Bill changed his Chinese food to spaghetti, because who else- no, what else, would pull such a odd trick? What else would surprised him like that? And most frankly of all, what else would have that kind of raw power to transmute? Only Bill. Well, Dipper had to eat. He just had to hope that no one came in and saw him with spaghetti instead of Chinese food. He sighed and shovled the steaming pasta into his mouth. Maybe he should be hoping that someone would come in and see him, catch him red handed. It would force him to tell the truth. Yes, he should hope for that. He tried to hope for it, he really did, but Dipper just couldn't muster up the righteousness within himself. It made him feel ugly inside, like a beast who shouldn't be allowed to live. He finnished off the pasta and put the now-empty box on his desk, which luckily was about an arm's length away. He struggled to lift his feet from under the blankets and out of his bed, but pain shot through him with the fury of a needle. He cried out a little bit, biting his lip. It drew a minute amount of blood, bright crimson compared to the pale pink lips.
"Dipper!" Mabel came rushing in, her face drained of color. "Are you okay?!" She nearly screamed.
Dipper stared at her for a second, paralyzed. "I'm fine, thanks," he answered after he had regained his senses.
"Thank goodness. I heard you scream and I thought something terrible had happened. Hey, you wanna play a game with me? I'm sure you're bored!" She asked, her previous distress gone.
"Uhh... Sure." Dipper answered, smiling. He was bored, and he felt like he hadn't gotten a chance to talk to Mabel in a week! Well, technically he hadn't. "What are we playing?" He asked his twin, knowing she had something planned already.
"Super Unicorn Rainbow Puppy Boy Wars!" She answered cheerfully, not seeing the expression of dread on Dipper's face. It was a game she had made up a year or two ago, when there was a heat wave and they had to stay in the Mystery Shack for a week. It had a dismal, ever-changing set of rules and combined all of Mabel's favorite things: cuteness, unicorns, rainbows, sparkles, boys, and art. The wars part on the end was really just a ploy to make it seem more exciting at first glance. It invariably doesn't work.
"Oh, great," Dipper said sarcastically, laughing even though pain splits through his side. Mabel cheered and ran off to find the board, confidant in the knowledge that despite his harsh tone, he was happy to play with her whenever.
Dipper fell asleep to the sound of the rain pattering softly against the roof, and the ocasianial drip on the floor. It was quite and peaceful, void of dreams and nightmares both, utterly alone yet not lonely. It was the most restful thing he had done since getting to Gravity Falls.
When Dipper awoke, though, it was different story. His head pounded insesantly, and he couldn't move a muscule without becoming dizzy. He couldn't breathe through his nose, either and his eyes hurt whenever he tried to look at anything that wasn't straight ahead. In short, it sucked. He must be sick, though from what he had no clue. He had been bed bound ever since he woke up yesterday afternoon, because of his injuries, so there was little cance of infection... unless... no. It couldn't have been... well, Dipper wouldn't put it past Bill.
"Real nice, Bill!" Dipper shouted to no one, his voice crackling with congestion. Then he remebered his family didn't know Bill was back yet. He blushed at nothing and covered his mouth with a hand quickly. The floorboards outside his room creaked, giving away the precence of someone, probably Mabel, just beyond the door. "Mabel?" He asked, his voice shaking almost unnoticeabely. The door opened a crack.
"Dipper, who were you talking to?" Her eyes glimmered, trying to decide between laughing and crying.
"I..." His voice trailed off. "I was having a nightmare." The lie tasted like rot when he said it, but he couldn't seem to help the words from falling out from his lips. "Mabel, can you try and find Will for me? I need to see if he's..." His voice caught all up in his throat, and the sound wouldn't come out for a second. "Dead."
"Uh, sure bro-bro!" She looked tearfully at him, then scampered off.
Dipper sighed and stared at the ceiling. The planks of wood that made it up were plastred with Mabel's posters and artwork, nothing short of chaotic. It was beautiful though, in an odd sort of way. The kind of compelling a tornado is, the way it draws you to it, but at the same time you're running away as fast as you can. Hypnotizing.
Dipper falls asleep again, listening to the faint chatter that wafts upstairs to his kingdom from the gift shop. He feels a little more okay than when he woke up, a little less 'kill me now' and a little more 'I'll survive'. It would have been a good feeling, if Will had been there. His chest ached for Will and his mind seethed with possibillities of what might have been. Possibillities of the future, of the time when Will might kiss him, when he might kiss Will, when they might get married, when they would wake up holding each other because there was nothing better in the world to do. He missed Will.
He didn't dream, but there was a tint to his rest, a soft rosey color. A feeling of warmth and the smell of a vanilla candle. It was nice in the way that sitting in bed on a cold day under piles of blankets reading and listening to your favorite music was, a comforting kind of nice.
"Dipper. Dippppppper!" Mabel's entergetic voice rose him from his deep sleep, her face in his. "Dipper! I kiddnapped Will!" His mind barely registered the sentance, then with a jolt of undertanding, his eyes shot open. He sat up quickly, groaning a little.
