Work Text:
July 2020
Dear brother Dagur, Heather, my love Astrid, Snotlout, Fishlegs, Ruffnut and Tuffnut.
I'm sorry I tried to kill myself.
Hiccup sighs to himself, and puts his pen down. He idly thinks, staring at the shadows of the gates against the lawn, that he has never wasted his time more than now.
But what else can he do... He has to say something . His friends and Dagur have been nothing but kind to him since... This happened. He is even sitting on the front porch of Dagur’s house, the July sun warm on his skin. It is a perfect summer afternoon, really. What an insult to the lovely weather to be writing apology letters for his suicide attempt.
Picking up the pen, he tries again.
I’m sorry I tried to kill unalive myself end my life. I wasn’t meaning to abandon you. You guys are my family best friends you’re all I have left I love you so much and I’m so sorry I tried to leave you.
God, he sounds pathetic. Like a clingy crybaby. What was it his dad once said? If he’s going to be a man, he can’t be so soft. Yes, that’s it. He’s Hiccup Haddock, and he needs to be stronger than this.
He starts over:
Dear Dagur, Heather, Astrid, Snotlout, Fishlegs, Ruffnut and Tuffnut.
I’m sorry about what happened, but please don’t worry about me. I know you will anyway, but I thought it was worth mentioning.
No, that’s passive aggressive. But then again, it’s the truth, isn’t it? Of course they will worry. Especially Astrid and Snotlout, who watched him fall.
Thank you for finding me when you did, I’m so sorry you had to see that.
Too painful to bring up those memories. It’s best he didn’t detail what went down on the roof of his school, Crows, stairs, Astrid, screaming, crying, laughing, pointing, falling falling falling.
I’ll be fine, and I promise I won’t try to end my life again.
That’s okay, right? A brief but definitive promise not to do the same again, and assuring them that they definitely don’t have to worry about him anymore.
But then again, it’s futile. They’re going to worry about him, and that’s the worst part of it all.
He scribbles it out, scrunches the paper into a fist in his hand, and hurls it across the lawn where it lands neatly in the grass.
Something heartbroken seizes him by the throat, and he almost falls over himself to retrieve it. He clutches it close to his chest like the last scrap of warmth on a cold night, and returns to the porch.
“Oh...” His voice tapers out into a wobbly breath as his shaking hands smooth the paper out. “I’m so sorry.”
He realises then, that he is apologising to a piece of paper. Even if its many creases look like how he feels: damaged, crumpled.
He once heard someone tell him that - no matter how much you smooth a crumpled piece of paper out - it will always be slightly creased. Even if it’s only slightly so, the arks never leave. Apparently it even works with a hot iron, but he’s never tried, and he’s not sure he trusts himself with one of those. Plus, he can only imagine how much Dagur and Heather would laugh at him if he asked them to iron a piece of scribbled out paper. Or maybe-
Maybe they would be kinder. Maybe they would hug him close, and say ‘of course I will’ and ask him why, and he would stutter an answer out and they would pretend to understand, but it would still be better than nothing. He even dares to hope that they would read the letter and say he has nothing to apologise for, that he’s here now and that’s all that matters.
Or maybe he doesn’t have to hope. He’s seen evidence of them caring: the jokes the twins sent him that made him chuckle that he still has saved on a note on his phone. Screenshots Snotlout sent from his awful Tumblr feed in a folder somewhere else on his phone. Books Fishlegs brought him to read while he was in hospital. Hours of texting conversations Hiccup still rereads. The get well soon cards he puts in between two hardback books under his pillow while he sleeps. The takeout menu Astrid brought him when she stayed with him in the hospital. Heather and Dagur offering him a place to stay while he recovers, because their house is more accessible for the wheelchair he needed to use for a few months after the accident.
What was it his therapist said- collect the evidence that people don’t like you, or something? It wasn’t hard to do for his mother and father. But for his friends, when he sat there with a pen and paper in front of him, it became harder. Maybe it’s because he knows - on a deeply intrinsic level - that the thoughts floating in his head about them aren’t true. Maybe it’s - for every bad thought - there are ten good ones.
Maybe it’s because they’ve proven themselves time and time again to love him like family.
He rereads the words again, picks up the pen for the last time, and begins to write.
.o0o.
That evening, seven people unravelled a mysterious piece of paper left in their letterboxes, and smiled to themselves as they read the contents.
Dear Dagur, Heather, Astrid, Snotlout, Fishlegs, Ruffnut and Tuffnut.
I’m sorry I tried to kill myself, because I never meant to hurt you. I love you guys so much, and I don’t want to do something like that ever again. I’m struggling a lot right now, but I know I have you guys and Toothless to live for, and I’m forever grateful. You guys are the best people I have ever met, and I want you to always be a part of my life in some way.
I love you so much.
Hiccup Haddock❤️