(Mabel's P.O.V.)

(Monday, June 15th, 2015)(The Pines house, Piedmont, California)

We ate dinner in the dining room that night. Our dining room table was small, since we only needed to seat four people, and it was made of dark oak wood. The walls were painted a vivid burgundy color. Dipper sat across from me, and our parents were at the ends of the table. Mom had made turkey meatloaf, Dad's favorite. As I'm a vegetarian, however, I had a veggie burger. Even though we were busy eating, the room was still uneasily quiet. I swear to God, you could cut the tension with a knife.

"So..," I began, finally breaking the silence.

"Yeah..," Dipper awkwardly responded.

I looked down at his food. The green beans, which he couldn't stand, were pushed to the top corner, and the macaroni and cheese had already been fully eaten. His meatloaf was soaked in ketchup, which was an bizarre preference he'd had for as long as I could remember.

"Are you trying to drown your meatloaf?" I teased.

"Maybe I am," he answered. "Maybe I'm trying to end it's monotonous, unavailing, miserable life."

My father stared at him with bewilderment and shock.

"Dipper, don't be cynical."

I looked up from my plate to face my mother, who, apparently, had been looking back at me the whole time. She was smiling. It was weird.

"What?" I asked, "Why are you staring at me like that?"

She turned to my father.

"I think it's time we tell them."

Dipper steadily lifted his head.

"Tell us what?" he questioned, his mouth full of meatloaf.

I wrinkled my nose.

"Eww. Don't talk with food in your mouth."

He glowered at me and slowly swallowed, never breaking eye contact.

"Happy?" he sassed.

"Very."

I turned back to my mother.

"So what did you want to tell us?" I inquired.

"You're not pregnant again, are you?" asked Dipper.

"What?!" Mom cried. "No, I'm not pregnant."

She pushed her plate to the side, as did my father. The two of them held hands across the table. Dad took a deep breath.

"We're sending you back to Gravity Falls to spend the summer with Stanford."

Dead silence. After a few moments, I was the first to speak.

"Are you serious?"

"Yes!" Mom insisted. "Why wouldn't we be?!"

I faced Dipper. He faced me. I could tell we were thinking the exact same thing.

We were going to kick some serious paranormal behind this summer. And it was going to be awesome.

"Well?" Dad asked, "Do you want to go?"

Dipper broke his gaze with me and turned to our father.

"Are you crazy? Of course we want to go! Who even are you?"

Dad shrugged, "Not the reaction I expected, but alright."

We both got up from our seats and brought our plates into the kitchen. After rinsing them off in the sink and putting them in the dishwasher, we headed upstairs.

Dipper and I had shared a room for the first 13 years of our lives, but things had started to get a bit awkward after puberty. Luckily, our parents were able to convert the home gym, which they never used, into a room for me, and I've been there ever since. If we were hanging out together, which was most of the time, we always did so in my room, since it was much cleaner.

Seriously. Unless you enjoy the smell of rotten banana peels, dirty laundry, and sweat, do not set foot in Dipper's room. He never changed his sheets, he never opened the windows, and he never cleaned anything. Whatsoever.

Long story short, his room was disgusting. So we went to mine instead.

All of my walls were different colors, since I wasn't able to decide on one. Mint green, lavender, baby pink, and pale yellow. I had stuffed animals littered all over the room, and my cat, Neil Catrick Harris, a grey exotic short-hair, sat comfortably on my black and white, polka-dotted bedspread. I took a seat next to him, and Dipper sat in my furry white beanbag. Neil jumped off the bed and began stalking Dipper.

"Mabel, your cat scares me."

He hissed.

"NEIL!!! LEAVE DIPPER ALONE!!!"

He hissed again and scurried into my closet. I turned back to Dipper.

"So," I began, "what's our plan for the summer?"

He grinned.

"I want to learn more about this town than we did last time. I want to explore more places, meet more people, discover more secrets. There’s so much that Gravity Falls has to offer.”

"And we get to see Waddles," I added.

"Yes. And Waddles."