Gravity Rises (S3)

SP: Part Thirteen

Content warning: This chapter contains semi-graphic descriptions of child abuse and its effects.

Gideon could have changed into Dipper's pajamas in the attic, but he went back down to the bathroom.

Stanford and Lincoln sat on the couch, talking about their parents and a brother named Shermie. Gideon nodded to them as he came down the stairs. He didn't stop to talk to them.

The first Journal entry ran through his mind as he walked down the hallway. A field of glowing flowers. When the gel touched an injury, all discomfort ceased. It was like the injury had never happened.

Gideon's scars flared in pain, as if crying out for some relief of their own. Mabel's earlier hug had increased the pain a bit, though the scars were already hurting plenty. They had been all day. Gideon was able to focus despite them — indeed, the harrying events of the day made them easy to ignore by comparison — but reading the entry on the Northwest's Relief brought the pain back to the surface. Almost as if the pain itself were begging him to end its existence with this magical flower.

He passed by Ford's room and heard no sound from within, though he knew Melody was in there with Fiddleford. He continued to the bathroom and shut the door behind him.

The solitude in the bathroom felt relieving and oppressive at the same time. He'd been alone for hours behind that vending machine, and it had been awful waiting for his father to catch up with him. Then he'd spent time with the Pines, doing real family things, and it had been wonderful. Yet he still kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. And drop it would: It was just waiting for him to go to sleep. Gideon dreaded his dreams tonight, but he found himself less anxious than he thought he would be. Perhaps because he already knew that the nightmares would be terrible — so he didn't have to wonder about it.

With a deep breath, Gideon pulled off his sweater vest and started unbuttoning his shirt. Dipper's flannel pajamas rested on the counter, and Gideon hoped they would fit well enough to cover him. The last of the buttons came undone, and Gideon put his shirt and vest on the counter beside the pajamas. He kept his eyes averted for most of the process, and he closed them afterwards.

Then, with some effort, he raised his head, opened his eyes, and looked at himself in the mirror.

Red, pink, and white scars covered almost every available inch of uncovered skin. No scar went above his collar bone or past his wrists, but his chest and arms were a graveyard of past injuries. He didn't turn to look at his back, but he knew all too well that there were scars there, too. Looking at the scars somehow made them hurt more, so Gideon rarely did it. Usually, he changed clothes quickly with his eyes averted. Sometimes, though, he would do what he did tonight: take off his shirt and simply look at himself in the mirror.

He brushed the scars on his left arm with his right fingers. Was the Northwest's Relief really out there? Could it really make the scars stop hurting? Could it make them disappear?

As much as he hated his scars, Gideon felt surprisingly anxious at the thought of living without them. They were a part of him. A hated part, but. . . still there. He'd wished them gone countless times throughout his life. If he had a chance to find the Northwest's Relief, he would use it. Yet. . . the thought was still strange.

Mabel hadn't understood. He wasn't sure that he wanted her to understand. She'd looked at the Journal entry about the Northwest's Relief and assumed that it would simply help him with the pain directly after a session of punishment from Gaston's servants. She didn't seem to consider the aftereffects. She didn't seem to imagine that Gideon would have scars.