billnoncipher

[billnoncipher]

Wendip Week 2022: Eight Stories

by William Easley

Though these stories sometimes share elements with my customary AU, they really aren't canon to that series. Each was written as a response to a prompt (the story title) and the conditions were that each story had to be set in 2022 and in some way deal with the past in GF.

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Story 1: On 4 Wheels

Who hasn't dreamed of a road trip with someone they love?

Chapter Text

1-On 4 Wheels

(June 2022)

Returning to Gravity Falls after four years of college felt weird. Well, weirder than normal. Dipper, now twenty-two, had last been here the winter when he was twenty. It was just a short visit, squeezed into the long MLK weekend, and he hadn't even stayed in the Shack that time. He only spent one night and then he returned to California and college the next day after Stanley Pines's funeral.

Now, two years and a few months later, he stepped off the Speedy Beaver bus and saw Soos waving at him and giving him his big buck-toothed grin. Around him were kids, a boy who was seven, a girl who was five, another girl who was three. The baby boy was, Dipper assumed, back home with Melody.

"Hiya, dude!" Soos said, cheerfully hefting Dipper's suitcase. "Mabel didn't come with?"

"No," Dipper said with a smile as they climbed into Soos's car. The three-year-old they fastened into the baby seat and the other two were big enough to wear grown-up seat belts. "No, Mabel's wedding is coming up at the end of the month, and you know her. She's deep into planning. She and her new husband plan to honeymoon here, though."

"Sweet!" Soos said. "Uh, mind if I make a short detour?"

"Go ahead," Dipper said. "You're the boss."

"Yeah," Soos said a little sadly.

They stopped at the Catholic church, where Soos showed Dipper a little memorial in the cemetery. "Abuelita's not really here," Soos explained. "She's buried in Mexico in her family's cemetery. But we did this, like, memorial to her. OK, kids, say your prayers."

The little ones clustered around the memorial stone and murmured, "Eternal rest grant unto our Abuelita, Lord, and let eternal light shine upon her." Soos joined in. Then he said, "Good job, kids. Now Abuelita lives with the angels."

From the church they drove straight to the Shack. It was open for business, and Soos said as they got out, "Dude, I have to go be Mr. Mystery. Is your old attic room OK? We, like, cleaned it and all."

"I wouldn't want to stay anywhere else," Dipper told him. They went in by the back way and Dipper carried his suitcase up the stairs and to the attic. The room was a lot neater than it had been the first year he and his sister had shared it, and the beds looked new. Dipper didn't unpack, but he set his bag and backpack down and smiled wistfully at the other bed across the way, still the old one. "Check out all my splinters," he murmured.

He washed his face in the upstairs bathroom and opened his backpack to dig out his old pine-tree cap, a little faded now. Later, he promised himself, he'd go into the gift shop, maybe buy a new trucker's hat if they still sold them, and visit. Not yet. He wasn't up to that yet. A little walk first would do him good.

He left quietly, forcing himself not even to glance into the gift shop. Wendy wouldn't be there, anyway, She had left the Valley, gone to college, then wound up, last he heard, in Portland. She had always wanted to move there some day. He had not heard from her for two years, except for Christmas cards.

Too late to regret, too early to remember.

First he paused at a small, fenced-in spot within view of the Shack. A single grave was there, with a stone for Stanley Filbrick Pines. The inscription beneath was a Psalm in both Hebrew and English: "He heals the broken heart and binds up the wounds."

"Hi, Grunkle Stan," Dipper said, standing beside the headstone and leaning over to place a pebble on it, one among many. People in town remembered him and visited him often. "I'm back for a while. Mabel's going to come and visit with her new husband later in the summer. Your Pumpkin. I just wanted to say thanks for all you did, and rest in peace. Yeah, I'm still a knucklehead."

That done, Dipper walked down the old familiar Mystery Trail to the spot where he and Wendy had sat on a log and had so many talks over the years. There was that time after the Bunker adventure when she'd let him down so gently. There was the time just before she headed off to college.

He sat down on the log, now softened with moss and decay, and talked aloud to the tall redhead now, though she perched beside him only in imagination. "Here I am," he said. "Back because I don't know anyplace else to go. I'm not going to move back in with Mom and Dad. They deserve their retirement and time together. I've got a little bit of money. Well, a lot of money saved up, 'cause when Grunkle Stan died, nobody knew it, but he had about tour hundred thousand squirreled away from something he'd found up in the Arctic. He sold whatever it was and . . . just banked the money and left half to Mabel, half to me. No estate tax in Oregon on the amount that came to us, so it's in my bank. I haven't touched it."

He imagined her saying, "Really man? He would've wanted you to."

"Yeah, but the thing is—here I am with my degree. Double major in physical sciences and in video production. And no way of getting a toe in the door of any studio. I just realized the morning after graduation how useless that diploma's gonna be. My science degree would allow me to teach high school, but I'd need education courses, and I'm sick of school right now. No idea what to do with the rest of my life. So I'm planning to spend a summer here, go out and look for mysteries and anomalies, and . . . be a hermit, I guess. Everybody I was close to's gone. Stan. Pacifica off somewhere in the East, with her second husband. Even Mabel's friends, Candy and Grenda, moved away. Ford down near Cal Tech in an assisted-living place, writing his memoirs. Gonna be lonesome—"

"Who you talking to, man?"

Dipper nearly jumped out of his skin. He scrambled up. "Wendy!"

She stood on the trail smiling at him. Wendy, now, what, twenty-five? Still looking like a late teen, though, tall and lanky and, oh my God, in a green flannel shirt, jeans, and boots! No trapper's cap, but that long, long red hair, those green eyes, the freckles, and her wonderful, sleepy-eyed, crooked smile. She leaned back a little, her elbows crooked, her hands in the back pockets of her jeans.

For a long moment he just stood and stared at her, his jaw hanging open. She chuckled. "Hey, I'm gonna hug you, dude, if I won't break you."

She spread her arms and embraced him. Then she stepped back and surveyed him. "You turned out hunky, Dip. Talking to yourself? You sound down, so, friend to friend, tell me what's the matter?"

He shook his head and for a moment could not speak with his throat tight and aching. 'Just—just I've been feeling lost. How'd you find me?"

"Soos told me a couple days ago you'd be coming to visit. I stopped at the Shack a few minutes ago and he said you were out someplace. I kinda guessed you'd wind up here."

"I—oh, Wendy, could we just sit here for a minute or two?"

"Yeah, sit down and scoot over."

She sat beside him. "So you graduated, I guess," she said.

He nodded. "Yeah, few days ago."

She nudged him. "With honors, I bet."

Still feeling dazed by her sudden appearance, he murmured, "Phi Beta Kappa." Then he coughed self-consciously. "What are you doing?"

"Well, I've been workin' over in Portland, hardly anything better than an intern job with a start-up company. No money in it, but I got by. What time is it? Early, but have you had lunch?"

"No, early, like you say. I took the bus up from Piedmont, so, uh. No real breakfast, either."

"Brunch!" she said. "Bus, huh? No wheels?"

"I'm just a ground-walker," he said with a grin.

"Soos will let us borrow his Jeep, I bet."

He did. They could have gone out of the Valley to an upscale restaurant, but for old times' sake—Greasy's Diner. It was early for lunch, late for breakfast, but hey, it was Greasy's. They had pancakes and scrambled eggs, coffee and OJ.

And they caught up. "So what are you up to this summer, Dipper?"

"Not much. Just sort of . . . winding down after college. Wondering what to do with my life and not coming up with any answers. How about you?"

"I got exciting plans for the summer. See, I just recently landed a new job. I mean, a good-paying one!"

"Great," Dipper said. "What?"

"I'm gonna be a TV star," she said. Then, grinning at his surprised, delighted reaction, she shrugged. "Well, I'm gonna host an Internet series, anyhow. At least for the next year. I'm supposed to start next week, and then I'll be on the road for a full twelve months."

"Doing what?" Dipper asked.

"Traveling all over the country. Everywhere except Hawaii, 'cause I can't drive there! But for a start, I'm going to drive up to Alaska and do travel shows on interesting, out-of-the-way small towns and little-known wilderness places all over the USA. One hour-long show every week for forty-nine weeks, one from every state in the continental United States."

"Wow, sounds exciting," Dipper said.

"Yeah, just me and my crew. A writer-camera operator-editor-computer person."

"All in one?" Dipper asked.

She shrugged. "Maybe. Haven't hired them yet. By the way, got an invitation to Mabel's wedding. Typical of her to have it in the Shack! I figure I can come to Gravity Falls that week, record the Oregon show, and kill two birds." She took a long, slow sip of coffee. Then, a little too casually, she asked, "How about you, Dip? Wedding bells in your future?"

He shook his head. "I don't have, uh, plans."

"Yeah," she said, nodding sympathetically, "I know. Mabel and I kept in touch, and she told me you didn't have great luck in the romance department."

"Zero luck," Dipper admitted. "How about you?"

"Nothing crucial," she said. "Sorta in between right now. Never met the right guy. Ready to go back to the Shack? I'd like to show you something."

They drove back to the Shack and Wendy returned the Jeep keys to Soos. Then she led Dipper out to the parking lot and to a remote corner. With a broad grin,

Wendy said, "There she is, my new honey. Want the grand tour?"

"Wow," Dipper said. He was looking at a cream-colored RV, over twenty feet long. "This is yours?"

"Well, for now it's the company's," Wendy said. "But I got the use of it for the next year, and then if the show does OK, they may let me buy it for cheap. I'm gonna put the miles on it, doing the video series."

She opened it up, and she and Dipper stepped inside. The compact space looked amazingly efficient: a tiny toilet with a shower and folding sink, a galley with a two-burner stove and microwave, pantry already stocked, little fridge, fold-down table, and all the way in back a bed.

"This is so cool. I'm happy for you," Dipper said.

"Get this." She sat in the driver's seat, turned on the ignition, and moved a control. Dipper heard a low-pitched hum and looked back. About a third of the RV space was moving, stretching out to the left of the driver's seat. "Slide-out. Gives more room. That's supposed to be a single bed, but it's been redone as a work station—digital editing and all that biz."

"Cool!"

"Sit down, Dipper. Wait, I'm gonna slide in the bonus space." She reversed the control, and the extension glided back. The engine purred. Not looking at him, her hands on the wheel, Wendy said, "Yeah, it's cool, but there's still a detail to work out. Gotta hire my crew. Any suggestions?"

"I don't know anybody in town now," Dipper said.

"Well, I got my eye on someone," Wendy said.

"Who?

She laughed. "You, doofus!"

"Uh—"

"Look," Wendy said softly, still not meeting his gaze, "I'm not too old for you now. And as I watched you back over the summers, I kept thinking I needed to give you another chance. Spent a lot of time thinking about you, Dipper. Did you ever think about me? About us?"

Dipper felt his face glowing red-hot, and his tongue tangled. "Um, think? You? I—I, uh. All the time!" he blurted at last. "Like twenty-four hours a day, every day. Uh, sorry. I—I didn't mean to, um—confess, because you know, um, friends—"

She turned toward him and put a finger against his lips to stop him. "I want you, Dipper. It's totally up to you. How about it, man?"

Dipper's mouth still wasn't making words very well: "Are uh, Wendy, are you asking me to—"

"To be my partner." Now she was looking at him, her eyes warm and dreamy. "Writing scripts, shooting video, editing, the computer biz—you got that all knocked, Dipper. I want you if you want the work. You won't get rich, but there's a salary and we get a good per diem for food and so on. Are you willing to go on a road trip with me?"

"For the whole year?" Dipper asked, wondering if he'd fallen asleep on the log and was dreaming. He bit his tongue. Ouch. This was all real.

For the first time Wendy's green eyes looked vulnerable, uncertain. "For a whole year. Or, really, for as long as, uh, you know. You can tell me if you don't want to—"

"I want to!" he blurted. "Oh, God, Wendy, I always—this is—but I don't have a car. I've got some money, I could buy—"

"You don't need a car," Wendy said, visibly relaxing. "We'll travel in the RV. Everywhere. Together. Get it?"

"Yes," he said. "I—thank you, Wendy, this is—I think—I think I'm happy!"

"Good for you," she said, standing. "You get up, too. Now put your arms around me. I'm happy, too. Like I said, I've been thinking about you. About us. So kiss me."

They kissed.

Then she looked him in the eye—he was as tall as she was now. Frowning a little, she said, "One thing, though. I mean, we're partners, that's settled. We'll do the contract stuff tomorrow or the next day, no big rush. I'm happy, too, but we got a problem, man."

"What?" he asked.

She whispered in his ear, "There's only one bed."

"Oh, well—uh."

She playfully nipped his ear. "We'll have to see if we can make it do."

So she drove the RV to a private spot.

They discovered that the bed would do very well.

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Story 2: Movies & Chill

Sometimes it's fun to rekindle customs we've grown out of....

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The run-up to winter of 2022 proved to be unusually cold and snowy in Gravity Falls. Climate change or whatever, for a while Dipper didn't think he and Mabel would be able to make it through the icy passes and the winding, snow-blowy roads, but somehow or other, they finally rolled through the entrance to the Valley and Mabel said, "We could've made it faster if I wa

The run-up to winter of 2022 proved to be unusually cold and snowy in Gravity Falls. Climate change or whatever, for a while Dipper didn't think he and Mabel would be able to make it through the icy passes and the winding, snow-blowy roads, but somehow or other, they finally rolled through the entrance to the Valley and Mabel said, "We could've made it faster if I was driving."

"Well, yeah," Dipper agreed, "only I wanted to get us here alive."

"Oh, if you want to get technical . . . looks like everything downtown's closed." That was true. It wasn't all that late, but the sky was low and gray and the stores showed nothing but security lights.

"What do you expect?" Dipper asked. "Past six o'clock, and more snow's coming in. If we can get up the hill to the Shack I'll be happy."

"You have your key, don't you?"

"Yes. For the fifteenth time."

"Watch it, Brobro. Little slippery there!"

"I may park at the bottom of the drive," Dipper said. "I doubt if the snowplow cleared it out, with the Shack closed for the winter."

The snowplow had not cleared the drive, and a good six inches of snow coated it, but very carefully, and sometimes backsliding, Dipper urged the car up into the driveway. "Made it! Thank God for snow tires!"

"It's a winter wonderland!" The Shack and the trees around it wore a white coat of snow. The place stood dark—Soos and his family were down in Mexico, visiting relatives—and Dipper unlocked the gift-shop door and lugged suitcases in while Mabel built a snowman.

By the time Dipper had stored the luggage, the snowman was already seven feet tall. "I'm gonna make a snow Manotaur!" Mabel announced.

"Sis, just let it go!" Dipper pleaded.

She didn't finish the sculpture, but came in some minutes later, her nose red and snow on the shoulders of her quilted jacket. "Toasty warm in here!" she said.

"Yeah, strange, there was a fire in the fireplace. I mean, it had burned down to embers, but usually Grunkle Stan wouldn't leave an unattended fire going."

"Soos, then."

"No, they've been gone since the first of the month. Who are you calling?"

"Pacifica, doy! I told her I'd check in—oh, hey, girl, it's me, Mabel! Guess what? Dipper didn't kill us, and we're in the Mystery Shack." Mabel laughed. "I'd love to, but it's way too wintry for me to—what? Really? Heck, yeah, I'd love that! OK, see you soon!"

"Pacifica's driving over here?" Dipper asked. "In this blizzard?"

"Just wait and see, ye Dipper of little faith," Mabel replied smugly. "I gotta pack for a sleepover. Sorry you're not invited. Candy's already there, and Paz is coming to give me a lift."

"I don't think you should try to drive," Dipper said. "It's already pretty dark."

"Tosh and tush," Mabel said. "I gotta move stuff from my suitcase to my backpack!"

Half an hour later, it truly was dark outside, and Dipper was debating putting his foot down about Mabel's going out when he heard the roar of an engine outside. "There she is!" Mabel yelled, dashing to the gift shop. Dipper followed.

A light glared into the window, and when he opened the door, he saw Pacifica at the wheel of what looked like a small bright-yellow pickup on treads. "She's got a Snow-Kat?" Dipper asked.

"Every girl should have one! Button up the Shack and stay warm, Brobro! I'll see you after the thaw!" Mabel went out into noticeably deeper snow, past the incomplete snowmanotaur, and yelled, "Cool ride, Paz! Can I drive?"

Dipper didn't want to see the result if Pacifica gave her permission. He closed the door and, shaking his head, started back toward the kitchen. Soos had left some food in the freezer and in the cabinets, and he was getting—

Someone pounded on the door. Dipper rolled his eyes. "Oh, great, what did she forget?" He went back to the gift shop, but when he opened the door—

"Hiya, dork!" said Wendy. She was all bundled up in a red thigh-length padded jacket and had the earflaps of her trapper's hat down over her ears. "Can I come in?"

"Yeah!" he said. "God, it's good to see you! How was college?"

"Got through in five years," she said cheerfully. "I'm working for my Dad until I can get a place with the forestry department or some biz. Pacifica gave me a ride over. How are you?"

"Got through college in four years," Dipper said with a grin. "Now I've got this degree and I'm still looking for a job. Hey, have you eaten?"

"Nope, got any food?"

"Let's see."

Not too shabby. They found some frozen steak, cans of tomatoes and beans, and spices, so Wendy whipped up a big pot of chili. "Dad and the boys are off on their annual apocalypse training," she said as the food simmered, smelling delicious. "I'm not much for sleepovers nowadays, so I thought I'd come and bum the sofa off of you for the night."

"Sure," he said.

As they ate—it was deliciously spicy for such a cold winter night—Dipper asked, "Are you, um, never mind."

"Not dating," she said. "I've had way too many short-term boyfriends, so I'm giving it a rest. You?"

He shook his head. "Nothing serious."

"How was the fire when you got here?"

"I just never met—wait, what? Fire?"

"Yeah, man! I knew how cold it was gonna be, so I stopped by and started just as small welcome fire before driving over to Pacifica's. I knew she had the Snow-Kat, and I was startin' to wonder if you guys would get stuck on the way. By the time Mabes called, I didn't want to risk driving my pickup over, so I hitched with Paz. And now here we are, and if the weatherman's right, here we're probably going to stay for two days, maybe three."

"Great," Dipper said. "Uh, that's not, not, sarcastic. I mean, it's really great!"

They were just a little awkward around each other. It had been two years since they'd seen one another in person. But soon they were joking around and reminiscing about the time when Dipper had cloned himself, the time when Robbie had tried to hypnotize Wendy, the time they had parachuted into Bill Cipher's lair—

At nine, Wendy stretched and said, "Dude, the local station's old-time horror show is coming on. Wanna watch, for old time's sake?"

"Sure!"

"How 'bout bringing down some pillows and a couple of blankets?" she asked. "This kind of cold, the fireplace doesn't cut it at keeping things comfy."

He did, and meanwhile she turned on the big flat-screen TV that Soos had bought to replace Stan's worn-out model. They improvised a nest on the floor, lots of blankets, then the pillows, then themselves, and finally two more blankets.

He chuckled. "I've heard of movies and chilling, but this is the real deal."

On the screen, the weather lady was saying dire things: "Buckle up, Gravity Falls! The low for tonight will hit the single digits, and by tomorrow an estimated two feet of snow will have fallen. Don't look for any melting tomorrow, because the high is going to be only twenty degrees. Stay inside and stay warm and safe. We want to keep all our viewers! Now stay tuned for the Friday Night Frights!

"They haven't even changed the title card," Dipper said.

"Same one I remember," Wendy agreed. "I'm cold, man. Mind if I snuggle?"

"Snuggle away," he said.

The crummy old movie began, in a kind of color—faded—as the music went into would-be eerie chords, dum DUM da DEEEE.

The title came up against a midwinter landscape of mountains and forest: The Invasion of the Abominables!

"Copyright MCMLVII?" Wendy said, reading from the screen.

"That's 1957," Dipper translated.

A somber-sounding announcer said, "This . . . is the top of the world! The Himalaya mountains! Tibet!"

"Early Tibet and early to rise," Wendy murmured.

"Here the lamas, priests who keep mysterious ancient secrets, perform rituals that they learned from their parents to keep . . . eerie beings at bay!"

"The lama's mama taught him," Dipper said.

"Who wants a llama, llama," Wendy crooned.

"Stop it!" Dipper scolded, but he was laughing.

"Man, I hope you don't mind this—"

Dipper screeched. "Your hands are like ice!"

She had slipped her palms inside his shirt, undershirt even, and against his bare skin. "Yeah, but your chest will warm them up. Who's this guy?"

On screen, a man who had to be a scientist, because he wore a white lab coat and horn-rimmed glasses, sat at a desk in what looked like the corner of a disused warehouse and picked up a ringing phone with a long spring-like cord. "Hello," he said. "This is Doctor Thornwright speaking. Yes, Operator, put him through."

A reverse shot showed another man in some kind of military uniform, sitting at what looked like the identical desk, except he was in an office setting with a window through which one could see a huge photograph of the U. S. Capitol posing as the real thing. "Thornwright!" the man said. "This is General Dismay of the U.S. Air Force, calling from my office in Washington, D.C. I know you're no longer in service, but I want you to do a great favor for your Uncle Sam!"

"Sammy needs his beard trimmed, and you have some scissors," Wendy said in an imitation of the General's voice.

"Why, sir, what could that be?" asked Doctor Thornwright.

"This is to be kept ultra extreme top secret, Thornwright. We've received reliable reports of suspicious activity in Tibet. The top of the world. The Himalayas, in fact. It seems as if . . . they have been spotted again!"

"Leopards?" Dipper answered for Thornwright. "Sir, they're always spotted!"

But the movie guy said, "Then this is the research opportunity I've been hoping for! At last I can prove my alternate theory of evolution is true. General, I'll take the assignment, with one provision!"

"What's that, son?"

"I'll need my personal assistant to come along to keep notes!"

"Right, Doctor, I keep forgetting you don't know how to read or write," Wendy said.

But the General's line was, "Sure thing, Thornwright. What's his name?"

"Her name," Thornwright corrected. "He's a she, and she's my personal research assistant, Dr. Joan Swiffle. She holds a PhD in assistantology."

"Your hands warm now?" Dipper asked Wendy.

"Getting there, man. You mind?"

"Well, you're kind of stroking my chest."

"Yeah, you got abs now. Does this bother you?"

"I wouldn't say that."

They kissed, just one peck, but then another more slowly and more intimate. They lost track of the movie for a few minutes.

A scene or two later, Doctor Swiffle, the doctor's personal assistant, was boarding an Air Force plane with her boss. Joan Swiffle was blonde with artificially arched eyebrows and very red lips, and she had two outstanding features.

"Is she wearing a bra or two ice-cream cones?" Wendy asked, now pressed close to Dipper under the blanket. "Were girls shaped different back then?"

Dipper felt a little short of breath. "I think the pointy look was sort of fashionable back then."

"Does it do anything for you, man?"

"No, I prefer a natural look."

The movie, with incredible speed, became boring. There seemed to be endless shots of snowy landscapes with something happening just on the edge of the screen, lots of stock footage of mountain climbers against snowy peaks, but no Abominables showed up in focus.

At one point, after the fourth commercial, the screen showed one of those fakey binocular views of a row of figures plodding across a snowy slope. But the highest magnification merely revealed a very blurred image of what could be a guy's face wearing a white gorilla mask.

Dipper tried to sound like a wise old Jedi: "The Snow People always march in single file to conceal their number. Which is 'one.' There's only one costume, you see."

The scientist cursed his luck. He had a state-of-the-1940s-art camera with a telephoto lens (it looked like the spool from a roll of toilet paper spray-painted black) and missed his shot because—"Film! I should have thought to bring film!"

"He should've brought like seventeen cameras!" Dipper said. "Annnd we're back to long pans over a cloudy sky and a row of snowy mountains. Same ones as before. Are you as fed up with this movie as I am?"

"Mm-hm," said Wendy. She reached for the remote and clicked them into darkness. "So blah it's not even funny." She did something involving a lot of wriggling under the covers and then rolled onto to her left side, resting her right thigh over Dipper's. "Sure is dark."

The fire in the next room leaked only a soft reddish glow through the doorway. "Sure is," Dipper said, feeling her breath warm on his cheeks. "Getting colder too."

Her hands again, gliding over his skin beneath his shirt. And then down to his waist. She tugged a little and he felt his belt loosen. "Not so cold under the blankets," she whispered.

As her hand sneaked inside the waist of his jeans and lower, he gulped. "This is great, but do you feel, uh, comfortable here in the dark?"

"I'm feeling something," she said in a husky voice, and she sure was. "I can tell you like this."

"Yeahhh," he replied. This seemed like a dream he'd had before. I don't want to wake up!

She felt so warm against him. He put an arm around her shoulders and to his surprise felt her bare back. "Yeah," she said comfortably. "Took off my shirt and stuff. Do you mind?"

He had involuntarily jerked his hand away. "No," he said, beginning to stroke her soft, smooth skin. "I don't mind at unnhhh—"

"Dipper," Wendy murmured right in his ear, "can I ask you something?"

"Uh, s-sure," Dipper said.

She reached for his wrist. "Are your hands . . . cold?" she whispered.

"A, uh, a little."

"I was hoping they were. Put 'em on these. Yeah, nice. Let's warm 'em up."

The movie, forget it.

Chilling, now, chilling was much more entertaining.

******************

Story 3: Friends to Lovers

“I hate it when guys fight!”

******************

When Dipper returned to the Mystery Shack in June, 2022, the first person he looked for was Wendy. He was disappointed.

"She's takin' some time off, dude," Soos explained. "Like a mental health day. She's had honkin' big problems."

"She never said anything to me," Dipper said, worrying. They still texted two or three times every week, had phone conversations at least once a month. "What's the problem?"

Soos looked apologetic. "Um, she, like keeps that secret, Dip. I'm not sure, but I think it's some b-o-y-f-r-i-e-n-d problem."

"That spells "boyfriend," said Soos's seven-year old daughter.

That made even a concerned Dipper smile. "Next time, Soos, spell it 'aneqhdmc.'"

"That's no good," the seven-year-old said without even looking up from the game she was playing on her tablet. "Just a minus-one Caesar cipher. Too easy."'

"She's even smarter than I am," Soos confided.

Mabel had checked in at the Shack as soon as they rolled in at sunrise that morning and then had taken off immediately because Marius and Grenda were in town and had invited her out for a day of royal dining and entertainment outside the Valley. She had borrowed Dipper's car, so in turn Dipper borrowed Soos's Jeep. "I'm going to run over to Wendy's house and see if she's OK," he told Soos.

"Tell her that her job is safe!" Soos said. "Also warn her to check inside her boots before she puts 'em on in the morning. Scorpions, dude!"

The drive to the Corduroy house was only about five miles, but it took Dipper longer than it would have had he been used to driving a straight-shift vehicle. He got the gear-grinding down to a minimum, though, and at a little after nine he turned off the road and onto the winding drive that led downhill to Wendy's home.

Dan's pickup wasn't parked there. Wendy's car, a ten-year-old Hideo Traxxer, stood in front of the house, but—Dipper saw as he got out of the Jeep—it had been in a wreck. Or something. The windshield was broken out, clumps of laminated glass fragments gleaming across the hood like spilled diamonds under a cloudy sky, and both headlights had been shattered, too. The hood itself held a half-dozen deep, concave dents as if a blacksmith had been working it over with a sledgehammer.

Dipper hurried to the front door and knocked.

"Go away!" Wendy yelled from inside, sounding angry.

"Wendy! Open the door!"

"Smoke, I don't want to talk to you! Go away!" Furious, no doubt about it. Wendy was yelling so loud her voice broke.

A little louder himself this time, Dipper yelled, "It's me, Dipper. There's nobody else out here."

The door opened then, just a crack, and one green eye peered out at him. "Dipper! I didn't think you'd be back in town until tomorrow," Wendy said, at first excited. But she went back to frustration and barely-controlled rage. "Go back to the Mystery Shack, and tell Soos I'll come in to work tomorrow morning."

"Wait, Wendy, please let me in," Dipper said. "Something's wrong. You can tell me about it. We're friends, remember?"

For a long few seconds, Wendy hesitated. Finally, with a sigh, she stepped back and opened the door. "Come on in. Excuse the mess."

