Fix You

"I hate my life," She confides to him, words muffled against his arm. "I just want to die." Rick finds Summer in the aftermath of her suicide attempt and tries to comfort her in his own stilted manner.

"When you try your best but you don't succeed

When you get what you want but not what you need

When you feel so tired but you can't sleep

Stuck in reverse

When the tears come streaming down your face

When you lose something you can't replace

When you love someone but it goes to waste

Could it be worse?"

-Coldplay, Fix You

He knew something was wrong the moment he saw her.

Everyone assumed that he was oblivious to what happened within the family. That he was self-immersed and self-absorbed and thus saw very little of what the outside world was going through.

Not true.

In fact he noticed everything. The soft exhale Beth would give as she passed the photo of her and Jerry (Rick never commented on it just as he never commented on the horse head she taped over Jerry's face), the wince Morty would express when he laid eyes on him and the portal gun he would wave enthusiastically at him, and the subtle arch of the brow that Summer would direct at him if he looked more peeved than usual.

Summer was a lot like him in that regard. Constantly cataloguing the actions and minute details of her surroundings.

But that was where the similarity ended because whereas he would silently observe, Summer would comment and in her own, somewhat caustic way, try to help. His granddaughter was a good girl, no matter how much she would like to be seen as otherwise.

Cruelty hadn't yet seeped into her heart, not really, but he couldn't deny her aptitude for apathy.

She was quite good at that; hiding her emotions, pretending like she didn't care. It was her shield, he knew.

It was his shield, too.

So when he saw her walk through the front door eyes bloodshot, makeup running beneath her eyes, and expression so broken it shocked him into a stupor he didn't know what to say.

He barely managed to form her name on his lips before she was sprinting upstairs, the loud bang of a door closing revealing to him that she'd holed herself in her room. Morty walked through the door a minute after and Rick instantly turned to his grandson.

"What's wrong with, Summer?" He bulldozed, voice showing more concern than he would've liked. But it was rather concerning. Summer had stopped showing such range of emotions after he'd escaped from the federation. She never showed sadness let alone cried. To see her doing it now was strange.

Morty cringed and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Ah, Summer caught her boyfriend cheating on her," He said. "She's taking it kind of hard since prom is this weekend."

Rick gave out a heaving sigh and slouched back into his seat upon the couch. He turned his attention back towards the television.

"Jesus—guess it's trouble in paradise. Could've—I could've warned her of that," He said, voice blasé. Morty shot him a frown.

"Rick, be a little more serious. Y-y-your granddaughter is upstairs crying her—s-she's really upset ya' know. She's been talking about going to prom for months."

"Well, if her boyfriend is fucking around town I doubt that's happening," Rick commented and took a long sip of his beer. Morty's frown deepened and he let out a disappointed sigh. Rick sneered at him as he passed and tipped his bottle back once more.

It wasn't his problem and he didn't care anyway.

And if he was extra attentive of Summer's absence at dinner, well, that was just his nature.

.

.

.

Rick had never been a light sleeper.

He'd passed out over alcohol and drugs and slept even as aliens slammed fists against his ship, and rocked it in rage. He could sleep through Morty insistently shaking him and calling his name in his high, stuttering voice and through glasses shattering as Beth stumbles around the kitchen with a bottle of wine clutched in her pale fist.

Tonight would be like no other except he finds himself jerking awake from his cot when he hears a crash coming from the room next to his.

His sight is still blurred, still heavy with sleep, when he hears a collection of things topple over and a keening whine before a series of retching follows.

"Summer…?" He murmurs thickly. The noise is indeed coming from her room. He pushes himself up a bit more, hand gliding down his chest to grasps the bag of Gladian drugs he'd picked up on his most recent venture.

Only it's not there.

The last vestiges of sleep leave him in a rush and he finds himself sitting up fully, his eyes and hands tracing over his cot as he looks for his missing contraband. It wasn't on his floor and Morty wasn't stupid enough to mess with what he didn't understand. That only left…

The retching coming from Summer's room has stopped and Rick stumbles out a curse before he is throwing himself out of his cot. He rushes to her door, legs wobbling under his not quite sober self, and rips it open to find Summer passed out and face down in her own vomit.

"Jesus Fuck," He hisses out, the sight sobering him, and he falls to his knees in order to turn the redhead over. Fingers feeling for a pulse, he finds none but he does find the pouch he'd stored his drugs empty and crumpled softly in her palm.

"Summer, you fucking idiot," He curses, and places his palms over her sternum in order to perform CPR. He's more than a little angry as he pumps against her chest, but the anger soon descends to panic when he finds she's still not breathing.

"Fuck," He mutters through gritted teeth, hands still pressing hard on her chest. She doesn't respond; her body just jerks beneath his ministrations, head rolling limply and much too closely to lifelessness that it starts to make his chest tight.

"Summer," He hisses angrily and halts to dig desperately in his pockets. "Summer, I swear to God!" He pulls out a device similar to an iPod, but instead of ear buds there are pads that he sticks to her chest.

He pushes the center button and watches as Summer arcs off the floor as an electropulse races through her body. He does it again and again until Summer takes a gasping breath and Rick, bone weary, falls back to let out a breath of his own.

His hands were shaking so he balled them into fists to quell it.

"Grand-pa?" Summer slurs out, and she slowly turns her head to take him in. Anger wells in him quick and fast.

"What the fuck, Summer!" He yells, forgetting his volume and uncaring of the other occupants of the house he could wake up. Summer's brows furrow, pupils blown so wide that Rick wondered if she even knew where she was. His musing was cut short when her voice whispered out.

