Dipper Steps Up

(Piedmont, California, 2014)

Chapter 4

From the Journals of Dipper Pines: January 3, 2014: Well, here we are, back in Piedmont. It was nice to spend the week after Christmas in Gravity Falls with Grunkle Stan, Grunkle Ford, Soos, and Melody.

OK, OK, and Wendy. ESPECIALLY Wendy. She's been teasing me in her texts ever since she saw that awful picture of me on Peoplebook, but a couple days ago she said she wanted to have a serious talk with me: Was I sure I wanted to play baseball? Could I handle it if we didn't do so well? If I didn't get to play much would I be upset? Was I going to focus too much on the game and not enough on school?

I told her she was talking like an adult, and she said, "Well, ya know, I'm getting' there, dude!" But we exchanged gifts (sorry, Mabel, but what we gave each other is still our secret. Yes, I know you sneak in and read this journal sometimes!), and I asked, "Are you still looking forward to us coming back next summer?" And she gave me a little shove and said, "Don't be a dork! You know I am!"

So. . . . I guess we're still just friends, but I realized again, being there with her—and I finally got the courage to tell her this—I can't turn off the way I feel about her. She thinks that's sweet. But she brushed back my hair, smiled at me, and said, "I love your birthmark." Then she leaned close and whispered, "I'm still kinda old for you, dude."

My heart beat a little faster, just because this time she said "kinda." Not "I'm too old for you. You know that," but KINDA! I know, I know, I'll hang my hope on anything. It's probably not realistic.

But maybe not totally unrealistic, because from what Wendy told us, Robbie's still tight with Tambry, and Wendy herself has no boyfriend, no serious one, anyway, and she hinted she might sort of be willing to wait for me to catch up. "Never dated a sports star," she teased me. "Might be fun to try if I got a chance. So—you guys win the pennant or you get to be like the most valuable player or whatever, and we just might go together to a dance or some junk when I see you again."

So . . . now I have to learn to dance?

I'll do it! Man, if I need to win a game single-handed, somehow I'll do that, too, and in the meantime I'll even get Mabel to teach me some dance moves—because NOW I'm motivated!

It was easy to be motivated, coming right off a week with his friends (especially the red-headed one), but the next day when school started again, Dipper didn't feel so sure of himself.

In Piedmont, January is the rainiest month of the year, and that Monday was a dismal, wet one with low, ragged gray skies and cold rain drifting down either in showers or in wind-rippled sheets. The team couldn't practice on the swamped baseball field, so they went to a gym classroom and on a big flat screen they watched video of last season's Pico Padres in action.

Just seeing the footage intimidated Dipper. The Padres all looked taller, longer of leg and arm, and more muscular than almost anyone on the Piedmont team—Chuck Taylor and Wiley Casen were the only two Panthers that looked like they'd be even close to an even footing. Coach Waylund kept identifying Padres players from last year who were still on this year's team.

Dipper could see how good they were—a couple of power hitters, some fast runners, some agile and accurate fielders. "Oh, man," someone groaned when they saw a video of one of Piedmont's games against the Padres. It ended in the fifth inning—the Padres were ahead twelve to one, and if a team led by more than ten, the game was over at the end of the fifth, rather than going to the standard-for-JV seven innings.

"We are so dead," someone else moaned, thunking his head down on the desk.

"With that attitude, you may be," Coach said as he flicked on the lights. "Start noticing their weaknesses, not their strengths! Look at their guy Manello—power hitter, but a sucker for a low inside pitch! And Grobbert—yell at him as you run the bases, and he gets confused! In the game against Pemberton, a player got caught between second and third, so he rushed Pemberton and screamed "Look out!" and Pemberton flinched and missed catching the throw and the runner hit third standing up. Watch for things like that!"

