I do not own the show GRAVITY FALLS or any of the characters; both are the property of the Walt Disney Company and of Alex Hirsch. I make no money from these stories but write just for fun and in the hope that other fans enjoy reading them. I will ask, please, do not copy my stories elsewhere on the Internet. I work hard on these, and they mean a lot to me. Thank you.

Engagement Rings and Hot-Tub Flings

(July 2016)

1: What Does the Gnome Say?

From the Journals of Dipper Pines: Tuesday, July 5: It's almost eleven PM, and an hour ago I got back from the bonfire clearing, where I had a long talk with Jeff and a short one with Shmebulock. Well, all talks with Shmebulock tend to be short ones, I guess, but anyway, I was there for an hour.

"Look," I told Jeff, "you guys have to stop being my sister's connection."

He didn't follow that, so I explained: "Twice now you've given her Gnome, I don't know, potions or something, and it's worked out badly both times. Remember when you gave her the super-strength stuff? She might have killed herself! She couldn't stop testing her strength, and she exhausted herself."

"Those mushrooms were good," Jeff said in a reminiscent tone of voice.

"Shmebulock!" Shmebulock said, nodding eagerly.

"Well, what works for Gnomes doesn't work the same way for humans. This last time, she turned invisible and when she turned visible again, she was naked in public. And she had to vomit rainbows for a really long time!"

"That wasn't really our fault," Jeff pointed out. "She was supposed to sprinkle a little of the powder in her shoes, not dip her finger in it and taste it! Gnomes wouldn't do that. We have better sense . . . es of what we shouldn't do," he said. His expression was like Soos's when he's just corrected himself and says, "Saved it!"

"My sister will taste anything," I told him. "What if the rainbow thing didn't work? She could have been stuck invisible for a really long time!"

"Shmebulock," Shmebulock muttered.

Jeff glanced at him. "We don't know that it would make her kids invisible," he said. "That's just speculation."

"Guys," I said, "look, we get along now. Let's keep it that way. Will you promise me that if Mabel ever asks for anything, uh, Gnomish again, you'll come to me and tell me before you decide to give it to her? It's for your own good."

"Her own good, you mean," Jeff said.

"I know what I said," I told him.

He and Shmebulock conferred and agreed that notifying me without giving anything to Mabel would be a good idea and said they would do it. But before the peace conference broke up, Shmebulock said something to Jeff—you can guess what—and Jeff said, "He wants to know if the same thing applies to Teek."

That made me suspicious. "Has Teek asked you guys for anything? Potion of strength? Love potion? Something to make him, uh, grow?"

"No, no, nothing like that," said Jeff. "More in the geological line. Like a specimen of a kind of rock. It doesn't have any power that we know of, though."

"I guess that would be OK," I said.

I mean, what can I do? I am not my sister's boyfriend's keeper. And Teek is level headed, so I don't think he needs to be kept. I do sort of wish I'd asked Jeff exactly what Teek had requested, but it really wasn't my business, so we left it at that.

When I got back to the Shack, Mabel was still awake, sitting in the parlor eating chocolate-chip cookies and watching an old romantic movie on TV. I sat down next to her.

"Tell me the rest of it," I said.

So she confessed it was all part of her plan to follow Teek around and see if he was flirting with other girls. I shook my head. "You didn't have to do that! Look, I've been around Teek when you weren't there, and he's shy around girls. I've never seen him be more than polite, even when it's a girl he knows from school. You don't have anything to worry about."

"I just wanted to be sure," she said.

She didn't much want to talk about it. Today I went easy on her, because she still had an invisibility spell hangover, or that's what she told me, and she missed work because she wasn't feeling up to it. But she had eaten a good dinner and seemed to feel much better, so now I made her go through the whole story. "Weren't you embarrassed?" I asked her.

She squirmed. "Yeah, kinda," she admitted. "But Teek was a gentleman. He touched my boob by accident when he couldn't see me, and then he grabbed my butt when we tried the kissing thing—I think it made him dizzy and he had to hold onto SOMETHING—and when I got sick and was heaving, he just forgot to let go. But then he held my hair up when I was barfing, and when I turned visible, all I could think of was somebody over on the beach might have binoculars and see me, so Teek gave me the shirt off his back. Literally! And also the jeans off his butt and the laces out of his shoes."

"But he saw you naked!"

"Pffbbt! You can't look alluring when you're retching and puking, Brobro. Anyway, you and Wendy gave each other an eyeful out at the lake. Ooh-la-la!"

"That's different," I said. "She had to clear her head, and a swim was the way to do it. We just didn't have any swimming things. Anyhow, this isn't about us, it's about you!"

"Look, Dip, Teek isn't a bad guy. He's a hero! He saved me from exposure! And when we went to his car, people were leaving the fireworks show, and they saw him in his underwear. Pacifica's already texted me, teasing me about it! He took a bullet for me, Dip! By the way, have a word with him, would you, about underwear? He still wears tighty whities, the way you used to. He'd look a whole lot yummier in boxer briefs, like the ones you wear now."

"Guys don't talk underpants to other guys!" I said.

"Well, that's stupid. I've already ordered a bra that Pacifica swears is the most comfortable and easiest one to get out of in a hurry. C'mon, Dipper. Say a word about fashionable underthings to him. For me? Please?"

