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When Rick barged into your room, you pulled the covers up over your head. He was mid-sentence already, not that it was a new thing, as if he had been talking to you for several minutes before even entering the room. It was a rant about an experiment gone wrong and his struggle to find whatever it was that caused the smaller explosion.
The words went completely over your head, your attention span so disrupted today that it was embarrassing and clearly, Rick’s attention on you was not there since he only saw that you had buried yourself in your bed’s covers when he stopped talking.
“W-what the hell are you doing u-under there?” He asked, proceeding to pull at the duvet. You tried to hold onto it, your knuckles hurting at the effort and when he eventually managed to rip it from your grip, you were in tears.
“Rick,” you sniffled.
“What’s the matter with you?” He asked, his tone probably a lot less hard in his own head. He walked to stand in front of you, leaving the covers on the floor.
You searched for an answer but found that you just did not know. When you had woken up earlier, it was just as if a big dark cloud was hovering over your head as if you were in a cartoon. It happened from time to time; you woke up, stared at the ceiling and felt as if a ton of bricks were piled on your chest. The bed felt like a prison and you felt like you were being held hostage by the indescribable sadness that was filling your body from head to toe.
“I don’t know,” you finally said, lip quivering.
“What do you mean y-you don’t know ?” Rick tried again, now sitting down on your bed. He turned to face you, one leg hanging off the edge.
The fact that he expected you to explain that became way too much and in a matter of seconds, you were a blubbering mess. The feel of tears running down over your ears because you were lying down was a horrible combo with your chest constricting as you heaved for breath with every sob.
Rick’s facial expression turned into one of horror and you knew that crying was the last thing he wanted to deal with, simply because he did not quite know how to handle it. When you cried, he either ran or did a 180 degree turn in his attitude. You hoped for the latter right now.
“Baby,” he said after a few moments and you wanted to let out a relieved sigh. The latter it was but the latter also meant that Rick had to figure out how to deal with this.
“What?” You reached to wipe your eyes with the hem of your t-shirt, thoroughly drying your cheeks but tears were still escaping.
“Is it one of those days?” Rick wasn’t stupid. He knew about it but a part of you guessed that it hurt him as much as it hurt you sometimes; Rick was sensitive at the bottom of his soul. Like… the very bottom, below the fake bottom. He wasn’t ignorant of this aspect of you.
You called these days The Dark Days and Rick knew. You had been straight with him about it the very moment you two started getting serious but it had never been this bad and you wanted to bury yourself six feet underground due to the shame. Why couldn’t you just get out of bed?
Eventually you nodded, and Rick sighed softly. He patted the space besides him, “Sit, I-I know just the thing.”
He then got up and left the room, and whilst he was away, you forced yourself to sit and decided to let Rick do whatever he had planned to cheer you up.
“Tadaa!” Rick re-entered your room with a bottle in his hand and instinctively, you reached up and ran a hand over your face. No no no no no no no .
“What’s that?” You grimaced, deciding to put a pillow against the wall and lean against it because it was simply too exhausting to even sit along with the fact that you had not eaten yet. You couldn’t even sit straight, what the hell was your deal?
“It’s m-man’s greatest gift to mankind,” Rick said as was it a fact, getting onto the bed again and sitting beside you, “It’s alcohol.”
“I don’t really see your point,” you said in a flat tone.
“You treat an outside wound with ru-rubbing alcohol, you treat an inside wound with drinking alcohol. It’s science,” Rick said, unscrewing the cap and when he held it out to you, you gagged at the strong smell.
“Put that away, you prick,” you commanded, trying to drag yourself away from the nauseating smell before you actually would throw up, “I don’t need booze.”
“It’ll make you forget you’re sad, I-I-I’m not saying you have to get completely wrecked,” Rick mumbled but did as he was told after taking a swig himself, “You know, this is my finest bottle - and yes, I know I say liquor is l-liquor but this…”
“Rick,” you pinched the bridge of your nose, “Rick, I’m not sad, I’m depressed. There’s a difference and you know it. You can’t cure it with these things; booze, ice cream, a bad rom-com.”
“What do you need then?” He put the bottle aside, turning his body towards you.
The question made you lose your breath, it was a question people rarely asked. Usually they would assume that whatever unsolicited advice they gave you was to be taken as gospel and if you were against it, you were simply not wanting to feel better. You thought for a moment, not really coming up with much and it made you feel horrible again. Why couldn’t you just give an answer that would help and that he could use? Here he was, trying to care for you and you were pushing him away.
“I just need you to tell me that everything is going to be okay,” you said after an incredibly long stretch of silence, only then realising that tears had started running down your cheeks again. If you only knew what was bothering you but you did not, and the frustration mixed with feeling so blue was enough to cause desperate tears.
Rick decided to pull off his stained lab-coat, throwing it on the floor and then opened his arms. He obviously knew what you needed despite that you had not told him, “G-get in here, you nutcase.”
“I’m a mess,” you sniffled, blinking away a few tears that threatened to escape, and then scooted close to him. The pillow against the wall fell over as you used his chest instead.
“Listen,” he rested his cheek in your hair, arms around your body and you had no idea that the pressure of him against you could make you feel so safe, “E-everything is going to be okay, baby. You’re just in need a bit of serotonin today.”
“More like every day,” you sighed, breathing him in to soothe yourself, “Can you just… talk about your day? I don’t need much else.”
There it was; you finally had a proper answer to the question and in return, Rick kissed your hair softly, “Have you eaten today?”
He knew you too well. You felt a little stab of guilt in your stomach as you shook your head, knowing that you had promised to be better when you had days like these, “Sorry.”
“I can pick up something, w-whatever you like, later,” he replied, holding onto you and squeezing.
“Thank you,” you said and kissed his shoulder, “Please just talk about something while I close my eyes for five minutes.”
“So I was pouring the Phosphorical Trisulphur Acid into some li-liquid nitrogen, and yeah, something just did not go as planned which is fucking unbelievable because I did my calculations twice yesterday, I told y-you about that,” Rick began, voice already turning back to the same tone as when he had first entered your room, “I bet Morty tempered with it, he never knows what’s not his, the little p-piece-“
You fell asleep against him mid-rant, his voice oddly soothing and his usual behaviour making you feel slightly more normal. People must have thought you were crazy if they had seen the scene before them but you did not care and despite Rick being far from perfect, he sometimes simply showed that he was perfect for you.