the finale messed me up so much i'm not okay

The first thing he registers is that he's in a field. More of a clearing, really. The grass under his knees is soft and squishy and bright green, and he's surrounded on all sides by pine trees. The shirt and coat he's wearing seem to fit him just fine, but they feel wrong in the same way being called by someone else's name might. It's not just that, either—everything feels wrong, and a bit empty, too, like somebody's taken an ice cream scoop to his head and dug out all the important bits, leaving him dazed and confused.

There's a couple of kids and an older guy not ten feet in front of him, all three looking like they've just lost their whole world. One of the younger ones calls him Grunkle, and, y'know, whatever that's supposed to mean, he can tell that it's important to her. He's not heartless, so he tries his best to play along, but she ends up crying anyway.

A pang of guilt hits him square in the chest, but he still feels like he's missing something big and important, like there's an inside joke here and he's the only one not in on it.

That feeling only gets worse when the older guy kneels down in front of him, voice cracking as he talks about things that don't make much sense at all (how can he be a hero if he can't even remember his own name?) before pulling him into a tight hug.

He doesn't move. The guy keeps hugging him, and there may or may not be actual tears shed into the coat that fits-but-doesn't-fit him, but he doesn't really feel anything at the moment. It's more than a little weird, because this sort of seems like it should be some big, monumental thing, but all he can think about right now is that he just really wants to know what the heck is going on.

There's still that overwhelming sensation of being completely and utterly lost, but whatever happens next, he gets the feeling that whoever these weird, weepy people are, they're going to help him.

That doesn't mean that it's not a relief when the older guy finally releases him from his incredibly strong grip (seriously, he looks like he's well into senior citizenhood, there's no way he can have that much muscle mass), but hey, he's still allowed to have personal space boundaries no matter how messed up his head is.

Mabel's scrapbook helps more with bringing back his connections to the people around him than it does with restoring actual memories, but he's not complaining. The memories themselves seem happy to come back on their own, albeit in an excruciatingly slow trickle. Fortunately, Stan doesn't mind all that much, especially seeing as a lot of those memories aren't really things he wants to have back.

He tries not to let them colour his impressions of the others too much, mostly because some of the things he remembers are months, sometimes years old and the people in those memories have changed beyond recognition, but it's hard to keep that in mind when it feels like those things happened yesterday.

Especially when it comes to Ford.

He still doesn't have all the puzzle pieces together, but the gist of it is easy enough to grasp.

What stands out is his blind faith in his twin, how eager he was to see him again after a decade of estrangement, and how stupid he was not to have learned from that in the thirty years it took him to get Ford back. No matter how many times Stan tries, he's not going to get that Hollywood-esque perfect reunion hug with his brother, so the sooner he sucks it up and faces facts, the better.

The day he gets back the memory of trying to greet Ford with open arms and getting nothing but a bruised jaw for his trouble, Stan makes sure to avoid running into him at all costs (something which is easier said than done, but hey, according to his battered mind, he's hidden from people who were a lot more motivated to find him than Ford ever would be).

Stan is still Stan, though, and he can't find it in himself to ignore his brother for long. They've wasted enough time fighting, he knows.

(That doesn't mean he can't hold onto some of that bitterness, though, and maybe let it out through a series of inconveniencing-but-probably-harmless pranks. Yeah.)

Stan's not jealous of Mabel and Dipper's relationship. Not at all. He doesn't care that they can get past pretty much anything just by talking it out and forgiving each other's mistakes.

Aw, hell, who's he kidding? Of course he's jealous.

Sure, he and Ford can have a conversation without yelling at each other, but anything more than small talk and it just deteriorates into both of them raging about their pent-up feelings. And yeah, it is nice to be on speaking terms again, but now that he can remember (some of) their childhood, he's really missing that twin bond and the way they used to be able to just understand each other without saying anything at all.

Especially right now, as he leans back into the couch on the back porch and watches the kids make up after arguing over ... something. He can't really remember—their fights never last long enough for Stan to figure out what's going on, and of everyone in the Shack they're probably the only ones that can settle disagreements in a way that's actually healthy, anyway, so there's no need for him to intervene.

"Awkward sibling hug?" Mabel asks, putting down the beloved grappling hook she'd just used to hang Dipper by his leg from the totem pole for the last hour.

Dipper grins back at her. His face is still tomato-red from all the blood that'd rushed to his head, but he doesn't seem too dizzy. "Awkward sibling hug."

Not for the first time, Stan wishes it was that easy for him and Ford ... but as much as he wants to march up to the guy and just tell him that damn it, he wants a proper conciliatory hug, he's not sure if he can handle being rejected again. The two of them might be on the mend, but that doesn't mean Ford won't laugh in his face for asking—he'd done worse for less before, and people don't change overnight.

Do they?

They're both sitting in front of the tv. The kids aren't around, and he's given Soos and Wendy the day off, and it's the perfect time to just spit out the whole Ford can you please just give me a hug because I missed you and I really need one right now thing, but every time he turns and opens his mouth to actually say that, nothing comes out.

