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Against Dipper’s wishes, the summoning was not a one-off.
Apparently, when one found a spell to summon a demon of knowledge, one felt the need to share it with one’s friends.
Dipper knew the freshman (his name was Kip, apparently, poor kid, and Dipper had thought his nickname was bad) had shared the spell with people immediately after his arrival to the scene of a second summoning.
He had been having a very nice dream where he had Bill shirtless before his boyfriend had frowned, and stopped running his hands up and down Dipper’s equally shirtless back.
“What’s wrong?” Dipper had asked, slightly breathless, lips still connected with Bill’s.
“Someone’s summoning me,” he muttered, looking up at Dipper.
“What?”
Two things happened right after another.
The first being that Bill disappeared from underneath Dipper, and the second was that Dipper was ejected from the Mindscape. He woke up panting in his own bed, his skin tight from the disturbance of the magic of Piedmont.
“Fucking hell,” Dipper muttered, sliding out of bed and into some jeans. His t-shirt, despite being gone in the dream, had actually stayed on his physical body. He grabbed his adventure bag, despite having a pretty good idea about what was going on. It was better to be prepared.
(Shut up Mabel, it’s not paranoia when you live in Gravity Falls for an extended amount of time!)
This time, instead of summoning a demon in the middle of a crypt, Dipper’s schoolmates were summoning his boyfriend in the ‘haunted house’ of Piedmont.
Dipper, an intellectual, knew that it wasn’t actually haunted. An older lady had moved in after it had been abandoned for years. She fell through a stair one day and, despite her screaming, no one had come to rescue her. She had died of blood loss and the heart attack that had come from the shock and pain. She hadn’t been found for a few days, but her spirit didn’t haunt the house.
But the other residents of Piedmont called it haunted.
Bill was already in the summoning circle when Dipper got there, and was in some sort of form that consisted of gelatinous red substance, sort of like blood.
“Mortals!” he intoned, then spotted Dipper. “Hiya Pine Tree!” The form grew a tentacle-looking appendage, and he waved.
A few students ran immediately, scrambling down the stairs. One kid was in the middle of puking their guts up. Dipper was pretty sure one guy had wet himself.
“Bill, seriously?” Dipper asked.
“What?” Bill asked, shifting into the human form that he had started wearing when Dipper was around. “It’s FUNNY, Pine Tree!”
“It’s really not,” Dipper informed him. He lived in Gravity Falls, gelatinous blood was one of the least disgusting things he’d seen. “Let me guess, they summoned you for the answers to a test.”
“How’d you guess?” Bill asked, head tilted.
“That’s why they summoned you the last time,” Dipper said, waving a hand dismissively. Well, if the spell disappeared from the mind of the caster then that was for Dipper to know and the caster not to know, wasn’t it?
“Oh?” Bill grinned, and made grabby hands, apparently unperturbed by the fact that a whole school full of idiots was trying to use him to cheat on their tests.
Actually, it was Bill fucking Cipher, that was totally in his vast category of ‘I do not give a single shit’.
“That’s undignified, stop it,” Dipper said as Bill continued to make grabby hands.
“We were so rudely interrupted before though, baby boy,” Bill said, trying to give a sultry look.
Well, he succeeded, but— while Dipper was into some fucked up shit, hence the demon boyfriend who fucked with minds as an existence— exhibitionism was not on that list.
“No, Bill, seriously, I’m not falling for that,” Dipper told him. He snapped his fingers and got rid of the various messes around the room. He loved cleaning spells, honestly. They were so convenient.
“Not even a kiss?” Bill pouted. Full-on, lip sticking out, pouted.
Dipper sighed, stepping into the circle, pulling Bill in by the lapels of his ridiculous suit. Bill made a pleased noise, taking full advantage as he threaded his fingers through Dipper’s hair, licking into his mouth.
Dipper, as much as he wanted to melt into the hard lines of Bill’s body and worry about everything tomorrow, still had memories to wipe and Bill to shove back into the Mindscape.
“See you in my head, Bill,” Dipper murmured against his mouth, grinning when Bill’s eye widened as he realized what Dipper was doing.
In a blink, he was gone, and Dipper had a bunch of traumatized teenagers whose minds he had to wipe.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
Dipper was taking a nap the third time it happened. He’d been up all night on the phone with Wendy about how to deal with the gnomes (apparently they were looking for another bride), and his study hall seemed like the perfect time to catch some sleep before his last class of the day.
Except that he was pulled out of the Mindscape because someone was doing another fucking summoning.
Jesus fucking Christ, it was the middle of the day, why the fuck was someone doing a summoning in the middle of the day?
And why the fuck were they doing it in the middle of a school bathroom?
