Chapter Text
December 2021
There she is - amidst the crowd of people, an endless sea of drab greys and browns. Her blonde hair and fierce demeanour sticks out like a goddess amongst humans.
Hiccup’s face lights up at the sight, craning his neck so he can meet her eyes, maybe subtly indicate for her to come and sit next to him and make him feel a little less alone in the crowd of people-
Her eyes flick towards him, faintly dark underneath... and she looks away. Her eyes expressionless, the rest of her face hidden by her fringe and her N95.
Of course, his immediate reaction is ‘what did I do?’ , spiralling into a fairly predictable ‘I’m an awful person’ , only to be concluded with a fierce ‘I have to make this right’ , all in the space of reaching his locker.
While his brain processes what happened, deciding which of the horrible situations his brain can dream up are actually real, the day moves on, and his classes pass in a blur.
He goes home, and immediately heads for the living room, where Heather is typing furiously on her laptop, her knees curled underneath her.
“Hey Heather,” he says. She doesn't reply, and that's when he realises she has earbuds in. He taps her on the head, and says “hey Heather. What're you doing?”
“Oh, just a song I’m working on,” Heather says breezily, her fingers working at light speed on a series of digital tracks.
“Sounds-” his mouth betrays him by breaking into a loud yawn.
Heather eyeballs him sideways. “You look like shit.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Anyway, I’m going to grab us both a snack.” She snaps her laptop shut, stands, and only then does she turn around and properly meet his eyes. “Do you want a snack?”
“Yes please. That would be nice.”
Heather stands in the doorframe, not-so-subtly raising her eyebrows at him. When he doesn’t get the hint after half a minute, she says “you’re supposed to say what you want. You know, intuitive eating and all that. Or I can give you options- do you want options?”
“Um, I’m okay thanks,” he says, and tries to force a smile. As much as he really appreciates Heather and Dagur’s efforts to help him recover from years of semi-disordered eating, the constant worried eyes fills him with a burning hatred he can’t articulate.
“Are soup packets okay?” He asks. Heather nods eagerly, and rushes into the kitchen.
He considers joining her, spending time with her like he usually would, but Heather is best friends with Astrid, and if he's... hurt her in any way, she'd undoubtedly hate him.
Maybe he should go anyway to make sure she doesn't poison his mug, he thinks to himself. Then he laughs out loud about how stupid the idea truly is. Heather would never try to poison him. And even if she did, there may not be a reason to, because he doesn't know if Astrid actually hates him. She's just been avoiding him for the whole day.
Maybe she's just upset , Hiccup thinks. Maybe she's tired, and something's bothering her at home, and she doesn't want to feel pressured to actively be a girlfriend at the moment.
He opens his phone, and checks to see if she's messaged him and explanation. Nothing. He's in one of those pissy moods where he turns his phone off out of spite if his notifications are quiet, so he swipes left, preparing to shut the rest of the world out until tomorrow.
Then, just as his finger is on the ‘power off’ button-
His phone buzzes.
Astrid: hey. i need to talk to you.
His heart leaps into his throat, his vision grows black spots for a few harrowing seconds, and he's just about to tap out an ‘of course!’ in response when a second - even stranger - text appears beneath it.
Astrid: but not face to face. i really hope that’s okay <3
Hiccup: of course it is - that's completely fine, whatever suits you :) are you good to call now?
Of course, his text is much more optimistic than he's actually feeling. He stumbles to his bed, and lets the pounding pressure in his brain send the rest of his body into a blissful A part of him really hopes she'll decline, and he can let his worry fester like a corpse left out in midsummer.
But she messages back to say ‘❤️❤️❤️ i’ll call you in five minutes?’ and Hiccup briefly wonders what he ever did to fate to make it despise him so much.
Heather hands him his packet soup, and he takes small sips from it. It's not too scalding hot, or too thick - good, by packet soup standards. He wants to savour it.
True to her word, five minutes (exactly) later, Astrid's name buzzes on his phone screen. He steps into the hallway and accepts the call. His vocal chords feel so twisted he's not sure if he could even speak.
“Hiccup? Is that you?” Immediately, worry strikes him like a lightning bolt. Her voice is croaky and hoarse, a smoker’s cough. Only Astrid doesn’t smoke unlike his dad , so she must be-
“You’re sick.”
He can tell it’s true, but a part of him really, really wants- no, needs her to deny it, to laugh it off and say it’s just a cold.
When she doesn’t say anything, dread fills his body. “Astrid? Are you okay?”
“No- well, it’s not bad , but I’m not exactly good .”
“Astrid?” Hiccup repeats her name like a prayer. “Please. Talk to me.”
“I-” Astrid’s voice is stolen by a harsh bout of coughing. It lasts for horrifically long, and the sound - agony, and pain, and pure suffering - is enough to make Hiccup feel sick. But he makes himself wait, because this is his girlfriend , and she wouldn’t even consider leaving him if he was sick.
Finally, she’s able to stop. “Hiccup? Are you still there?”
“Of course. I’m so sorry, you don’t have to talk if you don’t want- can’t .” He corrects himself. “Are you sick though?”
