Guest - don't review if you don't want an answer. Pregnant women should abstain from caffeine. Same as alcohol and nicotine - they could have it if they wanted but it has risks. I research for my stories, thanks.
'Waffle' means I'm saying more or writing more than intended - I am waffling on. It's probably a British thing.
Other guest - where did I force anyone to give head? I like sucking dick myself but I wouldn't want to be forced into it either...
-HTTYD-
"Ugh, I'm getting big."
Astrid flopped on to Hiccups bed... her bed too now. It was worth the jokes from his parents about it to get backrubs and foot rubs from him before bed when she was uncomfortable.
Plus the easy access to sex helped.
"You're gorgeous."
Hiccup eyed her bump, ran a reverent hand over the swell containing a six-month-old foetus. He was sweet, but she felt enormous.
"I'm not. I'm uncomfortable. And hungry."
"Want me to go make you food?"
He would probably carry her around if Astrid asked, so keen he was to take care of her. His parents were equally excitable, Valka cooing with her over kicks and rolls and lamenting the aches and pains. Stoick and his best friend Gobber had dug out Hiccup's old crib, gave it a new lease of life for the soon-to-be-Haddock. It was sweet, and Astrid understood their keen sense of community, the way they kept hand-me-downs rather than assume things had to be new. Her parents would never have reused her baby things.
"Were you really this tiny?"
Astrid held up the minute babygros, perplexed by the idea they used to fit on her boyfriend of five foot ten. Hiccup looked over from the cooker, humming and nodding as his girlfriend rooted through a box of his old baby clothes.
"I was a preemie remember. Thirty weeks. I think. Ask mom when she gets in from work where my baby book is."
She placed the box of newborn gear aside, found the next box underneath that contained slightly bigger clothes, more her expectation of what a newborn child would wear. On the side of the box it said 'Hiccup 1 - 2 years'. She looked at Hiccup. Considered his father. Shook her head. Babies were weird.
It was weird for her to think how she was past the abortion mark now, that thing she had been adamant about getting when the blue lines first stared back at her from the pregnancy tests. Her parents threw her out. Hiccup's parents took her in without a blink. Her sonograms were stuck up on the fridge in pride of place.
Valka had taken her to their family doctor, a near-silent old woman called Gothi who clapped and cooed when Valka said she was expecting a grandbaby. Astrid got blood tests and her height and weight measured, then came the pregnancy-dating scan. It hadn't quite seemed real until she saw that little jelly bean on the screen, heard the thrum of a heartbeat inside her.
"Seven weeks. Maybe eight."
"So two months? That's about right I guess."
Perched on the seat next to the hospital-style bed, Valka looked over at Astrid with goop on her belly and awe in her eyes.
"Did you only miss one period?"
"Not sure. My cycle isn't especially regular. I felt a little sick and then I realised I hadn't gotten it, nor the one before. So I took a test. Well. Several."
Astrid was brought back to the present by Hiccup placing a plate of food in front of her, line of condiments next to it whether they were the intended accompaniment or not. He carefully moved the boxes of baby gear away, sat with his own light sandwich and cup of tea. Astrid envied his caffeinated beverage greatly, though she wasn't short of options with Valka's fruit teas, and the decaf teabags available.
"Toothless, get out of it! Go on, go lie down you little shit."
Hiccup received a petulant puppy expression as his dog moped and ambled toward his bed, only to perk up considerably when Hiccup dropped a rawhide chew down for Toothless to gnaw at with his few remaining teeth.
College had been difficult at first, as news Astrid was pregnant and turfed out of her parents house spread. It was pretty obvious who the daddy was, when they realised she lived with Hiccup. He had held her hand throughout, stood at her side while people made comments about her being some kind of promiscuous whore, jealous guys complaining that Hiccup had 'nailed her' and bitchy girls who made up nonsense about her using Hiccup because she didn't know who the father was.
She had only ever been with Hiccup, and he knew it. Trusted her. Ignored everybody else and kissed her cheek, looked at Astrid like he couldn't believe his luck. He'd never been hugely social, and when Astrid expressed concern for his broken friendships, he insisted that fatherhood trumped petty schoolyard disputes.
"Better they get out of my life now, so I can focus on what... on who really matters."
Hiccup took her on dates. Simple stuff, like a picnic in the park or a long walk over the local hills. They went to the local diner and split a milkshake. Astrid made it a contest, and got brain freeze for her troubles.
