Skinny Dipper

1. In The Tub

"Dipper?"

A familiar voice awoke Dipper by returning a startled gaze, one which lasted for as long as it took him to discover her presence. Despite wearing nothing but his brand baseball hat, Dipper was as dry as the bathtub Wendy found him curled up inside.

"Oh, it's just you…well at least the newspaper didn't tell you" said Dipper, in this valley of dead confidence that he willingly offered the ginger girl; he almost obliged her to step in the hollow space.

Wendy's fixation was never a proud one at best, but it still impulsed her to shamefully scratch the back of her neck before she spoke.

"Yeaaah, listen Dipper…about that." replied Wendy, looking away to ignore Dipper's shameless exposure.

"I did this, okay dude? All of this! It's my fault I completely backed down on the day we were supposed to go skinny dipping together…and I'm sorry"

She would usually call him doofus, dork, or any other playfully insulting word that began with the first letter of his name. Dipper could never be mad at Wendy for what she modestly blamed herself for, yet some of that anger was used anyway to emphasize said point.

"Sorry? How is this YOUR fault, Wendy? You're not the one who surprised me by admitting you didn't want to go. I had this coming, hence why I'm paying for it now" replied Dipper, looking at her withdrawn visage which provided but a side view. He could tell this indignity of his was easily contagious no matter what he did.

In fact, he should've known he would be doing nothing but inviting her that way.

"But that's just it! You don't have to "pay for this" because you never really lied to me, dude" began Wendy, facing Dipper in order to add her own assertion to level the balance which Dipper started.

"It was my idea, and when that coward Robbie did what he did best and back down, you actually showed up-"

At that intermission, Wendy fit herself into the unoccupied space of Dipper's bathtub. It was then that she didn't want to stuff her point with unnecessary padding anymore and proceeded with making it, regardless of Dipper's consent. Unlike Dipper, her hat was the first to go.

"If anyone's the liar, it's me"

Dipper was in a daze of blind depression before he noticed Wendy remove her jeans. He woke up after she went for her green jacket.

"Whoa! Wendy! What are you doing?" asked Dipper, now more shocked by Wendy's casual striptease than by the realization of his arise. He was used to seeing Mabel naked whenever they desperately shared a shower, but this was Wendy.

She was the tall girl who introduced him to puberty.

"Relax, man, the paparazzi are miles away from here" said Wendy, typically laid back as she removed her shirt, assuring she was completely in her turquoise green underwear and matching bra, which as Dipper saw, were the same colors that adorned a lighter variant of her translucent pupils.

Wendy had the body of an angel, Dipper couldn't deny it, but he sat back down; blushing at the thought he wouldn't be capable of stopping her. His self-esteem was too low to share even at this heavenly opportunity.

"Listen, Wendy, it's too late to make up for this, you've already embarrassed me enough" said, Dipper, ultimately proving he was more mature than he looked, topping his episode during the inconveniencing at the haunted grocery store. For this, Wendy returned a smile at the kindly blunt side she only assumed Dipper faked no matter what strings his emotions pulled from him.

His try at anger wouldn't be as cute without his now evident crush on her.

"Fine, then let me also embarrass myself while I'm at it" said Wendy lightheartedly, her hands about to unhook her bra. "It's just the two of us showering, Dipp, play it cool"

"But… okay first of all, this is MY bath, and second, not a shower!" said Dipper, beginning to suspect fate might be bribing him via tempting irony.

"Whatever dude, only baths don't usually A. last for hours according to your little sis and Stan downstairs, nor B. are missing any water in them"

"Sigh…I know, but-" said Dipper hesitantly. If he really wanted to make Wendy see she needed no part in this, she had to see him suffer. He looked her in the face so she could actually listen as he tore himself apart, reaching for the core of his memories.

"I guess…I just…wow…*sob*…I…I can't even take one bat…without picturing myself wet, naked, and out in the open like I was that day!" he cried, wiping his nose with his arm.

So it began.

"*Hic* It was humiliating enough…when everyone saw me on the newspaper, but pointing at me or my privates, laughing, nothing but stupid déjà vu!"

Into Dipper's hands fell the imminent tears, the same hands he once used to expose himself to the love of his life, now bearing another instrument of revelation: Dipper's soft yet painful weeping clutched Wendy's guilt right out of her already weakened façade, forcing her to look directly at his broken gape of a face.

"Oh Dipper, I'm really really sorry, sweetie" said Wendy, placing a hand on his shoulder. Dipper looked away rather than welcome Wendy's unfaltering attempt to make this any more personal than it already was.

For the first time since that Lamby dance incident, Wendy finally felt the real apathy which she would trade for Dipper's painful memories. This was not only the second time Wendy had seen him naked, it was also the first time she saw him at all since the day she chickened out on something he still minded nothing in doing, even as she witnessed him go for it.

"The worst part is…I'd rather have them mock me for the constellation on my forehead than call me-" stuttered Dipper. Normally uncertain at first, but with Wendy here, almost as stripped as he was, Dipper elevated his nearly dead confidence up.

"-*Hic* Skinny Dipper!"

Dipper's emotions served as autopilot when he didn't know how to successfully convince Wendy she could do nothing about it.

