Disclaimer: Sadly, I own nothing and all rights belong to Disney and Alex Hirsch.
The first day of school had been horrible. Dipper had to force himself forward as he followed the broken concrete sidewalk towards his house. His sister trudged beside him, her shiny black flats scraping against the rough ground. Shoulders slumped Dipper heaved his backpack further up. The khaki bag weighed at least half his body weight already and the bulky textbooks crashing against his back with each step reminded him of the school work that was about to pile up.
"Dipper," Mabel tugged on the fraying sleeve of his t-shirt, "What are we going to do about gym and math?" Staring at the dark lines beneath his sister's sunken eyes Dipper realized for the first time how much stress they were already under even without school. His lips pursed and he focused back on the path ahead.
"I- I don't know." Gym and math were the only two classes they didn't have together and Dipper had no idea how they were going to handle it. Throughout the summer they'd always had each other's' back and to have to pretend everything was normal without his twin was not something he wanted to have to suffer through.
Stepping across the freshly painted crosswalk Dipper caught sight of the pale yellow siding of their house.
"Finally," Dipper heard Mabel mutter under her breath and then she had taken his arm, dragging him towards the empty house. His wrist began to cramp under her fierce grip but he allowed himself to be hauled towards the familiar house. Passing under the swaying branches of the towering oak tree Dipper let his free hand drag over the initials carved into wood. He and Mabel had used the pocket knife they'd found in the kitchen drawer to write them at the beginning of the summer. It seemed like such a long time ago.
"Shoot." Dipper turned to peer up at his twin who had taken the higher position on the stoop.
"Do you have a key? I forgot mine," she smiled down at him sheepishly.
Grinning at Mabel's foolish expression he gently tugged the sleeve of her fuzzy pink sweater. The soft fabric clutched loosely in his hand he led the way around to the back of the house, his navy blue canvas shoes growing dark with the moisture still coating the grass.
"There's usually a key-," he said to himself, looking through the small flower beside the back door for the miniature stone cat.
"Found it!" Mabel was on her hand and knees in the dirt, waving the statue at him. Picking up the key from the deep imprint in the ground Mabel set the cat back down.
She placed the dirt covered key in his palm and Dipper tried his best to wipe the mud of its surface. Instead, the muck just smeared, getting stuck in the grooves. He glared down at the filthy piece of metal and inserted into the doorknob, the golden coating chipping off in his hand. With and ominous creak the rusty hinges gave way and the door swung open.
Padding into the dark room, Dipper pushed his shoes off. The lights flickered on as the switch moved beneath his fingers.
"I put the key back." Mabel spoke softly behind him and gave her an appreciative smile.
"How do you do it?" Dipper spoke suddenly. "At school you act so normal I-"
His vision grew blurry and he swallows the growing lump in his throat. Earth surrounded him and Dipper found his sister buried in his arms.
"It's okay Dipper, you're okay," she said, voice muffled by his t-shirt. "I just think about how I acted before."
"I can't even remember before." His voice was scratchy even to his own ears and numbness slowly sunk in. He couldn't remember not jumping at every sound or not warily checking each shadow for hidden figures. He couldn't remember a time when simple geometric shapes were just that and he couldn't remember looking in a mirror and not expecting to see glowing yellow orbs staring back at him.
"I so sorry Dipper, I-I should've been there for you."
The desperate look in her eyes shattered something deep inside him and warm tears began to spill from his eyes. Tightening his hold on her he spoke softly into her chocolate hair. "You pulled through, you always do."
But was it soon enough, echoed through the air unsaid.
For the first time since Dipper had been home the house was filled with noise. Music poured from the speakers in Mabel's room flooding the house with songs from the 80s and she sung along happily, screeching the words in Dipper's ears. As the current song finally came to an end Mabel hopped of Dipper's bed, dragging him off behind her.
"Come on!"
"Mabel, wait-." He sighed as his sister vanished into the hallway. Her calls for him to hurry up ringing through the woodwork.
Entering the blinding pink room, he made his way other to his twin. "What are Mom and Dad going to say about this?"
"Don't be such a downer Dip-Dop, now help me move-" Her voice was cut off as she dropped the side of the mattress she had been attempting to remove from pale bed frame.
Lifting the mattress off of his sister he smiled down at her as she lay half buried in the plush hot-pink carpet, "You get to explain to Mom."
"Deal!"
30 minutes later they had managed to drag the mattress into the hallway. Dipper's muscles groaned with the effort as he tried to pull it forward another inch. "I blame you."
"Uggghh, why didn't anyone tell me mattress are heavy, I thought they'd be like giant marshmallows," Mabel said as she collapsed next to him, hitting the wall with a thud.
"They should come with-" Dipper sat up quickly. "Do you still have those roller skates?" Moving the enormous cushion would be so much easier if it had wheels.
"Of course!" Mabel jumped up from the floor, almost tumbling back down in her haste. She returned with a pair of what Dipper knew used to be yellow skates a few seconds later, covered in a layer of dust herself.
"Now if we just balance the mattress on top of them…" Dipper said quietly, more to himself than his sister.
Together the two twins were able to move the mattress out of the hallway and into Dipper's room. Leaving it propped up against his navy bedspread Dipper toppled onto the dark wood floor. "Finally."
"We still need to move the bed frame," Mabel said cheerfully and he let his head hit the ground.
By the time their mother got home from work Mabel's bed had been successfully transferred into Dipper's room and he never wanted to see any more bed linens for the rest of his life.
