A Promise To Keep

Hiding The Truth

It was now the month of March and the school term had just returned. The snow was close to disappearing and flowers were beginning to bloom for the upcoming Spring season. It was the afternoon and Hiccup was, once again, in the Sixth Form common room, sitting at the far table, making his usual dragon sketches in his notebook. There were some students there, but other than that, the room was mostly quiet.

Half term went by quickly for him, mainly because he didn't do anything else interesting, besides reading, writing, watching TV and helping his dad on occasions. But that didn't bother him. One because this was what he would do during the half term anyway and two, the memories of his weekend with Astrid was still engrained in his mind. He couldn't stop thinking about, even when he didn't want to. He was surprised at how much of an impact the trip had on him. But after the trip, they didn't hang out afterwards. 

Normally, it wouldn't bother him, since she had a life to live, as limited as it was. Also, it wasn't like he wanted to hang out with her in the first place. But the truth was now, a part of him wished he could. 

That's when he realised - he wanted to hang out with someone. He wanted Astrid to text him, telling him she'd found another thing to do in the bucket list. He wanted to be around her.

He stopped in the middle of his drawing, surprised at his revelation. But it made sense to him. Astrid was different, in a good way. How she pushed him to do things he wouldn't do. How considerate she was, not making assumptions unlike others. And he liked that. He surprisingly, really liked that. He couldn't help the small smile coming onto his face as he resumed his sketch.

"Hey, Hiccup." Suddenly, he froze, and the smile disappeared, hearing the voice calling him in a stern way. He slowly looked up and as he predicted, it was Heather standing in front of him. She had her hand flat on the table, looking very annoyed. Hiccup didn't reply, just looking at her.

"Why did you go with Astrid go to Dragon's Edge?" Heather asked sternly. Hiccup's eyes grew for a brief second before he returned to his emotionless expression everyone at school was used to.

He then shrugged his shoulders. "She asked me to go."

"And you said yes?" She raised her eyebrow.

"I didn't have a choice." He answered. He could tell that answer didn't go well with her as her expression became more annoyed. She then walked back a bit, removing her hand from the table and crossing her arms.

"Something's going on." She proclaimed. "Astrid can make friends easily, sure, but to suddenly be hanging with you most of the time? It doesn't make sense." There was a sense of desperation in her voice, wanting to know the truth. Hiccup wished he could just tell her, but he remembered the promise he made to Astrid and her reason behind not telling her in the first time.

He just shrugged his shoulders, which made her flare up in anger.

"Don't just shrug! You know what's going on!" She exclaimed.

"She's not abandoning you, you know." He said.

"I know she's not, but I want to know what's going on!" Heather slammed his hands against the table, leaning forward towards him. Her face was red, and she was clearly on the verge of tears. The other students in the room turned around, hearing the commotion. Hiccup was starting to feel uncomfortable, getting all this unwanted attention.

Heather breathed heavily in anger, before taking deep breaths, calming herself down. She looked straight at Hiccup; anger still present in her eyes.

"What's going on with you?" She asked, calmly but stern.

"We're just hanging out. Nothing more." Hiccup declared, as confidently as possible. They stared at each other's eyes, as if they were having a staring contest. Finally, Heather gave up and walked away. As she walked up to the door, she turned around to face him.

"I'll find out what's going on, either from you... or her." She declared before opening the door, bumping into Fishlegs, who just entered the common room, and marched off.

Hiccup sighed deeply, sliding down on his seat, releasing the stress that built up from their exchange.

"Keeping this secret is harder than I thought." He thought, before siting back up. Fishlegs then came to his table and sat opposite him.

"What happened between you two?" Fishlegs asked curiously.

Hiccup sighed, looking back on his drawing. "She still wants to know why Astrid and I are hanging out. She can't expect the reason as to why."

"I see. I guess she's still upset about what happened to Astrid today."

Hiccup looked up; his eyes wide with surprised. "What?"

Fishlegs bit his lip before answering. "She... she threw up during English, so she was sent home. But... it was really big. Like she had a flu or something."

At that moment, Hiccup remembered back to when he first met Astrid, behind the building with a pool of vomit in front of her. He leaned back on his chair, sighing. He then closed his eyes, containing the worried feeling he had inside.

"Hiccup?" His thoughts were interrupted by Fishlegs' voice, reminding him that he was not at home to act like this in front of anyone.

"Hmm. Sorry. Hopefully, she's OK." He simply said before returning to his sketches.

"Yeah, hopefully. Well, I have to head to class. I'll see you around." Fishlegs said before getting up. Hiccup gave a wave, not looking up until he heard the door open and close. He exhaled shakily, with his hands shaking a bit as well.

"Why I am acting like this?" He whispered to himself. It wasn't the first time she threw up, and yet he feared for her. He was worried about her.

Suddenly, he felt a quick vibration coming from his jean pocket. He placed his pencil down and went into his pocket, bringing out his phone. He turned it on and his eyes grew as Astrid's name was displayed on notification. He quickly pressed on it.

'Hey Hiccup!' She texted. He quickly texted back.

'Hey. How are you? I heard you threw up in class today'

'Yeah, it was pretty embarrassing. But I'm OK now.'

'OK. Glad to hear.'

'How did you find out?'

'Fishlegs told me after Heather harassed me.'

'Haha! I thought so. Sorry about that.'

'It's OK'

'I can see why you don't want to tell her the truth.'

'Yeah... I mean, I like her. She's my friend, of course, but she can be a bit too emotional'

'You think?!'

'Hahaha!!'

As Hiccup texted Astrid, he could hear her saying the things she was texting. Her cheerful, smiley self, despite the barrier of her illness. He sighed and smiled a bit, happy that she was indeed OK. But a thought lingered in his mind that he decided to text to her about.

'You know, it's getting harder to keep the promise.'

'I thought you said it wouldn't be a problem.'

'That's what I thought...'

He decided to stop texting her with that sentence, but she texted back.

'...Did you tell anyone?' 

He felt a slight shudder in his body, imagining Astrid saying this in a stern voice, completely opposite to her usual tone.

'No'

'Good. I know it's hard, but you have to. You know why now.'

'I know'

Hiccup could hear the desperation through her text, which still lingered in his mind as he put his phone away and continued drawing. He tried not to think about it, but he couldn't, as much as he tried. He'd never felt so worried for somebody. It was something new to him and, honestly, he didn't know how to react to this.