When Your Best Doesn’t Cut It
My fill for the 2015 Parapines secret santa for niczka! Sorry it’s a little late, but I hope you like it!
Dipper always made notes for every situation. Was Grunkle Stan paying Mabel more when they worked at the Shack during the summer? (Yes.) How did Ford manage to wear both a sweater and trench coat during the summer? (It was worth it to die a million deaths to look like Carl Sagan) Did Pacifica actually bleach her hair? (She almost murdered Dipper several times before Mabel stepped in)
This, however, was the biggest chart Mabel had ever seen. It was bigger than the one of string and photos that he made two summers ago, still trying to find the author of the journals. Photos and thread spilled out onto the floor, notepads were scattered over beds and Waddle’s head. The box of thinking pens was overflowing and Dipper’s mouth was stained black and blue from the ink. At the tippity-top of the corkboard were two different phrases, all capitalized and written in shaky scrawl:
PLACES NORMAN WOULD LIKE/DOES HE LIKE ME?
Dipper was pacing back and forth, stopping every once in a while, reaching for one of the threads that hung loosely from its pinned spot before shaking his head and pacing again. It was an interesting perspective from Mabel’s point of view, her legs sprawled on the mattress of their room in the Mystery Shack and looking at the world from an upside-down perspective. Of course she was forced to watch her brother’s pacing for the past half-an-hour. Mabel was afraid that if she sat up she’d end up puking her breakfast.
“We could go to that abandoned convenience store, but it was inhabited by ghosts. It could lead to another possession incident. No, out of the question, nothing could happen and it would get boring. The Arcade might be- no, wait. Rumble might challenge me to a fight and I’ll get my ass kicked in front of Norman and then he’ll think I’m not cool and then never want to hang out with me again and-“
“Breathe, Dip,” Mabel reminded him. He did and when Dipper looked back at her he was pale. “Again.” He did. “Norman’s not going to stop talking to you if you get your butt kicked. He didn’t friend dump you when you couldn’t fight off that Splintercat.”
“No, but-“
“No buts, mister!” Mabel attempted to sit up now, her stomach be damned, and ended up as a heap of long brown hair and wooly oversized sweater on the ground. “Norman loves all the crazy supernatural stuff we do! Remember finding the mercreatures by the waterfall?”
“The ones that almost ripped our faces off?”
“Yeah, Norman had a great time!”
“Did I mention we almost got our faces ripped off? Cause, I think I did.”
“Norman asked if we had other crazy places to go like that.”
Dipper didn’t have a comeback for that one. His eyes went wide in the dimly lit space of their room. “He did?”
“You were writing all sorts of stuff in your journal about them when he asked?” He didn’t answer. “You don’t remember? Seriously?”
“Well, I had to record everything! It’s kind of hard to write while fleeing enraged scaly monsters with sharp teeth,” Dipper went silent. Only for a beat. “Did- did he really enjoy that? We almost died.”
“Like every other flipping day in town, bro-bro, but it ain’t new news.” Mabel spat out a piece of hair that had fallen into her mouth and wrestled herself up until the girl had her legs folded beneath her and her sweater puffed around her jeans in a tent of neon green wool and a pink alien waving from the fabric. “Gravity Falls isn’t exactly Norman’s first walk of the weird near-death-experience either.”
“But-“ he bit his lip and glanced back at the chart. His eye fell to one picture. One of Norman’s hometown. The billboard for Blithe Hollow dressed in bright cracking orange paint and a horrible rendition of a witch painted half-hazardly over the wood.
It hadn’t been an easy experience, even after Norman had admitted to seeing ghosts during the last weeks of the previous summer. The “Witch Incident” could be found after a quick Google search, but the details remained with Norman. Details he had only admitted to two people, his dead grandmother, and his best friend from home. Not his sister knew. Not his parents knew. Only those two people had known who Agatha Prendergast was. Dipper and Mabel had known one week into this summer and the number increased to four.
Only Norman knew who Aggie was, and Dipper and Mabel knew that they would never know that side of the story.
“We’ve passed Death so many times we should start giving them high-fives,” Mabel said. A smile was offered, but it wasn’t completely humorous. It was an offer to lighten the mood and Dipper wasn’t taking it.
