Chapter Text
I met him on the front lawn, early, before the sun was even up. The grass was cold and wet under my feet and I saw him lit in the flashing red of fire truck lights. He was ghost-like in his long, white coat and– when I caught him staring at me – he flinched like a guilty dog.
Mom watched the fire from beside him, her posture stiff and her fists clenched in front of her chest. Her elbow brushed his arm like an anchor. She watched the fire with her body turned towards him, her hands up and ready. Like she was afraid he might try to leave. Like she needed to be able to grab him in case he flew away with the smoke rising from the smoldering embers that used to be our garage.
“Nice family you got here, sweetie.” His voice was sudden and deep and sandpaper soft and Mom crumbled under it. I watched her bow her head and cover her mouth. Her shoulders started to shake and the strange man in the ghostly white coat hovered his hand over the small of her back. It stayed there, frozen, and then dropped without touching her. I’m the only one who knows he ever raised it at all.
A firefighter carried my dad out the front door, then, trailing smoke from his black and yellow uniform. My dad was limp in his arms, bare legs flopping as the fire fighter lugged him toward a waiting ambulance. He was completely naked and I heard something else over the crackling of my burning home.
The man was laughing. Quietly. He grinned down at me again and tilted his head towards my dad, and I think I smiled back. I guess it was kinda funny.
In the morning I found out who he was.
Mom always told me my grandpa was dead.
🧲🧲🧲
Morty doesn't see the irony as he uses a damp sock to clean the dried cum out of the crevices of his elephant lamp. All he sees is another point of failure in his life, and as he scrubs he hopes he can erase the evidence of yet another thing wrong with him.
It was stupid (like him) and it probably didn't mean anything. Just another fixation, something he did without ever analyzing it. He liked to cum on the lamp, it was nearby, it was his, it was familiar. A little ritual. If Morty were more accustomed to self reflection he might connect the sentimentality of an heirloom and his despoiling of it to the tension in his family. His parents holding onto one another by their fingernails, his sister's increasing emotional distance. He might think that cum rolling down an object's body was a reflection of himself. Helpless, agency-less, dirty Morty. Life debasing him in an endless facial, his pathetic existence running down his cheeks and nose and chin, and him, immobile, letting it happen. Him, stewing in it, as the layers build and crust over, leaving him gross and untouchable.
But he doesn't think about that. He's cleaning the lamp because it was Rick's. His mom had pulled it out of storage when he was ten years old and he’d started getting into magnets.
"This was your grandpa's," she'd said, unwrapping yellowed newspaper and revealing the elephant inside, "I kept it, from the estate sale."
Morty wasn't sure what an estate sale was, and had thought the lamp was kind of gay. But the way his mother cradled it in her arms, like it was something very special? It made him want it.
"Your grandpa was," she unwrapped the red lampshade and fidgeted with it while she considered her words, "he was really smart, Morty. He was a… he was a smart man. A scientist."
"W-what kind?"
"Hm?"
"What kind of scientist, Mom?"
Beth had smiled down at him, placing the lamp in his lap.
"Every kind."
Morty had to clean the lamp. If his grandpa is as smart as his mom says, he'll know. He'll ask for his lamp back and will know what Morty did to it and hate him for it. He'll figure out his grandson is a disgusting little creep.
🧲🧲🧲
It’s fall, and it's wet and it's cold. Jerry complains about the draft whenever he can, throwing petulant glares in the direction of Rick's room. It's been a week and the garage hasn't been fixed yet.
They don't have the money to hire a contractor. There's structural damage, and it's not just from the fire. There's a hole in the garage roof, like something fell out of the sky and crashed through it. Beth had stuffed towels in the doorjamb to keep the worst of the cold out. But before that, Morty had seen it. He'd snuck into the garage after the firefighters cleared them to go back inside. There was something shining and chrome atop the rubble. He saw a cracked glass dome, and lights that sputtered weakly as they fought to stay illuminated despite all the damage.
It looked like a flying saucer.
Rick had promised to fix the garage, but he hasn't shown his face since Beth cleaned out the storage room and set up an old camping cot for him to sleep on. Sometimes, at night when he can't sleep, Morty stands at the door. Light spills across his toes and he hears the tinkle of glass clinking together. It reminds him of bottle depot day, when he and his sister Summer round up all of their mom's empties to trade in for pocket change.
Beth sets an extra place at the breakfast table. She's made pancakes for the sixth time since Rick got here.
"Mom?" Morty speaks into his syrup, pets Snuffles under the table.
"Mm?" She's reading a medical journal and misses her mouth, poking herself in the cheek with her fork.
"Is Grandpa Rick g-gonna," (Beth's face shifts into a carefully neutral expression), "is he gonna come eat breakfast?"
"Your grandpa is, he's-"
"Sleeping off a hangover,” Jerry mutters, just loud enough to be heard, but not loud enough to be acknowledged.
"He's still getting used to being here, Morty." Beth portions off a bigger hunk of cake with the edge of her fork, stabs it so hard that the entire table hears her tines hit the plate. "He needs time."
"I-I could, I could, you know, maybe bring him h-his plate? To his room?" Morty threads his fingers through the rough, slightly curly fur on Snuffles’ head. The dog noses against his palm.
“Suck-up,” (Summer.)
“If he wants to be a part of this family, he can come in here, apologize, and eat at the table!” (Jerry.)
“That would be… really nice of you, Morty.” (Beth.)
Morty dishes him some pancakes, pours a glass of orange juice. The walk through the entryway and down the hall is fraught with challenges— from his own racing heartbeat and sweating palms to Snuffles doggedly getting underfoot. Morty manages to trip on his own feet and stumble into a wall, catching himself heavily with a thump. He only spills half the orange juice (a sticky, pulpy trail runs down the drywall and collects along the baseboard) and he counts that as a win.
And then,
he remembers Rick’s room is just on the other side of the wall he slammed into.
Snuffles looks up at him with glassy, pitying eyes. Poor boy. Can’t even walk and carry something at the same time. How sad.
“You okay?” Jerry calls from the dining room.
“I-I- I’m fuh-fine!” Snuffles laps spilt juice off the wall, “just tripped, haha!”
But he doesn’t feel very ‘haha’ at all. This’ll be the first time he’s really interacted with his grandpa, and he’s probably heard everything and sitting in there thinking ‘this kid is a fucking idiot.’
