Chicken Soup
Mabel knows that she's already way too old to expect her parents to stay home and baby her just because she's sick today.
At seventeen years old she's practically an adult after all, as she has to remind them whenever they try to treat her like she's still a kid. That's a rare event nowadays though, because in the past few years Mabel has actually done a pretty impressive amount of growing up - she earns her own money at her part time job, keeps up a sorta-steady B average in school & even has her own car too (okay, technically the car is both hers and Dipper's since they had pooled their money together to buy it, but it still definitely counts as a real Adult Thing in her mind).
Heck, her parents had even completely axed her old curfew this year because they trusted her enough to not get dangerously drunk or pregnant or end up in jail or whatever. For all her crazy and carefree reputation among her classmates Mabel knows that she is actually pretty responsible and independent and junk and most of the time she feels proud of herself for how much faith her folks have in her ability to take care of herself.
None of those facts keeps Mabel from feeling slightly betrayed when she hears her mom's tires crunching in the gravel of the driveway as she heads off to work, leaving her beloved only daughter lying abandoned in bed with a horrible wasting illness eating away at her. She can practically feel the shadow of Death looming over her bed.
Well, okay – so it's really only a regular cold and not the plague or anything, but Mabel still feels like a miserable pile of aches and stuffiness. That should count for something, right?
Plus being left all alone at home is so boring, and that's almost worse than the sickness itself.
Mabel gives an irritated sniffle at the faint sound of her mother's car passing around the corner of the street and exiting the neighborhood, leaving the house totally silent except for the faint squeak of the ceiling fan turning lazily overhead and the gross rattle of her own phlegmy breathing. It was going to be a long and ugly day by the feel of things – the kind of day it would probably be better just to sleep through, and Mabel resolved to do just that. She smacked her lips a few times to try and get rid of the nasty after-taste of the extra strength medicine that she'd forced herself to choke down earlier that morning and shuts her eyes tight, hoping that it would be tomorrow by the time she opened them again.
It was a short time later and Mabel had succeeded in half-drifting back to sleep when she suddenly recognized the distinctive crunch of tires in the driveway gravel once again. She blearily shuffled herself up into a sitting position, curious about the source of the unexpected sound.
Maybe her mom had decided to take the day off from work after all?
Mabel tried not to let her sudden sense of childish relief show on her face when she heard the front door of the house open up and caught the sound of footsteps heading into the home. She considered calling out a greeting, but her throat was so sore from coughing all through last night that she decided against it. Mabel lay back down in her bed, feeling a calmness drift over her… it's not like she was scared to be alone or anything silly like that, it just felt nice knowing there was someone else in the house right now.
She could hear a clatter of noise drifting up the stairs from around the kitchen area and winced to herself at the loud CLANG of a pan falling off the rack followed by a startled voice. She couldn't hear the voice too clearly all the way here in her bedroom, but she could tell right away that it wasn't a very feminine voice.
Okay, so it's not Mom then. Who is it? Is it a burglar? What kind of a burglar breaks into a house to cook something?
Mabel's fever-blurred mind kicks into panicky overdrive at the thought that she's currently trapped sick and helpless in a house with a potentially insane (and apparently hungry) home invader. She jerks up unsteadily in the bed and staggers to her feet, trying to step as quietly as possible to not alert the maniac downstairs that there's another person in the house as she makes her way to her closet. It only takes a few minutes of digging through her accumulated closet junk before she manages to find her old softball bat with its slightly dented aluminum body and hot-pink duct tape grip. The bats weight feels reassuringly solid as she lifts it up in her hands.
Mabel hefts the length of the bat onto her shoulder, shuddering slightly at the feel of the cold metal on her fever-heated skin. Her hands are shaking but she tightens her grip on the bat and sets her mouth in a grim line, trying to think fearsome thoughts to psych herself up.
Alright burglar, prepare to meet your worst nightmare!
After a few tense minutes of waiting she hears the soft tread of footsteps moving up the carpeted stairs drawing closer to her doorway and gets herself ready to pounce, her hands choked up high and tight on the bat. Her heart practically explodes when she suddenly hears a tentative knock on her door.
"Hey Mabel – you feeling okay in there?" Dipper asks softly following the knock.
Mabel gives a sigh of surprised relief and then her eyes swivel to the bat in her hands before she guiltily drops it to the ground with a hollow metallic clatter.