“We need to stop meeting like this, Pine Tree,” Bill teased, already in human form. “Someone might start to think that we’re seeing each other.”
Dipper sighed, immediately wiping his classmates' minds. He was getting sick and tired of having to do this. One was a chance, two was a coincidence, but three was a pattern.
“I love watching you do that,” Bill murmured. His voice was fond, but there was something deeper there, warmer.
“I hate the fact that I’ve been having to do it so much recently. Love seeing you though,” Dipper added, stepping into the circle. He didn’t really care that he was about to make out with his boyfriend in the middle of the girls’ bathroom. He was taking advantage while he could.
Except that Bill cupped his face and looked him over. “You look tired Pine Tree,” he murmured, thumbing the eyebags that looked more like bruises.
“Wendy was having some problems with the gnomes. And, for some reason, I keep getting woken up in the middle of the night,” Dipper mused, nuzzling into Bill’s hands. Bill thumbed over Dipper’s cheekbone next, pressing a quick kiss to his nose.
There was a small furrow in Bill’s brow, and Dipper couldn’t keep his smile at bay. He ran his own fingers over the divet, leaning his forehead against Bill’s.
“I’m okay, Bill,” he murmured. “I just need some sleep. It’s not really a big deal.”
“I worry about you,” Bill admitted. “You’re a frail, squishy human. And I can’t be around all the time.”
It was moments like this when Dipper remembered that Bill had never really done anything like this before either. He’d had lovers, but they were never human, rarely ever mortal.
Bill, in his core, was protective. Oftentimes it manifested itself in a fierce possessiveness, but there were times when it showed itself for what it really was, in its purest form. These soft moments of admitted worry, where Bill’s face was downturned and dark.
“Hey,” Dipper murmured, holding Bill’s face in his hands. “I think Piedmont is probably one of the safest places I can be. I may not like it very much, but I can admit that it’s safer than Gravity Falls. But Gravity Falls has you. I know you wouldn’t let anything happen to me, Bill. I trust you.”
Bill wrapped his arms around Dipper’s waist, pulling him in close. They were chest to chest, and Dipper smiled, wrapping his arms around Bill’s neck.
“I trust you with my safety, Bill,” Dipper told him softly. “Even if you don’t.”
They stood in silence for a few moments, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. Dipper also had a great fondness for the moments where they could just sit together in silence. Bill wasn’t very quiet, given his nature, but when he was, Dipper cherished it.
“I’ll see you later,” Dipper promised when the magic around Piedmont started to protest at having Bill there.
“See you later, Pine Tree,” Bill murmured, pressing another hard kiss into Dipper’s mouth as he disappeared back into the Mindscape.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
The fourth time, Dipper was hanging out with Mabel and some of her friends. They’d gone out to the one ice cream place in Piedmont, now that the weather was getting warm enough for that kind of thing.
Dipper was excited for what it meant for him. Warmer weather meant that he and Mabel would be headed to Oregon for the summer pretty soon, which meant he got to have Bill all the time. Or, well, most of the time. Gravity Falls could still only handle so much of Bill at a time, but it was adapting to his presence pretty easily, considering the amount of time he spent there.
Come to think of it, Piedmont could handle his presence more and more too, since so many people had been summoning him lately.
Speaking of summoning Bill, Dipper’s skin tightened again, and started itching.
Dipper sighed, grabbing his milkshake off the table. “Mabel, I have to go deal with something really quick. I should be back before you head home, but if not then just tell Mom and Dad that I got sidetracked or something.”
“What are you going to go deal with in Piedmont, brobro?” she asked, her face scrunching in concern.
“Bill,” he muttered.
Mabel made a face of understanding. “I’ll think of something if you aren’t back,” she promised.
Sometimes Dipper really loved his sister.
Bill was leaning against the wall of the summoning circle, not even interacting with Bill’s classmates. He looked more tired than usual, and he was just hovering in the triangle form, which was a dead giveaway.
One mind wipe and a cleaning spell later, Dipper was holding a human-shaped Bill in his lap, Bill’s face buried in Dipper’s shoulder.
“Long day?” Dipper asked quietly, stroking Bill’s back in soothing lines.
“Yeah. Mix of missing you and not being in the mood to swindle someone out of their soul today,” Bill confessed. “How long can I stay?”
“A few minutes at least. I’ll let you know,” Dipper promised, kissing Bill’s head.
It was rare that Bill had hard days. Before, he had never even realized that that’s what it was. He’d been amazed to learn that demons weren’t so different from humans when it came to their mood swings. It was just that demons had more options when it came to throwing temper tantrums.
It was amazing to Dipper that demons had so much knowledge and experience and yet they were so ignorant about some of the simplest things.
