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Stan was not crying.
Pines men didn’t cry, he told himself sternly. It must’ve been sand that got caught in the vents of his car, blowing into his eyes as he drove to the darkest corner of the pier. Or maybe some eyelashes got into his eyes when he fell backwards onto the pavement after-
He didn’t want to think about that.
The point was, Stan was not crying. He just had something in his eyes that was making them water and his nose runny and his throat tight and feel like he couldn’t breathe.
He just needed to- to think. Thinking would help.
He had the car, his trusty Stanley Mobile that he’d fixed up himself. He had his favorite socks on, the ones that didn’t slip under his heels when he ran. He had the bag a few changes of clothes, and thirty two bucks. He had his wallet with his drivers license and his lucky fish hook and his O’Fishley’s Fish Co. punch card with only two more punches till his next fish and chips would be free.
Stan shifted in the beat up leather seat of his car to ease his aching back (did he hit it too hard on the pavement?) and bit his nail as he planned out his next steps. Ma would be mad, she’d been harping on how he needed to break that habit, but what Ma didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her.
Stan swallowed painfully and tried to keep his mind off his mother and the things she wouldn’t know about.
Okay. Okay. Stan had a place to sleep tonight- in his car, on the pier. Nobody would notice till tomorrow, so he was fine for tonight. But what would he do tomorrow? Go back to school like nothing had happened? Ha, fat chance. He was pretty sure Pa and Ford would have told the school by now that he was never coming back, and his teachers had probably said good riddance. Well, Stan didn’t need any of them and their stupid books and their stupid math problems and their stupid diplomas. Besides, the principal had said it himself- Stan would have been lucky to graduate, and that was after copying off of Ford all year. No way Ford would let him do that now.
No way Ford would want anything to do with Stan ever again after the stunt Stan pulled.
He shook his head to clear away the thoughts of his brother. Stan didn’t need him- he didn’t need anyone. He was fine.
He didn’t need a stupid genius twin to go sailing. He didn’t need a stupid lying mother to do great things. He didn’t need a stupid unimpressed father to prove himself to. He didn’t need a stupid baby nephew to be a good role model for. He didn’t need a stupid absent older brother to live up to.
Stan didn’t need anyone. He should feel great, untethered and free and-
And everything Ford ever wanted.
Alone.
Stan’s eyes welled up again and he swiped at them with the back of his hand before gulping and trying to continue. Stupid allergies.
He needed to get money to get a ship and go sailing. Thirty two bucks, that wasn’t enough to buy a rowboat with holes in the bottom, much less something sea-worthy.
Frowning, he wondered if he could get the Stan o’ War into the water.
He just as quickly discarded that thought, ignoring the bitterness creeping up his throat.
He could get a job, maybe. O’Fishey’s might be looking for a line cook, or better yet, a waiter. Stan knew how to work a good crowd, he might get some decent tips.
But… Ford liked O’Fishey’s. He might show up one day, and what would Stan do if he did? Or Carla, or Crampelter, or one of their teachers, or, God forbid, his parents?
Panic welled up in his chest as he thought about graduation coming up. His parents and Ford and O’Fishey’s and Stan, bussing tables while they celebrate all of Ford’s accomplishments, smiling and laughing about how they really picked the right son, didn’t they, and how everything was perfect now, perfect without Stan, and really, they should’ve just left him behind at the hospital all those years ago, saved everyone a lot of trouble.
He wasn’t sure when he’d started biting his nails again, just that he could taste warm copper on his tongue. The collar of Stan’s shirt suddenly felt too tight and the car felt too warm and he couldn’t breathe, he just needed a little fresh air, that was all. Keep it together, Stan, come on, he told himself as he used a shaking hand to roll down the window. He stuck his head out and gulped down a few breaths of the fresh nighttime sea air.
Huh. Come to think of it, it didn’t smell or taste like fresh nighttime sea air. Or stale nighttime sea air. Or daytime sea air. Or sea air at all, really.
It was weirdly warm and humid, more like late summer than mid-March, and it smelled like the Christmas trees their neighbors would dump on the curb a few days before New Years.
Stan shrugged it off. Maybe there was a Christmas tree sale he didn’t know about. He was pretty sure Christmas was in December, not March, but then he’d never celebrated Christmas, maybe they had some traditions about celebrating in the spring that he’d never heard of or something. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had tried setting up a weird booth on the pier, only to have it go out of business a few weeks later.
As Stan calmed down, he rolled the window back up and rested his head on the top of the steering wheel, loosely holding onto the bottom of it.
O’Fishey’s was out. And what did Stan really want a job for, anyway? If he really wanted someone to tell him what to do, when to do it, how to do it, and tell him he was wrong, he’d just go back to the pawn shop and beg his Pa for a job.
That tore an unexpected laugh out of his throat, painful and wet.
No, Stan had higher aims. If he couldn’t go home till he made millions, then Stan would make billions. He just needed to figure out how, then he’d go home and show them. He’d show everyone what Stanley Caryn Pines was really made of, what he was really worth.
Stan nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of a knock at the driver side window. He squinted through the glass in the dark- what he wouldn’t give to have glasses. Weirdly enough, the world was decently in focus, but it felt like splotches covered parts of his vision, murky clouds making it so he couldn’t catch what was right in front of him. He soon realized that what he was looking at was a man- an older man, with glasses and grey hair and a frankly ridiculous trench coat over a fuzzy red sweater.