He stepped in, blinking. She wasn't wrong. The place was a mess—but a closer look told him that most of the clutter comprised Wendy's clothes, jeans and shirts and bras and underwear, scattered all over the floor and furniture, many of them torn. A lamp had been knocked off a table and lay with its shade all crumpled on one side. The TV screen had been cracked. The coffee table was lying with four legs in the air, like roadkill furniture. "What happened?" Dipper asked.

"Smoke Krissell happened," she said wearily. Carefully, Wendy locked, dead-bolted, and chained the front door. She brushed her hair back out of her eyes. "His real name's Stewart, but everybody calls him Smoke. Used to play high-school football. We've had one date, and it wasn't fun. Soon as Dad left for work this morning Smoke came to the door and wanted to take me out right then and I said no, I had to work, and he got out of hand."

"Do you have a black eye?" Dipper asked, peering at her.

She touched her left cheek. "Do I? Maybe. Smoke slapped me pretty hard. He's got two shiners himself, though. I chased him off."

"Wait, who is this guy?"

She sighed. "Help me pick up this stuff and tidy the house, much as we can. I'll need to wash my clothes and maybe mend what I can and toss the rest. I got a basket here somewhere."

Two of Wendy's shirts were ripped in half, good for nothing but cleaning rags now. Her jeans were all in one piece. At least four pairs of her underwear had been shredded—"Did he use a knife?" Dipper asked.

"Don't think so, just his hands and teeth. After I turned him down, I was just standing in the doorway, waiting until he finished screamin' at me and callin' me names to tell him off. He got real mad 'cause I wouldn't flinch or say anything and slapped me so hard he made me fall on my butt, and he bulled inside the house and tried to grab me, but I got away and wouldn't let him touch me. I had my laundry in the basket, 'cause I was taking it to the washing machine, and he grabbed the basket off the floor and spilled everything out and started to rip stuff up. I tried to pull it away from him, and he popped me another one that made me see stars and fall to my knees, so I got up, shook it off, and beat his ass and kicked him out."

"Did he vandalize your car?"

Wendy sighed and nodded. "Yeah, while I was runnin' to the back porch to grab an axe. I got back to the front door just in time to see him drive off. Dammit, it's gonna cost a bundle to fix the Traxxer."

They rounded up all the undamaged clothing and righted the coffee table and lamp. The TV buzzed, but no picture appeared, so she shut it off. Wendy settled onto the sofa with a groan. "My eye swollen?" She switched on the lamp, popped the shade into roughly the right shape, and turned toward him.

Dipper leaned close. "A little. Want an ice pack?"

"That would be sweet," Wendy said. "You know where the fridge is."

Dipper went to the kitchen, popped out a half-dozen ice cubes, put them in a plastic bag and wrapped that with a face cloth. Then something from the living room sounded like an explosion. A muffled, furious male voice bellowed, "Who the hell you got in there with you, slut? Who's Jeep is this? I'll kill him!"

"Go away, Smoke!" Wendy yelled.

Dipper hurried back to her and handed her the ice bag.

Somebody kicked the door, hard.

"Oh, hell, he's gonna bust in," Wendy said, starting to rise.

With a splintering crash, the latch plate broke free, the chain ripped the holder out of the frame, and the door banged all the way open, and a burly skinhead guy in a black tee-shirt and jeans charged in, glaring through two purpling, bloodshot eyes. "Get away from my girl, runt!" he yelled. When he shook his fist, Dipper saw he wore what Grunkle Stan called knuckle dusters.

"Lay off, Smoke! He's not my boyfriend!" Wendy said, pushing past Dipper.

"I'm gonna trash him and then teach you a lesson, bitch!" he shouted, spit flying.

"He's just a friend! And I don't want to see you anymore, Smoke! Get out of my house!" She shoved his chest.

He slapped her so hard she spun and fell face-forward.

Later Dipper couldn't even remember the next few minutes.

Wendy, while they waited for the ambulance, told him, "I never saw anything like it, Dip. I mean, you know those cartoons where the Tasmanian Devil turns into like a whirlwind of claws and teeth? That was you, man. You plowed right into old Smokey and drove him out on the porch. He landed a good one on you, but, man, you didn't even pause, kicked him in the groin and doubled him over, then got his face hard with your knee—that's where the blood on your jeans came from, his nose—he falls backward off the porch, hard, knocks the wind out of him, and next thing I know, he's laying on his back, arms spread out, and you're sitting on his chest and just pounding left and right and yelling, 'She's-my-friend-you-BASTARD!' When I pulled you off, he was like out of it." She tilted her head. "I hear the sirens."

The EMT guys said it looked like Krissell was just unconscious, maybe a mild concussion. Blubs and Durland showed up and took statements from Wendy and Dipper and got video from the security camera Manly Dan had installed a year or so earlier. The recordings showed Krissell on both visits, and even included his pounding on Wendy's car with a breadloaf-sized rock.

Durland went back to the patrol car, radioed somebody, and returned with the news, "Checked on his ID. There's warrants out on him for assaultin' a policeman in Portland, domestic abuse of a girlfriend in Seattle, and another one from Washington State for armed robbery. Maybe another one from South Carolina, but they want prints to be sure."

"Take him into custody," Blubs said. "Cuff him."

"Do you want me to read him his rights?"

"Not until he's booked." Blubs glanced over. "And conscious."

One of the EMTs, a no-nonsense woman who reminded Dipper a little bit of Grenda, checked him and Wendy out. Wendy was OK except for bruising. Next the medic probed Dipper's face—"Does that hurt? Do you feel anything grating?" She made him focus his eyes on the bridge of her nose and follow her moving finger side to side. Then she looked at his hands. "Pretty swollen knuckles. Next time, don't punch anything bony so hard. Go for the gut. Make fists. Tighter. Open. Anything catching? Doesn't look like any bones are broken."

While her partner was injecting Krissell, who was beginning to stir and mutter incoherent curses, the EMT finished and said Wendy and Dipper weren't hurt bad enough for treatment and told them to rest, use ice on their bruises, and take ibuprofen for pain.

As the two EMTs loaded Krissell, who was fading again after the injection, into the ambulance, Blubs pushed his hat back. "Looks like he's gonna spend some hospital time before we book him!"

Then he explained to Wendy and Dipper that they wouldn't have to face charges. They had studied the damage he'd done to her car and the house and had already watched Krissell kick in the door and assault Wendy on the video. "In Oregon, what you did to him counts as self-defense," he said. "But later on the prosecutor's gonna want your statements unless this guy pleads out."

Durland would ride along in the ambulance to guard Krissell, now sedated as well as manacled and handcuffed, as the EMTs drove to the hospital. "What'll I do if he comes to and gets violent?" the deputy asked.

Before closing the rear doors, the tough woman EMT said, "Hit him on the head with your flashlight. We wouldn't notice."

The ambulance drove away. Dipper used Wendy's computer to copy the security video and put it on a usb drive for the sheriff. Then Blubs left in the patrol car.

Dipper and Wendy trudged back to the house.

"Damn dirtbag," Wendy said. "Little help, Dipper? We're gonna have to fix this door, dude, before my dad gets home. And anyways, he's going to tear into me about all this damage. I'll have to buy him a new TV set, I guess. He didn't like it that one time I went out with Smoke. I told Smoke that was it, that one date was all. He was so mean and nasty, and he kept touching me until I couldn't stand it. Slapped me and I kneed him where it hurts. That was two days ago. Then this morning he comes around with this crap. Jeeze, I give up on guys!"

They broke out the tools and—mostly Wendy, Dipper's carpentry skills were limited—got the front door properly re-hung, the latch plate replaced and reinforced, and by then it was lunchtime.

"Want to go out for something to eat?" Dipper asked as they sat on the sofa. "I'll drive"

"Your jaw feel all right?" she asked. "No loose teeth?"

He probed with his tongue. No loose teeth. But the whole side of his face was swollen and—ouch!—tender when he touched it. He told her he didn't think anything was broken.

"Your nose is a little bloody," she said.

Dipper took out his handkerchief and dabbed, but the little brownish-red spot of blood was almost dry. He caught Wendy gazing at him with a half-fond, half-amused expression. "What?"

Seriously, she looked into his eyes and asked, "You know what you have to do now, Dipper?"

Alarmed, he asked, "What?"

She made a pistol with her fingers and gave her voice a rasp: "Ya gotta whack Sollozzo and McCluskey, bada-bing!"

"Always The Godfather," Dipper lamented. "Why is it always The Godfather? 'Leave the gun, take the cannoli. Make 'em an offer they can't refuse."

Wendy said quietly, "Hey, Mikey, tell that nice girl you love her."

Dipper winced. "Ouch." It hurt to grin.

"Man, seriously, what is wrong with guys?" Wendy asked, sprawling back on the sofa. "Or is it me? I just have such rotten luck. Every time I think, I could really get to love this one, he immediately turns into a jerk and lets me down. I'm like the world's worst judge of guy's characters. Made up my mind. I'm gonna be a spinster, dude! No more boyfriends for me!"

"What about just a very good friend?" Dipper asked.

She glanced at him with affection. "Well, I dunno. I guess. Yeah, we've been friends a long time. I like you and all, but then you turned into a wildcat or some biz. You know I hate it when guys fight over me!"

"I wasn't fighting what's-his-name, Krissell, over you," Dipper corrected quietly. "I was fighting him because he hurt you." He took a deep breath. "I'd do it again."

Wendy touched his hair on his forehead. "Got a small lump there, too. Well—I gotta admit when you had him down, I came and got a couple of kicks in. The slimeball. Do me a favor and stay with me until Dad comes home and be my witness that it was Smoke who busted up my car and the TV and ruined like half of my clothes?"

"Sure," he told her. "I mean, he could just watch the video—

"Nah, you know Dad. He'd blow his cool before I could get him to sit down and look at it. But if you tell him the story, he'll believe you. Will you do that for me?

"You know I will," he said. "That's what a friend would do."

She didn't want anything to eat, but she did want to talk. She had a small bottle of Motrin, and they each took one. Then as they popped a couple of Pitt's and as they sipped them, for the first time, ever, really, she talked and talked to him about herself. He learned about her rocky love life, every single guy she'd ever seriously dated turning sour on her. In the afternoon, both achy, they sat side by side on the sofa—they'd forgotten about lunch—and she wept silently. "Guys are so rotten. Why couldn't at least one of them," she asked, "be like you?"

The silence stretched out until he said gently, "I'm like me."

Now her face, her freckled cheeks still wet with tears, broke into her lop-sided grin. "Yeah, man, you are, but—I dunno. You and me? You think? I'm too old for you."

"No, you're not," he said, brushing her bruised cheek with a soft touch of his fingers. "You're perfect for me. And I can't lie and tell you that if we get together I'd make our lives a bed of roses or whatever. I've got my college diploma, but no job yet. And I don't have much to offer you. Except—" he took a deep breath. "My friend, I love you. I mean, I'm not just in love with you, I truly love you and always have and always will. There. I've said it for the first time in, what, ten years? Wendy, all I can promise is that no matter what, I'll always love you and I'll never once hurt you or treat you bad, and . . . I'll just go on loving you."

"You're my best friend," she said, running her fingers through his hair, smiling at his Big Dipper birthmark. "A step like that, my kind of luck, it might totally wreck our friendship. But I gotta admit, you're getting that hunky Pines build. And I have a better time goofing with you and Mabel than I've ever had with any of my so-called boyfriends. I'm tempted."

Dipper got off the sofa and dropped to one knee. "Wendy—"

She giggled. "No, no, dude, please don't put me on the spot, not yet. Don't ask me to be your wife."

He dropped his chin and looked at the floor for a few seconds. Then he raised his eyes to meet her gaze. Softly, he asked, "Wendy Corduroy, will you be my lover?"

She gasped, her lips parted, her eyes wide with surprise. Then she got that sleepy look back in them. She leaned forward so her lips were close to his. "I think maybe—yes. And then, if we're OK together," she whispered, "I mean, after we're really sure, will you be my husband?"

Weeks later, Mabel was to call it the world's craziest proposal.

Maybe so, man. Maybe it was.

Like they say, whatever works, works.

And in this case—it worked like a charm.

**************

Story 4: Will You?

 Odd how two people can clash off each other, and then one day, boom.

****************

In the Falls, Dipper loved Wendy a lot,

But alas, at those times Wendy did not.

And other times Wendy wanted Dipper to hold,

But at those times, Dipper's feelings ran cold.

*****************

It wasn't the Grinch who fouled up things between Wendy and Dipper, it was sheer bad timing. They were always friends, but friends sometimes quarrel. And the times that Dipper was hopelessly, truly, deeply smitten, Wendy was distracted and just wouldn't be smote. And when Wendy was feeling warmly romantic, fear of having his feelings hurt had made Dipper retreat into his shell and he just wouldn't respond. They usually wound up a summer avoiding each other.

Then the next summer, when Dipper came back to Gravity Falls nursing his bruised feelings, Wendy would see him and sympathize and try to say, "It's OK, dude, I'm ready now."

Dipper being Dipper, he couldn't bring himself to trust her, or more precisely, her feelings. It's awful when you like someone a whole lot but fear they're going to hurt you again, so he'd say "Let's just be friends," and then Wendy would feel like crap, wonder what she had done wrong or what he was misinterpreting, and the next year he was back to loving her and she was all, "No, you're right, we're friends."

Ten years. Well, ten years that summer. Mabel was now a respectable married lady, had been for a month, and was three months pregnant. Yes, the man she married was a stand-up guy, and no, he wasn't a pile of Gnomes. He was quite a big name on the Interwebs, having established a profitable social-media site for teens. She was a clothing designer and consultant, and she could keep doing that until the baby decided to come.

Anyway, Mabel arrived in Gravity Falls for just a short visit in June 2022. Dipper was there for the whole summer, finishing up some investigations for Grunkle Ford, who was older and didn't travel as much as he used to, though he was now publishing best-selling popular books on the paranormal. Ford lived in Piedmont, near the Pines's home. Dipper had, after leaving college, become his Grunkle's ghostwriter (mainly changing Ford's stiff scientific prose into vivid prose) as well as Ford's chief researcher and leg-man.

No, that's not what it means. Of course Dipper liked boobs! Well, yes, he liked Wendy's legs, too, but—I did not say "butt!" It's a noun, not a conjunction! Listen, a leg-man is an employee who goes and does stuff for their more sedentary employer. A private eye's leg-man will interview witnesses, look up documents, stuff like that, freeing the Chief up to use the old brain, confront the villain, and have the hot romances. Not that the popular-science books Ford wrote were that kind of literature.

Anyway Dipper took photos of sap-embalmed dinosaurs, went snorkeling with the real Gobblewonker, recorded Gnome folklore, and other such chores.

Where was I? Oh, yeah, at Mabel's wedding and after, Dipper had lamented that he'd probably never get married himself, because the previous summer Wendy had still been on her friends kick, and now even though he'd be in the Falls all summer, he was planning on being cold and distant so Wendy wouldn't break his heart.

"The path of true love is like a rotten, rutted, washed-out road when the two people driving on it are both knuckleheads." That's William Shakespeare. No, wait, it's Grunkle Stan. He was still living in Gravity Falls, though he was retired, and when Mabel came to him and suggested that it would be nice if Dipper and Wendy could somehow get together, Stan said, "I guess somebody oughta pave over the broken pavements of life and smooth 'em out. OK, I want in on this."

Mabel went to visit Wendy, now working as the office manager for Corduroy Lumber and Timber, LLC. She caught the redhead just as she was getting off work on Friday afternoon.

"Mabel!" Wendy said, grinning.

"Wendy! Don't hug too hard, I'm pregnant!"

"Whoa! Dude! You gotta tell me all about this! Wait, already? You just got married like four weeks ago!"

"Yeah, Mike thought we ought to. Hey, we got a house, and we're gonna put in a nursery, and—I don't want to stand here on the sidewalk. Could we have dinner together or something?"

They went to the Big Swallow, a new-ish restaurant overlooking the lake, and dined on the patio. "I miss this town so much when I'm away," Mabel said. "So how's the job working out?"

Wendy shrugged. "Meh. It'll do for a while. Not gonna be my career, though. At least I'm making enough to have my own place. One of the tourist cabins Dad built. He lets me rent it real cheap."

"You know, Dipper's back in town," Mabel said casually.

"Good," Wendy said in a neutral tone. "Um—how is he?"

"He's good, he's good," Mabel said. "He's investigating some paranormal junk for Grunkle Ford. They're partners now, writing true pop-science stories about the paranormal, and the books are getting a big audience. Dipper's earning pretty decent money. It's all good."

"Tell him I'm glad he's good," Wendy said, sipping from her wine glass.

Mabel sipped her water. No wine for her! At least not for the next six or seven months. "Yeah, well, the thing about it, is Dipper's not good. He's terrible! Wendy, he's so lonely!"

Wendy shrugged. "I'm sorry about that. I mean, we just never connected, but I wish him well."

"You could help him," Mabel said.

"How?" asked Wendy, smiling, but suspiciously.

"Give him hope," Mabel said.

With a sigh, Wendy said, "I've tried over and over. Mabes, he's told me and told me we're just friends, that's all."

Mabel rolled her eyes. "Yeah, but you know Dipper. You can't believe him when he talks about emotions and all. Because he has them but can't understand them!"

Wendy ordered a second glass of white wine, a rarity for her. "I know. But when I'm feeling, you know, romantic about him, I worry that he's gonna brush me off because he's all on eggshells and doesn't want to force me to say something I don't mean or—I don't know."

"He'll come to see you," Mabel said. "You know he will. He can't stay away from you. Do me a big, big favor? When he comes, just say, 'I'm willing to give us a try as a couple. Will you agree?'"

"And he'll say, 'We said we'd just be friends, and I think we ought to stay with that," Wendy replied in a resigned voice. "And I'll get flustered and he'll get mad—we like each other a whole lot, Mabel, but I'm not sure that we'll ever, you know, connect with each other. Love each other." She sighed.

"I've got a reason to ask you," Mabel said.

"What's that?"

"I want my baby to have an aunt."

And at about the same time, Grunkle Stan was having a heart-to-heart with Dipper. "Kid, face it. You know you're in love with Wendy. She knows it. Everybody knows it. Give us all a break. Take her away from all this."

"All what?" Dipper asked. They were eating in Greasy's Diner, and the food wasn't nearly as good as the chateaubriand and chicken cordon bleu that Mabel and Wendy were having. "I mean, I love Gravity Falls! If I could do it, I'd move here full-time. I wouldn't be taking her away from anything."

"Yeah, you would. She don't like workin' for her dad. Fact is, she's miserable! Even miserabler than she was that first summer when she was clerking at the Shack. Look, you got a job with Ford, he sends you all over the place to investigate ghosts and ape men and crip-toed animals. Wendy'd love to travel! And she's an ace photographer and she could do all the illustrations! Ford's got plenty of dough. He'd hire her like that!" He snapped his fingers so loud that all the other diners and the whole staff jerked their heads around to look at him. He grinned and waved. "Still got it!"

Dipper sighed. "Grunkle Stan, I've tried to tell Wendy that I love her. I've even tried to propose. She always cuts me short. Then sometimes she feels sorry for me and says she loves me, but I know she's doing it out of pity—"

"Pity, schmitty," Stan said. "I'm tellin' you, you two could make it work. You gotta just do two things."

"What?" Dipper asked.

"One, trust her. You can. I know you can. Hell, you and her have stood side by side more'n once to face down some spookum! I remember this one time she jumped on a freakin' flyin' eyebat and flew it so it froze one of Bill Cipher's henchmen or henchthing or whatever it was. And I saw your face when she reached for your hand when you guys were standin' on Ford's stupid Zodiac! She says she loves you, trust her!"

"What's the second thing?" Dipper asked.

Stan leaned forward. "It's even more important, Dipper. Trust yourself! Trust your feelings! That fuckin' Journal ruined you, Dipper. 'Trust no one,' Ford wrote. That, that sentence, that's what you shouldn't trust, 'cause it ain't true. You can trust her if you trust you, and then you can, uh, trust each other, and—heck, just tell her you love her and say you'll give it a try and ask her if she's willing, too. I'll bet she will be. When nothing else works, fall back on the truth—"

"Aaggh!" Dipper yelled, flailing his arms.

"What? What is it?" an alarmed Stan asked.

"A possum just jumped on the table and stole my hamburger!"

"Yeah," Stan said. "They'll do that."

Dipper knew where Wendy was renting a small house, and on Sunday afternoon he showed up there, walked nearly to her door, turned around on the front step, hesitated, and walked away, paused on the sidewalk, turned again—

Wendy opened her front door. "Oh!" she said. "Hey, dude! Heard you were in town."

Dipper coughed. "Yeah, no, I mean, you're going out, I'll try to see you before I have to leave—"

Wendy shook her head and rolled her eyes. "Dipper! Relax, man. I wasn't going anywhere. I just saw you through the front window. Come on inside. Have a Pitt's or something. Catch me up."

Dipper faked a smile and walked back to her front door, not as fast as his heart was beating time, boom-da-ba-boom, and she stepped back, holding the door open for him. "You're looking really good," he heard himself say.

"Eh, I could lose five pounds. You look like you've been working out yourself, Dip. Nice day. Let's go on the back porch and sit. Quiet back there." She paused in the kitchen, her hand on the fridge door. "Mind if I have a beer?"

"I'll take one too," Dipper said. Why did I say that?

Wendy's eyebrows rose in surprise. "Really? Rimrock OK?"

"Fine, yes, Rimrock. Beer. OK."

She handed him a cold golden can, and they went through a sliding-glass door onto what she called a porch, though it really was more of a deck with an awning. They sat side by side in two patio chairs. The well-kept yard was fenced in, and beyond the fence he saw the woods and beyond them, the bluffs. She popped her beer. He popped his. "So you're drinking beer now," she said, sounding amused.

"Now and then," he said. To prove it he took a swig. It was true, he drank beer now and then. A total of, let's see, last New Year's Eve, then at Ford's barbecue in March when Fiddleford had come to visit, and, um. One other time that he couldn't remember. So this was his . . . fourth beer. He turned an impulsive "yuck" into an "ahh."

"You don't have to chug it, man," Wendy said. "I have more in the fridge."

Dipper coughed. "I didn't mean to—" he paused and sighed. "Wendy. OK, I promised myself I would ask. Um. If you say no, it's OK, and I won't ever ask again. I probably won't ever even see you again—"

"What are you asking me?" Wendy said patiently.

"Can I come and see you now and then?"

She actually laughed. "You're doing that now, dude! Any time, sure. That's not what you meant to ask, is it? Come on, what is it really?"

He sat for a moment, hearing woodpeckers busy with their carpentry somewhere in the woods. He took another small sip of beer. "OK," he said. "Here it is. I'd like to try being more than just friends with you. I—" he closed his eyes. "I love you. I'd like to be your boyfriend. Or more. Will you?"

"Dunno," she said, musing. "Don't look so upset! I haven't said no. I think I could love you, Dipper. Heck, I know I could. There are times when we're chasing monsters or fighting ghosts that we're really, really good for each other. But in just normal life, can we get along, you think? I mean, I can be moody and you can be insecure."

"Yeah," he admitted. "But, listen, I'm working for Grunkle Ford, and you and I can do investigations together. I travel all over the place for him, Twin Peaks, Eerie, Indiana, investigating ghosts and even stranger things. We could do that together, like we used to do every summer in Gravity Falls. And even when there's a lull and life is ordinary, I'll make allowances for you if you can do the same for me. Will you?"

"Dipper," Wendy said softly, "Listen up. I mainly don't want you to be a pushover, man. Lot of the times when I'm upset or angry or whatever, I get unreasonable. I know I do. And I don't want you just to lay back and take any crap—"

"Don't say any more," Dipper told her.

She blinked. "You trying to prove something?"

"No. You're just telling me stuff I already know. And it doesn't matter. You could—could take a swing at me, or cuss me out, or kick me out of the house, and I'd still feel the same way about you. But I'll try to deal with you when you have an off day if you'll try to do the same with me, when I'm all suspicious and worried."

"Will you?" Wendy asked.

He looked her in the eye. "You bet your ass."

Wendy set her beer down on the deck and stood right in front of him. She looked down on him with those wonderful, sleepy green eyes. "Stand up," she said.

He did, and they were face to face. She gently took the beer from him and set it down beside hers. "I think that might be too strong for you, man. All right. I've always liked your moxie. Let's try it, then," she said. She put her arms around him and gazed into his eyes. "Boyfriend."

He felt hot and cold and scared and elated. "Let's do it. Girlfriend," he managed.

She pulled him close. "You're just the right size for me now," she said, looking him straight in the eye. She moved her face closer, and he kissed her.

She pulled back, smiling. "Aw, dude. You haven't had much practice at this, have you?"

"Well, yeah, I—" Dipper stopped, feeling as sheepish as when he did the damn lamby dance. "No, I haven't," he admitted, falling back on the truth. "Romantically speaking, high school and college were both a bust for me. I haven't really, seriously kissed more girls than, um—well, more than you."

"It's OK," she said softly. "You get better as you practice it. Let's go inside, man."

They did, both carrying their beers, which they set down unfinished on the counter. she closed the glass door and locked it. "Bedroom's the first door on the left," Wendy said in a husky voice. "Will you come with me?"

"What are, uh, we gonna do?" Dipper asked.

"Practice," she said.

****************

Story 5: Babysitting

Thank heaven for little extradimensional eldritch horrors....

****************

Wendy was off on a photography shoot for Pacific Coast Nature when Dipper got an unexpected call from Grunkle Ford: "Mason, I hate to ask you, but I must have backup immediately! Stan's in Vegas, and Fiddleford's too old—it's an anomaly hunt. Possibly dangerous, probably not lethal. I think. Are you willing to go with me and watch my back?"

Dipper looked into the living room, where the twins were building something elaborate out of a set of intricately shaped wood blocks that their grandfather Dan had carved especially for them out of six different varieties of hardwood. "Let me make an arrangement and I'll be there as soon as possible," he said.

"Please hurry. Something is coming through from the monster dimensions!"

Dipper phoned Mabel. "Can I drop the kids off?" he asked. "Wendy's out of town, and Ford needs help."

"Uh, sure, Brobro," Mabel said. "But Sandi's teething, so—"

"That's OK," he said. "Danny and Gwen will play with each other. Be there in ten minutes."

Life is strange. Six years after the Mystery Twins had left Gravity Falls for high school and later college, Dipper and Wendy, then newlyweds, had returned to the weird little town to settle there. Mabel came back a few months later, because her boyfriend, who was now her husband, worked in the Falls, having replaced Blubs as sheriff when he and Durland retired and moved to Florida. It was a win-win, she figured. Sandi would love playing with the Gnomes and her hubby would have probably the least dangerous police assignment in the Northwest. Plus he was smarter than Blubs and ten times smarter than Durland, but then so was moss.

Dipper and Wendy lived up the road a half mile from the Shack, still run by Soos and Melody and their brood, and Mabel lived about the same distance down the road from it. Dipper pulled up and the three-year-old twins came with him to the house, Danny cheering, "Yay! Aunt Mabel!" and Gwen protesting, "No! My Aunt Mabel! Mine!"

Mabel opened the door. "There you are, my beautiful knuckleheads!" she said. "Come on in! I have juice and cookies!"

"Uh, not yet," Dipper warned. "They just had breakfast. Maybe a snack later, but not too much sugar."

Mabel slapped down the very idea with a dismissive gesture. "Oh, Broseph, no worries. You know my iron self-control! Come on in, kids!"

"Yeah . . . right. Well, thanks, Sis."

"You be careful, Dip."

***

Though Grunkle Stan was out of the Shack and on his own, living downtown in an apartment, Ford had turned his underground laboratory into a combination research center and home. Waving at Melody, Dipper pressed through the early crowd coming out of and going into the gift shop and ducked into the Employees Only part of the Shack. Because Ford realized that repeatedly seeing someone open a secret passage behind a vending machine just might make a stranger suspicious, he had rearranged things a bit. Now a closet to the left of the lockers, marked "DANGER: HIGH VOLTAGE / ELECTRICITY" and locked with a facial-recognition security unit scanned him and then silently opened to reveal an inner door to the extended elevator, and a narrow side door that opened to the emergency ladder, roughly where the stair used to be..

Ford met the elevator on the top level of the lab, aiming a quantum destabilizer at Dipper. "Good, it's you!" he said, lowering the weapon. "Or is it? Quick tell me how to pacify the Gremloblin!"

