Very rarely did Dipper argue with his girlfriend to the point of shouting, but this was one of those nights. He left his dorm room, went down the stairs, and exited into the night outside. The breeze from the San Francisco bay was soft in the air while he walked across the large concrete slabs making up the sidewalk.

There was enough ambient light to see at least. He found a park bench at the center of campus and sat, staring up into the sky to think. The moon was absent from the heavens, giving him as clear of a view as he could get from the inner city. He knew it was much clearer up in Oregon though, where the light pollution of Gravity Falls didn't blot out the heavens. That was such a magical place… how could anyone want to leave it?

He wanted to go back. Grunkle Ford still operated his lab out of the shack, and Soos somehow kept it running as the sideshow it had become. Life there was so much more strange and interesting than he had known it here… where his star constellation birthmark had him labeled as a freak. There, with his six fingered Grunkle in a wiid surrounded by ghosts and resting on top of a crashed saucer… he could fit in.

His girlfriend felt differently. It was becoming almost the same argument he had with his ex.

He head the footsteps only too late to catch sight of who was approaching before she spoke. "Penny for your thoughts, dude?"

Dipper didn't answer at first as Wendy dropped into the concrete seat beside him. Finally Dipper said, "I'm sorry I got… loud. You aren't literally giving the same argument Pacifica was, I'm just afraid because it was sounding that way."

Wendy nodded. "Apology accepted. Do you know why I'm feeling the way I do?"

Dipper sighed. "Uhh… is it all the creepy stuff?"

"Yes," she nodded, "But what about it?"

"Uhh… I dunno, greater chances of pterodactyl attacks?"

"No. Dude, do you know any normal person in Gravity falls?"

"Well um… there's… there's Tad!"

"One person. Out of a population of…?"

"Uh… it's ten thousand isn't it?"

"My point being… I grew up in that. I think while I'm trying to figure out what the rest of my life is gonna look like, I kinda want it to be a sometimes thing, y'know? Like, we go to weird stuff over summer break. We don't live in it."

Dipper sighed. "But… I feel more accepted there than anywhere else! Nobody thinks this is weird there!" He had pulled back his hair to reveal his birthmark.

Wendy smiled at him. "I know dude, but, you really want to live in a place where people get mindwiped every so often? Or live with stuff stolen by gnomes?" When Dipper sighed, Wendy said, "You ever think of what its like to grow up with that dude?"

"It sounds kinda cool actually."

"You think so, until… your mom starts forgetting who you are, and like… changing into a different person before your eyes. Can you imagine talking to her one moment, only for her to forget what she was saying and who you even are? Can you picture that?"

Dipper blinked and sat up. Wendy never talked about her mom. "Is that… what happened to you?"

Wendy was looking away from him, head tilted up to the heavens. She reached out with a hand to him and he took it and slid a little closer. She said then, "You and I have it going real good Dipper, but if we're gonna have a future together, I don't want it to be in Gravity Falls. We can visit and do the paranormal stuff you like… but at the end of the day, I don't want to raise a family there."

Dipper blinked as he looked at her, and it suddenly dawned on him just how close both of them were to the age they could do that. It was a good solid three years together, with no sign of stopping. "What… happened… to your mom?"

Wendy's eyes bounced between the stars above her before she said, "I don't know, dude. Dad wouldn't talk about it, just said she's gone. The night before she was saying… something… about running out of time. That things were different. I tried to… tried to tell her I loved her but… she didn't hear me. I thought I'd try harder tomorrow, but I never saw her again."

Dipper had been tearing up on her behalf. "I'm sorry Wendy."

With her other hand Wendy wiped her eyes then glanced at him with a smile beneath her waterlogged eyes. Her head leaned back against the bench again and looked up. Dipper looked up with her.

She said, "I had tons of stories I made up about what happened. She probably went crazy and just ran away, but my favorite one is that she was really an alien and her time on Earth was over. I think about that every time I look up at the stars like this."

Dipper looked up with her. Both of them studied the faint constellations visible through the city sky.

Dipper wanted to assure her that maybe her dream was possible. It was Gravity Falls after all. But something about this moment made him think back to the end of that first summer… when he almost considered leaving Mabel to remain in Gravity Falls. There was a lot he would have missed out on with growing up beside his sister. One of the last things he wanted was to end up like Grunkle Ford and Grunkle Stan.

Wendy wasn't going back, she was making that clear. Dipper had to choose again between immersing himself in the inconceivable… or having a more mundane existence with his loved ones.

He closed his eyes, thought a moment, then opened them. The first constellation he saw was Virgo. Her zodiac sign.

Perhaps the stars were telling him something.

He squeezed her hand and said, "Its getting late, we should get back."

"Not.. Just yet dude." Wendy said. When he looked at her, he saw the half lidded eyes and small grin.

"Wha… huh?" Dipper asked as she pulled on his arm closer. They kissed under the stars.