a friends with tax benefits drabble, for Mod Z since she is sick! Feel better!

—————-

Dipper plibbed into the kitchen, having remembered at the
last second to clean the blood and stray bits of organ and bone that covered
his shell. No point in upsetting his husband unduly after all.

Henry looked up from his seat at the kitchen table. Days
when the moon was full usually resulted in summons that Dipper would be unable
to resist, so today Henry had decided to work from home. One hand typed at the
keyboard of his laptop while the other held a half asleep Willow. Next to the
table was a playpen where Hank and Acacia were already out cold. The black
t-shirt that he wore served only to make him look paler than usual. Dipper saw
Henry’s head tilt down, knew without seeing that Henry’s gaze had fallen to his
left hand on the keyboard. The silver band Mabel had placed on Henry’s finger
shone in the light given off by the monitor, and Henry’s aura was roiling, the
color of bruises and thunderclouds.

There was a pain in his heart, and Dipper felt his suit melt
away into the casual clothes that he had started to wear around the house, when
it became clear he would have to play more and more at being human. Of course,
his definition of casual still left him in a polo shirt and slacks, but he was
making an effort darn it. Dipper came behind Henry, wrapping his arms around
the other man’s shoulders, his wings enveloping the three of them in their
embrace.

Henry stopped typing and placed his free hand on Dipper’s
arm, squeezing it tight.

“One of those days?” Dipper asked gently, throat tight and
heart crumbling to cold ashes in his chest.

Henry could only nod. For a second the demon (the twin) in
Dipper wailed in anger-how dare Henry make him
voice his distress, how dare Henry presume to miss her more, how dare he hurt– No. No, this wasn’t fair. Henry
loved Mabel (and Dipper had gotten more time with her anyway-stop) and Mabel
had trusted Dipper to take care of the four people she loved most in her life
(after him-stop!)

Henry shook his head, in turn shaking Dipper out of the
darker turn his thoughts had taken. “I do have something to show you, “Henry
said.

“Oh?” Dipper felt Willow drop into REM sleep, and as Henry
got up to put her down in the playpen, Dipper shamelessly stole his husband’s
chair.

“Yeah,” Henry went on as he bent over to put his daughter
next to her siblings. “Mr. Hagesawa sent it to me. It’s one of those optical
illusion pictures. It’s silly but damned if I haven’t spent the last five
minutes looking at it. I’m not sure if it would work for you though, I mean,
you got different eyes than me-“

Dipper pshawed. “Seriously? I’m like, the King of Mysteries
and Illusions!” He paused. “Literally. There’s a cult calling me that now. It’s
kind of weird.” He wiggled in the seat until his wings were comfortable. “I bet
I can see both layers at once!”

On the screen was the picture in question. Henry had blown
it up so it took the whole screen. It was of a rose garden, complete with ivy
covered trestles, and a white whicker garden set that had tea for three set on
the table.

“What am I supposed to see?”

Henry chuckled. “If you stare at it long enough, you’ll see
the pyramids of Giza.”

Dipper barely heard him, intent on analyzing every pixel on
the screen. His face got closer and closer until it was practically plastered
to the screen.

“W̩̖̳̮̥͟ͅh̙̗̝y ͕͓c͍̰̱ąn̷͍͎̻̦̮̳’̝̞͕̦̞̗̤ț̼͈̪̘ I
̣̱͇̝̜͇͘s͏è̲͕͓̗e̳͉ͅ ̞̺̲̜̜ì̥͕t̴̳͇̺?̭̺͖ͅ” Dipper growled after a minute of
staring.

“Yeah, you have to give it at least three minutes, and then the image will start to fade in. It’s
really quite neat, I promise.”

Dipper huffed but leaned in closer, closer, anxious to prove
to Henry that his far superior sight could easily see through this grimcrack
trickery.

Closer, closer, closer

A spider leapt out of nowhere at the screen, covered in
fanged mouths with snake tongues.

Dipper screamed, and all the faucets in the house turned on
and began to spew blood. Dipper screamed and dogs in a ten mile radius all
began to bay and howl. Dipper screamed and one two three little stars woke up
and began to giggle. His hair raised like a cats and turned his head into a giant
poofball, his eyes dilating until they were golden pools.  Dipper screamed and jumped out of the seat,
jumped and started to float through the ceiling but remembered at the last
minute that he was on this plane and proceeded to get stuck halfway phasing
through.

Adding insult to injury, he felt Henry take off his loafers
and socks and- Dipper began to spasm and laugh, the Shack shaking to its
rafters as Henry tickled his feet until he cried.

When he had gotten down, when he had repaired the damage and
gotten the kids calmed down, Dipper looked at Henry and raised an eyebrow.

Henry smiled, albeit a little sadly.

“When I think about Mabel, when I start to get upset, I try
and do something that would have made her laugh or that she loved to do.” His
sad smile turned into a wicked grin. “And scaring the shit out of you and
tickling you until you pee would have been exactly
what she wanted.”

Dipper felt his throat close up tight. Finally, he managed
to say, “That…that’s a good idea. I think…. I’ll start doing that too.”

Henry placed an arm around Dipper’s shoulder.

“You know what she would have wanted most of all?”

“What?”

“For us to do that together.”

Dipper smiled.