And now Morty’s made such a big show of it, it’s not like he can slink back to the table without making the delivery. His stomach twists and tears sting at the back of his eyes. Crying over nothing, again. ( Baby.)
Morty gathers courage he doesn’t actually possess and takes the last few steps to Rick’s door.
It’s the same as it was last night: shut tight against the rest of the house. The strange man who (crashed his spaceship) appeared out of nowhere hidden away inside. Morty raises his hand to knock and finds he’s holding a plate of pancakes in it. Oh, oh no. Actually, both his hands are full. Snuffles rounds the corner and settles at his feet, oblivious to his owner’s internal anguish. The unique agony of being Morty Smith is lost on the dog. Snuffles only wonders if the boy will spill more sugary liquids for him to drink.
“F-fuh-fd- damn it, ” Morty’s voice cracks, quietly, and he takes a few steadying breaths. He’s going to have to— “e-e-excuse me?”
Not loud enough. Barely even a whisper. He clears his throat.
“H-hey, grandpa R-rick?” Better, but he cringes at the whiney tone that always seems to creep in, “I h-have, I got you, got some p-puh-pan-, breakfast.”
This is bad, his stutter is worse than normal and he can feel the glass start to slip in his sweaty grip. He’s sure that, assuming his grandpa is awake and willing to open the door, if he offers him the glass there’s going to be a greasy, hand-shaped smear where he’d held it. And Rick would refuse to take it from him, because Morty had touched it.
“J-jeez.”
Just as he’s starting to spiral— the option of turning heel and pretending like he was never here becoming more and more attractive — Rick’s door creaks open. Morty freezes.
It’s him, the ghost, and this is the first time Morty has faced him since he moved in.
Rick looms over the boy, one hand propping himself up on the door frame. His lean torso swims in a stained wife beater and he tugs brown slacks over narrow hips like he's just stepped into them.
The light is off behind him and he squints, puffy-eyed, at the brightness of the hallway. He’s tall, Morty thinks, really tall.
“Hey,” there’s that rough voice again, and it’s all Morty can do to lift the plate and glass up like little shields. Rick glances between them and Morty. Now that he’s seeing the man, really seeing him, he notices the sickly pallor of his complexion. His eyes are blue, ice blue like his mom’s, and the man looks down at him with something unreadable in his face. It’s an expression that twists Morty up inside. Makes him feel not like he’s done something wrong. It makes him feel like he is something wrong. Looks at him like Morty is a tragic kind of problem that he needs to solve.
“S-sorry, I j-just,” Morty takes a step back, “sorry fuh-for waking you up, I-”
“I was up,” Rick says, cutting in quick, “don’t sweat it.”
( Shit! He knows I'm sweating! )
“Oh, c-coolsies. W-well, enjoy?” he manages to squeak out, desperate for the interaction to end. Why did he even offer? It’s like he loves looking like a dumbass or something. Morty’s breakfast roils in his stomach and bile rises in the back of his throat. He tries for eye contact, realizing he’s been staring at his grandpa’s unbuttoned slacks for too long.
Rick is still looking at him like that. It fucks with his pulse, his heart stumbling over a couple beats because of course Morty's insides are just as awkward as Morty’s outsides. Then Rick smiles. It’s a tiny, lopsided thing. Really just a twitch followed by a softening of his expression. His intent was probably to put the boy at ease, but Morty can’t help but feel like a rat staring up at a lazy house cat’s pointed teeth.
Before he can turn and sprint back to the comfort of anywhere-but-here, Rick reaches out and yoinks the food from him. His hands are huge, and his fingers brush against Morty’s. They're cold. As soon as the transfer is complete Morty pulls his arms to his chest like he'd been electrocuted.
“J-jumpy,” Rick stutters, teeth still bared in a subdued homage to the Cheshire cat, “Chill, little guy. Y-you know I’m not gonna, gonna bite you or anything.”
Huh?
An icicle of shame pierces Morty through the brain as he tries to process what he's hearing. A short lifetime of being bullied— by kids and adults alike —snapping in front of his mind's eye like the worst PowerPoint ever.
"W-what?" Rick stutters again, catching the W just like Morty had when he said 'w-well,' six line breaks ago. He glances down at his food, "wait, did you bring- how am I supposed to- to eat this without a fork?"
Morty wrings his hands together, twisting and pinching his skin until it hurts.
( He’s making fun of me he thinks I’m stupid he’s making fun of the way I talk and he knows I’m stupid and he’s laughing at me and he’s- )
“W-woah! Hey, hey, hey,” now it’s Rick’s turn to have his hands uselessly full, gesturing towards Morty’s face with his half-empty glass, “I can, I'll go get one myself, it's fine. Damn, kid, don’t cry over it.”
Morty runs, nearly kicking Snuffles in his haste.
He’s not fast enough, because his dad is hovering by the stairs and he catches Morty wiping the tears out of his eyes. He reaches out but Morty cringes away from his hand, rips his backpack off the hook by the front door. Tries not to see the way he just hurt his dad’s feelings.
Summer acts out all the time, he thinks. Leave me alone, he thinks.
Morty is struggling to tie his shoes when he hears:
“Okay, real nice, Rick.”
And then a door not-quite-but-pretty-close-to slamming shut.
Then, a little louder as Jerry tries to project right through the wood, “he was just trying to do something nice for you!”
Summer helps him with his laces without being asked. They catch the bus.
🧲🧲🧲
Dad
<You down with giving me the scoop on what happened this morning?]
Morty turns his phone over and folds his hands on top of it. Mr. Enis, his student support worker, taps a pen against his clipboard.
He's a soft man, with a weak jaw and droopy eyes. Everything about him seems washed out, like a favourite but oft-laundered blanket, and he almost melts away into the cream/gray colour scheme of his office. Their session has lapsed into yet another uncomfortable silence. He clears his throat.
“Well, then,” (Morty stares into his lap, his phone vibrates but he does not check it.) “I have some good news to share with you. Your referral went through.”
“W-whuh?”
“For the speech pathologist, at Seattle Children’s Hospital,” he flips through his papers, “a Doctor Schlit, looks like. Your parents will be contacted sometime next week to schedule an appointment.”
“I-I don’t, isn’t that expensive?" His phone buzzes again and he presses it into his lap, smothering it. Mr. Enis sets his pen down.
“That’s not something you need to worry about,” his eyes flick over Morty’s head, to the clock above the door. It hasn’t been long, they’re supposed to talk for an hour a week but Morty hasn’t given him much to work with. The majority of their session has been spent on halting bouts of small talk. He assesses the boy’s posture: knees together, shoulders hunched, hands folded tightly in his lap. The kid has constructed a nice little wall around himself. “Did something happen today?”