A car door slamming outside the house announced his mother's arrival. "Oh! Maybe she has Waddles!" Mabel almost screamed and raced out of the room, her fuzzy socks letting her slid across the wood floor. Dipper set his book down on his bed, carefully so not to bend the pages, and followed his sister down the stairs. Even if everything else in his life had changed the stories he had read again and again growing up hadn't changed.
The glassy wood banister was cool to the touch. He watched through the railings as Mabel flung the door open to greet their mother. He watched as the smile dropped off her face as she realized Waddles wasn't in the car.
"He's still at the vet darling," his mother glanced at her watch, "We can pick him up tomorrow." She patted Mabel on the head before bustling into her office across the hall.
"But…" Mabel paused and turned away. The front door shut with an almost inaudible click and Dipper made his way down to his sister. Hooking his arm around his sister's shoulders they stood together watching their mother type away at her computer, her face bathed in a blue glow.
Mabel relaxed onto him, her head hitting his shoulder with gentle thump. "There are groceries in the car," she said without looking up at him. Her voice wobbled as she spoke.
"Ok." Dipper didn't move.
"You'd think that," Mabel wiped her nose on her sleeve, "that after having us gone all summer they'd want to spent time with us."
Dipper's gaze stayed locked on his sister as she watched their mother with unfocused eyes. "At least we won't have to explain ourselves to them."
Mabel's laugh was bitter, possessing an edge Dipper had never attributed to his twin, "Only because they don't pay attention to us, and even if they started now, they probably wouldn't notice anything different."
Releasing Mabel from his grip he drifted towards the front door. "Come on Mabel, we don't want the ice cream to melt." His sister gave one last lingering glance to their mother before following him. Her smile didn't reach her eyes.
It was long past dinner time when his father finally pulled into the driveway, headlights pouring into the darkened living room through the front blinds.
"MOM!" Mabel leaped up and dashed out of the room, startling Dipper from his spot on the couch. "Dad's here can we eat?"
Slumping back into the worn purple cushions Dipper allowed his eyes to drift shut. Mabel's chatter from the office bleeding through the walls. His stomach warbled and he sat back up. Pasta, their mother had promised to Mabel before they had left for school that morning. The front door slide open, the looming figure of Dipper's father making his way inside.
"Hi kids!" Dipper watched from his seat in the living room as the man hung his long coat on the hooks beside the door and turned just in time to catch Mabel in his arms.
"Dad!"
Their father spun Mabel in a circle before placing her down. "And where is your brother young lady."
"Right here." Dipper slumped out of the living room, careful to stay out of the rage of his father's arms.
"Can we eat now?" Mabel tugged on their fathers sleeve.
His laugh was deep, genuine in a way Dipper hadn't heard since they'd left Gravity Falls. "Of course Sweet Heart, sorry to have kept you waiting."
Mabel's smile was not much more than a painted mask but their father didn't seem to find anything amiss as they moved into the kitchen, Dipper dawdling after them.
Just as his mother had promised they had pasta for dinner. Mabel scraped a huge pile onto her plate before covering it in something Dipper hoped wasn't sugar. Scooping a small serving onto his own plate Dipper focused on Mabel, avoiding the gazes of his parents.
"So," their father began, "You wrote us some quite creative letters Mabel."
"Hm?" Mabel looked up from the mess on her plate, "What'd you say?"
"The letters," Dipper spoke for the first time, "The one's you sent from Gravity Falls."
Her eyes widened and her fork clattered back to table. "Oh-h right." Dipper could feel the hesitation flowing off in her waves. Maybe before B-b, maybe before Weirdmageddon Mabel would have loved to have shared the crazy stories of Gravity Falls, but now, as Dipper stared into his sister's panicked eyes he knew it wasn't something she could do anymore.
"They're just stories we created, well that Mabel created really." Dipper slouched further down into the chair as his parents shifted their gazes to him.
"So the universe wasn't actually almost destroyed by reversed gravity?" The corner of his father's mouth had risen into a smirk, and his eyebrows were arched gracefully.
"Of course not," Mabel cut it, the tension leched out of Dipper's body as the attention returned to his sister. "That does remind me though, Dipper and I decided that since we, uh, we shared a room at the Mystery Shack it was kinda weird to not share a room here so we may of move my bed into his room," her voice speed up the more she spoke and the words blended together.
"You may of?"
Dipper almost winced at their father's tone. He could hear Mabel swallow from across the table. It might not of been far to make her explain it.
"It's just like a giant sleepover," their parents still wore frowns, "Umm, well we didn't s-scratch or break anything, oh! And we'll put everything back when we get bored!" Mabel finished, bottom lip clamped between her teeth.
"I suppose…" their mom glance to their dad, "As long as everything's put back when their finished it should be fine."
A buzz resounded around the kitchen cutting the discussion short. "Oh!" Their mom stood up from the table, her chair scooting back with a screech. "I have a conference call starting soon, Honey could you please help the kids with the dishes?"
"Of course, Dear."
Then she was gone.
"Oh, now that your mother's mentioned it," Dipper's father glanced down at his watch, "I actually have a couple calls I have to make myself. Will you kids be fine cleaning up by yourselves?"
"Of course Dad," Mabel said smiling as she stood up to clear her dish. It was only after their dad had left the room that Dipper heard her mutter, "We do everything in this house by ourselves anyway," under her breath.
Why Mabel still tried to get their parents attention he would never understand. After all, he had given up years ago.