“Shouldn’t he be sick of it?” He groaned and sat on his bed. Papers crinkled beneath his weight and his head rested in the palms of his head. “Why can’t we just have normal things? Like going to a movie without a poltergeist coming out of a film? Or a blob monster taking over the swimming pool? Why can’t we just go on picnics? Or just have a nice walk and hold hands and-“
Mabel was grinning at the flush that overtook her brother’s face. “Oh my God!”
“I didn’t mean-“
“That is so stupid cute!” Mabel pressed her hands to her cheeks. “C’mon! Tell me more! Picnic? Do you have any other ideas? What kind of food? What about music? You know Norman’s tastes! C’mon bro, tell me more.”
Dipper’s face was still flushed and no force on Earth could change that. But slowly, he lowered his hands, wringing them together as he talked in a hushed tone. “I-well, maybe, but it’s stupid and Norman probably wouldn’t-“
“Dipper,” Mabel said.
He cracked.
@_@
Mabel did have faith in her brother. As much as he got in his own way, Dipper had gotten himself together a bit over the past couple years. He could talk to boys and girls without stumbling over himself most of the time and wasn’t nearly as self-conscious as before.
She had faith. But she had to make sure.
“Your brother’s going to choke.” Pacifica didn’t bother keeping her voice down and a hand was slapped across it at the last possible second.
“Shh! They’ll hear us!” Mabel whisper was a tad too loud and the girl held her breath.
“Okay, I know that time I heard something.” Mabel knew Dipper was looking over his shoulder and held her breath from the bush the girls were hidden behind. “If it’s a Hide-Behind we might need to go back and grab some mirrors.”
“We already packed a bunch in case a Gremloblin shows it’s ugly mug.” Norman patted his backpack for good measure. A small muffled sound reminded Mabel that her hand was still over Pacifica’s mouth. If she had done the same to Mabel the younger girl would have licked her hand. Pacifica had more class than that. At least that’s what she said every time she wiped saliva off of her hand. She removed her hand and Pacifica gave Mabel a pointed look. A small hand mirror that had fallen out of Norman’s bag was held in her hand. The boy was none the wiser yet and Mabel suppressed the giggle at the smug expression on Pacifica’s face. “Don’t Hide-Behind’s make that weird hissy and rattling noise?”
“Yeah, but what else could it be? If it was a Gremloblin it would have made a lot more noise.”
“Maybe it’s just a deer.”
“A Wendigo?
“No, a deer.” There was a beat of silence between them and their voices were further away now. “There’s got to be a few normal deer. You know, ones without the bugged out eyes that say that they’ve seen some messed up shit.”
The shuffle of feet stopped and Mabel’s heart stopped in her chest. Oh no. “Yeah, I guess the creatures here aren’t exactly normal. Even when they’re as normal as normal can get, they’re not.”
The silence lasted a moment, then the boys continued walking and the forest was too quiet. When their footsteps had faded Mabel rubbed her temples. “He did it again! Dang it, Dip.”
“Professor Paranoia strikes again,” Pacifica added. “I guess that means he really likes this guy, huh?” Mabel stared and shuffled a bit closer. The other girl sighed. “I mean, Dipper stumbles over words in every situation like a drunk elephant over land mines. But that wasn’t just stumbling. That was falling face-first on a nuke that wasn’t defused first.”
“He did that when he crushed on Wendy.”
“How existential did he get when he talked to her?”
Mabel bit her lip in thought. He admitted to staying awake and thinking about her, that wasn’t hard to figure out on the fly. “Well, Wendy asked if two astronauts were on the moon and if one killed the other with-“
“That doesn’t count.” Pacifica cut her off with her nose twisted in slight disgust. Not so much disgust as slight distaste, but for the phrase that was tumbling out of Mabel’s mouth. “I mean insecurities coming out and all that jazz.”
She couldn’t think of a time. The only one was when the Shape-Shifter had hurt Wendy. That was a confession in a life-or-death situation. Did that even count? Mabel frowned, then her eyes lit up. “Wow, I guess- I didn’t know how serious Dipper was about this.”
Pacifica smiled and elbowed her in the side. “Which is why we got to help dip-stick from messing up with someone he really likes.” She offered a hand to help Mabel off of the ground and didn’t brush away the dirt stains in her skirt. “I can see Norman’s flashlight on the ground over there, they went that way.” Pacifica still held Mabel’s hand and Mabel didn’t bother to bring it up or the flush on her cheeks and skip in her step.