It would have helped if they'd had more practice time, but gallons of rain fell that month, and they got in only one day on the field per week. They got back to two or three days in February, but when Saturday, the fifteenth, rolled around, Dipper didn't feel ready—and he was afraid the team wasn't, either. In fact, he secretly hoped for rain that day, but—just their luck—the day after Valentine's dawned bright and clear.

As they suited up in the locker room, the guys talked about girlfriends and Valentines. Taylor said, "I'm out of luck there. The girl I really liked moved to freakin' Florida! How about you, Dipper? Have a date yesterday?"

Dipper was putting on his cleats. "Uh, not exactly," he said. "I video-chatted with this girl I like a lot, but—not the same."

"She from around here?" Chuck asked.

"No. Remember Mabel told you we spend summers in Gravity Falls, up in Oregon? I met her there."

"Bummer. Gravity Falls. Weird name. Yeah, Mabel talks about it a lot, and, something funny, I happened to mention the place at dinner one night. Guess what? My great-great-something-granddad on my mother's side lived in that crazy town, like, more than a hundred and fifty years ago! In fact, Mom says he founded it."

Oh, no. No, it can't be.

"He had a weird name, too," Chuck went on, not noticing that Dipper had frozen in position with only one shoe on. "Nicholas Northwest? Something like that."

"Nathaniel?" Dipper asked.

"Yeah, that's it! One of his daughters moved to California and became my mom's great-great grandmother, I think. I mean, Mom doesn't even know for sure, but something like that. Anyhow, the Northwests supposedly got rich, but I guess they didn't want to have anything to do with us poor relations. The Gravity Falls Northwests still around?"

"I think so. That's a wild coincidence," Dipper said numbly, wondering why his mystery sense was tingling.

For a while he didn't have time to worry about it. When they went out to warm up, he saw Mabel. In a short blue skirt, a white top with the Panthers logo on it in gold and blue, knee-high white-and-blue socks, white sneakers, and—not one, but two pony tails, one on each side of her head, tied with blue-and-white ribbons. And pompons. There had to be pompons. One big, fluffy, and gold, and the other one big, fluffy, and blue. And Mabel was doing high kicks, somersaults, even splits.

The bleachers looked about half full of laughing spectators. Chuck whistled. "Man! I know this is the home field and all, but we never drew a crowd this big last year!" He slapped Dipper's shoulder. "Your sis is OK, dude! I think she'll bring us good luck!"

As the game started, Dipper warmed the bench and hoped that if they really were in for some luck, it would start soon.

But it didn't, not right away. Piedmont won the coin toss, and Chuck decided they'd take the field in the top of the first, so the guys who were playing trotted out to their positions. Dipper hunkered down on the bench, his glove in his lap, and tried not to hear Mabel shrieking, "Padres, Padres, gonna flop! Panthers, Panthers, we're the top! Gimme a Panther roar, people!" What she got was mostly a sustained laugh and some scattered cheers, but that didn't even slow her down.

Dipper glanced sideways and saw that Coach was grinning down at him. Dipper knew he must look sheepish.

But Coach just shrugged and said, "Don't worry, Pines. Mabel's brought in a crowd. Nice to have some spectators!"

Chuck's arm was in good shape. He struck out the first batter with four pitches—two strikes, a ball, and then a strike—and the next man in the batter's box popped out on his first pitch, the shortstop taking two quick steps to field the little looper. Then, seeming to gain confidence, Chuck fanned the next man, the big hitter Ricky Manello—though Manello protested the last low inside pitch, which he claimed missed the strike zone by an inch. The umpire politely disagreed, suggesting if Manello thought a pitch was too low, he probably shouldn't swing at it, and the Padres took the field.

