Hail, Hail

Written for the 2017 Wendip Week prompt "The gang finds out."

(August 19-25, 2014)

Tambry was the first. She and Wendy had met over in Morris at a chic little restaurant for lunch to talk about a million and one details about Tambry's and Robbie's wedding (which was still ten months away, but you can never be too prepared) when Tambry suddenly gasped and said, "Omigod! Who gave you a ring?"

Crap! I forgot to take it off! But, trying to keep her cool and pass it off as no big deal, Wendy said, "This? It's a friendship ring. Just a little silver band, see? No diamond."

"Wendy," Tambry said, her eyes aglow. "You do NOT wear a friendship ring on the third finger of your left hand! Dish!"'

"Aw, it's really not anything that big," Wendy said, shrugging. "It just fits my left hand better. I hardly ever even wear it. Just a sweet gift from a guy I kinda-sorta like. You're right, though. I should force it onto my right ring finger." She pretended to have difficulty screwing it onto the finger, though actually it fit equally well there. "I'll probably have to soap this to get it off."

"Who?" Tambry demanded, shoving her chicken salad aside and leaning over the table, her gaze drilling into Wendy's.

"Nobody you know," Wendy countered, shifting a little in her chair.

"Dipper Pines," Tambry said. "OMG, you and Dipper—you're engaged!"

"Not so loud!" Wendy said. The Bon Ton in Morris wasn't exactly crammed with people who would recognize her—Gravity Falls folks in general thought the citizens of Morris were stuck up with no reason for being so, and few Fallers ever came to Morris unless it was to visit someone in the hospital or to consult a specialist doctor. "We're not engaged!" Wendy insisted. "Well, you know. I mean, we've talked about it, sort of, but the age thing, his parents, my dad, you know, a million things—"

Tambry took her hand in hers. "Wendy, this is Tambry here. You know what? I have this sharp memory of one time when we were, like five? And you saw this boy and told me he was cute? And I told him what you said, and you pushed me off my bike?"

"Yeah. . . I sort of remember that," Wendy said, frowning.

Tambry squeezed her hand. "Girl! That kid was totally a dupe of Dipper Pines! Looked just like him!"

Wendy had no mental image. She mainly remembered feeling guilty for shoving her best friend to the sidewalk. "How do you even remember that?"

"I always remember cute guys," Tambry reminded her. "Oh, this is so great! He'll be such a cool husband, always whisking you away on wild adventures—"

"Nothing's settled!" Wendy said firmly. "We've talked, that's all. We—"

"Are you doing it?"

"—just have to, wait, what? TAMBRY! He's fourteen! Of course not!"

"He's a mature fourteen," Tambry said. "And won't he be fifteen in like two weeks?"

"Yeah, but—"

"You know what the guys we know were like when they were fifteen!" Tambry's grin became wickedly knowing.

"Well—he's not like that. And we've promised each other to wait and—see if this can—maybe in time, we don't know—look, just promise me, with your hand to God, that you won't tell a soul!"

"I promise! Oh, Wendy, I'm so happy for you," Tambry said with tears of happiness in her eyes.

And it was totally a coincidence, or maybe in the grand scheme of life it wasn't, that Mabel's farewell summer-ending sleepover occurred that same night.

Candy, Grenda, and Pacifica came over to the Shack, Dipper swapped bedrooms with Mabel—because the attic was the right size for a mob of four girls and the guest room was OK for one person—and in the course of the evening somehow a game of Truth or Dare eventuated.

Well, at sleepovers they always do, don't they? But I wanted to use a fancy word. Eventuated. Heh! Anyway, somehow Mabel (who always went for the dares) unaccountably decided on "truth" at one point. And unfortunately, Candy asked her, "Is there remaining a place in Dipper's heart for Candy?" She didn't actually have a real crush on Dipper, but as she had said a few times, "I would not kick him out of my baenang if I found him there." That means "knapsack," by the way. Candy can be odd.