Morty looks up quick, like he’s been caught.
“Oh, j-jeez no, just a regular day in, in Mortyworld,” he says. Scrapes his nails across the textured plastic of his phone case. Scrrt, scrrt, scrrt. He’s shut down.
“Mhm.”
It became apparent that Morty Smith needed extra support early on in his Middle School career. Missing homework, failed tests, general inattentiveness in class. His file describes a withdrawn, overly anxious child who should have been assessed for learning disabilities by now. But every time the school reaches out about setting something up, the mother has politely but firmly insisted that it wouldn’t be necessary. Getting the boy’s stutter looked at by a specialist will be a big step towards helping the poor kid, but until then…
“I heard you stayed home from school last week,” Mr. Enis says. Morty stops scratching at his phone case.
“Oh, y-yeah.”
“Anything to report there? It was Meatball Monday in the cafeteria,” he’s heard students say it’s a good dish, comparatively, “share whatever you’re comfortable with.”
He avoids mentioning that Morty also missed his support session, no need to put him on the defensive.
“I, uh, we got some drama. A- at home.”
Interesting. Mr. Enis stays still, laying in wait like a hunter, barely breathing lest he spook his prey. The boy’s homelife, from what he’s managed to wring out of the kid, is dicey territory. His sister showed up to last year’s picture day with a black eye. The gossip in the teacher’s lounge was that it was her mother. Morty takes a breath.
“Muh-my grandpa moved in,” he laughs a warbling laugh, “it's been a l-lot to get used to, you know?”
“To be sure, it’s not easy adjusting to a new addition in the home.”
Morty nods. The clock ticks in the silent office and Mr. Enis fights to hold in the exasperated sigh he really, really wants to let loose right now.
“And you missed school to welcome him in?”
Morty shifts in his seat.
“You don’t have to share if you don’t want to, I understand-”
“H-he crashed his… car. Through our garage, uh, door. Through the garage door. Th-there was a fire,” he blurts, pushing the words out like unruly dinner guests who’ve long since worn out their welcome, “a-and we had to stay outside f-for a couple hours. Until eight in the morning a-and my m-mom, my, she said wuh-we could s-s-sleep in and stay home and everything like that.”
"A fire? Is everyone okay?" Oh boy.
Morty's eyes slide down and to the side, staring at the floor as he thinks.
"I-it did a lot of damage. I heard my parents s-saying it's gonna be a lot of, of money. To fix it."
"Mm."
"And th-then my Dad was saying stuff about my grandpa, th-that he couldn't just blow u-up our lives a-after walking out o-on Mom a-and leaving Grandma t-tuh-to d-die a-alone."
"Oh," Mr. Enis says (because what else can he say?). And before he can say anything else, Morty chugs along, picking up steam though his voice grows thick and his eyes start to swim with tears.
"A-and my Grandpa came in from the garage and suh-said he'd fix it a-and my mom was crying and suh-saying s-s-sorry for what my dad said about Grandma a-and and-"
He sniffs, snot bubbling from his nose even as he grinds the heels of his palms into his eye sockets. The boy's trying his best, but his breaths still hiccough and heave out of him in pathetic little gasps. Mr. Enis picks up his pen again and begins to note down these developments. He scratches interesting words like 'grieving' and 'estranged' into patterns he hopes will make sense to whatever schmuck inherits this kid after he retires next year.
"I, I'm s-sorry," Morty murmurs before lifting his shirt collar and wiping his nose off on it, despite the box of tissues within arm’s reach on the end table.
"You don’t have to apologize for your emotions, Morty, I can see how upsetting that would be to overhear."
Morty nods, slow, like his head weighs too much for his neck. He sniffs. His hands— now shiny and slick with mucus and tears — go back to messing with his phone case. Before the boy can clam up again, Mr. Enis flexes his active listening skills:
"I'm hearing some life altering events happened last week. Your grandfather, who you’ve never met-"
"I thought he was dead," Morty says. Mr. Enis bites his lips, and just as he’s deciding that Morty has finished, the kid adds: “Mom makes an ofrenda for him. E-every year. And we put tequila on it, except l-last year Summer drank it and D-dad said we would juh-just p-put water this year b-but…”
“But he’s here this year,” Mr. Enis finishes as a new wave of tears washes over his client. He writes: hispanic?? on the first page in Morty’s file. The school would probably appreciate that demographic data.
“Y-yuh-yeah,” Morty keeps wiping his nose on his shirt collar, the yellow fabric visibly slimed, “I u-uh, c-can I go buh-back to free period? I n-need to, to get a hold of muh-myself be-before math.”
Aw. “You can stay here if you like. I have emails to answer, feel free to sit on the couch and take a breather,” he pauses, “there’s tissues on the end table if you need them.”
“Jeez, th-thanks.”
Mr. Enis’ mind becomes a mystery to us again, as we drift out of third-person omniscient and back into Morty’s own limited point of view.
The couch is firm and boxy under him, the upholstery scratchy against the backs of his arms. His phone goes off again and he swipes to wake it up. His only notifications are missed texts from his dad.
Dad
<I know youre in class right now, but that doesnt stop your sister haha]
<you really worried me this morning champ thats not like you]
<not trying to be “not-baller” or anything but i think we should sit down and have a chazzizzle]
<A chat i mean haha. Anyways you, me, and Rick are going to talk about this morning. together. See you after school Love you!]
Morty’s stomach clenches painfully. He gets a flash, the image of his breakfast snaking through his guts, getting smeared against the folds and furls of his intestines. It feels heavy, gummy, sick. He feels sick. He wants a shower.
Morty opens Subway Surfers on his phone and tries to drown out the dread with coins and hi-scores and simple reflexive tapping.
🧲🧲🧲
He’s there. Afterschool. He's sitting on the couch, and from this vantage point Morty notes for the first time that his grandpa has a bald spot. He doesn’t turn his head when Summer slams the door shut and stomps up to her room.
“Morty!” His dad rounds the corner, a tray with three glasses of OJ in his hands. Morty remembers the way Snuffles licked spilt juice off the wall this morning.
Morty remembers his grandpa mocking his speech impediment.
“H-hey, Dad. I-is it okay if I just g-go get changed?”
