Work Text
Inevitable
By William Easley
(December 2011)
1
The year hadn’t been a great one for Stanley Pines. Oh, the Mystery Shack had turned a respectable profit, and he had enough dough on hand to buy the electronic whatsises and gizmos that he had deduced the Portal required. He’d found a possible solution to the power problem—the dang thing ate kilowatts the way visiting cousins would tear into a brisket and rip through the rugelach at Chanukah time. And if he watched his p’s and q’s, aka pennies and quarters, he ought to be able to make it comfortably through the winter and into tourist season again.But on the down side, he knew he was missing two of the Journals he really needed to dope out the final wiring and the synchronization of the circuitry before starting the search for—for his final goal.Chanukah that year happened to begin on the twentieth of December, a Tuesday. Not that Stanford (as the town believed him to be) was terribly religious. More like religiously terrible. Still, the Festival of Lights reminded him of childhood, which reminded him of his strict dad and fond mother and, um, you-know-who, gone now for close onto thirty years, ever since—Ah, what did it matter? The Shack was buttoned up for the season, the weather had turned colder, below freezing at night, though no snow so far. No tourists this time of year, and no visitors, ever, really. Just his weekly shopping trip for grub and his weekly poker night at the lodge. That hadn’t happened last Saturday, though, and it wouldn’t next, because the lodge hall had been rented out for holiday parties.So what? You could get along without friends, though you couldn’t stop yourself from remembering. The stupid dreidel for example. Still, Stan couldn’t help grinning a little as he recalled the year he’d learned to control the spin so he always took either halb or ganz. He’d also learned to string the other players along, avoiding landing on shin and leaving it to the others to have to chuck another piece into the pot. He got so good at it that he never once got called out for cheating, though to his way of thinking, he was just playing smart, nothing shady. And though she was Jewish by conversion, his mom had been a terrific cook. Latkes, he could taste them now.A knock on the door, oy, always the gift-shop door, interrupted his reverie. He grabbed his pants and got into them on the way, yelling “Keep your shirt on!” while walking and pantsing. He opened the door and said, “What’s shakin’?”Toby Determined stood on the porch next to Durland, the worst handyman and second-worse lawman in the county. “Hello, neighbor,” Toby said.“You live nine miles from here,” Stanley said. “Come on it. I don’t suppose you want coffee?”“That’d be nice,” Durland said.“Yeah, well, I ain’t got any. Have to go shopping later on.”“Want me to drive to Greasy’s and get us some?” Durland asked.Stanley stared at him. “Nah, don’t bother. Come on in and I’ll see if I can reheat what’s in the pot.”The pot held about three scanty cups. Stan poured it into a saucepan and put it on a burner. The two men were sitting in the TV room, Durland scratching himself and Toby sitting with his hands on his knees. “Just takes a couple minutes,” Stan said. “Cream? Sugar?”“I’d rather have the coffee,” Durland said.“OK.”“Both, please. Two spoonfuls. Of sugar, I mean,” Toby said. “Just a little bit of cream. Sort of until it’s the color of a chocolate bar that has, you know, that white powdery stuff on it?”“Yeah, I hate that stuff.” Stan checked and found the coffee was a little more than warm, a little cooler than boiling, and poured it back into the cups. He glugged a little cream into his cup, added some to Toby’s along with two teaspoons of sugar, and took Durland’s to him black.“Merry Christmas,” Toby said.“Yeah, you too,” Stanley replied.“Speaking of Christmas,” Durland said, reaching into the pocket of his uniform shirt for a notecard, which he held up in front of him but did not read. Stan suspected that the deputy couldn’t read. But he could, with a lot of effort, memorize, and he reeled off something now: “Christmas is a time for sharing we have some poor families in the Valley so the businesspeople and the public servants of Gravity Falls are putting together a fund so the needy can have food and some gifts what do you want to continued on next card?” He glanced at Toby.Toby nodded. “Best one yet, Deputy. To continue, what would you like to contribute to our little holiday fund for the poor, Stanford?”“You gotta be kiddin’ me,” Stanley said.“Most of the local businesses are putting in a hundred dollars each,” Toby said.“Yeah, well, I had a hard year, sorry.”“Oh, well,” Toby said with a sigh.“We were hoping for a hundred dollars,” Durland added.“Can’t spare it,” Stan said. “Maybe I could put in a hundred Stanbucks. That gets customers a discount in the Shack.”“It’s better than nothing,” Durland said.“Barely,” Toby agreed.Stan got a stack of the phony-baloney cash from the office. “Here ya go. Of course, I’ll have to charge you a printing fee of five dollars.”“Very reasonable,” Toby said, forking over the five-spot.And Stanley saw them off, thinking that this had been easier than the dreidel scam.
