today puberty, tomorrow the world

For about ten seconds Dipper doesn't even know where he is, which is good, because he's in a school hallway where he just had his first kiss in front of an audience. He'd be mortified if that were something he was capable of being.

His first kiss! (And no, Mermando does not count.) And it wasn't awkward, or unwelcome, or out of pity after a lame date with one of Mabel's friends, as he's always sort of suspected it would be. It wasn't meaningless. It was hope and gratitude and promise. It was soft and sweet and just right. And it was with a really, really, smoking hot girl, and, you know, he's not shallow or anything, but come on! Pacifica Northwest!

His moment of nirvana is invaded when he hears a voice just behind him. "Dipper! Dude, who was that?"

It's Mikey Diego, one of the guys from the Tragic: The Garnering table. And he isn't alone: Dan and Jon are with him. All of them appear equally curious and close to something like disbelief, as if a celebrity just walked by. Which, Dipper supposes, is about as likely as him getting a kiss from Pacifica Northwest. Not that these guys have any idea who she is. All they know is that they've never seen her before and now she's kissing Dipper, which makes two things no one's seen before.

Dipper straightens his hat, steadying himself. "Hey, guys," he says, approaching them.

"Who was that?" Mikey repeats.

"Pacifica," Dipper says, nearly tripping on the syllables. Knowing that more is required, he adds, "Me and Mabel met her over the summer and now she's staying with us for a while."

It's an almost ludicrous simplification of a very complicated situation, but that must not be apparent from the outside because his friends accept it easily enough. Everything except the most obvious point of detail.

"You started dating last summer?" Dan says, probably wondering why they've never heard of her even in passing. Dipper isn't really close with any of them, but he's spent enough time hanging with the group for such a revelation to have come up in some capacity.

Dipper isn't ready to talk about it, and he's pretty sure Pacifica won't want him to. He's been second-guessing everything she's done up to this point. A kiss on the cheek would have left room for further doubt but a kiss on the mouth is a message even he can't confuse. Now he knows that she's at least attracted to him (which blows his mind). They still need to talk, though, now more than ever, and he's not going to speak for her by claiming some kind of relationship.

"No," he says truthfully. "I can't really talk about it, okay? It's complicated."

"Oh, one of those," Mikey says, but he's not being judgmental so much as wry. School is full of relationships that fall under the wide umbrella of 'it's complicated.'

Dipper's friends drop the subject readily enough, mostly because when it comes down to it they aren't especially interested in his love life. Dipper kissing a new girl is odd enough to be temporarily interesting, but these guys care a lot more about the Star Wars EU and the minutia of D&D&MD than they do about who is or isn't dating who. He's lucky that way. They don't care enough to dig.

But there are other people who do, and one of them is in his second period class. He's leaning over the water fountain by the girl's locker room (always the least likely to be jammed with gum) when he is suddenly grabbed by his backpack and hauled backwards, water dribbling down his chin.

It's Mabel. She's practically vibrating with excitement, which means news has spread fast. She points a finger at him, eyes huge. "Rochelle said you were making out with Pacifica!" she says accusingly, probably because he had dared to not inform her immediately.

"We weren't making out," he quickly denies.

Mabel gasps. "So you were doing something!"

Dipper shifts uncomfortably, tugging at the straps of his backpack. "Mabel, can't we talk about this later?"

Mabel takes his reluctance as an implicit admission (which it sort of is). "I missed it!" she laments, face crumpling with dismay. "Why couldn't you have done it a minute sooner?!"

"Okay, hold on," Dipper says sternly. "First of all, quit being a creep. I don't need a running commentary on every step I take with a girl."

"I knew steps were taken, I knew it—"

"And besides, she kissed me, okay? It's not like I had any advance warning."

If Mabel were a cartoon there would be rainbows shooting from her eyes and songbirds settling on her shoulders. "She kissed you," she sighs dreamily. "Was it magical? Did it set your heart aflutter?"

Dipper sets his jaw. "We'll talk about this later."

"But—"

"No, Mabel! It's not even all up to me."

Mabel's shoulders slump and she slowly backs away, making certain he can see her hurt expression by maintaining eye contact until she backs around the corner. He knows he'll have to smooth things over later, but after the unmitigated disaster that had been his would-be courtship of Wendy, he knows better than to allow Mabel to meddle or to allow himself to jump to conclusions (or start making lists). He's going to be the mature teen he likes to think of himself as and talk to Pacifica about it when he has the chance.

That doesn't mean he won't be a jittery bundle of nerves in the meantime.