@_@
“I know I packed a mirror! It’s in here somewhere.” Norman had gone through his bag at least seven times now, dumping out everything and only finding more items missing. His flashlight, the mirror, a few snack bars. He sighed and stuck his hand through the new tear in the bottom of his bag. “I need a new bag.”
“Mabel could fix it.”
“And probably cover the rest of it in sparkly pink wool and stitch a ribcage onto it for good measure.” Norman paused, the corners of his mouth ticked up. That way where his lips curled back enough into a lopsided grin. “Actually, that sounds kind of cool.”
Dipper wanted to say that he could talk her down out of the pink at least. He wanted to make some kind of witty comeback. Some fun banter that would make Norman laugh. That laugh that turned into a slight cackle when something really cracked him up.
“I brought sandwiches!”
Norman turned and stared at Dipper. God, his eyes were so blue. He couldn’t help but flush and turn away and tore through his own bag. “I-I thought we might get hungry and who knows when we’d find the Axehandle Hound so I brought food. You like turkey, right? I also have, uh, some chips, and I think there’s some sodas-“
“Turkey sound great, actually.” Dipper tried to hide the flush in his face and the double beat his heart was on as he found the lunches he packed. Norman was sitting closer.
“H-here,” Dipper’s voice cracked on the word. Norman took the plastic wrapped sandwich and the boy’s throat caught on his breath. Norman’s hands were really warm. It felt like electricity even from just brushing his hand. He hid it with a cough and found his own food. Even through his own nervousness Dipper sat close to Norman. If he shifted just an inch he’d be leaning on the younger boy.
“Axehandle Hound?” Norman asked between a bite of his sandwich. “What are they exactly?”
Dipper nodded and took a swig of his soda. Anything to keep his voice from cracking. “It’s supposed to be this dog with an axe for a face.” Norman stared and Dipper couldn’t handle looking at him for long. He stared down at his food. “Some people say that they’re the spirits of abandoned or broken axes left in the woods, others say it’s the spirits of angry trees coming to haunt lumberjacks.”
“Maybe a dog tried to have sex with an axe and it worked?”
A loud, blaring laugh exploded from Dipper. The soda in his mouth was sprayed over the ground and he coughed a few times to recover while Norman laughed. There was that little cackle in his voice and he shook. Norman was really close.
“Holy-“ Coughing, “shit, Norm-“ Dipper felt like he was hacking up a lung around his laughing. “D-did you have to say that when-?”
Dipper turned to him and froze in place. He wasn’t sure what to call the expression on Norman’s face. His eyes were wide and blue. So blue. His face was dusted with red. Dipper’s heart was pounding in his chest. Was Norman sitting closer? “H-hey, Dipper?”
Dipper swallowed. He was frozen. His face was hot and his nerves shaking. “Wh-“ his voice cracked. “What’s up?”
Their shoulders brushed. Dipper could feel Norman’s body heat leeching through his sweater. Touching his arm. One of them swallowed and Dipper couldn’t be sure which of them it was. His hand felt warm and- yup. Yup. That was a hand on his. Dipper felt like he was going to pass out.
“Uh- hey, do you mind if- I mean, I thought-“
Norman’s face was close and each word fanned out across Dipper’s face. Dipper wasn’t conscious of his own body moving towards Norman. His eyes drifting closed. Norman had stopped talking. Just a little closer-
“AaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-!” A scream broke the silence. It wasn’t stopping.
@_@
Mabel had to keep herself from screaming when she saw Norman’s face light up. Honestly, it was really cute. She knew Dipper’s laugh got to him. The weirdest little things like how Dipper would get excited about supernatural creatures or how Norman loved when he was caught off-guard by some stupid off-handed joke.
She had her phone ready to document her brother’s second kiss, her own internal squealing filling her ears and ignoring the sounds of the forest.
“Mabel!” Pacifica pulled on her arm as her camera went off and she pouted at the blonde.
“What’s the big-?”
Pacifica wasn’t looking at her. She was looking at nearby trees, all of them falling to the ground.
A dog was frantically barking.
Another tree was chopped in front of them and Mabel held her breath.
