The Problem With Riko

 Corey and Oats in…

The Problem With Riko

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Sometimes it’s hard to take care of a member of your family if you don’t know what they want and especially if they caught speak to you,  Riko was one such character, he was a Rizmo that was supposed to be a singing and dancing monster that could be a musical prodigy and he was one but he couldn’t talk which made taking care of him difficult, at least according to Mel, she couldn’t do anything about it, she was stuck with what she dubbed as the ‘mute weirdo’  ‘the freak who could not speak’  and the ‘silent stepchild she didn’t ask for’.

Riko tried his best to make sure he was accepted and to be a good boy but for some reason Mel just didn’t know what to do with him, she was having trouble accepting him for who he was, she didn’t want to sell him to another op-shop, she tried to get a replacement Rizmo to replace him but it was no use,  one day she just decided she hated him and she started to resent him and didn’t even listen to him, which made him sad.  ‘Come on, won’t you please talk me to me, mom?’ Riko asked. ‘I’m not your mother, you’re not even the son I wanted. You’re a gross miscariage.’  ‘A miscariage, but why?’  ‘Because you can’t even speak. Look, if human Jahna couldn’t fix you and mom couldn’t, what makes you  so sure I should even be your parent? I can’t take of a mute child if I don’t know what they want.’  ‘But I can talk, I’m speaking to you right now.’

‘Yeah but you’re a walking fire hazard waiting to help, you’re a freak, nobody loves you and I certainly don’t.’  ‘But you’re supposed to love me.’  ‘I can’t love you if you can’t tell me what you want from me, I don’t know how to play with, feed or nurture you,  i don’t know what games you want, or what you want to do,  i’m stuck with not knowing what you want because all you can do is silently stare at me and be creepy.’  ‘Creepy? But it’s not my fault.’  ‘It is you, why couldn't you just not be you? Why couldn’t you just talk to me about what you want instead of being silent, it’s no fun telling you anything if you can’t talk to me, everyone else can speak, you can’t, you’re not the one I wanted. Yeah I wanted to get you and I did but it was not my choice to have a broken kid.  I HATE YOU, go to your room!’

Riko started breaking down in tears as he cried, he was upset that his mother would treat him like this and so she ran into the bedroom and cried. Augini and the aquatic squishmallow gang looked at him with concern…’What’s wrong Riko?’  ‘I am trying my best to live up to the expectations of my friends but Mel hates me now.’  ‘Why?’  ‘Because she says i’m no use to her because i’m the mute freak who can’t speak.’  ‘She said that? Well she’s maybe upset you didn’t meet her standards.’   ‘But she adopted me and I am her kid, i’m part of the family, what makes me any different than the others? I know i’m an alien but come on,  at least give me a chance, your friends were nice enough to let me perform and express myself.’

‘That’s true.’  ‘I don’t know why she won’t accept me,  I’m trying my best. I’m not a mute weirdo, I can express myself, I just have problems communicating.’   ‘There there, don’t cry.’  ‘I can’t help but cry,  she doesn’t like me and I didn’t do anything wrong.’  He broke down in tears and cried, he never felt so sad before, he had gone out of his way to prove he could be a good friend to them and he tried to speak and make himself understood but Mel did not seem to like him, he smiled when he was told that maybe Mel didn’t understand him.  He ran out of the bedroom and ran back to Mel. ‘What do you want, you little freak?’  ‘I don’t like that you call me these names and pick on me, when you’re supposed to be my parent.’  ‘Look, you’re a hand-me-down kid, not one of my own.’  ‘Hand me down?’  ‘I never wanted to want to take of you, I just wanted to keep you and try to see if I could give you a home, i cannot give you a home if you don’t tell me what you want,  I hate you, I hate you.’

Riko started crying even more, he tried to tell that he didn’t mean to…’Oh he doesn’t mean to make buzzing noises and cause fire hazards to happen, he just doesn’t know any better,  he’s just a broken traumatized kid, you’re worthless to me. I try to respect you and be nice to you but I don’t know what you want, I cannot look at you with any feeling other than disdain and disappointment.’

Piff tried to get Mel to think nice thoughts at Riko but all Mel could think about was how she thought she had been betrayed, left with an offspring she could not care for and she thought about how she wanted to get rid of him, she thought about leaving him on the street and watching him get run over by a car with his guts spilling out over the floor, she thought about him in a wheelchair and her pushing him down the stairs like in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, she imagined hobbling him like in Misery,  she imagined putting him into a meat grinder and making him into meat strips,  she imagined him being sliced in two.  ‘I want that little brat to suffer.’  ‘Why? Riko never did anything to you, he never did anything wrong.’  ‘He’s going to be bullied all his life just because he cannot speak.’

Feeling unloved even more, Riko ran off into the bedroom and tried to drift off to sleep but he kept having nightmares of the things Mel was imaging she wanted to do with him, including of being hobbled, burned alive, buried, chopped into meat strips, skinned, disintegrated,and even being ridiculed by Mel. ‘You’ll never be a family member to me, you’ll never be anything but a useless mute freak. You will never amount to anything and they’re all going to laugh at you, they’re all going to laugh at you!’

He cried in his sleep as he tried not to think of these things but all he could think about was…’Does Mel really hate me?  Am I really that bad?’  He cried and cried as the squishmallows kept close to him, he woke up an hour later and decided to go back to Mel, Mel had gotten over just how mad she was at him and she apologized to him and he accepted the apology as they had afternoon tea together.

Which was followed by Piff helping as he made Japanese food for them all to eat, and they all played games afterwards as Mel emailed her about the adventure, and afterwards they all relaxed and had fun as Riko realized Mel never meant to insult him or anything, she was just frustrated.   

She was just frustrated that Riko had to be born with a defect and that he couldn’t express himself easily, she didn’t want to give him away and didn’t want him to leave, she just felt it was odd he could not talk or express himself clearly, but she was okay with him.

Piff and Tangie went fishing as they caught a lot of fish and they had a karaoke session and they wound down with a relaxation session,  which was followed by Oats putting on his pink nightgown and Corey putting on his bat pajamas as they brushed their teeth and Piff initiated a special version of the closedown sequence that was animated in the style of Dexter’s Laboratory with the pufferfish using an invention to open up a special bedtime area as he teleported himself into the bedroom and his day clothes morphed into pajamas as the daytime background turned into a night time one.

The pufferfish yawned and brushed his teeth before the goodnight message appeared, and Piff floated into the bedroom with all his pals including Riko, he kissed Tangie and gave the goodnight speech which was: ‘Sometimes we have family members who frustrate us because we don’t understand them or we can’t communicate to them,  or vice versa, sometimes we hate them and want to see them suffer in someway but they can’t help it.  Remember, even if someone’s broken or flawed, they still deserve to be loved and now it is time to embrace our own quirks by going on an adventure in dreamland, goodnight to you all.’

Anglo turned off the light as they all drifted off to sleep and had sweet dreams, including Piff who dreamed of help Riko communicate to others and to express his feelings in a way that was comfortable,  and thus their adventure ended but more are coming up.