If he were as brave as he wants to be, he would have shaken off the stunning effect of her kiss to follow her and ask her exactly what it had meant. But his bravery is of the monster-hunting variety, not the dealing with girls variety. He'd demonstrated that to an embarrassing extent over the summer. Plus, Pacifica isn't Wendy. It's hard to think of any similarities beyond them both being girls and being attractive, and even their respective attractiveness has so little in common.

Wendy is tall and athletic, with bright mischievous green eyes and a ready smile. In retrospect, he must recognize that, as much as he had been attracted to her, the feeling had been inextricably tied up in his need to be her friend, and to be like her. Wendy is so cool, so capable, so easy-going, so collected and comfortable in her own skin. Dipper is none of those things. She had represented a teenage ideal, a hangout buddy and a pretty girl in the same package, with a ready-made circle of friends just waiting for him to step in and expand it. It's embarrassing to realize, but, setting his crush aside, he probably wouldn't have behaved much differently if Wendy had been a guy. He'd been a hanger-on, a wannabe, desperate to impress his cool older friend. The fact that she is female had just complicated things, wrapping up his admiration and emulation in newfound hormones. He isn't sure what he'd wanted more: to be with Wendy or to be her.

What if she had reciprocated? He finds it hard to imagine her doing so from any stance other than pity (such fantasies had once come so easily). It would have been a disaster. She'd known that even when he couldn't admit it to himself. He is so grateful to be her friend. He needs that more than he had ever needed all the other noise.

Pacifica is a study in total contrast. She is short and graceful, with curves that grow more pronounced every passing month. Her eyes are blue like the bay in clear summer. They turn electric with little warning, storm fronts flashing beneath straight blonde bangs; they can soften with sunshine or grow dark with tears like a rainy purple evening. Her lips plump into a smug pink rosebud or thin into a pale petal slash. But, sometimes, they bloom full and genuine, grateful, hesitantly affectionate, with a rare flash of the finest smile money can buy. She is cashmere and porcelain, blue and blonde and china white wrapped around a core of steel she is still learning to flex. Diametrically opposed to Wendy in just about every way. Dipper wonders if he even has a type.

Or, he thinks with chagrin, his type is 'has boobs.'

Good grief. All this rumination seems premature considering he doesn't really know where he stands with Pacifica.

Mabel ignores him through second period, broadcasting her displeasure with crossed arms. He's not entirely unrepentant and feels kind of bad for brushing her off. Still, he can't let her do this for him or push him into something he's not ready for.

Darn it. He realizes he should have said something; now Mabel will go after Pacifica since she didn't get anything out of him. Pacifica isn't Wendy or Candy. She won't take Mabel's meddling with good humor or embrace it as an opportunity. She could feel humiliated; she might turn inward and regress. She's still uncomfortable with some of the newly exposed sides of herself.

He hopes he's wrong. Maybe Mabel and Pacifica are good enough friends now that Pacifica won't react badly. Maybe he's not giving her enough credit. Mabel is a close companion to the Northwest heiress, it's not just Dipper. And Pacifica's never been as fragile as she sometimes seems.

Well, all that aside: Whatever is happening, whatever the kiss means, it was meant just for Dipper. He must deal with this no matter what Mabel does. The result of Pacifica's presumably impulsive gesture of affection isn't extreme, at least. He isn't well known beyond his small circle of friends. His personal life is not a hot topic in the halls.

He honestly expects Pacifica's social cachet to outstrip his within the week. She's gorgeous, fashionable, sharp-tongued, and confident enough to use her words to get what she wants. She has the air of someone who belongs at the top, that ineffable popular quality, and she knows it. She can probably score a seat at the coolest lunch tables by style alone.

It's true that she's been shaken by all that's happened. She has discovered great wells of dormant self-doubt along with a new sense of perspective (as they all have, after Weirdmageddon). But Dipper figures that being popular is like riding a bike. Placed back into a semi-familiar habitat, she will rise to the top ranks. Because she's Pacifica Northwest, and that's what she does.

He doesn't know what will happen to their friendship if they become separated by social tiers. At least they'll still live together. She can't avoid him at home. Not forever, anyway.

He shakes his head slightly and tries to focus on the lesson at hand. He's a little ashamed of the direction his thoughts have wandered. He needs to give Pacifica the benefit of the doubt. She's already put forward more effort to change herself than he would have ever imagined before. She's reached out to him more than once. It makes him want to be worthy of that trust.

And to be worthy of being kissed again, because wow.