“Nah, this won't take long, dawg. Cop a seat.” Dad puts the tray down on the coffee table and motions towards the couch (where Rick’s shoulders are steadily climbing to his ears.)
Morty shrugs his backpack off and holds it in front of his body, still in the entryway to the living room. Dad looks at him expectantly; his grandpa pointedly stares out the sliding glass doors and into the back yard. He’s put on a long sleeve sweater since this morning. Dark circles ring his eyes and he holds a silver flask which he spins and turns it in his hands.
“Wh-what are we gonna talk about?” Morty asks, stomach twisting with anxiety. His Dad grabs one of the glasses and brings it over, taking the backpack away and replacing it with a juice.
“Come sit, champ,” he guides Morty to the couch beside his grandpa. He drags the teal recliner across from them (with some effort) and sits, taking his own glass.
The three dudes sit in silence. Somewhere, a neighbor starts a lawn mower.
“Jerry,” Rick’s voice comes out of nowhere, making Morty jump. He doesn’t miss the way his grandpa glances at him before continuing, “y-you’re the man of the house. I get it. But what, what are we accomplishing here.”
Morty stops breathing.
(y-you’re the man… what, what are we)
“Well…” Jerry shoots his own glance Morty-ward, “about this morning…”
“W-what about this morning, Jerry? Y-you you can’t keep saying the same sh- the same crap over and over a-and expect us to guess.”
(W-what… y-you you… a-and)
“No, now you know what, Rick? You may have Beth charmed, but you can’t just barge in here and act like this!”
Rick is untwisting and retwisting the cap to his flask again and again. Morty can hear the sound of metal threads grinding against each other, can picture the way they move clearly in his head. He holds his juice too-tight and his heart beats too-fast. He did it again. Fucked up again.
“Act like, l-like w-what? Jerry? I haven’t done a single thing to encroach on y-your territory, and here ya-you have me sitting here while you piss all over the carpet trying to prove you’re the, the, the big suburban alpha dog.”
(Like l-like w-what-) Morty screwed up ( y-your… ya-you… the the the-) Morty’s always getting it wrong.
“You made my son cry, Rick!”
“I didn’t do shit!”
Dad slams his glass down on the side table but before he can continue Morty bursts out:
“I-it wasn’t his fault!” His voice is shrill in his own ears, “I-I was crying b-but it had nothing to do, tuh-to do with Grandpa R-rick, Dad, it’s fine.”
Morty chugs his juice in a few deep swallows, tries not to feel those two sets of eyes on him. He wipes his mouth on the back of his arm and gets up, breathing a little too hard.
“Morty…” his Dad lifts a hand towards him tentatively.
“I just d-didn’t understand something and, and I was stuck in my head,” Morty makes eye contact with his dad, willing him to drop it. On the couch, still seated, his grandpa takes a quick sip from his flask before capping it again. “I-it was my mistake, Gruh-grandpa Rick didn’t even do anything. I tripped and, and Snuffles was- I just got a little confused. Y-you know how… how I get.”
His dad’s expression softens, eyebrows drawing up. But his grandpa audibly scoffs, like he just heard something so stupid he could barely believe it. The old man opens his mouth like he’s gonna argue when the front door slams shut.
“Morty! Summer! Jerry!” His mom calls into the house, the clatter of keys dropping in the dish by the coat rack audible from the living room. “Can you get your baskets down here? I’m going to the laundromat and getting takeout! Oh-”
She stops in the entryway, looking between the gathered two and a half men. Rick stands.
“How was work?” He tucks his flask into the front pocket of his slacks. Jerry clears his throat and adds:
“How was your day, honey?”
Beth grimaces. She’s still in her scrubs, specks of blood decorating her shirt. She moves past her husband and rests her hand on Morty’s shoulder, “saving the world one horse at a time. How was school?”
“‘S fine, I was j-just gonna go shower” Morty keeps his eyes lowered. His mom purses her lips for a moment, then slips two fingers under his collar and tugs, “M-mom?”
“Your shirt’s dirty, put it with your laundry, alright? And keep it short, please, I want to get to the laundromat before it closes. You too, Dad, I stopped by the bank and picked up enough quarters for everyone,” she says, letting her son go. He edges around her and flees the room.
“Beth, you just got home, you shouldn’t have to do all that,” his dad says.
“Someone has to, unless we want to be the family that goes around in dirty clothes, Jerry,” she sighs. Morty is just stepping foot on the first stair when it starts:
“If someone didn’t blow up our garage, this wouldn’t be an iss-”
“Jerry, really?” Beth cuts him off, her tone raising. Morty grips the banister and realizes he’s still holding his empty glass.
“Sweetie, l-look,” Rick starts, “I said I was gon-going to fix it. So I’ll fix it. I’ll get started a-after dinner. Good as new.”
Morty can imagine his mom shooting a ‘ see? ’ glare at his dad. And he can imagine the way his dad’s lips probably twist into a frown. Morty climbs the stairs and shuts out the rumble of his grandpa’s voice as he reassures Mom of whatever. Ignores the whine of his dad’s voice, complaining about whatever right back.
The orange juice sloshes around inside Morty’s stomach, and all he can think of is hot water down his back and the gunk that coats his guts.
🧲🧲🧲
It’s night in the Smith residence. Morty’s hair is dry and his body is clean. The pajama set he was gifted by his grandma slips off his shoulder. She’d said he would grow into it. The pale yellow looks white in the dark as Morty makes the familiar trek past his parent’s room, down the stairs, and stops in front of his grandpa Rick’s bedroom door.
It feels like being pulled. Magnetic.
Tonight is different: the door is ajar. There is a glow. Faint. Green. Morty’s pulse races in his veins, roars in his ears. He has something he wants to say to the dead man who’s been living here, so he knocks.
Each soft rap of his knuckles against the door nudges it inwards, the glow rising as the gap widens.
“G-grandpa Rick?”
If Morty nudges the door open enough to squeeze through, there’s no one to see him do it. The room is empty.
There’s boxes, a lot of boxes, and Morty figures they must have been brought in while he was at school. The cot he helped dig out of the family camping gear sits pressed against the right-most wall. The wall Morty fell against this morning. He cringes and just knows his grandpa was laying right here when he tripped.
There’s a desk on the far end of the room, and the green glow emanates from it. Morty steps deeper in, blinking as his eyes adjust to the gloom. There’s another thing. There’s a buzzing, like a hum that brushes over his skin and disturbs the fine peach fuzz on his arms. It feels staticy, charged. Something broken is scattered across the desk, a mess of wires and shattered glass and cracked pieces of a smooth, gray, plastic-like shell. Sitting in the middle of the debris is a glowing green rock. Morty backs up.