2
Who knows, maybe it was that happening on the first evening of Chanukah, maybe it was thinking of his mom and dad, both gone now, or maybe it was taking some cash from the safe for grocery shopping and noticing the folded deed there. Something had him in a weird mood, though as he unfolded and read the deed again, he couldn’t help feeling a little satisfied and a little ticked off. Satisfied because nearly seven years earlier he had paid off the mortgage on the place and now owned (as Stanford Pines, though) the Shack and its extensive land free and clear. No more nine-hundred-bucks-a-month payments to the bank, hurrah.On the other hand, nine hundred smackers a month going to the bank used by Preston Northwest’s real estate company for twenty-four years . . . when he’d needed every penny for the Portal. That was a lot of moolah, and for the longest time more than half of it had been interest, not principal. And then Preston, not only the owner of the real estate business but also the VP of the bank, had the gall to smile at him and say, “Now, Dr. Pines, there’s just the matter of the loan payoff penalties.”Penalties, because after Ford’s vanishing there were some months of missed payments and other months of double payments to make up for it. In Stan’s calculations, it came out even in the end. In the bank’s—“I owe another two thousand dollars?” Stan asked, caught between dismay and admiration.“You may pay it off in monthly installments. There will be a surcharge of ten percent a month,” Preston had said with a smooth smile.Stan paid it off in a lump sum, though that pinched him badly. Better to cough it up than to have Northwest become suspicious and start prying into his background. That couldn’t stand much digging.Anyway and anyhow, 2011 was winding down and 2012 was waiting in the wings, adjusting his diaper and waiting to kick the old man out. Look ahead, not behind.Ah, but Christmas loomed, too. The Pines family had kinda-sorta observed Chanukah and had given a nod to Christmas—Mom had been raised Russian Orthodox and she recognized Christmas (though that year it had fallen on January 7). The pawn shop always put up an aluminum Christmas tree in the window. The days after Christmas usually brought in lots of customers, why turn a bunch of them off by not nodding to the holiday?Seeing Gravity Falls decked out in baubles and garlands and strings of lights didn’t much move Stanley. When he did his shopping on Thursday, he accepted the “Merry Christmas” wishes from the employees at the market with, “Yeah, you too.”But he didn’t feel like celebrating. He felt tired that evening and while watching a re-re-rerun of It’s a Wonderful Life, he nodded off, just about at the part where Jimmy Stewart is on the verge of jumping off a bridge.He woke up, or it seemed he did, some time later in a dark room. TV off, no light showing from any other room, odd because he always kept a little security lamp on in the gift shop. “Time is it?” he muttered.“Very late, amigo,” someone said in the darkness.Stan’s arms broke out in goosebumps. That voice . . . .Wait, he saw something vaguely glowing. Someone standing a few feet away, in front of the chair. A familiar figure, but—“Who are ya?” Stanley croaked.“You must be kidding me, pendejo,” the phantom replied. “You don’t remember so good? We was partners, Pines. Roommates, down in Colombia, right? You don’t remember when you stole from me a little package of emeralds?”“Rico?” Stan asked. “I heard you were dead!”“Yeah, funny, I heard the same about you. Drowned in a car accident, right? But you don’t seem to be so dead. Me, on the other hand—muy muetro!”“Then how come you’re here?”“Look, you know how if I ever got caught, I was facin’ life plus fifty years?”“Yeah?”“Now I’m lookin’ at like fifty times that. Includin’ the life part.”“So you’re like in what do you call it—”“Purgatorio. But if I do like good deeds, I cut some time off that, get it?”“Whatcha gonna do, tell me where you buried some loot? Man, I gotta be dreaming. Now you’re tellin’ me you’re a ghost? Some cockamamie thing like that?”“Sí. And no, I didn’t leave no frickin’ buried treasure. The good deed I’m gonna do is to warn you.”“And that gets you time off your sentence?”“Two weeks.”Stan snorted. “If you ain’t dead, get out of my house now! If you are dead, ditto!”“Silencio, estupido!” The ghost of Rico, if that’s what it was, glowered and flamed. Despite himself, Stan tried to draw away, prevented from doing so only by the fact that his chair was against the wall. And then the thing said, “Forget about it. Look you’re gonna see three ghosts tonight, tomorrah, and the next night, you got me?”“Huh? Ghosts?”“What do you call ‘em, visions, apparitions, whatever. Listen to ’em and they’ll do you good. Gotta go now.”“Wait, wait. What the dickens is goin’ on?” Stan demanded.“You’ll find out. Adios, amigo.”Stan finally thought of what he should have thought about right off. He reached over and turned on the table lamp.The TV was still on—the part where they’re decorating the tree and angels were getting their wings. That was all. No ghosts.Stan reached for the remote and turned off the TV. “Oy,” he grumbled aloud. “The Christmas Carol bit. Well . . . I suppose it’s inevitable.”
