Never Trust Your Demons

5

"Hey look!" Bill's voice seems farther away. The eye on my forehead fades away, and I see Bill in the mirror, appearing behind me in his human form. He folds his arms, resting them on my head. "It's me!" His voice comes out a purr, and I glare at him through the mirror.
I turn around quickly, my hand flying up to Bill's face for a slap. The world nearly seems to go into slow motion as my hand goes through his face, as if he was a ghost. Then he grabs my hand. I almost expected my hand to go through that as well, but for someone who was phantasmal just a couple seconds ago, he's got a pretty solid grasp.
"Ah ah ah, Police Box," He grins. I take a deep breath,about to tell him exactly what I think about him just entering my mind, but his finger is suddenly on my lips. "You don't want to wake them up!" He sing-songs quietly, pulling his hand away and letting go of mine.
"What the heck was that?!" I hiss back at the same volume. "You just think I'm going to be okay with you just walking into my head like, 'Oh I'll just sit around in here and possibly control her while she has no idea what the heck is going on and just tell her all this weird crap she either doesn't or barely understands after telling her I'm secretly a nacho that's just been watching her since she arrived at this insane place!' And at five AM no less!"
"First of all," He rolls his eyes. "Dream demon that could destroy the world if he really wanted to that happens to be triangular, not nacho."
"Do you think I care?" I cross my arms.
"Second," He leans on his cane. "You haven't even tried to tell Pine Tree about me. And you only half told Shooting Star! Something tells me you actually trust me..."
Pinetree? Shooting star? Considering the context, he's probably talking about my cousins... but seriously? Why not their real names?
t's true. And he knows it. There's part of me that at least wants to trust and know more about this demon.
"Do you want to know more about those voices you hear?" He asks, an air of mystery surrounding his question. "I hear them too. You know what they are?" I shake my head. "Thoughts. That's you reading other's minds without knowing. That larger brain allows you to live both in your world and the mindscape while awake."
"Mindscape?"
"Exactly what it sounds like, kid," He taps on my forehead. "Everyone's mind can access it, but most everyone can only do it through dreaming."
"And why don't have to be dreaming?" I ask.
"Most humans who have the extra space fill it up with dumb smart stuff too quickly," He shrugs. "Not saying you haven't," He adds as my fists clench by my side. "Just not as much. That leaves just enough space for clear sight into the mindscape."
"But if I'm the only one who can do that... then how can I hear everyone's thoughts?"
"Mind scape!" He makes jazz hands. "It's called that for a reason!"
I guess that makes sense.... "And why doesn't happen all the time? Like now? Why can't I read your mind?" I sit down on the bed. I feel like all my questions would irk someone, but Bill answers each question with no annoyance visible.
"Well, no one can read my mind. The mindscape is pretty much my home, so I've found ways to keep my thoughts out. And who knows?" He shrugs. "And just so you know, you're not going to want to have your head on your pillow in five minutes or so." He grins and starts to disappear.
"That was characteristically cryptic..." I mutter.

