Summary: Jerry Smith wakes up one day and realises he needs to move on.

I do not own Rick and Morty.

Enjoy!

Jerry Smith, recently divorced man was suddenly woken up by the sound of his pathetic and lonely digital alarm clock.

He sat up, and realised he was no longer in the house that he lived in for the past 20 years but in a sad and lonely single apartment and let out a pathetic sigh before rubbing his eyes to clear the dust out of them.

He looked at the small and messy apartment that reeked of how low he had sunk.

He got up and began to make his way to the bathroom, with every step he could feel his body creaking and his soft carpet giving way to a cold surface underneath.

The bathroom was small and had the needed essential in it; Jerry splashed some Water onto his face to properly wake him up and looked at the small mirror with almost dead eyes.

"Jerry, where did your life go so wrong?" He said, to himself. "You had a wife. Two kid's. A house and a high paying job"

Now he was in this sad and lonely apartment.

Alone.

But he knew where his troubles started.

It started with the return of Rick Sanchez, his wife's dad who suddenly want missing one day and then came back roughly around a decade later.

There was no explanation; he just slit right into their lives.

He would have been fine with that if Rick didn't put him down every chance he got.

He wasn't smart like Rick and the man used those smarts to send his own son Morty to dangerous and traumatising worlds that no 14-year-old should ever go to.

He didn't realise, but cracks were starting to show in his family.

Suddenly he wasn't good enough for his own family; everything was Rick this and Rick that.

His own kid's and wife no longer looked at him like he was the man of the house but a pathetic man who only had a big mouth.

And when he saw the reality where he pursued his dream of becoming an actor and yet still wanted Beth to be his wife.

He thought his marriage problems with his wife was over and that he really should be with Beth.

And then the insults started rolling in from his own family member's mouths just because he was an ordinary man and wasn't amazing like Rick.

He felt like the bad guy for trying to keep his family safe from a lunatic that was clearly going to kill himself one day and every member of the family along with him.

He felt so much less of a man with that man in the room.

He had lost to a ragging Alcoholic.

Jerry remembered that he had a perfect day where he was given a promotion, had amazing sex with his wife and there was hardly any Rick around but that all turned out to be a simulation and he was mocked for thinking he could be anything but a loser.

When Rick was arrested, he thought that his family could go back to normal and he was even doing well even if Earth was enslaved, his perfect day was no longer a simulation but reality.

But his family looked at him as if he was a monster for being happy for a man who clearly needed to be in jail.

When Rick came back with the kid's, the drunken old man was given a big hero's welcome.

He couldn't understand why they would welcome him back after everything he had done and he could see that Beth daddy issues were getting in the way of the man who stood by her when her father did not, so she gave her a choice.

It was either her father or him.

It tore his heart how fast she made that decision and said she would rather have a man who disappeared on her than a man who stood by her and helped raise their kids beside her.

The sudden divorce slapped him in the face, and it made him realise Beth no longer loved him like she used to.

To make it worse not even his own flash and blood cared to ask him if he needed any help when he was moving his stuff out of the house.

Nobody truly cared when he was leaving; in fact, his own daughter faked a mission with her grandpa then say goodbye to her own father.

He moved to this lonely apartment and every time his kids visited him it looked like they were being forced to come to his home.

He could see it in his eyes.

They only came because they didn't want to hurt his feeling's, but their eyes told him they would rather be with Rick on an adventure than be with him.

He had lost everything.

His family, his home and his respect for himself as a man.

He cried himself to sleep every night.

"Everybody has abandoned you, Jerry" He said, to himself. "They abandoned you because you weren't interesting enough and had the gall to care about you and your family's safety. It didn't help that your ego was constantly coming out. Perhaps, if I kept your mouth shut most the time you wouldn't be in this mess." before he asked himself a question.

"Why are you shedding tears for them?"

He was surprised.