The boy might have a learning disability but he knows what radioactive looks like.
From the other end of the house he hears a muted crash. His grandpa’s still working on the garage, then. Morty retreats, making sure to leave the door just as ajar as it was when he found it.
His parents, his sister, his dog, everyone is asleep in their beds except for Morty and his grandpa. It feels good, moving through the hall and across the dining room in the dark. He is unseen and unknown. The towels that were stuffed into the cracks around the door to the garage are laying discarded in front of it. Light shines in a fan from underneath the gap. On the other side: something settles loudly on cement, like a heavy metal object stuttering to the floor.
“F-fuck!” His grandpa.
Maybe he’s feeling bolder after his short B&E, because Morty twists the knob and eases the door open in one smooth motion. Rick is standing with his back to him, facing the crashed vehicle.
“Pr-ox-imi-tyyyy,” a feminine robotic voice intones, its syllables pitching up and down, “de-de-de-fence-ces active-ate-ing.”
Lights ringing the spaceship shine brighter, silhouetting his grandfather in cool blues, until clack, clack, clack! A series of floodlights snap on, blinding Morty. He stumbles backwards, heels hitting the threshold to the kitchen and he goes down, landing hard on his ass.
“Ma-ay-ay-ke pee-ace with your g-o-d-d-d,” there’s a whirring noise as something powers up. The lights are hot. Morty can’t see.
“Quit it,” Rick groans, “F-fuck, Ship, my fucking eyes holy shit.”
Click, click, click. The heat disappears, but with the stars flashing in and out of his vision Morty can only assume the lights are off. He moans, twisting out of the doorway and onto his knees. He grinds his palms against his eyelids. His butt hurts.
“Isn’t it past your bedtime, kid?”
“A-aw jeez, what the he- heck? Ah!” Two hands clamp around his wrists and drag them apart, leaving Morty’s face uncovered. He tries to jerk free but Rick holds him fast.
“Look at me,” he says. His hands are cool and rough and Morty can’t, can’t, can't pull away. “Y-you were creepin’ around in the dark like that, you’ll be, be lucky if you’re not permanently blind.”
“ Whuh-what! ”
“Open your- I’m not g-gonna ask again, open your eyes dumb-dumb.”
Morty does as he’s told, absently feeling tears slip down his cheeks. His face burns as he stares at the sparkling black where his grandpa’s face might be. Afterimages of his silhouette duck and weave in and out of view. One hand leaves his wrist and he hears the snikt of something small and mechanical. His grandpa sighs, his sour breath washing over Morty’s face. He recognizes the smell from the shrine his mother built for him last Día de Muertos. Tequila.
“Ye-ugh-p, flash blindness. Good going,” he takes Morty by the wrist (his hand is big, his fingers wrap all the way around and more) and tugs the boy to his feet, leading him around tripping hazards.
“H-how was I supposed to-” Morty drags his feet. (He doesn’t know it yet, but this is the first of many times Rick will yank him around by his wrist.)
“N-not you, kid. Ship?”
“Ye-sss, Ri-ck.”
“White-list him, o-obviously,” he pushes Morty into a chair, “there. Sit and, and don’t move or anything. You’re gon- gonna have to wait it out, I don’t have my shit set up yet or I’d whip something up f-for ya.”
“W-wait, is it p-permenant or not?” Morty blinks in his direction, sniffing. There’s an uncomfortably long pause before his grandpa speaks again.
“Ph-photic retinopathy is caused by, by the oversaturation of retinal pigment. When it’s bright out your- your pupil, it constricts, l-limiting the amount of light that can reach your retina. But you,” he pokes Morty in the chest for emphasis, forcing a squeak out of the boy, “you were cr-crawling around in the d-dark like some kind of, of home intruder so your pupils weren’t constricted.”
“But wh-what does that mean,” Morty whines, more tears pouring out of his eyes and landing on his pajama shirt. His grandpa groans, and from the sound of it, slumps against something and knocks a bunch of crap to the floor. He swears under his breath.
“It, it means we gotta wait and see- heh- if your pigment returns to normal.”
Morty hears the metal threads of Rick’s flask unscrew, a gulp, and then the lid screwing back on. He smacks his lips a couple times, and Morty can imagine him staring up at the ceiling.
“For a human… Let's give it twenty minutes before we start to-to panic. And stop crying, damn,” the last part devolves into a grumble he aims away from Morty.
“Suh-sorry,” Morty pulls his collar up to wipe his nose, “I c-can go…”
“Y-eah, a-and break your neck walking into walls? I don’t think so,” the older man sighs and kicks something that goes clattering away. It’s chilly in here, the tarp covering the hole in the roof crinkles as autumn night breezes pass over it. Morty pulls his legs up and warms his toes with his hands. “J-just, sit and be quiet.”
“O-okay.”
It’s nice sitting in here and listening to his grandfather work. Well, there's the crushing fear of maybe being forever-blind, but other than that? Alright, it's almost nice.
Every so often the man swears, or kicks something, or the Ship yelps (in pain?). For the most part it’s easy for Morty to tune into the chatter of drills and the bleep-bloops he’s starting to think of as ‘Sci-Fi Noises.’ Even the cold recedes after a solid ten minutes of, Morty guesses, Rick welding. The roar of flame rises and falls. After a few more minutes, and a few more degrees in ambient temperature change, Morty thinks he can follow the glow of the torch. He swallows and leans forward, hope climbing up his spine and wrapping around his throat.
“I-I’m not blind!” Relief chokes his voice.
Rick must turn the gas off because the glow dims, plunging Morty into the void once more.
“W-wait,” his grandpa laughs, it’s halfway between genuine humour and a mean snicker, “w-were you staring into- holy shit Morty.”
“Wh-what?” It’s the first time Rick has actually said his name.
“Y-y-you’ve just been sitting there staring directly into, fuck, man, hahaa,” he devolves into raspy giggles and heat rises up to settle in Morty’s face. “You-you going for a record? Gonna add arc-eye to your flash blindness? C-could you wait a couple hours and just g-gaze deep into the fucking sun? Cut out the middleman? ”
“Th-this isn’t my fault!” Shame burns in him, his stomach flipping like it wants to jump out of his mouth. Morty does his best to point in the direction of his grandpa’s voice, “y-your spuh-sp-spaceship’s the one who blinded me!”