3
So this one time in school he’d been assigned the Charles Dickens book to read, right, but Ford read it instead and then they’d watched the movie on TV, and Ford filled him in on the differences between the book and the movie, and believe it or not, Stan had received a nice fat C+ on his book report. Ford, of course, aced it, but that was because he was a Poindexter and always got A’s.Anyhow, Stan figured that between the old movie, the other old movie, and the visit from the guys wanting him to chip in a hundred simoleons for the poor, he’d dozed off and had a little nightmare about old Rico. Purgatory? That was a laugh. If anybody had a one-way ticket to hell, it had to be Rico, the rat. Just a dream, Stan figured.Still, when he went to bed that evening he took his Louisville Slugger with him. He figured that since he’d dozed through like an hour of the movie he wouldn’t go to sleep anytime soon.Then he closed his eyes.The sound of a bell tolling slowly woke him up. Huh. The courthouse had a bell tower, but no bell in it, not for years and years. Yet . . . bong, bong, bong, bong . . ..Twelve times in all. Midnight already. But no sign of any—Wait a minute. There was a greenish glowing mist at the foot of his bed, and it condensed and took on form—“You knucklehead!” the shape snapped.“Dad?” Stan asked.“No, I just took on the appearance of Filbrick Pines to haunt ya. I’m gonna take you back into the past.”“Like history?”“No, numbskull, your past! Come on, get a move on. Hustle!”Without any memory of getting out of bed, Stan found himself standing next to the imposing figure of his father, just as he had been that time he’d kicked Stan out of the house, sunglasses and all. “Uh—” Stan muttered.“This way.”“Hey,” Stanley said, “I know this joint. It’s where me and Ford went to elementary school—P.S. 618!”“Yeah, and there’s your brother. Remember this day?”A twelve-year-old Stanford cowered against one of the school’s brick walls. “Cut it out, Crampelter!” he wailed.A hulking kid pounded his right fist into his left palm. “Ya gonna cry, nerd? Take it like a man! You made me look stupid, and you’re gonna get a lesson!”“I’m wearing glasses!” Ford objected, crossing his arms over his head.“I’m gonna pound them, too!” Crampelter said with a sneer. He landed a punch on Ford’s shoulder, solid blow that made Stanford whimper.“If you don’t want them glasses broke, better take ‘em off! Next you get my fists in your eyes!”“Hey!” yelled a voice. “Pick on somebody your size, jerk!”Crampelter spun, his face scarlet.A twelve-year-old Stanley caught him one-two in the breadbasket, like a boxer working the heavy bag. “Run, Ford!” Stanley yelled.Crampelter was already drawing back his fist . . ..The place changed. Now it was their bedroom, in the apartment over Pines Pawns, the family shop nestled between Hot Belgian Waffles (a breakfast-all-day joint) and Knuckles Sandwiches, an Italian place. In the new vision, Ford sat uneasily on the top bunk of their bed, watching as Mom applied iodine and Band-Aids to Stanley’s scrapes and abrasions.“Poor baby,” Caryn Pines said as she put a final bandage on Stanley’s forehead above his left eye, swollen and purple to match his right one.In the doorway Filbrick Pines was waving around the pieces of a pair of spectacles. “You broke your glasses?” he grumbled. “You got any idea how much these things cost?”“He didn’t break them, Dad,” Ford said. “It was Cram—”“Did I ask ya?” Filbrick said. “OK, Stanley, you gonna get in fights, you’re gonna do it right. Startin’ next Monday, you’re getting boxing lessons.”Stan said hopefully, “I got one good one into his belly and another one in his chest, didn’t I, Ford?”“He did, Dad,” Ford said. “If it hadn’t been for Stanley I would’ve been beaten up.”“Yeah, yeah,” Filbrick growled. “But two punches wasn’t enough to make him run off crying, was it? Not enough to keep you from getting your ass beat.”“Filbrick,” Caryn said, ruffling Stanley’s hair.“I tried,” Stan said.“I’m not impressed,” Filbrick said, crossing his arms.Then things got blurry, and next thing you knew, Stan was watching himself and Ford hauling the old boat out of the cave. And then there they were in high school. And the first time he met Carla McCorkle, on line for the movies, when some creep snatched her purse and Stan reacted with a powerful left hook, knocking out some of the thief’s teeth and making him Carla’s hero.And then—“Oh, no,” Stan groaned. “Not this. This I know.”