Let's Say We Forget About The Last 5 Minutes Of The Episode And Just Stay Here For A Moment

let's say we forget about the last 5 minutes of the episode and just stay here for a moment

I want to just rewatch this movie over and over again, but the amount of fanfiction between my ship is so minimal that it's putting me off from rewatching it

Mew: I don't like players Top: *sweats profusely*

Boston: I don't like guys who record me. Nick: *dies a little inside*

Ray: We should just be friends. Sand: *screams into the 25th hour*

My comfort couple 🥲

ONLY FRIENDS || EPISODE SIX

who's...who's doing it like them?

Ray went to hell, and Sand paved the way with his good intentions.

Damn. That hits really hard 💔

(Had some thoughts about ep 6 and I feel like sharing... so.)

Ray's road to hell was paved with Sand's good intentions.

At the end of ep 5, as others have written, Ray and Sand's tenuous situationship had some major holes blown into it by Boston... being Boston. Ray ends the night hoping for a chance to explain himself to Sand, and Sand ends the night berating himself for falling in the first place, and so they fail to communicate.

I believe, once Sand learned "the truth" about Ray's feelings for Mew (notably, not the truth as Ray would tell it, lying next to him in that bed), it was easy to convince himself that Ray would never care the way Sand does. So why bother discussing it? "It's not my business," as he says. All Sand gets is the shame of knowing better and making the same mistake anyway.

So as I see it, Sand starts ep 6 deciding distance is needed. When he runs into Top in part 1, and gets another ego/status check, it's a trigger that sets him off, and sets the wheels in motion. Sand (through Nick) has dirt on Top. It affects Mew, who is loved by Ray. I think Sand truly saw this pass-the-sex-tape power play as having only good outcomes - for himself, and honestly for Ray too. Sand can get back at Top this way, yes, but also, Sand relinquishes Ray to Mew, the man he loves. By putting the sex tape in Ray's hands, Sand sets Ray up as the friend who saves Mew from an asshole, the good guy who has always been there, for Mew to hopefully fall for. In a way, it's a sweet sacrifice, a way to give Ray something good, something that should make him happy in the long run, and a way to start Sand's own process of moving on. In Sand's eyes, Ray might even be grateful to him for this, down the line.

And I think that's how Sand goes into the pool hall scene, with his 'good' intentions. Sand did this for himself, yes, revenge on Top is 100% part of this. But I think he did this for Ray, too.

When Ray showed up to talk, I believe Ray was expecting a conversation about them, their feelings, and maybe a chance to be honest about Mew and his complicated history with his friend. Ray wanted Sand to know, to clear the air. To set the record straight. And maybe to start over.

Sand was looking for a way to get back at Top AND give Ray the easy out he thought he was looking for. "You like Mew, I have dirt on Top. You can bring that to Mew, get them to break up, get Mew to yourself, and maybe be grateful to me. We go back to being casual sometimes drinking buddies, and I start figuring out how to get over you. This is as clean an exit from your life as I can offer."

But critically, without being a part of the friend group, Sand has no way to know or assume the deeper complexities that are actually in play here. Ray's feelings for Mew have actually evolved in ways he never got to explain to Sand. Mew will probably always feel too morally superior to Ray to fall for him, and Ray is coming to the end of his hopes for being with Mew anyway. It doesn't mean he doesn't still have feelings - that will take a while to fully let go of, but Ray is starting to reevaluate his relationship with Mew and what his life might look like if they are never more than just friends.

So Ray, walking into that pool hall, expecting a conversation, instead gets handed a bomb. And Sand makes it clear he wants Ray to use it. Even making it explicit that Sand is looking for revenge on Top. Aiming Ray like a pool cue. (More wonderful thoughts on this scene here!)

Or, as Ray perceives it, using him. Manipulating him.

And it hurt Ray to realize that. To recognize Sand giving up on the two of them, jumping to a conclusion and not looking back. Shutting things down. Sand's good intentions had already started to sour.

Now, we as the audience know how Ray's day goes from bad to worse at this point - the confrontation with Boston making him question his own motives, the bathroom scene with Mew reminding him he's never been good enough, Top being smug and praised by everyone at the party, even Chueam calling him stubborn for being 'the single one'. The bitter weight of the truth starts crushing Ray, until he collapses under its weight, and he can't stand it anymore. Ray - the burden, the bad friend, the drunk - is the only one who cares enough to tear down his friends' facades of happiness. (More great meta has been written about this scene, and I'll let that fill in the blanks here.)

But Sand just sees Ray standing, unsteadily, to take the mic.

When Ray gets up on that stage, Sand panics. And he has to watch as everything goes horribly sideways, as Ray has a breakdown and tears his friends apart, and gets humiliated and hurt in return, punched to the ground, because Ray let the bomb go off in his own hands. Sand tries to intervene, but Ray lashes out at him, too. Because Ray understands that he has been made into a weapon, and weapons hurt people.

Sand is horrified. He never intended this. He never wanted to cause Ray to implode.

But that's what happened. And when Sand tried to save him, to finally confess the truth, to show he cared, it was too late. Ray's implosion and breakdown was Sand's fault.

Ray went to hell, and Sand paved the way with his good intentions.

(Of course he's going after him.)

((All of my love, adoration and thanks to everyone whose amazing and beautiful gifs helped me make these points visually - @firstmix, @raypakorn, @xceanlynx, @theedorksinlove - and to the meta writers whose lovely ideas have been sproinging around in my brain like children in a bounce house - @wen-kexing-apologist, @thatgirl4815, @bird-inacage 💜💜💜))