"Give him a singing fish!" Dipper said. "Grunkle Ford, is there a monster loose in the basement or something?"

"Something's here, all right," Ford said. He looked much the same as he had ten years before, except his hair now was mostly white and he had undergone laser surgery and no longer wore glasses. "I somehow can't get a fix on it. I think it's currently on the bottom level, but in order to capture or neutralize it, I need a wingman! Wait a minute and I'll arm you."

To Dipper's surprise, Ford handed him a rifle-style quantum destabilizer. "It's set to narrow beam, lowest setting," he said. "Even so, be careful. A shot in the wrong place could bring the whole Shack down on us!"

***

Meanwhile, and some miles away from Gravity Falls, Wendy stood on a temporarily non-flooded beach and took beautiful photos of Hug Point, specifically of an inlet that allowed a waterfall to tumble straight onto the beach, like a replica in miniature of some Hawaiian spots. The weather was good that morning with just a few puffy small clouds, and she squatted for one angle, stood tall for another, shifted position for another, and captured at least a dozen great shots. Her assistant said, "Mrs. Corduroy-Pines, the tide's just turned."

"Six more and let's get out of here," Wendy said. If they lingered much longer, a rising tide would catch them between ocean and a bluff, and they'd have to clamber over water-slick rocks and then push through tangles of thorny growth and over slippery, mossy boulders to get back to the van. She snapped the last few pics, then turned and got some photos of breaking surf—each wave coming a bit closer—before she joined Grace and they briskly hiked down the beach until they hit the spot where they'd come in via a narrow, crooked footpath that led to a parking spot. "Tired?" Wendy asked as Grace unlocked the car.

"Getting tired," Grace said. "How far did we walk?"

"Couple miles each way. Don't know about you, but coffee's not lasting me. We need some food. Let's find a place to get brunch and then what's next on the list?

"Um." Grace consulted her phone for the list. "Nehalem State Park."

Wendy corrected her pronunciation: "Neh-HAY-lem, not KNEE-hah-lem. Cool! That's only like half an hour away, and I know a bakery and café there where we can eat. Can you wait that long?"

"Sure." Grace said. She unlocked the van and Wendy stored her cameras before climbing into the passenger seat.

"Two more long days of this," Wendy said. "Be good to get back home."

Grace drove south and they chatted, but after about ten minutes Wendy's phone chimed. She glanced at the screen and answered it: "Hi, Mabes. What's up?"

"Um, I'm kinda stuck here," Mabel said. "The twins want a snack, but I don't know what you and Dip let them have, and I can't get him on the phone."

"Why are you babysitting?" Wendy asked, sitting up straighter in the passenger seat.

"Dipper has some emergency deal with Grunkle Ford, I don't know what, and I love having them over, but, you know, they're saying they're hungry."

"They're always hungry," Wendy said. "OK, let me see, what would you have handy? Yogurt?"

"Uh, yeah, banana flavored. Is that OK?"

"Perfect!" Wendy said. "Give both of them about three ounces of that and maybe, um, two small graham crackers? Like snap a regular one in half for each of them?"

"Got those!" Mabel said. "Thanks. I'll go take care of this right now!"

As soon as she hung up, Wendy tried Dipper's number. It went straight to the voicemail message. So she tried Ford's. No luck.

But when she dialed the Shack number, Soos answered: "The Mystery Shack, where the dreams are real! Come and visit us! This is Mr. Mystery speaking, how can I help you?"

"Soos," Wendy said—

"Wendy?"

"Yes, right. Listen, are Stanford and Dipper over there?"

Soos lowered his voice: "They're like down in the secret L-A-B, up to something mysterious and all. I can go see if they're busy."

"Um, don't bother them. But soon as you see them, let Dipper know to call me."

"I will, dude! That's like a Soos promise."

"Thanks, man."

The drive south was scenic, the brunch tasty. Still, Wendy couldn't shake a feeling of foreboding.

***

"What is that thing?" asked Dipper.

"It's either an eldritch horror or a cryptid monstrosity," Ford replied, sweat beading on his forehead. "Still behaving in the same maddening way. Since the moment I spotted the thing, it keeps phasing in and out of reality! It's impossible to get a good bead on it!"

Whatever it was, the . . . apparition, the thing, appeared momentarily as either an eyeless, slimy, pulsating, purple-and-pink blobby thing with short spiked-tipped tentacles, or a twelve-legged crab-like scuttling blood-red crustacean-like creature with abut nine eyes on stalks, or a lurching, glurching monstrosity that looked like a zombie's torso, except the distorted, crumbling face was on the chest and it had no head. And less describable shapes in between. It didn't speak, but made strangely faint, strangled, gurgling sounds and sometimes seemed to chuckle at them.

"It's like the Shapeshifter," Dipper said. He'd given up on trying to shoot it with the destabilizer rifle. From the way it flickered, both in his vision and on Ford's anomaly-detector screen, he was sure that if he fired, the thing wouldn't be there by the time the beam actually ignited.

Ford was shaking his head. "The somatic pattern does not match the Shapeshifter's. It's something else, from somewhere else, and I suppose we really should fire if it ever manifests completely. One thing gives me pause. So far, it seems to have made no hostile moves. I hesitate to make a first strike when it hasn't attacked or even made a threat display."

"It is a threat display," Dipper said.

"If only it would retain its grip on our dimension—there it is again!"

This time it looked like a snake with three heads threaded through a six-legged turtle's body. It scampered for a foot and a half and vanished.

"You're absolutely sure it isn't the Shapeshifter?" Dipper asked.

"Not the same morphic signature at all," Ford said. "And I checked the surveillance feed from the bunker, and the cryonic chamber is stable and secure."

Dang, the thing, now something like the melancholy offspring of a turkey and a lobster, flickered into view and immediately faded.

Dipper gripped his weapon without attempting to sight in on where the thing had been. "Have you ever come across something that sort of phases in and out?"

After a few moments, Ford replied, "Well, actually I recall that when I was lost in the Multiverse, I once had a brief fit of dimension-flicker. It was at a time when I made a narrow escape from a dangerous situation by diving into a natural portal, and I seemed to be on the edge of two realities. One was a swamp, the other a desert, and bizarre creatures yammered at the sight of me in each one. I went back and forth for quite a long time before I was able to hold onto one of the dimensions long enough to get away from the instabilities. Unfortunately the desert rats were hostile, and I had to find a way out of there before—"

"It's here again!"

Now it appeared in a corner of the lab, facing away from them. It spun and they wished it hadn't. This bodily form looked like a toad formed to display a greatly outsized mouth, but when the toothy jaws opened, there was a beak behind them and when that opened there were like seventeen tongues serpent-like.

"Move left and aim for the corner!" Ford said, moving to the right.

The creature faded again, but it did not move very far between appearances, and now they should have it, quite literally, cornered.

"Wait for it, wait for it—" Ford said.

He and Dipper both nearly jumped out of their skins when a deep voice boomed from behind them: "MY BABY!"

***

By the time Wendy had shot her Nehalem Park photos, ranging from the beach to the walking trails and to views of the mountains, her nagging feeling of alarm had increased. Once again she called Dipper.

This time he answered: "Hi, Wen, can't talk right now, got a situation, twins are fine."

"Gah!" Wendy viciously switched her phone from call mode.

"What's wrong?" Grace asked.

"Probably nothing," Wendy said. She called Mabel again.

Mabel answered in a soft voice: "Hi, Wen. Shh. Danny and Gwen and Sandi are all down for a nap."

"Are they OK?"

"They're fine! What could go wrong with me, Mabel, babysitting? Just a sec. OK, I'm texting you a picture."

"Aw," Grace said, looking over at the mat with the three sleeping kiddos sprawled out on it.

"Watch the road," Wendy warned. "Thanks, Mabes. Listen, I may head home pretty soon. I've still got a week's deadline and only two more days of shooting, so—"

"Don't worry!" Mabel said. "Everything's fine. Do your photo thing and then come home, but don't make your trip longer than it needs to be by doubling back here. I'm sure Ford will keep Dipper safe. Probably."

"I'll think about it," Wendy said. Instead of thinking, she worried.

Dipper's outlook had a way of rubbing off on her.

***

"Thank you," the weird creature said. It looked, as much as anything, like an enormous toad with seven legs, three tentacles, and nine eyes on stalks, and its body was indeed toadlike, except the mouth ran seventy per cent of the way around it. "How much should I pay you?"

"Nothing, nothing," Ford said, speaking through Fiddleford's universal translator device, which had pickups and speakers in every room of the basement. His words came out as gleeble glup gleeble, but the sort-of-toad thing seemed to understand.

She (Ford supposed the gender) heaved and belched up something that looked like a dinner-plate-sized, slightly flattened purple egg. "At least take this. And I apologize for Slunguggle's playing with his firstfather's dimension hopper. He's just a naughtums itty baby, really."

"Floorbie shzinkle pookie," said the translator, though what Ford had said was, "We're happy he's well."

The baby gargled, "Muppa loopa gumma goob." Obligingly, the translator said, "Muppa loopa gumma goob. Um, possibly 'The pen of my aunt is on the table?'"

"Come along, little one," said the probably-mother. She picked up the child, which now looked like a partly-metamorphosed tadpole version of her.

The creatures vibrated and shimmered out of existence.

"Well," Dipper said, "that happened."

Ford took a deep, unhappy breath. "It will take a lot of air freshener and pine cleanser to get the smell out of this laboratory."

They took the elevator upstairs, and Dipper, to his surprise, saw that the sun was down and the Shack was closing up. Ford thanked him. Deadpan, Dipper asked, "Aren't you going to share our babysitting fee with me?"

"Good Lord, you can have it all!" Ford said. "It's only a nodule of purple quartz."

"Kidding," Dipper told him.

***

At Mabel's, he went inside and found her snoozing in a recliner. "Wake up, Sis," he said. "Dinnertime!"

She yawned and blinked. "Dipper! Hi. Everything OK?"

"I'll tell you about it later," Dipper said. "Meanwhile, I brought you a pizza with everything. Also, I came to collect the twins."

"Yay, pizza! Oh, about your kids," Mabel said, grinning. "They wanted a sleepover, and I told them that's fine. My neighbor watched the kids for a few minutes, and I went up to your house and got them some clothes and PJ's and a few toys. They're being real quiet now, so let them stay over tonight. I love babysitting!"

That didn't sound like her, but Dipper shrugged. "Uh—well, sure, if you want—do you really love babysitting that much?"

"Oh, Brobro, it makes me want to have two more kids of my own! See you tomorrow around noon, OK?"

"That will be fine," Dipper said. "Say hi to Jimmy for me when he gets off duty. And save him some pizza."

Through a mouthful of crust, toppings, and mozzarella, she said, "Let Jimmy get his own. He knew the job was dangerous when he took it!"

He drove the short distance up Gopher Road and parked in the driveway. What a day. It's gonna be weird here all alone in the house, he thought. He'd become so used to the toddlers' clamor and giggles. Silence was going to be worse than their noise.

He was too tired to think about cooking. In the kitchen he slapped together a ham and cheese sandwich and chased it with a Pitt's. Then he trudged upstairs to the bedroom, tugging off his shirt and unfastening his belt as he went.

Dark in here already. He had stepped through the doorway and had pushed his pants down, kicking them aside, before he switched on the light—

"Don't stop there," Wendy said from the bed. She threw back the covers to show that she hadn't stopped there.

"You're back!" Dipper said joyfully.

"And my front, too," She said, grinning. "And now about those annoying boxer briefs—"

"Um, the kids are—"

"Are with Mabel, I know. She came up and got their overnight stuff to give us a little break. And Grace is at the motel in town, and she's gonna come and pick me up at six sharp tomorrow morning for the rest of my photo job, so we don't have all that much time together and we're all alone and I'm feeling kinda hot for you." She rolled out of bed and came over and removed his shorts for him. "Come to bed, man."

He did and as they pressed warmly together, she said, "I had a feeling all day that something was bad wrong here. Was I right?"

"Yes and no," he said, kissing his way down her throat. "Ford called me in for what turned out to be a routine job."

"Chasing spooks?" she asked. "Ooh, don't stop, that's nice."

"Babysitting," he answered her, and then carried on with the nice part.

**********

Story 6: Looking Back 

Memories can be scary. But also sweet. Especially when shared. Especially when shared in bed....

**********

Soos and Melody's fourth child, a daughter, making it like even steven, dawgs (as Soos said, meaning they now had two sons, two daughters) came into the world on the morning of Friday, July 13, 2022.

What a coincidence. From now on, little Stephanie and her dad could celebrate their birthdays together every year. "I'm gonna make sure she never hates her birthday, though," Soos said the first moment he saw his new daughter. "I'm planning on being a cool dad, not a cold one like mine was!"

Wendy and Dipper were sure he'd succeed. His other three kids adored him. Young Mr. and Mrs. Pines, not yet parents themselves (but they were trying to accomplish that), had watched after the three Ramirez kids from about six A.M. to ten that morning, while Soos was with Melody at the hospital. Then the blessed event occurred (actually at 8:33) and a couple of hours later, Soos had joyfully returned to the Shack with photos of Melody and the baby, which everyone told him was the most beautiful baby ever, an evident though kindly-intended falsehood. Stephanie looked crinkly and pouty and bald, like practically every other newborn.

"I really want to go back to the hospital to be with Melody," the big guy said apologetically. "This afternoon, when Stephanie and her will be in the room, like together, you know what I mean? If I can make arrangements, but no pressure on you, dawgs. I just really want to see my wife and our new baby!"

Anyway, Mabel took over babysitting at four that afternoon, and a little later, Soos called from the hospital to say cheerfully, "The doctor just told me, like, Melody and Stephanie can come home by ten on Sunday morning. She's doing great, and Stephanie's like a hundred per cent healthy, and, um, it was a real smooth delivery, Hambone. Two nights in the hospital, and boom! Like that, they get to come home. Isn't that great?"

The Pines twins and Wendy got everything ready by eight that evening, Soos returned from the hospital in time for dinner, and when Mabel, Dipper, and Wendy said good evening, he was happily regaling his other children with tales of how great their new sis was going to be. Mabel went on her way, and Dipper and Wendy drove back to their home, not far from the Shack.

"Hope our kids will be as sweet as Soos's," Dipper said as he and Wendy settled down for the evening. He reached for the remote. "Want to watch TV?"

"Let's just reminisce," Wendy said. "I'm in the mood for memories."

"OK," Dipper said, replacing the remote on the bedside table and slipping into bed beside her. "Let me see. I'll start. The first day we saw the Shack, which was a big surprise to us, Stan made me and Mabel go up to the attic and unpack, and when we came downstairs, you were at the cash register and Soos was fixing something. Stan introduced you both, but for a day or two I thought your name was Wanda, like Mom's, and Soos's was Zeus."

Wendy laughed. "I remember you wrote that in your journal," she said. "Zeus! What a name that'd be for him. Let me see. I kinda remember the first time I saw you guys, with Stan tellin' us that you were his niece and nephew. He had Mabel's name right, but he called you Dippy. Um, and you were wearing your cargo shorts and red shirt and blue vest, but your hat was different?"

"Was it?" Dipper thought. "Oh, right, that was my old brown trucker's cap, with a star on the front. I'd had that from the third grade! Or fourth? Anyway, I lost that one when Mabel and I were fighting off the Gnomes who wanted to marry her. We were in the golf cart, and one of them had his teeth in the bill of the cap when Mabel gut-punched him off me, and he and the hat flew out of the cart. Oh, you might not know this part: We got back to the Shack after it closed, kind of wrecked the golf cart and had to face down a hundred Gnomes, and by the time we staggered inside, we looked so beat-up that Stan told us we could each take one piece of merch. That's when I got my blue and white pine-tree hat—"

"Which you've replaced now a couple times," Wendy said.

"Yeah, lost one when I was trying to save Ford from a spaceship, and lost others at other times. I think the one I wear now is my fourth. Anyway, I chose a cap, Mabel chose a grappling hook."

"So that's where she got it!" Wendy said. "That's strange. I don't remember the Shack ever selling them!"

"I don't think it ever did," Dipper said. "I think the grappling hook was in a box of junk that Stan bought from an abandoned self-storage unit. Back then he did that to get raw material for making new exhibits."

"You and I didn't talk much those first few days," Wendy said. "Of course I remember early on when you came runnin' up to me and said you needed to borrow the golf cart to save Mabel from a zombie. I thought you were just tellin' a story so you could try out the cart! But, hey, this one time when I was twelve, I snuck off and drove Dad's pickup halfway to town before I ran it into a ditch. I could relate. I liked your moxie and gave you the key."

"That was the first time I'd ever driven one," Dipper admitted. "First time I'd driven anything! But I didn't hit any pedestrians!"

"Good on you, man." Wendy laughed.

"Yeah, and it turned out to be the Gnomes, not a zombie, but you know that story. I was driving the golf cart too fast to get away from that giant Gnome formation, and when we pulled up to the Shack, I rolled it. Mabel and I fell out on the grass but just got scratched up a little. I was so scared Stan would make us pay for the golf cart, though."

"Nah, it's still going. Sturdy hunk of junk!" Wendy burst out with a laugh. "Oh, my God, remember that time we tried to jump the golf cart off a ramp, and we totally busted it?"

"And Soos fixed it but also added a nitrous oxide booster!"

Now Wendy was laughing uncontrollably. "And—that time-we made—made the jump and crashed it through the freakin' roof!"

That started Dipper's laughter. "And we somehow gave Grunkle Stan the impression there'd been a freak tornado!"

They ranged to other summers. "Our first kiss," Dipper said. "That Fourth of July. I'll always recall that."

"At the fireworks," Wendy said. "Yeah, I remember real well."

"Then that time I had to wear Mabel's clothes and a wig and Mabel disguised herself in my clothes and hat so your dad wouldn't get mad if he saw us and thought you were hanging out with me."

Giggling, Wendy crooned, "Yeah, I kinda kissed a girl, and I liked it!"

They tried a little experiment. Yep, they still both liked kissing.

"Hey, man, that summer when I made you my assistant lifeguard and Poolcheck fired us both!" Wendy laughed again. "When I took you on, I didn't know you couldn't swim, I swear!"

A little more somberly, Dipper put his arm around her and said, "That time we fell off the boat into the Pacific."

"Yeah, so cold, Dip. I thought we were both dead."

"We passed out before the rescue chopper got there. They flew us to the hospital while we were both unconscious, and I woke up before you did, but to get me really awake, the doctor told me you had frostbite and they had to amputate your fingers."

Wendy shook her head. "So cruel. But it woke you up and we recovered. And remember they let us warm up in a nice hot shower?"

"Together," he said.

She snuggled close to him. "Yeah, and there we were wet and naked and hugging and nothing happened but a big slippery embrace. We were still too dazed to get up to anything sexy. But Dad would have freaked if he'd ever found out!"

"Anyhow, one summer you taught me how to swim," Dipper said. "In the lake, remember? We skinny-dipped, first time I'd ever done that. And then I got to go hot-tubbing with you in that nice steamy natural spring. Still love doing that. We ought to hike out there this weekend."

"It's a date, man! Don't pack any clothes!"

They kissed and fooled around a little. Then out of nowhere, Wendy asked, "What do you think was the weirdest thing we went through?"

"Getting stuck in that bizarre valley where everything morphed into monsters is way, way up there on my list," Dipper said.

"Me, I think it was following that ghost into the creepy dimension where Gravity Falls was a cartoon show, and we got stuck at a comic-book convention, and we like entered a masquerade dressed as ourselves—"

Dipper couldn't stop chuckling. "And we came in second! And Mabel's still pissed about that!"

"We all suddenly had five fingers," Wendy said. "And we all felt so heavy and all. And we met that dimension's versions of McGucket and Soos. Guy from Georgia, I think. Anyway, he was our Soos in the masquerade, remember? Real nice guy."

"And with other McGucket's help, we finally put the ghosts to rest."

"Yeah. So many times things we thought were terrifying turned out to be sorta OK when we understood what was going on."

"Like the Sentivore's cave. When the butterflies captured Mabel."

"Man," Wendy said softly, "I really thought you were dead that time. But it was the clone of you from the copy machine."

"That was rough," Dipper said. "We found Mayellen McGucket and rescued her, but we lost the last two clones."

"Yeah, and then later on, the next summer, I think, Soos's dad died up in Canada, and Soos told us about the only time he'd seen the guy since like forever. He came to the Shack the previous winter and bummed money off Soos and then ran off to Canada. Harsh."

"I remember the funeral," Dipper said. "Soos cried like a little baby, but not so much because his dad had passed away. He talked about how Stan had become his second father, remember? And Mabel and you and I were like his sisters and brother."

"Yeah, and that reminds me of how later we put up memorials to the two clones near that awful cave."

"And we visited your mother's grave."

They were silent for a while, sharing thoughts without speaking.

"Dip, when were you the most scared?" Wendy asked.

"Lots of times. When Gideon was completely off the rails and built his giant robot and kidnapped Mabel. I jumped from the cliff to crash into the robot and fight him. I was really furious about his taking Mabel, but mostly I was terrified." He considered it a little more. "Really, though, about the most scared I've ever been was when I investigated the Westminster House and ran into a lich. That was horrible."

"Yeah, but you had cute little Eloise by your side. No, man, Brujo was way worse than that," Wendy said. "Nearly as evil as Bill Cipher in Weirdmageddon."

After a few minutes of snuggling, Dipper reflected, "So many good memories, too. I remember all the holidays we got to spend together. The Christmas we helped the Sawyer family. And you and Stan went off somewhere to get Mr. Sawyer out of jail. Somebody was stealing stuff all over town that winter. We thought the Gnomes had all turned into kleptomaniacs or something."

"Yeah, Stan and I sprang Mr. Sawyer from jail and gave that fat, crooked cop the surprise of his life!" Wendy said. "Oh, and did I ever tell you how Stan and I once burgled a museum?"

"What?" he asked.

Arching her eyebrows, Wendy zipped her lip. "Maybe later," she said enigmatically.

"All right," Dipper said. "Oh, and the time you got that magic axe—"

"Not magic, enchanted," Wendy corrected. "Came down from my ancestor Archibald, yeah. That's why I usually carry that one when we go into the unknown!"

"Like the abandoned gold-mining town. That creature was scary."

"Meh, we've faced worse. Just remembering it all, whoosh! I mean, we've had exciting lives, man," Wendy said.

"Yeah. And soon now, it's going to get a lot more exciting," Dipper told her.

"I know what you're thinking," Wendy said as they caressed each other.

Of course she did. When they were touching, they both read each other's minds. They kissed and fondled and did a few other things. Wendy said, "The thought of it still kind of scary to me, though. You think we can get pregnant in the next year?"

"Not unless we work on it," Dipper said.

"Dude, I notice you're getting all the tools ready."

"Mm. Too tired?"

"Dipper, I'm a flippin' Corduroy." She moved closer and kissed him long and hard. "And if you want to work on it—yeah, that's good—let's get started."

Not that they ever kept a score card, but if they had, of the times they'd made love, well, you know. The honeymoon would be way up on that list. A few times when they'd faced danger and had come through and celebrated their escape in each other's arms rated high, too.

But, to tell the truth, that night, when they set out with a determination to become parents, that night everything got so intense and so good that it rocketed to spot number one.

Um, and also two. And before the sun rose the next morning four.

Not three, though. The three spot was occupied. Well, what did you expect? Man, the honeymoon had to be in the top three.

**********

Story 7: Birthdays

And Many Happy Returns….

Wednesday, August 31, 2022

"Here they are!" Dipper said from the front window.

"Yay," Wendy responded. She started to get up from the easy chair.

Dipper waved her off with a big smile. "No, wait here. I'll go help them in. You just take it easy."

"You're babying me, but OK," Wendy said with a grin as she settled back into the chair and put her feet up. "You're gonna suffer, though, 'cause you know Mabes is gonna have a ton of luggage!"

He opened the door. "I know."

Dipper went out onto the porch. Brilliant, already hot August day, sun climbing up and already about a third of the way to noon, no clouds up in the blue, humidity low and a little breeze to help. Not shabby at all. The SUV, a red Canyonero, had just parked in a slot, and Mabel threw open the passenger-side front door and hopped out as he came down the gift-shop steps to meet her. "Broseph!" she yelled as she stood on tiptoes and arched her back, hands thrust to the sky. "Come and help Teek!"

"That's why I'm here," Dipper said, approaching her. "And by the way, happy birthday, Sis."

Mabel did a little celebratory three-second dance. "Back at you, Broseph. Sorry it took us this long to come up to Oregon to see you and your new place. How's the house working out?"

"It's great," Dipper said as Teek got out of the driver's seat, waved, and walked around, to open the hatch of the SUV. Mabel hugged Dipper and then stepped back for a better look at the log house.

"Manly Dan outdid himself," she said. "Looks so . . . modern! How many rooms?"

"Wendy will give you and Teek the tour. But there's three bedrooms, three bathrooms, study, kitchen/dining room, living room, and on the second floor two attic rooms we haven't even put furniture in yet. Nice basement too if we want to expand. On four acres. And we're only a mile from the Mystery Shack! Here, Teek, let me help you with that. How's life in L.A?"

Teek smiled. "Well, I just got a promotion from production assistant to Mr. Chalkyn's personal assistant. So I get to work side by side with a director plus a twenty per cent raise!"

"Teek's the only one that can keep old Chatty Chalky focused," Mabel explained. "Teek sets up meetings and tasks for the day, makes sure he gets to them, has all the data he'll need when he gets there. Schedules the whole day and gets Mr. Director where he's supposed to be, then is right at his side during shooting. Oh, and because of Teek, production on Eagle Sauadron's coming in on time and under budget."

"Down side," Teek began—he pointed toward a heavy gray suitcase—"Could you get that one, please? Down side of my job is Chalkyn's gonna want to take me with him if he changes studios, and he will because he always stirs up trouble and goes on to the next producer in town. I mean, his movies make money, but he's hard to get along with."

"Sounds great," Dipper said, hauling out two suitcases. "Hey, Mabel, at least take one of these!"

The three lugged in a total of five suitcases, three of them Mabel's.

Wendy was standing by the fireplace—no fire there in August, of course—and Mabel dropped her suitcase and said, "Hi, Wen—"

Mabel broke off, clapped her hands to her cheeks, and shrieked.

Wendy said, "Happy birthday, Mabes! Dip and I are gonna drive you and Teek over to Ford's house for the party this afternoon. Hope you had a good drive from California—what's the matter with you?"

"Holy Moley!" Mabel said, laughing. "The matter with me? You gotta be kidding!"

Three months and ten days earlier-Saturday, May 21, 2022

Early in the morning, from the bathroom, Wendy called, "Hey, Dip, come here for a minute!"

Dipper, propped up in bed with his laptop on his thighs, murmured, "Hmm?"

"Just come here."

"Hang on, answering an email to my publisher . . . there." He set the laptop down on the bedside table and swung out of bed. Wendy always took her shower first, unless they were conserving water and showering together, or unless Dipper had to get up way early for some reason, like an emergency call from Ford regarding a vampire bat infestation or an eldritch abomination in the ladies' room of the library.

Dipper was wearing gray boxer shorts and a white tee shirt, his usual sleep attire. He didn't bother with slippers.

He opened the bathroom door. Wendy, wearing a grin and nothing else at all, stood at her sink. She not yet showered—the big mirror over the double sink hadn't misted. "What have you got on your mind?" he asked.

"Take a look, Dip." She wrinkled her nose stuck out her tongue. "Not at my boobs, at what I'm holding in my hand."

He took the plastic wand from her and looked at the little window in it. "Wow!" he said.

Two lines, both bright pink and sharply defined. Two.

He blinked at the two lines and smiled like an idiot. "Can I hug you?"

"You better. It's my birthday today!"

Hugging a completely nude girl, especially one as gorgeous as Wendy, especially one as warm and soft and loving as Wendy, especially one with whom one shares a touch-telepathy—well, it's nice.

—Happy birthday, Wendy. And by the way, I love you. Oh, what are we supposed to do next—

Don't panic, man! I'll make an appointment first thing Monday.

—Oh, right, right. Is it still OK for me to take you to The Club this evening for your birthday?

Sure it is! I've got a craving for filet magnon and crème brulee for dessert! No wine though. But it's barely daylight, it's a long time to dinner. Tell you what I want, let's celebrate.

He got a flash of how she wanted to celebrate.