At first glance, he kind of looked like Pa, but even with his poor vision and it being dark, Stan could see stark differences between him and this stranger. He didn’t have Pa’s weird mustache, for one thing, and the clothes were all wrong. He could make out the man’s dark brown eyes, too, something he rarely could do through the thick sunglasses Pa insisted on wearing at all times. And his whole look screamed ‘nerd’, the exact opposite of Pa.
The man gestured for Stan to roll the window down. Bracing himself, he finally did, hoping this wasn’t a cop telling him to move on.
The man leaned in, acting way too familiar for Stan’s liking. His head was half poked into the car, mere inches from Stan’s face, and he looked concerned. Not angry, not annoyed, just… concerned. Vaguely, Stan realized the man had a flashlight, illuminating his face and the inside of the car just enough to be seen properly.
“Are you alright?” he asked Stan.
Stan blinked, then mumbled “Uh, yeah, sorry, I’ll move.” He moved to start the car, but the man placed a hand on Stan’s arm, causing him to jerk back and flinch slightly.
The older man quickly removed his hand. “You don’t need to move, but- why are you out here? Shouldn’t you be in bed?”
Stan stared down at the steering wheel. He shrugged. He didn’t owe this guy anything, much less his story. “Forget it,” Stan muttered.
“But why? Why are you sitting in your car? It’s nearly three in the morning.”
As if Stan didn’t realize how late it was. As if he hadn’t been counting the hours, the minutes, the seconds since he’d landed on the pavement, since the rustling of curtains closing had sealed his fate. Stan glared at the older man. “What are you, a cop? I don’t gotta tell you shit, man.”
The older man blinked owlishly behind his glasses and wow, if that wasn’t the same way Ford blinked when he was confused. It wasn’t a sight Stan saw too often anymore, but he remembered it well. A deep ache shot through his chest as he recalled the early days of Ford’s genius, learning as much as he could the moment he didn’t understand something. It had been so impressive then, Ford being able to learn everything about a topic in less than an afternoon.
Funny how a few years could change so much.
Suddenly realizing how long they’d been staring at each other in silence, Stan muttered “Uh, g’night,” to the stranger as he tried to roll up the window.
The man quickly said “Wait!” causing Stan to pause. “Do you mind if I sit with you?” he asked.
Stan was taken aback. His first thought was hell no, he did not want a random strange old dude to sit next to him in his car during Stan’s wallowing-in-sadness hours. Then his second thought was what the hell, not like I’ll be sleeping tonight anyway. If Stan ended up kidnapped, well, that was Future Stan’s problem. He gave a jerky nod and turned to move the duffel bag from the passenger side of the car, only to find the seat empty aside from a half-chewed pencil and some glitter. Stan vaguely wondered if Carla had sat in the car recently, but that wouldn’t make sense, as they’d broken up weeks prior.
The older man opened the door and sat in the car, glancing around with wide eyes. He placed the flashlight between them, illuminating the scene. He cleared his throat. “Er, you don’t know who I am, do you?” he asked. It sounded more like he was looking for confirmation than anything.
Stan squinted at him again. Despite the strange sense of familiarity, he definitely didn’t know this guy. “Nope. Should I?”
“Ah, no, I just wondered.” The man bit his lip, looking like there was more he wanted to say but staying quiet.
Stan nodded and stared at the steering wheel again. This was fine. Completely fine. He just let a complete stranger pile into his car, the one safe place he had left, and was just sitting with him in silence. Perfect. This guy could have been a drug dealer or a kidnapper or a serial killer or any number of things. Even worse, he could have been an army recruiter with too much time on his hands.
Stan suppressed a shudder and cleared his throat. Time to get control of the situation. “So, uh, did you need a ride or something?”
“No, no, nothing like that.” The man paused. “I was just worried to see you sitting in the car in the middle of the night. Did you- what happened? Why are you out here alone?”
Stan snorted. It’s not like this guy could know, but boy was that a loaded question. “Nonspecific excuse?” he said with a shrug. It’s not like it mattered anyway.
The man went from looking concerned to looking flat out worried. “You really ought to go to bed, it’s very late.”
“Sure, mac. I’ll do that once you’re out.”
“What do you mean?”
Stan gestured at the seat of the car. “This is my bed as of today. Can’t really sleep when there’s company, that’s rude, you know.”
The man looked stricken. “Oh no,” he whispered, seeming to realize what Stan meant. Good. He didn’t feel like explaining it all.
“Yep, sorry it ain’t the Ritz, and mind your shoes on the upholstery, these floors don’t vacuum themselves.” Once glance at the man’s boots showed they were covered with mud, which didn’t make any sense- it hadn’t rained in days, and they were nowhere near the places that would get muddy in the first place. To his credit, the man lifted up his feet so the floors didn’t get too muddy. Between that, his hands deep shoved into his pockets, and him looking like someone had just told him his dog died, he was a weird sight.
The man finally cleared his throat. “What will you do?” he asked, voice trying to hide the shake. Like Stan couldn’t tell, Ford-
Someone Stan knew sounded the same way when he was upset.
Stan shrugged. “Eh, dunno. Maybe- travel? It’d be nice to get outta Glass Shard, that’s for sure. Maybe I could go to Vegas. Bet I’d do great there.” Stan thought about it some more. “Or maybe there’s work down south. Neighbor’s kid picks fruit in Georgia. I could do that.”
The man nodded, thoughtful. Stan continued. “Or maybe I’ll just go treasure hunting. I mean, you can do that alone, can’t you? You don’t need anyone else for that.”