“Watch,” said the Ghost of the Past or whatever it was.It was the school auditorium, being used for the science fair. And there he was, munching on some toffee peanuts, roaming the aisles until he came to Ford’s free-energy demo, a perpetual or nearly perpetual motion machine—“Don’t pound the table,” Stan warned his younger self. “Don’t do it!”“They can’t see or hear you, dummy,” the ghost said. “They’re like images or shadows or some deal, right?”And the younger Stan then pounded the table, and the machine got unbalanced or something, and a wisp of smoke rose from it—Another quick change. Now Filbrick, chest to chest with Stanley, was snarling, “You ignoramus! Your brother was gonna be our ticket out of this dump! All you ever do is lie and cheat, and ride on your brother's coattails. Well, this time, you cost our family potential millions! And until you make us a fortune, you're not welcome in this household!”And there was Caryn behind him, holding Shermy’s kid Alex—“Say something, Ma,” Stan pleaded. “Anything. Just say something!”But she didn’t.Stanley closed his eyes, feeling them sting.And opened them.“No, no, no!” he shouted. “Not this!”Because he saw the Portal and saw Stanford levitating toward it, desperately yelling, “Help me, Stanley!”“Dad,” Stanley pleaded. “Don’t do this to me! I don’t wanna remember—”“No,” the specter of Filbrick corrected, already fading. “What you gotta not want to do is forget. Never forget, ya knuckle . . ..”The voice faded out, like the ghost.And Stan found himself in his own bed again, heart pounding, eyes burning.“I don’t want to remember,” he said. “Not that. I don’t—”He was alone.It was dark.And the bell, wherever it was, whatever it was, again tolled twelve.
4
“It can’t be midnight again!” Stanley told himself. “If I been layin’ here for twenty-four hours straight—why ain’t I had to go to the can?”“Hidy do!”It was, of course, another ghost. “You?” Stan asked. “Old Man McGucket?”“Shore am,” the bearded phantom said with a cackle. “Or leastways, thataway is the way you’re seein’ me. By th’ way, is all of Stanford’s equipment still down yonder in the basement? Because I lost my marbles, and I useta hang out there.”“Nobody knows about that!” Stan exclaimed. He rubbed his eyes. “Wait a minute, wait a minute. You’re the ghost of the present, right?”“Of nowadays, anyways.”“Could you stop repeating so much?”“Could I? Don’t think so. So think, don’t. I could.”“OK, OK, show me what you gotta,” Stan said. “The sooner this is over, the better.”“That’s what they all say!” The spirit spat into its hand and held it out. “Take aholt, and we’ll git a-going!”Stan grasped the marginally cleaner-looking tip of the guy’s long white beard. “This good enough?”“Reckon it’s like a elf with his toe in a vise. It’ll do in a pinch!”Stan rolled his eyes. But somehow he was on his feet, though leaning forward, and the two of them standing in an incredibly cluttered space that looked as if it had been assembled from random hunks of junk. For a good reason.Old Man McGucket—another Old Man McGucket—stood over a potbellied stove that evidently had been stuffed with pieces of rubber tire as fuel. On the top of it a saucepan bubbled and steamed. It seemed to contain a mixture of pinto beans, lima beans, and corn. “This is you?” Stanley asked.“I’m kinda a version o’ him.”“But he can’t see us, yada yada.”“Don’t rightly know. Howdy, me!”The real McGucket jerked his head up. “Howdy to you, too! Care for some Christmas-like food? I’m whompin’ up some burgoo like my old grampappy useta cook, ‘ceptin’ I ain’t got no possum meat. But I found a rat!”“Ugh,” Stan said. “Is that even healthy?”The spirit shrugged. “He’s et worse’n that.”“But couldn’t he get something a little, you know, edible from the county food bank or—”“They done run plumb out o’ money,” the spirit said. “He mighta could, but they fell short o’ their fundrasin’ goal.”“Look, I know he’s got a son—”“They ain’t even spoke to each other in five or ten years. It’s a saddening kinda thing, ain’t it, when families bust apart?”