"Wait a minute," I said. "You've been peeking at me in my underwear?"

"You saw me in my bra and panties!" she shot back.

"Not on purpose!"

Well, I won't go into it. We kind of bickered, but I told her if she wanted to say something about Teek's undershorts, she could do it, but I was out.

"How about Wendy? Would she do it for me? I don't want to upset Teek. We're just getting re-balanced as it is. Our chakras have started to chakra cha-cha-cha again, if you know what I mean. Wink!"

"I do not want to know about this," I said, and gave it up for the evening.

Now, lying in bed with my Journal propped up on my knees, I'm wondering about going ring-shopping with Wendy. From little things she's said, I'm not sure that she really wants to make a public show of being engaged yet. I hope she's not having second thoughts.

I know I never will.

You always go online to start your shopping process, or you do if you are Dipper Pines. He spent Wednesday evening on the internet, looking up jewelry shops in and around Portland.

They ranged from national chains (like the one where a guy in the diamond business is a friend of yours) to mom-and-pop shops and to individual crafters, including a good many aging hippie types. Portland is like that—a sort-of big city (not in San Francisco's league, though) with a history of being off-beat. And proud of it.

Anyway, as Dipper scanned the web sites, one caught his eye: Landlord of the Rings, which advertised "We have thousands of engagement rings just waiting to move out!"

It looked weird and quirky, and at first he wrote it off as silly, but then . . . well, Mabel was silly, and he wouldn't write her off. Somehow he kept coming back to it.

Two women in their late thirties or early forties owned it, and they looked like a couple. He wondered if they wrote their own ad copy and sort of hoped they didn't. It offered lots of hype, usually a bad sign. As Stanley Pines's great-nephew, Dipper knew a few things about hype. So come-ons like "Lowest Prices, Highest Quality in the Northwest!" and "Put a ring on it!—for LESS!" and such had relatively little effect on Dipper.

However, the "Mission Statement"—really, how many big stores have one of those?—made him grin. "We will handcraft your ideal ring from your specifications and you do not have to purchase until it is all you dreamed of. We do not discriminate and will sell to any individual and any couple in love, no matter what gender or species. Whom you love is your own business, not ours. Only bring money."

That was so Grunkly it made him chuckle. He spent some time on the web site for Landlord of the Rings. Their jewelry did look good in the photos. Of course we're talking online here, who's to say the proprietors of Landlord of the Rings didn't just download every photo of a good-looking ring they could find and then foist them off as pictures of genuine merchandise?

He made a few notes, turned in, and the next day he got so busy when a horde of tourists invaded the Shack that he forgot about engagement rings. But then the next morning, Thursday July 7, as he and Wendy ran, he asked her if she'd ever heard of the place. "Nope," she said. "That's Portland, though. If not for Gravity Falls, Portland would be the weirdest place west of the Rockies."

"When we do our shopping run, you want to take a look there?" Dipper asked.

"Yeah, I guess so," Wendy said. "Couldn't hurt, right?"

"And you're still willing to wear the ring?"

She slowed and stopped. "About that."

Dipper's heart sank.

She saw his apprehension and gave him a playful punch on the shoulder. "You are such a dork! That's why I love you. No, I mean yeah, I will, but—little proviso, OK?—let me begin wearing it on August 31, OK?

"Our birthday?" Dipper asked, surprised.

"Yep. A one-year engagement. Well, officially. See, my friends won't tease me so much, and my Dad won't be all suspicious, if we're long-distance right after you put the ring on my finger. Is that all right?"

He was so relieved that he hugged her. "It's fine with me," he said. "I was afraid that—never mind."

Afraid that I was gonna break up with you? Get out of town, Dipper! This is me! This is you!

—I know, I know. What you told me the other day about people's personalities being set by the time they're twelve—I guess I'll always be a worrier and a pessimist. And, let's face it, a dork.

Nah, those are things that make you a good guy, too. Hey, when I was twelve, I was taking, like, insane risks. We were camping this one time and I chased a bear off before anybody else was awake. I went over a waterfall once saving Tambry's dog—he'd jumped in and didn't know the current was gonna wash him over, so I grabbed onto him and held him and curled up when we shot over the falls—

—Not THE falls?

No, dude! These were ten, twelve feet tall. I'll show 'em to you some time. Anyway, I saved Liquor and got him back to shore. What I mean, I did crazy dangerous things just on impulse. You take care of reining me in, Dip, and I'll take care of getting us in trouble.

—Deal—but "Liquor?" Seriously?

As they resumed their run, Wendy explained that "Liquor" was a gag name, because the pup was a licker—anything, anybody. He never drank anything stronger than water, though. He had passed away more than a year before Dipper and Mabel first came to Gravity falls, at the age of thirteen. Tambry had been heartbroken.

But at least now she was happy. Wendy had heard from her: the Tombstones were off on a summer tour, and they were recording another album down in L.A.. "Good for them," Dipper said.

"Yeah," Wendy said wryly, "but, man! My old gang is so scattered out now. I really miss them."

And Dipper began to realize why his Lumberjack Girl had become such a dedicated student and such a hard worker.

It was hard to understand, but his cheerful, laid-back, outgoing girlfriend—

Was a little lonely.