The man hesitated. “Strictly speaking, no, it can be a solo venture. But these things tend to be more successful with at least one other party present.”
Stan snorted. Party present. He knew what the guy meant, but it was sorta funny. He rolled his eyes. “Kinda hard to have a group when no one wants you, mac.”
“W-what?” The old man’s voice cracked and Stan winced. He shouldn’t have said that part out loud.
“Forget it, just me bein’ dumb, that’s normal for me” he said, waving it away with an attempt at a smile. If it looked as bad as it felt, it would explain the way the man looked even more distressed.
“You’re not dumb,” the man said, sounding almost insulted.
Stan raised a brow. “Yeah, no, you don’t know me, bud. My defining features are dumb, sweaty, and good at punching,” he said, ticking them off on his fingers. “Just ask my old man. Or the principal. Or hell, anybody on this boardwalk.” Stan gestured to the empty boardwalk on the other side of the windshield. “I’ve shoplifted and swindled from nearly every stand on this beach. None of them ‘like’ or ‘trust’ me, apparently. See that seashell shop, right by the sea shore? I broke both those windows in a fight, pinned it on the owner’s kid. Or that ring toss? I told the guy who owned it that his shoelace was untied, he bends down to tie it, and I stuck the rings on the bottles while he wasn’t lookin’ and got a whole bunch of stuffed animals to give to my gal.” Stan huffed a laugh. “Can’t really call her that now, though. I might’ve driven her new guy’s van offa bridge. Ain’t that some dumb shit? But hey! Just goes to show. Nobody wants me around.” He choked back an unexpected sob creeping up his throat. “And it’s all ‘cause of me.”
The man looked down right distraught throughout Stan’s tirade. “Of course people want you around, that’s not true. You are so much more than those things.”
Stan rolled his eyes and stared out the window, arms crossed tightly over himself, definitely not trying to feel like he was being hugged. Funny, it didn’t really look like the pier- it was more like dark blobs of green and brown. Probably just the dust in his eyes making him tear up, and making his throat burn as he spoke. “You don’t even know me, man. Hell, even my family doesn’t want me.”
“W-what?” the man whispered.
“My old man tossed me out on the street like garbage. Had a bag packed-” he waved towards the back seat, unsure of where exactly the bag in question had gotten to- “for Moses knows how long. My ma just… stood there. Didn’t say nothin’. Like she was watching one of her soaps, not her own kid get kicked out. She- she had the baby, and- I don’t know, maybe she was scared Pa would kick her out too? Or- she just didn’t care. And-” Stan choked on his constricting throat- “I don’t think my brother will ever wanna see me again after what I did to him. They’re all gonna be better off, aren’t they?” he asked. “Maybe they all woulda been better off if I was never even born.”
If he’d never been born, he wouldn’t have held Ford back, drowning him like an anchor, suffocating him. If he’d never been born, Ma and Pa wouldn’t have struggled so much with money and argued all the time. If he’d never been born, Ford would get to go to his dream school and live his perfect life and everyone would be so much better off.
“That’s not true,” the man said, his voice rough. “Please, Stanley, that’s not true, you can’t think that, you can’t.”
Stan sat straight up and stared at the man, hard. He suddenly became keenly aware of how close his hand was to the door handle, and the baseball bat in his backseat. “How the fuck do you know my name?”
The man flinched slightly, and something in Stan ached. The man flinching felt wrong, very wrong. He wasn’t sure why. He pushed that aside and kept up the glare, hoping against hope that he could bolt out of the car quickly if he needed to. The man was older, maybe pushing sixty or seventy, Stan could probably outrun him. But the man was tall and broad shouldered, and wore a trench coat. Only major nerds and people who were secretly jacked wore trench coats, even Stan knew that, and he wasn’t looking to find out which one of those this guy was.
The man stammered “I- well, um- you… told me?”
Stan stifled a snort. This guy was a worse liar than Ford. Stan slowly slid his hand down the left side of the seat, trying to subtly reach the baseball bat in the back seat. “How long have you been following me?”
“Following-”
“Don’t act dumb, I didn’t tell you my name, and we sure as hell don’t know each other. Who are you? How long have you been following me?”
“I wasn’t following-”
“Cut the bull, how else would you’ve found me? Are you a cop? Cause if you taped my confession, I was lying! I wanna lawyer, and- and I know my rights! Right to remain silent, don’t I got the right to remain silent?” Bingo. Stan’s hand wrapped around the bat.
The man looked frazzled. “It’s, ‘do I not have the right to remain silent.’ Language, Stanley.”
Oh, that did it. It was clunky, and awkward, but Stan managed to dislodge the bat from the backseat and swing it towards the front of the car. It smacked the steering wheel with a dull thud but Stan ignored that, getting a better grip as he swung it towards the stranger in the car with him. He just had to hit him hard enough distract him enough to buy Stan some time to run. Run where, he didn’t know yet, but he had to get out, had to run, he couldn’t let the cops get him, not this time, not now-
The stranger’s eyes widened behind his glasses as Stan clumsily swung the bat at his face. The small space in the car didn’t make it easy, but he put every bit of force he could muster into it, making the swing fast and hard. With a woosh it approached the man’s face-
And was stopped in motion by a six-fingered hand, gripping the bat like it was nothing.
