SpongeBob's Guilt
Friday, 23th of November, 2003
I woke up by the sound of the alarm clock, finally Friday, school had really been hard these past few days, atleast for me, some of my classmates wouldn't even get bothered by all the exams we were having, but i wasn't part of them. I'm not the type of kid who does all his homework until late, i was more of going outside or watching TV the whole day, mainly Nickelodeon. You might think it's stupid, a 15 year old watching cartoons made for kids about 7 or 8, or even preescholers, however for me it was a way of relieving stress.
You see, 1 month ago my parents went on a divorce, since then everything pretty much changed, my father took my brother with him, and i'm happy about it. I love my dad, he's overall a great person, and everytime i can hang out with him i do, my mom on the other hand is more authoritarian, and likes to have everything her way. It was hard at first to just live with her, but she still loves me at the end and I got used to it, still it was hard to process i wouldn't be seeing my brother and father every day when i woke up from now on.
So as you might guess, this is the main reason i like to watch cartoons, my favorite one being Spongebob, he always made me laugh and feel optimistic in a way, Spongebob was always happy, and seeing him happy, made ME happy. You probably already know the main plot, an sea sponge called, you guessed it, Spongebob Squarepants, lives his daily life hanging out with his friends and working at his job at the Krusty Krab.
Anyways, let's get back to the main point, i left school and went walking to my house, my mom usually would get home until 6 pm or so because of his job and school ended about 2 pm, so i had time to do random thing while waiting. On my way home i stopped to see a Garage Sale nearby, i told myself checking quick what was there wouldn't hurt, and so i made my way over the other side of the street to take a look.
There were a lot of clothes and old books, but what grabbed my attention was a bunch of old videogames and DVD disks about several cartoons, i remember seeing some of other Nickelodeon shows like Invader Zim, however i wasn't interested in that, there was a DVD Disk with no cover, labeled "Spongebob Squarepants Season 3". Now this REALLY grabbed my attention, the season 3 of the show just started airing on 2001 and it technically wasn't over yet, why was there a disk with the full season then? I quickly grabbed it and went to the owner of the sale, it was an old man, in his late 50's maybe, he looked in a really bad state, like if he didn't slept on days or even weeks, however i didn't really mind, i was there to buy the DVD, not to know about this man's life.
The DVD was surprisingly cheap, just 2 dollars, i had 10, so this wasn't a problem, i quickly took the DVD and went home, when i got there I noticed time really went by fast, it was about 5 pm, "Did i really spent that much time on that garage sale?" I told myself, but i just shrugged it off and went to my room. Yes, i really wanted to watch the DVD i just bought, but i still had school work, and if i finished it all on that same day, i could have the whole weekend free to watch the DVD and maybe even give a quick visit to my father. Saturday, 24th of November, 2003
Saturday, 24th of November, 2003
I managed to finish my homework yesterday thankfully, and I woke up at around 11 am. I had all the time of the world to do whatever i wanted now and my mom wasn't home due to some work stuff she had to solve before the weekend ended. I put on some clothes, made myself some breakfast and went to the living room, i inserted the DVD on the TV Disk Player and started eating my breakfast while watching some Spongebob episodes
I started watching the first 3 episodes, Something Smells/Bossy Boots, Your Shoe's Untied/Squid's Day Off, Dying for Pie/Imitation Krabs.
The 3rd had to be my favorite all of them all, it really gave Squidward more character more than just the usual bad neighbor kind of person and they made it seem like an actual friend for spongebob in some way.
And so my day went on, until i finished watching most of the episodes, i really liked all of them, even the ones that i hadn't saw on Nickelodeon, it was all just silly jokes that made me laugh and feel happiness, now it was time to get to the last episode, which seemed kinda off to me at first, the title card went in, the title of the episode was "Spongebob's Guilt"
It was rather...unusual to say the least, however i didn't mind, the title card went still for some seconds, i thought maybe the disk corrupted this part a bit and it got glitched, so i just waited to see what happened and if nothing came on i would take the disk off and put it back in, i started to think what the episode could be about, maybe this was a type of episode like Dying for Pie but the roles being inversed and instead Spongebob did something bad for one of his friends and feels bad about it so he tries to fix it in several ways to make it up to them, that was just a fun idea at the end, cause when i finished thinking of the plot the episode continued.
