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It’s their fourth year in Gravity Falls after just turning 16 that Dipper finally cracks.
He’s always hated going home to Piedmont at the end of summer. People never understand him back in California; he’s always been the weird one, the kid that gets picked on and pushed around.
It doesn’t help that most of the kids in his grade have known him and Mabel since they were in elementary school—they’d known Dipper back when he and Mabel still told people that they were identical.
They’re still technically identical, but they don’t broadcast that fact anymore—not since Dipper came out.
But here in Gravity Falls, people think that Dipper is cool—in fact, he and Mabel are practically the town darlings, these days. After all, they did help stop Weirdmageddon. But what’s best; they hadn’t known Dipper before he transitioned. Nobody has the information to be able to deadname him, up here.
Yet still, another summer draws to a close, and Dipper and Mabel head upstairs to pack their things and prepare for the bus ride home.
At least, that’s what they’re supposed to be doing. Instead, when Mabel pushes the door to their room in the attic open, Dipper takes one look around as he closes the door behind him, and a dread unlike anything he’s experienced since the almost-end-of-the-world clutches at his throat. He presses his back to the door and slides to the floor, pulling his knees up to his chest as he grabs at his hair.
“Dipper?” Mabel says, her concern evident in her tone, “What’s wrong?”
Dipper just shakes his head, squeezing his eyes shut as they start to burn. He can’t start crying—Stan and Ford will know as soon as they see him, and they’ll ask questions.
But Mabel sits down on the floor next to him and wraps her arms around him, pulling him to her chest, and Dipper can’t stop the tears from spilling down his cheeks or the sob from escaping his throat. Mabel just rubs a hand up and down his back as he cries into her sweater.
He doesn’t know how long they sit there in relative silence as Dipper cries his eyes out. When he’s managed to exhaust himself, at least temporarily, he pulls away, wiping at his eyes with the sleeve of his flannel. Mabel watches him expectantly, but doesn’t press him.
“…I can’t go back there, Mabel,” he mumbles after a moment.
Mabel’s expression speaks of sympathy. “Mom and Dad?”
Dipper looks down at the floor. Their parents hadn’t exactly been… supportive when Dipper came out to them.
Things could have been a lot worse; they could have kicked him out, they could have hit him, they could have forced him to wear dresses to school. They could have done any number of things that were worse than simply deadname and misgender him. It could have been much worse—but it still hurts. They’re still his parents, and he still wants their support.
“Not just them,” he says, “All of our classmates, and my teachers, and the bullying, and–“
Dipper is interrupted by a knock on the door, and he instantly feels a spike of panic. The others can’t see him like this.
Mabel places a comforting hand on his shoulder.
“Kids?” Stan’s voice sounds from behind the door, “Are you almost ready?”
Dipper and Mabel share a glance, and Dipper has always hated that whole twinergy thing that people talk about, but he knows the second that they lock eyes that Mabel has some kind of plan. They’ve been practically attached at the hip since birth, after all; if Dipper didn’t know how to read Mabel like a book by now, he would assume something was seriously wrong with him.
Dipper gives her a small, if tentative, nod— I trust you, it says.
Mabel stands up and holds a hand out to pull Dipper to his feet before she pulls open the door.
“Sorry, Grunkle Stan,” she says, “We haven’t done any packing yet.”
“Well, you’d better hurry up,” Stan responds, putting his hands on his hips, “Your bus is supposed to be here in an hour.”
Mabel glances back at Dipper briefly, who looks away in an attempt to hide his wrecked appearance from Stan.
“…About that,” Mabel says, “Can you come in here for a minute? We wanna talk to you about something.”
Stan blinks, glancing between the two of them for a moment before he responds. “Uh… yeah, sure, sweetie.”
He steps inside the room and Mabel closes the door behind him. Dipper still refuses to look at Stan.
“Dipper, kid, what’s wrong?”
Tears well in his eyes again, and he wills them back down with all his strength.
“He’s nervous about going home,” Mabel supplies in his stead.
He gets like this, sometimes—where he’s so distraught that the mere thought of speaking makes panic seize his lungs, and he feels unable to even breathe, let alone speak. Mabel knows the signs, so he just lets her talk for him when he feels like he can’t.
“Oh. How come?” Stan asks, turning his attention towards Mabel instead. He also tends to notice the signs by now, at least when they’re in conjunction with Mabel answering for him. He knows better than to try and engage Dipper directly, instead leaving him to his own devices until he feels capable of using his own words again.
Mabel hums in thought before she looks in Dipper’s direction. He pauses momentarily before giving her a nod. Mabel turns back to Stan.
“He gets bullied a lot back home,” she admits, “and our parents aren’t very… supportive of him.” She frowns. “Only me and like, three other people call him by the right name.”
Stan had met them when they were babies, so he’d known from the get-go about Dipper—or at least, he did when Mabel pointedly introduced Dipper as her brother. He caught on surprisingly fast, considering their parents definitely hadn’t said anything to him about it.