Stan stared at the hand, a loud ringing in his ears drowning out every other sound in the car. The man might have been saying something, but he couldn’t tell. All he could focus on was the hand. He counted and recounted the fingers- six in total, one pointer finger, one next to pointer finger, one middle finger, one ring finger, one pinkie finger, one thumb. All nicked and scratched and scarred, nails nibbled down to the quick. A pink bandage with a cartoony looking cat was wrapped around the knuckle of the pointer finger.
Stan suddenly felt like he was falling, despite the fact that he had already been sitting. The ringing persisted, sounding like a scream, or- or like a hearing aid whose batteries needed changed. His head felt heavy, and something was propping it up- something sort of soft and fabric-y. He blinked a few times, trying to clear the black spots and foggy spots in his vision.
Eventually, the ringing quieted, although it didn’t go away completely. His head felt a little better, though he had a pounding headache and could tell his neck and back would be killing him for a while. He tried to shift, to sit up fully on his own, and realized someone’s arm was around him, keeping him leaned against a shoulder attached to the arm.
He glanced up, taking in the face of the man. An older man, with glasses and grey hair. Dark brown eyes behind the glasses, brows furrowed in concern. Definitely a nerd, given the trench coat and the overall vibe he was giving off. A tired, grizzled face, lined with age and sadness and pain.
Stan suppressed a sigh. Despite it all, his brother still managed to age better than he had.
“Sixer?” Stan finally said, voice rough like he’d been crying. He definitely hadn’t been, but if he maybe had, that’s what his throat would feel like.
“Do you remember me?” Ford asked, his voice low.
Stan nodded.
“Do you remember the date?”
Stan cast his mind back a little, to the last time he looked at a calendar. “Uh, Thursday?”
“Well, yes, but which Thursday?”
Stan thought a little more. “August… twenty-ninth?” That sounded about right.
“And the year?”
“2012.”
Ford released a soft sigh. “And do you remember where we are?”
“Do we really gotta do this now?”
“Stan.” Ford sounded pleading, and Stan caved.
“Gravity Falls, Oregon. The woods. The Stanley Mobile.”
Ford nodded, looking relieved. “Good, very good. And do you remember what happened?”
“Eh, a little fuzzy before you got in the car,” Stan admitted, sitting up, grateful the spinning in his head started to subside. Ford let him this time, releasing his grip on his brother’s arm. “I remember tucking the twins in bed, and I remember throwing on the TV… then I was here. Then you were here.”
Ford frowned. “I do not like that you can’t recall the events in between. That’s potentially up to two hours of missing time, during which you left the house, drove roughly two miles away, and parked the car. That’s assuming those are the only things you did.”
“What made you look for me?”
“I had run out of coffee. I could hear the television from the kitchen and looked in, but you weren’t there.” The unspoken I looked in to check on you was still picked up on and understood by Stan. Normally, he might be a little annoyed, but it seemed Ford’s overprotectiveness had proved to be justified tonight. “I searched the house, but I couldn’t find you. The Stanley Mobile was missing. I tracked you here and quickly realized you were suffering from some kind of flashback.”
Stan nodded. “I remember that part.” He kind of wished he couldn’t. He’d said a lot of things he hadn’t meant to, especially not in front of Ford.
“What I can’t understand is what could have caused this kind of reaction?” Ford mused. “Your memories have been largely returning, the only major setbacks we have noticed seem to occur once you’ve woken up. In those cases, it would be more accurate to say that you were returned to, ah, a clean slate, so to speak.”
Stan nodded. Usually when he first woke up, it was like being in the forest the very first time- everything was blank. Empty. A clean slate, like Ford said. It had taken less and less time to get him to remember things since that first day, so he seemed to be improving. This was just weird.
Ford continued. “In this case, you accurately referenced specific events prior to the one you were remembering in the moment. You knew your name, your relationships, where you were at the time, but anything past that was unknown. It was almost like you were-” Ford broke off.
Stan picked it up from there. “Like I was really there? Yeah, that’s what it felt like.” He leaned back and stared up at the ceiling of the car. The kids had stuck a couple stickers on the beat up ceiling, covering some of the stains. He focused on an orange one. He was pretty sure it was a goldfish, but his cataracts blurred out just enough of his vision that he couldn’t really tell. “Felt like I was right back there, living that night all over again.”
Ford took in a sharp breath. Stan closed his eyes.
Should he be angry? He couldn’t tell. Anger was easy to fall back on, it fit like a favorite pair of pants. He’d learned young that anger was a safe feeling. It was a manly feeling, manlier than sadness and happiness and love. He could be angry- angry with Ford for hearing the things Stan wanted to keep secret. Angry with Ford for not saying something sooner and preventing the uncomfortable conversation.
But somehow, Stan didn’t want to feel angry. He had spent so much time being angry- angry with Ford, angry with himself, angry with the world- and he was tired. He didn’t think he needed to be angry anymore. Not now, not about this.
Ford finally spoke again. “I- was worried. When I couldn’t find you.”
Stan sighed wearily. “It’s not like I tried to wander off, you know. I’ll leave a note next time I remember to.” It was snarky, but there was no bite to it. He didn’t have the energy for there to be any bite to it. “You didn’t wake up the kids, right?”
“No, no. I checked on them before leaving. They were sleeping soundly.”
Stan nodded. “You locked up the Shack, right? Before leaving?”
“Yes. The Shack is fully secure.”
“Good, good.”
Silence once again reigned in the car. Stan rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck one direction, then the other. “Probably oughta head back, huh?”
“Are you feeling up to driving?” Ford asked, frowning.
