A/N - Wrote this today under a blaze of inspiration. Modern AU, Hiccstrid, Smut. Not too smutty - but smutty towards the end.

Should I be working on something else? Probably. Did I? Nope.

I've got this modern-AU in my head and this is a piece of it, I think. Don't expect a full-length story about it any time soon. I've got too many other stories already started. I realize that I've said that before and it never works out like that. I typically start new things while finishing other things. It's a issue of mine. I'm aware.

X

Fireworks boomed overhead, a star fight in the sky, each zip, pop, boom illuminating the wisps of gray smoke from the previous explosion; the most recent wisps took the perfect ghost of their former selves, circles, dots, ovals, and ringed moons. The sparking bottle rockets and pricy colored bangs screeched into the sky above the thick tree line, each blast reflected in the still waters of Berk Lake.

Hiccup could barely believe that he sat where he sat: on a quilt, beside the Astrid Hofferson, on the roof of his father's boat house, within the privacy of their private residence. Hiccup took his eyes away from the fireworks display to spy the blonde beside him. Yup. Still real.

It still felt unreal that she'd agreed to watch the fireworks with him instead of going to the Berkian fair grounds with the rest of the town. But here they were, resting against the angled roof of the boat house gazing upward at the blazing, dazzling display of light and sound. He liked this better than the fair grounds. Less people to gawk and awe at the sky.

Astrid moved her legs up, pushing her knees into the air, nudging her nearly dried swimsuit cover-up to her hips. Her yellow bikini bottoms popped out underneath the white tunic; the cups of her stringy top stood out against the thin material, proudly displaying where yellow turned to pinkish flesh. He's left his shirt off after the swim. He hated the feeling of wet skin and dry clothes.

"This is so much better than going to the fair grounds," she said. She scratched the inside of her knee, stretching her leg out to the side. "Not as many people. Every year someone parks beside us with a van full of kids that want to scream the entire time."

Hiccup pretended to look at the sky. She still had long lovely legs. "Really? Every year?"

"Well, last year this van parked cockeyed and they all got out to watch the show, but someone else parked beside them and I thought they were going to throw-down right there."

"Over the view?"

She laughed. "Right? We were just sitting there watching. This woman was in a wheelchair and apparently it was her view they had obstructed."

"Why couldn't she move?"

"Don't make it too complicated, now," she said with a smile. The bright-white light that illuminated the smoky, inky sky lit her face. Stringy strands of drying hair hung around her face, pasted in clumps by the lake water.

"Dad would always go to the fair grounds and we'd stay here."

"Why not stay here? I mean, this is great."

"He has to be seen."

She nodded. "I guess that makes sense. People expect him to be at things like that. Everyone wants to talk to him."

Hiccup groaned. "I know. Since I came back I've gotten nothing but prodding questions about my life."

"You're a curiosity to them. You left one day without a word. People wonder about you."

"Mrs. Ack has no business in my personal life."

Astrid laughed. "What she been asking about?"

"She's asked about ten different ways if I'm seeing anyone. She always asks in front of people, too, like my answer might change, and she words it like it's a secret or an embarrassment, like she keeping talking about my 'secret girl.'"

"Do you have a secret girl?"

"No," he said.

"Why not just say so?"

"I have. She won't quite her prodding."

She ran her finger over a seam in the quilt. "So you're not seeing anyone?"

"No, I'm not. Why is that so hard to believe?"

She smiled. "I guess we all thought since you moved to the big city you'd find someone there. I mean, you're not a bad catch."

Blush surged in his cheeks and he was grateful for the red firework that hid it. He laughed it off. "Oh, really? How so?"

"You're not ugly, for starters," she said with her index finger in the air, pointing at his chest. "You're intelligent. You're not a smoker or a drunk. You think for yourself and don't need constant attention. You're well off financially. You're also sweet. You see the good in people."

He replayed her words in his head, but with every passing moment they felt farther away as if he'd imagined them. It must have been the lake water in his ears. He ran a hand over the back of his neck, a nervous habit he'd tried and failed to quit.

After a pause he said, "That's...uh, sweet of you to say."

"I'm calling it like I see it."

"Some of that was...exact."

"It comes from experience," she said with an undertone that meant it.