—Uh, is that, our doing that you know, OK?

She showed him just exactly how OK it was.

Wednesday, August 31, 2022

"Why didn't you let me know?" Mabel asked, jumping up and down as if she were ten.

"Thought we'd make it a surprise," Wendy said.

Teek finally put down the two large suitcases he'd lugged in. "It really is!" he said.

"How many months?" Mabel asked. "You're really showing!"

"About four and a half," Wendy said.

Mabel poked her twin's face and mussed his hair. "Dipper! You're gonna be a dad! You better write five or six new books—wait a minute. Wen, I gotta ask, boy or girl?"

Wendy glanced at Dipper. Dipper nodded.

So Wendy said, "That's why my tummy's so big. Twins. One of each, actually."

Mabel's whoop of joy rattled the windows.

"We're pretty sure they're both gonna be red-haired," Dipper said.

Teek looked a little puzzled. "What makes you say that?"

"Well, red hair's usually a recessive gene, but Wendy's special. She's got flippin' Corduroy genes!"

"So you beat us to the punch," Mabel said. "Teek and I are trying."

"You'll get there," Wendy said. "Keep a watch on your temperature and strike the days after the thermometer's hot."

"Yeah, already keeping track," Mabel said. "Ooh, I'm so excited! I'll decorate a nursery for you! Which room's the nursery?"

"There's time for that later," Dipper said. "Sit down, you've been driving for hours."

"One thing, Mabes," Wendy said as they all sat. "Grunkle Stan wants to be godfather to every child you have. And to ours too."

"It'll do him good," Dipper said. "He's kinda feeling his age, and he laments that he never had kids."

Mabel was holding Teek's hand. "OK, we'll talk to him about that, but you guys were sneaky about not telling us you were pregnant."

Wendy answered her seriously: "It's a big deal now, bringing babies into this mixed-up crazy world. It's a serious thing, and I just wanted to make sure I was getting through the first trimester OK."

"She did," Dipper said. "Flying colors."

"Especially during morning sickness," Wendy said. She became serious again: "Yeah, but you think about possibilities, you know. So much could go bad wrong. And it's huge responsibility. On the other hand—"

"I get to be Aunty Mabel! Those kids are gonna be slopping over with love! When are you due?"

"Doc says December 15, but that's an estimate and can be way off."

Mabel had her phone out and tapped out the date in the calendar app.

For a short while everyone just sat smiling at everyone else. Then Teek and Wendy started to sing "Happy Birthday," and Mabel got bashfully teary and Dipper said the presents for his sister were in the next room.

"No," Mabel said, her face shining. "Right here I got my big unofficial sister and my younger brobro right here. I got my nearly lifelong crush who's also married to me. And I got me. Let me get used to being an aunt-to-be. That, now. That's the best gift I've ever received."

"Tell us that again when you've been changing diapers and wiping bottoms for a day or so," Wendy challenged.

"Hey," Teek said, "don't knock it. We know that's how a girl tells a niece or nephew 'I love you."'

Squeezing her husband's hand, looking at them all with shining eyes, Mabel said, "I love everybody!"

**********

Story 8- Wild Card

 Because in life there’s always some random element….

Around 7:15 PM, an icy night in February 2022 . . .

The tree came out of nowhere. One second Wendy was driving along a curving Roadkill County Road, looking ahead to a date-night evening with her husband, and the next second a gigantic tree was falling, headlights showing it smashing to the pavement right in front of her car, too late to—

Crash.

Darkness . . ..

***

Grunkle Stan put his hand on Dipper's shoulder. Quietly he said, "Go get some shut-eye, kid. I'll wait here with Wendy and call you pronto if anything happens."

Wendy lay so still, so pale, in bed, her head swathed in bandages, her face bruised, more bandages on her arms, a yellowish IV drip feeding into the crook of her left elbow. "I can't leave," Dipper said hoarsely, his eyes red and bagged from lack of sleep. He'd been sitting in the hospital room for twenty-eight hours now, and the doctors kept saying, "We don't know, son. We'll have to see how it goes in the next few hours. We just don't know."

Stan patted his shoulder, gently. "Kid, you're beat. Look, the Stanleymobile is parked right outside the hospital. Two minute walk from here. Back seat is plenty big enough for you to stretch out. Here's my spare key. Grab a blanket from the shelf there. You go, I'll stay, and I'll call you with any news."

"Thanks," Dipper said wearily as he pushed up to his feet and swayed a little. "Oh—Mabel's finally managed to get a flight. She should be here late tonight." He stood by the bed and stooped to kiss his wife's cheek. "Hang in there, Wen," he said. "Remember, you're a flipping Corduroy."

Stan took Dipper's place in the chair and settled in for the vigil. It was late, getting close to midnight, a little warmer than it had been the day before. He reached into his outer jacket pocket and took something out. Then he sat still and waited, listening to the hospital sounds, the monitors, the occasional ding of somebody calling a nurse.

When the lights dimmed, he sat up straighter, taking a deep breath of the disinfectant-scented hospital air. "Here you are," he said. "Might as well let me see you. I know you're here and why you're here."

Like a storm cloud coalescing from vapor, a dark form materialized. It became a tall, robed, hooded skeletal figure, grasping a scythe. The skull tilted to the right. ARE YOU A WIZARD?

"Me? Naw, I'm just a guy." Stanley nodded toward Wendy. "The lady in the bed, there, she's my niece. By marriage."

USUALLY I AM VISIBLE ONLY TO WIZARDS OR WITCHES. AND THOSE WHOSE TIME HAS COME, OF COURSE.

"Yeah, I'm no wizard, but I been around. You've come for her, right? But it don't necessarily have to be her, if all the old folklore stories are in any way true. There's certain escape clauses. Unless you're really just a vengeful SOB."

VENGEFUL? DON'T LOOK ON THIS AS MALICE. I DO WHAT MUST BE DONE. I HAVE NO MALICE IN ME.

"You're dodgin' the issue. Come on, like I say, I been around. I'm Mr. Mystery. Retired. I read and saw enough weird stuff in my time to know there's always rules, and rules always have exceptions. So you don't have to take her, right, if I volunteer to go in her place. True?"

IT IS MORE COMPLICATED THAN THAT. TRADITION HOLDS THAT TO WIN A REPRIEVE, A MORTAL MUST BEST ME IN A CONTEST.

"I challenge you to a pie-eating contest! And first one who drops part of the pie on the floor loses! Hah!"

For the briefest of moments, the fixed grin on the skeletal face seemed to show the faintest flicker of amusement. I MUST DECLINE. BUT THAT WAS A GOOD ONE, STANLEY PINES.

"Yeah, I was just pulling your leg. Straight up now, no fooling. You go in for, what, chess?"

SORRY, NO. I CAN NEVER REMEMBER HOW THE LITTLE HORSES MOVE.

Stan held up the deck he had taken from his pocket. "How about some Tarot Hold 'Em, nothing wild?"

Though the visitor's eyes could not blink, somehow they gave the impression of blinking. YOU HAVE PIQUED MY INTEREST. HOWEVER, PLAYING FOR JUST ONE LIFE IS RATHER LOW-STAKES.

"OK, OK," Stan said. "Gotcha. Penny-ante's no fun. Here's the deal: One hand. Double or nothing."

SO IF I WIN, I TAKE BOTH OF YOU, BUT IF YOU WIN—

"You get neither. Or if you have to take something, find a sick bird or squirrel or something. But no humans. Like a what do you call it, scapegoat. That's allowed, the stories tell us. What do you say?"

LET US FIRST AGREE ON THE RULES OF THE GAME.

It took them some time, but Stan had already noticed that the wall clock's second hand had frozen at five ticks to midnight, and all sounds had stilled. Somehow time had paused for this. Finally, they agreed to the basic proposition: The Major Arcana would be left out of the deck. The Minor Arcana would be played like a poker deck. Each player would be dealt two hole cards, face-down, and then five more community cards, face-up, and from the total seven, each player would select five to make up his hand. After a minor bit of quibbling, they agreed on just one wild card. Stan disliked wild cards, but as the visitor insisted, THERE MUST ALWAYS BE A RANDOM ELEMENT.

"OK, I'll agree to that," Stan said, spreading out the whole deck. "Here, point out the wild card you want." A bony finger tapped one. Stan snorted as he added it to the fifty-six card deck of Minor Arcana. "Figures."

Stan pocketed the smaller stack of Major Arcana. They pulled up the narrow hospital table, the kind that raised and lowered so a bed-bound patient would have a place for plates, silverware, and cups or glasses. Stan sat forward in his chair. The other stood but bent a little. Stan neatened the deck. "Cut the cards. And not with that thing!"

DON'T POINT. IT IS VERY SHARP. AND I APPRECIATE THE HUMOR. The bony hand reached out and cut the deck as nearly equally as anyone could, probably twenty-eight cards in one stack, twenty-nine in the other. Stan shuffled repeatedly.

He dealt one card to his opponent, one to himself, then another to each. As he picked up his two, he said, "We're not fooling with flop, turn, and river bets. Here go the first three."

He laid them down one by one. Ace of Wands. Three of Pentacles. King of Wands.

Stan reflected. He held the Knight of Wands and the wild card. OK, he could make that at least a pair of aces, not too shabby.

NOW, REMIND ME OF THE VALUE OF THE POSSIBLE HANDS.

With a sigh, Stan reviewed the various hands and their standing. "Ready now?"

READY.

Stan dealt the Queen of Wands. "Interesting," he said. "We still good for the deal?"

WE ARE STILL GOOD. THE SUSPENSE IS NOT KILLING ME.

"Hah! Good one yourself!"

Stan dealt the final card. Page of Wands.

READY FOR THE SHOW-DOWN, STANLEY PINES?

"Yeah, I guess. Whatcha got?"

Death showed the Ace of Pentacles and the Queen of Swords he held. TWO QUEENS AND TWO ACES.

Stan whistled in admiration. "Nice. Two good pair you got there. However—" He laid down his cards. "Page of Wands. Knight of Wands. Queen of Wands. Wild card, I'm using as King of Wands. And Ace of Wands. Royal flush."

I SEE.

Stan tapped the Death card. "That's the one you insisted be wild. It's wild. So I say it's now King of Wands, and I win."

A BIT IRONIC, I SUPPOSE.

"You accusing me of cheatin'?" Stanley asked with a grin.

His opponent silently returned his grin. Bit of a foregone conclusion, that . . ..

***

Dipper rushed into the hospital room, still clutching his phone. The doctor stood by Wendy's bed, his back to the door, but he turned, saw Dipper, and, his eyes above his green surgical mask obviously smiling, gave him a thumbs-up.

"What happened?" Wendy asked in a woozy, weak voice.

"You're going to be OK," Dipper said, leaning close to her, his tears falling onto her face. He kissed her lips, very gently. "You had an accident, but—you're going to be OK!"

Then he turned—and saw Stanley sitting slumped in the chair. A scatter of oversized cards lay on the floor between his feet, his cell phone beneath his dangling, limp right hand.

Dipper gasped. "Oh, no."

He stepped around the doctor, who was murmuring reassurances to Wendy, and fearfully reached to shake his Grunkle's shoulder.

"Hey! Hands off! Oh, it's you," Stan said, jerking. "Sorry, Dipper. Thought somebody was tryin' to pick my pocket. I wasn't asleep, I was just resting my eyes. Like I told you on the phone, I knew Wendy'd come through."

He grunted and bent over and began to pick up his phone and the scattered Tarot cards.

"What were you doing?" Dipper asked, staring at the colorful cards his Grunkle was gathering..

"Ah, hand me that Death card, kid. Thanks. What do you think I was doing? I was playing a hand of solitaire. Might play another one tomorrow night, who knows. Wendy's been asking for you."

"Dipper?" Wendy croaked as the doctor paused to shake Dipper's hand. "My head hurts and I'm thirsty."

As he straightened the deck, Stan said, "Go take care of your wife, knucklehead."

"Water will be fine," the doctor said. "Everything looks great. I'll be in again before eight, but Wendy's turned the corner. Good night."

Dipper was so tired he fumbled and nearly spilled as he poured ice water from the pitcher into a plastic glass. Stan smiled as he watched his nephew hold a bent straw to Wendy's lips and she began to drink. When she'd finished half the glass, he heard her whisper, "I love you so much."

Stan decided the two needed their privacy and left them alone. On the way out, he stopped at the small first-floor chapel, where Manly Dan was praying. "Hey, Dan, good news," he said. "She's gonna make it. Go up and say hi, and then get your butt to bed. She needs rest, and you ain't gonna be any good to her all wore out."

Manly Dan shook his hand, nearly crushing it. He glanced upward and rasped, "Thank you, Lord," before he hurried out of the chapel and toward the elevators. Stan honked his nose in his handkerchief and walked out of the hospital, not to go home immediately but just to stand for a minute and look up at the stars. "Anytime you want a game, putz," he said genially. "You know where I am."

His cell phone chimed and he took it from his inside jacket pocket. "Yeah?"

A strained, frightened voice: "Grunkle Stan?"

He grinned. "Pumpkin! Wendy—"

Mabel's voice was frantic. "Oh, God, is she—"

"Calm down, Doc says she'll pull through fine." Stan heard Mabel whisper something, a prayer, and then he asked, "Where are you?"

"Portland, airport. I'll drive—wait, I'm too young to rent a car. I'll do something, call an Uber or catch a bus—"

"Nah. You just go get something to eat," Stan said, glancing at his watch. "Then rest somewhere in the airport. Keep your phone handy. I'll be there in two and a half hours."

Sounding exhausted and edgy, Mabel blurted, "It's so late! Are you up to driving—"

"Kid, way I feel now, I could drive for a day and a night. I think I just might live for a hundred more years. Do what I told you. And I love you, Mabel."

Now she was sobbing. She said something he could not catch, her voice strangled with relief and tears.

"Anyhow, I'll call you soon as I get there." It came out maybe a little gruffer than he'd meant. In a gentler tone, he added, "I'll meet you at the passenger pick-up. And dry up the waterworks before I see you."

"I love you too," she squeaked.

On his way out of the hospital lot, just after the turn on the highway, Stan saw a brownish blur—a rabbit bursting from cover and darting across the road. He heard a thump on the undercarriage.

Stan sighed and pulled over to the shoulder. Resignedly, he climbed out of the car and walked back until in the glow of parking-lot lights from the hospital he found the young rabbit, unbloodied, still warm, but its body loose with the finality of death.

"So you had to make me hurt a little," Stan said. He laid the small rabbit in the yellow, overgrown grass beside the road. "You couldn't just lose gracefully, could you?"

He didn't see a thing, but he perhaps heard a remote voice: A LIFE HAD TO BE TAKEN. AND IT IS FITTING THAT SOME GRIEF MUST COME AT SUCH A TIME. STILL, REMEMBER THE ONE I CAME FOR.

Stan walked back to his car, nursing a sour grudge. "Yeah, yeah. Thanks, I guess. I gotta go get my niece now. My niece by blood, not by marriage."

DRIVE SAFELY.

Despite himself, Stan smiled—grimly—as he got into the driver's seat. "That a warning?"

JUST FRIENDLY ADVICE.

"You're kind of a cruel bastard, ain't ya?"

When no answer came, Stan started the engine, turned on the heater and pulled back—carefully—onto the highway. "Nah," he said to the night. "I guess not cruel. Just a real workaholic."

**********

That wraps it up for this Wendip Week of 2022. Of course, this last tale must tip a black felt hat to the late, great Sir Terry Pratchett.

 

OK, Wendippers, see you next summer!

And for Dipper and Mabel,

 

8-1-16-16-25 2-9-18-20-8-4-1-25!

[billnoncipher]

Losing Time

This story is not in my usual continuity, but was written for Wendip Week 2021, topic "Time Travel."

for Wendip Week 2021

---

Mabel faced a hard decision when she called in that favor.

She was nearly thirty, she was a successful clothing designer, she had a steady romantic partner, life was good. But then on a visit to Gravity Falls, she visited the grave of good old Waddles, whose heart had given out the previous winter, while she was off in New York.

And she hadn't been able to say goodbye.

And despite the fact that she was all grown up and everything, it ripped at her heart—that she hadn't said farewell to her most favorite pet of all time. It wasn't that he hadn't been well cared for—Soos saw to that, giving the pig all the comforts and plenty of food. It wasn't that he was cut off in his youth—seventeen is a good long life for a pig. It's just that—

Well, now she knew how Dipper felt.

Speaking of whom.

Dipper and Wendy were coming up on their tenth wedding anniversary, they had adorable twins, age six, names Alexander and Amanda, and they lived in the Mystery Shack. Grunkles Stan and Ford still technically owned the place, and Soos ran it, but over the years he and Melody had expanded it until their own growing family caused Soos to have a separate house built just across the road, and he and his family of six—he, Melody, Benny, Betty, Alma, and little Stanley—had made the short move. Dipper had inherited Grunkle Ford's role as investigator of the weird, Wendy was a nationally-known consultant on forestry issues, and they took over the living space that Soos had left vacant.

Ford, now semi-retired, still came over to work with Dipper down in the secret labs when some project was afoot. Grunkle Stan came over to help when the Shack was swamped with tourists in vacation season, but he spent a lot of his time visiting casinos all over the world, where his odd luck always brought him a steady income.

The attic bedroom had become disused.

"Can I stay?" Mabel asked in a small voice just at sunup that day. "Just for a couple weeks?"

"Sure, Mabes!" Wendy said. "Any time, you know that."

Dipper, now sporting a goatee and wearing glasses to correct mild myopia, said, "Sis, what's wrong?"

With a sad smile, Mabel said, "You can tell, huh? Just getting all sentimental. Missing Waddles."

"Oh," Dipper said. "That. We're sorry you couldn't make it back in January."

"It was so unexpected," Wendy said. "He was OK, you know, kinda slow and sleepy all the time, and then one morning we found him in his stall. He'd passed in his sleep."

"He was comfortable to the end," Dipper said. "The heat was on. He didn't freeze or anything. He looked peaceful."

"We buried him down the hill," Wendy told her. "Come on, we'll walk you down."

The place was pretty, a small clearing off to the right of the Mystery Trail. Grass had greened the mound, dewy now with the dawn, and—Mabel couldn't help sobbing—Dipper and Wendy had put up a marker, one of those you could buy for a cherished dog or cat. It read,

---

WADDLES

2012-2029

Always Loved

---

"Could you just leave me here for a few minutes?" asked Mabel.

Dipper hugged her. "Sure, Sis," he said. "Take y our time."

Wendy hugged her, too. "You gave him a good life," she said.

When the two had left, Mabel took a deep breath and took something that looked like a thick button from her jeans pocket. She held it between finger and thumb, close to her lips, and said, "OK, Blendin Blandin, you owe me one."

And without fuss, explosions, or special-effects noise, he was there, beside her, in his old uniform. "M-Ma-Mabel," he said, smiling. "Hi. It's be-been a wh-while."

"Yeah," she said. "You're looking—exactly the same. How's Time Baby?"

"Te-te-teething," Blendin said with a grimace. "The ne-next thou-thousand years are go-gonna be hard. I gu-guess you want your fa-favor now?"

"I do," she said. "Waddles passed away last January. I don't want to bring him back to life or anything. I've learned better than that. But I didn't get to see him before he went, and I really want to visit him one last time. So—could I borrow a time tape?"

"I pro-promised," he said. "I always carry a sp-spare these da-days. Here."

"And I also need your advice," Mabel said, accepting the heavy time-travel device. "I want to visit Waddles on the happiest day of his whole life."

"You-you'll have to a-avoid meeting yourself," Blendin warned. "That would be cat-cata-catas—bad."

"Agreed," she said.

"Let me find out how to se-set the co-coordinates, then," he said. "Just a se-second."

He blinked out of existence for just three seconds, then reappeared, slapping at his hair, which was smoldering. "Th-that was two we-weeks of hard wo-work!" he said. "Lucky this-this is m-my va-vacation month. OK, I've reviewed Wa-Waddles' s li-life and this will ta-take you to the ex-exact day when he was happiest. You can ha-have the wh-whole day, or eight hours any-anyway, bu-but remember to a-avoid me-meeting yourself."

"Will do."

Blendin set the time tape, warned, "It will br-bring you ba-back to the present automatically. Ha-have a g-good time-tr-trip."

The strange noiseless explosion, a moment of spinning disorientation, and poof! there she was, at the edge of the woods behind the Shack. The sun was just rising.

"Out you go," she heard a girl's voice say from the back door.

She saw a rectangle of yellow light. Oh, my God, that's me, in my old sleep shirt! I'm twelve! I'm so young!

Her younger self held the door for Waddles—He's so cute and tiny!—and the pig stepped out, sniffed the air, and waddled over close to the woods to take care of his morning business.

Let's see. I always let him out, then had breakfast, then called him back in, so I have about half an hour before I have to duck out of sight.

"Waddles," she called softly.

He heard and galumphed over to her. He knew her. Her different size, her different voice, didn't matter. She scooped him up. "Oh, I love you!" she said as he curled into a ball and nuzzled her cheek. "Let's go for a walk."

She set him down, and they went down the Mystery Trail, past the Bottomless Pit—not yet fenced off—and as far as the bonfire clearing, where she sat on a log and played with him, laughing through tears. "I'm gonna have to say goodbye, later," she whispered. "But remember, no matter what, I'll always love you!"

Too soon she heard her own younger voice calling, probably for the second time and more loudly, "Waddles!"

"Go on," she told the pig, patting his bottom. He trotted back to the other Mabel, his Mabel.

What day is this? Mabel wondered. What day made him happiest?

She sat too long. Someone spoke, startling her. "Whoops, sorry, didn't know anybody was here!"

Wendy.

Mabel stood up. "I was just, uh—I used to come here when I was a girl—" she began.

"Mabel?" Wendy asked, blinking and staring. "Mabel? Is that you?"

"Haven't changed all that much, have I?" she asked. "Oh, my God, you're so young! Can—can I hug you?"

She was a little bit taller than the fifteen-year-old Wendy, who would add a few inches to her height in the next two years. Mabel couldn't help crying again. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I didn't mean to let anyone see me. Time travel. I came back to—to visit Waddles."

"Oh, man," Wendy said. "Dipper's told me about this kind of stuff! Come on back to the Shack and surprise him!"

"No, I can't," Mabel said. "Don't even tell him you met me. That would cause problems with time."

"Oh."

Something in Wendy's voice hit her then. "Uh—what's wrong, Wendy?"

"Just—just the end of summer," Wendy faltered. "I—I hate that you and Dip are goin' home today."

Oh, my God! Of course! Waddles thought I was gonna leave him, and I nearly had to, but Grunkle Stan and Grunkle Ford made the bus driver take him aboard—of course he was happiest on that day!

"Oh, yeah," Mabel said. "Our birthday was yesterday. We turned thirteen."

"Technical teens," Wendy said with a ghost of a grin. A tear ran down her cheek.

"But you don't have to cry," Mabel said.

"I—I guess I can tell you a secret," Wendy said. She sat on the log, and Mabel sat beside her. "See, Dipper admitted to me a while back that he has a crush on me. I already knew, but I had to let him down. You know, me fifteen, him twelve. But now he's going away, and I'll never see him again, and—I just can't tell him I'm kinda-sorta in love with him, too. It's hard, Mabel."

Mabel bit her lip. "Listen," she said. "I may get in big trouble because of this, but—OK, I'm gonna say it. You gotta give Dipper a note. Have all his friends here sign it. You sign it, too. Here's the most important part—write on it 'See you next summer.' And wait for him. He'll come back. And he'll grow up, Wendy. And if you wait for him—it's gonna happen. I promise. Just stay in touch, and—most important—when the time comes, the age difference won't mean a thing."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Trust me, I know. OK, I've got a few hours today. I'm gonna stay close to the Shack and get in as much time with Waddles as I can. Then I'm going back to the future, and thirteen-year-old Mabel and Dipper are going back to Piedmont. But he doesn't just have a crush, Wendy. He really and truly loves you. So write the note, give it to him before he gets on the bus, and things will all work out. Promise me?"

"Yeah. I promise."

"Oh—and tell Grunkle Stan that when the time comes for us to leave, to make sure Waddles gets on the bus, too! I—Oh, I love you like a sister, Wendy! You won't believe how happy you're gonna be with Dip."

"That—that means a lot to me, Mabes," Wendy whispered.

"OK, you'd better get back. Don't say anything to anyone about this. Be sure to do the note thing. Oh, and Wendy—do me one more favor?"

"Sure, what?"

"Tell Pacifica that Mabel's waiting—in the future. Don't explain."

"All right," Wendy said with a lopsided smile. "I'll do it." She mimed zipping her lip.

The day passed. Out of her eight hours, Mabel spent about three in Waddles's company as her brother and her younger self got ready to leave Gravity Falls. She spent more time standing out of sight, watching things unfold—finally the kids coming out, glum, with their suitcases, the bus pulling up, Dipper and Mabel and—finally—Waddles climbing aboard. And all their friends running as far as they could to see the twins and the pig off.

She stood alone near the Shack. The flash came. Benjamin stood there. "How d-did it go?"

"It went good," Mabel said, handing over the time tape. "I said goodbye." She sniffled and a tear ran down her cheek. "I'll still miss him but I—I can handle it now. Uh, how much time has gone by while I—?"

"A m-minute," Blendin said. "Well, I-I g-guess we're e-even."

"Thanks, Blendin. Goodbye."

"N-no, I d-don't think it's g-goodbye," he said, smiling. "I'll s-see you again. In time."

He flashed out of existence.

"Aunt Mabel!" It was red-headed Amanda, running down the hill to meet her. "Hi!"

Mabel swept her up in her arms. "Hi, Sweetie! Where's your bro-bro?"

Squirming, Amanda laughed. "He can't find his shoes!"

Carrying the six-year old up the hill to the Shack, Mabel laughed. "When your dad was six, he had the same problem! All the time! Every morning!" She paused and looked back at the green grave. "Hey, let me tell you a story about the most special pig in the whole world," she said, and they went back to join the family.

---

The End

[billnoncipher]

Wendip Week 2018, Prompt 7 -“Bedtime Story”

Goodnight, Goon!

(Not in my usual continuity, but written for Wendip Week 2018 for the prompt "Bedtime Story")

Goodnight, goon!

Goodnight, loon!

Goodnight to the Mystery Twins who defeated you in June.

Goodnight, gnome.

Goodnight, home.

Goodnight Journal 3, you're a grand old tome.

Goodnight scam!

Goodnight wham!

Goodnight, Grunkle Stan, twice as strong as a ram!

Goodnight, sword.

Goodnight, bunker hoard.

Goodnight to the author, our great-uncle Ford!

Goodnight, Mabel.

Goodnight, table.

Goodnight, something that rhymes with Shnable!

Goodnight, Wendy

Goodnight, friendly.

Goodnight in my bed (this could get trendy!)

Goodnight, me.

Goodnight, all that I see.

Am I feeling great? Yes, great as can be!

The moon shines in the window and paints a triangle on the floor.

Now that we're grown up, Wendy, who could ask for more?

Today we stood before a priest and we both said, "I do."

And here we lie in my old bed. And I am loving you!

Mabel's off to college soon. Stan and Ford are on a cruise.

Soos is sleeping down below—the snores come with the snooze!

Bill Cipher's just a memory. The Shapeshifter is kaput.

The Gnomes are happy with their queen. The Witch is in her hut.

We've climbed the stairs and gone to bed behind a closed, locked door.

We're giggling in each other's arms, our clothes are on the floor.

We had troubles, the good Lord knows, but they didn't last.

Let's think about the present now and not look at the past.

I loved you when you gave me keys to the Shack golf cart,

And when you rode the pines on down, you took hold of my heart.

For us this silence, for us this room, for us this splendid now,

Tomorrow starts our future life, but for the present—Wow!

Here we lie, flesh warm to warm, lips pressed to lips, my wife,

I hope we live a thousand years and love our married life.

But now it's time to draw the shades and shut out one and all,

For here it is, our wedding night. Now—let gravity fall!

"Dad? What are these words?"

"Hm?" Dipper took off his reading glasses. His four-year-old son held up a couple of pieces of paper. "Let's see." He took them, read them, and grinned. "Mm, these are a little adult for you guys. Just some sorta-kinda poems I wrote for your mom before she was your mom. Stay out of my desk, OK?"

His four-year-old daughter said, "She's always been our mom!"

