AN: Okay, @the–regenerating–degenerate, so I guess there was a part 2 after all. I even drudged up another bit of lyrics to go by. This is from Heartbeat by The Fray:
“I’m trying to put it all back together. I’ve got a story and I’m trying to tell it right. I got the kerosene and a desire. I’m trying to start a flame in the heart of the night. Oh you got a fire and it’s burning in the rain.Thought that it went out, but it’s burning just the same, and you don’t look back, not for anything.”
Hiccup stared down at his coffee mug. It had once been a disturbingly bright yellow—to channel the owner’s sunny disposition, he had been told—but over the years, it had faded to a sickly pallor. Nothing in Berk had changed, only diminished, like the mug finely cracked in places, though what could he expect of a town succumbed to the unstoppable ravages of time? Everything seemed run down and weary, like the attic in an old house. Berk was a forgotten relic of an age before the interstate. The only reason anybody still lived there was an inextinguishable stubbornness; inhabitants determined to degrade with the sleepy little town they so unreasonably loved.
He had to get out, and so he did without explanation or apology. It was not running. Not really. Rather, he had saved himself from drowning.
Yet, there he was, sitting in a coffee shop he used to frequent in a place he swore he would never revisit, inhaling the familiar smell of cedar and dust.
His brow was furrowed over the foam of his latte, watching the tiny bubbles burst at random. Anything to distract him from the striking blue eyes that stood out against the dreary backdrop, pulled straight from a faded photograph. She was a lovely anachronism; a picture of modern beauty seated in place that had been stagnant for decades.
Neither one of them spoke, uncertain how to proceed without falling back to misery. If Berk had any appeal, it was sitting across from Hiccup at that uncomfortably small table. But he had not come back with delusions that a simple apology would fix things. Astrid needed an explanation and he owed her that much. He was not sure she wanted to hear it, though, tales of his life in the Big City; adventures had, people met, things seen and done. They had never seen eye-to-eye on the merits of small-town living.
She had yelled, he had shut her out.
So, he left and accusations of cowardice had echoed down the empty street after him.
Still, as he tentatively gazed up at her, he could see the anxious girl behind the impatient façade. Under her frustrations was the hurt he had inflicted, and he had come back to set things right.
Five years was a Hell of a cooling off period.
He was glad she had not diminished with the world around her. She had gone away too, for a time. University, if he had to guess. It made her stand out, like color bursting from a black and white film.
“Why did you come back?” she asked, going right for the jugular. Same way she always did.
“Would you believe me if I told you I wasn’t entirely certain myself?” he replied.
Astrid managed a small smile and Hiccup felt a warmth spreading to his numb fingers—Berk’s cold, dry air permeated everything.
The eye contact was jarring and they both looked away, burying the awkwardness in their respective caffeine, swallowing ill-advised grins that would be dangerous. They had always been combustible, waiting for the right spark to touch, to kiss, among other things…
“I didn’t come back here with any expectations,” Hiccup explained, wiping the foam from his upper lip. Astrid’s hand twitched ever so slightly. Muscle memory, from a time where she might do it for him. He pretended not to notice like she pretended she had not considered it. “I came for some loose ends.”
Astrid scoffed, leaning back in her chair. It creaked from its tired joints.
His fingertips drummed against his mug. “You don’t have to be.”
Clouds gathered outside, casting even gloomier shade inside the coffee shop, but Astrid always emitted her own light, her own fire. It never made sense then, why she stayed. A small town like Berk was akin to dried up tinder. She could burn through it. There was nothing for her there and Hiccup had tried to make her see that. God knew, he had tried.
Maybe he had come back then, not to tie up any certain loose ends, but to tug the string that would bring down the entire house of cards—whatever it was that kept Astrid contained.
“I don’t want to rehash old arguments, Hiccup,” she said firmly.
He pursed his lips and nodded. She was right, of course. Digging up hurt feelings of the past would do little more than keep them spinning there, and he was trying to lay the foundation for something—not sure what, because he did not dare to hope with so much still unresolved—to set something new in motion. They could disconnect themselves from the Hiccup and Astrid of years ago and set fire as the Hiccup and Astrid of the present. Young. Vibrant. Burning with passions a small little town could not contain.
“There’s a world outside of Berk,” he murmured. It was not quite the same, tired argument, but it was close.
Astrid gazed outside the window, watching the first few raindrops begin to fall.
“I’ve been outside Berk,” she sighed, glancing back to Hiccup as her thick braid slipped over her shoulder. She folded her arms on the table, leaning forward. “I never found what I was looking for out there.”
There was something pointed in her gaze and Hiccup swallowed hard, mouth suddenly dry. Something about her eyes and her tone stoked coals in the pit of his stomach that had never really burnt out.
“And you found it here?” he asked.
“That depends,” she replied with a shrug. Her chair legs screeched across the floor as she stood. It was pouring then, but she grabbed her bag anyway. “Do you still enjoy a good sprint in the rain?”
She extended her hand and it was not lost on him that is was a one-time offer. A last chance. He had blown it years ago, but she too was trying to lay a new foundation there, in that shop. It could be a reset—a jog through the cleansing rain like they did as juniors, from the high school doors to the parking lot. It was a chance to be more than old photographs and bittersweet memories. It did not guarantee they could be anything more than one careless afternoon, but it was a start.
So, Hiccup took her hand, and it was childish to run, sopping wet and giggling, like they were fifteen and newly in love again. He only had the one day, but maybe they could burn once more despite the rain. After all, he had come home looking for something, and maybe Astrid was it. She could not make him stay, but maybe he could make her leave. And maybe they were running headlong into disaster again, doomed to fail with old baggage still weighing them down.
But he was kerosene and she was the spark, and come what may, they never would look back.
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