It was time to show the producers of the episode, however, it didn't showed anything at all, it was just the sand with the background music playing, now this was weird, not something i could just ignore and continue watching, this made me uncomfortable in some way. Did the episode got edited? perhaps, or atleast that's what i thought, the episode started with the usual bubbles transition, Spongebob woke up and told Gary he was going to boating school, then onto his job at the Krusty Krab after he finished with his lessons with Ms Puff, Spongebob then got ready and left his house singing the usual "Im Ready, Im Ready" theme he always sang while he made his way to boating school.
Then the screen went back to Spongebob's house, the screen focused on Gary this time who started to roam around Spongebob's house. "Oh so it's a Gary themed episode!", i said to myself, just to be quickly disproven by the fact it couldn't fit, why would it be named SPONGEBOB'S guilt if it was a gary episode, I continued watching after thinking about it, Gary then noticed Spongebob left the TV on, so he started watching while waiting for his beloved owner to arrive home so they could spend time with each other like they usually do.
The screen went black for some seconds, again i thought the DVD might have been a bit corrupted and i planned to took it off but suddenly the screen changed back to the episode, this time it was Spongebob again, he just arrived at Boating School, he greeted Ms Puff who was as usual annoyed by the fact they had to have another test again, Spongebob however seemed rather excited thinking this time he could do it well, they got in the boat and Spongebob started driving.
This time he actually did it well for the first minutes atleast, surprising Ms Puff and honestly me too, Spongebob finally getting his drivers license was something that i never thought would actually happen knowing the main plot, after some minutes of driving with some background music which i could now recognize as the "You're Nice" soundtrack, Spongebob chose to took a left turn to 123 Conch Street, the street where he lived in, everything seemed rather nice, that's when
i heard a sound coming from upstairs on my room, i quickly turned and was about to see what happened, when suddenly the screen got my attention back, all of a sudden something had happened that made the boat start going crazy like usual, but this time was different, Ms Puff started screaming as normal, but Spongebob seemed rather stressed a bit more than usual by the situation, it was a louder scream, a scream that made me hold my ears a bit, all of a sudden the boat got into Spongebob's house direction and black screen suddenly appeared, there was a crashing sound, more precisely a car crash, i went back to sit on my couch and watch again.
The screen was black for about 1 whole minute, i didn't even bothered of thinking of taking the disk out, i was too intrigued on what happened that i didn't even got the thought about it, i just waited. The screen finally went back to normal just to see a big hole on Spongebob's house, the boat went across it apparently, Spongebob and Ms Puff woke up, they most likely went out for a bit due to the car crash, Ms Puff took time to breath but Spongebob quickly got out of the car to see the damage, it was horrible, most of his house was destroyed because of him, or atleast that's what i think, again i couldn't see what caused the crash and the boat to go crazy.
The music then stopped, there was a silence, Spongebob quickly realized something that i didn't and went to check his house for something he couldn't find, I was wondering what was he searching for when i suddenly got the horrifying realization, "GARY!" Spongebob screamed as then now the screen focused on the car, below it was the corpse of the poor snail, the screen gave a closer look to the corpse, i almost wanted to vomit, the screen showed a realistic shot of Gary being mostly torn apart and in a bunch of blood, Spongebob started crying as he went over to his beloved pet corpse, i couldn't take it anymore, i paused the screen and went to the bathroom to puke the breakfast i had eaten some hours earlier when watching the DVD, i quickly went back to my living room and took the DVD out, i wanted answers.
I left my house and went over to the place where the Garage Sale happened, but to my surprise, there was nothing there anymore, just a sign saying "FOR SALE" in front of the house, the guy who i saw yesterday on that fucking Garage Sale was gone before i could ask him anything, he most likely wanted to get rid of some things before moving out of his home and made the sale. I thought the disk was maybe edited by him, and the episode was a fraud made by him just to trick some poor kid like me, and i guess he did.
I went back home, and tried to sleep, my mom hadn't arrived yet, but i didn't cared, i just went to my bed and tried to sleep. However, as you probably guessed already, i couldn't, my curiosity had a hold of me and i got up and went to my living room again, i inserted the disk and i tried to watch the episode again.
I already knew what happened the first minutes, so i was intrigued on what was gonna happen next, this time i covered my eyes when Gary's corpse was shown on screen just to avoid puking again and this time maybe not even in the bathroom. After the scene ended the screen went black again, this time know with the thought of this being edited i thought to myself maybe the black screen was just edited in to make it seem more misteryous and spooky for someone like me, but i wasn't gonna fall for that, suddenly some flashes on the screen started happening, at first i thought maybe it was a glitch, however when i payed more attention to the screen i noticed the flashes were images of Spongebob crying, and being more sad than ever.
This made my stomach and head hurt, as i mentioned earlier Spongebob's happiness made ME feel happy, and seeing him sad gave me an uneasy feeling, it made me uncomfortable.