Mabel teetered indecisively. She knew she couldn't tell the whole truth, but this was Truth or Dare, and it was a sacred obligation, practically, to be a little bit honest. She said as comfortingly as she could, "I'm sorry Candy, Dipper loves someone else."

"Oh," Candy said. "That small sound you hear is my heart breaking in three equal pieces, each weighing one hundred grams!"

"It's Wendy," Pacifica said, her voice flat, her face expressionless.

"I didn't say that!" Mabel protested.

"I know it's Wendy." Pacifica looked sad, not angry. "Everybody knows it has to be Wendy."

"Hey, Pacifica," Grenda said in an effort to give her a little comfort, "if it's any consolation, Marius has an eligible cousin who's a baronet."

"How old is he?" Pacifica asked.

"I think eleven. But he's single!"

"Worked for the redhead," Pacifica muttered. However, she didn't take Grenda up on the offer, nor did she sleep much that night.

So by the next morning because of Tambry, Robbie knew, and the guys in Tombstone found out about it from him, and then of course Lee and Nate heard their news, and their girls, and Soos got wind of it from someone who dropped into the gift shop, and . . . you know how it goes. And you've probably played the game "telephone."

And that was why on the following Wendesday, Wendy discovered she was secretly married and three months pregnant with twins. Or that was what Lazy Susan told her, congratulating her and advising her on the best diet for expectant mothers.

And that was why Dipper was totally confused when on Thursday afternoon Gideon Gleeful saw him downtown, walked up to him, and said, "Well played, Dipper. Well played. But you just remember, now, if you get the least mite out of line, she can break your arm!"

And it was also why on the following Friday, when they got together alone for their last movie night of the summer, Wendy said morosely, "Dude, everybody in town thinks we're doin' it!"

"I know," Dipper said. "Stan's already jumped me and I had to deny everything. I explained and swore him to secrecy, but I'm not sure even he believes me. It's crazy."

Wendy sighed and leaned against him. "You know what, dude? We might just as well go ahead and do it."

Dipper's mouth felt as dry as the Mojave at high noon in the middle of a summer when a persistent high-pressure area over the Pacific deflected the usual wind patterns and kept the air depleted of moisture. He felt simultaneously excited and terrified and stammered, "Um—but—but we made a promise—"

Wendy tickled his chin and smiled at him from six inches away and in a husky voice asked, "Don't you want to, you know, do it with me?"

"Yeah! Of course. I do. I really do. But—but—you know. It's too soon. Uh. Do, do you want to? With, uh, you know, with, uh, with me?"

"So bad!" She hugged him and he felt the warmth of her sigh on his neck. "And that's exactly why we're not gonna. Stay strong, Dip. Three more years from the last day of this month, man!" she pushed away but reached out to hold his hand. "Hang tough, dude. We good?"

"Yeah. Yeah, we're good," Dipper said, squeezing her hand and trying to control his heart rate. For a minute, it had zoomed way up there.

She broke the hug but kept her arm over his shoulders, and he reached up and held her other hand, too. She sighed. "OK, man. My fault. I was wearin' that silver ring you had made for me in the ghost town, I slept with it on my finger the way I do sometimes, and then that morning I forgot to take it off, and somebody saw it on my finger and jumped to conclusions. So—hope you won't mind this—since I don't want to hide the ring away in a drawer, but also don't want to wear it, like, right out in public where people will see it and wonder, I—well, I got a piercing. So I can always wear the ring where nobody will see it."

"I—whatever you want to do, Wendy. After we got those matching henna tattoos on the last day of Woodstick, I'd even get a matching piercing if you asked me to."

"Not necessary, dude," she told him. "OK, you're privileged, 'cause we aren't gonna each other for a long time after the end of the month, right? And 'cause you did give it to me. And 'cause I love it, and you. So—here, this is my solemn pledge to you that I'll be ready the moment you are."

And then, smiling like the Mona Lisa, she showed him exactly where she was wearing the ring.

The End