"Y-yeah… just kinda feverish in the brain I guess," she calls back quietly.
I was gonna slug Dipper with a baseball bat? What in the heck was I thinking!
They should put "extreme paranoia" on the list of cold medicine side effect.
"I'm heating you up some chicken soup – mind if I come in?" Dipper asks, his voice still in that sickroom-quiet tone.
"Uh, sure, just gimme a sec," Mabel says hastily as she frantically nudges the bat under her bed with her brightly-socked foot. She settles herself back down into the bed, pulling the covers up to her chin and trying to forget the whole embarrassing incident.
Dipper pushed the door open slowly and peeked in around the corner at Mabel, giving her a small smile and a gentle wave of greeting.
"Aren't you supposed to be at school right about now mister?" Mabel asked, feeling a matching smile tug at the corners of her own mouth.
"Technically yeah, though as far as the front office knows we both have the same cold so I'm going to be out for the day too," Dipper said, pushing open the door further and stepping into the room fully.
"Lying to school officials Dipper? I'm shocked. Shocked! Maybe just a little proud too," Mabel said in a teasing tone of voice, right before a sudden burst of coughing wracked through her and left her throat feeling raw. She hunched forward on the bed hugging her knees and tried to breathe slowly and painlessly as possible.
As soon as the coughing fit stopped Mabel felt Dippers broad hand moving soothingly over her back and her pain-blurred eyes saw him bending low over her with a look of concern on his face.
Dipper leaned back once the fit had finally passed and rested up against the wall, trying and failing to seem calm and casual in the face of his earlier show of concern.
"Well you know, I was heading to school today and it just didn't feel right without you there fighting with me to see who got to drive or which radio station we were going to listen to and it was just throwing my whole rhythm off. I figured I could do more good here at home trying to get you better soon as possible," Dipper said, one hand idly scratching the back of the other in a nervous gesture.
Mabel smiled up at him and felt a warmth swell in her chest which had nothing to do with her fever. At least she hoped it didn't anyway.
"Thank bro-bro… that's really sweet of you," Mabel said softly, reaching out her hand to give his a friendly squeeze. She doesn't let go though, and the squeeze passes just a tiny bit past acceptably friendly.
She could see a faint flush come over Dippers face and he squeezed her hand back gently, his touch as soft as if he were handling an eggshell. They both stayed silent for a brief pause, not quite looking at each other but also not not looking at each other… it was one of those situations which they knew all too well but which they never spoke of. Awkwardly tender moments that always seemed to be on the cusp of something more. Something big and strange and a little frightening.
Dippers eyes traveled down from their nervous inspection of Mabel's ceiling (decorated with a galaxies worth of glow in the dark plastic stars) and back over to her face. Even through the sheen of fever sweat and the redness of her nose and cheeks he thinks she looks beautiful and he feels those dangerous words try to squirm their way out of his brain and into his mouth before he quickly stifles them. He reluctantly starts to loosen his grip on her hand, but hers is still clamped on his own fingers as tight as a vise, and there's a look in her slightly feverish eyes that leaves him fixed in place.
The shrill shriek of a fire alarm startles them out of their brief pause and Dipper's eyes shoot guiltily to the door.
"Damn! Give me a second Mabel, I gotta get back to the kitchen!" Dipper says, gently pulling himself free of Mabel's grip and darting out of the room and down the stairs.
Mabel's eyes stay fixed on the now empty doorway for a moment before she snuggles herself back into the bed. She runs her fingertips over the palm of her hand, feeling the faint traces of his warmth fade away. She knows that she should feel guilty about moments like this, but she doesn't. Not anymore, anyway – it's been going on in her head far too long to still beat herself up about it.
She knows he feels it too - she can see it in his face. Dipper could never keep secrets from her no matter how hard he tried, but whether he'll ever admit it to her is another matter entirely.
Maybe he will and maybe he won't. Maybe it's all just a phase for the both of them… but phase or not Mabel doesn't really mind. In this moment, sick as she is, she feels almost content listening to the sounds of Dipper scrambling around the kitchen and working his dorky little heart out to make her chicken soup. It might not be the same as finally letting whatever this thing that was going on between them out in the open…
…but it might be a good place to start, Mabel thought with a small smile.