Next chapter here we go! Gotta go into a lesson now so no shoutouts or anything this time... Sorry.
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Jack didn't understand.
Just in case? What did that mean? He had a pretty solid guess who H was and whose phone number was written underneath, but what Jack couldn't fathom was why Hiccup had left it to him…
But after a moment, Jack realised he didn't care about the reasoning behind it, and a strangely warm, fuzzy feeling overcame him as he dropped back against his pillow, still holding the slip of paper close to his chest.
This was amazing.
In what situation does one person give another their phone number unless they want to talk to them again? None, and that meant that Hiccup obviously wanted to talk to Jack again!
He looked back at the paper, then to the ceiling and then back again.
He couldn't help but let out a little squeak of excitement and had to shove his face into the pillow, though he knew Tuff wouldn't wake up even if a hurricane was blowing through their room.
And if Hiccup had given Jack his number, what did he mean by that? Was it just a friendly gesture, a way of making Jack feel better after the rough night he'd had? To let him know he had a friend? Or, had he meant it as something more?
Oh man, Jack hoped so…
He pushed his face harder into the pillow, desperately trying to stifle his high pitched giggles. Aster was in the next room over, and he was a very light sleeper…
Jack's mind was racing.
This was like the beginning of some super cheesy romance novel. And Jack was the protagonist of it all. Was this where it all was gonna start? His first serious relationship, he meant?
Jack suddenly sat himself bolt upright again, clenching his fists around the blankets over his legs. No, he was jumping to conclusions… What if Just in case meant literally that.
Just in case you realise you've left something behind…
Just in case you want to sue me for 'kidnapping'...
Just in case could mean anything.
Just in case you think you want to see me again?
Yes, Jack hoped the least one had been the implied meaning.
Damn, he was still feeling drunk and weird. What time was it? Jack leaned across his bedside table and began feeling about for Tuff's phone, which he knew was always kept right next to the plug socket. It took a minute, but he found it and clicked it on. The screen was so bright it nearly burned out his retinas, but he could still read it.
4:48am.
Whoa, Jack had been asleep for almost the whole day and night… And of course, now he couldn't get back to sleep again.
Well, he might as well go make himself some breakfast then, he thought. Even though it's technically still the middle of the night.
Whatever. Jack swung his legs around again and tested his weight against them. Finding them to be as stable as they could be, he leaned forward on them and attempted to stand up. He fell back a few times because his knees were shaking so much but eventually he managed to keep himself upright long enough to stagger over to the bedroom door and open it. He realised he'd forgotten to turn off his bedside light, but didn't bother to go back over to it. Tuff could easily sleep through it and Jack wasn't sure his legs could make that three metre trip anyway.
Leaning against the doorframe, Jack looked up and down the corridor. Jack and Tuff's room was the only shared bedroom. Also in their flat- well technically, you could call it a house… Aster, Jack and Tuff had bought the bottom floor flat of the building and Kristoff, Flynn, Sandy and North lived in the one above. But since they were all friends, they essentially shared the two floors of the place... Anyway, on Jack's floor there was a kitchen, a bathroom, and two bedrooms, as well as the lounge, which was the most shared room of the two flats, since the lounge in the flat upstairs had been converted into another bedroom. Anna had pretty much moved in with Kristoff about a month ago, so they wanted a bigger room, and the guys all figured no one needed two lounges anyway so it got a switch up.
Jack could hear aster snoring softly from his bedroom, because the door had been left ajar. Jack also knew that Aster was a ridiculously light sleeper…
As Jack began to creep down the corridor towards the kitchen, he was hit by another realisation. To get to the kitchen, you had to walk through the lounge and open a very creaky glass-paned door.
And as he rounded the corner into the lounge, he was smacked in the face with yet another major problem.
The lounge was a bombsite of loudly snoring, sleeping people. Somehow, Kristoff, Anna, Flynn, Rapunzel, North, Sandy, Gogo and Astrid had all managed to cram themselves into the tiny room, sprawling themselves out across the two sofas and the somewhat limited floorspace.
Jack groaned. He needed to get through this wreckage in order to get to the kitchen…
Okay, plan of action.
Jack's still slightly hungover mind was pretty proud of the plan it'd managed to conjure up. He took a few steps forward, pausing when he reached the awkward small gap where the arms of the two sofas met. It was a common fact that everyone in the house had managed to get one hell of a bruise smacking their hip on this point when they weren't paying attention. So trying to squeeze through it when your legs barely work anyway and the gap is meshed in random limbs sticking out from the sofas became a much harder challenge than Jack was expecting it to be.
It seemed that his friends had at least kept some kind of chivalry when they'd crashed, since all the girls were on the sofas and the guys had taken to the floor. However, that didn't really make much difference to Jack since it just meant he had to be extra careful with his footing since the bodies he had to maneuver around were bigger.
As he was taking a cautious step over North's legs, a voice suddenly came from the sofa to his right.
"Jac-?"
Oh crap, who'd woken up? He spun around, realising too late that he was in an incredibly compromising position, standing over Flynn, halfway through a step.
Astrid was stirring, rolling over to face the back of the sofa, elbowing Gogo in the process. Neither of the girls seemed to be awake though
Jack sighed in relief, and finished his step over Flynn, giving himself a little triumphant fistpump when he finally reached the kitchen door and grasped the handle. He gave one last look to the room before opening the door, forgetting about the creak, and having to stop suddenly.
Keeping one eye on his sleeping friends, he pushed the door open as slowly as humanly possible, stretching the creak out until it wasn't really a creak, more of a high-pitched drone, drowned out by the snoring.
Once in the kitchen, he flicked on the light and shut the door behind him. Thank god that's over… Jack collapsed into a chair at the kitchen table and leaned back, shutting his eyes. His legs and head still hurt like hell.
As he sat there, watching the shadowing shapes through the glass door separating the lounge and kitchen, he remembered something else. Had Astrid been dreaming about him? She'd definitely been mumbling his name in her sleep, that was for sure.
Jack grinned to himself.
Drunk jack was such a flirtatious twat when he wanted to be, and that side of him was starting to wake up now.
That was when he realised he was still holding the slip of paper in his hand.
Just in case, H.
He didn't have his mobile phone on him right now, but the landline phone was right in front of him, on the kitchen table, surrounded by empty bottles from the pre-drinks carnage that had taken place the night before- or would that be the night before the night before?
Whatever.
He could do it.
He could call Hiccup right now.
He could call Hiccup and tell him how completely head over heels he was for him...
Or he could listen to the sober half of his brain, telling him not to be such an idiot, and to at least wait until morning. He wasn't about to call his crush while he was totally drunk and not even able to string an unimportant sentence together, let alone a confession of love.
Yeah, he'd at least leave it until morning…
He rolled his head over his shoulder to look at the clock on the kitchen wall.
Nearly 5am…
Damn, this was going to be a very long night.
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Until next time xxx