At first it looked as if the bottom half would fly by just like the top: Mike Monohan took a good cut at a fast pitch and launched a pretty fair line drive, but the Padres shortstop, already tall, made a leap and snagged it. One out. Then Petey DeFoy, who had started out nearly as bad as Dipper at the plate but who had been hard at work on his batting all fall, took two strikes and two balls, but to the crowd's excitement, on the next pitch he made a solid connection. The left fielder misjudged it, it flew over the tip of his glove by a couple of inches, and by the time he'd scrambled around to grab the ball and fire it in, Petey was sliding into second, and Mabel was going nuts, like an AAA-cell battery-operated toy that had accidentally been plugged directly into a wall socket.

Chuck stepped up. The pitcher shook off a couple of suggestions from the catcher and pitched an outside ball. Then another. It looked as if he meant to walk Chuck, but then the pitcher threw one that would have just clipped the outside edge of the strike zone if Chuck hadn't swung on it and sent it past the first baseman and skipping along the first-base line. He made it to first while the right fielder fielded it and threw to second for the relay to home, holding Petey at third.

Now the bench guys all leaned forward, chanting, "Go! Go! Go!"

Jayden Dufresne, like Dipper a freshman, was a muscular, above-average cleanup man, and Mabel chanted, "One, two, one-two-three! Hit a homer now, JD!"

He grinned at her and gave her a salute before stepping into the box. The pitcher looked grumpy as he went into a windup. He drilled in an excellent fastball—and JD, the heavy hitter, bunted!

That was all Petey needed. He slid into home plate, though the catcher, a fraction of a second too late to tag him, turned and fired the ball to first, just barely putting J.D. out. And then, unfortunately David Barbour—"Barb"—struck out after two strikes, two balls, and two fouls.

The second inning was fast and scoreless for both teams. Dipper kept looking back at the scoreboard, as if the Panthers' 1 would suddenly evaporate. He began to hope that he might have a chance on the field this game. It was early in the season, they were ahead—well, just barely ahead—and maybe things would fall right for him.

And they did in the next inning. Coach looked thoughtful as the Padres' seventh and eighth batters both reached base on singles. He signaled Chuck to call for a change and said, "Pines, take second. Renaldo, you're in at first. Don't get shook up just because this is your first game, guys. Remember your practice!"

Dipper took over second from X-Man, who in passing said, "Luck, Dip!" and Tom-Tom Renaldo replaced Monohan at first. Dipper got into position and tried to concentrate over Mabel's glass-shattering "Dipper! Dipper! There's no doubt! He's the man to put them out!"

He tried to gulp back some butterflies that seemed to be trying hard to flutter out of his stomach and pass up his gullet and escape from his mouth. It wasn't a hot day, but suddenly the sun seemed glaring and he felt a little dizzy. Get a grip, get a grip, be in the game.

The next batter whiffed the first pitch, took the second for a called strike, and then swung on the third, getting a piece of it—it was going to come down a few feet behind second! Dipper backpedaled, jumped, caught the ball—and it stayed in the pocket of his glove!—and was running in mid-air before his feet hit ground again. The runner on second had bolted for third, realized what happened, reversed, and made a dash back to the base—but Dipper's monster-running practice got him there a heartbeat faster, and he tagged the Padres player out—an unassisted double play!

And the crowd went crazy! Well, be fair, Mabel, mainly, went crazy. But Dipper felt a couple of feet taller. Unfortunately, the next man up blasted a double, and the runner on base scored. But Chuck bore down hard and struck the next batter out, retiring the side with the score tied 1-1.

From there, for Dipper, it was downhill. He got to bat in the bottom of the inning, but though ahead of him Bobby Adamski had reached first and Dub Wilson had made a clean hit through the gap, the base coach unwisely motioned Dub to stretch his hit to a double—and Dub wasn't as fast as Dipper. He was put out, the throw to third was in time, and suddenly the Panthers had two outs, no one on base, and it was up to Dipper.

Who clenched up. A good pitch went right past him. He swung uselessly at one outside the strike zone. And he broke too soon and went down swinging on the third pitch, which, to be fair, he should have hit.

He took the field again, feeling, as Grunkle Stan might say, like ten cents worth of nothing.