He was right though. I tried going back to sleep, lying down the other way, but was soon reawakened by a water balloon that would have been to my face. Courtesy of Mabel.
I've grown kind of used to Bill coming in and out of my brain on a daily basis. He says he could, but he's never actually possessed me except for that one moment with Dipper in the woods.
I trust him, and since no harm no foul, I haven't told anyone about him. There have been a few incidents where I nearly slipped up. At our zombie/karaoke party, I kept accidentally calling Mabel and Dipper "Shooting Star" and "Pinetree," like Bill does. I made the lame excuse that they needed nicknames. They bought it. I think. Also, there was one time where Mabel was moping about losing at mini-golf at a restaurant. I took a bite out of one of the nachos we ordered and I could hear Bill mumble in my head, "Cannibal." After all those times he had insisted he wasn't a dorito, he's calling me a cannibal for eating one with him in my brain. I have to say, I cracked up. I mean, I kept it mostly in, but I kept snorting and I'm pretty sure my smile spelled out L-A-U-G-H-I-N-G. I got queer looks from everyone else, but nothing more.
Despite the fact that he's not taking control of me, however. Bill's doing more than just sitting around in my mind. He keeps digging out memories, including finding out about my secret passion for all things Disney, my first grade crush that I ended up giving a bloody nose to last year, and how much I just wanted to be normal.
"Don't be ashamed of being different," He'd tell me, taking his human form in my room nearly every night. "Be ashamed of everyone else for being the same!"
He's in my dreams a lot, though I'm not always sure if it's actually him, or just my mind.
And I have to say, Dipper's sucked me into this whole "Who is the author?" quest. This town is crazy, and finding all the secrets this guy has revealed would be so cool. Plus, what's the significance of the six fingers on the journal? The last thing we found was an old laptop in a hidden bunker of some sort. After a somewhat awkward moment where I was stuck in a closet with Dipper and Wendy (it was so cute when he confessed his crush to Wendy. And now I have blackmail.), and getting attacked by a shape shifter we thought was the author, we brought it back. Dipper got Soos to fix it up.
Right now, he and Mabel are at the library, getting it started up. Meanwhile I've joined Wendy in her after-work activities in the cemetery with her other friends. I've spent more time with them, and less and less time with my sketchbook.
When I get home, I find that, at the library, they had discovered both the fact that the laptop had a password to crack, and Mabel's next crush was a puppet-loving boy with a ponytail. She had, for some reason, told him she had an over-glorified sock puppet show playing on Friday. She doesn't, so she has to create one in that time.
Guess who gets to help? Me.
In between it all, Dipper's still trying to get into the laptop. He keeps staying up late, and that buzzer whenever he gets it wrong is getting on my nerves

By Thursday, I'm so sick of socks I've stopped wearing them. At least today Dipper's got one hot glued to his face, so I've got some entertainment besides Mabel editing "Puppet Boy." That's pretty mean of me, but then again, I've had a demon with these kinds of thoughts in my head.
"...and the earrings will be triangles!'
An image of the triangular mindscape inhabitant pops into my mind, soon changing from his true form to his human one. Despite his original creepiness factor, I've grown attached to him. He's pretty cool, and I don't have to tell him anything (because he's in my mind), and part of me likes him. Like, crush likes him. Hopefully that's in someplace Bill wouldn't go in my mind. I don't realize I give a content sigh until i notice Dipper looking at me strangely. I can feel my face grow hot as I clear my throat and go back to gluing googly eyes on the puppets.
"Puppet boy, Puppet boy," Mabel starts singing singing.
"Weirdness' sake, that song again?" Bill sighs in my head.
At least you can leave whenever you want. I tell him. I have to sing along.
"Good idea!" He laughs, and I feel the eye on my forehead disappear.
"You're the one I-"
"Looooove!" Everyone else joins Mabel on the last word, even Waddles. They all look at me expectantly and I sigh as Stan walks past.
"Loooove," I sing half heartedly.
"Not even gonna ask," Stan keeps on walking.
Soon, Dipper and Soos leave to go find something to get the socks off his face, Wendy heads home, and Mabel goes to the attic room to finish writing songs. I'm left alone with the mess. I pull together the fabric scraps and spare socks.
"There's a lot of yellow in here," I mutter. "And black..." A smile grows on my face as I pull out a yellow sock and cut into a black piece of fabric.
When I finish, I still have the puppet version of me, but sitting next to it now is a sock puppet Bill Cipher, the human version. I feel a bit silly as I stick them both on over my hands.
"Bill! Hi!" Puppet me says.
"Hey, Police Box..." Puppet Bill says. I can't help but laugh at my bad imitation of him.
"It's a TARDIS! What brings you here?"
"Well," I start Bill's next line without thinking. "I came to tell you, I lo-"
"Yes, Police Box," I hear a voice suddenly. "What am I doing here?" The Bill puppet moves on it's own.
"GAH!" I jump back in surprise. This stuff shouldn't surprise me still, should it?!
Bill laughs as his human form appears, lying on the ground with one hand in the puppet. "Aw, you're so easy to freak out," He chuckles, grinning at me.
My face flushes red and I feel it burning. "Bill! Are you doing here?!"
"I could ask you the same question: What am I doing here?"
I laugh. "Look, I was bored and that was something to do, okay?"
"Eh, I thought it was pretty interesting! Please, continue!" He grins. Oh, gosh, does he know what I was about to say?!
The blood doesn't fade from my face, so I'm just sitting there, a red-faced idiot looking at this humanized demon. "Uh..."