She stretched her legs out, pale in the starlight, color-changing in the radiant light. He fought the urge to reach out and lay a hand on the smooth skin above her knee. She might hit him for it. It wasn't a good idea right after that speech. She'd find something bad to say about him then.

"You make me sound like a nice guy," he laughed.

"You are a nice guy," she said, poking him in the shoulder. "A really nice guy. I don't mean that as an insult to insinuate that you're a pushover, or weak, or whatever you think it means. I mean it as you're a good catch. Guys like you don't stay single for very long because normal girls see that and will try to snatch you up before someone else can."

"Is that more of your girl logic?"

"It's like when you're picking a donut out of a box, some are more appealing than others. You are the crown jewel of the box, no sprinkles, no smudges, no previous bites from people tasting it, no finger marks where people have scraped off the icing. The filling isn't budging out one side but perfect centered in the middle."

He laughed nervously and held his arm firmly at his side, aware of his habit this time. "Too bad I'm not to donut with a Harley. I'd be downright irresistible."

In the bright orange of a firework that took half of the sky to spread its needling spark, she frowned and her brows came together.

"What?" he asked.

"Does that come from experience?"

He averted his eyes and shrugged. "It might have."

She continued to stare.

He sighed and shifted his eyes to the unmoving lake. "There...uh, was a girl that I liked."

"Liked?" She emphasized the past tense.

"Yeah. We had class together. I starting talking to her and I thought we...I don't know, had a thing. She talked back, seemed interested. I-I asked her out and she said no."

"And...this has to do with a Harley?"

"I asked why and she said I was too brotherly. I wasn't 'dangerous' enough. Whatever that means."

"Did you come back to class the next time in ripped jeans with blood stains and studded leather chokers?"

"...No, I did not. Does that say 'danger' to you?"

"It does. That guy obviously has issues. He either is a weirdo or he craves attention. Either way, I want nothing to do with him. He'll cause nothing but problems."

"Oh," he said. "I thought she meant like James Bond dangerous."

"News flash to her, James Bond doesn't exist. Dangerous guys today live in trailer parks with gang tattoos on their necks and sawed-off shotguns under their pillows."

He laughed again, genuinely.

"But let me guess, she found a guy with a Harley?"

"Correct," he said. "Less than twenty-four hours later I saw her on the back on a candy-apple red bike."

"Candy-apple red?"

"I heard her talking about the guy to her friends in class."

"Oh, let me guess, he turned out to be a jerk?"

"How did you know?"

"It's girl logic, the backward kind where a girl will continually pick the wrong guy, ending in numerous failed relationships in which they fail to see where it went wrong. They pick those guys that ride bikes and think they're the shit. Those types of guys will dump a girl if she gains weight or if she cries, or if he finds a prettier girl. Shallow, that's the word I was looking for."

"So...you know me well enough to know that I'm not shallow?"

"Yes. You're about as shallow as the lake." She threw a hand out toward the lake whose bottom fell several miles at the deepest.

"Uh, thanks."

"Like I said, I call it as I see it."

The sky rattled with boom after boom, racing streaks of high-cracking wailing as the firecrackers soared into the sky with nothing but a red spark before they burst into a wheel of colors, red, white, blue, one after another, bang, bang, bang, lighting the entire sky in what he assumed the finale.

The smoky sky darkened and from the other side of the lake a low rumbling of applause could be heard.

"That's it, then," she said. She pulled her legs up and stood on the angled roof, putting her bare thighs at his eye level. "I don't know about you, but I'm not really that tired."

"Did you have something in mind?"

"Do you remember when we would sneak into Sven's store and snag some ice cream?"

He chuckled. "Yeah, but when you're ten it's cute. At twenty it becomes breaking and entering. I'd rather not find out what the jail looks like, or call my dad to come get me."

Astrid spun to face him, mischievous smile lit in the darkness, highlighting her devious side.

"What are you thinking?" Hiccup asked slowly.

"Come on," she said.

She made her way to the edge of he quilt where their shoes lay. She slipped on her flip-flops and angled herself to climb down the ladder; she bent at the hips and Hiccup's low guard prevented him from looking away. Her swim bottoms hugged her backside, ending just above the curve of her butt. She swung herself onto the ladder and Hiccup bent to gather his shoes.

