"A bet." came the flat confirmation, a dubious expression gracing Hiccup's face, "About sports. Against me."
"Uhm...Yes?" the hesitant confirmation sounded. Jackson Overland certainly looked embarrassed about it, and really, he should be.
"You bet that Chase Feldstall, the captain of the football team, can't throw a football farther than me, one of the waterboys." Hiccup clarified, because maybe he had heard wrong, but alas.
"Yes." Jack nodded, swallowing slightly.
"Why?" the smaller boy asked mildly, and Jack immediately launched into an explanation.
"Okay, so you know that half the football team is really supportive of us being together, because you're really sweet and I'm apparently a good influence on you." Jack started, sparing a second for a derisive snort before continuing, "But you also know that the other half is really homophobic about it all, creating tension in the locker room and at practices and all that."
"I am aware of this, yes." Hiccup acknowledged easily.
"Well, my last period teacher sent me to the field yesterday because Ryan Jackson is my partner for an important project she introduced when he was excused, and I was supposed to explain it to him and give him the assignment sheet, but when I got there I saw that they had apparently gotten into a really big fight over it. Us, I mean." Jack told him, and Hiccup nodded.
"Yeah, I heard about it from Ken." he said, referring to the other waterboy. He and Hiccup alternated between practices, but they usually handled games together to get water to the guys faster. "Flattering that we can inspire such dissension, isn't it?" he inquired mildly, and Jack flashed him a grin.
"I know, right? But anyway, Chase was bad-mouthing the both of us, and Terrence Bando was defending us, but it looked like it would turn ugly any second, so I kinda just...stepped in." he finished lamely, and Hiccup's eyes widened in concern.
"You didn't actually step in between them, did you?!" he demanded, but Jack's guilty look was all the answer he needed. "Jack!" he reprimanded, and the white-haired boy winced.
"I know, I know, it was stupid and I'm sorry. Anyway, I don't even really remember what we said, but we somehow got over to the subject, and in the heat of the moment I...bet that you could throw a football farther than him." he said with a note of trepidation in his voice.
"Really. And how do you propose I actually do that?" Hiccup questioned flatly, raising an eyebrow at Jack's surprised expression. "What?"
"You're gonna do it?" the white-haired boy asked, honestly not expecting such an eventuality, and Hiccup gave him a grimace.
"Part of the terrible consequences of making a bet is that you usually have to do them." Hiccup pointed out, then clapped a hand on his boyfriend's shoulder and gave him a friendly smile, "Besides, if I didn't, they'd probably blame you. And we all know how that would turn out."
Jack, far from being touched by Hiccup's concern, merely eyed the boy with a suspicious air. His smile was far too happy.
"What's your price...?" Jack questioned slowly, and Hiccup's smile widened.
"I'm thinking light bondage and lots of toys." the smaller boy said, still quite cheerful even as the rather risqué sentence left his mouth, and Jack choked on his own spit as Hiccup walked off to the library.
Jack felt like biting a piece of his hand off, just to have something to distract him from his nervousness. Or maybe a finger. Yeah, his mother was always telling him never to stick up that middle one at anyone, maybe he should just take the option right off the table.
Oh, wait. He needed that finger. It was Hiccup's favorite. Damn it.
Oh, what's this? The football team around him had gone silent with apprehension. Jack glanced up from his fidgeting hands to see that Feldstall had taken centerfield. Guess it was high noon already.
Oh, stop it. Duelling at high noon was tradition.
Jack looked around, but he didn't see Hiccup anywhere. Maybe the boy had decided he couldn't, in fact, throw a football to save either his or Jack's life, and had simply stayed in the library.
Jack wouldn't blame him. Feldstall was a legend, football scholarships raining down on him like snow in a blizzard, and Hiccup...was a stick.
Oh, but wait. People were laughing. Why were they laughing? Jack looked back at Feldstall and burst into snickers himself.
There was Hiccup, Jack saw, and what a place to be.
He was standing behind the football star, perfectly still and silent, and looking up at the back of the guy's head with an innocent expression. He had done that to Jack on more than one occasion, always scaring the pants off of him (in more ways than one), and the blue-eyed boy assumed this time would be no different.
His assumption would be right.
Feldstall, hearing the laughter, scowled and followed the gazes of the football team behind him. He caught sight of Hiccup almost immediately and gave a loud shout, jumping away from the boy and tripping over his own feet to land on his behind.
Jack saw Hiccup say a single word, probably 'hello', and snickered some more when Feldstall could only stare.
Then the football player pushed himself to his feet, said a blustering phrase to the boy, and shoved a football into his hand. The boy stared down at it, a mild expression on his face, then replied to him with the same neutral expression.
