Rick: Chapters 7–16

In the meantime, I am elated, enthralled, and exhilarated to be here.

In the meantime, I am elated, enthralled, and exhilarated to be here.

In addition to sharing your name, grade, and preferred pronouns, I welcome you to tell us briefly what brought you here today.

It was Ronnie, from homeroom and the Cafeteria Ketchup Kerfuffle.

Mom and Dad reminisced about their own times in college and how they had met as seniors and Mom had almost failed her last semester classes and how Diane had better never do anything like that.

“Uh...I...uh...er..." Rick’s mouth contorted with each nonsense syllable.

“You are welcome and encouraged to share, especially because that can make it easier for others to open up, and your answer can change, but I don’t want anyone to feel they have to give an answer every week if they’re thinking it over. So let’s do our go-round. And for an icebreaker this week, tell us a word you love.”

“And I genuinely appreciate the inclusivity of LGBTQIAP+, but it was a little unwieldy on my tongue. So I did some sleuthing and found this gem that a feminist artist named Sadie Lee came up with. Any ideas what the other letters stand for?”

“I didn’t mean to say you need to use this acronym. I was just offering an alternative.”

The room was quiet.
"Leila?" Mr. Sydney prompted.

"Broadway style!" Yaya stretched his hands out at his sides and shook them with flair.

The conversation turned to ridiculous parents and the indignities suffered by their children while Mr. Sydney tried to steer the conversation back to fundraisers.

“You know what I’ve had a hankering for lately?” Grandpa Ray asked when Rick showed up for their weekly visit. “A big old bowl of popcorn! Sound good?”

Rick wasn’t sure how to do that, much less whether he wanted to, but in the jostle heading downstairs, no one really noticed two kids stopped on the midflight landing.

But the defaced sign stuck in the back of his mind.

Kelly tipped her hand in a grandiose bow from her seat.

They could keep watching Rogue Space, but Rick had seen the new ones and even Grandpa Ray admitted that most of the old ones were hokey.

Serendipitously, he found what he was looking for, and better yet, it was the following weekend.

The sound came involuntarily, from deep in Rick’s stomach.

Tickets $1-20—give what you can. All proceeds will be used to purchase LGBTQIAP+ titles for the Jung Middle School library!! followed by the date and time of the show.

But if he hadn’t had reason to avoid Jeff, his brain wouldn’t have been so muddled in the first place.

“Theater thrives on spontaneity.”

Kids gathered around it, gabbing about who was performing when.

Ellie affected a posh British accent.

Ellie affected a posh British accent.

"Spins quarters?" Kelly sounded dubious. "What kind of talent is that?"

"Thank you, thank you!" Yaya said with Miss Kris’s lilt.

Melissa lowered her chin so that she was staring at Kelly from under a deeply furrowed brow.

The shiny liquid-metal river captivated Rick, and once it cooled into a brick, he enjoyed watching the metal pressed out over and over, until it was flexible enough to be rolled up.

He wore a long black dress with a thick red sash over his shoulder, a red wig back in a bun, and lots of large silver jewelry, like Senator Smithfield wore when she addressed the Pristine Council.

“It does feel pretty great to put out the old garb. And thank goodness this wig held up all these years. I had to dig pretty deep in the closet this morning to find her.”

They got to hear some of the current Rogue Space writers talk about the history of the show, and Rick even got an autograph from the actors who played VerDurZal, the three-headed sage of Kendor Prime.

Rick thought Dad would say something in response, but he didn’t, until the silence grew wider and wider, and out of the chasm grew a thought in Rick’s mind.

“Salutations! Salutations!” Melissa cried as she squeezed through the mass of quieting people to reach the auditorium entrance.

She greeted everyone cordially, except one woman, who she nearly leapt on with a giant embrace and kiss on the cheek.