"What? You kiddnapped him?" He asked, still trying to process what he had heard.
"Well, not quite. I just know where he lives, sleeps, and eats, and what times he does all that."
"So you stalked him?" She nods earnestly. "That was fast. Thank you so much, Mabes."
"No problem, Sir Dippingsauce. Squire Mabel Syrup is at your service," she saluted him. "Can you get out of bed, or should I actually kiddnap him?"
"I'll try walking. I'm sure I can get to town, at least," Dipper says, then slowly scoots out to the edge of his bed. He carefully places one foot on the ground, then the other. He puts his weight on them tenderly, and when he doesn't fall down, more confidantly.
"Go Dipper!" Mabel cheers, pumping her fists.
"Can you, uh, leave so I can get dressed?" Mabel scampers out of the room.
He pulls on his classic orange shirt, navy vest, biege shorts, and navy shoes, then stares at himself in the mirror. He looks... lackluster. When he sees Will, he needs to look striking. Handsome. Put together, at least.
He digs through his and Mabel's closet, looking for anything a least a little more showy. There is a black t-shirt, some loose jeans that would be way too hot for the middle of summer, a pair of cowboy boots, a sweater vest, a button down shirt, a revered costume from the time when Bipper was in Mabel's puppet show, a pair of grey shorts, a sari, a cowboy hat, and some biege cargo shorts, not unlike the ones he had on. It was misfit collection, but he thought he could make something of it. Hopefully.
After about a half hour of expirementation, Dipper came out of their room and walked down the stairs to the kitchen, were Mabel awaited. She stood against the counter, throwing pebbels on top of the refrigerator.
"Finally! Let's... go?" She looked at him oddly, her right eye twitching. "What happened to my bro?!" Alarmed, but at the same time grinning.
"I wanted to change my style a little bit... you know?" He answered her, hoping she didn't ask the question he knew she would.
"For Will?" His heart dropped.
"No, nuh-uh, never, nope! I just wanted something different!" His face twitched. She shrugged.
"Whatever you wanna tell yourself, Dipstick."
And then they were off, to find the man Dipper had a crush on, an impossible, crazy, weird, inappropriate, unforgivable crush. It was the story of Tantalus told in slow motion and with a time bomb.
After an hour or two of walking, Dipper's wounds were starting to hurt again. Not like the sharp stabbing of before, but a dull ache. It was so much worse. They had reached town about 15 minutes ago, and Mabel was leading him to the same allyway that he first found Will in. It was slightly unnerving, thinking back to that so very odd day, but Dipper strood on, confident in a way that was not quite like him. Not like him at all, in fact.
"We're here, Dips!" Mabel shouted after about ten more minutes. Dipper groaned joyfully. There was door he hadn't noticed before, set into the left wall of the ally. She pushed open the door for him and held it while he stumbled inside. It was a really bad idea to walk here, but he had to see Will. He just really had to. It was a drive within him, a force not unlike gravity. Or what the gravity between them would have been if Dipper was a speck of dust and Will was Alpha Centari.
It was a small shop, something like the Mystery Shack's gift shop, but cozier. The floor was a dark, hard wood and the walls were painted a deep, wine red. Dipper looked around, the counter barely hidden from veiw by stacks of books and shelves that were filled with various tarot decks, crystal balls, amulets and other things of the sort. He quickly made his way around the blockade and stopped in his tracks.
Will sat behind the counter, slouched in a poofy armchair and reading a thick book. The title looked to be in French, maybe something about alchemy. Dipper stood there meekly for a minute, before gaining the confidance to speak up.
"Uhh, Will?" His voice shook and his head felt heavy, weighted towards the ground, just as Newton intended.
Will's eyes widend and he looked up, his head a blur. His cheeks turned tomatoe red and he smiled, all his teeth showing. "Dipper? Why are you here?"
Dipper didn't even think about answering his question. "Why aren't you at the Mystery Shack, Will?" His voice cracked and his eyes became blurry with water, but he forged ahead. "Why aren't you with me? Why did you leave me alone? Why couldn't you have at least told me anything?!" At the end he was sobbing quite a bit more than he meant to and he actually felt pretty bad. His head felt heavy, and his eyes hurt.
"Because I love you, Dipper." Will instantly clapsed his hands over his mouth. His face turned a brilliant red. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean..." But Dipper had stopped crying, he was staring at Will, astonished yet smiling. It looked partially crazy, twitching on the ends, but happy none the less.
"You... you love me!" Dipper inched closer to Will, the counter holding him back.
"I tend to. But, Dip, I'm much too old for you. You wouldn't want me. Believe me, I'm not exactly what I seem..." Will trailed off as Dipper walked around the counter, pushing the little half-door into the employees' area open. He started again. "Dipper, don't. I'm crazy, and not the fun kind. I'm ill, dangerous, and uncontrolable. It's a bad idea to even think about falling for me," Will's arguments got weaker the closer Dipper got. By the time he was all the way over Will's voice had completely stopped.
"I. Don't. Care."