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He isn’t smiling. It’s his wedding and he’s not smiling.
But then again, neither is Stanford, so who is he to say anything on the subject?
“But still,” he thinks, “he should be smiling.” Instead, Fiddleford just looks sad as he takes in the sight of Ford in a hand-me-down suit, given to him by his father and mother to wear to his own theoretical wedding (that was never going to happen now). Fiddleford himself is also wearing a suit, looking the nicest Ford’s ever seen him. His wild hair has been slicked back, his shirt is crisp and wrinkle-free, his cowboy boots switched out for shiny dress shoes…
And he looks nothing like Fiddleford.
They’re alone in a room off to the side, apart from the world, and it’s almost too easy to pretend like Ford is the one ... that Emma-May isn’t the one Fiddleford is getting married to. He shouldn’t be thinking like that when it’s only a half hour before Emma-May will be walking down the aisle, but it’s too easy to pretend, especially when Fiddleford reaches out to fix Ford’s bowtie, and Ford tries hard not to notice how Fiddleford’s hands linger on his shoulders for just a moment too long before retreating.
Neither of them can look each other in the eye. Neither of them can say anything. They both know if either happens, there's the incredibly real possibility that it will snowball, tumbling down a mountain of emotion until it shatters at the bottom in an irreparable mess.
Maybe, just maybe, in some other universe, this moment is one of the last until they’re married to each other. Maybe in some other universe, they’re both smiling like fools, and Fiddleford will look gorgeous with that smile and they’ll crack jokes to deal with the nervous energy, and they’ll laugh about why they’re even having a big wedding in the first place, considering practically no one would attend because they were both nerdy recluses with no friends (or family, on Ford’s part), but that didn’t matter because they were getting married. And maybe on some other plane of existence, some other dimension, that would all happen.
But of course, this isn’t that universe. And so neither of them are smiling or giggling like fools.
You’d think they were at a funeral, and Ford supposes they are, in a way. Ford, at least, is mourning what could have been, what never will be. Mourning those other universes.
Ford wonders (for what must have been the millionth time) “why.” Why tie yourself down? Why give it all up? Why stop everything just for this one person?
“Why her and not me?”
Ford, through his whole life, had never understood marriage. He couldn’t understand that concept of tying yourself down, of stopping, of giving it up for one person.
He hadn’t understood until he met Fiddleford.
Because Fiddleford was kind and supportive and Ford wouldn’t have to give anything up because Fiddleford would be right there beside him, he’d be with him the whole way, and Ford wanted nothing more for that to happen and so no! No, this hand-me-down suit would never be used again, because he would never meet anyone like Fiddleford again, and he still wishes it were him, not her, even though he knows exactly “why” that’s not the case. Knowing why doesn’t make the truth any easier to accept.
So no, neither of them are smiling, just standing there, staring at each other's shoes, waiting for doomsday to come and end their world, mourning what could have been.
“But still,” Ford thinks again, “he should be smiling.”
They can’t keep going like this.
It takes all of Ford’s strength to take Fiddleford’s face in his hands and tilt it towards him. It takes all of Ford’s strength to look Fiddleford in the eye. It takes all his strength not to acknowledge how Fiddleford leans into his touch. It takes all his strength not to kiss him softly, right there, in that empty room, both of them dolled up and looking nothing like themselves, because Fiddleford is getting married, for God’s sake!
“You should--” Ford starts to say, and then stops to swallow down the lump that had formed in his throat. It takes all his strength to continue. “You should smile,” he says. It takes all his strength to plaster what had to be the worst and most fake smile ever on his own face.
But he has to be strong, he has to keep going, has to keep smiling, even if it kills him inside because this is Fiddleford McGucket, and Stanford Pines loves him like he’ll never love again.
Fiddleford's stretches grotesquely in a tight, harsh, mockery of a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Are you ready?” Ford asks, and Fiddleford’s “smile” disappears as quickly and violently as it had just appeared.
“No,” he says, voice hoarse. He inhales deeply, then exhales for a long time, sounding like he was Atlas, holding the world on his shoulders. “I wish…” he stops and runs his fingers through his hair, thoroughly messing up his perfect hairstyle, but now looking much more like Fiddleford. “I wish…” He starts again, “It doesn’t matter what I wish anymore though, does it.” It occurs to Ford that Fiddleford is mourning those universes just as much as Ford is.
Fiddleford sighs again and then sighs a third time. He smears the smile back on his face, looking more like a grimace than anything. “I’m ready,” he says.
And that’s it. The final nail in the coffin.
Fiddleford leaves the room, and Ford doesn’t smile as he watches him go.
Ford doesn’t smile as he listens to Fiddleford recite his vows.
The only time he does smile is when Fiddleford gazes into the audience, locking eyes with him.
There’s a silent plea there.
A question.
Ford nods ever so slightly, even though it physically pains him to do so.
With his question answered, Fiddleford smiles slightly, and turns back to his bride.
Ford doesn’t smile when Fiddleford says “I do,” and in fact, he turns away as Fiddleford kisses her. He can’t bear to watch.
But perhaps what he can’t bear most of all is Fiddleford, his smile looking genuine as he pulls away from their first kiss as husband and wife.
But why shouldn’t he be smiling? He should be smiling. It’s his wedding, after all.
Stanford leaves in the chaos of post-marriage congratulations. He doesn’t smile, and he doesn’t look back.
In doing so, he misses how Fiddleford’s smile falters as he tries and fails to look for his friend.
Ford doesn’t smile for a long time after that.
He doesn’t smile until he finds his place among the oddities of Gravity Falls, he doesn’t smile until he begins categorizes hundreds of moths and starts writing in his journal about the wonders of this strange and beautiful place.
He smiles as he wins a game of interdimensional chess for the first time. He smiles as he talks about the secrets of the universe with a celestial being who compliments him, who inspires him, who makes him laugh, who makes him feel special, who makes him feel wanted.
He can't help but smile as he realizes that there’s only one person on this whole planet who could help him with this project, only one person who would even be willing.
Fiddleford’s smiles have been few and far between, mostly reserved for his computers and Tate. But he can’t help a grin spread across his face as he hears the voice of his dearest friend over the telephone. Of course he says yes.
Fiddleford smiles as he sees Ford for the first time in years, he smiles as they spend late nights laughing with each other as they work on the portal, reminiscing about their college years. He frowns, frustrated as he tosses aside the third failed prototype of six-fingered gloves. But it’s worth it when he sees the smile on Ford’s face. He smiles as he sees the portal decked out with Christmas lights, sees Ford's awkward smile that desperately searches for his approval. They both smile as they make snowmen of each other. Fiddleford smiles as he presents an axolotl, a squash, smiles as he and Ford sit under the stars.
And yet…
All these memories, all these smiles have an underlying guilt to them. Every smile given to Ford was one taken from Tate and Emma-May. If Fiddleford had known then, sitting in his Palo Alto garage and listening to Ford talk about a transuniversal polydimensional meta vortex, if he had known how many smiles would be stolen, how many would have been forgotten, would he have been smiling as he stopped his whole life for this man?
He knows he still would, because he never stopped loving Stanford Pines.
But as Fiddleford McGucket holds the memory gun to his forehead, desperate to forget projects gone terribly wrong and the horrors beyond their dimension, he wonders if he’ll ever smile again.