"Well," Dipper said, laying his glasses aside, "there was a time before you guys were born, you know." He looked at the clock over his desk. "Holy Moley, it's past your bedtime!"

Wishing Wendy were back home, he herded them upstairs. Got them into their jammies, made sure they'd brushed their teeth and said their bedtime prayers. But as to bedtime, well, both the twins were yelling, "A story! A story!"

Then footsteps on the stairs, and Wendy, lugging her overnight bag, came to the twins' bedroom door. "You need help, Dip?"

"I got this," he said. "How was the forestry conference?"

"Pretty good. Learned a thing or two. But I missed you, so I managed to catch an earlier red-eye flight back home. And it looks like the kids stayed up past curfew, so I'm glad I did."

Both twins were clamoring, "Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, you're home!" It had been two whole days without her.

"Sweetie, sweetie, sweetie," Dipper chanted. "It's so great to see you back!"

The twins were both on one bed now, pulling at her. She laughed. "OK, OK, calm down. I'm gonna give you both goodnight kisses!" And she gave each child a big smack on the cheek that made them both giggle.

Dipper wrestled the two redheaded twins into their own beds, gave them his goodnight kisses, and said, "OK, what kind of a story do you want? Giants? Pirates? Princesses in towers? Adventure?"

His son said, "Tell us about the time Auntie Mabel stole the airplane!"

Dipper blinked. "Um—that would take way too long, so maybe that's for another night maybe eight years from now."

His daughter said, "I know! Tell us about when we weren't born yet!"

Dipper sat in the chair beside the bed. Wendy came and sat on his lap. "Yeah," she said, snuggling with her arm round his neck. "Tell them that one."

Dipper put his arms around her. "OK, let's see . . . once a handsome and brave knight discovered that his funny, silly sister had been stolen by a zombie!"

"Ooh, this is going to be a good one!" his daughter said.

"Post your critique after the story," Dipper told her. "Now, this knight had to chase down the zombie and rescue his sister, but he didn't have a horse! He hurried and asked the king of the castle for help, but the king was too busy fleecing rubes—"

"Just like Grunkle Stan!" his son said.

"A lot like him," Dipper agreed. "But then a beautiful princess—"

"With red hair," his daughter said.

"Yes, with beautiful red hair. Just like yours. This princess drove up in a golf cart, and the knight went down on one knee and begged, 'Oh, lady fair, may I borrow the golf cart, for my sister hath been stolen by a zombie, forsooth!' Well, the princess hardly even knew the knight at all. But you know what she did?"

"What? What?"

"She handed him the keys and said, 'Try not to hit any pedestrians!'"

"Ooh!" his son said. "She's a cool princess!"

"I love her!" his daughter said.

"So do I, kids," Dipper told them, patting Wendy's hip. "So do I."

The End

[billnoncipher]

Wendip Week 2018, Prompt 6: Moving in with Each Other

Got Your Back

by William Easley

(Not part of my usual continuity, this story was written for Wendip Week 2018, for the prompt "Moving in With Each Other")

Mabel, her tongue stuck out, said, "Eww! You guys! Get a room, why don't you?"

"We got one," Dipper said. "Wendy's moving in with me."

"What? Oh, that's great for you, but where will I sleep?" Mabel asked. OK, it was 2016, and as sixteen-year-olds, she and Dipper were really too old to be sharing a room, but then it was Gravity Falls, and what happens in Gravity Falls stays in the Bottomless Pit, as far as parents ever know.

"It's cool, Mabes," Wendy said. "You sleep in your own bed. Dipper and I will share his."

"Uhh. . . awkward! I . . . think I'll go sleep in the guest room," Mabel said. She chuckled in an evil way. "Wouldn't want to distract you crazy kids. You're so stuck on each other!"

"Mabel, no jokes," Dipper warned.

"OK, OK, I'll just get my stuff and clear out. You guys look really cute in bathrobes, by the way. Did you enjoy your shower?"

"Mabel!"

"Sheesh! I'm going already!" Mabel packed up a few necessities—three trips down and up and down the stairs—and then standing in the doorway, she said, "Well, I'll just leave you two alone, so you can get rid of the bathrobes, or whatever."

Wendy threw something at her. It was only a stuffed animal, and a giggling Mabel closed the door before it hit.

"Man," Dipper sighed. "How did we get into these messes?"

"You know, dude," Wendy said.

Yeah, he knew. They'd been exploring the crashed space ship, when Dipper had opened a hatch—evidently never previously opened—and they entered a cabin with a cryotube in it, like the one the Shapeshifter had been frozen in. In fact, Dipper suspected that the cryotube in Ford's bunker had been looted from here to begin with.

However, once they opened the door, the cryotube deactivated with a hiss, they felt a wave of heat, and then it opened, and a strange creature, three feet high with three short arms and three negligible legs and shaped sort of like an extremely obese bowling pin, waddled out. It looked up at the two of them and asked, "Zgrfmck nzzpl vmqms?" Well, at least it had a rising inflection and sounded like a question.

"We come in peace," Dipper said.

And the alien creature drew a ray gun and fired it. And divided into two. Which divided immediately and made four, then eight, then sixteen—

"Grunkle Ford!" Dipper said into his transmitter. "Are you seeing this?"

"Yes!" said Ford, who was watching everything from the comfort of his lab, while the GoBo camera that Dipper wore clipped to his cap caught it all. "These are very dangerous creatures—the Poppaparts! Get out of there and seal the door! They don't have object permanence and they'll forget you once they can't see you!"

"We're surrounded!" Dipper yelled.

Wendy stood back to back with him. She wielded her axe, and he swung a length of pipe. So many of the Poppaparts crowded them that they found it hard to pick a target. "Edge toward the door!" Wendy yelled, swinging the axe and pressing tight against him.

And they almost made it—but just as they fled through the hatch, a burst of hot orange radiation from one of the guns hit them, "Gah!" Wendy shouted.

They stumbled out through the hatch, Dipper slammed it shut, and then he said, "What now?"

"Nothing now," Ford said. "They'll reabsorb and go back into their sleep chamber."

"Reabsorb?" Wendy asked.

"Yes. As they divide, so they unite. They press together, adhere, and gradually shrink back so there's only one. They were shock troops."

"Uh-oh," Dipper said. "Grunkle Ford, I think we have a problem."

Cutting their clothes off was embarrassing. Then without even thinking to provide the teens with a sheet or towels, Ford and McGucket conferred, and Ford said, "Well, the good news is we can fix this up. I know the technology required. The bad news is it will take us approximately seventy-two hours to create the device. Wendy, call your Dad and tell him you're staying with Mabel for the next couple of nights. Say there's an illness in the family. Oh, sorry. Meanwhile, I'll get you a couple of bathrobes. Fiddleford, get two bathrobes, scissors, and a needle and thread."

"So," Wendy said when Mabel had left them alone. "Guess we're bunkin' together tonight, dude."

"Yeah," Dipper said. "I'm sorry."

"Not your fault, Dip. Well, make the most of it. Let's get out of our robes."

That was a little tricky, considering how the robes had been cut and sewn together, but they did it and then, carefully, both of them naked, they slipped into Dipper's bed. "Dude," Wendy said, "which side do you sleep on?"

"Left," Dipper said. "You?"

"Uh. Awkward, but—I can't sleep unless I'm laying on my back."

"OK."

They talked late into the night, and ordinarily it would have been heavenly for Dipper.

But ordinarily they weren't fused together from the napes of their necks down to the ends of their spines.

Anyway, Dipper finally got to sleep with Wendy pressing down warm and soft on him from behind. But he couldn't help wondering—

Wouldn't it have been better if we'd been standing face to face?

The End

[billnoncipher]

Wendip Week 2018, Prompt 5: “Flirting.”

All Aboard the Flirt Train

By William Easley

(This is not part of my regular continuity, but a story written for Wendip Week 2018 for Prompt 5: Flirting)

Ever since he had turned sixteen, Dipper had felt different. He could drive—when Mom and Dad let him borrow one of their cars for an hour or so. He had asked Wendy out to three whole dates the previous summer, and she'd accepted every time. So as the summer of 2016 began, he was fired up for . . . adventures in Gravity Falls! With his favorite redhead!

And when Mabel gave a sleepover alert for their first weekend in the Falls that summer of 2016, and when it turned out that Pacifica was out of town with her parents, Grenda was off in Austria for a week, and Candy was at band camp for two weeks, Wendy was the only one who responded.

"Not good," Mabel pronounced that afternoon.

"Sure, it's good," Dipper said. "You two are buddies. Like big sister and little sister."

"Augghh!" Mabel yelled, waving her arms and doing a good vocal impression of Charlie Brown missing that football again. "You can't play any of the good sleepover games with just two! Gotta be a minimum of three! So, I guess it's gonna be really boring for Wendy." She paused and then in a sly tone, she added, "Unless . . . "

OK, Dipper told himself, it would be awkward but not that awkward. Mabel would sleep, if she slept at all, in her old bed in the attic. Wendy would sleep in Dipper's bed.

Yep, right . . . in my bed.

And Dipper would sleep on the floor. On an air mattress. In his sleeping bag. At the foot of his bed, not in it.

Knowing Mabel, and knowing this is the first sleepover of the summer, we probably won't even get to bed, anyway. The first and last ones are all-nighters.

Dipper assured himself it would be all right. That morning Wendy brought an overnight bag to work, and that evening the three went up to the attic bedroom. They got into sleepwear—Wendy modestly chose green pajamas, Mabel wore her old sleep shirt plus shorts under them, and Dipper wore a t-shirt and shorts that came down to his knees, nothing racy.

And then Mabel said they first had to gossip—not a life skill Dipper had developed. But he sat mostly silent listening to Mabel and Wendy dish the dirt on Pacifica, teachers from both of their schools, Tad Strange (very bland gossip), and a few others.

"Come on, Dipper!" Mabel said at one point. "Hold up your end of the conversation!"

"I never talk to anybody or find out any of these things," Dipper pointed out. "I'd have to make up gossip. Like 'The mailman is a werewolf.'"

"No, he's not," Mabel said, laughing. "He told me he suffers from hyperpilosity, that's all."

"I said I was making it up."

Wendy shook her head. "No good, dude. It has to have some fact in it to be gossip."

Next, Mabel broke out the trusty old Twister game. Now, Dipper couldn't deny that posing nearly wrapped around Wendy with one hand and one foot on red, one hand on yellow, and one foot on blue wasn't stimulating. It was less so, though, when Wendy, laughing, lost her balance and fell on him, smashing his face into the floor.

They dealt with the nosebleed for ten or fifteen minutes. Wendy kept apologizing, but Dipper said, "Wasn't your fault. It was the game. I'm OK, really."

Then there was M.A.S.H., the game of numbered lists under the headings Mansion, Apartment, Shack, House, plus some arcane business with a spiral line and counting, and Mabel announced the results: "Wendy, you're gonna live in a Shack, drive a tank, marry Jared Padalecki, and have four kids! Dipper, you're gonna live in an Apartment, drive a minibus, marry Melanie Martinez, and have one child!"

"Name it after me, dude," Wendy said.

"Only if it's a boy!" Mabel said, and she fell over backwards, hugging herself as she gave her high, gurgling laugh.

"This is a stupid game," Dipper complained. "Why can't we play 'Dungeons, Dungeons, and More Dungeons?' Or the Duck-Tective version of 'Clue?'"

"Lame!" Wendy said. She didn't have the patience for board games.

"Truth or Dare!" Mabel said.

"Yeah, I'm up for it," agreed Wendy.

"I . . . think I'm leaving," Dipper said, getting to his feet.

Mabel lunged across the floor, tackling him at the ankles. His crash hurt even more than the bruised nose had. "Mabel! Seriously, quit it!"

"Come on, dude," Wendy said. "We'll go easy on you."

"Yeah, yeah," Mabel said. "Dip, you first—truth or dare?"

Looking at her fiendishly grinning face, Dipper sighed. "Dare, I guess."

Giggling, Mabel said, "Do the 'Lamby Lamby' dance!"

"I hate that!"

"It's a sacred dare! You gotta! Wait a minute!" Mabel dashed to her bed, hauled out a trunk from beneath it, and rummaged in it. She produced a white crocheted tam and gloves set, and she followed those with a wooly white sweater. "This'll be close enough! Costume, Broseph!"

She tugged the junk onto him. He sighed. "I hate this." But he sang the song and danced the dance, going down on one knee at the end. Mabel laughed so hard she was gagging.

But Wendy smiled and clapped. "Brings back memories, man. And Dip, you still make a darned cute lamb. You could follow me to school one day."

Wendy chose dare, too, and Wendy challenged her: "Flirt with my brother for five minutes!"

"Don't humiliate her," Dipper said. "Wendy, you don't have to—"

"It's cool, man. I won't embarrass you. Hey, dude, I love the way you're always trying to protect me."

He squirmed. "I know you don't need to be protected but I just don't want Mabel to embarrass you. Or me. And she always finds a way to do it."

Wendy hip-slid over to sit next to him. "But you're mature enough to let that roll off your back," she said.

"Like a duck off a log!" Mabel yelped.

Wendy reached out and gently touched Dipper's cheek. "Hey, hey, don't let it bother you like that. It's just flirting. It's not that bad. It doesn't hurt anything."

"Yeah, but it makes me all crazy," Dipper complained, huddling where he sat. "I mean, it's different for you, Wendy. You're the coolest person I've ever known, and you've got all the confidence in the world."

"You think so?" Wendy asked. "Let me tell you, I've got rotten judgment in guys. That's why I'm so glad you came back this summer. You're not like the guys I usually see. You never try to pressure me into anything. You're a true gentleman, Dipper."

He blushed. "Wendy I'm not—but if I seem that way, it's because being close to you makes me better than I really am. Better than I thought I ever could be. But that's you, not me. I'm a mess, and you're so fantastic—I wish I had your strength and your confidence. I wish I was one-tenth as hot as you are. Oops, I didn't mean to say that!"

"It's a compliment, Dip," Wendy said with a sweet smile. "Just like you to say something nice like that and get embarrassed. Man, it's kind, but please don't talk about me like that. I'm, like, a wreck! I wish I could be as loyal as you are, as willing to help anybody in trouble, as forgiving. I'm none of that. When you find a girl—"

"Time!" Mabel yelled. "That was some pretty good flirting, Wendy!"

Dipper blinked. "Wait, what? The game already started? I thought—oh." He sighed. "Not real. Like my made-up gossip."

Wendy touched his arm, rubbing her palm up and down as she caressed it. "Nope," she said. "That was one hundred per cent from the heart, man. Mabes didn't say the flirting had to be made up."

"You—were serious?" Dipper asked.

She kissed him on the lips. "Yep," she said in a whisper.

Mabel switched back to Dipper's turn without him noticing she hadn't taken her own turn yet. "Truth or Dare, Brobro?"

"Truth," he said.

Chuckling, Mabel said, "How many girls have you ever kissed?"

Dipper winced. "You mean on the lips?"

"On the whatever!" Mabel said. "Come on, spill it!"

"Go on, Dip," Wendy said.

He squirmed. "Um. Let me count. There's my mom, on the cheek. There was that girl in fifth grade that Mabel promised a dollar to if she'd let me kiss her on the cheek."

"Oh, yeah, Anna," Mabel said. She glanced at Wendy. "She didn't get the dollar, 'cause at the last second she ran away screaming. I think she had to have therapy later."

Dipper was frowning as he did mental arithmetic. "I guess it's a total of . . . thirty-three, counting Mabel. Just a brother-sister kiss."

"Dude," Wendy said, "that's more impressive than I figured!"

"Wait, wait," Mabel objected, frowning. "Dipper, there is no WAY you've kissed that many girls!"

"It's true," Dipper said.

"Name them all!"

Dipper shrugged. "You, Mom, Anna . . . Wendy."

"That's four!" Mabel said. "Boo, you liar!"

"I'm not lying," Dipper said, reaching for Wendy's hand. "Wendy's ten times better than each of the others, and three tens make thirty."

Wendy laughed. "Oh, Dip, that deserves another one!" And she kissed him again.

"I feel like I've been touched by an angel," Dipper said.

Mabel said, "Hang on, no fair! You weren't dared to flirt with Wendy!"

"Mabes," Wendy said, comfortably hugging Dipper and looking not at Mabel, but deeply into her twin's eyes, "we just started a whole different kind of game."

The End

[billnoncipher]

Wendip Week 2018, Prompt 4: “Date Night”

Wendy Said Yes!

by William Easley

(This is not part of my usual continuity, but was written for Wendip Week 2018 following the prompt "Date Night")

An entry from the Journals of Dipper Pines, written in the summer of 2015:

Wednesday evening: 

Oh, my gosh! I'm hyperventilating. Mabel is out on the roof shooting off fireworks. She won a bet from Grunkle Stan that she could persuade me to ask Wendy out on a real date.

And she did.

And I did.

Wendy said yes!

Oh, my gosh.

Saturday night. This is Wednesday, nearly ten PM. The rest of tonight, and then two more nights from now. There's a dance at the teen center. We're going to The Club for dinner first. I've saved up all the money I've made at the Shack so far this summer, and I think there's enough for a meal there, plus a tip, plus the tickets to the dance. Then I'll be broke, but still—

Oh, my gosh.

My clothes! I've got to have some good clothes! Grunkle Stan says a sports jacket, tie, and good shoes, and I don't have any of those! Or a shirt I could wear with a tie! But when he told me that just after Wendy went home, I explained my problem, not having enough money to buy all that and pay for the date, too, and he said not to worry, to see me in decent clothes for once, he'll buy me the outfit, including the sports jacket. Mabel told me she'd pick out the styles and colors. But Melody gently said she'd do that instead. She's shopping online for the local mall stores that sell such gear.

Maybe this time, without Mabel's help, I mean, I'll look like, you know, a normal teen boy instead of an apprentice circus clown. Mabel has a certain taste in clothing, but—she's Mabel!

I told Melody I'd appreciate her help, and my sister got grumpy, but I conceded her one point. She gets to design and hand-paint a tie, which she'll do tomorrow. She's thinking a pictorial representation of Bipper, because she said when Bill Cipher possessed my body he made me look like a hot bad boy, but I'm going to veto that idea. I'll probably still wind up with yellow triangles on an ugly purple tie, but—

But that's not the least of my worries. Between tonight and Saturday evening, I have to learn how to dance! I can't just do the Lamby Lamby dance! I don't care if Wendy thinks it's cute, the other people would stare at me and I think I'd die right there on the dance floor.

Mabel says she'll teach me four basic steps for contemporary fast dances, and Melody has offered to teach me how to waltz and fox-trot, which she says will do for any slow dances, and with those six different steps, I can fake my way through fast or slow dances.

Slow dances! I'd have my arms around Wendy! Oh, my gosh.

I mean, I'm fifteen years old! And Wendy's eighteen and everybody at the dance is going to be staring at us already and laughing behind our backs and talking about us because she's so cool and I'm so not, and she's tall and I'm not so tall, and I'm sure she's a great dancer, and I'm so—so lame.

Maybe I'd better just call it off.

No, I can't do that. I'd hate myself forever.

But if I screw everything up, I'll hate myself even more and I'll probably—

Maybe I can jump into he Bottomless Pit over and over until I stop coming out again, I don't know. Because I know me. Somehow I'm bound to screw it up. And even if Wendy forgave me, I couldn't forgive me. Ack, I can't breathe.

But no matter how it turns out—oh, my gosh!

How did it even happen?

This afternoon, I got my nerve up and went right up to Wendy. I leaned casually on the counter and said right out loud, "Since we've been through so many things, Wendy, I was thinking maybe we could go out. Not seriously. But together. Just, uh, just for one time. I mean, just as friends. To, um, the dance on Saturday. But you have a date already, probably, so, bad idea, sorry, my bad—"

"No, I don't," she said, not looking up from her Teen Fuzz magazine (she was behind the counter in the gift shop, leaning back in her chair, her long beautiful legs propped up on the counter). "I'm between boyfriends, dude. And I got nothing else to do Saturday night, so yeah, I guess."

I couldn't believe my ears. I mean, I literally didn't believe she said what she said. "Oh, well, maybe next time," I heard myself say.

With a little irritable line between her eyebrows, but still not looking at me, Wendy said, "Dude, you got something in your ears? I said I'd go to the dance."

I stood there opening and closing my mouth, and then I said, "Wendy, I just want to be, you know, clear on this, OK? I asked you to go to the dance Saturday night, and you said, um—what did you say?"

She glanced at me with a kind of exasperated grin. "I said yes, dork! We'll go as friends, like you said. Might be fun."

"Uh, and dinner first?" I asked. My voice started squeaking. I thought it had stopped doing that when I was thirteen. I cleared my throat. "Um, dinner first? At The Club?"

"Ooh, fancy," Wendy said, arching her eyebrows, her beautiful green eyes twinkling. "Yeah, sounds good. You got a car, man?"

I wilted. She knows I don't. There it was, right there, the deal-breaker. She told me she might date me when I'm old enough to drive. Feeling the rejection coming, I mumbled, "No, I—Wendy, you know I don't. I just have my learner's permit. I couldn't drive a car if I had one."

She gave me a sympathetic sort of smile. "Hey, don't look like I just hit you with my axe. I was teasing. No sweat, man. It's OK, I'll drive."

I still couldn't get my head around what was happening. "Um. OK. In other words—we have—we—you and me, I mean—I want to make sure, now—you're saying that—"

She put down the magazine. I couldn't tell if she was mad or just wanted to end the conversation. "I'm saying it's a date, man! Haven't you ever dated a girl before?"

I couldn't talk. I couldn't even look at her. I stared at my toes. A big lump throbbed in my throat. I kept telling myself, Don't start crying! But I felt like that time in fourth grade when I didn't get a single Valentine card. How could I tell her what a failure I've been with girls?

But I think she understood. In a gentle voice, she said, "Oh, Dipper. I'm so sorry, dude! I wasn't being mean, I just didn't know. I mean, you're fifteen, I thought—OK, relax. This is your first time, that's cool. Everybody has one. It's all right, man. We're gonna have a friendly date, and it's gonna be fun. And really, I don't mind driving."

"Thank you," I finally said. I know my voice sounded small and humble, but that's exactly the way I felt.

Grunkle Stan and Mabel were hiding in the Museum, eavesdropping from out of sight behind the doorway. "That's five bucks you owe me!" I heard Mabel yell. "Plus another twenty 'cause she said yes!"

"Jeeze Louise," Grunkle Stan grumbled. "That's steep! How's about the five in cash and the rest in fireworks?"

"It's a deal! Put your skyrockets where your mouth is!"

And that's why right now, a few hours after all that, Mabel's shooting off rockets outside. I can see their red and green and gold flashes coming through the triangular window. I can hear the shrieks and booms.

But they don't seem festive to me because now I realize I've really landed myself in trouble.

I've got two days to learn how to do something besides the Lamby Lamby dance. I hope I'm not too clumsy. Mabel swears she and Melody will whip me into shape. If I don't step all over my own stupid feet. Or Wendy's! Oh, man.

Grunkle Stan's taking me to the mall to buy the clothes Melody suggested for me tomorrow. I've hardly ever worn a suit and tie, just for my Bar Mitzvah that Gramma insisted on my having and then another time, well, sort of, when I played Mr. Mystery, and that one time when Bill Cipher got my body into the Reverend's costume for Mabel's puppet play.

But in a sports jacket and tie and regular black leather shoes, plus whatever ugly tie Mabel whips up, I'll look like such a dork.

And before Saturday, I have to look at The Club's menu online and plan out what I can order and stay within my budget. I'll assume Wendy will want a high-priced meal, so I'll look for something cheaper for me to balance hers out. Oh and I'll have to find out online how to pronounce the names of any French dishes. Or I guess I could just point at the menu. But I don't want to have to do that, because Wendy might laugh at me—

Oh, my gosh.

What have I got myself into?

Oh, my gosh!

Late Saturday night:

I haven't written anything since Wednesday. Now it's late.

I'm back from the date.

It was—I don't know! Wendy was—I don't remember, except she's beautiful! My dancing—I can't even recall it, except she felt so warm in my arms! I don't think I stepped on her toes. I can't remember!

My mind's a blank.

Because Wendy just dropped me off outside the Shack.

She smiled under the porch light and said, "I had a good time, Dip. Let's do this again."

I think I squeaked "Sure!"

But I don't remember! Not anything before the next moment!

Because then Wendy grabbed my jacket and pulled me close against her, and—

Oh, my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh!

WENDY KISSED ME!

The End

[billnoncipher]

Wendip Week 2018-Prompt 3

Fight it Out

by William Easley

(This is not part of my normal continuity but was written for the Wendip Week prompt "Combat")

One day in the summer of 2015—

"It's not looking good," Dipper said grimly.

GI Guy and his team must have been captured by M.A.M.B.A. From where he and Mabel crouched behind the shelter of some ABC blocks, Dipper could see as far as the derailed scale-model train and the scattered circus animals. All of them were down. No movement of any kind, friend or foe—at least that was something. "Mabel," he said, "I wish you wouldn't fool around with magic spells you don't understand."

"But it looked like fun!" Mabel complained. Loudly.

"Shh! I hope Wendy's OK."

"But it looked like fun!" Mabel complained. In a whisper.

It grew out of her taking a babysitting job for Kindly Old Man Stuart, who had a raft of grandchildren, including two who were only a couple of years younger than Dipper and Mabel. Dipper remembered them from the first Fishing Opener the Mystery Twins had attended—when Old Man Stuart and Grunkle Stan had sort of become bitter enemies, Stan said, because Dipper and Mabel didn't demonstrate enough wuv. Dipper wasn't sure what that meant.

He was sure that Mabel shouldn't have read the incantation that made Betty and Benny's toys come to life. Or used the shrink ray so she and Dipper could join in the fun. As for Betty and Benny, they were four and six, and they were taking naps. Maybe. It had been some time. Dipper was hoping they hadn't woken up. Having a couple of little kids come into their trashed playroom would put the cherry on top of a rotten afternoon. Especially if the little mon—darlings saw their toys were running around fighting each other and decided to join in.

Worse, they might find the shrink ray, though it was on a low table near the bookshelf. No telling what could happen if the kids got small. Or gigantic.

"OK, where are we?" Dipper asked. "I'm gonna climb up on B-C to see if I can spot Wendy or any of the G.I. Guy patrol."

"You'll be spotted!" Mabel warned. "I'll go. I'm like a ninja of stealth!" And before Dipper could stop her, she yelled, "Ninja!" and fired her grappling hook. She zipped up to the top of the oversized building block—Dipper estimated that he and she were only two inches tall—and plopped up onto the top.

"OK, Brobro," she said in a loud whisper, "I can see all the way to the toybox. There seems to be a ruckus over in the prehistoric section—there's a plastic pterodactyl swooping around. The military section looks trashed."

"It did when we came in!" Dipper growled. "Any sign of Wendy?"

"Mm . . . nope. But there's some movement over in the tea party section. I think the bad guys are rounding up the dollies! The fiends!"

"Which way to the table with the shrink ray?" Dipper called up. "Wait, what, did you use the word 'fiends'?"

"The room's so big—we passed the little model ranch, didn't we?"

"Yeah, I remember the corral."

"OK, it must be that way. See me pointing?"

"I see you! Get down before somebody sees you!"

"Uh-oh. Too late. Here comes a tank!"

Mabel rappelled down the block and yanked the grapple back onto the grappling-hook pistol, and they ran for it.

Not that either was a coward, but the magic spell that brought the toys to life also made their weapons real enough to kill. "What did you see?"

"Some of those red guys!"

Dipper groaned. "The Cardinal Kraits! They're like M.A.M.B.A. Commander's elite guard!"

"Did you collect them when you were little?"

"Couldn't ever afford them! But I saw the commercials! Quick, in there—"

They dashed into a plastic bunkhouse. Four plastic cowpokes sat at a plastic table playing a game of plastic cards. One looked up. "Well, howdy, little buckaroos!"

"Howdy," Dipper said. "Also, help! Some soldiers in red are looking for us."

"They bad hombres?" one of the others asked. All the cowpoke figures were identical.

"Ooh, the baddest, hombre-ist guys you ever saw!" Mabel shot back.

"Boys," a third one said, "reckon we got some fightin' to do."

They all stood and moseyed out. "Let's go," Dipper said, and he and Mabel ducked out the door as soon as the cowboys had gone. "Maybe they'll slow them down."