“Tell me about it,” Stan said.“Hey,” the real McGucket said, looking around, “where the blue blazes didja go? Oh, well, more burgoo fer me!”Then they were elsewhere. Durland, his Mountie-type hat in hands, stood next to Toby Determined, and they were in the presence of—“That guy,” Stan growled.Preston Northwest leaned his elbows on his desk and coldly stared at the two men standing in front of him. “So let me be sure I understand this,” he said. “You still have fifteen names on your list to receive Christmas meals and you need another three hundred dollars to take care of them?”“That’s right, Mr. Northwest,” Toby said. “We did manage to check off all the families with small children and about half of the old folks who’re living alone, but—”“Time is money,” Northwest said. “You’ve taken up twenty minutes. By my estimate, you owe me three hundred already.”“Thanks for your time,” Durland, showing unusual perspicacity, said.They left Northwest and Stan saw that the manor up on the hill had been professionally decorated for Christmas. It looked very much like an upscale mall, all the decorations gleaming and blinking and shining and looking so new that they could have been put up on November first, like those in all upscale malls across America.The butler ushered Durland and Determined to the front foyer—where a little blonde girl stood. As the two men started out, she said, “If this will help—” as she handed something to Toby.“Thank you,” he said softly.A little handbell jingled in the house, and the girl stiffened and said, “I have to go see Father.”The county police car was parked outside the mansion. “What’d she give you?” asked Durland.Toby held up a fifty-dollar bill. “This and a note. It says, This is all I have left from my allowance. Please take it.”Durland took out a handkerchief that had seen better days and honked his nose. “I reckon they ain’t all awful.”Stan looked defiantly at the spirit. “I always knew that Pacifica had some good in her,” he said.“Yeah, not like her daddy. Or some other folks I could name,” the semblance of Old Man McGucket said.“Yeah, yeah, I had a hard year,” Stan said. “Hey, where are we? I don’t recognize this place at all.”“This here’s way down in Californy,” the spirit said. “Place name o’ Piedmont. Does that tinkle your dinger?”“Wait, wait, I have been here. ‘Bout ten or eleven years back, when—” Stan caught his breath at the sight of a man sitting in a chair, speaking on the phone. Pointing, Stan asked hesitantly, “Shermy?”“Naw, he’s done been dead,” the specter said affably. “This here is his boy Alex. ‘Course he’s not no boy no more. Got kids of his own nowadays.”“Twins,” Stan said. “Yeah. I was there when they were born. They thought I was, uh, somebody else.”“Hush up an’ listen,” advised the ghost.“Merry Christmas,” Alex said as he ended a call on his phone.His wife, Wanda, leaned over to hug him. “How is your mother?” she asked.Alex put a hand on one of hers. “She says she loves Florida. She’d like for us to come visit her again when we can.”“Is she all right?”Alex sighed. He looked so much like young Shermy—He said, “She says she’s happy. She has old friends there, and you know how miserable she was after Dad died. California has too many memories for her, and they’re too painful. I think she’s all right. Everything ready for the kids?”“Mabel’s been trying to find where her presents are hidden,” Wanda said.Alex chuckled. “She always does. Good thing she can’t go to my office. I’ll drive over tonight and bring everything home.”“Dipper could find the stash,” Wanda said.“Oh, I think he could. He’s a smart one, Mason. He reminds me a lot of my uncle Stanford.”“He does?” Stanley asked.“Reckon so, lessen Alex is in th’ habit o’ lyin’ to his wife, durn his worthless hide!”“Hey!” Stan flared. “He takes care of his family and he loves his kids!”With a shrug, the McGucket double said, “Maybe he’s not so worthless, then.”