Hard Knocks
A/N: Hi, everyone! I'm back, with a new chapter. I went to the bookstore again yesterday and I MuST BE SToPPED. I got like, six new books, it was insane xD and I scored a really awesome Harry Potter journal. I love bookstores so much, man. I especially love the one I go to, because it always smells like coffee and magic and information and just ughhhh. I feel like Fishlegs in Race to the Edge episode 1: "There is no greater treasure than knowledge!" xD xD xD Yep, when I first saw the movie, I wanted to be like Hiccup or Astrid, only to realize years later that I'm Fishlegs. That is the way the cookie crumbles, apparently xD Oh, also, as I type this, I'm listening to the 2014 version of the Annie soundtrack. And the night is young, and this is written, so I bid you adieu, I guess?
(Oh, PS, I also got a new book while I was out today, I confess, there is my confession, I'm sorry I told you I must be stopped. But most of the books were fantasy, which is my favorite genre, and the books I got last time I went to the bookstore were all research. Like for fics and stuff. So I can write my stories more accurately. I even got a book on the Vikings! :D There really is no greater treasure than knowledge, I swear...)
True night had fallen by the time they exited the veterinarian's office, pulled out of the parking lot and headed for the nearest supermarket (Hiccup wanted to buy Toothless some dog food, to be sure he'd get a meal tonight, and that it would be a meal safe for a canine to eat). Though this was now the least of his ever-growing list of problems, Stoick still could not fathom why anyone would choose to name a dog 'Toothless', and even worse, that the dog actually responded to it. Nonetheless, the animal limped faithfully after Hiccup wherever he went, indicating that he'd already decided to attach himself to the boy, at least for now.
Upon being asked to stop for dog food on the way home, Stoick had so nearly given a sarcastic and completely humorless response – he wasn't precisely sure what he would have said, but it would probably have been something along the lines of, sure, why don't we visit the whole damn city! – but one look at the boy's earnest green eyes and he simply couldn't. Even now, as he reluctantly pulled into the parking lot and cut the engine, he couldn't explain exactly how Hiccup managed to do that, to just shut that side of him down so completely, the side he had learned to master, so as to never show to any voters. But Hiccup was not a voter, or…or anything, really, anybody that Stoick had to impress. Why was he so hesitant to speak harshly around the boy?
The trip into the supermarket was hasty - Stoick barely even glanced at the chosen bag of dog food as he hefted it over to the counter, though he saw out of the corner of his eye that it appeared to have dark blue packaging. Once back inside the Thunderdrum, Stoick turned to look at the boy in the passenger seat, Toothless sprawled out happily on the teen's legs. This appeared to be putting Hiccup in some discomfort, but he didn't complain, just scratched the dog happily behind the ears.
"Do you want to grab something out?" Stoick ventured cautiously. "I mean, it would take care of dinner at least, but if you don't want…"
Hiccup shook his head in disbelief. "You expect me to complain about takeout?"
"I'll take that as a very enthusiastic yes," the man told him.
Hiccup nodded. "You do that."
Upon arriving back at the apartment, they were immediately confronted with a new problem. Stoick did not have a dog dish. Or a water bowl. Or anything at all, really, that could be loosely construed as anything for a canine to eat out of. Throughout all that had happened that day, this was certainly not the biggest problem the man had ever faced, but it was beginning to seem downright insurmountable until he wrestled an old orange Halloween bowl with black pumpkins dotting the rim from the back of his pantry. He suspected the bowl might have come from someone else, because although he did not prize style very highly, even he could immediately see that it was the ugliest dish he'd ever seen. He was quite happy to give it to the dog.
Hiccup busied himself with pouring the food into the bowl, and then giving Toothless some water to lap, and while he dealt with that, Stoick walked over to the table at the far end of the room, taking the two individually wrapped hamburgers out of the bag, setting one by Hiccup's place and one by his own. And while he liked to think of himself as fairly easygoing about messes, germs, bacteria, that sort of thing, when Hiccup walked over to the table himself, the smell of muddy dog clinging to him like a second skin, the man found he had to protest.
"Wash your hands."
"What?" Hiccup gaped at him, as if personal hygiene was not even a concept in his brain.
"You heard me. You were all over that dog, and he's been running around the streets these past few days. You have no idea what kind of things he's picked up."
"But why do I have to wash my hands?" Hiccup protested, as if the very idea was unendurable to him.
"Because you're supposed to wash your hands before you eat anyway," Stoick said. "Whether you've been around a dog or not." He was growing tired of the questions.
"You are?"
"Yes. So go. Do it."
Hiccup looked baffled, but he jogged over to the sink anyway, sticking his hands under the spray for the space of a blink before withdrawing them.
"Use soap," Stoick called, before the boy could waste his time attempting to rejoin him at the table.
A long sigh was his only answer. Stoick glanced back to see if the boy was following his orders – and thus noticed the exaggerated eye roll.
"I saw that," he snapped, and Hiccup didn't even have the grace to look sheepish. But Stoick noted that this time when he turned the faucet on again, he picked up the soap bottle too, and squeezed some out into his hand.
This time, when he made his way over to the table again, Stoick did not send him away – however, when the boy began to eat, he tore into his meal with such savagery that the man was reminded forcibly of the dog lapping up water behind him. In fact, he finished eating so fast Stoick rather thought he'd more inhaled his food than really eaten it. His drink remained untouched, and he pushed himself out of his chair, hastily thanking the man for the food and motioning for the dog to follow him. "C'mon, Toothless."
"Is he going to sleep up there with you?" Stoick asked doubtfully.
"First you question my hygiene habits and now this?" Hiccup pretended to look insulted. Or…maybe he really was. Either way…
"Those habits needed questioning," Stoick told him.
"Whatever."