Chapter Text
The flashing neon sign stuck haphazardly to the roof read “Twin Bed Motel.” The building listed slightly to the left, and Tom hesitated at the door before a particularly loud peal of thunder shocked him into turning the knob and stepping inside.
The bored teenager behind the desk didn’t stop tapping at her flip phone as the bell above the door jingled. “Welcome to the Twin Bed Motel, your home away from home here in Gravity Falls,” she intoned without even glancing up.
Tom gingerly sat his single duffel bag on the counter as he waited for her to say anything else. “Can I get a room?” he asked, eventually breaking the silence himself.
The girl looked up and sighed. “How long are you staying?”
Tom shrugged. “A while, I guess.”
***
If Tom was being honest, which he found he rarely was anymore, Gravity Falls was one of the strangest little towns he’d ever wound up in. Yet, despite the strangeness, Tom quickly came to realize he was bored out of his mind. No amount of weird townsfolk were going to save him from the suffocating closeness and mundanity of small town life. But he couldn’t leave, not yet anyway. The cops didn’t follow him here, and the local police didn’t seem like they could find their way out of a paper bag, but that didn’t mean he was out of the woods yet. He’d taken up driving along the town’s poorly marked back roads just to kill the time.
About a week after he settled into his strangely quaint motel room and his routine, he stumbled upon Gopher Road.
The building looked like a stiff breeze could blow it over, and one of the letters on the enormous sign was already halfway to the ground. Tom slowed to a stop in what he assumed to be the parking lot and began reading the many signs advertising tours and various local oddities scattered about. At the very least, it’d probably be an interesting way to pass an hour or two.
A large, rodent-looking man in a suit and a red fez stepped out of the gift shop as Tom was walking up. He raised his right hand in greeting, and Tom noticed an eight-ball cane gripped in his left.
“Welcome to the Mystery Shack! I’m your host, Mr. Mystery,” the man hollered excitedly. “Our next tour starts in 15 minutes, but please feel free to browse the gift shop in the meantime.”
He swept his arms out grandly toward the door, holding the pose a bit longer than he needed to before relaxing again.
Tom smiled politely and stepped inside.
The woman behind the counter looked up and waved. “Items are priced as marked,” she said pleasantly. “Please let me know if you have any questions!”
The place smelled of dust and old wood. Tom drifted between the racks and shelves, fingers brushing the overpriced t-shirts, glittering snowglobes filled with pine trees and little woodland animals, and bumper stickers asking, “What Is the Mystery Shack?”
The door flung open as the man in the fez hurried inside, lowering his voice only slightly. “Melody! We have a tour bus coming in!”
The woman, Melody, apparently, grinned at the man and slid an eyepatch across the counter to him. He accepted it seriously with a nod like he was psyching himself up.
“Knock ‘em dead, Soos,” she said as she leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.
Then she turned to Tom, her smile never faltering. “If you could follow our very own Mr. Mystery to the museum, the tour is about to begin! We’ll be here to fulfill all your souvenir needs when you return.”
Mr. Mystery gestured toward the door and Tom fell into step a few paces behind him as they took off.
“So, what brings you to our little neck of the woods?” the man asked brightly, glancing back over his shoulder.
“Just passing through.” Tom took a step to catch up. “I’m assuming Mr. Mystery may not be your real name,” he added, changing the subject quickly.
“Oh, no dude! My name’s Soos,” he laughed. “Mr. Mystery is just sort of a tradition.”
They reached the museum entrance and Soos paused, taking his time to adjust the eyepatch until it was sitting just right. “Look okay?”
Tom nodded as he turned to look at the growing group of tourists finally beginning to walk up. “Is it always this busy?”
“Sometimes. We usually have a dip in customers after someone gets eaten by zombies or kidnapped by gnomes or something, but that hasn’t happened in like, two months, dude.”
Soos said it so casually that Tom almost believed him.
“Two months, huh? Business must be booming then."
“Oh yeah, for sure,” Soos said as he turned to face the tour group that had assembled. “Stick around and you might even see a unicorn or something!”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Tom mumbled as Soos launched into his tour guide spiel with practiced enthusiasm.