“Yeah.” She sniffles, borderline pitiful , which might be worse than the coughing. “I- I didn’t know how to tell you, but-” she pauses to clear her throat. “I have covid.”
Hiccup’s heart almost stops. Everything suddenly makes sense. Astrid had a perfectly good reason for avoiding him. That, he thinks, is the worst part.
“I started feeling ill when I woke up this morning, and-” she coughs “-I thought it was nothing, and I’d feel better when I got to school. But then I didn’t, and I tested, and...”
“You have covid.” Hiccup tries his best to swallow his panic. “It’s- it’s okay. Really. I mean, not that you have it, obviously! But I know why you avoided me. I... well, that was nice of you.”
“Hiccup, it’s the-” she coughs “-it’s the least I can do for you.”
“I know.” He rubs his kneecap with his spare hand. “Hope you feel better soon. I love you.”
She takes the hint that it's time for the call to end. “I love you too.”
She hangs up.
The second she’s gone, Hiccup feels more alone than ever.
He looks down at the mug in his hand- still half full. Reluctantly, he takes a sip. It's too cold, and it's separated into thin water and clumpy powder. He can't eat it now.
Silently, he re-enters the living room, where Heather is now sprawled sideways in the armchair, watching a guitar tutorial on YouTube. Her earphones are still in.
Out of pure obligation, he takes one more sip, and leaves the mug on the side.
He curls up on his bed, and cries until he falls asleep.
.o0o.
Astrid hangs up the call, and instantly feels more alone than ever. The brief moment of comfort Hiccup’s voice brought her is washed away with every second she spends in her empty bedroom without a pair of hands to comfort her.
The universe seems sorely against her; why did she have to fall ill (for the first time in actual years ) with the one illness her boyfriend was dangerously susceptible to? It wasn’t fair.
Someone knocks thrice on the door. “May I come in?”
It's her aunt - her tía, as she calls her. Not the first person she wants to see right now (she knows exactly who that is) but she's definitely in the top three.
“Hey honey,” her auntie says, gently opening the door. “How are you feeling?”
“Worse,” she groans.
“Aw, I'm sorry sweetheart.” She taps on her phone, opening a webpage. “How's your temperature?”
She gestures to her tank top and shorts (in the middle of winter) and glares.
“Okay, point taken.” Her tía pats a damp cloth on her forehead. “Loss of taste or smell?”
“Your [food] for lunch was amazing, I'm sure, but I hardly tasted the spice.”
“Are you sure it’s not just your insane spice tolerance?” Her tía jokes, but she nods, taking it seriously. “Coughing?”
“It's not so bad.” To directly betray her point, a coughing fit seizes her throat, and her whole body curls forward. Her aunt's gentle hands support her back, slowly helping her sit up.
When it's finally over, her tía gently touches her cheek. “Mija,” she says, “this is bad.”
“It's really not-”
“Sweetheart, you might need to go to hospital,” she says seriously.
“Tía, I really don't.” She raises a disbelieving eyebrow at her. “I'll probably wake up tomorrow right as rain, and self isolate until I’m all better. But I promise, if I don't get any better, to tell you.”
“ Promise? ”
“I promise.”
“Swear on God's name?”
Astrid isn't religious like her aunt and uncle, but she knows her tía needs to hear it; to hope that she'll be okay.
“I swear.”
“Okay. Call me if you need anything.”
She shuts the door, and the loneliness is there as quickly as it came the first time.
.o0o.
Hiccup realises something’s wrong - badly wrong - the second someone shakes him awake.
He rubs his dry eyes, blinking awake. Thinking feels like dragging himself through syrup. He can barely comprehend the blurred, red digits on his alarm clock - 2:31 am
“Hiccup? Hiccup are you awake?” a voice speaks urgently.
“Yeah, ‘mawake.”
Heather’s arm slides around his back, making him sit upright. She slips onto his bed behind him and fastens her arms around his waist. “I need to know you’re awake to hear this.”
Dread strikes him like a thunderbolt. Heather’s tone is even more serious than earlier this afternoon when they woke him for dinner and told him about-
“Astrid!”
“Slow down, Hiccup,” Heather says, gently stroking his forehead. “Hm. You’re sweaty.”
“It’s... hot under the duvet.”
Heather squeezes him, their arms warm and strong - every bit as comforting as Dagur’s python-strength hugs. “Hiccup...” she sighs, laboured and heavy, resting her chin on Hiccup’s shoulder. “I need you to not panic. Or freak out.”
“You’re waking me up at half two in the morning, Heather, I think I have a bit of a right to freak out,” Hiccup says.
Heather’s nods, her chin sharp and jutting on his shoulder. They detangle themself from Hiccup, turns to face him and grips his hands. “Listen, I don’t want you hearing this from anywhere else. It’s not catastrophe -bad, not even bad -bad, I just... you wouldn’t want me to keep this from you.”
“Spit it out,” Hiccup snaps.
“The thing is...” Heather screws her eyes shut, like there’s something she really doesn’t want Hiccup knowing.
“Heather, what is it? ”
“Astrid. Her aunt and uncle called to say they... they took her to hospital.”