“It was gonna do a lot more than that, a-and it’s not my fault you w-were being a sneaky little- st-stop fucking crying!”
“I d-d-don’t ha-have to apologize for muh-my emotions,” Morty sobs, “y-y-you sh-shouldn’t swear at me neither. What k-kind of grandpa even a-are you?”
“The kind who shouldn’t have to, have to tell his dipass grandson not to stare directly into an oxy-acetylene torch. You’re blind now, c-congrats, you proved you can be whatever you want if what you wanted to be was blind! ”
“O-oh j-jeesus Christ,” it comes out as a moan.
“Shut up! Y-you’ll be fine! Y-y-y-you act like it’s the end of the fucking world, and not some shit I can fix in five minutes.”
“Y-you can fix m-my eyes?”
“I’m a motherfucking genius, Morty. I’m the smartest motherfucker in the universe, of course I can.”
“Th-then why d-didn’t you!” Morty gets to his feet, fists shaking. The conflict is getting to him, it's late, he's tired. Morty only even came in here to apologize to the bastard.
“Because you weren’t supposed to make it worse- f-fuck! Fine! Sit the fuck back down before you trip and gouge both your eyes out somehow.”
“D-don't swear!”
“Sit down!”
Rick stomps around the garage, metal clanging as he digs in his things, before suddenly fingers are tilting Morty’s chin up and something is being put on his face. His grandpa tucks thick stems behind Morty’s ears and pushes what feels like glasses up his nose.
“I, I, I can do it my-” Morty raises his hands and finds his grandpa’s chest, pressing on him. Despite his thin frame the man is disturbingly sturdy, and Morty can feel hard muscles through the layers of his clothing.
“Y-you can't do it yourself, actually, so stop freaking out.” He depresses a button on the glasses with a 'bleep-bloop', and a stabbing pain shoots down Morty’s neck. He gasps and Rick captures his wrists before he can slap the glasses off his face. He mumbles a steady stream of ‘It’s good, it’s fine, it’s over,’ into Morty’s ear.
(Morty has seen his mom do this to calm spooked horses.)
“Wh-why? What was that?” He can’t take this, this is too much, he can feel something hot and wet rolling down his neck and he knows it’s blood. He’ll stain the pajamas his grandma gave him for Christmas. “It h-hurts.”
“Open your eyes,” Rick says, his hands falling to Morty’s shoulders.
“Wh-what the hell in hell!”
The man in front of him is electric green and wrapped in millions of glowing yellow threads. They follow the lines of his body before arcing away like hairs on the head of someone touching a Van der Graff Generator. Morty blinks hard, but when he opens his eyes again the image is still there. His grandpa raises one hand and moves it from side to side, nodding as Morty turns his head to track it.
“See?” he backs away, hands on his waist and a hip cocked. It’s hard to see the fine details of his expression, as obscured as it is by a confluence of glowing lines emanating from a bright spot inside his skull. But Morty can hear the smugness in that one syllable, regardless.
“What is this?” Morty runs his hands over the glasses and balks as he catches sight of his own hairy aura. It’s dimmer than his grandpa’s but definitely there, the threads flowing through the air in geometric semicircles, staying equidistant from one another. He karate chops them but feels nothing but air over his skin. Rick does jazzhands. There’s a bar in his left forearm that glows brighter than the rest of his arm.
“Flux,” he says, as if that explains it.
Morty perks up, because it kind of does.
“Yeah, it’s a pretty big deal. That headset interfaces with the, the magnetoreceptors in, in your little monkey brain,” he turns back around, wrenching the door to the crashed ship open and digging through the driver’s side as he continues, his tone light: “and the visor’s j-just a gaussmeter, except it beams those measurements into your eyes wh-where a protein in your retina picks it up and-and the headset translates that data into images through y-your optic nerve, completely bypassing the fuckin’ damage you did to your retinal pigment, baby!”
Morty gets to his feet, swinging his head from side to side. Lines flare out from the ship, from the tools, from the floor, from everything to varying degrees. His heart beats. He thinks about the magnetic field demo kit sitting forgotten at the back of his closet. His mom had bought it for him for not failing 4th grade science; a simple glass pane filled with black sand and a single horseshoe magnet painted red and blue. He’d spent a lonely summer playing with it while his parents worked and his sister hung out at the mall with her friends.
“L-like a pigeon?” He breathes, taking a shaky step towards his grandfather. “L-like a l-lobster, Grandpa Rick?”
Rick looks at him through the shattered windshield, going still for a second before nodding. The lines of force— the magnetic field lines emitted by the electricity created by the excitable cells in his body —following the motion through. He can see it, Morty can see his magnetic field.
“W-wow.” He takes another careful step, then another, reminding himself that he can pass through the yellow threads, “its magnets.”
“I-it’s a little more complicated th-than that. Careful, the noise sh-ough-ould equalize once it adjusts to, to this planet’s main field."
And it is adjusting, if by noise he meant background sources of flux. The neon green glow begins to dim and settle into something easier to parse, and the faint lines coming from the floor (generated by the outer core of the planet, Morty thinks excitedly) mostly disappear. The ship is brighter than almost everything in the garage and he rests his hand on it in wonder.
"W-a-atch it bu-s-ter," it warns, lights pulsing threateningly. Morty marvels at how the yellow threads appear and disappear as electricity runs through their circuits.
“S-so cool,” he says, touching the headlight, running his finger along a crack in the lens, “I a-always wanted to know what they saw…”
“Wh-at who s-aw, Mis-ter Hand-s?” The ship asks.
“Oh, uh, pigeons. And lobsters a-and sea turtles? Th-they can navigate by sensing changes in the e-earth’s magnetic field. A-actually, I read th-that pigeons, they have something in their eyes th-that lets them actually see it. L-like on top of their normal vision. Cryp- uh, crypta-”
“Cryptochromes,” his grandpa supplies, shutting the door and rounding the ship. He’s clutching a tablet, “I th-thought you kids were too busy planking and watching rednecks eat each other's beards on, on A&E to actually read books.”
“Jeez, n-nobody planks anymore,” Morty rolls his eyes, momentarily catching a glimpse through his forehead at the magnetic activity in his own brain. Yeesh. “I, um, I j-just kinda like magnets. They’re cool.”
Rick hums, setting the tablet down on the hood of his ship. He lingers for a moment and Morty thinks he can see the man’s brain lighting up in different places.
