A Drop of Rain

Are You Ready to Take a Risk?

Authors note: I MADE THE ART UP TOP, IM SO PROUD OF MYSELF. Hope you guys enjoy this chapter!

Everything made sense now at the same time that his whole world was thrown into a whirlpool. Not that it hadn't already been thrown in one, but now it was in an even larger one than before. He was scared and worried and confused and angry and happy all at the same time. Everything made sense because now he knew partly why Rick had been acting weird as of recently. (The other reason being that Morty had almost died.)

But there's no way Rick felt that way about him. He'd taken a truth serum that made him unable to lie, but the teen still couldn't believe it. No fucking way. There's no way Rick felt that way. It was impossible. There had to be a fluke with the serum.

Morty sorta felt that way too, actually. Like, he had a crush on the old man, but he told himself it would go away with time. And usually, he'd ignore those thoughts, pushing them to the deepest part of his mind. Only in the dead of night when he couldn't sleep would he allow his mind to think about such things. Which, unfortunately, he had hardly been able to sleep since Rick had left, meaning most of his thoughts consisted of the old man.

Morty had managed to ignore those feelings for the most part, even as those emotions grew over time. He had become so used to them that he'd pass them as ordinary thoughts, and at the same time that he'd think them, he wouldn't think much of them. He had convinced himself that Rick would never return those emotions and that his own would go away with time— he just had to wait.

But with Rick being the one to bring up the subject— the very source of Morty's own insane dilemma— it was as if those thoughts Morty had trained himself to not think about had suddenly gone into Hulk mode, and punched a hole in the wall he'd put up to not think about them. And now they were pouring out, clouding his mind in a thick fog he couldn't get rid of. Not only that, but he had never felt these emotions for Rick as intensely as he was right now.

Rick made him feel... like everything and nothing all at the same time. He lightened up his day, but also ruined it in the best way. He told him the truth about the world, the truth about the universe. He didn't treat him like as much of a child as everyone else did. Rick leveled with him, probably because he...

Because of the way he felt about Morty.

It always confused him why Rick was so blunt about things with him. Usually, everyone was talking in code when it came to certain important topics, as if he couldn't handle the truth. But then Rick would butt in at the weirdest moments and say the truth. He never sugar coated anything with Morty.

It took some time to get used to, but eventually Morty grew to like how Rick treated him in that sense. No sugar, just pure black coffee with nothing to sweeten it. The bitter truth. It was straightforward, and honest.

Rick knew he could handle it even when no one else thought he'd be able to.

Morty could handle a lot more than people thought he could...

But still... Morty was simply an immature child. How could Rick possibly like him in that way? Why did Rick like him? It wouldn't click in his head. It was like an unsolvable riddle.

Another part of why Morty worked to squash the crush he had on Rick was because, well, he assumed he'd be too young and immature for him. He was dumb, and ignorant. He was going through puberty and stuck in high school, and had hardly any life experience compared to Rick. Sure, he had more experience than others, but Rick had years upon years stacked up on top of each other, exceeding light years past what Morty had seen.