The screen then went back to normal, only to show a sad spongebob on his room, no music or sounds were heard, just some sobbing coming from Spongebob, while he sometimes mentioned the phrase "It's all my fault" or "Gary come back, i'm sorry.", this ran shivers down my spine, it made me feel bad and...sad, was i really feeling sad for a cartoon character? well i was a kid so, yeah i guess so. The screen the faced Spongebob from the front, then he made something that almost made me want to stop watching.
Spongebob took a gun from out of nowhere, and tried to shoot himself, several times. Every time it either went through one of the holes of his body or just made him feel pain for a second then it went away moments later, he was trying to kill himself and end his pain, but he couldn't. From the logic of the show, he couldn't die like this, he could just regenerate or not even feel pain at all, he then stops and for some seconds there's a silence again. Spongebob then leaves the room for about 3 seconds then comes again with a rope already tied. He was now trying to hang himself, however when he tried, he didn't die either, he just fell to the floor and cried louder this time, the crying sounded so real it made me feel horrible.
And so the episode went on with Spongebob trying to kill himself in several ways, there was never background music, or even sound effects, just Spongebob's sobbing sounds while he did all of those things to try and stop his pain. After some minutes the screen went back to Spongebob's house, he was now on his bed, crying like always, suddenly the screen cuts black again, however this time it goes only for 2 seconds before going into a transition saying "4 months later". I could now see a decayed Spongebob just repeatedly trying to drink poison to end his life, he was sitting on the side of his bed, keeping drinking the poison several times, until stopping.
"It's all useless"
Spongebob said, then, something happened that made me have some really bad goosebumps, Spongebob looked at the screen, like if he knew I was watching, just to say after that the following, which to to this day still makes me confused, and scared.
"It's all my fault, isn't it Daniel?"
My heartbeat started going as faster as ever, did he just said my name out loud? how did he knew my name? and most of all how did he knew im here?, i wanted to start crying from all the tension, Spongebob, like if he saw me through that screen, started crying with me, and we were like that for almost 2 minutes, before the screen went black again, i kept watching even after everything that happened, the screen went onto Spongebob, crying to his sleep, then a transition was made onto Spongebob's dream, he was happy again, playing with Gary, they were watching the TV together, just suddenly the snail turns to Spongebob and starts talking to him "Don't worry everything will be ok", it's what i remember he said.
Somehow, i felt relief, yeah he was talking to Spongebob obviously, but in some way, i thought he was talking to me, too.
"You need to move on and live your life, Spongebob"
"Don't ever let the world erase your smile"
The screen then transitioned to Spongebob waking up, he was sweating, and seemed rather scared, the background music started again, like a normal episode, Spongebob looked at the side of his bed, and saw Gary sleeping comfortable in his snail bed, "It was just a nightmare!", was what Spongebob said, he then chose to go to sleep again, but not before giving his snail a kiss on the shell, Gary, even though he was sleeping, smiled at this, Spongebob then went back to sleep "Goodnight Gary", he said before some soft music started playing.
The credits then went in, again, none of the producers names or Nickelodeon was on the screen, it was just the sand, along with the background music, i just realized what time it was, and that my mom might be here at any second, but i didn't cared at the moment, i wanted to finish, even if it was just the credits all that were left to see, the music gave me a weird feeling, it was chill, sure, but it somehow made me feel weird in a way, the music itself might not be scary, but at the moment, it really made shivers ran down my spine.
"the end."
Appeared on the screen, then after that the TV went out, i took the DVD out, and holded it on my hands, thinking of what i just experienced, what was that all about? was it real? was it not? was it a lost episode of some sorts? i couldn't think straight, i went to my room, put the DVD on my desk, and went to sleep, now more calm about the whole situation and thinking about what to do with the DVD next. Sunday, 25th of November, 2003
Sunday, 25th of November, 2003
The DVD is gone. I don't know how it happened or where it is.
I woke up and checked my desk and it wasn't there anymore, i asked my mom who got home late if she saw anything, but she told me everything was normal and nothing was out of the usual.
However, I don't think i care anymore if i'm being honest. I saw everything i had to see, and there was no pourpose on having it either way.
The episode might have been weird, and overall really scary and offputting, but im glad it had a happy ending, i'll never forget that DVD Disk, doesn't matter if it was edited or if it was official, all that matters is that no matter what happens, i have to keep on a big smile and see the bright side of things. Now today im visiting my father and brother, and I can't wait to feel as happy as ever again.
Credited to LeSlayWasTaken
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