Finding Hiccup - Modern!Au ✔️

thirty eight

I'm doing it. I'm getting better. Not just baby-steps better, massive-great-strides better. It's three weeks later and I'm feeling more on top of it than ever. I've been to Starbucks three times, Costa once, and The Ginger Biscuit once for milk shakes. I know! Dr. Gobber was like, "Henry, you are making strides!" Then he told me not to go too fast too soon, yadda yadda, but you could tell he was impressed.
I've even had lunch at a pizza restaurant! I had to leave before pudding because the restaurant suddenly got too clattery and threatening—but still, I lasted a whole Quattro Staggioni. Mum and Dad came too, and Astrid and Heather and Snotlout, and it felt like we were...you know. A normal group. Apart from the fact that one of us was sitting there in dark glasses like some sad, wannabe celeb. I said that to Mum and she said, "You think you're the abnormal-looking one? Look at Sam!"
Which was a fair point, as Snotlout was dressed in his beloved new morph suit with a tiger mask on top of it, and had a tantrum when we pointed out that he wouldn't be able to eat any pizza like that.

So that made me feel better. In fact, a lot is making me feel better at the moment. Seeing Astrid is definitely making me feel better. We text all the time and she comes over every day after school, and we've started playing table tennis in the garden, like, obsessively. Even Heather joins in sometimes.
And today was amazing, because Astrid gave me a present. A T-shirt. It has a picture of rhubarb on it and she got it off the Internet. Mum and Dad said "Why rhubarb?" and she winked at me and said, "It's our thing."
Our thing.
I'm not sure what makes me happier—the T-shirt or the our thing. I've never had an our thing with a girl before. Whichever it is, I'm still glowing. Mum and Dad are out and Heather is doing homework and Snotlout is in bed and I feel fired up. I feel restless. I'm wandering around the house in my T-shirt, feeling like I want to share all this. I want to talk to someone. I want to see someone
Nathan. I want to see Nathan.
The thought is like a light ray in my brain, so positive, it makes me blink. I want to see him. I want my friend back. Yes. I'm going to do it. Right now.
I've nearly phoned Nath a couple of times since I had that talk with Mum. Once I was actually halfway through dialling when I chickened out at the last moment. But today I can face it. I can more than face it.
I get out my phone and key in Nathan's number before I can change my mind. I know it off by heart, even though I haven't spoken to him for, like, a zillion years. The last time we saw each other was on that awful last day at school, and he was crying, and I was, like, beyond crying, and it wasn't the greatest goodbye.
I text:

𝗛𝗶 𝗡𝗮𝘁𝗵. 𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘂? 𝗜'𝗺 𝗮 𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗯𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗿. 𝗟𝗼𝘃𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝗰 𝘂 𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲. 𝗛𝗲𝗻.

About thirty seconds later his reply arrives. It's like he's been sitting by his phone all this time, all these weeks, waiting.
Which maybe he has. I blink at the text, which goes like this:

𝗢𝗠𝗚 𝗛𝗲𝗻. 𝗜 𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝗯𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗦𝗢 𝗪𝗢𝗥𝗥𝗜𝗘𝗗 𝗔𝗕𝗢𝗨𝗧 𝗨. 𝗖𝗮𝗻 𝗜 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱? 𝗦𝗵𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝗜 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝗻𝗼𝘄? 𝗠𝘂𝗺 𝘀𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝗶𝘁'𝘀 𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗲. 𝗡𝗮𝘁𝗵.

I text back:

𝗢𝗞 𝗖 𝘂 𝘀𝗼𝗼𝗻.

And what seems like five minutes later, the doorbell rings. It might have been ten minutes. It definitely wasn't any longer than that. He must have left the house that exact second.
I swing open the front door and step back, a bit unnerved. Not because I'm not pleased to see Nathan, but because of all the stuff he's holding. He's got a gift basket of bath oil and a teddy bear holding a banner saying Get Well Soon and some books and magazines and bars of chocolate and a massive card.
"Hi," I say faintly. "Wow."
"We wanted to visit you before," says Nath in a rush. "But your mum said..." He swallows. "Anyway. So we'd already bought all this stuff. It's just been sitting there in the hall." He looks at his laden arms. "I know. It looks a bit mad."
"Well...come in."
As he edges in, he's eyeing up my dark glasses until I say, "What is it?"