She was included effortlessly in Haddock family stuff; Stoick taught her how to use an axe for firewood and Astrid loved it. She met Hiccup's grandparents, who were ecstatic to find they would be around meet their great-grandchild.
"Well, the first one anyway!"
Astrid turned to Hiccup, glad to find he looked as surprised as she was that his grandparents were already insisting on future babies.
"It's cus of moms struggling to have me" Hiccup clarified after they left, holding hands in the back of his dads truck "after they only had mom. Dad's only got the one brother. They just want to see the family grow."
"Well, they can keep that to themselves. I'm not even done incubating this one, they should stop picturing me as some kind of baby factory."
"Sorry. Vikings, yanno?"
Astrid waited until that evening, sat in bed with Hiccup rubbing her sore ankles as she dipped ice cream wafers in jam and nutella, to ask the question burning in her throat.
"Do you want more kids?"
Hiccup looked up at her in surprise, hands stilling on her foot.
"I uh... I hadn't thought about it to be honest. I know you want an education, a career. And that we've only been dating just over four months, and that we are so young to be having one baby."
She scrutinised him, hormones making her hyper-aware of Hiccup in pretty much every way. Mostly sexually, but not exclusively.
"But?"
Hiccup ducked, looking sheepish.
"But... I guess I wouldn't mind making this one not an only child some day. Not now. Later. When we have our own place and you aren't a student."
Having grown up an only child herself, Astrid could certainly see where he was coming from
"But only if that's what you want too. I'll never expect another kid from you. Honestly I'm still amazed we're having this one. You wanna go out tomorrow? I was thinking bowling, since dad's away visiting Old Wrinkly with his brother, I figure we can go out with mom."
Blinking slightly at his sudden change of topic, Astrid frowned slightly. She knew Old Wrinkly was a nickname nobody could seem to not use, for his paternal grandfather who was dying with Alzheimer's and grew distressed by any visitors - even his sons, but they insisted.
"What do you mean, you're amazed we're having this one?"
Hiccup resumed rubbing her ankles, soothing any soreness.
"Come on. We both know you are way outta my league."
"If I could reach, I would smack you."
Hiccup pouted.
"Why?"
"Because" Astrid rubbed a hand over her rounding belly "I don't like that you say that. We're having a baby together, I don't want you acting like I... settled for you rather than actively wanted you."
Hiccup had started rubbing her calves now, shimmying so more of her legs rested over his lap.
"I'm sorry. I still flash back to the awkward dork nobody would look twice at."
"C'mere."
She gestured, unable to bend the necessary way to reach Hiccup from this angle. He complied, crawling up her body until their faces were inches apart. Astrid touched his sharp jaw, high cheekbones. Traced the soft bump of his nose, felt the keen stare of sparkling emerald eyes on her as she touched his thin lips.
"You're beautiful. And I don't want to hear otherwise. Ok?"
Hiccup flushed slightly, leant down and kissed her. Astrid let him, surging uo to wrap arms and legs around him needily.
"I'll do my best."
"Good" Astrid started working on the buttons of his shirt "oh, and bowling sounds great. Tomorrow."
Hiccup smirked as Astrid's fingers bit into his shoulder, raked over his chest in her efforts to get him naked.
"Tomorrow."
Tomorrow was a long time coming, much of the night encompassed by the two teenagers mapping bodies that weren't done changing yet - his by puberty and hers by pregnancy. Hiccup enveloped her within a fiercely cosy embrace when they were spent, cleaned up and back beneath cool sheets.
"Hey mom" Hiccup asked as he cooked breakfast, mood clearly chirpy "we were thinking of going bowling today. You want to come?"
"That sounds lovely son."
Valka was one half of the most welcoming couple in the world, gave Astrid hugs and forehead kisses the same as she did for Hiccup. They warmed her heart, truly helped Astrid feel like a part of their family. Having gone through a tumultuous, difficult pregnancy herself, Valka barely batted an eye over Astrid's mix and match eating, thrilled that that was the weirdest thing about Astrid's pregnancy. Everything else was working just fine.
Astrid was usually more competitive, but honestly she was just glad she could still get about. The baby shifted her centre of gravity, so learning to throw without tipping over felt like a huge achievement in itself, and wisely, neither Haddock commented on Astrid's scores.
Until she landed a strike, when Hiccup got up to kiss her and congratulate her. Someone wolf-whistled, but Hiccup only had eyes for her as he beamed and held her close. Astrid couldn't help but return the wide smile.
"You're amazing."
"It was probably a fluke."