Hiccup tossed the quilt into the boat house and shoved the key into his pocket. God forbid his father find it unlocked.

"Can I drive?" Astrid asked, hand outstretched.

Hiccup blinked, looking between her hand and the car he'd worked so hard to keep clean and running, his baby in a way. His reluctance came out in a stuttering hesitation.

"I'll be gentle," Astrid cooed.

Hiccup's face brightened and he dropped the keys into her hand.

Astrid ran to the driver's seat of the Mustang and hopped right in. Hiccup went around to the passenger side, a strange trail for him, and sat on the other side.

"I've never sat over here before," he said.

The engine roared to life, the purring rumble he'd grown to love.

Astrid's smile didn't wean as she drove away from the Haddock's lake house and toward Berk. Hiccup held onto the seat for the most part, flickering between towering pines looking for stray deer or people. Once on the main road, his tension relaxed only slightly. Astrid drove once around the square, then pulled into the alley lot behind the post office.

"What's up?" Hiccup asked, nerves on end. A boy, a girl, a parked car.

"Come on." Her smile said it all.

She switched off the engine and tossed the keys to him. He followed her out into the warm Berk night, the smell of smoke still fresh on the post-firework air.

"Maybe this isn't a great idea," Hiccup whispered.

"Why not?"

"For starters, you're not wearing pants."

Astrid looked down at her bare legs. Her cover-up didn't even quality as a tunic.

"And," Hiccup added, hand on his bare chest, "I'm not wearing a shirt."

"All the more exciting."

Hiccup sighed as Astrid jogged another several steps toward Sven's store, beside the post office. Hiccup dropped the car keys into his pocket and followed Astrid to the backdoor.

Just like when they were younger, she wiggled the lock until it came open. She snuck inside, crouched low to the floor, and waved Hiccup in after her. He did, and shut the door without a sound.

The ice cream cabinet stood against the back wall, beside the freezer, out of view from the front window. Astrid opened the door, showering them both with a puff of freezing air, and withdrew two ice cream bars. She shut the door with a soft click and handed on to Hiccup.

Hiccup had been watching her; his hand closed around the bar and movement outside the window caught his eye. Someone walked by the front window.

Astrid caught the movement, too, and froze. The someone paused at the door. A key slid into the lock. The door opened and in walked Sven, humming out of tune to himself, throwing a word here and there.

Hiccup froze, contraband in his hand. Astrid grabbed him and pulled him into the storage closet. A finger over her lips, Astrid yanked him behind a filing cabinet. She bit her lip, a grand smile tugging at her lips. Hiccup could already see his father's face.

Sven hummed as he walked to the register. "Ah, there you are."

Plastic slid across wood. Sven's footsteps retreated to the store's front. The door opened, rang the bell, and closed with a clicking of the lock.

"Shit," Hiccup said, hand over his heart. The hand that held his ice scream shook.

Astrid let out a small, girlish giggle. She took him by the hand and they fled out the back of Sven's store and climbed into his silent car. This time, Astrid didn't argue about driving.

"Oh, we almost got caught."

"My heart's racing," Astrid said. She grabbed his free hand and pressed it against her chest. "Can you feel that?"

"Yeah." Hiccup felt nothing other than his own racing heart.

Hiccup took a lap around town while they ate their stolen ice cream. Above, with the fireworks done, the stars shone brightly over Berk. Without the moon to take center stage, they had the sky to themselves. Hiccup turned off the main road toward the lake house.

Astrid reached across the console and wrapped a hand around his free wrist, and pulled it into her lap. His knuckles brushed her bare thigh; a shiver radiated from the touch and ended up in his groin. Swim trunks were not suitable for keeping things hidden, and he focused on the trees as they passed, the damage a full grown deer could do to the hood of a Mustang, and how many weeks it would take to fix the damage.

Did this evening quality as a date? Had he, Hiccup Haddock, president of the automotive club, gone on a date with Astrid Hofferson, the homecoming queen? No, surely he died early that day and lived in a coma-dream. Yes, that explained how his hand ended up in her lap, between both of her hands.

The lake house came into view. No new lights sparkled the cabin's windows.

"You're dad must not be home yet," she said, eyes on the house.