"Maybe they'll defeat them!"

"Not a chance. The Kraits are individualized."

Gunfire broke out behind them, and they heard one of the cowboys yell, "This here was a mistake!"

"See?" Dipper said. They had entered a winding canyon of overturned tea cups, scattered doll clothes, and toy musical instruments. As they rounded the corner of a ukulele, they screeched to a halt.

Because in front of them loomed the menacing figure of a soldier wearing a blue uniform, red-lined cape, and a helmet with a reflective faceplate. And he was four times their size. "Stop!" he shouted, in a voice like thunder. "You have been captured!"

Mabel put her hands over her ears. "Ow! You don't have to shout!"

"I shout! At everything! All the time!" the figure yelled.

"He does," Dipper told Mabel.

"Yes! It's what! I do!"

"It's his thing," advised one of the six red-suited troopers who supported him. The leader took out a pistol and shot him. "Insubordination!" he yelled as the plastic figure dropped to the floor, apparently dead.

"Look, man, we're not your enemies," Dipper said. "We're not G.I. Guy's soldiers—"

"That! Is immaterial!" The leader clenched a fist and raised it in victory. "We! Will control! The world of the playroom!" Then he lowered the pistol, aiming it at them. "Prepare to die!"

"Uh, can I have a week to get my affairs in order?" Mabel asked.

"No!"

"Two days?"

"Say goodbye!" The pistol steadied—

And the M.A.M.B.A. Commander shrieked as a whirling axe flew spinning and with a crunch disarmed him. And I mean that literally. The whole arm, off at the shoulder.

"Let my friends alone!"

"Wendy!" Dipper shouted. "I'm so glad to see you!"

"Yeah," Wendy said. "Meet my little friend." She rose in the air, higher and higher.

Because she was astride the neck of a two-foot tall model of a tyrannosaur.

The M.A.M.B.A. leader clutched his shoulder. "Bring! It! Down!" he shouted to his men.

The battle was fierce but futile. Eight-inch warriors have little chance against a two-foot-tall dinosaur. Wendy leaped down from its neck after the carnage was over and retrieved her axe. "Thanks, Toothy," she said. "Go and let the G.I. Guys out of the castle." The tyrannosaur rumbled and turned to stalk away.

"M.A.M.B.A. has a castle?" Dipper asked.

Wendy kissed him. "Nope, they commandeered Cinderella's. She's kinda pissed."

"Are they dead?" Mabel asked, staring at the scattered remains of M.A.M.B.A. Commander and his men.

"Look pretty dead to me," Wendy said. "Let's get outa here. We need the flashlight, right?"

They reached the table, Mabel used the grappling hook, and they all climbed up—Dipper last of all, and it took him some time. Wendy reached down and hoisted him up. "Now how does this work?"

"We have to rotate the crystal," Dipper said. With all three pushing and tugging, they did.

"Now we have to enlarge ourselves again. But I think this table will collapse."

"Dude, get to the edge of the table. When you start enlarging, jump for it."

"OK."

Dipper took his seat and gulped. When you're two inches tall, twenty-eight inches is a long way down. But then Mabel turned on the flashlight, the beam hit him, and as he started to grow, he slipped to the very edge. He dropped when he was about half his normal size. Then he could stretch up and reach the flashlight. He took it down—it felt heavy—and finally he helped the tiny Wendy and Mabel and set them on the floor before growing them back to normal size.

"Now do me," he said, handing the flashlight to Wendy.

She smiled down at him. "I dunno, dude. You're incredibly cute like that. Like a stuffed toy. I could, like, sneak you into the house and put you on my bed and tonight—"

"Do it!" Mabel said, chortling in an evil way.

"Nah, just messin' with you man." She enlarged Dipper all the way and then some, until he was an inch or two taller than she was. "Just seein' what you'll look like at twenty," she said. "Not bad."

Drunk with size and relief, Dipper grabbed, her, dipped her, and kissed her.

"Woohoo!" Mabel cheered. "But seriously, guys—guys? We gotta end this spell. I see King Kong climbing Cinderella's castle over there in the far corner. Guys! Knock it off! Don't! Make! Me! SHOUT!"

They reluctantly stopped kissing and adjusted Dipper's height, he found the spell book and ended the enchantment, and Mabel went to see if their baby-sitting charges were still asleep. "Man," Wendy said, her arm around Dipper's shoulders, "that was intense!"

"I hope these kids won't mind that so many of their toys are broken," Dipper said.

"Nah," Wendy told him. "That happens all the time. They'll blame each other, and their grampa will buy them new junk. You know, you look pretty hot when you're tall."

Dipper blushed. "Don't think I haven't thought about—something like that."

"Plus, you looked real cuddly when you were like half sized. No kidding, man. I wouldn't mind having you in my bed."

His blush became as scarlet as the uniforms of the Cardinal Kraits. "Really? Uh, which size do you mean?"

Wendy pulled him closer. "Hmm," she whispered, her breath warm on his lips. "Let me think about that."

The End

[billnoncipher]

Wendip Week Prompt 2

Just My Luck

By William Easley

(Not part of my normal continuity and written for the Wendip Week 2018 prompt 2, "Typical Pines Luck")

Before the Mystery Twins had been in Gravity Falls for more than the first three days of June 2015, Mabel had found a new boyfriend.

"A fawn?" Dipper asked. "Seriously? You're going with a baby deer?"

"No, silly!" Mabel, who was preening at the mirror, said. "F-a-U-n! As in part hunky boy, part goat!" She narrowed her eyes and whispered confidentially, "He doesn't wear pants!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Dipper said. "T.M.I! And also, no. No, you cannot date this guy, thing, whatever it is—"

"He's a faun," Mabel insisted. "And his name is Raymond."

"I don't care if he's a—Raymond? Raymond is a faun's name?"

"Yup," Mabel said, changing her earrings. "He's got the cutest little hoofs, and a twitchy little tail, and these two little curly horns."

"Yeah," Dipper said grimly. "I've read in mythology that fauns were always horny! Look, you know this guy's just gonna dump you for another girl. Or maybe another goat. Take my advice and give Raymond a wide berth!"

"You're not gonna spoil this for me, Dipper!" she said. She'd settled on earrings in the shape of little gold pine trees. "Anyway, we're just going to frisk in the meadow for a while. You can come along if you want. Hey, you could do the—"

"Don't even say it! I am not doing the 'Lamby Lamby' dance. Especially for a guy whose mom may have been one!"

Dipper told Wendy, whose response was, "Mabes can take care of herself, Dip. Besides, I give the relationship two days, tops. Just wait until they have a meal together!"

He had to chuckle. "Yeah, heh. I guess a faun would be pretty disgusting to watch eat."

"Um, right," Wendy said. "The faun . . . ri-i-ight."

Next he told Ford, who said, "That's interesting. The fauns rarely come down from the tablelands below the western cliffs. I'll have to ask her to collect a hair sample for DNA analysis."

And the last resort was Grunkle Stan, who shrugged. "Meh, she'll find out soon enough the guy don't have any money, and that'll be the end of that."

When Dipper collapsed groaning into a chair, his Grunkle gave him a sharp look. "What's the matter, kid? Scared a goat-guy's gonna elope with your sis?"

"Noooo," Dipper moaned, drawing it out. "It's just that—we've been here practically no time, and she's got a date already! I asked Wendy if she might want to go see a movie with me, and she told me, 'Wait until you're old enough to drive, and then we'll talk.'"

"So, ask somebody else," Stan suggested. "Plenty of seafood in the ocean, kid!"

"Wouldn't do any good," Dipper said. "I have terrible luck with girls."

"Give me a fr'instance," Stan said. "Maybe I can help."

"Aw," Dipper said, "there was this girl, Francine, at one of the school dances, and she wasn't dancing with anybody, so I walked over, got my nerve up, and asked if she wanted to dance. She said yes."

"See, you were in luck!"

"No, because when we walked out onto the floor, she stepped into a little pool of spilled punch and her heel skidded and she sprained her ankle! Just my luck!"

"Don't sound like hers was any too good, either," Stan said. "Come on, Dipper, that was one time!"

"Another time," Dipper said, "Mabel talked this girl, Ellen, into being open if I asked her on a date. I asked her to a movie for that coming weekend, and she said yes."

"Luck turned around, see?"

"No, it did not," Dipper said. "Because the movie was on Saturday, and on Friday her dad moved the whole family away. Turns out he was in witness protection, and somebody in the family let their real last name slip."

Stan's eyes narrowed. "Realllllly? Uh, what was the name?"

"Farghandahler," Dipper said.

"Never heard of 'em. Well, it was worth a shot," Stan said. "Kid, it sounds to me that you need a good-luck charm."

"Oh, come on," Dipper said. "I don't believe in horseshoes and rabbits' feet and all!"

"Got a point there," Stan conceded. "Horseshoes were invented so hicks could beat city folks at a stupid tossing game. And if a rabbit's foot brought luck, you wouldn't be able to buy any, 'cause every rabbit's got four of 'em! Nah, I'm thinkin' along the lines of an amulet. They really work. Sometimes."

Dipper remembered Gideon's amulet of telekinesis, which did seem to work. "Worth a shot," he mumbled.

"Come with me."

Grunkle Stan led him to the stock room. Though Soos was Mr. Mystery these days, and Melody was engaged to become Mrs. Mystery soon, Stan still kept a close eye on what the Shack offered. He fiddled around in a box and then came up with something shiny. "Aha! Knew we had half a dozen of these. OK, kid, I'm gonna make you a gift of the world's most powerful good-luck charm. It comes all the way from Niue!"

"Where . . . is that?" Dipper asked. He'd never heard of it.

"Ah, somewheres near Metuchen, I think. Anywhoo, this here is a five-dollar silver piece. No kiddin', real silver, so take care of it! Look at it. See these little insets? This here is a genuine four-leaf clover from County Cork, Ireland, blessed by a priest who's also a part-time leprechaun! And this is a miniature horseshoe, actually manufactured from a real shoe once worn by Man O'War, the luckiest horse that ever ran in the Derby! This is, uh, a preserved ladybug. Not killed, it died of old age, ya understand. Ladybugs are notoriously lucky!"

"What?" Dipper asked.

"C'mon, Dip, ya never heard of one's house actually burnin' down! And last this is a little figure of a lucky elephant. With all them on your side, your luck will turn right around! You'll see! If it don't work, double your money back."

"How . . . much are you charging me?" Dipper asked.

"Nothin'! It's a free gift! Take it before I change my mind. I could sell this dealy to a sucker for fifty bucks!"

Oh, well. The silver disk had been pierced for a thong, and Stan threw a rawhide one in for free. "Word of caution," he said. "The gals go nuts for a guy who wears a thong! Don't get yourself in trouble, kid—or them, either."

Dipper put the rawhide cord around his neck. What the heck, it would either work or it wouldn't.

And Gideon really had almost cut out his tongue with lamb shears that one time.

Strangely, that night Dipper had a vivid dream of a tourist couple parking in the Mystery Shack lot. They had a cute daughter about fourteen and a little baby not more than a year old. The weird thing was that they pulled their Grand Rover van into a slot, the dad and mom and daughter got out, and they turned to take a photo of the Shack and the totem pole—and the van rolled away backwards, because the dad had evidently not put it in Park. The mom screamed as the van rolled over the edge of the hill and then fell and rolled over and over down to the forest edge, where it collided hard with a tree.

And the baby was inside.

The next morning, while chatting with Wendy at the sales desk, Dipper glanced out the window and saw a maroon Grand Rover van—exactly like the one he'd dreamed of—just pulling into the lot. "Be right back," he said to Wendy and dashed outside.

He felt creeps all over his skin—the van was parking in the exact spot that he'd dreamed of. He sprinted across the lawn and leaped over the low fence just as the mom, dad, and teen daughter got out and the dad hefted a camera. The van started to roll. Dipper leaped into the driver's seat—the dad hadn't closed the door—and jammed on the brakes, while pulling on the emergency brake handle. The mom screamed.

The dad came running up, white-faced. "What happened?"

Dipper said, "It's OK, sir. I saw the van start rolling. I think you didn't put it in Park."

The mom opened the rear door and took the baby—a cheerful little one-year-old boy who had no idea he'd been in any peril—out of his baby seat. "He's OK," she said. "Bless you!"

The father was reaching for his wallet. "How much can it—"

"No, sir," Dipper said. "Just—I don't know, pay it forward. Help out somebody who's in trouble. And enjoy the Mystery Shack!"

The dad got behind the wheel, started the engine, and pulled the car back into the parking slot. He very carefully put it in Park and set the emergency brake.

Someone tapped on Dipper's shoulder. "You can take this, anyway," the teen girl—braids, freckles, really cute—said. And she hugged him and kissed him on the mouth. "Thanks for saving my baby brother!"

Dipper realized he had an audience. Wendy and Stan had come out on the porch. "Uh, you're welcome," Dipper said.

The girl took his hand and wrote something on his palm. "My email," she said. "Get in touch with me. My name's Laramie."

"O-OK," Dipper said.

He walked back to the Shack, where Grunkle Stan clapped him on the shoulder. "Lucky you spotted that!" he said. "Saved us from losin' some customers!"

Wendy, settling back behind the counter, asked, "You know that girl, Dipper?"

"Uh, no," he said. "Just saw their van start to roll and she was, I guess grateful or some deal."

"You mean this isn't gonna be a regular thing?"

"Gosh, no! They're probably from Canada or someplace. I'll never see her again."

Wendy grinned. "Just teasing, man. Good going."

Later that afternoon, because he really couldn't think of an excuse, he went with Mabel to meet Raymond. Raymond waited for Mabel in the bonfire clearing. He seemed skittish when he saw she was not alone, but then she introduced Dipper as her twin. "I'm Alpha, though," she confided.

Well, Raymond wasn't quite what Dipper had expected. True, he had curly little horns and a crown of curly black hair. True, his ears were pointed, and his eyes had strangely slit-like pupils. And he definitely had hoofs and a strange ankle joint. However, the fur on his legs and waist and, um, that general area, was six inches long, very fluffy and shaggy, and he might as well have been wearing pants.

And he talked normal. No baaas or godawful puns, no "I'm Mr. Satyr day night" or anything like that. He seemed interested that Mabel had a brother. He wanted to know where they were from, what Dipper liked to do, why they had come to the Falls, did they like the forest, would he like to see some secluded beautiful areas, and so on.

Mabel looked increasingly uncomfortable and finally reminded Raymond, "You were gonna show me that beautiful forest pool with a cascading creek leading into it. Dipper doesn't have time, sorry." And she led him off.

In about an hour she was back, looking mad. "You win," she said. "I broke up with Raymond. I hope you're happy!"

"Hey, I didn't do anything!" Dipper said.

"Yes, you did! Raymond asked me if you were attached. He wants to date you! Lucky!"

"Tell him I'm not into guys or goats. And especially not into guy-goat combos!" Dipper said. He was beginning to think that luck had its downside.

But he tested it. The next day he asked Wendy if she'd like to go see that movie on Friday night. "I'm still not old enough to drive," he said. "But I don't mind being driven."

She grinned. "OK, Dip, just this movie. But it's no big deal, understand? Just two friends going to see a three-D earthquake movie!"

"I understand," he said. "Just friends."

And then the next day Candy came over to visit Mabel and wound up telling Dipper he was really growing up to be a handsome guy, and she sat uncomfortably close to him. And a little later he went outside just to get away from her and found a wallet on the ground. 

He opened it and saw a drivers' license, the picture looking familiar—oh, yeah, a guy who'd gone out on the tour with a bunch of others. And speak of the devil, Soos came driving the tram back just then, and the very guy jumped off, looking anxious, and headed for his car, which he opened and checked—

"Excuse me, sir," Dipper said. "I just found this wallet. Is it yours?"

"Yes!" the guy said, looking relieved. "I must have dropped it while going out to the tram."

Dipper handed it over. "You might want to check to make sure everything's there."

The man did. "Yep, all the cards, all the money. Here you go, son." He held out a twenty.

Dipper shook his head. "I didn't want a reward, sir. My great-uncle co-owns this place, and he'd never want to make money from someone's misfortune." That was true, sort of. Of course, Stan didn't mind a bit if he made money from them any other way.

But the guy asked his name, went inside, and evidently praised him to Soos and Wendy, because they both gave him thumbs-up when he came back in. And Candy hugged him. "My Dipper is an honest and truthful man!" she announced.

Wendy raised an eyebrow at "my Dipper."

Still later, downtown at a convenience store, Dipper fed a dollar into a vending machine and bought the first and only scratch-off lottery ticket in his life so far. Back in the Shack, he scratched it off.

Yeah, it figured. He'd won $1,000.00. There was, of course, a catch. He gave the card to Stan. "I can't use it," he told his Grunkle. "You have to be eighteen or over."

"I'm eighteen or over," Stan pointed out. "I'll do somethin' nice for ya, kid." And he did. He went into town to cash in the ticket and brought Dipper back a candy bar.

That night, Dipper complained to Mabel about the amulet. "It's making me lucky," he said, "but not in any way that helps me out. And it's got you mad at me."

"I'm not mad," Mabel said. "Just disappointed that Raymond prefers you to me. That's not your fault. My irresistibility must've rubbed off on you a little." She picked up the candy bar. "You gonna eat this?"

"Don't like coconut. You can have it."

"Thanks, Brobro!"

Mabel bit into the candy bar and chipped a tooth. Fragment of coconut husk. Stan had to rush her to a dentist he knew who owed him a favor. She came back with a repaired tooth and a rueful, "You're lucky you didn't want the candy, Dipper!"

But the amulet didn't work with Wendy. The next morning, she said, "I gotta break our date, Dip. Sorry, man. My dad wants me to go with him and my brothers to visit my aunt this evening."

And without Wendy—meh. The kind of luck he was having just wasn't worth it. After some soul-searching, Dipper walked out to the Bottomless Pit and walked back a little lighter and amulet-free.

Just before quitting time, Wendy apologized again—but then the phone rang, and she answered it. "What? Oh, OK. No, tomorrow's even better. Sure. OK if I see a movie, then? Thanks, Dad!"

She hung up the phone. "Huh. My aunt called Dad and asked him to put off the visit, so our date's back on, unless you got someone else to see it with."

"No!" Dipper said. "Uh, no. No, I don't. Uh. If you want to go."

"Yeah, I guess so," Wendy said. "Guess you're in luck, Dipper."

Yeah, for a change, he guessed he really was in the best kind of luck. Seeing a three-D movie about an earthquake sitting next to a gorgeous redhead who made a practice of not dating anybody under the age of sixteen? But she would make one exception?

Hmm, maybe he shouldn't have tossed that amulet away so quickly . . . .

Nah. Typical Pines luck was better than anything it could dish up!

The End

[billnoncipher]

Written for Wendip Week by William Easley!

(Not part of my normal continuity and written for the Wendip Week 2018 prompt "School")

It was January of 2015, and the first day of school after the Christmas break. Wendy Corduroy, Vice-President of the Senior Class, showed up sleepy and resigned to another five months of school before—freedom!

The other members of her class were already buzzing with plans for college. Wendy, not so much. During the summers, she and Dipper had talked about going to college together somewhere, but he'd been accepted at a prestigious technical institution in California, and she had not yet applied, mostly because she was positive she couldn't hack it.

But maybe there was another college nearby. She cursed her habitual laziness. Really have to get on the stick this month, find those schools, put in her application. Maybe tomorrow.

Everything went fine until first-period Senior English. She walked into the classroom, dropped her books on her desk, and dropped her jaw to the floor. Well, not really, but it felt like that. She slipped into her seat and said, "Dude! What are you doing here?"

Dipper Pines smiled at her from the next desk. "Hi, Wendy! I guess this is a surprise, huh? I transferred up from my normal school to finish up the year here with you."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Wendy asked. She couldn't help laughing. "Oh, man, this is such a—did Mabel come, too?"

"Mabel?" Dipper asked. "Uh, no. she wanted to finish the year at, you know, our school."

"Oh?" For some reason that bothered Wendy. Where Dipper went, Mabel was sure to follow. "Did something—"

"Settle down," the teacher said. "Welcome back from break, and I hope you haven't forgotten everything we learned up until December! We've got a new student with us, and I think many of you know him already—Dipper Pines. You're in Timmy Abbott's seat, Dipper. He will be in soon—the next five minutes, unless he's changed his tardy habits. We've got a seating chart, and you will be on the last seat in the second row over from where you are now. Go ahead and move."

He picked up his stuff and mouthed, "See you later" as he made his way to back-room banishment.

Wendy seemed to prove the teacher right in suspecting that she—and the others—had forgotten everything, though in fact she was only puzzled by Dipper's showing up in Gravity Falls. It wasn't like him just to pop up like that—he always had, and stuck to, a plan, no matter what.

He wasn't in her next class, but Tambry was, and Wendy grabbed some time to talk to her.

"You're kidding," Tambry said. "He came, like, up from Oakland or wherever to go to school here? What, is he insane?"

"I know, right?" Wendy said. "He's all about getting into a high-ranking college, and his high school has to be ranked ahead of ours. I can't figure it."

"Girl, he's still got a crush on you," Tambry said, grinning.

"Well—that wouldn't be so bad, considering the crappy guys you have to choose from around here. I'm not including Robbie, by the way."

"Yeah, thanks. It's not like I ever see him unless we're on stage together. Lucky I learned piano, huh?"

And then they had to concentrate on math for a while.

At lunch time, she spotted Dipper in the cafeteria and went to sit with him. "So fill me in!" she said. "What are you and Mabes up to this winter? Man, I wish you could've come up over the break! There was a crisis, man! Power went down all over Gravity Falls for the last three days. I was hoping it'd stay off today, delay school, but it came back late last night. Nobody knows what happened. I bet you could've tracked it down."

"Oh, sure I could," Dipper said.

Wendy waited. Then she said, "Well, what about it? You and Mabes?"

He shrugged. "Same thing we always do, you know. Nothing has changed much."

She squinted. "Have you like shrunk? I swear you were lots taller last summer!"

"Just slouching." He straightened in his seat and did seem to grow to the height she remembered—these days almost equal to hers. "The bench is uncomfortable. You're looking good."

"Thanks," she said. "What are you shaving with? Your skin's so smooth!"

"Just the regular stuff," he said. "I don't have bumps like a lot of these guys, that's all."

It was true. His skin was clear of acne—as smooth as it had been the first year she'd met him. "Wanna hang after school?" she asked.

"Oh, sure."

"I guess you're staying in the Shack, huh?" Wendy asked.

"Staying where I always stay," he agreed.

They talked a little more, but Wendy's uneasiness steadily grew. When she got a chance between her next-to-last and last class, Wendy called the Shack. Ford answered, mildly surprising her. "Hi," she said. "Wendy here. Listen, Dr. P, why didn't anyone tell me that Dipper was coming back to Gravity Falls?"

"He is?" Ford asked, sounding completely flummoxed. "When?"

"He's here in school," Wendy said. "He's got some junior classes, some senior ones, I guess. He just turned up this morning."

"Let . . . me do some checking. What time is school out?"

"Three-thirty."

"All right, nearly another hour. That should give me time."

She hunted around after her last class to find Dipper—not terribly hard, because the student body wasn't that numerous. "Hey, Dip!" she said, bundling herself in her heaviest coat—it was like fifteen degrees out—and carrying her backpack by the strap. "Wanna ride home? I got my car in the lot."

"That's great," he said. He headed for the door.

"Whoa, dude!" Wendy said. "Aren't you forgetting something? Where's your coat?"

"My coat? Oh, I did forget," Dipper said.

"In your locker, I guess?" Wendy asked.

"In my locker. Yes."

"Better go get it. You don’t' want to freeze solid."

"I'll be right back."

He walked off, but didn't head toward the hall with the lockers. Instead, he turned toward the boys' room and came back in a minute wearing a heavy jacket identical to hers. "Nice style choice," she said.

"Thanks."

The eager seniors had already mostly cleared out the parking lot. Wendy said, "Let me toss this in the trunk and then I'll unlock the car for you."

The bitter breeze chilled her as she unlocked and opened the trunk. "Hey, Dip, come and help with this," she said.

"Help with what?"

He came around the corner of the car.

Wendy drew back her axe. "Did you escape from your tube during the blackout?" she snarled.

"What? Wendy, what do you mean—?"

"Freeze!" Ford's voice. He held that rifle-like thing he had toted during Weirdmageddon, not that it had helped, and he was aiming at Dipper.

"Yeah, Ford, it's the Shapeshifter!" Wendy yelled.  "I figured it out!"

With a snarl, Dipper altered, became an identical copy of Wendy, down to the axe—

But Wendy was ready and swung first. The axe bit into the creature's throat, and green goo sprayed out. It staggered, wounded but not killed—you probably couldn't kill it with an axe.

A quantum destabilizer, though—that was something different, as Ford demonstrated.

All that it left of the Shapeshifter was a smoldering little patch on the pavement. "Thanks, man," Wendy said.

"You're welcome," Ford said.

"You want to check to make sure it's me?" she asked.

"No need. If that had been the real you, it wouldn't have disintegrated, but would have burst into a thousand bloody fragments."

"Whoa! Glad you didn't make the mistake!"

Ford shook his head. "In a way, I hated to do that. I was present when the Shapeshifter first hatched out. I tried to care for it, but—well, on its homeworld, it's an apex predator, and I should have suspected that." He sighed. "I kept meaning to destroy it, but it seemed harmless, frozen at minus fifty Celsius. Of course I should have anticipated an eventual power failure, but I have a bad habit of putting things off."

"Me, too, Dr. P," she admitted.

But the next Saturday, Dipper Pines—the real Dipper—heard the doorbell ring at about eleven and opened it to see—"Wendy!" He was so overjoyed that he not only hugged her, but kissed her.

"Slow down," she said, laughing. "Glad to see you too, Dip! How's Mabes?"

"Mabel? She's off at the mall this morning, probably be back for lunch You look so good!"

"Your mom and dad home?"

"Uh, no, grocery shopping day. They'll be back in an hour or so."

"Good," Wendy said, closing the door behind her. "You and me have some unfinished business, Dip. That's why I drove all the way down."

He swallowed hard. "I—think my dreams may be coming true," he croaked.

"Maybe. Let's go to your room, OK?"

"Uh, my, my uh, bed—bedroom?" he asked suavely.

"Yeah. You got a desk and a computer, right?"

"Right. Right, I have. Uh, why?"

She held up a sheaf of papers. "'Cause I got this college application to do, man! And I need your help with it."

The End

[billnoncipher]

Another little promo for AllenbysEyes’ new “Dipper and Wendy’s Doomsday Defense” at fanfiction.net

[billnoncipher]

Inspired by a story by AllenbysEyes on fanfiction.net: “Dipper and Wendy’s Doomsday Defense”

[billnoncipher]

Naughty (but Nice)

Maybe NSFW. Rating is T/M, but nothing’s really explicit. My Wendip Week story for the prompt “Naughty and Nice.” And, writing too fast, I called Soos’s family by the wrong name originally! Sorry, dawg!

Naughty (but Nice)

By William Easley

Pioneer Day was the perfect date for their visit. Wendy and Dipper were attending college year-around—he’d already finished his B.A. degree in only two years, and he was now working on his Master’s, and she would have her bachelor’s degree in hand in another four months—but Pioneer Day fell on July 6, and they had an extra-long weekend vacation from college down in California, so the timing was ideal.

Also, it was a good time to visit for other reasons. One plus was that Pioneer Day drew everyone, and that meant everyone, downtown. The Shack was closed and all the family, even Abuelita and the Ramirez kids, were in town, and no tourists would come wandering up the drive. Grunkles Stan and Ford had sailed off somewhere on another expedition. Mabel and her new husband were enjoying a two-week trip to Ireland, their honeymoon.

So, Dipper and Wendy had the Shack, privacy, and most important, each other.

In the dappled shade of the bonfire clearing, Wendy stretched languorously. “What was that, our third time?”

“Mm. Let’s count it up: Once up in my old attic bedroom.”

“Check. That was good except for the splinters.” She rubbed her butt and made a face.

Dipper nodded. “Probably should have used the bed. Then once on the counter next to the cash register.”

Wendy punched the air. “Yes! I always wanted to do that! More fun than driving a tank!”

“And now here in the grass, where you once told me you were too old for me.”

Wendy lay on her side beside him, lazily stroking his bare chest. “Guess I was wrong, huh?”