"Everybody thinks you're a pathetic cry-baby. All you have every done is cry for people who don't care if you're even in the room. Your own kid's only visit you because they would feel like terrible people if they didn't. Your ego is your greatest weakness. How can you be proud when a man who's got a drinking problem and just comes and goes when he feels like it took your place in the family?"

He was right and Jerry said. "But I can't move on. They're my family"

"They can still be your family but where do you draw the line between caring too much or being in the company of bullies?" Said, the other him in the mirror. "Rick may have your family and home but the greatest revenge you can give him is turning yourself into a success. Rick is most likely smiling at himself knowing how pathetic you've become. He may have won the battle but he hasn't won the War. You still have that Pride and it will continue to destroy you"

"Your right" Jerry said. "I've done nothing but wish that my family comes over or I get back together with my family. I don't know where it comes from but I have a problem that I need to address. I don't have to forget my family, I got Child support bills to remind me of that. Maybe one day, I can feel the same way for Beth as she does for me"

The lack of care in her eyes as she didn't even see him to his new apartment still hurt.

He straightened up and said. "Let's search for a newer higher paying job." he took off his clothes and stepped in the small single shower for showering and went back into the room soaking wet where he found his towel drabbed over a small black television not that far away from him.

He dried himself, then put on some jeans, a t-shirt and shoes before going out to grab the morning newspaper.

He walked down the long wooden corridor and bare wooden steps to the room that held a bunch of cabinets with each residence names on it.

He found his own sad and lonely one and opened it with a silver key that was in his pocket before taking out the newspaper and letters within it.

He made his way back to his apartment and closed the door behind him.

"My lawn magazine is here" Jerry said, putting it on the wooden table. "Morty's weekly update letter that he only sends so that he doesn't feel like a horrible son" he threw it to the bed as he went to the next one. "Letter for the next child support payment because Morty is 14" he threw that on the bed before moving onto the next one. "Not a letter from Beth because Rick is wonderful again" he threw that one on the bed before he finally got to the newspaper and sat down on the bed.

He went to the job section.

"Car Salesman. No" Jerry said, before he said. "Apparently I'm too boring to persuade people to buy what I'm selling" then he went to another one. "A Vet? Beth works in that profession and it doesn't pay that well" plus it would be super embarrassing if he were to run into her. "An Artist? I don't have the artistic skills and creative for that"

Subconsciously he had pushed away his hatred for Rick and was actually listening to some of his family's comments.

"An Accountant?" He said, before looking at the starting price and it was almost double to what he was making both Earth was enslaved. "I tried to be creative but it isn't working. Maybe, I'll be perfect as an accountant. I hear it's a soul-sucking job anyway. I can be paid big for being boring"

He never thought he would think about being an accountant but he had to face reality, he was out of the job.

He heard that as an accountant, the job could take him all over the world and he would be meeting people all the time and be making good money.

"But I haven't seriously looked at numbers in over 20 years," Jerry said, in school, they hammered into him how he needed to know how to do all these complex equations when in truth all you needed to know was how to add and take away.

Beth did the family accounting.

"We'll I can apply for the job and study for it. There is even a company car included!" Jerry said, before saying with determination. "I'll study like I have never done before" being an accountant meant that he had to know more than adding and subtracting.

He walked out and walked down the street into town to go to the library to pick out some accountant books and on his way home, he brought a carton of milk and a box of Cereal for his breakfast, it was time like this that he couldn't help but remember Beth had gotten the car in the divorce leaving him to walk everywhere.

He walked back into his apartment and sat down, thinking how sad it was that both his kitchen, living room and bedroom were all in the same place.

While he ate a bowl of cornflakes, he opened up the first book and began to eat the first page, knowing it would take an all-nighter for him to read the whole book.

He set a timer to tell him when to eat, and for the first time in a long time he wasn't thinking about his family but trying to get the job so that he could move out of this place and get a decent apartment, that wasn't sad looking.

He had nothing better to do, Rick had practically put him out of a job, and the divorce was draining his bank account dry.