Although, when he thought about it, humans wanted the answers to the bigger questions and would do almost anything for that knowledge. When it came to things like emotions, demons didn’t really need to know the information because humans tended to figure that shit out for themselves.
“I love you, you know that, right?” Bill asked quietly, almost like he hadn’t meant for Dipper to hear it.
“I know Bill. I love you too.”
“I know.”
“We need to stop Star Wars-ing each other,” Dipper muttered.
Bill didn’t laugh like he normally did, but he did manage a weak smile.
“Time’s up, but I’ll see you later, I promise. I love you,” Dipper said, kissing Bill slowly, sweetly, in a way that they never really did.
“I love you too,” Bill said as he vanished.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
The fifth time, Dipper was ready to commit a murder. He understood that it was finals week, but if he had to erase one more mind or send Bill back one more time, he was going to do something illegal.
Well, more illegal than what he did on the regular anyway.
He had a plan for this one though. Given the pattern that had appeared, Dipper and Bill had concocted a plan for making sure that it stopped.
It was pretty complicated, but between the two of them as well as Grunkle Ford, it had been easier to pull off than Dipper would have thought.
All they had needed to do was wait. Dipper had figured that it be towards the end of the year when things started to ramp up again when people would get desperate again and start trying to summon Bill.
And, like most other times, Dipper was right.
Bill had been worried about that a spell of this magnitude would hurt Dipper, would but him in danger, but Dipper had assured him that as long as they did it the right way, then he’d be fine.
Bill, in an absolutely fabulous bout of protectiveness, had dragged out every piece of knowledge about the spell to make sure that it would go as well as it possibly could. Dipper had, more than once over the past few months, walked into the Mindscape version of their bedroom to see Bill neck deep in an ancient text or covered in blood from interrogating a demon that tried to keep the information from him.
“Ready Pine Tree?” Bill asked, grinning.
“Yes,” Dipper said emphatically. He was ready to not have to worry about someone trying to summon Bill over the summer and ending Piedmont when Dipper wasn’t here to shove him back into the Mindscape.
Dipper didn’t rush to the site of this summoning the way he had done the others. He strolled leisurely, breathing in the deep night air and looking at the stars that he could see.
He had never really noticed Piedmont at night. It was almost preferable to Piedmont in the daylight if he was being completely honest.
Dipper wanted this batch of summoners to know what could happen if you summoned a demon without the proper precautions, without someone experienced in it.
Bill was currently scaring them shitless. Not enough to do any physical damage, but enough that it would leave a lasting impression on their minds.
When Dipper showed up, most of them were catatonic with fear, though there were a few that were still screaming their heads off.
Dipper cast a shared feeling spell, then a memory erasure spell, and one more to make the others stick.
One kid was different though. He was the center-point of the spell. He remember the same distinct impression of fear of the others, but unlike the others, he remembered that Bill was a demon. He remembered the bare minimum of the details and nothing more.
“Seems like it worked Pine Tree,” Bill said, wrapping his arms around Dipper’s waist, resting his head on Dipper’s shoulder. He looked like some sultry Victorian gentleman now which was very different from whatever he had shown Dipper’s classmates.
Dipper tilted his head to the side so Bill had easier access, then turned his attention to his classmate, who was staring at him with abject horror.
“What you remember, no one will ever believe you. No one who will be able to do anything about it anyway.”
Bill grinned smugly into Dipper’s neck. He always did like it when one of their plans came together like this. Something about them working together to pull off something huge stirred something in Bill. Dipper wasn’t complaining, but when he said ‘traumatize my classmates’, this was not what he meant.
“Go home,” Dipper said, and everyone started filing out of various exits toward their houses. The classmate that remembered (Dipper couldn’t remember his fucking name, even though they had Government together third period), scrambled to his feet, looking a very interesting shade of green as he bolted through an exit.
Dipper sagged against Bill, who took his weight easily.
“Tired Pine Tree?” Bill asked, sweeping Dipper up into a bridal carry, cradling him to his chest.
“Exhausted. I hate high school,” Dipper muttered. “At this point, I’ve erased the memories of at least a third of my classmates.”
“You won’t have to do it anymore, hopefully,” Bill said, pressing a kiss to Dipper’s forehead, right over that damned birthmark.
Dipper grumbled an agreement, curling into Bill’s chest more. He wanted a night of peace, for fuck’s sake.
“Sleep, Pine Tree, I’ll get you home and go home myself, promise.”
Dipper hummed, letting his eyes slip shut. He trusted Bill to get him home safely and without fucking Piedmont up beyond repair.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Dipper was suffering. The robes were itchy, he was pretty sure he was sweating through them now, and he wasn’t even paying attention to their valedictorian’s speech. He just wanted to get his fucking diploma and go kiss his boyfriend, who had actually shown up to Dipper’s shitty high school graduation even when Dipper hadn’t told him about it.