"At least…Mabel took the risk of suspension…and beat the teeth out of them…whenever someone made fun of my birth mark"

It was true; Wendy would've ignored him if he was a different boy, unfamiliar with the risks of both public and social devastation. Dipper swam these waters before; he had the forehead to prove it. Only this time, his sister or Grunkle Stan's intentions weren't going to save him. Overall, sadness finally betrayed him once Wendy felt she didn't just NEED to help him.

She gave herself no choice.

"Dipper, look. I know it hurts, but you've gotten over bigger things than this; like I said before, you're still not the one who backed down on the whole ordeal, I did! For once, I'm the jerk, I wanted to see which one of you was brave enough to win me back after what happened in Lookout Point" said Wendy. Her firm voice awoke a tenor not many people knew from the lazy yet exuberant lumberjack. She never wanted revenge on neither Robbie nor Dipper, but that didn't mean she wouldn't try it.

She knew this was cruel by her standards either way.

"I used you, Dipper! Isn't there anything I can do? Anything at all?"

"No, Wendy, you can't do anything for me now!" replied Dipper aggressively, pretending every word Wendy previously stated was for naught. Now he just wanted her to go if testing her was too easy.

"I've had this stupid constellation on my forehead since I was a baby!...People, always trying to help me because they feel sorry for me!"

Dipper went temporarily mad there. As weak and emotionally bankrupt, he still didn't have the gut to directly insult Wendy once again.

But Wendy didn't care. From what she could analyze, that's all Dipper ever wanted. Not just to have her believe the guilt would be enough, but also to convince himself it was the only way.

Maybe he was just smarter than her, not more mature.

"So…you want me to just let you wallow in your embarrassment with nothing but tears to help you shower?" asked Wendy insistently. There was no need to turn passively hostile on Dipper back like she already had the first time, even if she didn't mind playing his little game.

"Nobody's making you, Wendy" said Dipper, without an ounce of bliss.

"In fact, why won't YOU leave me alone for a change?"

It was true; Dipper was no more mature than his age allowed him. The depression didn't just strengthen over him, it strengthened him, period. His mind broadened wide enough to understand emotions as obstacles rather than the only true companionship. If Wendy really wanted to see how 'mature' Dipper really was, she had to do it.

She had to fight moral will with physiological will, the kind Dipper gave in to when he tried catching her on the rebound.

"Sigh…You think rejection is fun? You think you know rejection?" She began humoring him, despite predigesting her regret.

"I'm not leaving you this time, Dipper"

Dipper didn't expect it, and if he did, he never felt as if he saw it coming. Without the bra or panties to censor her, Wendy's undressed self flashed into Dipper's colorful perception, expanding not only his cornea but the way he would ever see the teenage redhead ever again. She took another form by removing all her clothes. The lumberjack shirt, sweater, and trousers once felt like extra layers of skin.

And just like any human being's skin, Dipper briefly gave in to the disgust at the image of its removal.

At first at least.

Indeed, the Wendy Corduroy Dipper pictured on a daily basis was shed in place of this real mold. The mold everyone came from at birth. With age, fairly built curves adorned her shape. The naked redhead got on her feet once Dipper took the time to soak it all up, She turned her back on him and bowed to the front in order to reach the handle, giving Dipper too much to absorb without wanting to.

Wendy smiled at imagining his face after seeing everything new to him, her cherry pink nipples centered on each of her swaying breasts to the swarms of freckles, running from her lower back to her upper thighs. Her sensitively pallid flesh intensely shading the wedges of her backside, let alone the slit that compressed the biggest mystery Dipper never knew he'd want to divulge.

Once he admitted the idea himself, the red flush faded in him.

"Feel fee to cover your ears, Dipper, if that 'stupid déjà vu' of yours comes back" Wendy joked once she finally took a glance at Dipper's seemingly unabashed state.

She did it; she punctured greatly into Dipper's inner longings. It never took a psychology undergrad nor Soos to figure out Dipper's soft spot for the eccentric redhead. Wendy just didn't know how far she might be going once Dipper not only covered his ears but his lower regions via his protruding knee.

"Just chillax, dude" said Wendy, laying both his hands down as she shot him a friendly look. Nearly the same one he almost 'left her hanging' with.

"We'll just share the bath together instead of showering just yet, wink"

Before Dipper knew how to reply, the water began to circle around his waist. Soon enough, Wendy nodded at the thought he seemed to allocate.

"Besides, the water will be high enough to hide it for you"

"Wends…I…I don't know what to-" stuttered Dipper, oblivious to how elevated the water really was. Wendy's index finger ceased Dipper's muddled vowels, hinting at her desire to cherish Dipper's potential solace.

"Ssshhh, don't then…like I said, let it rock" She added placidly before removing her finger and lying down on the other side. Indeed, the calm company in some small legroom apparently overpowered the urge to do this in a lake now. In spite of the alien comfort it provided, Dipper still couldn't help but wonder how long this "healing" would work.

He was still in deeper waters than the ones he now found himself in.

Here's my try at a less artsy approach, I hope you enjoy and please review, Chapter 2 coming soon!