“Listen, family—whoa, why are they fading? I ain’t even seen their kids yet—”“Jest one last stop,” the McGucket double said. “Here we go!”Their surroundings faded out, then slowly reformed. Except now they were in the meeting room of the Chamber of Commerce, but the table and chairs had been moved out. Stan recognized about everyone—a crowd of locals milled around, cups of punch in their hands, some of them wearing red Santa hats. There was Lazy Susan chatting with Shandra Jimenez, Tyler Cutebiker laughing at some joke Poolcheck had just told, Jimmy from the supermarket, Steve the mechanic, almost everyone.“Hey,” Manly Dan Corduroy boomed, “why ain’t Mr. Pines here? Wasn’t he invited?”“He’s always invited,” Bud Gleeful replied. “Only he never comes, no he doesn’t.”Tats, getting himself a fresh cup of steaming punch, said, “Stanford is sort of anti-social. Maybe he doesn’t believe in Christmas.”“That’s not true,” Stan objected. “I know it exists,”“Well,” Mrs. Valentino said, “maybe he’s lonely. He doesn’t seem to have any family.”“Maybe he just likes being alone, in that creepy Mystery Shack of his,” someone suggested.“That’s right,” Stanley agreed. “I don’t need nobody. I mean, I created the Mystery Shack, I paid off the mortgage, I got the fershlugginer Portal practically ninety-nine point nine per cent rebuilt—I can handle myself without anybody’s help!”“I wish he’d come, though,” said Mayor Befufflefumpter. “It’s always nice to have someone in the room uglier than me.”The scene faded to the sound of everyone’s laughter.“Jeeze,” Stan complained. “You’d think that at least they’d say I’m a good businessman. What’s next?”“I got no ideer,” the ghost said. “Here’s where you—”“See the future and a gravestone with my name on it,” Stan said. “OK, turn me over to the Grim Reaper or—”
5
Darkness and silence, and here he was in bed again. Stanley heaved a sigh. “Nothing matters but getting Ford home,” he told the night. “Nothing at all. Gotta remember that. So where are the bells?”
Bong, bong, bong . . ..
Twelve in all.Nothing happened. No ghost. Stan got up and didn’t bother with pants or shirt, just grabbing a warm bathrobe. He went downstairs, turning on the lights. He heard laughter from the TV room—Whoa. The TV room was different. Everything was different. The furniture was newer, the kitchen modernized—“Hah! I’m here, Mr. Pines, dawg. I’m sorry if I’m like late or some deal.”“Soos?” Stan asked. “No, wait, you’re all transparenty. Ghost of the Future, am I right?”“Um, sure, Mr. Pines. See, what you see now isn’t what is gonna necessarily happen, but junk that might happen or some biz. I dunno. They didn’t give me clear instructions. Hey, let’s go to the party room and meet your great niece.”“Huh? Mabel?”“Yeah, dude. Her. This way.”And they walked in and there was this beautiful twenty-something woman—yeah, she was a Pines, look at her cheeks and her pink nose—saying, “I wish I’d met him at least one time. I mean, it’s crazy, here I am the owner of this great house, and I didn’t even know it belonged to someone in the family.”A stouter young woman—what was her name, Brenda or Grenda or something—said, “Well, we’re glad you moved to town. I wish we’d known each other earlier, too!”“And it is so sad about your poor brother,” the Korean girl, what’s her name, Candy, said.“Yeah,” Mabel said, looking sad. “He would’ve loved this place just the way it was last year when I inherited it. I miss him.”“What was his name?” Candy asked.“Dipper,” Mabel said. “His name was Dipper. Excuse me.” She turned, and she was face to face with the unseen Stan. Tears trickled down both her cheeks.“What happened to her brother?” Stan demanded.The Soos-like apparition shrugged. “It was like a whole tragedy, man. A couple of summers ago, he was hitchhiking across the country. I mean, he had finished high school and he wanted to go to New Jersey for some reason? Anyway, a bus barreling along just went out of control, ran off onto the shoulder, and, you know, struck him or whatever. Boosh! It was fast, Mr. Pines. Dipper never knew what hit him." Soos paused, then added, "It was a bus, dude! Oh, wait, too soon? Sorry. I never knew him, but anyhow, he's gone."Stan blinked rapidly and in a choked voice said, “That’s not fair! He was just a kid! And I ain’t even seen him since he was what, three or four years old?”