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When Stan had first met Rick over a year and a half ago, one of the very first things he'd noticed about the other boy was how damn skinny he was. Whereas both Stan and Ford had broad shoulders and thick builds, and Fiddleford (his brother's nerdy ass boyfriend) had the slightest bit of pudge in the middle, Rick's body was slender and flat, ribcage and hip bones visible to anybody who cared to see them. The skintight pants Rick wore almost every damn week didn't do much to help his bony structure, either, as they clung to all the places normal people had fat (like Rick's pancake ass).
And it only got worse when Rick got naked. Stan remembered how genuinely shocked he'd been the first time he took Rick's shirt off and saw just how small and smooth the other man was. He'd been so used to looking in the mirror and seeing muscles and stomach fat and chest hair, that he'd forgotten that there were people in the world who weren't as well built as he was.
And built Rick was not, what with his tanned, taut skin and those deliciously sharp angles. But that was okay, because what Rick lacked in muscles, he more than made up for in brains, and any heavy-lifting (or ass-kicking) he couldn't do, Stan was more than happy to do for him. It was like everybody at school always said, Rick was the brains of the operation and Stan was the brawns (but don't ask either of them what the operation was because they had no fucking idea).
Something Stan had always found confusing and slightly funny, was just how close the two of them had managed to become, despite the being as different personality wise as they were physically. Something he found really funny, was the fact that he sometimes forgot the weight gap between them existed, and squeezed Rick a little too hard during one of their (unfortunately rare) hugs, which always caused Rick to let out a strangled, breathless, hilarious noise of protest.
Stan'll admit that, as shallow and selfish as it sounds, in the beginning of their relationship, he didn't really mind that Rick was more-or-less skin and bones. If he was being completely honest, Rick's lack of body fat had been a real turn on for him. The sharpness of Rick's hipbones had turned fighting into fucking more times than not, and the fact that Stan could wrap an entire hand around the pale column of Rick's neck had caused more sticky messes than either were comfortable admitting to.
A less indecent reason was the way Stan's shirts absolutely dwarfed Rick whenever he put them on; seeing Rick in his clothes always made Stan's heart tight with possessiveness.
And while all the reasons Stan loved Rick's overly bony ass might've still stood true, once they'd actually gotten to know each other and Rick trusted him enough to start occasionally dropping little details about his personal life, Stan had truly grown to hate the thinness of his lover.
At first, Stan had just thought Rick liked being the skinny piece of shit he'd always been. That thought turned out to be completely wrong, and though Rick had never outright said it -and Stan would never outright ask him- the real reason anyone got to see Rick's ribs through his skin or that Stan got to feel Rick's hipbones through his pants so effortlessly, was because no one at Rick's house cared enough to feed him. And in reality, everyone knew. Everyone knew that Mr. Sanchez spent half of his day at his job and the other half at the bar, and everyone knew that Mrs. Sanchez went around town with every man except her husband. And at the crux of it all was Rick, who everyone knew was unfed, unsupervised, and unloved at home. And yet no one had done a damn thing to help him.
Until Stan came into the picture and practically forced his family into doing something. He knew that neither his parents nor his brother were particularly fond of Rick, and he knew they weren't very happy when he'd announced they were dating, but Stan also knew that none of them were capable of turning down someone in need. So in the end he got his way, and the family had developed some unspoken rules when it came to Rick.
Mr. Pines knew never to say 'no' when Stan asked if Rick could stay for dinner; Mrs. Pines knew to keep quiet when she saw Stan leave for school with two bagged lunches instead of one; Ford knew to turn a blind eye when he walked in the kitchen and saw Rick pocketing snacks when he thought no one was looking; and Stan knew to keep track of when his boyfriend had and hadn't eaten, so he wouldn't shrivel away and die. It wasn't a lot, but it was enough to keep Rick alive, and that was all that mattered.
Plus, as Stan realized not too long ago, helping Rick had actually helped himself. Now, whenever Rick stretched and exposed his ribcage, Stan could guiltlessly stare instead of avert his eyes, and he can finally savor the feeling of Rick's skinny arms wrapping around his midsection, instead of dread it. Sex was so much sexier now that Stan didn't feel like he had some type of asshole parental-neglect fetish. And it was a hell of a lot easier to get Rick to bottom when he had a full stomach.
And, ya know, seeing Rick's bony body collapse against his bed after sex made Stan hot and all, but hearing Rick rave to Mrs. Pines about how good the meal was and seeing him rub his stomach in satisfaction and laughing when Ford can't help but smile when he sees Rick dozing on Stan's shoulder made Stan warm.
And fuck his brain for getting all mushy, and fuck himself for choosing his feelings over his libido, but Stan would totally, one hundred percent give up hot bone sex, if it meant keeping his favorite person alive and feeling warm forever.