Dipper can see the way Stan’s jaw clenches as he scowls. “I oughta have a word with them,” he grumbles, but Mabel shakes her head.
“He’ll just get in trouble if you do,” she says, “but I was thinking…”
“Dangerous habit, pumpkin,” Stan says with a small smile.
Mabel rolls her eyes and shoves at his arm. “Anyways, I was thinking about how Grunkle Ford offered to homeschool Dipper that first year we were here. Do you think he’d still be up for that? Maybe with an additional, adorable student?”
Dipper turns to look at her in surprise, and Stan’s eyebrows shoot up.
“You two want to stay here?” He glances at Dipper, who stuffs his hands in his pockets but nods after the shock wears off.
“You too, Mabel?”
Mabel nods. “Dipper gets the brunt of it, for sure, but I don’t honestly have many close friends at home. Plenty of acquaintances, but Candy and Grenda are my best friends! Everyone at home is always too dazzled by my sparkling personality to stick around long!”
Dipper huffs a laugh, and Mabel grins. Ford had told him once that Gravity Falls drew in people like them; people born different. Ford with his six fingers, and Dipper with his birthmark. But Dipper thinks it goes beyond that—he thinks that Mabel was drawn here just as much as he was.
She may not have an anomalous extra finger or a constellation on her forehead, but she’s just as strange as the rest of town, in her own ways. Just as strange as Dipper.
Stan hums. “Well, I’m glad you both feel safe and happy here. I’ll… I’ll go talk to Ford. I’m not promising anything, but I don’t see why he wouldn’t be on board.”
“Yay!” Mabel wraps her arms around Stan’s middle in a big hug. “Thank you, Grunkle Stan! You’re the best Grunkle who ever Grunkled!”
Stan laughs, giving her a quick hug back. “Okay, alright, I already said I’d talk to him, no need to butter me up, kid.” He gives her a quick pat on the head before he pulls away. “I’ll be right back. Ford will probably wanna talk to you both, too.”
“Mkay!” Mabel calls after him as he closes the door on his way out. She practically skips over to her bed, plopping down onto it and patting at her side with a grin.
Dipper can’t help the amused chuckle that escapes as some of the tension leaves his body. He sits down next to Mabel.
“Sorry I didn’t ask ahead of time,” she says, “but I didn’t figure you’d have a problem with it.”
“I don’t,” he confirms, “Gravity Falls has always felt more like home than home does. It would be… nice. To stay here.”
Mabel nods. “I know what you mean. I’m sure Mom and Dad will want to see us for like, Hanukkah and junk, but maybe we can spend some of it here and some of it with them.”
“If Ford agrees,” Dipper adds, not wanting to get his hopes up.
“Psh,” Mabel says, shoving at his shoulder, “you worry too much. Grunkle Ford loves our company!”
“Yeah,” he agrees, “I know, I’m just… stressed, I guess.”
“When aren’t you?” Mabel teases.
Dipper laughs weakly, rubbing at the back of his neck. There’s a moment of silence as he fidgets anxiously, picking at his nails, his face, anything to keep his hands occupied.
“Hey, Dippin’ Dot,” Mabel says suddenly.
“Huh?”
“Can you braid my hair?” she says with a grin, “The fancy one, with the ribbon and the pigtails?”
Dipper smiles at her. He’s always been better at braiding than Mabel; namely, because she always asks him to do it for her when she notices him picking at his skin.
Sometimes, he’s truly blown away by how lucky he is to have her as his sister. Dipper doesn't like it when his twitchiness is addressed, so she doesn’t tell him to stop twitching; she asks him to braid her hair so that he has something else to do with his hands.
Sure, she likes to poke fun at him, and they get in fights like any other siblings do, but her quiet kindness always shines through where it really counts.
“The corset braid?” he responds, “Yeah, I can do that. Got a ribbon I can use?”
Mabel hops off the bed and pulls out her box of miscellaneous crafting supplies, handing it over to him. Clearly, she wants him to pick the ribbon.
He glances at Mabel’s outfit, tilting his head as he tries to find a coordinated ribbon.
Ultimately, he pulls out a simple purple ribbon. It will go well with the pink, purple, and yellow strips of hair that Candy and Grenda had dyed for her a couple weeks ago.
Dipper is well into the process of braiding Mabel’s insanely long hair, his tongue sticking out in concentration, when there’s a knock at their bedroom door.
“Come in!” Mabel calls.
Dipper briefly looks up from his project, and a spike of anxiety shoots through his heart and clutches at his throat as he watches Stan and Ford both enter the room.
“Hey, kids,” Ford says with a soft smile, “Stanley said you asked about staying here so that I could tutor you. Now, I’d be happy to, and my decision doesn’t depend on how you answer, but I’m curious. Why now?”
Dipper nearly drops Mabel’s hair and lets the braid fall apart, but manages to get a hair tie around it to hold his place before he lets go.
Dipper’s never come out to Ford.
