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There was something to be said for his bravery. No, not for inviting his ex-girlfriend to a tell-all podcast after rumor, illness, and heartache abounded. No, for inviting Mari along with.
"I'll be the perfect ref," she'd said, and maybe did a lot of winking and finger-crossing as she did, that part was unclear to him. A little hazy, let's say. That big grin she flashed, was that the support of a friend or the knowledge of destruction? And that thump on the back, was that reassurance or a push into the abyss?
Okay, maybe that was dramatic. In their many years of friendship Ian had known her to be conniving, devilishly funny, and one of the few left at Smosh who could genuinely surprise him. So he loved her. He loved her like all the others he lost along the way.
But she was the perfect menace, really.
"Ian, what was a harder break-up: you and Pam or you and Anthony?"
Very rarely did shock feel like a slap across the face, but her words delivered with a sting.
"Oof."
Pam shook out her hands like she'd touched something burning. She must have felt it too. Mari stared him down, all quick wits and narrowed eyes. She always knew too much.
A nervous laugh couldn't hide his shaky hands, the way his knuckles curled until his nails imprinted on the palms. An unhelpful distraction.
"Now don't do me like that," he heard himself say with ringing ears.
It sounded far off and tinny then, and still so watching now. Sat under bright studio lights, squished in next to Anthony, Arasha and Shane, he'd been unprepared to hear it. Though public embarrassment seemed frequent in his line of work, he would rank this moment very close to the top. Especially since everyone knew the answer.
"Press the buttons, press the buttons," Pam teased, while Mari helpfully hummed a gameshow tune. Your time is up! Form that lie quickly now!
"Uh. Well." Excellent work Ian, great job so far.
"I don't think I -- well, I didn't -- I didn't cry when Anthony left. Because Anthony and I, we -- we -- we knew what had to happen," he stammered. That was one hell of a simplification, and it forced down a lot of pain and heartache, but it seemed believable in his eyes. And historically this was a point in his life where denial was king: everything's fine, the friendship is fine, he's fine, hey look over there! That would be about when he threw out some absurdly depressing remark and the cast would devolve into cracking jokes to bring up the mood. Or to the rest of the world, he would premiere a Try Not To Laugh with yet another cast member gone and yet a new face in the crowd, and hope they take it well, and go to visit Pam in the hospital, or go home alone.
"It was coming," Mari said solemnly. Her nod said everything and blamed no one.
"Yeah, yeah."
His tone was listless and the pang in his heart shone through too clearly.
"Each one's different," Mari said. Then, partially to herself, "Each one's different."
And the look on her face could have killed him, because he knew they matched completely. The remorse of it all. The exhaustion.
"Is that your answer?" Pam asked. "Each one's different?"
It was maybe half teasing, half genuine curiosity. She had been there through so much chaos, a silent supporter and a shoulder to cry on even throughout her own pain, her own struggles that made him feel trite in comparison. He admired her strength and compassion maybe more than anyone else alive.
"I -- I didn't cry when Anthony left," he repeated.
Because what else could he say? She swallowed sharply and nodded, her bottom lip sucked in, and though Mari had already changed tack he knew he'd let her down. And maybe broke her heart all over again. All for a man who no longer spoke to him, probably no longer even loved him.
In the studio, Shane was laughing.
"That is the best question I've ever heard in my life," he was nearly crying, red in the face with glee. Ian's ears burned.
'Press the buttons, press the buttons,' Pam was saying before the video cut off, a small mercy. He hadn't expected this moment in a random compilation of 'Where's Anthony' jokes: no one said 'hey, let's combine a funny little video with evidence of all your greatest personal failures!' No one warned him this moment was clipped in, though maybe that warning would have been too intimate between a producer and their boss. Maybe he should have actually watched the video when it was forwarded to him so he could've avoided this deer in headlights feeling he was trapped in now.
Anthony clapped, his mouth in a wide grin. Oh God, he wanted to drop off the face of the Earth.
"That was good. Mari caught me off guard with that one, too."
That implied that he noticed how thrown Ian had been at the time, and probably how thrown he looked now. Ian smiled and nodded along like they were discussing the weather.
"Did you ever answer?" Arasha asked helpfully. Anthony turned swiftly and looked directly at him, reading him too closely. Ian had forgotten that about him. When they were together it was like his head was transparent and Anthony could study his brain: after he left it was like someone built a wall between him and the rest of the world.
"Yeah, did you ever answer?" Anthony asked now. Oh right, that was the wall Ian had built himself.
"I hope I didn't," Ian responded, to a great bout of laughter. "I hope I deflected and moved on. Just like I'm doing now."
And he reached over and hit the play button, flitting past the faces of an old friend and an old love, two girls he lost along the way. Silence started to permeate his very being, and he was very conscious of how little he contributed to the remainder of the video, of Anthony's reassuring hand on his shoulder, of how much of that wall still remained.
Wrapping the video was a non-event, and much of the workday was then unremarkable. Jackie and Chanse laughed like hell in the hallways, Erin sent him a few emails, Spencer drank a Mountain Dew Kickstart. Anthony waved off the team a little earlier than Ian, but it was still light outside when Ian walked back to his car, and the heat was still suffocating when he sat inside. When he flipped the ignition the AC blasted even hotter, and he slumped back in his chair.
He was tired, but his brain itched. It was in his very nature to avoid this forever: cram that guilt and shame down the gullet even if it made his throat scratch. But he and Anthony had gone against that nature these past few precious months, though it had been teeth-pulling at every turn (for him). After everything that happened following the breakup with Pam, the Defy Riots, after losing Smosh Games (so much of the team! So much of the brand!) and losing Anthony before all that -- well, there was no world where he pictured opening up the way he has.
Hadn't everything been so much better, though? Hadn't it become a cure? Opening his mouth and hearing his own real thoughts come out instead of some macabre remark? A fucking dick joke? Doing that podcast with Mari and Pam, maybe that was a blessing. Maybe that was the dam breaking. That and Courtney bullying him to go to therapy for a year. And Anthony reaching out again.
Ian is kind of like the sun. And I feel like I'm a magnifying glass.
That's what Anthony had said when all this began, and it was the best Ian had ever felt about life. It was the most pure and unconditional love he'd ever known. He was not going to lose that to embarrassment now. Something in him reached for his phone, and when he watched his fingers shaking over the phone screen it was like they were someone else's.
"After all I put Pam through, I couldn't tell her it was you."
He locked his phone and threw it onto the passenger seat like that was going to do something. If he'd found uranium it'd be like using hand sanitizer after holding it. When he rubbed his sweaty palms on his jeans the phone buzzed again, and though he noted the light from the corner of his eye he almost couldn't bring himself to pick it up.
When he did, the answer was so clear and easy.
"I know."
Then:
"See you tomorrow 🌞"
And Ian loved him like all the others he lost along the way. And he'd see him tomorrow.