He spent days just reading, eating, taking care of his body and hardly ever going out.

He sent his resumé off to the company, and a few days later, he received a long brown envelope that held a letter that told him his application got through and that he would have to take a test with a bunch of applicants who also got through in the room.

He did have an A* in math when he left school, after all.

Thankfully in the divorce, he got to keep his suit even if he had to spend money to wash it and spend time nicely ironing it out.

He didn't have shame taking the bus to the work place while every other applicant arrived in a car even if it their car looked like they were on their last leg's.

Jerry wanted to strut his stuff and be incredibly confident... but just maybe, he shouldn't do that this time.

This was a job he was begging somebody to hire him for, not the other way around.

He entered the building, and there was a man in the reception area dressed in a sharper suit then he was in.

"Welcome, valued candidates" Said, the man. "Please follow me to the test room to take the final step and then in a week time, we will call you... or not"

No pressure... Jerry thought, sarcastically.

They followed him down the hall and to a door that was far nicer than the one at his apartment.

They entered it and saw a long room that was divided by curtains that split the room into sections.

"We have split the room into sections to make sure there is no foul play and everybody gets an equal shot" The man said, before saying. "Please find the desk with your name on it and close the curtains behind you. You will have an hour to go through the questions, starting now"

They all rushed forward except Jerry.

"Wait. Now!?" Jerry said, rushing to find his own desk and was the last to drawl the curtains on his section.

He sat down at the desk and saw a booklet like the one he remembered in his school exams and a pencil, ruler and rubber.

Beside that was a stack of paper with a note saying 'Show all your working on this paper and place your answers in the booklet'.

Jerry could feel the clock ticking as he picked up the pencil and opened the first page.

Suddenly the knowledge he gained from those days of endless reading did not abandon him instead they came to the forefront of his mind.

He started writing on the lined paper and filling out the answer box at an impressive pace.

What he excelled at the most was being dull and boring, and it was showing.

His family would be shocked to learn what he was doing right now and that he looked like he knew what he was doing.

He wasn't on the level of Rick smart, but he didn't have to pass this test.

He tore through the pages until he got to the last question that made his hand stop moving.

"Why do you want this job?" He read to himself.

He suddenly had the overwhelming urge to praise himself to the high heavens, and show just how big his ego was.

"No, Jerry" He told himself. "You are the person who needs this job. Swallow your ego. If you let it out you're insulting your 'would be employers' and making them look somewhere else."

He took a breather and began to write.

#A Week Later#

It was coming to the end of a week.

"So, I didn't get the job after all," Jerry said, as he sat down at his table and began to write a check for Child support and felt his bank account bleed while doing it. "We'll; I can always work at a normal shop."

Suddenly he heard his old-timey mobile phone ring from underneath his bed, and he went to go and get it.

He saw an unknown number and was so lonely that he didn't even care.

"Hello?" He said, answering it.

"Is this Mr Jerry Smith?" Said, a women voice on the other end.

"Yes, that's me?" He said so she didn't call his number by mistake?

"I work for Lawfirm INC, the company you recently applied for," Said the women and he almost dropped his phone.

"Y-Yes, that's where I recently applied for," He said, trying not to sound too eager.

"We have reviewed your application and we think you are perfect for the job opening." She said, and his eyes became round in disbelief.

Did he get the job?

HE GOT THE JOB!

"Do you think you can start on Monday, as early as 6? Our team is falling behind schedule" She said.

"O-OF COURSE!" He said, before coughing and saying. "I'll be more than happy to start on Monday. I'll prove to you that I'm a valued member of the team."

"That's great, Mr Smith," She said, before ending the call.

The phone dropped out of Jerry's hand before the whole apartment block heard Jeff yell.

"YES!"

Jerry began to dance awkwardly; it was one of the rear times he was so overwhelmingly happy.

He got the job!

He got the 48, 000-dollar job.

He finally had a car!

Something was finally going right for him.

And scene!

Want more? Review/fav and follow!