The fourth inning brought a personal improvement, but unfortunately, it looked like the Padres had caught fire. They led off with a double; then the next man struck out; and then the biggest guy on the team with the unfortunate name Frank Farder hit a sweet home run, and suddenly the Padres were ahead, three to one. The next Padre got to first, and the next one after him smashed a blazing line drive to far left field. Dipper saw JD dive, catch it a foot off the ground, roll and leap to his feet, and fire it to him. He caught it—it stung like a hard-hit ball—and Dipper spun, realizing that the runner on first had overrun on his way to second but at the last moment had reversed direction. Putting on his best speed, Dipper caught him almost at first base and tagged him out.

The coach met him as he came in. "Good double play back there earlier," he said. "But Pines, throw to first when a man's running back. You're lucky you got the speed."

Dipper hung his head and admitted, "I know that was a dumb move. I got too anxious and lost track."

"You're coming along. Just remember next time."

Dipper rested in the dugout, but not for long—the next three Panthers struck out, one after the other. The Padres pitcher, Norm Chernky, was even better than Chuck, and he seemed to have hit the top of his game.

In the fifth, as if in revenge, Chuck in turn struck out three Padres in a row. And as if inspired, the other guys stood up to Chernky when they came up to bat: Stevie Prenelli, not a great hitter, got a single on a fielder's error. Kenneth Keeler, who had a good eye, then sacrificed to put Stevie on second. Mike managed a double, Petey went down swinging, and then Chuck, facing a Padres pitcher who now was getting a little tired and wild, also smacked a double, tying the score. That was great. Even better was JD's heroic homer, which pushed Piedmont to a 5-3 lead. Mabel didn't calm down even after the next batter, David Barbour, made a ground out.

Following league rules, which limited a pitcher to under 95 pitches per game, Coach retired Chuck at the top of the sixth and sent in Jon J as pitcher. After his warm-up, Jon J first pitched into a line drive, but the shortstop nabbed it for the out. The next Padres batter hit a fast grounder, and Dipper hustled to pick it up—but he glanced to first base at the wrong moment and overran it, letting it shoot through the gap, and the opposing player got a single.

Coach called for substitutions, and—not to Dipper's surprise—he was called in to the bench, while X-man took his place. "Sorry, Coach," Dipper mumbled. "That was a bad error."

"Not so bad if you learn from it," Waylund insisted. He also sent Big W in as catcher, and from that point to the end of the game, Dipper was a spectator. The Padres went down without managing to score another run, leaving it 5-3, Piedmont's favor, before they were retired. In the bottom of the sixth, the Panthers just couldn't get anything going. Two men got to base, but the others were caught out or struck out.

"If we can hold 'em," Coach muttered, "we've won a big one."

And—

Well, no need for false suspense. They did win it in the seventh. True, thanks to a double and a grounder single, the Padres got another man home and brought the score to 5-4, but between some good pitching and some better fielding, the Pico Padres were retired without managing to tie or beat Piedmont. The game ended with the score still five to four, Piedmont, and they'd squeaked out a win for their first game of the season.

And—funny thing—only when his mom and dad came down from the bleachers did Dipper even realize they'd come to the game. "We are so proud!" Mom said, beaming with joy. "You were absolutely wonderful! Everyone loved it! That was so great—Mabel!"

But Dad at least glanced at him and said in a mild voice, "Nice double-play, Dipper."

Mabel was jumping up and down in her lone-cheerleader get-up and excitedly suggesting that they should treat Chuck to an early dinner at a fancy restaurant when, behind them, a commotion broke out. Dipper turned.

One of the Piedmont men lay on his face in the grass just to the right of the third-base line, as if he'd fallen.

The number on his back was 3.

Chuck Taylor's number.

And Coach, who had hunkered over him, stood up with an expression of urgent concern and yelled as loud as he could, "Is there a doctor here?"