping Sandy up.

Sandy blinked at him, fishing a lever on a decal from her suit, placing it on her air helmet, and purging the tears out.

"I…never thought of it that way," she admitted.

Squidward was a little surprised himself. He had always been known to be pessimistic, and never one to offer up advice.

"So," Sandy said, "what do you say? You coming?"

Squidward looked at Sandy, and seeing the welcoming glow in her eyes-

"Yes."

The octopus and the squirrel walked next door to Patrick Star's house with mixed feelings. Sandy knocked, and the giant boulder adorned with a weathervane lifted, revealing a living room made of sand. In the center on the floor, Patrick was sitting and sobbing quietly, hunched over something that his arms were wrapped around. Two eyes on stalks sprouted out of something smooth and glossy, and a tiny "Meow," was heard. Patrick rocked back and forth while Spongebob's beloved snail Gary purred in an attempt to comfort him.

"Hi, Patrick," Squidward approached him, "uh, I'm here. You uh, still want to play?"

Patrick nodded and handed him the dice while Sandy sat down and gestured to a game board in front of the starfish. Squidward nodded and rolled the dice.

"Oh, uh, Squidward?" Patrick said.

"Yeah?"

"Spongebob's parents came by, and uh…asked me to give this to you."

He pulled a framed photo out from on his other side and handed it to Squidward. Squidward looked at it. He had often seen the picture on Spongebob's stand in his living room right next to his chair. A photo of the two of them right above the words "Best Friends". Squidward cringed.

"I keep it right there so you're always there with me," Spongebob had said about it once.

The game went on rather pleasantly for the situation. Everyone even laughed a couple of times and showed the most relieved of faces and the most lifted of spirits. It was nearly five o'clock when Squidward and Sandy went home still smiling. Squidward decided he was ready now to practice his clarinet.

He took the instrument outside and scanned his surroundings, wondering where to play it at. His gaze drifted to Jellyfish Fields. He started towards it.

It was calm, and peaceful, and Squidward decided to sit on a large rock in the middle. He positioned the sleek black clarinet in front of his mouth and began to perform his favorite practice. The jellyfish usually didn't like hearing him play, but they seemed to enjoy it this time. Besides the jellyfish, the only sound was the perfected melody hauntingly outpouring from the woodwind instrument. He began to draw the song to a close, and all time stood still as he took a deep breath and played the final note…

It sounded more perfect than ever to him.

Squidward smiled and looked up. He was surprised to see Patrick standing in front of him. Patrick only looked at him for a minute, and then explained simply:

"That was beautiful, Squidward."

Squidward went home with a more open mind and a freer spirit. Spongebob had helped him like a true brother. His childish whimsy, his appreciation for imagination; no matter how Squidward had tried to dampen his wings in the past, Spongebob had had a beautiful condition which Squidward had found could not be cured. The inability to lose hope.

Squidward breathed in the magic of the day for the first true time in the longest time. He literally even danced to his front door and inside his house, but he wasn't alone for long. The doorbell rang, and Squidward energetically went to the door to answer it.

The fish he recognized as Dr. Cascade greeted him.

"My sincerest apologies," she began.

"Oh, thanks, but I feel much better now," Squidward smiled.

"No, it's not that," the doctor explained, "I suppose I got you worrying for no real reason. You see, Mister Tentacles, we had a faulty heart monitor at the hospital, and it misread Mister Squarepants' life readings."

Squidward was taken aback. "What…are you saying, then?"

Dr. Cascade smiled. "Your friend was only in a coma for a while, and he woke up. He's alive and should be home tomorrow."

Squidward's mouth hung agape.

"He's taking visitors," the fish said, "you can go in my car."

Squidward excitedly shot a look out towards Patrick's house.

"I've already informed the others," Dr. Cascade told him, "the gentleman crab in the blue shirt took them already."

"Let's go," Squidward grinned.

Squidward and the doctor arrived at the waiting room where both were greeted by Sandy, Patrick, Gary, Mr. Krabs, Pearl, Spongebob's parents, and Mrs. Puff, who all eagerly awaited their chance to see their friend.

Dr. Cascade disappeared inside the Accident Ward for a minute, then came back out and motioned the others in. The group followed her to Spongebob's room and Dr. Cascade opened the door…

Everyone peered inside. Sitting up on the bed in the room with an overjoyed grin…was Spongebob.

"Hi, guys," he said.

Everyone was silent for a moment. Then Spongebob's friends all cheered and piled on top of the bed in a group hug, laughing and savoring the moment.

"Um, okay, don't get him too excited," Dr. Cascade said, "He needs his rest. Okay, please, he'll never get to sleep if you keep it up."

But it was hard for anyone to leave. Finally, several doctors and nurses peeled the group off the bed and gently shooed them out the door.

Squidward was the last to leave. Spongebob was pleasantly surprised to see him laughing with the others. He wasn't surprised at all that Squidward cared about him so much, no; Spongebob had known that all along. But it was just that Squidward was truly enjoying a moment like that.

"Glad to see you happy," Spongebob said to Squidward as the octopus began to leave.

"It's all because of you, little brother," Squidward answered.

There was a tear-jerking moment between them.

"So," Squidward finally said, "I have a picture your parents gave to me that I'll drop by when you get home."

"The 'Best Friends' one?" Spongebob asked, "Oh, you can keep it."

"Thanks," Squidward smiled, "so, you should be coming home tomorrow?"

"That's what the doctor said," Spongebob fell back on his pillow and closed his eyes, preparing for a long, restful nap.

Squidward smiled again and started to leave, but he stopped at the door and turned back.

"Uh, Spongebob?"

"Yeah, Squidward?" Spongebob opened one light blue eye to look at him.

"Sometime, do you want to go jellyfishing with me?"

Author's Note: Well, hope you enjoyed the ending. I love reviews. No flames please, but constructive criticism is welcome and appreciated.