After Weirdmageddon, Mabel is restless. She checks every corner for cobwebs, checks under her bed for monsters, scratches her arms and brushes her fingers against the windowsill, dust coating the tips as she thinks, this isn't perfect.
She memorizes every bit and piece of her room, obsessively, Dipper says, but he's not one to judge, not when he always keeps a sock puppet stuffed in his pockets and a polaroid hung around his neck, sitting on his chest as he snaps a picture of the sky and tapes it into his newest journal.
"It's... well, it's not the best," Ford sits in his hot, overheating trenchcoat, and Mabel watches as he fiddles with his frozen waffles, not eating them, not even bothering to heat them, because he knows that they'll forever sit there, untouched, until someone puts them back into the freezer. "But it's your way fo making sure that you're safe. And there's nothing..." Hesitant. Uncertain words. Ford has forgotten how the world works, what's right and wrong and what's good and bad, it's all become jumbled up in his head. He bites his tongue and shakes his head, uncertain of whether what he's about to say is true, right. "...Stan?"
"Ford," Grunkle Stan pops his head in, tapping two fingers against the doorframe. His memory is slow, coming and going, and he always sticks close to Ford for a reminder in case he forgets something. "You needed something?"
It's a funny idea, Mabel thinks, the two of them, neither remembering everything right, both needing each other, despite neither having perfect recall of what is right or not, good or not.
"What's the word for..."
Ford spits out a definition, it sounds almost textbook. Maybe it is. Mabel wouldn't know.
"Ah, that," Grunkle Stan's eyes soften, "PTSD. Stands for Post..."
"...Traumatic Stress Disorder," Wendy saunters in the room and squints at Ford's frozen waffle. "Dude. You know that you have to, like, toast them first, right?"
Wendy has taken to coming over at random times to make sure they're all alive, after she came in three days after Weirdmageddon and found them all collapsed on the floor.
("Ghosts and stars," Wendy sighed, "Can't you live without me?"
"We were fine," Stan says to the carpet, "But then Soos went to go see his girlfriend in Europe or something and..."
"Ah," Wendy kicks Stan on the side, "When's he coming back?"
"In two months," Dipper sobs, "We'll never survive."
Wendy sighs and rubs her temples.
Mabel laughs and starts making a dust angel, "Never say never!")
Ford stares at his waffle and frowns, "Yes, well..."
Wendy sighs and doesn't bother waiting for Ford to finish his sentence. "Where's Dipper?" She rolls up his sleeve, "Anyone has any allergies, now would be the time to speak up."
Nobody speaks up.
Wendy shrugs. "Suit yourselves."
She pulls two bowls from the cupboards, finding her way around the kitchen with ease and pulling out ingredients. Flour. Salt. Sugar. Vanilla. She knows the kitchen better than Mabel does, and once she's got everything out she yells for Dipper, who shimmies down the bannister and jumps off of it around five steps up instead of going to the bottom like a normal person.
(And Mabel would laugh and tease, except she knows that Dipper has a permanent scar on his shoulder blades from where Bill sent him down the stairs, knows that there used to be a nail that had scraped through Dipper's skin with frightening ease and that Dipper can't go down without paranoia eating him up.)
"Pancakes?" He barely blinks before taking over, dumping the ingredients in and measuring them carefully, giving three swift stirs before mixing the dry and wet ingredients. "Thanks, Wendy."
"Brought blueberries, too," Wendy places them gently on the counter, careful not to bruise them or break anything. "In case you wanted something special."
And Dipper, he's not the best at smiling, so Mabel does it for him.
"You're the best," she chirps, before washing the blueberries and squinting at the mixture before dumping the entire package in.
"Mabel!" Dipper protests, but there's no bite in his words, no anger, something that's almost a laugh drowning out any annoyance.
"Blueberry pancakes are your favourite," Mabel pokes his cheeks and grins because that's what she does, she brightens up the day and teases and reminds everyone else of the bits and pieces of themselves from before Weirdmagadden, what makes them, them, in the simplest of ways.
"Ah, right," Dipper casts her a shy smile. She wishes that it were bigger, but she understands. "How could I forget my own favourite food?"
Mabel puts her hands on her hips and scrunches up her nose at him. "Okay, okay, Mr. High and Mighty, then what's my favourite food?"
Dipper mock shudders, "Don't make me think about it."
Mabel rubs her cheek against his, "Come on, say it, say it!"
"Mango sushi," Dipper whispers, and then a glazed look comes over his eyes. "The horror..."
Their Grunkles look adequately amused and Wendy looks intrigued as to what mango sushi is. "You've got to take me to try it, sometime," she says thoughtfully, and Mabel laughingly agrees even as Dipper protests, horrified at the mere idea.
Dipper finishes putting everything together and hands the batter to Mabel. "Go nuts," he sighs, looking resigned, and Mabel grins wickedly as she pulls out the pan.
"Don't I always?" She asks charmingly, batting her eyelashes at him.
He laughs and shoves her face away, gently, "Don't do that, it's weird!"
Mabel sets the stovetop to medium heat and decides that she'd like to try something easy. "How about a pancake that looks like an actual cake?" She asks, delighted at the thought.
Dipper tilts his head to the side, squinting at her before he turns and frogmarches out of the room. "I'm going to the grocery store to buy some fruits," he calls into the kitchen, "Does anyone want to come with me?"
Grunkle Stan is quick to stand and chase after Dipper, knowing that as good as Mabel's food may come out, the process in which they are made is very dangerous to any bystanders. "Yes," he says, and waves the others. "Come on, one of you."
"I'll stay and chaperone," Wendy says, grinning.
Dipper loves Wendy, he does, (no longer a crush, but as a friend who is still out of his league), but...
"Are you kidding me?" He stares at her incredulously, "You and Mabel, alone, cooking? It'll be a miracle if the shack is still standing. Grunkle Ford can stay behind, you need to be separated."
Wendy sighs and detaches from the wall, halfheartedly grumbling something about Dipper being a spoilsport and claiming that it was "one time" ("It was not one time," Dipper hissed, narrowing his eyes, "Don't think that I haven't forgotten the brownie incident.") while Ford sat obediently in the chair, casting queasy glances at the doorway from time to time.
"How funny," he laughed nervously, "They're being overly paranoid about your cooking, right?"
Mabel giggled and then tossed Ford a hockey helmet, "Dipper says that if you do nothing else, at least wear that."
Ford gulps.
Breakfast, in the end, turns out quite well, Wendy buying a bit too much bacon than strictly necessary (or even loosely necessary... seriously, Wendy needed to stop, this was getting out of hand) and Dipper finding a steal on cantaloupe, which Ford eagerly chopped up into squares, grateful to be of some use (other than putting out the three possible fires that Mabel may have created).
It's the first real, good breakfast that they've had, (alone or together), in two weeks, since Weirdmageddon ended, and they've gone all out.
Mabel is proud of them.
Slowly, but surely, they're getting better.
(She pours whipped cream on her plate of cantaloupe and watches as Dipper slowly dies inside. Just for good measure, she adds in the witch's potion that she bought a month ago and some maple syrup. Needless to say, she loves it and Dipper is still rinsing off his mouth from when he became too curious for his own good.
Ford laughs when he tastes it, while Stan inches away. Wendy doesn't shy from a challenge and is currently trying to chug as much lemonade as she can to get the taste off her lips.
The frozen waffles stay in the freezer, but Mabel has bacon and pancakes and fruit and her family is here. And that's better than anything she could ask for, even as she runs her nails against her arms to make sure this is real.
It's real and perfect, and Mabel thinks who needs Mabel Land when you can have this.)