“Yep, totally normal.” He was still a little fuzzy, feeling like he’d just woken up (well, woken up normally, not woken up with an empty brain like the past week), but he’d driven in far worse conditions over the years. This would be a piece of cake. He turned on the car and put his hands on the wheel and-
“Stanley! What happened to your hands?” Ford cried, reaching to take Stan’s right hand in his. Stan winced slightly at the sight of bloodied nails, nibbled during his ‘episode.’ The blood was mostly dry, the stinging mostly gone, but even Stan had to admit that they didn’t look good.
“Oh, uh, I… don’t remember?” It was a weak lie, told by a weak man who didn’t want to admit to an old habit he should’ve gotten over years ago.
Ford looked distressed. “These look awful, could you have cut them?”
Some genius, Stan thought, with no real heat to it. Ford’s nails were bitten to oblivion, but apparently he couldn’t recognize the signs on someone else. Stan vaguely wondered if Ford even realized that his looked so bad- he never seemed to notice when they were kids, not until Stan or Ma or somebody told him to cut it out.
With a sigh, Stan finally muttered “Was munchin’ on ‘em. Earlier.”
Ford pressed his lips into a line, but he didn’t say anything. He gave a jerky nod and released Stan’s hand, allowing him to drive them home.
They drove much in silence. Any worry Stan had had about not recalling where they were going quickly disappeared as he went on autopilot. He must’ve driven in and out of the forest a lot to be able to do this so easily. They weren’t even on a real road, more like spaces between trees big enough to drive his car through.
Finally, finally, they pulled up at home. Something in Stan relaxed as he climbed out of the car. He felt a little tickle at the edge of his mind- what was he forgetting? Halfway out of the car, he asked Ford “Say, where’s my bat?”
Ford nodded to the car, having already gotten out and closed his door. “In the backseat.”
“Ah, right.” Once the car was locked, Stan said “Sorry for swingin’ at you. Didn’t know who you were.”
“No, no, don’t apologize!” Ford hastily said as they walked to the Shack. “I was a stranger invading your space, and you were clearly in distress. I didn’t even tell you who I was, it is completely understandable why you would think I was a danger to you. I’m sorry.”
“Eh, you just came to make sure I wasn’t dying or somethin’.” Stan ignored Ford’s wince as he unlocked the door, walked into the kitchen and went to the sink to wash the blood off his hands. Somehow, he thought that felt too familiar for his liking.
Ford followed, staying a few feet behind Stan. Even without looking at him, Stan knew he was probably fidgeting with that damn trench coat. Stan washed and dried his hands and decided he didn’t need any bandages, so long as he didn’t bite his nails again. It would be easy enough- he’d rarely done it as a teenager, and had pretty much stopped biting his nails entirely by the time he’d turned eighteen.
He’d quickly found that bandages and cleaning supplies were harder to come by on the road. It was better to break the habit than to bleed unnecessarily.
Ford finally cleared his throat.
Stan sighed and walked right past him, up the stairs and to the attic. Ford followed, but he didn’t really care. As quietly as possible, Stan cracked open the door and peeked in.
The makeshift bedroom was messy, with clothes and craft supplies scattered across the floor. Glow in the dark stars littered the walls and ceilings, casting a faint light into the room. Soft snores rolled out from two sleeping children and a pig. Dipper laid sprawled on his bed, one of the red leather-bound journals still open on his lap. Every now and then he twitched, but he quickly eased. He was still wearing his hat, Stan noticed with a quiet chuckle. On the other side of the room, Mabel had her arms wrapped around the pig. She giggled in her sleep, then half-muttered, half-sung a few lines of a song Stan nearly recognized, but couldn’t quite place. She was only wearing one sock, the other having apparently been kicked off in her sleep. The pig sighed contentedly in her arms.
Stan shut the door with a soft click and breathed a sigh of relief. Over his shoulder, he muttered to Ford “Sleeping.”
Ford nodded, an oddly fond expression on his face.
“What?” Stan asked, keeping his voice low as they walked back down the stairs.
“Nothing, just-” Ford chuckled. “You’re good with them.”
Stan raised his brows. That was unexpected, but he wasn’t about to argue about his failings with his brother. For some reason, he seemed to get upset when Stan talked about how he wasn’t very good at things like being a guardian, or being honest, or being smart, or being successful.
He couldn’t for the life of him think why, especially since it was well-known that Ford liked the truth.
Anger, anger over destruction, yes, but also over lying. Lying and hiding the truth and brushing it off like it was nothing and-
Stan shook off these thoughts and sunk back into his chair. Ford must have left the television on when he left to find Stan. A documentary about Watergate was playing. Frankly, he found the whole thing to be boring as hell when it happened, but then he’d barely been able to focus on government scandals when he was trying to get Stanco Enterprises off the ground and, you know. Not starve.
Ford hovered at the edge of the room, staring at Stan with wide eyes. For the life of him, Stan wasn’t sure why Ford kept looking at him like that, like Stan would disappear if he wasn’t watched. It was probably the guilt, he decided. Stanford Pines felt guilty for someone he hadn’t felt much of anything but anger for in decades, and he didn’t know how to fix it.
Because that’s the thing with the Pines family- they liked fixing and solving things. Ford liked answering complicated science-y questions, Dipper liked solving mysteries, Mabel liked fixing people’s personal problems, even Soos liked to repair things-
And Stan-
Stan wasn’t a fixer. He’d wanted to be, a long time ago, back when the biggest problems were bullies and Pa’s anger and Ma’s negligence, and his way of fixing things was either punching the problem or a distraction. Looking back, that’s all the Stan o’ War and sailing had been- distractions, keeping their minds off a cruel world and a tough home.