As the group moved through the museum, Tom lingered near the back only halfway paying attention. He could plainly see that most of the exhibits were fake, but some of the taxidermy looked a little too real, even from up close. He hated to admit he was fascinated by the time they’d filtered back out into the gift shop.
Tom had decided to steal a keychain when the guy next to him cleared his throat for the fifth time.
The tourist (mid-forties, sunburned, balding) hovered in front of the t-shirts, scowling like they personally offended him. He picked up one, frowned at it, put it back, then reached for another, restarting the cycle.
Tom moved closer and pretended to inspect a snowglobe as he watched out of the corner of his eye.
Behind the counter, the cash register was beeping angrily every few seconds as Melody and Soos frantically prodded at it. Gravel crunched outside, signalling the arrival of more visitors. Soos looked up, panic splashed across his face, and locked eyes with Tom.
“Hey dude,” he said, already walking over. “Sorry, this is super weird, but can you like, hang here for a sec? Somebody’s pulling in and the register is going crazy.” They both glanced out the window at the same time a young boy stepped out of the car and promptly got sick all over the grass. “Melody! We need a front lawn clean up!”
Soos didn’t wait for Tom’s reply as he handed him a clipboard with a quick, “Sorry, dude!” as he hurried out the door, Melody close behind with a bucket and mop.
Tom stared down at the clipboard, then up at the tourist.
The tourist noticed him watching and shrugged. “My wife said I can’t come home with anything stupid.”
Tom sighed quietly. “That’s a tall order, especially around here.”
The tourist nodded with a small laugh.
Tom stepped closer to the rack and began looking through the shirts. “So, who’s this for? You, your wife?”
“Our son. I bought him a shirt for his birthday last week and my wife said it was inappropriate and flammable.”
Tom blinked at him. “Okay then. Did your wife give you any other guidelines?”
The tourist shook his head. “Just that it can’t be stupid.”
“Then definitely don’t get the one with the screaming goat,” Tom said, holding up a shirt to demonstrate. “It’s funny for like, five minutes, then everyone’s asking questions. The wrong kind."
He pulled another shirt free, a yellow one with a question mark on the front and “I survived the Mystery Shack” on the back.
“I’d go with this one,” Tom continued. “It’s a little silly, but it makes you seem tough, since you survived and all that. Kid will love it.”
The man considered it for a moment, then nodded. “Makes sense to me.”
“And,” Tom reached for a nearby snowglobe that had two swans nuzzling in it. “Get this for the wife as an apology. It’s cheaper than flowers and doesn’t die.”
The man laughed. “You’re good at this.”
“Nah, I just know what the ladies want,” he replied with an exaggerated wink.
The man walked up to the register with his shirt and his snowglobe and a recently returned Melody began ringing him up.
When Soos came back, slightly out of breath and his eye patch shoved into his pocket, Melody was bagging the man’s items while he promised to “tell everyone about this place.”
Soos stared at the receipt as it printed. Then he stared at Tom as he smiled proudly and leaned against the counter. Then he stared as the man cheerfully traipsed out the door, bag in hand.
“Dude,” Soos said slowly. “No one ever buys those snowglobes.”
Tom shifted his weight. “It’s a nice snowglobe.”
“Yeah, but like,” Soos gestured vaguely between Tom and the register. “You’re the reason he bought it, dude.”
Tom shrugged noncommittally.
“What did you say your name was?” Soos asked.
He paused for a second before responding. “Tom.”
Soos stuck out his hand and Tom shook it without thinking too hard about it.
Soos nodded decisively. “Here’s the thing. Do you…wanna do that again tomorrow?”
“I…what?”
“I mean, for money. Like a job,” Soos rushed on. “You don’t have to or anything, but you’re good at the whole ‘sales’ stuff.”
“We could use the extra hands,” Melody added.
Tom looked around the shop; the tourists milling about, the crooked shelves overstuffed with overpriced novelties.
“Like I said before, I’m just passing through,” Tom said carefully.
“That’s cool, dude,” Soos responded easily. “Lots of people do that, especially here. Some stay, some don’t. Either way, we pay on Fridays.”
Tom hesitated.
Then before he could change his mind, he said, “Okay, yeah. I can do tomorrow.”
Soos beamed. “Awesome! Welcome to the Mystery Shack, dude!”