Chapter Text
College tuition: thousands of dollars in loans and money out of his parents’ pockets.
Cost of living on campus: another handful of thousands.
Books: $200. Each.
Food outside of the meal plan: $6 or $7 without a drink unless you wanted to go off campus, but that was only safe to do during the day.
The razor blades in the campus bookstore: $3.
The cashier didn’t question why he was buying them. The cashier had no idea who he was or that he had no classes that would ever require exacto knife blades. They just took his credit card and swiped it. Handed them to him in a bag with the school’s logo on it.
He took it to his dorm. His laptop was still open and still had on display what his final grades were for the semester.
Three Fs for three final projects for three different classes. Giving him two Cs and a D for overall class grades. With how precarious his grades had been leading up to this, this would completely destroy his grade point average.
His hands shook as he ripped the razor blade package open.
He changed the angle of the razor blade last minute as his cell phone went off. While there was blood, it didn’t gush or spray. Just oozed to the surface and rolled down his arm, dripping onto his jeans.
With the hand connected to the injured arm, Dipper grabbed the phone.
“Hey, Mabel,” Dipper said, hoping the wavering of his voice wasn’t noticeable.
“Hey, Dipper! I just got my grades back in! Do you have yours? Does West Coast Tech give those out at the same time as The Art Institute?”
“N-no, I - I don’t have mine back yet. What’re yours?”
“All As! I’m so happy, Professor Caines is a really tough grader and I never would’ve thought any of us this semester would get anything higher than a B from him, but I got an A! And they’re really impressed with my sweater designs and how it combines art with science and my adviser says if I do this summer internship, I could become a fashion designer come graduation! The internship is in New York, though, so I wouldn’t be able to come with you to see Grunkle Stan and Grunkle Ford.”
“That’s a great opportunity, Mabel. You should go. Grunkle Stan and Great-Uncle Ford won’t die on you or anything. They’re not that old yet.”
Mabel laughed, and the guilt crushed Dipper.
He almost … .
She’d be so … .
How could he even think of doing that to her?
“What about you? Wouldn’t you miss me?”
“Of course I would, but your future is important, Mabel. You should definitely go. I’ll see you when you get back.”
Tears were rolling down Dipper’s cheeks, but his voice had evened out.
“Okay! Well, I’ll call you later! I’m gonna call up Grunkle Stan and Grunkle Ford and tell them the good news, then call Mom and Dad!”
“All right. Mabel?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“Heehee, love you too, Dipper.”
She hung up first. He clicked the “end” button, then set the phone down.
He bit his lip hard as the tear production doubled.
He turned his arm over to avoid slashing at his artery and veins.
You stupid, selfish, failure, failure of a student, a son, a brother, failure at life, the fuck is wrong with you, how could you fail like this, how could you even think of failing her like that, what is wrong with you, you big stupid, stupid failure
He scared his roommate.