No, he wasn’t a fixer. Stan had always been far better at breaking things than fixing them.
Ford finally cleared his throat, snapping Stan out of his train of thought. “What?”
Ford shuffled and finally said “May I sit? With you?”
Stan was surprised at that. “Uh, sure.” He gestured to the couch next to him. “‘S a free country.”
His brother sat on the couch, looking terribly awkward. It was like he was trying to make himself smaller, which wasn’t easy on a little couch like that. It fit the twins well enough with plenty of room to spare, but a big guy like one of them? Ford took up half the couch, and that was after trying to shrink in on himself.
Stan suppressed a snort and turned his attention back to the failures of Richard Nixon. It was a lot easier to ignore your own shortcomings when looking at those of presidents.
Ford broke the silence. “I wanted to ask you something.”
“Yeah?”
Ford bit his lip. “What did you do- after?”
“After I got kicked out, you mean?” He winced and nodded. Stan sighed and leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling. He felt a few disjointed memories at the edge of his mind, mostly running from things or people, but when he tried to focus on them they slipped out of his hands like too-smooth sea glass. “A lot of it’s fuzzy. I stuck around for a bit- not long. Couple weeks, maybe a month. Looked for treasure-” Moses had that been stupid, they lived on Glass Shard Beach, all he got was shards of glass in his feet- “I think after that I tried to get into sales. Didn’t go too good.”
Ford looked at him and nodded, wanting him to go on. Stan sucked in a breath. “Look, I did a lotta stuff I just ain’t proud of, most of it I don’t even remember. Most of it I don’t wanna remember.”
A gun shoved in his face, tears streaming down his cheeks, bitter alcohol in his mouth, screaming, so much screaming, a bottle broken against the back of his head, cold, waking up in a bathtub of ice with blood pouring out of his side, nostrils burning from blood and drugs, hunger, a husky voice snickering “Aw baby, c’mon, don’t be like that” as fingers ran down his chest, his jaw on fire as he chokes on blood, tired, so tired, so scared-
Stan shook himself back to reality. “It’s in the past,” he finally said, his voice gruff. Though after what had happened tonight, Stan might have to face each of those memories again, in real time. He shoved the thought away. Future problems were for Future Stan, right?
“I’m so- sorry, Stanley,” Ford choked out.
Stan turned and stared at his brother. “What’re you apologizing for? I’m the one who did a bunch of stupid stuff and paid for it.”
“You never should have been in that position,” Ford said. “You were a child and- and we just-” He buried his face in his hands.
Stan reeled back in shock. He hadn’t seen his brother this upset since- well, when he first sat in this chair, a few days before, and the children tried to jog his memory with a scrapbook and a bit of hope. It was strange, not knowing the people around him, who looked so distraught that he assumed someone had died.
He hadn’t understood why they were looking at him like he had died.
But they’d gotten a happy ending- he remembered most of the important, recent stuff thanks to the kids and Soos, and he remembered most of the important, long ago stuff thanks to Ford. Between them all, he’d gotten the story of the end of the world, and how he’d saved them all thanks to a sacrifice that resulted in his memory being wiped clean.
Sure, there were a few things missing (alright, fine, a lot of things missing, but what are you, a cop?), but for the most part, things were alright.
Well, no point in hiding it, he decided. “I remember. Why I got kicked out, I mean,” he admitted, quietly.
Ford let out a choked half-sob. He hadn’t said exactly what happened- just that there was a misunderstanding, and that their father had overreacted and wrongfully kicked Stan out. There had been apologies then, too, a kind of guilt that Stan didn’t like to see on his brother’s face. He didn’t ask for details, seeing how much it clearly hurt Ford to talk about.
It hadn’t mattered- it didn’t matter, not now, not after all these years. Not if they were brothers again.
But then why did Stan’s chest feel tight? Why did he taste bitterness and salt? Why was there a knot in his throat?
Why did he feel like something had ended? Where was that sense of calm, of peace that had followed him, despite the confusion of the past few days? Why did it feel like he couldn’t go back to that?
Stan had known he wasn’t really a good person. Between some of the more questionable stories from the kids and the boxes of fake IDs and guns in what was supposed to be his room, his actions made that clear. According to the kids and Soos, he was something of a sketchy family member/boss, but he had apparently protected them and taken care of them more times than they could count. They had called him ‘brave’ and ‘funny’ and ‘the world’s best boss’ and all kinds of wonderful things, and they had meant it too.
They called him a hero. They all did, even Ford.
Stan didn’t believe them, even without his memories. But… he let himself pretend to believe it. And it felt good.
And now-
Now he remembered. He remembered why he would never be a hero. Why words like that, like ‘protector’ and ‘caregiver’ should never apply to him. He was a screwup, that was all he was and all he could hope to be. The fact that he’d managed to dupe a bunch of kind, loving, good people, most of who were actual children, showed that he was even worse than he had thought.
He’d been rotten to the core since he was a kid, hadn’t he? Selfish in a way that went deeper than childish pranks, fights, apparently driving some musician’s van off a cliff (yeah, that one was probably a pretty big sign that there was something wrong with him, looking back, even if that Thistle Down asshat absolutely deserved it and he would do it again today). Only someone that selfish would do what he'd done, especially to his twin brother.