But this time will be different! Probably.

Stan glances over at Ford, whose wide eyes are locked on the television. Stan can't blame him—Ducktective is just about to reveal that the handyman was the murderer all along, and whoever made the show sure as heck knows how to keep an audience in suspense, even he's already seen this episode at least seven times. Say it, Stan. Don't be a chicken, he chides himself. Come on. He looks at Ford, opens his mouth, and ...

Doesn't say anything. Stan swallows and turns back to the tv.

"Stan, would you just say whatever's on your mind so that we can move on?" Ford says without looking away from the screen.

Stan, to his credit, does actually say what's on his mind. However, because he's still Stan, with his pride and whatever, he says it at a volume so low it could possibly be mistaken for not saying it at all, especially by six-fingered jerks with 12 PhDs.

"Stanley." Ford looks like he might throw a tantrum if Stan doesn't just spit it out.

"Ikindofwantanotherhug," Stan mutters under his breath.

Ford, well-versed in the art of deciphering things such as codes and unintelligible mumbles, blinks a bit like a startled owl might. "You what?" He asks anyway.

"It's just—yanno, the sappy make-up hug we had didn't really count for me, 'cuz I didn't have my memory back or anything. It was just like getting hugged by a stranger—a weepy, nerdy-looking stranger," Ford definitely looks nerdier than he does. "I dunno, it's stupid, never mind." Stan says quickly, making a break for the door. If he's lucky, the twins will be outside and ready to include him in whatever they're doing at a moment's notice. Anything would be preferable to actually dealing with the fact that yeah, he, Stanley friggin' Pines, actually likes hugs and has been looking forward to properly reuniting with Ford, even if Ford doesn't feel the same way.

If he hadn't turned away, he might've seen Ford's face fall momentarily, or seen the tiny smile that came after. Instead, he just hears his name being called. "Hey—Stan! That isn't ... it's not stupid. You're right."

Stan barely has time to turn back around and register that somehow, Ford is standing right freakin' there—the guy's like a cat, seriously, how can a human being move that quickly and quietly—before he's being hugged. By his brother. For the first time in—well, okay, sure, it hasn't really been 40 years, but that first hug didn't count. That one was awkward, and sort of uncomfortable, but this one isn't like that at all. His face isn't half-squished between Ford's chest and shoulder this time, for one thing, and for another, he actually has some context to go along with it. It's warm; comforting; full of the brotherly affection that both of them have been craving for much too long.

It's ... nice.

Hesitantly, Stan lets his own arms wrap around Ford and he puts his chin on Ford's shoulder, letting his eyes slip shut.

40 freakin' years without him. Four decades with almost no contact whatsoever. Almost half a freaking century alone, after spending every damn day together for their first eighteen years—

Oh jeez. He's gonna start crying.

Stan takes a sharp inhale into Ford's shoulder and tries to keep his own from shaking. It doesn't work, but damn it, he helped save the world a few weeks ago. He can have this.

Ford lets him deal with whatever's going on in his head that's making him feel so damn emotional, but he doesn't let go. Not even when Stan starts making stupid little hiccuping noises into the nerdy coat his brother seems insistent on wearing 24/7 (seriously, it's summer, the guy must be dying under that thing), or when a damp patch begins to bloom right where Stan's eyes rub against the fabric ("It was just some dust in my eye, I swear!"), or when he suddenly realises that he's gripping his twin tight enough to bruise and forces himself to loosen his grasp.

When Stan finally gets himself together enough to be embarrassed, he goes to pull away, only to have Ford tighten his hold, all twelve fingers curling a bit more forcefully into the back of his shirt. That's when it hits Stan that Ford's crying, too, stifling his sniffles in the shoulder of Stan's suit. He probably shouldn't feel good about that, but it's sort of nice to know that he's not the only one getting overly emotional.

Stan doesn't know how long they stay like that, standing in the middle of the living room, hugging each other and weeping like somebody traded out their eyes for faucets, but eventually they're both calm enough to let go of one another.

"Whooo!"

—Then they realise that the other Pines twins are standing in the doorway. Mabel fist-pumps the air with both hands and starts rambling on about how "I told you guys to just hug it out!" and "hugs fix everything!" and "I'm so so so glad you two finally got over your dumb fighting and now we can all just be happy and I'm gonna make so many sweaters and we'll all do fun family things together and it'll be the best thing ever ..."

Normally, this is the part where Dipper would slap a piece of tape over her mouth, but he looks just as happy as his sister that their Grunkles have gotten over this hurdle.

Stan and Ford glance at each other. "Awkward family hug?" Ford asks, looking back at the kids.

"Awkward family hug," the other three agree in unison.

i never really write straight fluff so this was kind of fun.

i'm galaxybriel on tumblr if you wanna chat. (please come cry about dumb grunkles with me)