It wasn’t a dog, or something that resembled a dog. Big, fuzzy and brown with big dark spots over it’s back. But its head wasn’t normal. It was a huge axe-handle. Patches of fur covered the sides where two dark eyes stared out. The metal blade of it’s head split in two, a large slobbering tongue hung from the improvised thin mouth lined with steel teeth. The large head turned. Its tail began to wag, then it ran at them, barking.
“Move!” Pacifica already had a death grip on Mabel’s arm and dragged her through the trees. Mabel was already screaming.
They broke through the clearing and Dipper jumped up like a rocket with his face a red brighter than Norman’s jacket. “What are you doing here?”
“Run, Dip-shit!” Pacifica screamed. Her words were garbled by the barking of the hound.
It froze. Head turning to look at them all.
Norman scrambled to his feet.
The Axehandle Hound began to wag its tail and ran at him.
Mable was frozen. Dipper was frozen. Norman was frozen. His face reflected on the blade of the dog’s head.
Pacifica’s hand unlatched its death-grip from Mabel’s wrist and ran at the younger boy. Her body tackling him to the ground as the dog leaped at him, still barking and yipping when the two hit the dirt.
She scrambled up with his arm trapped in her grasp and dragged him away.
The dog’s head was embedded into the tree that had been behind Norman, whimpering and trying to free its head from the thick wood of a tree. It pulled, kicking at the ground and Norman’s eyes were glued to it’s metal nails that dug deep rivets into the earth.
“Norman!” Dipper ran over to help him to his feet. “Oh, no, no, oh man, are you okay?”
“I-“ he glanced to Pacifica. “I’m fine.”
“You’re lucky-“ Pacifica panted, leaning over to catch her breath, “-that you didn’t have a close shave.”
“Yikes, those scrapes aren’t pretty.” Mabel fussed over both of them, but her hand lingered over Pacifica’s and she flinched away when the other girl sucked a breath between her teeth at the contact. “We need to get some medical supplies.”
“I packed some. Did you manage to find where I dropped them.”
Dipper paused, looking to Norman, to Mabel, Norman, Pacifica, and back to Mabel. “Wait, you two were following us?” He looked back to Norman. “And you knew?”
“Wait, he knew?” Mabel parroted her brother.
“Of course I did, you guys weren’t exactly quiet.” Norman managed to laugh even while catching his breath.
Pacifica produced the kit and rifled through the supplies. Her nose twisted. “Hate to tell you, but this isn’t going to help much. We should get back to the Shack and patch up there. I’m sure it’ll be easier to comb out the bird’s nest your hair just turned into.”
Norman laughed and nodded. “Yeah.”
Mabel was still stunned, but dragged along by the other girl that was still bleeding from her knees.
Dipper wouldn’t move. He couldn’t. The dog was still trying to pull itself free, but he stared at Norman. He almost kissed Norman. He’d almost lost Norman.
“Dipper, you okay?” Norman’s hand pressed into his back, feeling the quick breaths.
The older boy blinked at him. “You almost died.”
“We almost die everyday, man.”
“I- I almost lost-“ Dipper choked. He had seen Norman’s face in the blade. Stunned. Terrified. All he did was stand there. That’s not what Dipper was supposed to do. He’d dealt with creatures before. Terrifying and horrible creatures. He stood there and almost lost Norman.
“Hey, I’m okay. Everyone’s okay.” All the reassurance in the world couldn’t stop Dipper’s heart from trying to push its way out of his chest. Norman sighed. “Look, we just need to go to the Shack and-“
“Everything went wrong.” His voice was a whisper. God, he was shaking. His eyes burned and Dipper tried to not let them overflow. “This was so stupid. Can’t something go right? Just once?”
Norman stared, his hand had stopped rubbing Dipper’s back. He sighed, and smiled. “I thought it was a pretty exciting date.”
The word sent Dipper’s head reeling with whiplash when he looked up at Norman. “D-date?”
“That’s what this was, right?”
“I-I- h-how, um-“ Did Norman know? He knew Pacifica and Mabel were following. Had he seen through Dipper’s plans too? It wasn’t like this was different from other adventures. Well, Dipper did pack them food. And he mapped out the clearing beforehand.
“Let’s go.” Norman pulled on his hand. Dipper followed, still reeling but a smile fighting it’s way onto his face. He squeezed his hand and Norman squeezed back. Neither of them let go.