Stan remembered the feeling of desperation, of despair, of absolute hopelessness. Stan felt those things a lot over the years, now that he thought about it. Feelings were the easiest to remember, easier than details like whether hitting a table was an accident or purposeful, or whether he had planned to destroy his brother’s ticket to his dream life or if he had, for some ungodly reason, decided to just go there on a whim and just happened to accidentally destroy everything.
Even he wasn’t too stupid to know that story was impossible.
Stan was a monster disguised as a hero. He was willing to bet the whole ‘saving the world’ thing was selfish, too, just him trying to save his own hide. It sounded like him- or at least what he knew of himself from fragmented memories, lies sold to children, and boxes of evidence of the lives he’d led.
Ford was so blinded by guilt over what had happened to Stan that he couldn’t see what he’d seen that night decades before; the twins and Soos and Wendy were too young, too innocent, to see what Stan was, believing the lies he’d no doubt told them.
Ford finally spoke again, snapping Stan out of his spiral. “I can’t believe what a fool I was- how selfish-”
“Whoa, whoa, hey, come on,” Stan said, reaching over to place a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “You had no control over Dad kicking me out. You were seventeen, that’s almost Wendy’s age. You were a kid, Poindexter.”
“So were you!” Ford cried, eyes red-rimmed behind his glasses. Stan froze in surprise. “So were you,” he repeated, his voice softer. “You were a kid and it was so wrong and I- I didn’t do anything. I just- stood there. And closed the curtains.”
He could remember that part. He could remember staring up at a window, holding up his hand, asking for a High Six that would never come. He could remember yelling something cocky as the door to the only home he’d ever known slammed, shutting him out forever. He could remember tossing a pre-packed duffle bag into his car and driving off to the darkest part of the pier to cry and plan his next steps.
“I ruined your life. Anybody woulda done the same after that,” Stan finally said.
“Not you. Never you.”
Stan paused. Ford was right. If it had been him, if he had been the one wronged, if Ford had been tossed out on the curb like last week’s trash, Stan wouldn’t have closed the curtains. He would’ve pushed past their father and followed his brother, not caring about losing his home and his future, as long as he had his brother by his side.
But Stan wasn’t Ford, and he’d never had anything to lose.
Nothing except his brother.
Ford began to ramble, running a hand through his already messy hair. “I didn’t believe that it was an accident- I don’t know why, I mean, the thought that you would ever do something like that on purpose, it’s- it’s laughable. I was a fool.” The hand that was messing with his hair began to tug on it. “I have been so foolish, and time and time again the ones I love paid the price. First you, then- then Fiddleford, then the children and then you, again, and- and it just never stops.” His breaths started coming short, the way Dipper’s did when he got too stuck in his own head.
“Ford,” Stan said, trying to get him to stop.
“God, I have been so selfish, I- I nearly destroyed the world because of my own pride!”
“Ford,” Stan pleaded, reaching out and hesitating, not wanting to break another thing he couldn’t fix.
The tugging worsened to pulling as Ford’s shallow breaths grew panicked. “You never should have tried to bring me back, I- I don’t deserve to be-”
“Stanford!” Stan cried, grabbing Ford’s wrist and pulling it away from his hair. He tried to keep his grip on his wrist gentle, he didn’t want to hurt his brother, just keep him from hurting himself. Ford’s eyes were glassy and his chin trembled, breaths still shallow but not quite as panicked as before.
Stan swallowed down the burning lump in his throat. “Don’t ever talk about yourself like that again. Nobody gets to talk about my brother that way, not even you.” Ford blinked and opened his mouth to speak, but Stan didn’t let him. “You made mistakes! Who cares? You didn’t mean to hurt anyone. You feel bad, right? You try to make up for ‘em?” Ford nodded. “Then they don’t matter. None of it does.”
“But I-”
“Alright, you feel bad about me gettin’ kicked out? You were seventeen. I’d ruined your chances, and you were upset. I ain’t mad at you. Heck, I’m way more upset with Pa than you, and I’m not even mad at him anymore.” Well, that last bit was a bit of an exaggeration, but Ford didn’t need to know that. “The whole,” Stan waved his hand in circles, trying to remember exact details that just weren’t quite coming to him, “portal thing, you were tricked. It happens. If you knew how it was gonna turn out, you’d never’ve done that, right?” Ford shook his head. “Exactly.”
“I should have known better,” he despaired. “I should have seen it coming, I- I’m supposed to be a genius, and I didn’t see it, I believed everything he said, like some child being told a fairytale.”
“It happens.” Stan released Ford’s wrist and rubbed circles into his arm as Ford’s breathing slowed and deepened. “You’re trying. I know that, the kids know that, everybody does. Look, if-” a thought came to him, a memory or an idea he didn’t know- “if a guy asks you to buy ‘im a bat, and he uses it to beat some guy to death, does that make you a killer?”
Ford stopped and stared at Stan. “... What?”
“If a guy asks you to-”
“No, I heard you, I just-” he pinched the bridge of his nose under his glasses. “Why would you do that? Why would you buy a baseball bat for someone who had murderous intent?”
Stan leaned back in his chair. “I- uh- I don’t really know, actually.” He really, really hoped that was just a random idea that came to him and not a memory. He cleared his throat. “Look, point is, that wouldn’t make you guilty.”
Ford rubbed his temples and finally said “Fine. For the sake of argument, I can accept that logic- for the portal, at least. It does not excuse any of my other actions.”
“Like I said, you made some mistakes, did stuff you weren’t proud of. You think I haven’t?”
