Disclaimer: I don't own Gravity Falls.

Warmth In The Night

Pacifica took a breath of relief as her door closed, shutting out the world behind her. She clapped her hands twice and the lights lite the room up. Despite the snow on her outside windowsill, her warm was as toasty as the rest of the house.

It was Christmas night. This day had always been filled with boring parties, luxurious but silent meals, and gifts that she had little interest in. Much of her gifts were really just more trinkets for the mansion. She battled off the exhaustion from the day in favor of the prospect of finally getting to what she'd been looking forward to for weeks.

Outside her room, she heard footsteps approaching her room. Pacifica was quick to clap her lights off, climb into her bad and lay still, pretending to sleep. She couldn't get caught. Not now. Relief overcame her when the footsteps passed and faded away. She was careful to climb out of bed and move quickly to her walk-in closet. After shutting herself in and locking the door, she clapped again, and lights came on once again, revealing rows of cloths and shoes. She went to the back of the closet and pulled something from the top; a pair of packages.

These were her real presents. Her friends, Dipper and Mabel Pines, had sent them a couple of weeks ago with the explicit instructions to the butler to keep them secret from her parents. He'd complied, presented them to Pacifica in private, and she'd hidden them in the closet. Her parents would never allow this; they said the Pines twins were a bad influence on her.

The first one was from Mabel. A messily wrapped clump with wads of tape. By the softness, and knowing Mabel, it was pretty obvious what was in it. Dipper's present was more of a mystery. It was a neatly wrapped square box with the same wrapping paper, held with two bits of meticulously placed tape. She imagined that Mabel had been the first to get to the tape and used up most of it. Sounded like her alright.

Mabel's gift turned out to be a sweater, big surprise. Knitted in her favorite color, though; hot pink. A point of interest was that there was a button and a small flap that formed a concealing door. On the flap where the words 'Totally Not Suspicious'.

Pacifica laughed at this. "She's crazy." she muttered to herself. She undid the button and flipped the flap, and the laughing stopped. Behind the flap, Mabel had knitted the following image: a green hill with a light brown llama standing beside a darker green pine tree, a shooting star with a rainbow tail flying overhead. "Wow, Mabel." Pacifcia whispered in aw.

Now she knew the real reason she was to keep these gifts a secret; her parents would surly get rid of these the moment they came out of their wrapping. She hugged the sweater, nuzzling into its warmth before she looked at Dipper's package. That was the one that made her nervous.

Pacifica liked Dipper. Like...really liked him. After saving the world by their side, the Pines had been heading home to California. As a goodbye, Pacifica had done something to Dipper that she realized afterword was a pretty stupid move. She kissed him. As soon as the bus was out of sight, Pacifica started torturing herself with questions. How would she face him next summer? How would the kiss effect their friendship? Would things be awkward between them? Did he like it? Did he not?

Pacifica stopped herself. She had both of their emails and though she and Mabel wrote each other regularly, there was still no word from Dipper. Mabel assured her he was too busy, advanced placement came with lots of homework, and it did make sense. The most she usually got was 'Dipper says hi'.

The box was surprisingly light, and inside she found a small framed picture; the perfect size for a nightstand if she were allowed such pictures, much too small for the larger box it came in. Part of her wondered if he'd done that on purpose. His way of keeping secrets, or a mild prank, perhaps. The picture was of the three of them. She remembered when it had been taken; back at her family's party when she had finally become friends with Dipper and broke the ice with Mabel.

Her own image smiled back at her – a rare, genuine smile – and she had an arm slung around each of their shoulders. Mabel was on her right, looking like a big pink puffball, hugging her like a stuffed animal and her face glowing with delight. She'd been giddy that Pacifica was now open to really being her friend. On her left, Dipper stood tall in his tux, his arm around her and his hand was clamped on her shoulder. He made a 'v' with his free hand and gave the camera a small, shy smile. The boy was even more awkward than her, but he was very sweet.

The picture frame was a reflective gold – clearly fake – but that didn't matter to her. Across each side of the border one word was in embroidered; 'Friends'. So, Dipper still liked her, at least as a friend. That was a relief.

She'd have to find a place to hide these. The sweater could be hidden in this closet easily and she supposed the picture would fit neatly in her nightstand. The trick was hiding them well enough so no one could come across them. If she was gonna keep secrets, she wouldn't be stupid about it; like keeping everything in a barely concealed room. Her parents...weren't smart about that.

She quickly hung the sweater up, placing it just beside the brownish llama sweater, which her parents also hated. Mabel had given it to her as a token of their friendship the evening before she and Dipper had left. That was two sweaters she could only wear in public; her parents couldn't do much when the townsfolk could see.

She climbed back into her bed and gave the picture of her, Dipper, and Mabel one last look before she placed in carefully in a drawer. She snuggled under the warm covers. This boring, routine Christmas had become well worth it for those gifts. For the first time since that party, she fell asleep with a smile on her face.

Consider this a sequel to of sorts to 'Summers End'. Review.