Realistically, he knows this is silly; Grunkle Ford has been all across the multiverse, has seen people from all walks of life and likely has a much better grasp on what ‘nonbinary’ means than any of them do. For fuck’s sake, he dated a triangle. He’s pretty positive that Ford lands somewhere under the queer umbrella.
But he was scared, at first. He was worried that Ford, being from a different era, would be… less than supportive about Dipper’s identity, so he didn’t tell him for fear of alienating him. And after that, it simply felt like the opportunity to tell him had passed, so he just… didn’t. He kept it a secret, and so did Stan and Mabel, despite their reassurances that Ford would be accepting.
Mabel looks at him over her shoulder, a silent question on her expression. Dipper takes a deep breath.
“Um,” he starts, “It’s just—well, our parents… I’m not—that is—“
“Dipper is trans,” Mabel blurts out, “Our parents aren’t thrilled about it. It just got to be too much.”
Ford blinks at them, confused for only a brief moment before he seems to understand.
“We were… we used to be identical,” Dipper says, “Well, I guess we technically still are. Mom and Dad used to dress us up in matching clothes… they weren’t too stoked when I started wearing t-shirts and cargo shorts.”
“Oh, Dipper,” Ford says, and his sympathetic tone very nearly drives Dipper to tears, “I’m so sorry that you felt like you needed to hide this from me.”
Dipper shakes his head. “I just… felt like I missed the opportunity, and I didn’t know how to bring it up.”
“So, you want to stay here because your parents aren’t supportive?” Ford asks.
“Not just that,” Mabel says, “We just… fit in better here. Piedmont is full of… I dunno. Normal people, I guess. But Gravity Falls is nothing but a bunch of hicks and weirdos! Which place do you think the Mystery Twins belong?” She guesures wildly with her hands. “I’ll give you a hint; it rhymes with Shmavity Malls.”
Dipper clears his throat, fidgeting a bit as everyone turns their attention towards him. “Plus, y’know… we just prefer your company. Our parents are so… rigid. They get mad when Mabel makes a mess while she’s crafting, and they yell at her if she burns herself on the hot glue gun.”
“And they’re always so dismissive of Dipper’s interests!” Mabel adds, “They don’t even listen when he tries to tell them about his newest theories!”
Stan holds his hands up in a slow down motion, smiling at how quick they are to defend each other. “Easy there, kids,” he says, “You don’t have to explain yourselves that much. Sixer here was just curious!”
“For what it’s worth, Dipper,” Ford says with a smile, “I consider myself non-binary.”
“Really?” Dipper says, eyes widening.
“Really,” Ford responds, “He/Him pronouns are the most comfortable for me, but I don’t consider myself cis at all.”
“Me too!” Dipper says, “I’m—I actually consider myself transmasc, not a trans man, y’know?”
Ford nods in understanding.
“In any case,” Stan says, “We’d be happy to have you here for the school year. Hell, you can stay as long as you want. You know we love to have you here.”
“I’ll have to give your parents a call,” Ford says, “But I’m sure I can convince them to let you stay. Wait here while I talk to them.”
Ford and Stan file out of the room, and Dipper lets out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding, flopping onto his back in Mabel’s bed.
“Feel better?” Mabel asks.
“Oh, man,” Dipper says, heaving a sigh of relief, “I had no idea how much that was weighing on me until it was out in the open.”
“Hey, maybe I should tell them that I’m bi,” Mabel says, “It wasn’t really relevant before, but….”
Dipper gives her a sly smile. “Buuuut…?”
Mabel playfully slaps at his arm but smiles as well. “ But, if we’re gonna be in town for more than the summer, maybe I’ll, y’know. Ask Pacifica out.”
“She’s gonna faint or something,” Dipper says, matter-of-factly.
“Rude! I’m not that much to deal with.”
“No, no,” Dipper says, “She’s gonna faint because she’s super into you.”
“Wait, for realsies?”
“Yeah, for realsies. Mabes, I’m oblivious as hell and I still noticed. How come you didn’t?”
“I wasn’t looking for it!” Mabel exclaims, “I thought she was just being friendly! Oh, I hope she doesn’t think I’m not interested…”
“I think she just thinks you’re obtuse as fuck.”
Dipper gets a pillow to the face for his commentary.
By the time Stan and Ford return to give them the good news, Mabel is standing over Dipper and beating him repeatedly with her favorite pillow, Dipper himself curled up with one hand raised to block the incoming blows. Both of them roar with laughter.
Tomorrow, they’ll go shopping for back-to-school supplies (which doubles as crafting supplies for Mabel, and journaling supplies for Dipper). Tomorrow, they’ll discuss their individual learning styles with Ford. Tomorrow, Ford will create a syllabus for both of them, individually.
But tonight, Dipper is in the attic with three of his favorite people in the world, and he and Mabel are kicking ass at a pillow fight with their family—their real family—all of his hard work on Mabel’s hair falling apart in the process. Tonight, for the first time in what must be years, he feels no anxiety, no fear. Only joy.