Summer was almost figuratively dead for Dipper. School would rear its ugly head again two days from now. Riding the bus on the way home wouldn't take too long, only a few hours. This gave Dipper time to reflect on a dream he had.
He dreamed of an extraordinary summer filled with mystery and adventure. He discovered all sorts of creatures. He found a journal whose author disappeared, and he became obsessed with finding the author. He even became a hero of his home town, Gravity Falls. Alongside his sister they defeated a demonic triangle and prevented the apocalypse.
Waking up, Dipper realized the dream was sort of... silly. His summer was as thrilling as sweeping the floor and chopping wood, just some of the chores he did in his Grand Uncle Stan's tourist trap. As for mystery, the biggest one is how tourists found the place interesting with its phony attractions. The strangest part of the dream to Dipper was the sister part. A twin sibling? Impossible, Dipper was an only child. He couldn't imagine living with a sibling, much less a sister. All in all, weird dream.
Soon Dipper arrived home. Lifting the welcome mat positioned below the front door revealed the house keys, just as his parents said it was placed.
"I'm home." he said to the empty living room that he entered. It was just afternoon, so no parents would appear to greet him now. The boy led himself to the kitchen and made instant noodles for lunch. The quiet meal ended, and Dipper entered his bedroom.
The room was tidy, maybe cleaner than how he thought he left it. A bookshelf stood at the corner of the room while a computer and its desk occupied the corner opposite the bookshelf. Adjacent the computer desk was a closet. The bed that he's been sleeping on for as long as he could remember was at the center. A bathroom was located on the right side of the room.
Right away Dipper started unpacking his suitcase. He took off his cap and gazed at the brown star in the center. Surely the cap wouldn't fit him any longer, he wasn't 10. He decided to place it in his closet. Forever. No more caps for now, he thought. The rest of his clothes meanwhile were dumped in the hamper in his bathroom. Finally he placed his camera bag on his desk.
As he finished, he noticed a cap inside his suitcase. A blue and white cap with a blue pine tree in the center. A note attached said "To Dipper, here you go. -Stan".
"So I guess I'm still wearing caps then." Dipper spoke as he placed the cap on his head.
The hat reminded Dipper that his summer wasn't too bad. The Mystery Shack was surrounded by a thick forest filled with animals and plants. These became the focus of many photographs Dipper took. Recalling that those photographs were still in his camera bag, Dipper took it to lay the photos he developed onto his desk. He gazed into each picture for sometime until he realized how boring it was.
Out of boredom, Dipper decided to call his friend Bill and see if he wanted to come over. He fished his phone out of his pocket. Several moments passed until a voice answered.
"Well well well, glad to hear from you again Pines." Bill said over the phone.
"Finally free from my con artist grand uncle. Wanna come over?" Dipper asked. "Hm, sure. Be there in an hour or two." With this, Bill hung up and Dipper placed the phone back into his pocket. He stared at his computer, and spent the next hour and a half on the Internet.
The buzzing door bell broke Dipper's intense focus on nothing of importance. Opening the door, his blonde best friend greeted him. The boy of similar age was clothed in shorts similar to Dipper's as well as a shirt with Egyptian pyramids. "What's with the crappy top hat?" Dipper asked. "Decided to follow in your footsteps and wear a hat everywhere." The two made their way to the kitchen to get cans of Pitt.
As he closed the fridge door , Bill noticed the new hat his friend was sporting. "Speaking of hats, that new one represents you well." He said as he pointed at it.
Dipper raised an eyebrow. "Why does it?"
"You know, Dipper Pines. Pine tree hat." Bill explained.
"Oh. Never thought of it like that. What a coincidence." Clutching their cold beverages, the two made their way to Dipper's room. Bill sat down on his friend's bed once inside.
"It's been a while Dipper! How's the Mystery Hack experience?"
Before correcting him Dipper then realized that his grand uncle's tourist trap was missing the S in Shack the whole time. No wonder some people chuckled at mere sight of the building.
"Mystery Hack. Grand Uncle Stan described perfectly. The old fossil made me work all day doing chores around the shack. Got the hat as a reward. Meanwhile, the Mystery Hack scams people into buy total garbage for at least 20 bucks! Can you believe it?" Dipper exclaimed. "He sold a dumb tourist a turkey bone once and called it an Oregon Dinosaur Fossil. The tourist bought it for 75 dollars!"
"No way he did that." Bill said shaking his head. "This guy sounds like a seasoned con artist."
"Exactly!" Dipper agreed.
"Dipper, I have to meet this man. Imagine all the scams I could learn from him."
"He'd scam you out of your clothes before you learn a thing from him." Dipper warned.
"It gets even more seedy. It turns out he doesn't even own the place, my other grand uncle does. Great Uncle Ford decided stay and keep the business open, scamming more people in the process."
Bill realized something but had to be certain. "You have another grand uncle and they both live in the place?" Bill asked.
"Well, I guess so." Dipper replied.
The blonde boy connected the dots. "So they're both gay then?" he concluded. Instead of an approval of some sort Bill witnessed laughter almost kill his friend.
"No... Siblings... They aren't gay!" Dipper managed to say between laughing.
As the laughing died down, Bill saw photographs sprawled on Dipper's desk. "Oh, you took photos while you were there. And I thought the old guys made you work all day." Bill walked towards the table intending to look at one before he felt a cold splash of Pitt cola on his face. Dipper rushed to take the pictures. However, a hand grasped his arm, preventing him from doing so.
"What the hell was that for?" Bill spoke in frustration as he stared into his friend's eyes.
Nervously, Dipper attempted to respond. "Sorry, sorry. I wanted to arrange the good pictures from the bad ones. No use seeing the blurry ones right?"
Bill wiped his hand on his pants and took a photo from the desk. It displayed a picture of two girls in a swimming pool, smiles visible as they splashed water onto each other. Dropping the picture the blonde boy picked up another photograph. This one displayed a female life guard, seated in her life guard chair.
"Stolen shots huh?" Bill asked.
"Y-Yes." Dipper replied.
"Well, I'm not gonna ask anything else. Have fun with those." He carefully placed the photograph back on the desk.
"Anyways, want to know what I've been up to?" Bill asked to change the subject.
"Vandalism, pranks and maybe theft?" Dipper guessed.
Bill wasn't exactly the greatest role model. The graffiti of the mayor and school principal dressed as Stalin and Hitler on the convinience store? His idea of a great time. The exams were perfected by nearly everyone? Students knew who to thank. 3 dozen pizzas on your doorstep at 3 am? Bill. He did it.
"Kind of. I've been dealing forks lately. Aside from eating, you'd think they'd be worth my time? Nope. So why are they interesting?" Bill paused expecting an answer to the question. A shrug from Dipper allowed him to elaborate.
"A few weeks back some weird girl posts on her blog, says she wanted dozens of plastic forks and was willing to pay for them. An exchange in the park later, and wham! $80 that I didn't need to steal! Then I realized something: satisfying a weird request is pretty fun. Plus they pay a lot."
"Selling cheap store bought forks to some weirdo doesn't seem fun to me."
"Did I forget to mention that I hid in a restaurant bathroom until closing time just to take plastic forks? Ah, good times. Also good tasting fries the cooks left out." Bill narrated. "I should take you on these jobs some time, if I find something to sell that is. I wonder what though..." At that moment, Bill's vision gravitated to the photographs on Dipper's desk.
A/N: Finally it's out! I've been holding onto this for a while now. Leave a review if you could, tell me what you liked/disliked about the chapter, and what I can improve on. The next chapter should come in a month or two (it's written, but needs editing).