“G-grandpa Rick?” When he doesn’t acknowledge him, Morty presses on anyway. The man’s already blinded him. The least he can do is answer a question or two, “wh-why do you have a higher gauss than me?”
Rick’s head snaps up, “what?”
“Y-y-you have bright sp-spots. Like there’s places where your magnetic field is denser but mine looks the same all over?” The statement rises at the end like a question as Morty’s throat constricts. Maybe a man’s flux density is a private thing. Rick clicks his tongue and taps his chest, right over one of the hotspots.
“Augments, kiddo. T-top of the line cybernetic enhancements.”
“Wow, like a pacemaker?” Morty absently reaches towards his grandpa’s heart, watching their lines of force interact. They don’t touch, but bend around each other, so that Morty’s field and Rick’s field slot perfectly together. “Y-you’re inside me.”
Rick smacks his hand away, “d-d-don’t make it weird. And no, not like a ‘pacemaker’, what do I look like to you?”
“My o-other grandpa h-has a pacemaker…”
“Well, Morty, I’m not l-like your other grandpa. I’m awesome, and he’s your dad’s unfortunate progenitor. Gross.”
“W-what do they enhance?” He decides to let the swipe at his dad slide, after this afternoon’s awkward sit-down Morty’s not that impressed with that guy either. Rick puffs out his chest.
“Basically anything I want,” he pulls from his flask, “got some hardware in the ol’ ticker that keeps it beating even if I get nerve-agented.”
“Like a pacemaker?”
“I-It’s not a pacemaker! It a-also keeps my diaphragm contracting so there’s enough oxygen circulating in my- my blood for my brain to work. So I h-have time to make my own antidote from scratch.”
“O-oh. Well th-that’s pretty cool.”
“I didn’t make it to impress you, broh,” Rick takes a deeper swig. Morty waves his hands like he’s trying to brush the negativity out of the air.
“I- I wasn’t being sarcastic! I just, uh, I don’t really get things sometimes. I’m not the brightest tool in the shed.” he says. Rick scoffs.
“W-who told you that? Wh-what about, what about all that magnet stuff from earlier?”
“My teachers? A-and that’s different. I get… fixed on stuff.”
“Hm.”
Rick stares down at Morty, flask held loose at chest height. Here in the middle of the night, in the cold, in the trashed garage, in the fantastical, impossible light of his own magnetism, he doesn’t seem that scary. Not as scary as the dour, skeletal, unwashed wraith that kept to the dark corners of the house since he crashed into it. That man he knew from the tinkling of bottles on the other side of a shut door. The man he’d only ever seen before in a faded polaroid on an altar, looking spiffy in his combat fatigues. Morty had been introduced to him by the nametag over his right breast that read ‘SANCHEZ’ and the slight frown twisting the corners of his mouth. Morty had learned about who he was by the matching frown on his mother’s face, as she poured a shot of tequila and placed it reverently beside his picture frame.
Hard not to be intimidated by that. Morty takes a breath.
“I a-actually wanted to talk to you,” he says, grasping his hands together to give them something to do. Rick picks up his tablet and starts tapping at it.
“Yeeeah, isn’t that what we’re doing right now? About time, too, y-y-you’ve been dodging me like a pet Chihuahua when the PETA van starts circling the block,” he rolls his eyes and turns his back on Morty.
“A-about this morning,” Morty rushes out, “wh-when I- about breakfast.”
His grandpa waits.
“I… I thought, jeez, I thought y-you were makin’ fun of me,” it sounds stupid now that it’s out there, real and hanging in the air, “c-cause of how I talk. My impediment.”
“W-what? For real?” His grandpa laughs like he’s been kicked in the stomach, his shoulders shaking, “a-a-and that made you cry? Fuck, kid. I gotta toughen you up.”
Morty lifts his chin and forces his hands down to his sides, “y-yeah well, I, I’m in touch with my emotions.”
Rick laughs harder, shoving him out of the way so he can pass. A spark of something indignant flares to life in the pit of Morty’s stomach. The urge to backtalk. He’d been honest, told the plain truth, and his grandpa is an adult. He shouldn’t be laughing more. Before Morty can dig his heels in Rick is already at the door to the kitchen.
“St-stay here, Curse of the Crying Boy, gimme a sec, hahaa.”
Once he’s through and gone from sight, Morty slumps against the hood of the ship. He’s exhausted. It has to be three in the morning by now, on a school night, no less. (He doesn’t know it yet, but this is the first of many times Rick will keep him up late.)
"I am n-ot a faint-ing couch," the ship says, revving something that sputters and clicks and ends up being more pathetic than intimidating. Morty pats one of its dents.
"S-sorry, ma'am," he chews his lip, "s-so, you're a real spaceship, huh?"
The machine doesn't respond.
"A-are there, you know, things ou-out there. Aliens?"
"Don't t-alk to me," it revs again, something inside its hull rattling around.
"Sorry, jeez."
“Got it,” his grandpa calls from the doorway, waving what looks like a roll of aluminum foil and grinning, “y-you wanna see something cool?”
Morty doesn’t need to nod, because the man is already clearing space on the workbench and ripping wires out of a gadget. Morty grimaces as the man shoves those wires in his mouth and strips the insulation off them with his teeth. He chucks the aluminum foil in Morty’s direction, “make a bunch of little squares, like an inch by an inch. Folded four times.”
“A-aw jeez, uh,” Morty scoops up the foil, “w-why?”
“Just do it, buddy, trust me.”
They work in companionable silence, Morty tearing and folding and Rick breaking and recombining and soldering and sawing and swearing a bit, too. Morty—nervous, insecure Morty — can't bring himself to ask for clarification and ends up shredding the entire roll, his pile of inch by inch squares a mini mountain on the ship’s silvery surface. He fiddles with them, pushing the pile around and restacking it to look busy, until finally, his grandpa lets out a satisfied sigh.
“I’m a genius,” he mutters to himself, his voice so full of self-satisfaction that it makes Morty smile, “C’mere kid, bring me my electrodes.”
Morty hesitates, and Rick snaps his fingers, not looking up from the completed thingy.
“Th-the squares?” Morty makes a pouch out of his pajama shirt and starts scooping them in, some hitting the floor.
“No, yes the squares.”
He’s hooked a tangle of electronic bits and bobs to the tablet. Power runs through it, and the lines of magnetism ebb and swell until it looks like a pulsating, ethereal mass of organs.