“All because you were put in those positions after an accident.”
Stan rubbed the back of his neck. “Look, Poindexter, I-”
“I held that anger against you over an accident for years when you needed help, and I-”
“Stanford.” Ford finally stopped again, looking into his eyes. “You gotta stop beatin’ yourself up over this. Seriously, it’s fine, I’m fine, everything’s fine!” Stan was never good at lying to his brother. He hoped Ford was too upset to notice. “It was years ago, it’s over now, and it’s fine. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does matter!” Ford cried tearfully. “You suffered because of my selfish pride- and tonight- seeing you, reliving that- God, Stanley, you were a child, and I just- refused to accept that it was just an accident-”
“Was it?” Stan finally blurted.
Ford stopped, frozen, eyes so wide they practically stretched past the frames of his glasses. “What?” he whispered, his voice sounding fragile.
Stan sighed and leaned back into the chair, scratching at his right shoulder through his suit. It itched randomly, especially when he was upset, for some reason. “I- I might not exactly… remember?”
“Explain.” It wasn’t a request. It was soft, but sharp.
Stan took a deep breath and, before he could chicken out, started word-vomitting. “Alright so I remember the science fair a- and I remember what your machine was and I remember, um, being upset and I remember going to the school after we talked and I remember getting kicked out and I remember being angry and lonely and I remember leaving, but I don’t really remember why I went to the school?”
Ford blinked owlishly, and something tightened in Stan’s chest. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I don’t remember if it was an accident, Stanford!” Stan cried. It was closer to actual crying than he planned for it to be. “I don’t… remember.” He stared down at his hands. They were covered kind of fucked up, now that he really looked at them. Masses of scar tissue at the knuckles, crooked fingers, long lines stretching from the base of his pinkie fingers down to his wrists, scratches that never quite healed right- they were a mess.
Another hand, also scarred but with different scars and an extra finger, entered his line of sight, waving to get his attention. He looked up and caught sight of Ford, staring at him with an unreadable expression. “Can you explain?” he asked, his voice gentler than expected.
Stan huffed a sigh. “I already told you, I don’t remember.” Ford still stared at him. “Look, the details, they’re fuzzy, you know? I remember the- the outline of what happened, I remember the feelings, but I don’t- I can’t-”
“You can’t remember why you went to the school,” his brother finished.
Stan deflated. “Yeah.”
“And you can’t remember whether it was intentional.”
“Yeah.”
Stan waited for- something. Maybe a punch to the jaw, but he wasn’t really sure why. Or yelling, yelling would make sense. Pines men were like that. When they got mad, they yelled. Both of them were like that, Pa was like that, hell, even Dipper. Mabel, not so much. She yelled when she felt any emotion in excess, especially happiness.
But Ford was silent. And still. His brows were drawn together, but he didn’t tap, didn’t fidget, didn’t do any of the things he normally did when he was angry, or happy, or thinking. It was like he was made of stone.
Moses had Stan pissed him off that badly?
His shoulder itched.
Finally, finally Ford spoke. “I don’t know if it matters anymore,” he said slowly.
“What do you mean?” Stan was shocked. “It matters whether I ruined your life on purpose.”
“Oh, I ruined my own life,” Ford said, wearily. “The only thing going to West Coast Tech would have changed was the timeline, and perhaps left Fiddleford out of things. Even if I had never met him, I would have dragged some other poor soul into my mess. Studying weirdness was my goal, even if there had been other opportunities I would have eventually ended up in Gravity Falls, I would have eventually met Bill and made a deal. In the end, I don’t think much would have changed, regardless of what college I attended.”
“It was your dream, Stanford.”
“It was,” he acknowledged. “But I have a new dream now.” He returned Stan's blank expression with a shaky smile then took a deep breath. “Accident or purposeful, we were children. Pa blew it out of proportion. I don’t think he was even upset on my behalf- he was upset about losing hypothetical millions I wouldn’t have given him, even if I had made that kind of money. It wasn’t right.”
“But I screwed up and broke everything,” Stan said, shaking his head. “I kept trying to shove you back into a dream you didn’t want, and I ruined what we had.”
“We could have communicated better, that is not all on your shoulders.”
“I lied! I lied, and even if it was an accident, I hid it. I hid it and I brushed it off.”
Ford shrugged. “You did, but it doesn’t matter now.”
“Doesn’t- but I-” Stan didn’t know what to say. “I made so many mistakes.” His voice was rough with regret.
Ford sighed and leaned over, placing a hand on Stan’s shoulder. “Yes, but we both have. And that’s what they were- mistakes.” His mouth quirked up. “You feel bad, right? You’ve tried to make up for them?” Stan nodded, numb and confused by Ford turning his own words back at him. “Then it doesn’t matter. I forgive you. You’ve more than made up for any damage you ever caused, and even if you hadn’t, I would still forgive you.”
Stan’s eyes stung, and he swiped at them with his arm. “Why?” he asked.
“Because you’re my brother,” Ford said, simply. Then he smiled.
Stan tried to hold it back. Pines men don’t cry, he heard his father’s voice say. Pines men don’t cry. Pines men don’t hug. Pines men don’t say ‘I love you.’
Then Stan decided his old man needed to fuck off, and let the tears spill down his face as he pulled his brother in for a hug and muttered “Love you, knucklehead.” The nickname softened the overall weirdness of it, but there. He’d said it.
Ford patted Stan’s back and replied “Love you, too, Stanley.”