“Shh,” the ghost said. "Hambone's talkin'.In an unsteady tone, Mabel was apologizing to her guests: “Yeah, he wanted to see the place where our folks came from. I mean our granddad and I guess our great-uncle Stanford. And Dipper wouldn’t take any money from our folks to do it. He said it was just something he thought he owed our family and that he had to do all on his own. He was in this horrible traffic accident out in Missouri, and—don’t make me talk about it. Not at Christmas.” Now she was sobbing. “He—he loved Christmas.”“Can’t I talk to her?” Stan asked. He tried to touch her shoulder, but he might as well have tried to pat a puff of mist.“Sorry, man, that’s, like, not allowed under the ground rules. Hey, is that a joke? Underground? Like you are ‘cause of your accident?”“Accident? Me, too, you mean? What accident?” Stan asked. “What happens to me?”“I’ll show you,” the ghost said. “Hold onto your hat!”The scene faded into the basement—the Portal room—only—“Everything’s all burned up,” Stan said, staring at the twisted metal and the scorched walls. He stooped to retrieve something from the floor. It was charred and fragile, but what remained was burgundy with a yellow design on it a little bit like a stylized fish, a round something just inside its gaping jaws. His fez.“What happened to me?” he asked.The ghost that looked like Soos frowned. “Um, I don’t know, really? Nobody does. But there’s all this machinery? I think you like tried to fire it up and it exploded or some junk. And you got burned, and you made it back upstairs, but then you collapsed in the gift shop, and a day or two later I found you when I came into work, but it was way too late, dawg. Hey, know something funny? This is like two years later, and nobody yet has found the way down to this lab! ‘Cause even though she made it into her house, Mabel kept the vending machine right where it's always been! Funny, right?”“Hilarious,” Stan muttered.So . . . his attempt to start up the Portal backfired. Maybe because he didn’t have the other Journals. And that meant that Stanford never returned from wherever the hell he’d vanished to. And that meant that his entire life had been one big failure. "Uh, Soos, what made the boy head to New Jersey that summer two years ago?""Oh, 'cause the family got word that you were, you know, like C.O.D. Wait, that's not right. D.O. C? D.O.A! Nailed it!"Oy. So even Dipper's death had been his fault. Would it have happened if Dipper hadn’t decided to go hunt up his family roots, all on his own hook, and all by himself? "I screwed up," Stan mumbled. "My whole life, I screwed up."“I got one more thing we're, like, supposed to do, Mr. Pines,” the Soos-ghost said. “Back to the party!”Just like that, they had returned upstairs. Now Mabel sat and the other young women clustered around her. “Hey,” Stan said, “isn’t that Dan’s daughter?”“Yeah, Wendy,” Soos said.“She looks very—”“Well, she’s eight months along,” Soos confided. "When Mabel moved in year before last, Wendy and Dan came in and were like a great big help."Wendy was talking: “Gonna be rough, I guess. Robbie was the one who wanted us to have a baby, but then—he cut and ran. We wound up gettin' a Reno divorce. So anyways, I’m looking at being a single mom. The only thing I regret is that I’ll have to raise him in Dad’s house. It’s stressful.”Mabel leaned forward. “Listen, this is crazy, but how about this? Will you come and live here in the Shack with me? There's plenty of room. I can help with your little boy, and I can use the company, and it turns out that my great-uncle Stanford had all these patents and things, and he left everything to my brother and me in his will, only now there's just me. Anyway, there's plenty of money, and—and—and I’m so lonely.”“That’s real sweet of you,” Wendy said. “But really, I couldn’t. I don’t have any way to repay you, or—”“You don’t have to,” Mabel told her. “I think—I know—Dipper would’ve loved to meet you. And with a little boy in the house, I could be like an auntie, you know. And—please. We could be like a little family.”“Oh, man,” Stanley said. “You ghosts love to make me feel like crap, huh?”“What happens and is gonna happen is, like out of our hands, dude. It’s all up to you.”“I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do!”The Soos-ghost chuckled. Ha! “Do like everybody else, dawg. Make it up as you go along!”