“Nice,” his grandpa reaches a hand into his pouch and grabs a fist full of aluminum squares, laying them out in a grid pattern on the workbench. He connects a wire to each one, sticking them together with paste from a tube he materialises out of his back pocket. His fingers move quick and easy, and Morty stands obediently still with his shirt-pouch spread. It feels like playing a tree in the school play, but at least Morty can rest his eyes while still being useful. “There! Okay give me your head.”
“M-my wha-?”
Rick doesn’t wait for his acquiescence, instead dragging him into the chair and combing his fingers through Morty’s hair like they belong there. “H-hey!”
“I had to make some adjustments, Morty, had to account for the interference from that neural interface you’re hooked up to," he's talking a mile a minute while parting Morty's hair at regular intervals and squeezing paste onto the boy’s scalp. It’s cold, and Morty can't help but think of monkeys at Woodland Park Zoo grooming each other. Morty drops his shirt (the remaining foil squares scatter at their feet) to try and pull his grandpa off him, but Rick bats the boy’s hands away without skipping a beat, “and, and then there’s the issue of projecting the readout, Morty, it’s a hologram it projects in visible light. What is light?”
Morty keens in the back of his throat as a particularly intense shiver runs down his spine. Rick applies paste to the back of his neck, the viscous, wet paste settling into the baby-fine hairs there.
“It’s a wave! You know what else is a wave?”
“G-grandpa Rick, wh-what are you doin’ to me,” oh no, oh no, no no. Morty pulls the hem of his pajama shirt down. Rick ignores his question:
“Electrons! Electron waves, Morty! Using electron holography I can project an image that you can see with those fucked up eyes of yours,” his breath ghosts over Morty’s ear and makes him squirm, “sit still, g-gotta, gotta get the electrodes on now."
Morty whines but does as he’s told. Now that those fingers have stopped petting and brushing and scritching through his hair, it’s easier. The last time someone was in his business like that was his dad when Morty got lice in Elementary School. Except (Morty gets a sinking feeling as he shifts in his seat) when his dad did it, it hadn’t felt weird.
There’s a moment where Morty worries about that.
And then there’s light.
Rick positions the tablet on the workbench in front of them, messing with the wires that run from a port on the side of the device, up to the aluminum squares stuck to Morty’s head. Above the tablet, yellow threads writhe and dance and jump. Morty lifts a hand and touches his viser.
“What is it?” he breathes as his grandpa crouches in next to him. He mutters something about ‘ shitty MacGyver-ass science fair tier bullshit ’ as he messes with the wires. The image jitters, cutting in and out, and then it’s done. The yellow lines coalesce into one whole.
It’s a wave, with peaks and valleys, and it undulates rhythmically five inches off the surface of the table. Morty catches Rick grinning, teeth bared, from the corner of his eye.
“There it is. Pretty cash money, huh?” He lowers himself to a kneel, folding his arms over each other on the table beside Morty. There’s an echo of that look on his face from this morning. The one that’d gotten Morty so twisted, that’d bugged him all day at school. His grandpa looked… sad. Not boo hoo sad, but sad in that way Snuffles sometimes gets when he sees birds in the yard but no one will open the patio door for him. Confusion mixed with helpless resentment. Maybe.
It’s hard to read his expression when Rick’s face is glowing green and Morty’s eyes are all fucked up.
“I don’t… I don’t get it,” Morty whispers, lifting a hand to his head and feeling one of the electrodes. The wave stutters for a moment and Morty withdraws, “a-am I doing that?”
“Y-yeah,” Rick says, lowering his tone as if to match Morty’s. “That’s all you buddy. Check- check this out.”
He digs into a discarded tangle of wire and straightens out a length, like arranging spaghetti into one even cylinder. He spreads his eyelids apart with the thumb and forefinger on one hand and stabs the mass of wire into his eyeball.
“G-grandpa Rick!” Morty's voice cracks. Rick lets out a low laugh, a mean one, like this act of mutilation was a prank at Morty's expense. Goo oozes down the man's cheek.
"Y-you ever try n' shove an earring through an old piercing after it grew over?"
Morty shakes his head 'no.' The hologram pulses bright and dim, bright and dim, along with the boy's racing heart.
"Well it sucks. At that point it's, i-it's basically just like giving yourself a new piercing. Except slower and with a blunt stud instead of a needle."
"You're freaking m-me out, man," Morty can't even edge away without risking dislodging all the electrodes. Rick rolls his eyes at him, the mass of wires following the motion obscenely.
"R-relax, it wasn't a real eye, y-y-you gotta learn to lighten up, kid. Just another augment."
"I-it's not glowing though. Like the not -pacemaker."
Rick scratches the side of his nose (knuckles brushing the wires, making the ruinous remains of his eyeball move in the socket,) "bio-synthetic. I grew it on the back of this fungus I found on Ciglia Five, just like mama used to make."
"But why?"
"Morty, y-you ask a lotta questions. Just look," he squeezes some paste onto the other end of the wires (the tube moans and Morty tries to forget he heard that) before jamming them into the tablet. There's a noise, wet but sharp, like the sound of knuckles cracking, and then the wires start to retract deeper into his grandpa's head. "Oh yeah, that's it. Just lemme... there!"
The hologram falls out of sync, devolving into a confusing mess of thrashing yellow worms. It's horrible, in a way, but Morty is transfixed. He watches closely as two signals begin to emerge.
There are two waves, flowing against one another. When one peaks, the other valleys. When one valleys, the other peaks. Rick and Morty watch, and they are quiet.
Rick reaches out his hand and runs his fingertips through them, highlighting one. It separates from the other, like the hologram has split them into foreground and background. A little display pops up with a text box that fills in one letter at a time:
M O R T Y
C - 1 3 7
"There you are," Rick breathes.
"That's me?"
"That's you."
The way he says it.
It's the way he says it. Like he's something special.
The holograms merge once more and resume their dance. They're perfectly asynchronous, so opposite that they fill the other’s empty and empty the other’s full. Rick and Morty watch as the two waves start to come together, flattening and flattening until they become one.
A flat line.
If Morty were a better student, if he didn't daydream during his classes, he might have the base knowledge to understand what he's seeing. Even with the primitive level of scientific literacy that the American public school system offers, he might recognize this flat line for what it is.
When two waves meet trough to crest and crest to trough, they cancel eachother out and their amplitude reduces to zero.
It's called destructive interference.