"I wasn't talking about the bowling."
He kissed her again, only letting up when his mother shooed at him to take his turn. Hiccup chuckled, pecked a kiss on her cheek and left Astrid slightly dazed as she ambled back to her seat, resting a hand on her swollen belly. Valka smiled over at her, then back to Hiccup.
"You two are so sweet together."
"I just hope we can be half the parents you and Stoick are."
"Oh, I'm certain you two will be magnificent parents. Hiccup adores you, and he'll adore your child too."
Astrid nodded, watching the concentration on Hiccups face as he calculated how to throw the ball just so - that's what she got for dating an Engineering student. His mother scolded him when Hiccup swore colourfully, landing a 7-10 split.
"Sorry mom, but ah gods that's so annoying when that happens!"
He spent a good three minutes picking his next throw, and it paid off when the jammy git managed to knock 7 into 10 with a careful glancing blow. Astrid cracked up laughing at his victory dance, as did two children nearby playing with their parents in the next lane.
That could be them one day...
"Damnit! Mom beat me."
Valka clapped and whooped, then hugged her son to her with a joyful laugh.
"You're forgetting your father and I try to do this weekly."
"Oh. Yeah. And dad had to get custom balls done cus he could only pick these up like tennis balls."
That explained Valka's abundant skill. Hiccup continued to pout petulantly about losing until Astrid kissed him, turning his frown upside down in record time.
"We can do this again if you want. Then you can challenge her to a rematch."
"Good plan. Shall we go get food before mom worries you'll waste away?"
They left the bowling lanes, Hiccup's hand resting against her lower back as they headed toward a nearby cafe that politely gave Astrid pancakes with sausage and ice cream. Hiccup bravely ignored his girlfriend's food, ate his cheeseburger quietly while Valka worked on her chicken salad... thing. The baby kicked, and Hiccup lit up when Astrid placed his hand over the area of activity to feel a sturdy kick hit him.
"That's so incredible. I can't wait to meet you little one."
A mutual agreement meant they weren't finding out the sex, and so all the baby gear that wasn't Hiccup's hand-me-downs came in neutral shades of brown and green. Hiccup's parents had even redecorated the spare room now Astrid had vacated it, painting it in earthy shades with a soft yellow ceiling that relaxed Astrid when she looked at it.
Leaning over the crib in there, Astrid tried to picture a baby in there. Would they be golden blonde and sapphire blue? Or would the Viking genes continue, giving their baby autumn locks and emerald eyes? Hiccup's freckles or Astrid's light tan? Tall and lanky, or shorter and sturdier?
"What you thinking about?"
Hiccup slid up behind her, arms round her waist and hands splaying over her bump as his head rested on her shoulder.
"Right now? Whether they'll look more like me or you."
"I hope they look like you. It'll be rude of our genes if four generations are nearly identical."
"Four?"
Hiccup nodded, kissed her cheek.
"Grandma Rama, mom and me. All look like we were made from the same mold."
Astrid chuckled, felt Hiccup squeeze her gently in his embrace.
"I'll be happy either way. Of course, they might look like a mix of both of us. You've got your dad in your face too, just not as much as Valka."
"I know. I'm just imagining a second fierce little Valkyrie like you. Wielding tiny toy axes that dad gets her while mom yells."
"Tiny axe?"
"Yeah..."
Hiccup faltered, then took her hand and led her downstairs to where his baby pictures rested. He flipped open one of him at about two months old, and sure enough clutched in one little fist was a minute toy axe.
"Mom made me this dragon toy, but I didn't always like it. Dad got me a tiny axe, and in her own words mom wanted to 'feed him to wild boars' for giving a tiny preemie a weapon to 'strengthen me up'."
"What happened to it?"
"I used it as a paperweight?"
Astrid laughed, pointing at the little dragon plush.
"I meant that."
"Oh. I uh... I threw it out of a fishing boat once when we were visiting relatives in Norway. They retrieved it, dried it out and I wasn't allowed it back. It's probably in the attic... when I found out I did that I apologised to mom. A lot."
"Ironic, given how you love dragons now."
Hiccup chuckled, closed the album and wrapped his arm around Astrid.
"I promise not to let dad give our kid an axe until they're at least a year old."
Nestling into his hold more comfortably, Astrid smiled. Let her eyes slide closed. She was pregnant. She had earned a nap.
"I'm holding you to it."
-HTTYD-
Hoping to have this finished in a couple of days. Enjoy your fluff fest.