Mabel sat down on the couch with a plop and a long sigh, letting her body relax into the old, plush furniture. Maybe it was a bad idea to read the Journal out in the open, but she loved this couch. Besides, Ford was back in his lab, where he would probably be for hours to come. Mabel thought she was safe.

She pulled the Journal out from under her arm and flipped it open. She could hardly believe Ford wrote this. He was always doing research, sure, and he openly affirmed the existence of the supernatural; but he seemed too. . . uncaring to write something this amazing. There were detailed pictures on every page, shadows drawn out with carbon strokes. The information on each supernatural object or creature was thorough, almost excessive. Like Ford had spent days or even weeks on each entry. The man Mabel was staying with for the winter seemed to have none of that motivation.

She shook her head slightly to clear her thoughts and focus on what was on the page in front of her. Psychics. Right. She was looking for any entry that had to do with telepathy or other mind powers.

"Hey, Mabel!"

Mabel jumped as the door slammed open and her brother came into the house. "Where have you been?" she asked. She hadn't even known that Dipper was gone; although, now that she thought about it, it had been unusually quiet for the past few hours. "And what happened to your hair?" she added as she got a good look at him.

Dipper jumped onto the couch next to his sister. His hair was spiked, sticking up in all directions, like he'd licked an electric socket (which he had done before). Were the tips of his hair dyed? They were an electric blue now. A dark blue scarf he didn't have this morning was wrapped around his neck, slightly obscuring the yellow star on his shirt. The t-shirt, a lighter shade of blue, was layered over a yellow long-sleeve shirt, and it contrasted nicely with the scarf.

Dipper waited for Mabel to look him up and down before launching into an explanation. "Pacifica calls it the power of hairspray. Don't I look awesome? She gave me the scarf, too, which not only is really warm but looks really cool too; at least, I think so. Oh, and don't worry, the color in my hair is just chalk. Should be gone in a couple days. I'd never heard of hair chalk before! Pacifica has all sorts of cool things for having such a tiny trailer to live in. She's really awesome, Mabes."

Mabel blinked. "So. . . you were hanging out with Pacifica, the creepy psychic child—"

"She's not creepy!"

"—and she gave you a makeover?"

Dipper wrinkled his nose. "Makeover is such a girly word. 'She made me look awesome' sounds better."

"Sure. Dipper, are you sure you can trust her?"

"She's not a real psychic, Mabel," said Dipper with a roll of his eyes. "I've been backstage at her show, remember? She's just a nice girl with an awesome sense of style."

"You've been hanging out with her a lot, Dipper," Mabel pointed out. And not with me, she added silently. Four days since they'd gone to the psychic show together, and it seemed Dipper had spent most of that time with Pacifica.

He shrugged. "She keeps inviting me over."

"Does she? Or do you keep inviting yourself over?"

In response to her question, she got a flat look. "She's the one who invited me backstage. And the one who suggested a makeover."

Mabel made a grumpy nose and turned back to the Journal.

"You sure it's safe to have that out here?" Dipper asked. He supported Mabel in keeping the Journal from Ford, though she knew he didn't like the idea of hiding anything from him. Well, neither did she; but what choice did she have?

"Yeah, should be safe," she said. Halfheartedly, she flipped through the pages. She'd looked through the Journal a hundred times over the last few days, but she couldn't find anything on psychics or telepathy or mind powers. There was always that entry on Bill Cipher, the dream demon. . . but that entry unsettled Mabel, to be honest. If Pacifica did have psychic powers, Mabel didn't think it was related to Bill.

Or, at the very least, she hoped it wasn't related to Bill.

"What are you looking for?" asked Dipper. He frowned. "You're not trying to find anything about psychics, are you?"

Mabel shot him a guilty look. "Well, I was, but there's nothing in here. You and Ford are probably right: She's probably just a fake."

But even as she said it, it didn't feel true. "You're shutting me out," Pacifica had said, when Mabel had run into her during intermission. That sounded like she could see into people's minds.

"But even if she is fake," she continued with a glance at her brother, "I still have a bad feeling about her. Just. . . be careful, okay? Even without powers, she could still be dangerous. I don't trust anyone whose hair is bigger than their head." She cracked a smile, meaning the last part as a joke, but it didn't come out quite right.

Dipper sighed. "Fine, I'll be careful. But maybe you should come hang out with us sometime. Then you'll see for yourself what she's like. I think you'd have fun."

"Maybe," Mabel replied in a noncommittal tone. The thought of voluntarily spending time with Pacifica was not an appealing one.

There was a beat of silence. "Do you wanna do something?" asked Dipper. "Maybe go on an adventure?"

Mabel smiled. That sounded fun. Maybe her unease about Pacifica was just loneliness, since her brother wasn't spending as much time with her. She opened her mouth to respond—

"Hey, kids, we need your help in here." Robbie Corduroy poked his head through the Employees Only door. "Somebody just spilled their soda, and Melody and me are too busy to clean it up." He shot them an apologetic grimace.

"Be there in a minute," Mabel told him. She stood up, intending to hide the Journal upstairs before going to clean, and looked back to Dipper. "Well," she said, "it's no adventure, but can we still clean up together?"

Dipper grinned and jumped to his feet. "Sure, Mabes," he said. "I'll grab the cleaner."