6
Stan opened his eyes. His bedroom. The morning sun coming in the window. He got up, scratching himself, and went downstairs on legs that felt achy and shaky. He put on a pot of coffee and muttered, “Is it Christmas today?”He drank some coffee, got dressed, and drove downtown in the Stanleymobile, stopping in front of Greasy’s. Which looked open.“So not Christmas,” Stan decided. “Did I miss it?”Inside, Lazy Suzan greeted him, and he responded with, “Must be getting’ old. Is it Christmas today?”“No, you silly man,” Susan said. “That’s on Monday.”“Oh. And, uh, what’s today?”“Friday,” Susan said. “Silly man.”Well. He hadn’t missed it. Later, as he paid for his breakfast, Stan asked, “Hey, is the Chamber’s Christmas party tonight or tomorrow?”“Tomorrow!” Susan said. “Starts at four o’clock. Come this year!”“Yeah, I think I will,” Stan said.“Hey, Stan! Your check’s only five dollars and twenty-five cents. You gave me a twenty!”“Merry Christmas,” Stan said.When had he last said that? My God, it must have been to Mom, so many years ago.He went around the corner to the offices of the Gravity Falls Gossiper. As usual, the editor, columnist, and reporter were all there—they were the same person—and Stan said, “Hey, Toby, I been thinkin’. Maybe I can chip in something to your charity there.” He took out his checkbook and scribbled. “Here ya go,” Stan said, tearing out the check and passing it over.Toby blinked. “Five hundred dollars? That puts us over the top!”“Yeah, keep the donation secret, though. Oh, and one thing—that old guy, McGucket, who lives in the dump—make sure he gets a good Christmas dinner, right?”“I’ll add him to the list. Turkey and all the trimmings! Thank you again!”“Merry Christmas,” Stan said, and this time it felt a little more natural.It took him half of Saturday, the day before Christmas Eve, to make up his mind. And when he did, it took him another hour and a half to practice the voice.But in the early afternoon, Stan dialed the number, and down in Piedmont his niece by marriage answered: “Pines residence.”“Ah, good afternoon,” Stan said, enunciating carefully. “Wanda? This is Alex’s uncle Stanford. How are you?”“Oh, my heavens! It’s so good to hear from you! We’re fine, thanks, and how are you?”“I’m good, I’m good,” Stanley said. “Just perhaps a little lonely. Uh—does your family celebrate Christmas?”“We do,” Wanda said. “Well—we also celebrate Chanukah, sort of. I mean, we’re not very religious, but Alex thinks it’s good to keep up family traditions. Oh, you’ll want to talk to him! Just a second. Alex! It’s Uncle Stanford!”And a moment later Alex, who sounded a lot like Shermy, said, “Uncle Stanford! How are you?”“Missing my family,” Stanford said. “How are the children?”“The twins are fine. Hyped up over Christmas, like every year!”“I wish I could see them,” Stan said. “You really should come up and visit me maybe next summer when they’re out of school.”“Maybe we can,” Alex said.They chatted for half an hour, and when he hung up Stan felt a little guilty. They still thought that Stanley Pines was dead and that he was the more educated Stanford.He’d forgotten to ask exactly how old the twins were. No matter.“I gotta get ‘em to come visit me,” he told himself. Then he thought if they came up in the summer—heck, for the summer—he could help them connect with the family. He could give the boy the family info he craved so he wouldn’t go hitchhiking after senior year and wouldn’t get hit by the bus. And it would be great to have Mabel around to laugh with. And the kids could keep him from feeling all alone, and, hey, they could work in the Shack! For no money! And that way he could make up for the five hundred dollars he’d donated to charity!Perfect.Later that afternoon, Stan did attend the Chamber of Commerce party, and he had a good time, and he went home that evening feeling better. He’d had a couple-three beers, and before he turned in for the night, he did something he had not done in ten years.He dug out a Polaroid photo he’d kept ever since leaving home—be honest, since being chucked out of home—and stared at it.Him and Ford. March of their senior year. A few weeks before the science fair and—all that came after.They were at a high-school dance, both in pastel-colored jackets, Stan’s right arm over Ford’s shoulder, Ford’s left over Stan, both of them grinning into the camera. Later that evening, Ford awkwardly would try to flirt with a girl who would throw her glass of punch in his face, and then Stan, to make him feel better, would dump punch on himself.“I always had your back, Ford,” Stan told the photo. “I’ll get you back home soon, too, I promise. I got a good feeling about this next year.” He sighed. “Goodnight, Ford. And Merry Christmas.”Yeah, good idea.Merry Christmas to us all. Every one.The End