"I guess not." Hiccup drove past the house and parked in the lot beside the boat house. "You still want to see the boat?"

Her response came quickly, "Yes."

All of Berk knew about Stoick's boat. Some say it cost five hundred thousand dollars. Other say it cost nearly a million. Hiccup didn't know how much his father spent on it.

"Whoa." Astrid's mouth gapped when she walked into the boat house.

The expensive boat rested in it's own little private harbor, tarp thrown over it's top. The entire thing was the size of a small house.

Hiccup had been on the boat before. It's glory didn't dazzle him as much as it did others. Astrid walked the length of the harbor and back to Hiccup. The low lighting reflected off the water and off her, giving her a ghostly lady-of-the-lake look.

She spun and threw her hand to her temple. "Permission to board, Captain."

Hiccup blinked. He chuckled. "Right this way."

He led to her to the ladder that current dipped down into the water. Astrid took no hesitation and jumped the short distance to it. She wiggled underneath the tarp with little problem, shaking her backside within Hiccup's view. He took several calmly breaths before he jumped to the ladder.

Astrid stepped down into the cabin and stood in the galley. "This is huge. It's practically a house."

"This is the kitchen," Hiccup said in a professional tone. "Here is the dinning room. Behind you is the master. Through here the is second bedroom. It's got all the closet and cabinet space you could ever need while venturing on the high seas."

"Does it have a bathroom?" Astrid ran her hand along the smooth white plastic wall, cabinets from ceiling to floor.

Hiccup laughed. "There is no bathroom on the high seas. That's why sailors look like they haven't showered. They don't."

"Which bedroom is yours?"

Hiccup pointed down the narrow space.

Astrid purposefully brushed up against him, her backside against his leg, on her way to the narrow hallway. She stepped down into the room and vanished from view.

"Oh, it's cozy," she said.

Hiccup followed in her steps. Astrid knelt on the made up bed. In the short time out of his view, she had taken off her cover-up. She held it in one hand.

He'd seen her in her bikini earlier, but it did not dull the effect it had on him. The pale blue lights in the cabin glowed against her skin. Despite the warm summer air her nipples poked through the cups of her top. Hiccup felt a shiver through his stomach.

She dropped her cover-up to the side and sat down. She padded the space beside her. Hiccup slipped off his shoes and left them with hers in the entrance way. Her hand glided across his chest and her mouth met his before he could gain his surroundings. Her hand touched his jaw, slid into his hair, and grabbed a fist full of it. Hiccup held onto her waist.

In the shock of the moment, she climbed onto his lap. She straightened, putting her breasts at eye level while she adjusted her hair out of her face. Hiccup slid his hands up her back to the ties of her bikini. He grabbed onto the strings. She arched closer; he pulled. The bottom strap loosened and he reached for the tie that hung around her neck. With a yank the entire top came free.

Astrid hummed, yanked it off and tossed it.

Hiccup enclosed his hands around her breasts, fondling the firm lumps in his hands while Astrid ran her nails along his scalp. She pushed her hips around his, teasing his erection.

"Hiccup," she said, her voice a breath exhalation.

He hummed his response. He pulled one of her breasts to his mouth and teased her hard nipple with his teeth. She gasped and arched, pushing her breast further into him. He work the nub, teeth and tongue, if only to hear the sound she made, god, the sounds. He could get off on her voice.

He switched sides, tonguing her other nipple with the same slow laps, pulling it between his teeth, gently biting, sucking it, all the while the blood rushed to his groin. Involuntary thrusts of her hips had invented a rhythm between them. Nipple between his teeth, one hand pushed down her side, to her thigh, and into her bikini bottoms. Soaked.

"Hiccup," she moaned.

He pushed his finger inside her, earning a second moan, a shiver of gooseflesh across her skin. He pulled his fingers out, slick with her, and left her nipple with a lingering kiss.

She lifted herself from his lap enough to adjust her legs, reclining back onto the soft bedding. Hiccup reached for his swim truck; she pulled down her bottoms. Hiccup's trucks hadn't yet hit the floor when her hand wrapped around his exposed flesh.

"I want you," she said.

Astrid Hofferson, naked and waiting, laying in his bed, hand around his erection, thumb finger the head - a slightly different spin on his most popular adolescent wet dream. In those dreams, they'd never been in the boat, but it had always been Astrid.

