Rick: Chapters 1–6

Rick dumped the pile of quarters back into their jar and bounded down the stairs and out to the driveway to say goodbye.

Rick and Jeff had been best friends since the second week of third grade, when Rick had done an impression of Mrs. Fields, the old woman who volunteered in the lunchroom, and Jeff had laughed so hard milk had come out of his nose.

“You heard him—go do your thing,” Stacey said with an offhand wave.

A worn wooden bureau with the top drawer pulled out and sitting on the floor was centered on the third wall, below a round window that opened outward.

A flat-screen TV sat on the floor in the middle of the room, flanked by stacks of video games and in front of two black leather beanbag chairs.

“This game is awesome. You can actually crack a bottle on a guy’s head and the shards embed in his skull.”

“Especially on the day before school starts, when the parental beasts of the suburban savannah are most likely to pounce.”

And with the choppy waters of sixth grade only seventeen hours away, that could be more important than ever.

But in a group, he was always on the lookout for something to make fun of. Or lately, to stare at, if there was a girl he deemed pretty.

They sat there for a moment in the din of introductions, just seeing each other.

When the bell rang, the room devolved into a whirl of chaos.

“But you were the one who said she...” Rick was too flabbergasted to finish his sentence.

Rick and Diane had gotten hooked on the first episode and couldn’t get enough of the swirling cursive lettering and the goofy banter between the competitors and the host.

Rick was pretty sure his liking-people neurons were pulling a C. J. At least C. J. got to leave the show and return to the real world, where no one cared what his calligraphy skills were like.

Rick had to keep pretending and deflecting while everyone, even his father, seemed to think he should turn into some sort of hormonal beast now that he was in middle school.

Homework from a legion of teachers was already worse than homework from one.

Moments later the door buzzed and the lock released, letting him into an airy lobby with a marble mantel under a large mirror, and an old, intricate ironwork banister leading up a set of stairs.

The door to the left of the stairs had a diamond-shaped window that opened into the darkness of an elevator shaft.

He was stocky, with tufts of bright white hair, a full face, and an even fuller smile.

Grandpa Ray flourished his hand palm-up around his one-room apartment.

Both laughed into their hands until Ms. Medina looked their way, and they stared at the ground to try to gain their composure.

Mr. Vincent was a thin white man with a thick, dark mustache and a receding hairline.

“So, let’s imagine Plato is tired after a long day of philosophizing and wants to go home to have dinner and see his wife.”

Mr. Vincent looked flummoxed.

It takes a long time for tiny bubbles to develop at the bottom, but then they start to rise into little bubble columns that multiply and grow faster and bigger, until trails of steam start to waft from the surface, and then suddenly—poof, the water is in a full boil.

Kids liked to challenge him to draw anthropomorphic mailboxes and BMWs and, today, a plate of spaghetti.

One kid with a pink-streaked ponytail had an especially deft style of catching the underside of the packet, giving it a little lift that soared it right toward the opposing goal.

One heated volley sent a packet flying in an arc over the table and landing on the ground ten feet away.

That sparked the attention of Mr. Kyle, the vice principal, who meandered through the cafeteria, alternating between chatting with some students and yelling at others.

Grandpa Ray took a deep breath and let it out through pursed lips.