He nuzzled her. “So glad you were.”

“Well,” she said with a contented sigh, “What with starting college so soon and all, we didn’t ever get a honeymoon, but this kinda makes up for it.”

“Morning’s getting on. Let’s get dressed,” Dipper suggested.

She pouted. “Aw.”

“You don’t want to kill your husband before our third anniversary,” he said, kissing her.

She still didn’t make a move to retrieve her scattered clothing. “Where should we go next? Lake?” Wendy suggested. She really liked the water.

Dipper shrugged. “We could try it, but I’ll bet there are people around, swimming and boating. How about that hot spring up in the mountains?”

“Mm. Too far to hike,” she said. “Being back in Gravity Falls makes me want to be all lazy and irresponsible again.”

“I . . . think we covered the ‘irresponsible’ part,” Dipper said, chuckling. “Hey, hand me my shorts, please.”

“I would,” Wendy said, making no visible effort, “but—ugh!—I can’t reach them. She grinned. “You can roll over me and get ‘em for yourself, though.”

“Um . . . I think I can stretch.”

A few minutes later, fully dressed, they strolled down the Mystery Trail, hugging each other in the way Dipper used to think sappy when he was younger and saw teen couples walking linked like that. “So,” he said, “next year I’ll have my Master’s. Think you could stand it if I stayed in school another two years for my doctorate?”

“Stood it so far, dude! I’ve decided I’m gonna take that one-year master’s program in environmental science myself. Shouldn’t be hard—I’ve already taken the undergraduate equivalents of most of the courses for the comp-exam track, got an A in all of them. Normative is two years, but I’ll bet I can nail it in a year and a half, tops.”

“I’m betting a year. Go for it,” Dipper said. They stood in front of the Shack, holding hands and just looking at it. “Same-y, but different-y, as Mabel says.”

Wendy hugged him. “Yeah, Soos has the place really fixed up nice. It’s nearly twice the size it was.”

“Top tourist draw in Oregon last year.”

“Soos and Melody are so happy. Didn’t he want seven kids?”

Dipper grinned. “Yep, one to love for each day of the week.”

“Well, four more to go. They’ll make it!”

He kissed her cheek. “We’ll get started ourselves whenever you want. What next?”

She sighed. “Let’s go back inside for a last look around. I just love this old place so much.”

“Um,” Dipper said, “I think I might need a little more recuperation before—”

She bumped him with her hip. “Nostalgia, man, not lust! C’mon, just one more walk-around.”

They sauntered through the Museum, laughed at the Sascrotch—Soos had recently given him new designer underwear—and then, on impulse, dug out the electron carpet—“What do you think, Dip?” Wendy asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Maybe some other time,” Dipper said. “Right now, it would seem, I don’t know, kind of weird.”

She laughed. “When were you ever worried about weird, big guy?”

Hey, they’d been married for nearly three years, so what the heck. Then, having swapped bodies, they roamed around a little more, joking and laughing and somehow feeling completely at home in each other’s skins. “Time to change back, I guess,” Wendy said in Dipper’s voice.

They had returned to where they left the carpet, in the gift shop, and everything seemed quiet, empty. Dipper, in Wendy’s body, said mischievously, “You know, I just might change my mind about that weirdness bit. I just realized there’s still one place we haven’t visited.”

“Huh?”

He twitched the curtain aside. “Roof time! Roof time!”

Wendy, in his body, laughed. “Up where we might be seen?”

“Don’t lame out on me!” Dipper said. “You know you want it!”

“Pret-ty naughty,” she said, but she climbed the ladder.

I ought to work on my butt muscles, Dipper thought, climbing up behind her and seeing his body from the rear. They emerged on the roof—Soos had nailed the S of the Mystery Shack sign permanently to the shingles, so the sign still read MYSTERY  HACK, just as they remembered—and they scrambled to Wendy’s old retreat on the flat roof over an attic dormer window. The cooler was still there, but some storm in the intervening years must have blown away the lawn chair.

“You really up for this?” Dipper asked, beginning to take off the flannel shirt and wondering about how to unhook a bra by reaching behind. “Not too weird for you, is it?”

“You darin’ me?” Wendy asked with a broad grin as she shed Dipper’s vest.

He said, “Sure am—Mr. Pines.”

She arranged their discarded clothing into an improvised pad and said, “OK, then let’s see how the other half lives—Mrs. Pines!”

They attracted a woodpecker’s beady-eyed interest, but at least no Gnomes. And later, lazing up there in the late-morning sun, Dipper said, “You know, we shouldn’t have done that. It was really very, very—”

“Nice,” Wendy insisted. “Nice in a whole different way, but man! In fact, now I’m curious. I’d like to swap back and, you know—climb back up and try for double nice!”

The carpet got a lot of use that day.

The End

Hey, if you liked any of my stuff, there’s about half a million words of my GF stories at fanfiction.net. Visit me there and look up William Easley!

[billnoncipher]

Fireworks at the Lake

(A story of mine on fanfiction.net that happens to fit the prompt “Fake Relationship” for Wendip Week)

Fireworks at the Lake

By William Easley

(July 4, 2014)

1

"Wendy," Manly Dan rumbled, "I want to talk to you."

Lounging on the sofa on the back porch of the Shack and nursing a Pitt Cola, Wendy glanced at her dad and immediately thought, Oh, shit! He had that you're-in-trouble look in his eye. But she forced a smile and said, "Sure, dad. Uh, you want another beer? I'll run and get you one—"

The Fourth of July barbecue was into its second phase, after the games had ended, before the sun sank low enough for people to head out to the lake for the fireworks. Manly Dan and the boys had showed up a little late, but he'd made up for that by eating five cheeseburgers, three barbecue sandwiches, a pound of fries, half of a ham, and a quart of coleslaw, along with four beers.

Now he climbed up onto the porch—it creaked—but then jerked his thumb at her and said, "Let's go somewhere more private."

They walked through the side yard and into the woods, just a few steps. The murmur and laughter of the ongoing Independence Day party at the Shack still came drifting on the sultry air. Wendy tried again: "If you want me to get you another beer, it won't take me a minute—"

He grabbed her arm before she could start toward the house. "Naw, I wanna know what you were doin' runnin' around kissin' every boy in sight."

"What?" she asked, blinking. "What gave you that idea? I haven't—"

Dan scowled down at her, making her feel about five years old. "You tellin' me you ain't kissed a boy?"

"When?"

"Today! When'd you think? You sayin' you ain't kissed no boys today?"

Wendy shook her head. "No, I'm not saying that—but it was just one, and it wasn't even—"

"Out in public?" Dan growled. He pounded one gloved hand against a small pine tree, which broke and fell over.

Wendy held up her hands. "Dad, please! Calm down, OK? Do you want to hear what happened? 'Cause I'll tell you if you'll just give me a chance!"

"Go ahead," Dan said. He snapped off the trunk of the pine tree he'd punched out—granted, it was only a young one, but it had been twelve feet tall already—and moodily broke the remainder of the trunk into smaller and smaller pieces.

With her gaze on the mutilated wood, Wendy said, "OK, I kissed Dipper Pines, right? Once, and on the cheek! And that was 'cause we'd just won the three-legged race!"

"Oh, just a little kid?" Dan asked, visibly relaxing. "Toby didn't say that. What is Dipper, nine?"

Wendy chuckled. "Little older than that, Dad. He's in high school now. But we won the race—"

"By how much?"

"I dunno. 'Bout fifteen, twenty feet ahead of second place. We were way out in front!"

Manly Dan actually laughed. "'Cause you dragged him along on the ground! You did, didn't you?"

"No. I didn't have to. Dipper's a pretty good runner, Dad. Don't you remember, him and me have been running together every morning?"

"Oh, yeah, trainin'. Didn't I hear he was a track star or something?"

"Yeah, down in California. State high-school JV champion in the hundred-meter sprint. We surprised everybody. Nate and Lee have won the three-legged race for the last two years, and we left them in the dust, man!"

Dan's face clouded. "But then you kissed him where people could see and all!"

"Dad," Wendy said, "I remember five or six years ago when in front of the whole crowd, you kissed Tyler Cutebiker at the Fourth of July games!"

"That was only 'cause we won the relay race!"

"Yeah, and you just won it 'cause you picked him up while he was still holdin' the baton and carried him and it both over the finish line! But you kissed him, and there was even a photo on the front page of the Gossiper!"

"That was different!"

"Well," Wendy said reasonably, "isn't this different?"

"No! This is the same!" Dan bellowed. "I was kissin' a teammate! You was kissin' a boy!"

"Who was my teammate!"

Dan blinked, processing that. "Oh, I kinda see what you're drivin' at. And you won by fifteen, twenty feet, huh?" Pride and anger warred in his face for possession.

"We whupped everybody," Wendy said with a grin, borrowing one of his words. "Just like you, Dad."

Pride seemed to win. Dan dusted all the splinters of the pine trunk off his hands. "Well. Glad you run such a good race, then. But I better not hear of that kinda behavior again."

"Stop talking to Tony Determined, then!"

"Toby."

"Whatever! Even if you call him Bodacious T, you can't believe everything he says. He's still a gossiper."

"He's on th' television! People on th' television don't tell lies."

"Dad!" Wendy said. "If you're going to believe people who love to tattletale instead of believing me—"

"Simmer down, baby girl. I believe you. For now. But don't you go kissin' on every boy you meet, you hear me? I don't trust your judgment. That guitar player, that Robbie Valentino, now—"

With a sigh, Wendy told him, "Robbie is old news, Dad. He's going with Tambry now."

"Yeah, I heard about them, too." He sounded angry.

"Well, they don't exactly hide it," Wendy said.

Dan sniffed and gave her a quizzical look. "Prob'ly shouldn't tell you this, might give you ideas. But you listen here." He dropped his voice to a confidential whisper: "Tambry's folks were goin' to a movie one night an' they got about fifteen minutes away from their house when Mrs. DiCicco realized she'd left her purse at home. So they drove back, and there set Robbie's car parked in the driveway. Her mom slipped inside quiet-like and caught them on the living room couch, and there wasn't no doubt about what they'd been up to, judging from what they weren't wearing."

Wendy felt her face getting hot. "Tambry never told me that," she admitted. "But you don't know the whole story, either, Dad. You'll hear the rest of it soon enough, so I might's well tell you. They're engaged, Robbie and Tambry. They're getting married as soon as they graduate next spring."

"Gives him no right to do what he done to her!" Manly Dan bellowed. "That coulda been you, baby girl! I don't want nobody tellin' me you have to get married 'cause of some boy doin' you like thataway!"

"Not gonna happen," Wendy assured him.

He grunted, and for a few seconds they were silent. Then he asked, "You goin' to the lake with us?"

"Nah, my boss offered me a ride out. Then he'll drop me off at our house after."

"Soos, you mean?"

"Sure. He's the manager."

"Not Stanley Pines?"

"No, Soos Alvarez. You know Soos, Dad. Married to Melody, they got the little boy?"

"And Dipper ain't goin' with you?"

She shrugged. "He and his sister will probably go over with Stanley and Stanford. Maybe they'll bring dates."

"They're too young for datin'!" Manly Dan said with great assurance.

"I think they're like sixty-seven or some deal," Wendy said.

Dan blinked. "Oh. I though you meant the little ones. Dipper an' what's-her-name."

"Mabel."

"Yeah, them."

"I don't know what plans they have," Wendy said. "I may run into them at the lake, or I may hook up with some of my friends there."

"Not Robbie Valentino! Nor Tambry DiCicco! They're bad influences!"

"OK, geeze, Dad, I may just hang with Mabel or something."

Dan sounded far from satisfied: "And I may check on you. Just to see who you're runnin' around with."

Which was pretty nearly exactly what Wendy figured. And dreaded.

2

Later that afternoon, up in the attic of the Shack, Dipper groaned, "Oh, man, I didn't know people were gonna make such a big deal out of one kiss! And it wasn't even—you know."

"No, it sure wasn't in our top ten, dude!" Wendy said with a grin.

She, Mabel, and Dipper were sitting on the floor of Dipper's room, away from the laughter and shouts and the sounds of eating out in the yard. "You got a top ten?" Mabel asked, her eyes wide. "Show me! Show me! Show me!"

"Nah," Wendy said. "We'd be a bad influence on you."

"I don't know about that," Dipper said. "Before now, I've heard suspicious sounds from around the corner and when I got there, I spotted Mabel and Teek in a clinch!"

Mabel wilted a little. "Won't happen today, though. Teek's not gonna be at the lake. His folks are driving over to Portland for the big waterfront fireworks show. He invited me, but after all the craziness that happened today with that dumb crystal ball, I gotta take a breather."

Wendy nudged her. "Well, Mabes, I told Dad I'd prob'ly hang with you at the lake, so there's that at least. If you even want to go, I mean."

"Yeah, I want to go! I love fireworks. Maybe we could go out on Soos's boat with him and Melody and Little Soos."

"Yeah," Wendy said.

"What's wrong?"

"Well . . . thing is," Wendy said, sounding moody, "I don't believe it's a real good idea for me an' Dipper to be seen together, even if we're in a group and chaperoned. Not with Dad on the warpath like he is right now. This summer I've already been in trouble with him because I was hangin' out at the Shack too much."

"I thought that had all blown over," Mabel said.

Wendy shrugged. "Kinda has. I worked out a way to make sure the wolves were all fed on time."

"You got wolves?" Mabel asked, her eyes bugging. "I've got pigs! Wolves and pigs—what's happening here? We totally have to get them together—"

"I don't think she means real wolves," Dipper said, his voice not sounding happy.

"No, dude, I meant my dad and brothers!" Wendy said.

"It's a metaphor," Dipper added.

Mabel tilted her head. "Like in poetry?"

Her brother sighed. "Yeah. Kinda."

Mabel turned to Wendy. "Oh, man—wait—your family's not werewolves, are they? 'Cause that would be so cool!"

"Not as far as I know," Wendy said, laughing. "Dad and the guys just eat like wolves. And smell like them too, most of the time. Anyhow, yeah, Dad ragged on me about not being home in time to clean and cook and all, but I worked out a schedule, and Dad agreed finally that I'm responsible enough now—Assistant Manager of the Shack an' all—so I deserve some free personal time. 'Cept he sneaks around and asks around about what I'm doin' and checks up on me!"

"Bummer," Mabel said. "Hey, Dip, what's wrong with you?"

Dipper had been leaning back against his bed, but he slumped forward now, arms wrapped around his bent knees, huddling as though gathered into himself. If he'd been wearing a sweater, he probably would have turtled into Sweater Town. "Aw, it's that I've been looking forward to seeing the fireworks with Wendy," he admitted. "Last year we saw them together, and it was special."

"First real kiss special," Wendy said.

"Ooohhh!" Mabel murmured. "That's why Dipper wrote on the Fourth of July in English class when we had to do a 'My Favorite Holiday' essay!"

"You did? That's sweet, dude," Wendy said, reaching out to rub Dipper's back.

He leaned against her. "Yeah, but—if we can't even see each other tonight. . . I mean, it's kind of an anniversary and all."

Mabel said, "Fear not, Broseph! The course of true love won't stumble over its own feet and fall over like a tree Manly Dan has chopped off at the roots! We'll come up with a plan!" She booped Dipper. "Now, those were metaphors!"

"You hate making plans," Dipper pointed out. "You make fun of Mom and me all the time because we always make plans!"

"Exceptions prove the rule! Let me think, let me think—hey, Brobro, can I chew on a thinking pen?"

"They're in the cup on the table," Dipper said. "Help yourself."

Mabel not only chewed on it meditatively, she gnawed it. Then she giggled. "Ink! Blaarrgggh!" She stuck out a purple tongue. "Okay, that helped. Maybe we can find a way to get you two together for your anniversary. But you're gonna owe me if I can pull it off."

"Sure, whatever," Wendy said.

"Better hear her out before we agree to anything," Dipper cautioned.

3

Manly Dan drove the boys to the lake as the sun was going down. Half the town was already there, and the other half were coming in. He wandered through the crowd—easy because he was a crowd on his own, and he towered above everybody else on the beach—and watched families spreading beach towels and tablecloths or setting up folding chairs for the big fireworks display.

The fireworks team had already set up out on Scuttlebutt Island, and this year they had put out a line of red-blinking buoys to keep boaters at a safe distance. The previous year one family had ventured a little too close, and a dud skyrocket had flopped down onto the deck of their cabin cruiser before exploding. It hadn't done serious damage or hurt anybody, but the four people aboard, dad and mom and two kids, had jumped into the lake and had to be fished out.

Meandering, Dan saw the McGuckets and spoke to them—Old Man McGucket, tidier than he'd been in the old days, was actually making sense for a change—and then he spotted Tats, recognizable by his head and chin tattoos, who asked him, "You workin' tomorrow?"

"Naw, layin' off after the holiday," Dan said. "Whatcha got?"

"All-night poker game, you want in. Do you?"

"Sure," Dan said.

"Awright. Back room of the Skull Fracture, eleven o'clock."

"Who else?" Dan asked.

"Blubs an' Durland, Stan Pines, Roadhog, Chains, Ghost Eyes, so far."

Dan laughed. "Well, we'll take a few bucks off of Blubs and Durland, anyhow! See you there. Want me to bring anything?"

"Snacks if you want. Got the beer covered."

"Good enough."

Dan said hello to Mayor Cutebiker, to Lazy Susan, and a few others. But he was looking for a tall redheaded girl, and he'd better not see her in with a bunch of guys. Or else.

Twilight started to come on and deepened into dusk, and then Dan heard a distant but familiar laugh. It came from the docks.

He walked through the crowd, then around past the ranger station. By the time he got there, the sky was darkening and the first stars were just visible. He saw two figures sitting really close together on the edge of one of the piers, their feet swinging.

They didn't look around as he went toward them, though for a man of Dan's size, there was no way to keep his big feet from clomping on the wood. He stopped behind the two. "Wendy."

She leaned on one arm and turned around. "Oh, hey, Dad."

"You behavin'?"

"Yeah. Me an' Mabel are just hangin' here 'cause it's a good dark place to see the fireworks from. Wanna join us?"

Now Dan recognized the girl sitting beside his daughter—the pink headband, the long brown hair cascading down her back, the sort of goofy grin. She was wearing a red T-shirt and shorts, and she waved at him. "Mavis," Dan said.

"Mabel," the girl corrected.

"Oh, yeah. Uh. So where's your brother?"

Mabel pointed out toward the lake. "Soos's boat."

"So why ain't you with them?"

She shrugged. "I get seasick."

"It's a lake."

"Lakesick. Blarrrggg!" She mimicked vomiting.

"Okay," Dan said. "You girls be careful an' don't fall off the dock!"

"It's like three feet deep down there," Wendy said. "But, yeah, we'll be careful."

"Might take the boys out in th' rowboat," Dan said. "Well—I'll be home late, Wendy. You make sure everything's locked up."

"Will do. Have a good time, Dad."

Dan turned and walked away through the gathering darkness.

"Wow."

Wendy laughed. "I know, right? You know what he's gonna do now. He's gonna take the boat out and hunt up Soos's boat and make sure Dipper's aboard."

"He sure doesn't trust you."

"Oh, I dunno. It's not that so much as it is that when Dad gets an idea in his head, it's stuck there." Wendy pointed. "Uh-huh, there he goes with the boys."

It was getting hard to see, but you could make out the rowboat heading out from the far side of the ranger station. The tall, bulky figure at the oars was definitely Manly Dan. And sure enough, he did head toward Soos's boat, which had been repaired since the Gobblewonker expedition—if by "repaired" you meant that Soos had acquired another second-hand boat and had put the steering wheel from his old one on it.

A single rocket streaked up from Scuttlebutt Island and exploded, signaling the beginning of the fireworks show. Then more joined it.

"There they go," Wendy said. "Come here."

It lasted maybe ten or fifteen seconds. When they pulled apart, Wendy murmured, "Mm. Wow! Tambry an' I used to practice kissing for when we'd start dating guys, but I never French-kissed a girl before. I think I like it!"

"Aw—"

Wendy reached out for a tight embrace. "Come here, Mabes. I want me some more of that!"

4

Dan pulled up alongside Soos's boat. "Hiya," he said.

On the boat, Stan Pines leaned on the rail and said, "Hiya, Dan. How's it hangin'?"

"Fine, fine. See ya at the game tonight."

"Oh, yeah. I'll be there."

"That, uh, that your nephew over there?"

"Huh? Yeah, Dipper, come an' say hi to Manly Dan."

The kid came to the rail. In the light from the exploding rockets, Dan saw it was Dipper Pines, all right—pine-tree hat, red shirt and blue vest, the whole nine yards. "You're gettin' tall," Dan said.

Dipper shrugged. "Never match you, sir," he said.

"Listen, I, uh, heard you an' Wendy done good in the games."

"Three-legged race."

"Yeah. Congratulations. You, uh, kissed her, didn't ya?"

"She kissed me. On the cheek!"

"Yeah, well—you gotta realize not to do that in public to girls. Ruin their reputation."

Stan laughed. "That's a good one, Dan! Hah! Ya don't have to worry about Dipper—he's still scared of girls! Right, Dip?"

The kid looked down at his feet. "Aw, Grunkle Stan!"

"Good seein' ya," Dan said.

He rowed for a better vantage point and relaxed to watch the fireworks.

He felt a lot better now. Wendy and Dipper Pines—what a laugh! Why the kid's voice hadn't even broken yet.

While his boys yelled with enthusiasm at the rockets and Roman candles and bursts of stars, Dan smiled gently, reminiscing. All those flashing lights reminded him pleasantly of the times in the woods when he'd misjudged and a limb or a whole tree had whopped him in the head.

Really took him back.

5

Wendy was giggling. "Come on, Mabel, kiss me again!"

"No way! Not until I take this off!" Dipper reached under the shirt and struggled with the sports bra until Wendy had him turn away so she could unhook it. He had to shrug out of the shirt sleeves to get the straps off, and then he pulled the wig off his head. "I felt so silly!"

"Good thing that Mabel had that." Wendy picked it up and stroked it as though it were some kind of long-haired animal. "Why'd she even buy a Mabel wig, anyhow?"

Dipper tugged his shirt back down. "For those school mornings when 'five more minutes' turns into half an hour in bed and she doesn't have time to get her hair ready. Think she looked enough like me?"

"Oh, yeah, man," Wendy said. "With her hair tucked down the back of her collar and your hat and clothes on—yeah, in this light she'd fool anybody."

Dipper sighed happily. "Well, at least we got our anniversary."

Wendy dropped the wig to the pier beside her and said wickedly, "It's not over yet, dude."

As if to underscore that, fireworks lit up the sky.

"Want to see what it's like kissing a boy this time?" Dipper said. "I've just popped a peppermint!"

She pulled him tight against her. "Oh, dude, I thought you'd never ask."

The End

[billnoncipher]

Blessing 2

By William Easley

(Written for Wendip Week 2017 for the prompt 5 1)

(August 31, 2017)

"Mabel," Dipper asked early on the morning of their eighteenth birthday, "can I borrow your car?"

"Nope!" she chirped brightly. "But I'll drive you to Wendy's house!"

"Uh . . . I want to . . . ask Manly Dan something."

"Yup! So, you might need a driver to get you to the hospital." Mabel had gone retro—a new version of her rainbow sweater, and her hair band in a matching red—and they set out right after an early breakfast.

It was only seven o'clock, but Manly Dan was an early riser. "Git them trees before they're full awake," was his motto.

Gravity Falls was already stirring on that Thursday morning—a morning that threatened rain later, with low gray clouds. Mabel's graduation present, a new Chevy Sonic (bright red, stick shift, a compromise because Mabel had requested a BMW M6, a wee bit pricey), took the curves well, though Dipper had to grip the edge of his seat from time to time.

"Off to college next month," Mabel said. "So—you and Wendy are gonna room together, I guess?"

"Married couples do," Dipper said between clenched teeth.

"Set the date?"

"Today."

"No freakin' way!"

"Yeah—squirrel! Squirrel! That was close. Just a civil ceremony, to make it legal. Then on September 15, we'll have the church ceremony and you'll be—"

"Maid of Honor! Yes!"

Wendy was waiting on the porch of the Corduroy house. She hugged both Mabel and Dipper. "Happy birthday, you guys! I now pronounce you technically adults. Mortgages and weight control forever!"

"Is, is your dad—?"

"In the living room, dude. Mabes, let me drive your car for a little ride with you?"

"Sure! Here's the keys. Try not to hit any wildlife!"

Manly Dan glowered at him. "Well. Finally come around, did you?"

"Yes—yes, sir. I love Wendy, and she's agreed to marry me. I—I—we—I—"

"Spit it out!"

Dipper gulped, feeling like a twelve-year-old again. "I want to ask your blessing on our marriage!"

For many seconds, Manly Dan just glared at him. "You think you're man enough for my baby girl?"

Taking a deep breath, Dipper said, "If I'm not, I'll die trying to be."

Manly Dan cracked his knuckles. "Here's the deal. Let's put you to the test. Six, in fact. You fail 'em, you can't marry my daughter. You pass three, I'll give my OK."

Dipper clenched his jaw. "You're ten times stronger than I am, and I know the kind of test you'll put me to. Let's say if I pass one, you'll give us your blessing."

"One. OK. I hope you know what you're up against."

"I think I'll find out."

The two trees were of identical girth. Manly Dan said "Ready, set, go!"

Their axes flew. Dipper had learned a little about tree chopping from Wendy—but Dan's muscles and expertise had deep roots. Chips flew from his tree like sawdust from a buzz saw. When he yelled, "Timber!" and his tree crashed to the floor of the forest, Dipper had cut maybe a tenth of the way into the trunk of his own tree.

"One down," Dan said with a fierce grin. "I'll finish that one for ya. We don't have all day."

Dipper had seen Wendy do this a dozen times—loop the belt around the trunk, walk yourself up, quickly relocate the belt, repeat. Tree climbing, easy-peasy.

He got up five feet, lost two while repositioning the belt. Up ten, lost two more. Up fifteen—

"Two down!" Dan yelled from the crown of the tree. "You aint' doin' so well, sonny boy!"

"Let's do something I'm good at," Dipper suggested.

"Like what?"

"Math."

Dan grinned. "How many board feet of lumber are in that first tree I cut? We'll measure it and calculate."

Maybe if Dipper had ever heard of the term "board feet" he might have stood a chance. As it was—

"I got 2500," Dan said. "Halfway through, and you ain't come up a winner yet. You want to check my figures?"

"No, I'm sure you're right," Dipper said with a sigh.

"Three to go, son. You want to go through with this?"

"Sir," Dipper said, "I'll see it out. But if I fail every single one and you don't give us your blessing—you know we're still going to be married."

"That so?"

"It's so."

They drove to the lake, to the place where back in July the lumbermen had thrown their get-together. In the pen a waterlogged, well, log, still floated. "Log rollin'," Dan said. "I know you seen us do this. First one to fall in the water loses."

For the first time that morning, Dipper gave Dan a run for his money. His track experience had given him speed and agility, and they were as important as sheer bulk and strength.

Forward, reverse, canny stop, leap, faster, slower—the log revolved in the water as the two struggled to stay on it.

And then something went wrong. Dipper's foot slipped on the slimy log. Dan reached down and plucked him out of the water.

"Down to two, boy."

At least Dan lent Dipper some of his son's old clothes, though Dipper did not feel at home, really, in flannel shirt and overalls. Next was—the hatchet toss.

Dan had a target set up out back. "My baby girl," he said, "can get five in the circle every time. Let me show you how."

It was almost like a juggling trick. Dan held four hatchets in his left hand, one in his right, and onetwothreefourfive he threw, shifted another, threw again, and all five were in the air practically simultaneously. With solid-sounding thwacks! they embedded themselves in the wood and stuck there quivering inside the faded ring of the painted circle.

Dipper . . . didn't have the knack. The very first one hit handle-first and bounced off. In the end, he managed to get one hatchet to stick, and it was outside the circle.

"I got my doubts about you," Dan said. "One chance left."

"Next?" Dipper asked grimly.

Dan grinned at him. "Arm wrasslin'."

"So . . ." Wendy said suspiciously half an hour later, "Dad let you win?"

"Not exactly," Dipper said. "We sat down at the table, got into position—he had to sit way back because his arms are so much longer—and when he said, 'I'll count to three, and then we go,' I interrupted his count. I said, 'Sir, I just want you to know why I think I'm man enough. When I was thirteen years old, I slept with Wendy.'"