"Am I dead?"

"No, but I should've let you die for all your fucking idiocy," He spit out, rather ruthlessly. His hammering heart is starting to slow, the desperation of the situation no longer pressing down on him. It nearly stops altogether with her next words.

"You should 'ave…I—I was trying to…to die, ya' know."

"What?" He asked, voice deadly.

"I—" She coughs and her hand slides sloppily over her mouth. She tries to sit up and he watches her fail twice before, annoyed, he roughly drags her up into a sitting position. Her body, still weak, leans heavily against him for support. "I was trying to die."

Her voice is flat; dead. It angers him like nothing else.

"You dumb fuck." He finds himself spitting. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

She stares at him for a long while before, unbelievably, she smiles.

"Everything." She says and he watches in alarm as she then begins to cry. "Everything is wrong with…with me. I just want to die, grandpa. I'm tired of this world. I don't want to be here anymore."

"What—so you're just tapping out? I didn't raise no—" He halted. Raised what exactly? He'd had no hand in bringing up Summer. He'd barely raised Beth. For all that Summer was like him, she wasn't a product of him.

But, well, Summer trying to kill herself? Summer had never resembled him more than in that moment. She stares at him silently, tears still trailing softly down her cheeks.

He gives a heaving sigh and scrubs his hand over his face. The anger drains out of him until only exhaustion remains.

"Is this about that boy?" He finds himself asking. Summer is quiet.

"You know, as cliché as it sounds there are other fish in the sea. That kid isn't the end all, be all, Summer." She shook her head.

"It's more than just that," She mutters thickly. "I'm just…not good, grandpa." He snorts, irritation building in his chest at her words. Who told her such bullshit.

"Summer, you're probably the best person I know." He says and then frowns when he realizes that's the truth. Summer was good in a way that wasn't like Morty; whereas Morty's actions were subtly measured by what he'd gain Summer's actions were unselfish. In fact, there was more than one occasion where she was the party to suffer because of her good deeds.

"I mean I'm not good at—at anything. I can't…can't save my…my parents, I can't save my relationship." She stops and looks right into his eyes. "I couldn't save you."

Oh. Now he sees.

"Summer, you're not responsible for your parent's marriage. Trust me that was a fruitless endeavor from the beginning. And that boy? That kid he's—h-he's a fucking asswipe, Summer. Seriously. He honestly wasn't worth your time."

"I loved him." She said. "I never once thought…thought that he'd ch-cheat on me. That…" Her hand trails up to rub against her chest. "That hurt so much."

"Yeah, betrayal always does," He comments wryly and fumbles with the flask in his coat pocket. She looks down at that, hand clenching tightly against her pink tank top. It's still covered in vomit, as is the bottom of her face and she looks utterly miserable.

He sighs again and grabs her head, tilting it up so he can use the bottom of his lab coat to wipe her face. She stares into his eyes, tears still quietly falling.

"My advice to you, kid, is to never let anyone get that close to you again." He tells her and he's only half joking as he says it. She cracks a mirthless grin and he thinks that is maybe the best he'll get tonight. Once her face is free from her stomach's contents he drops the lab coat and uses his now free hand to hold the other side of her head.

"Summer," He begins gravely. "You're not responsible for me either, you know. I'm a grown ass man and I can take care of myself."

"But it's my fault," She whispers.

"No, Summer, I get it—" He says and wipes at the tears that leak from her eyes with his thumbs. "I said some—some really shitty stuff to you after that wedding but I didn't mean it. I was angry and it's not an excuse b-but you can't—can't keep blaming yourself for everything that goes wrong."

"You do," She says and his hands pull away at that remark. Christ, the kid was too observant for her own good, he thought as he drags his hand along his hair.

"That's different," He argues poorly eyes looking toward the open door and away from her heavy stare. Her arm moves jerkily before falling limply atop his, hand covering his own as she twitchily tries to lace their fingers. He turns his palm over and does it himself. Her head lolls and fall against his shoulder, her face rubbing against his clothes like a cat.

"I hate my life," She confides to him, words muffled against his arm. "I just want to die."

Me too, he thinks.

"You don't have anything to live for?" He asks.

"Do you?" She counters and fuck, she has him there. He would be more annoyed with how well Summer knows him if he weren't so fucking tired. He lets his head roll back until he's staring at her ceiling.

"Live for me," He finally offers and the silence that follows that statement is stifling.

"Okay," She finally agrees, voice still soft. Rick feels both a tightness and a warmth settle in his chest.

"But that means when you die I won't have anything to live for. So live for me, too." There is a vulnerability in her words; a plea. He huffs a laugh. Summer—always trying to fucking help him even when she's at her lowest. His free hand comes up to card through her hair.

"Okay."

He'll help her and she'll help him and they…they would be alright.

They would be alright.

"…Lights will guide you home

And ignite your bones

And I will try to fix you…"

.

.

.

Some hard and devastating shit went down and to make a long story short I tried to kill myself as a result of it. I lived, obviously, but this is just my little note to the world that it's normal to feel sad and to feel depressed. Life has its downs just as it has its ups. Please, talk to someone if you're sad. Look at the ups before being consumed by the downs. I'm in a much better state right now and I'm glad I'm alive. Thank you to all my friends' support even though you didn't quite know what was going on with me. A special thanks to Boop as she did know and was there to help me. I'm sorry for ignoring you guys as I took time to heal. I love you all.

This post is extra special because it is not only a year ago that my suicide attempt took place but it is also my birthday. I hope to see many more.