Fishbone [ hiccstrid oneshot ]

Part III

20 years old

Hiccup yawned and stretched, his back aching from a night of terrible sleep. His eyes remained shut, and he flopped backwards into the bed again, pulling the furs around his body and snuggling against their warmth. He knew he had duties to do, but he really, really did not want to do them. Nothing could motivate him to get out of bed.

"Hey, sleepy chief, wake up. You've got stuff to do," a feminine voice called. Well, nothing could motivate him to get out of bed, except her. Hiccup groaned and rolled over onto his stomach, feeling around the wooden floor till his fingers felt a cool, solid object. He pulled up his prosthetic peg and lazily fit it to his stump, strapping it tightly. He used to struggle with this task in the morning, but as five years passed doing the same thing every morning, he grew used to it.

Hiccup slid out of bed, resentful to leave the comforting warmth of his furs. He hobbled down the stairs, scratching his head and rubbing his eyes. "Morning, Dad," he said instinctively, then his head snapped up in remembrance. It had been a week since his father died, and he was still not used to him being there.

"I miss him, too," Valka, his mother sighed. She set a plate of porridge on the table, at Hiccup's seat. "Here, have some breakfast.

"It's okay, I'm not hungry," Hiccup said, again, instinctively.

"Oh, don't give me any of that," another voice said, the girl's one that woke him up. He turned to see Astrid, now his girlfriend of two years, standing with her hands on her hips and raising an eyebrow. "You're eating, whether you like it or not, Haddock."

Valka was somewhat confused. "Well, if he doesn't want to eat, he doesn't have to-"

"Oh don't worry, he's eating," Astrid assured. Hiccup gave a half-smile, and kissed her forehead good-morning. He sat down in his chair, and lazily scooped at the porridge taking small bites. While he was eating, Astrid took the chair beside him and rolled up his sleeves, checking his wrists and forearms.

Hiccup was in recovery, and this was a cycle they repeated every day. He tried to skip out on breakfast, she scolded him, and she checked for cuts while he choked down food. Astrid kept an eye on him for the rest of the day, too, making sure he didn't throw up the food that he put down.

Hiccup was almost a year clean from slitting his wrists at that point, and he was significantly happier. He was gaining weight, too, but his ribs still liked to present and display themselves on his bare body. They weren't like two years ago, though, they weren't valleys and mountains that were painful to just look at. These were more ridges in his skin, little bumps that weren't as visible on his body. He went days where he held a knife close to his skin, but he didn't cut. He still went days without eating, and he still hadn't beaten the sheep scale in the way he wanted. He was working at it, though, fighting to recover. He was just about to being equal with the sheep, a weight common amongst 13 and 14 year-olds. Hiccup was still severely underweight, but the sheep were starting to tilt upward, signaling he was growing heavier that 130 pounds.

"Good, good, keep it up. They're starting to fade," murmured Astrid, inspecting his arms. Hiccup didn't notice her do this most of the time, since it happened every morning for the past two years. And trust him when he says, you don't want to find out what happens when she finds a new, fresh scar on your wrist.

"I've got meetings I have to go to," Hiccup mumbled, pushing the half-eaten bowl of porridge away.

"Eh eh eh, I don't think so, mister," Astrid said, raising an eyebrow as he pushed his chair away and stood up. "Two more big boy bites."