The football player immediately flinched back, and Jack imagined that Hiccup had to try very hard not to laugh. As it was, he only gave a bright smile and a wink before turning to face the end of the field they were throwing to.
Jack didn't catch all the small intricacies of the preparations Hiccup made, but it sure took him a bit to actually get around to throwing the ball. Jack did, however, see him turn to his left, toward the bleachers they were sitting on. He saw him bring the ball, held lightly in his left hand and steadied by his right, up to his ear.
And then, quick as his wit, he saw Hiccup snap his left arm forward. The ball left his hand, fingers skimming along it to give it just the slightest hint of a spiral, and as the masterful throw was executed, Jack concluded that Hiccup must have been up half the night planning every instance of this encounter.
Hiccup was improvising.
He was improvising when he went to the library to brush up on football theory. He was improvising when he saw Feldstall making his way down to the field and impulsively stepped into the football player's shadow. He was improvising when he startled him the same way he startled Jack, staying in his shadow with the most unassuming expression on his face until the boy noticed him on his own. He was improvising when he gave Feldstall a mild, "Hello.", he was improvising when he took the ball from the football player with a calm expression, and he was improvising when he replied to Feldstall's blustery, "Just throw the ball, Haddock, and maybe I won't have the whole team fuck you up with your boyfriend afterwards."
"Gangbang? Kinky, Feldstall. Can Toothless come too?" he had said in a mildly interested tone, Feldstall flinching back with a hot blush on his face, and Hiccup tried very hard not to smirk as his analytical brain read into the implications of such a reaction (lingering gazes in the openness of the locker room, preferences buried deep for fear of rejection and ridicule, secret fantasies only dared to be dreamt in the furthest recesses of his subconscious). Instead, he only gave a bright smile and a small wink before focusing on the task at hand.
Alright Haddock, you're probably gonna fail miserably, but nobody can say you didn't try your best, he reassured himself as he widened his stance a bit and bent a little at the knees.
I mean really, most people wouldn't have even bothered to show up at all, he reasoned as he pivoted his torso to face the bleachers.
Feldstall's a legend. Nobody would have blamed you if you decided to skip out. But you didn't, he thought defiantly, pulling the ball up to the side of his face by his ear. Held in his left hand and steadied with his right, he thought he must look ridiculous.
You came anyways, even though he has four years of experience and practice to your none. That in itself is a miracle, and you should be proud of just that, he told himself firmly. Taking one final breath, he bunched his muscles in preparation for the throw.
He didn't even see himself complete the maneuver. One second he was staring at the bleachers, instantly able to pick Jack's face out of the midst of the team, and the next he was watching the football sail away from his outstretched hand with a perfect spiral propelling it on to bigger and better things and wow that was a good throw and wait a minute did it just-
"It's good!" came the single, lone shout, and as one the entire team plus an Overland rose to their feet and let out a tumultuous cheer because, against all odds, the leather ball had spiralled through the air and sailed directly between the two tall metal poles at the end of the field.
Feldstall could only gape as Jack jogged over to retrieve the fallen ball and bring it back to them, and it took the entirety of those three minutes for him to gather his wits together. Once he had, though, a nasty glare spread across his features.
"Lucky break, twig. Too bad it won't be enough. I've thrown far enough to hit the side of the school from here; beating you'll be a cakewalk." he sneered, snatching the ball from Jack's fingers, but instead of mirroring the hostile look the white-haired boy's face, Hiccup only gazed up at him with innocent curiosity. Not thrown for a moment, Feldstall took stance and prepared to throw the ball.
"So, will you be joining in on the gangbang?" Hiccup questioned curiously.
Feldstall's hand spasmed right as the ball was poised to leave it, and the miniscule tremor gave the ball a wild pivot that sent it careening towards the ground much sooner than it otherwise should have. The result was that Feldstall's throw only made it about three-fourths of the way to the goalpost, thumping down well behind Hiccup's throw, and the assembled athletes had to take a moment to stare in stunned disbelief.
Then Jack gave a strangled sort of laugh, one that spoke of disbelief and pride and a healthy dose of 'wait what was that?', and half the team flooded the field to hoist Hiccup up on their shoulders as the other half scowled and determined ways Hiccup could have cheated. The brown-haired boy was carried off the field as if he had just made the winning touchdown of the championship game.
Twenty minutes later, as Feldstall was walking home in a fuming sort of embarrassment, he reached into his pocket to fish out his phone and instead found his fingers brushing a small piece of paper. Curious, and a bit annoyed, he pulled it out and unfolded it.
"Friday at five? I promise I'll be gentle ;) -Hiccup" it read in the boy's neat scrawl, his address underneath, and Feldstall blushed a furious scarlet as he stuffed it back in his pocket.