(Dipper was pretty sure that Mabel was to blame, but then, Bill also had a tendency to simply snoop for these things with whatever weird powers he had. Dipper didn’t really care most of the time, but sometimes it was a little creepy. This, for clarification, was not one of those times.)
Bill had been summoned to Piedmont so much in the last few months of Dipper’s junior year that it had gotten relatively used to his presence. His senior year had been relatively calmer than his junior year, because of the spell that they had worked to get the entire town to forget about the spell to summon Bill and given them the urge to stay away from anything that might even remotely be demonic in nature. (Although there had been a few summonings in Piedmont, they were done by someone with the knowledge and relationship to do it safely.) That meant that he was able to sit through the totality of the hour and a half ceremony. He was even able to control the urge to cause chaos, and only cheered a fraction louder than a normal human would’ve been able to.
Dipper had rolled his eyes at him, but when Bill’s magic had playfully teased at his, Dipper had let his own play back before he took his seat again.
Once the ceremony was over (thank the Beings That Were), Dipper rushed to wrap his arms around Bill, who swung him around like they were in some shitty rom-com.
“I’m proud of you, Pine Tree,” he said, burying his face in Dipper’s hair and squeezing him in a way that bordered on a little too tight.
“Thank you. What are you doing here though?”
“A little star told me that you were both graduating, and that this was something of a human milestone. Said it was important that I be here.”
“Mabel,” Dipper grumbled, rolling his eyes. Well, at least he had answered that question. “I’m glad that you’re here though.”
“Mason, who is this?” his mother asked.
“Mom, Dad, this is Bill. He’s my boyfriend from Gravity Falls,” Dipper said, lacing their hands together. He was not letting Bill go until he absolutely had to.
“Oh! Oh, it’s so nice to meet you!” his mother said, taking Bill’s free hand in hers. “It’s so nice to know that Mason has someone looking out for him.”
Their parents hadn’t been too pleased when Dipper had come back from Gravity Falls that first summer with a sudden obsession with the occult and ‘magic’. To be fair, Dipper hadn’t exactly been forthcoming with everything that he had learned over the summer and who he was seeing. He had given his parents the barest details he could while satisfying their need to know what was going on with him.
Bill looked like he didn’t know what to do in this situation, which was fair. He’d never really had a human lover that he was committed to enough to meet their parents, let alone ones that were grateful to him.
“Uh, he makes it easy,” Bill offered, looking to Dipper with a look that practically screamed ‘WHAT DO I DO?’, and Dipper bit back a laugh.
“Mom, let him breathe,” Dipper said. “He’s not used to this.”
“Oh, sorry, sorry, it’s just really nice to finally meet you.” She shot a pointed look at Dipper, who didn’t really care that she was expecting him to be bashful. “We’ve been waiting an eternity.”
Bill shot Dipper another look.
“Mom, can we just get the pictures out of the way so I can spend some time with him before he has to leave?”
“Oh, oh of course,” she said.
Another half an hour of pictures and handshakes and hugs and they were finally set free.
“How much do your parents actually know about this Pine Tree?” Bill asked, making an odd hand gesture to represent ‘this’.
“Not much. I told them the bare minimum required to keep me out a mental health ward,” he admitted. “And enough to sate their curiosity about you.”
“Aw, you don’t brag about me Pine Tree?”
“Bill, there’s not much that you do that I can brag about without being put into that ward,” Dipper told him. “I basically just said that you came from an old money family and that you were practically a genius, which is why you like me so much.”
“I like you for other things too,” Bill said, practically leering at him.
“I like it when you don’t say shit like that in public,” Dipper told him primly, “but I know.”
Bill grinned, squeezing Dipper’s hand and reeling him in to kiss the top of his head.
“Thank you for coming today, really. It was… it was nice having you there. Nice that you wanted to be there for me.”
“‘Course I do, Pine Tree, I mean, you’re mine.”
Dipper smiled, hiding his face in Bill’s shoulder. It never failed to make Dipper feel shy when Bill just said things like that, like they were the simplest things in the universe. Bill never really let him live down the fact that Dipper also liked the sheer possessiveness in those statements, but that was something else entirely.
“Come on, I want you to see a little more of my town that doesn’t involve bathrooms or graveyards,” Dipper told him, which made Bill throw his head back and cackle.
Which turned into Bill practically bent over crying into Dipper’s shoulder with laughter when the kid who remembered everything went as white as printer paper as they walked by.
Oh well, Dipper would probably never see that kid again anyway.
The wonders of graduating high school!