Hiccup arranged himself over her, nestling himself between her legs, a shiver of a dream in his spine.

"Tell me you want me, too," she said.

"I've wanted you since puberty."

She smiled, hands on his shoulders like they might be slow dancing at prom. She rustled his hair. He bent down, readied his legs in place, and pushed himself inside of her. She let out a low moan, eyes closed, back arched. Her hand fists in his hair. He withdrew and thrust again, and again, gaining speed with each return. Astrid's nails pressed into his shoulder, short words left her lips on breathless gasps, some of which sounded dangerously like his name.

He grabbed onto her hip, leveraging himself, earning himself a ragged moan and a hard nail-grab on the shoulder. He'd have marks tomorrow. There would be five moon-shaped bites on his shoulder. What would he say if someone asked. Snotlout would be the first to point it out.

I was fucking Astrid Hofferson.

Hiccup felt the edge pulling closer. Astrid bucked underneath him, nails on his back and in his hair, gasping with every thrust, shaking - she arched her back and let out a wild cry; her body spasmed around him, clutching him, pushing him over the edge.

He meant to pull out, but Astrid locked her legs around him, forcing him in to stay while he spilled.

"Astrid," he gasped.

She didn't say a word. She grabbed hold of his limp arms and pulled him down to the bed beside her. She climbed on top of him, hands holding his shoulders down, his shrinking self nestled in her slick self.

"That bad?" Hiccup asked, breathless.

She bent down to kiss him, breasts pushed against his chest. Her lips lingered against his, not moving with sexual haste or hormonal speed. She kissed him tenderly, a passion driving his tongue to find his. Hiccup reached around to her bare back. He'd never been kissed like that. Astrid tilted her head and he followed suit. She flattened herself against him while her tongue taught his new things.

He took the chance to feel the body he'd only seen before, only dreamed about before. Her smooth back became her rear, her hips. Every inch of her skin felt as smooth and soft as it looked. With every part of her he touched, every caress of her tongue, he felt his excitement returning.

Astrid left his lips and kissed her way down his jaw to his throat, lingering against his pulse, licking his Adam's apple. Her hand traced a fine line down his stomach to his groin, and fastened around his erection. She poised his hips over his, held him in place, and plunged her hips onto him.

"Ah, Hiccup," Astrid cried out, hands clenched in his hair.

Hiccup held onto her hips as she worked herself over him, up and down, pushing herself closer to the second brim.

Hiccup couldn't keep his eyes off of her face. Ecstasy pulled at her eyes. She came first, rolling with the waves, shivering in his hands, her entire body shaking. She kept going, thrusting down on him, riding shivering waves; his second took longer and she took his seed just the same.

Finished, she sat on top of him, breathless and gasping, sweat shimmering between her perked breasts.

"God, Astrid," Hiccup said, resting his hands on her thighs.

She dropped down onto the floor beside him. She rolled over and laid her head on his shoulder. A sleepy smile came over her lips. "Better than basic bitches, right?"

"They're not even in your league."

"What about moto-babe?"

"Not even close."

Astrid laughed and scooted closer. She flattened her hand on his chest and he rose to grab it, and laced his fingers with hers.

"Hiccup?"

"Hm?"

"I know you said you were only going to stay through the fifth," she said.

Hiccup sighed.

"Will you stay a little longer?" Her voice weakened. "With me?"

Hiccup lifted his arm and draped it around her bare shoulders. "I, uh, won't be going back."

"What do you mean?" Astrid sat up, eyes scrunched.

Hiccup shrugged. "I told everyone I was visiting to keep my options open, but…I'm moving back to Berk. Gobber's already got a full-time job lined up at the shop."

Astrid didn't say anything for a moment, her face frozen in silent shock.

Hiccup swallowed. Had he been a summer fling? So in love in July but come September he was gone? Had he ruined his allure?

"Really?"

"Really." He nodded.

She smiled, a squeal escaped her lips before she squeezed them shut. She threw her naked self at him again, locking her arms around his neck. He held onto her as they tumbled back onto the bedding.

"Good. Tell those stupid city girls that you're mine."

Hiccup laughed. "I will if you tell Snotlout that you're mine."

"Deal."