Wendy and Mabel both gasped.

Dipper shrugged. "He was so shocked that I think he was paralyzed for a second. That was when I slammed his fist down on the table and then, real quickly, explained that we just fell asleep watching TV on the floor in the Shack that New Year's, and nothing happened."

"And—you're not a ghost, are you?" Mabel asked. "He didn't kill you?"

"No. He laughed. He clapped me on the shoulder so hard I think I have a mild sprain. He said, 'That's what I was waiting for, boy! I know you got the Pines smarts. Listen, I want me some good strong, smart grandkids from you and my daughter. You get to work on that soon.'"

Wendy blushed. "That's my dad!"

"But," Dipper said, "he also told me he was just funning with me. He was going to give us his blessing anyway."

"Well-p," Mabel said, "that's one down. Now for Mom and Dad."

"Two down," Wendy said.

"Say what?" Mabel asked.

Dipper chuckled. "We'll tell you," he said, "when you're older."

[billnoncipher]

Bound . . . and Determined

Written for Wendip Week 2017. Prompt: “Handcuffed together.” Lightly crosses with the Harry Potter universe.

By William Easley

1

"Allow me to be quite clear," the Minister for Magical Law Enforcement told Dr. Mason Pines and his wife Dr. Wendy Pines. "If it were solely up to me, I wouldn't have called you in at all. However, the homeowner in question is an American—as well as a highly-qualified witch—and has requested your aid specifically."

"We understand that, Mrs.—uh, I'm sorry, how should we address you?" Dipper asked.

"Minister is the preferred term. However, as we are in the same line of work, 'HG' will do.""

"Thanks, HG," Wendy said. "I'm Wendy, and you can call my husband Dipper."

"I beg your pardon?"

"It's a code name," Dipper said smoothly. "Now—this client—"

"Mrs. Abigail Merriwether," the Minister said, picking up her glasses to read from a memo. "Formerly of Salem, Massachusetts, has lived in the UK for, let's see, ten years, suspects there is an unfriendly ghost in her home." She put the memo down. "Please understand, Mrs. Merriwether's husband Hugh is a mu—a non-magical person. For reasons of her own, she prefers that he not know of her special talents."

"If she's a witch," Wendy said, "couldn't she handle a ghost?"

"Ah, but this is not an ordinary ghost," the Minister said with a smile. "Here is a card with the address for you. However, I shall have a car take you there. Exorcize the phantom, and the Ministry will pay your expenses. Now, as to fee—"

"No fee," Dipper said. "Consider it a case of international cooperation."

"Well," the Minister said. "Isn't that nice." Before they left her office, she seemed to thaw a bit. "Do you know," she said, glancing at Wendy, "I just realized you remind me a bit of my sister-in-law. She's a ginger, too."

"Really."

"Yes, and quite a nice woman. Well, is there anything else you require."

"If it's not too much trouble," Wendy said, "since we had to fly on a commercial airline, I would like to request something that I wasn't allowed to carry aboard."

"And that would be?"

"An axe," Wendy said. "I've looked at British axes, and I would prefer an Eversteel 3000 felling axe, 85 centimeter handle, 1.75 kilogram head."

The Minister frowned a little as she wrote that down. "Why do you need this to take care of a ghost?"

"I believe," Wendy explained, "that every woman should carry an axe. Oh, and I'll need a Handleman leather scabbard, too, with bandolier harness. I won't be taking them back to America, so I'll return them to you when this job is over."

"I'm sure we'll find some use for them," the Minister said. "The Armory will send out for your, ah, implement. They're quite efficient. Be ready to leave in an hour."

2

"How is it?" Dipper asked as the self-driving car let them out at the curb—kerb, whatever—in a reasonably suburban stretch outside of Metropolitan London. The houses here were miniature estates, most of them brick, standing in spacious grounds—say half an acre or more each.

Wendy moved her shoulders. "It's OK. It'll do. But it's like British food. Not quite the same."

He told the car, "We'll call when we've finished." The car did not respond verbally, but purred away.

"Quite a house," Wendy said.

"More like quite a tower with a little house built onto it," Dipper replied. The brick cottage looked cozy, but adjoining it on the right was a massive three-storied tower with a round observatory-like dome, looking completely out of place, as if it had wandered there from one of the castles dotting the English landscape and had settled down for a snooze. Surrounding the spacious yard was an eight-foot-tall fence of black wrought-iron.

"Let's see if our client is in," Dipper said. He pressed the call button on the left pillar of the wrought-iron gate.

A moment later, a hologram of a thin, gray-haired man in a pale blue blazer and a dark bow tie appeared. "Yes?" He had a British accent, even with just that one word.

Dipper smiled. "Hello, sir. Are you Mr. Merriwether?"

"I am."

"I'm Mason Pines, and this is my wife Wendy, sir. We're former students of Dr. Merriwether's, and when we let her know we'd be vacationing in London, she asked us to visit. May we speak to her?"

"Ah—sorry, she's not home yet. But yes, I recall her saying something about visitors. Just a moment, I'll buzz you in."

The gate clacked, they went inside and up to the door, where the man stood, having just opened it. "Please come in, young people. Would you care for tea?"

Dipper glanced at Wendy. "No, thank you, sir. When will your wife be home?"

"Oh, any time, any time. Would you care to wait for her in her little workshop? She most often takes her guests there."

"That will be fine," Dipper said.

"This way, then." He pottered around, opened a door, said, "No, pantry, lose my own head next," and then found the right one, a stairway leading down. "She says it's cool in the cellar," he said. Go along, go along, I'll follow. Not so spry on the steps as I used to be, you know."

They descended and the first thing Dipper thought was It's like the Shack—more cellar than house!

The second was It's a trap! Against the wall near the stair was a workbench with carpentry tools on a pegboard—but the rest of the cellar was a cellar, stacked with tidy piles of odds and ends, with wiring and pipes hanging from the overhead joists. No workshop.

He spun, Wendy caught his flash of thought, and she reached for her axe.

"Ah-ah!" The man stood on the stairway, holding a wand. "Now, I cannot kill you—yet. But I can't have you inconveniencing me as I question Mrs. Merriwether, so pleasant dreams!" He waved the wand and things turned black.

3

Well, when you think it's a ghost, you don't go into the fight prepared to battle an evil wizard. "We should've brought Mabel, dude," Wendy said, rattling the chain that held them together.

"Even if she weren't pregnant, I'm not sure that would have helped," Dipper told her.

Here they were, in the basement, stripped to their underwear and handcuffed together.

With magical handcuffs, the chain behind a floor-to-ceiling pipe. The space between the pipe and the wall was maybe eight inches—too narrow to squeeze through.

"What did he do with our clothes?" Dipper asked. "Did you see?"

"Nope," Wendy said. "Last thing I remember, he flicked that stick at us, and boosh! Here we were, stripped down and chained up. Any ideas?"

Dipper looked up. "Well, these may be magical handcuffs, but the pipe's an ordinary three-inch water pipe. Think we can climb it?"

"Dude, this is Lumberjack Girl you're talkin' to. I can climb it. What about you?"

"I'll do my best."

They were not ordinary handcuffs—the chain was about a foot long. On one hand, that gave them a little freedom of movement. On the other, it didn't give them all that much. They had to climb practically wrapped around each other, facing each other, with the pipe between them. "Yes!" Dipper said after they had nearly reached the top, eight feet from the floor. "Look! The pipe makes an L-bend! If we can loop the chain over the horizontal run—"

"We can get to the wall over there—"

"And maybe you can reach down to the tool bench with your toes—"

"And snag the hacksaw hanging there! And then we can saw through the chain!"

"Maybe!"

A few things stood in their way, though. Or, more accurately, hung in their way: three equally-spaced hanger straps, about four feet apart, that supported the horizontal run of the old pipe, perforated metal bands that hammocked the pipe and then were screwed to the joists overhead.

The pipe sagged with their weight, though, and because the house was an old house and the plumbing was aged and the straps had been manufactured in Birmingham, UK, in 1919, when there was a steel shortage, the first one snapped.

And that rendered the question of the hacksaw moot, because without its support the pipe gave way, too, and broke free from the upright. And water gushed from the upright in a soaking shower.

"Dude, it's cold!" Wendy complained as they staggered through falling water.

"At least it wasn't a sewage drain," Dipper yelled. They sloshed over to the tool bench, where Wendy grabbed the hacksaw and, after a moment's hesitation, Dipper picked up a hand sledge, a five-pound hammer. They hurried to the stairs, where Wendy sawed at the chain.

"Any progress?" Dipper yelled. "The basement's flooding pretty fast!"

"Yeah!" Wendy said. "I've worn all the teeth off the saw! What's wrong with you?"

"Your bra's so wet," Dipper said, "that's it's pretty, uh, translucent."

"Right now, we got other worries. Let's see if he locked the door."

The evil magician had not. "Come on, dude," Wendy said. "We have to find him."

"I know where he'll be," Dipper told her. "The tower room. Under the dome. Way up at the top. He locked us up as low as he could because he was going high."

"Figures," Wendy said. "Wish I knew what the son of a witch did with my axe!"

"I got it figured out," Dipper said. "The lady who thought it was a ghost was really being harassed by this guy—bet you he's not Mr. Merriwether at all. Somehow, he got past her defenses and got in, and now he may be torturing her."

"Let's go, dude!"

They found the tower and the spiral staircase leading up. They crept up on still-damp bare feet. They heard angry voices from the top. They paused outside the door. Dipper held up the hand sledge and whispered his intent.

"Could work," Wendy whispered. "But we gotta get all the way inside!"

"See if the door's locked."

It wasn't. From the room, they heard a woman's angry voice: "You can kill me, but you'll still never learn where it is!"

"There are worse things than killing!"

"Now," Dipper said, and they stepped through the door.

The wizard jerked around. He had tied a woman to a chair and had been menacing her with his wand. Now, his face furious, he raised the wand and began to yell, "Avada—"

"Go!" Wendy yelled. She stepped away from Dipper. They jerked their arms forward. They had hooked the sledge hammer over the chain by the head. They hurled it forward, as if they were a human slingshot.

The wizard was unable to finish whatever spell he'd started because a heavy hand sledge-hammer hurtling at the speed of 75 miles per hour tends to make enunciation difficult the moment it knocks out all your front teeth and renders you unconscious.

"The wand!" the woman shouted. "Get the wand!"

Dipper and Wendy ran forward, she scooped it up, and she asked, "Now what?"

"Give it to me and I'll unbind these ropes," she said. It was difficult, because her hands were behind her, but she twitched the wand and said, "Solvite!" The ropes dropped away.

Then she tied up the still-unconscious man. "Thank you," she said. "You are the young Americans my friend Dr. Pines recommended?"

"Wendy and Mason Pines," Dipper said.

"Why are you naked? That's a nice little navel ring you're wearing, Mrs. Pines."

"Thanks," Wendy said. "It was sort of my first wedding ring!"

"He stripped our clothes off," Dipper said. "Hit us with a spell that left us in our underwear and put these cuffs on us. Down in the basement."

"This is Makoto," Mrs. Merriwether said. "British, of course. Good thing, I suppose. If he were American, like us, he probably would have vanished your underclothing, too. He is seeking—well, never mind, a magical object, and if he found it, he could kill anyone, anywhere, without fear of retribution. Now the wizard court will deal with him."

"Um—your basement is filling up with water," Wendy said. "We had to break a pipe to get free."

"Hm." The woman went to a table and picked up a slimmer wand. "This is my own," she said. "It obeys me much better than Makoto's does. Speaking of which—" she snapped his wand in half. "That will take care of him!"

She waved the wand and spoke a rapid-fire series of spells: Restituo! Harefacio! Operiemur! Nothing visible happened, but she smiled and said, "There, all repaired, all dried, and we should find your clothes downstairs. Just a second now." Then she materialized a phone, made a quick call, and asked, "What's the time, Mr. Pines?"

"I suppose it's about noon," he said. "My watch is gone, too."

"Oh, of course. Well, we have to wait just a few moments—ah, no we don't, they are here."

With little flashes of air, three men in robes appeared. "Hello, Abbie!" one of them said. "What's the row—bloody hell! Hello, Miss!"

"Ronald," Mrs. Merriwether said firmly, "I told the Ministry Makoto would try! Here he is. Take him away and remember—you are married!"

"She's beautiful, though," the man said with a grin. "All right boys, let's take this scrote in custody!" The other two grabbed the still-unconscious Makoto and they all four vanished.

"Come," Mrs. Merriwether said, tucking her wand away somewhere in her dress. "My husband will be home in a matter of minutes, and he doesn't know about any of this. And he mustn't."

Their clothing lay in a heap in front of the cellar door. "But we can't get dressed until you take off these handcuffs," Wendy said.

"There is a problem," she confessed. "This is a dark spell, and only the man who cast it can take it off. However, I've broken his wand, and he will not be permitted to use magic again anytime soon."

"Then we're stuck like this?" Dipper asked. "Me in shorts, and my wife in—what she has on?"

"No, no," Mrs. Merriwether sighed. "There are ways, but they take time. The fastest—well, no, it costs too much."

"What?" Wendy asked.

"Well—there is a payment. You see, each person has a defined lifespan, and except for magic, it cannot be extended. We can't predict what our time is or foresee the future, but let's say one of you will live for another, oh, fifty years, and the other for sixty. A demonstration of commitment will vanish the handcuffs. If you agreed to blend your lifespans—then one of you will gain five years of life, but the other will lose the same amount of time, and you would both pass on in fifty-five years, at the same moment. But as I say, we never know. Suppose one of you has only two years, the other eighty! That's a terrible price."

Dipper took Wendy's hand and looked her in the eyes. Their chain jangled. They both smiled.

"Do it," they said together.

4

Later that week, Dipper said, "Well, it's five years late, but we finally got our honeymoon!" They were standing in front of Hexcombe Priory, a ruin that once had been the most haunted spot in England. It had a lot more history than the Mystery Shack, and the tour had been interesting, but Grunkle Stan could have made it more fun.

"And I got my axe back," Wendy said. "Shame I couldn't keep it. It had a really nice balance!"

"Well, now I know what to get you for our next anniversary," Dipper said. They kissed. He stroked her lovely, long red hair. "Do you regret what we did?"

She grinned, wrinkling her nose. "Nope. You?"

"Actually," he said, "I'd never thought about it before—but to live our lives together and leave them together—that might have been something I would have wished for."

"So love still binds us together," Wendy said, squeezing his hand. "For life and afterward."

They kissed, and Dipper whispered, "Always and forever."

The End

[billnoncipher]

Hail, Hail

by William Easley

(Wendip week Day 4: prompt is "The gang finds out.")

(August 19-25, 2014)

Tambry was the first. She and Wendy had met over in Morris at a chic little restaurant for lunch to talk about a million and one details about Tambry's and Robbie's wedding (which was still ten months away, but you can never be too prepared) when Tambry suddenly gasped and said, "Omigod! Who gave you a ring?"

Crap! I forgot to take it off! But, trying to keep her cool and pass it off as no big deal, she said, "This? It's a friendship ring. Just a little silver band, see? No diamond."

"Wendy," Tambry said, her eyes aglow. "You do NOT wear a friendship ring on the third finger of your left hand! Dish!"'

"Aw, it's really not anything that big," Wendy said, shrugging. "It just fits my left hand better. I hardly ever even wear it. Just a sweet gift from a guy I kinda-sorta like. You're right, though. I should force it onto my right ring finger." She pretended to have difficulty screwing it onto the finger, though actually it fit equally well there. "I'll probably have to soap this to get it off."

"Who?" Tambry demanded, shoving her chicken salad aside and leaning over the table, her gaze drilling into Wendy's.

"Nobody you know," Wendy countered, shifting a little in her chair.

"Dipper Pines," Tambry said. "OMG, you and Dipper—you're engaged!"

"Not so loud!" Wendy said. The Bon Ton in Morris wasn't exactly crammed with people who would recognize her—Gravity Falls folks in general thought the citizens of Morris were stuck up with no reason for being so, and few Fallers ever came to Morris unless it was to visit someone in the hospital or to consult a specialist doctor. "We're not engaged!" Wendy insisted. "Well, you know. I mean, we've talked about it, sort of, but the age thing, his parents, my dad, you know, a million things—"

Tambry took her hand in hers. "Wendy, this is Tambry here. You know what? I have this sharp memory of one time when we were, like five? And you saw this boy and told me he was cute? And I told him what you said, and you pushed me off my bike?"

"Yeah. . . I sort of remember," Wendy said, frowning.

Tambry squeezed her hand. "Girl! That kid was totally a dupe of Dipper Pines! Looked just like him!"

Wendy had no mental image. She mainly remembered feeling guilty for shoving her best friend to the sidewalk. "How do you even remember that?"

"I always remember cute guys," Tambry reminded her. "Oh, this is so great! He'll be such a cool husband, always whisking you away on wild adventures—"

"Nothing's settled!" Wendy said firmly. "We've talked, that's all. We—"

"Are you doing it?"

"—just have to, wait, what? TAMBRY! He's fourteen! Of course not!"

"He's a mature fourteen," Tambry said. "And won't he be fifteen in like two weeks?"

"Yeah, but—"

"You know what the guys we know were like when they were fifteen!"

"Well—he's not like that. And we've promised each other to wait and—see if this can—maybe in time, we don't know—look, just promise me, hand to God, that you won't tell a soul!"

"I promise! Oh, Wendy, I'm so happy for you," Tambry said with tears of happiness in her eyes.

And it was totally a coincidence, or maybe in the grand scheme of life it wasn't, that Mabel's farewell summer-ending sleepover went on that same night.

Candy, Grenda, and Pacifica came over to the Shack, Dipper swapped bedrooms with Mabel—because the attic was the right size for a mob of four girls—and in the course of the evening somehow a game of Truth or Dare eventuated.

Well, at sleepovers they always do, don't they? But I wanted to use a fancy word. Anyway, somehow Mabel (who always went for the dares) unaccountably decided on "truth" at one point. Candy asked her, "Is there remaining a place in Dipper's heart for Candy?" She didn't actually have a real crush on Dipper, but as she had said a few times, "I would not kick him out of my baenang if I found him there." That means "knapsack," by the way. Candy can be odd.

Mabel teetered indecisively. She knew she couldn't tell the whole truth, but this was Truth or Dare, and it was a sacred obligation, practically, to be a little bit honest. She said as comfortingly as she could, "I'm sorry Candy, Dipper loves someone else."

"Oh," Candy said. "That small sound you hear is my heart breaking in three equal pieces, each weighing one hundred grams!"

"It's Wendy," Pacifica said, her voice flat, her face expressionless.

"I didn't say that!" Mabel protested.

"I know it's Wendy." Pacifica looked sad, not angry. "Everybody knows it has to be Wendy."

"Hey, Pacifica," Grenda said in an effort to give her a little comfort, "if it's any consolation, Marius has an eligible cousin who's a baronet."

"How old is he?" Pacifica asked.

"I think eleven. But he's single!"

"Worked for the redhead," Pacifica muttered. However, she didn't sleep much that night.

So by the next morning because of Tambry, Robbie knew, and the guys in the band, and then of course Lee and Nate found out, and their girls, and Soos got wind of it from someone who dropped into the gift shop, and . . . you know how it goes. And you've probably played the game "telephone."

And that was why on the following Wendesday, Wendy discovered she was secretly married and three months pregnant with twins. Or that was what Lazy Susan told her, congratulating her and advising her on the best things to eat while expecting.

And that was why Dipper was totally confused when on Thursday afternoon Gideon Gleeful saw him downtown, walked up to him, and said, "Well played, Dipper. Well played. But you just remember, now, if you get a mite out of line, she can break your arm!"

And it was also why on the following Friday, when they got together alone for their last movie night of the summer, Wendy said morosely, "Dude, everybody in town thinks we're doin' it!"

"I know," Dipper said. "Stan's already jumped me and I had to deny everything. I explained and swore him to secrecy, but I'm not sure even he believes me. It's crazy."

Wendy sighed and leaned against him. "You know what, dude? We might just as well go ahead and do it."

Dipper's mouth felt as dry as the Mojave at high noon in the middle of a summer when a persistent high-pressure area over the Pacific deflected the usual wind patterns and kept the air depleted of moisture. He felt simultaneously excited and terrified and stammered, "Um—but—but we made a promise—"

Wendy tickled his chin and smiled at him from six inches away and in a husky voice asked, "Don't you want to, you know, do it with me?"

"Yeah! Of course. I do. I really do. But—but—you know. It's too soon. Uh. Do, do you want to? With, uh, you know, with, uh, with me?"

"So bad!" She hugged him and he felt the warmth of her sigh on his neck. "And that's exactly why we're not gonna. Stay strong, Dip. Three more years from the last day of this month, man!" she pushed away but reached to hold his hand. "Hang tough, dude. We good?"

"Yeah. We're good," Dipper said, squeezing her hand and trying to control his heart rate. For a minute, it had zoomed way up there.

She broke the hug but kept her arm over his shoulders, and he reached up and held her other hand, too. She sighed. "OK, man. My fault. I was wearin' that silver ring you had made for me in the ghost town, I slept with it on my finger the way I do sometimes, and then that morning I forgot to take it off, and somebody saw it on my finger and jumped to conclusions. So—hope you won't mind this—since I don't want to hide the ring away in a drawer, but also don't want to wear it, like, in public where people will see it, I—well, I got a piercing. So I can always wear the ring where nobody will see it."

"I—whatever you want to do, Wendy. After we got those matching henna tattoos on the last day of Woodstick, I'd even get a matching piercing if you asked me to."

"Not necessary, dude," she told him. "OK, you're privileged, 'cause we won't see each other for a long time after the end of the month, right? And 'cause you did give it to me. And 'cause I love it, and you. So—here, this is my solemn pledge to you that I'll be ready the moment you are."

And she showed him just where she wore the ring.

The End

[billnoncipher]

Blessing

(by William Easley)

My story, written for Wendip Week 2017. Prompt: Meet the Parents

(August 30, 2017)

The next day would be Dipper's eighteenth birthday.

And Wendy Corduroy couldn't sleep. Because.

Because of a lot of things. For a change, Dipper and Mabel weren't riding back to Piedmont on a bus, or driving themselves, or even flying down on an airplane. Instead, their dad and mom were coming to pick them up here, in Gravity Falls.

Because, though Wendy had met Mr. and Mrs. Pines many times—and though Mr. Pines especially was fond of her and talked her up—tomorrow she'd meet them in a whole different way.

Because "Mom, Dad," Dipper would tell them, "this is the girl I'm going to marry."

And—what?

Normally Wendy could stick her chin out and deal with anything, from a chimera to an animated mummy to a ghost. Normally she was fearless. But tonight—

What if Mrs. Pines brings up the age thing?

No, I'm twenty, he's eighteen, big deal! My dad was younger than my mom when they married! Dipper says his mom's six months older than his dad, too. She doesn't let anybody know that, though.

And look at Ford and Stan! Decades, man!

But—Dipper's always been his mom's favorite. What if she, like, hates the idea and disowns him? I couldn't come between him and his mom. So—what will I do then?

She tossed and she turned so much that finally she couldn't stand it, got up, dressed, and quietly left the Corduroy cabin.

Maybe a walk in the woods would calm her. She walked straight back from the house, down a path through the woods that led to a shallow tinkling creek, crossed the creek on a tree trunk her dad had felled and then adzed off level to make a rough bridge, and started an upward climb that came out on the treeless crest of a hill.

She noticed how quiet it was—no insects, no owls, no wind. Bright moonlight making everything silvery and blue-shadowed.

Standing alone, with her arms crossed, Wendy stood there looking at the distant lights of town, bathed in the glow of a full moon, directly overhead—Must be midnight.

"No," Dipper said. "Later, I think. And the moon's really only just past first quarter. I think you're dreaming."

"Dude!" She turned around. "How'd you know I'd be here?"

Dipper shrugged. "I think I'm dreaming, too."

They embraced, and it felt warm and real enough. She leaned her forehead against his. "I still got two inches on you, Dip," she said fondly.

"You wear flats to the wedding," he said. "I'll wear heels."

That made her laugh. "Is this real?"

"I . . . don't know. We'll talk about it tomorrow and see who remembers what."

"This is weird, man. I never had a dream this intense."

"Nice weird, though," he said. They kissed, and that felt real too.

They heard a cough and looked around. Wendy wasn't surprised—though probably she should have been—to see Archibald Corduroy standing there, just at the edge of the forest. He had both eyes and looked younger than he had appeared to Dipper years before. And he had no axe embedded in his head, either, which improved his looks.

"Great-great granddad?" she asked.

He smiled and nodded. "Wendy. Someone wants to see you. I said I'd make the introduction. Hello, Dipper. Sorry about that turning you into wood thing."

"It's OK, man. You had issues."

"It's been a pleasure watching my little descendant here grow up to be a fine woman. And I know you're going to be a good man." He waved off anything they might have said in response and turned and beckoned. "Come on," he said in a surprisingly gentle voice.

From the forest at the foot of the hill walked—another Wendy.

"What?" Wendy asked. "Dude, who—"

"I'm your mother," the woman said softly as she stopped a few steps away. "Not the way I looked the last time you saw me, all wasted and sick. This is the way I looked when I was your age."

Her red hair was a lot shorter, but otherwise—they could have been twins. Like Wendy, Mrs. Corduroy wore a flannel shirt, jeans, and boots. "Wendy, Dipper," Archibald said, "this is Wendy's mother, Mrs. Amanda Blerble Corduroy."

Wendy said, "Oh!" She stepped forward. "I—can I touch you?"

Mrs. Corduroy smiled and spread her arms, and Wendy rushed into them. "I missed you so bad," Wendy said, her voice muffled.

Her mother stroked her long hair. "I've been watching you," she said softly. "I was never very far away." She raised her hand and gestured, and Dipper came over shyly and grasped it. "Mason Pines," Mrs. Corduroy said. "Or shall I call you Dipper?"

"Whatever you want, ma'am," Dipper said.

Then Wendy's mother embraced them both at once and kissed first Wendy, then Dipper. "I want you to know you have my blessing," she whispered. "I want you to tell Dan that, too." Her voice became a little sad. "I can't appear to him, you see. He misses me too much, and it would break his heart. But tell him you saw me and that I still love him just as much as I ever did."

Wendy stepped away—not far—and stared at her. In a weeping and laughing voice, she said, "You know what? I never knew your last name was Blerble before you married dad! Not until, like, two years ago! See, Dad wouldn't ever tell me my middle name, just that my initial was B."

"Oh, Dan can be so stubborn! My father was Henry Ward Blerble," she said. "My grandfather welcomed Dan into the family. My father, well, father thought Dan was too young and too poor for me and didn't. And Dan was an awfully proud man. I saw my father often enough after Dan and I were married, and he knew I was happy, but he went his way and Dan went his. The two of them never spoke, and even when we were poor, Dan wouldn't accept any help from him." She touched Wendy's cheek. "But don't be concerned about yourself. I have it on good authority that Mrs. Pines is going to be very happy with your announcement, darling. Stop worrying."

"Thank you, Mom," Wendy said.

"Dipper," Mrs. Corduroy said, "Don't you be afraid tomorrow. Just tell your mother, while you hold Wendy's hand. Just say it: We're in love, and we're going to be married. She already knows Wendy's good for you." She winked. "We mothers know more about love than you young folks think we do."

Archibald led Dipper off a little way and let the womenfolk have their talk, as he said. Archibald spoke of the forest and how much and how little it had changed in the last century and a half. Dipper listened. And some time afterward—too soon—Wendy came and took his hand and they turned and the ghosts were gone.

"I guess we have to wake up now," Wendy said sadly.

"I guess so. I love you so much."

"I love you, Big Dipper. More than I can say."

And mumbling, "More than I can say," Wendy opened her eyes and realized she was in bed. The clock's display said it was nearly three in the morning. Her phone chimed—Dipper's ring. She rolled over, got it, and thumbed it on. "Hi."

"Uh—hi. Wendy, sorry for calling this late. I just woke up. I had this dream—"

"I was there," Wendy said. "I know."

"Uh—on the hilltop? And we got your mom's blessing?" he asked tentatively.

"Yeah. We did."

His voice sounded joyful: "It was real."

She gently corrected him: "It is real."

"Yeah," he said. "It is real."

And that was all they needed to say.

The End