Chapter 2

The morning was fine but a tired air hanged over the room, rays of morning sunlight seep into Astrid's room through small openings of her window grills, they also happen to graze Astrid's eyes, waking her up earlier than she expected

"Haaaww... Augh, damn.. What time is it?" She gives a big yawn and lazily rubs her eyes, cleaning any form of sand still stuck between them. She looks at her watch and is certainly surprised but not at all pleased that she woke up 30 min early, what with the lack of sleep and mild hangover bugging her head. Unfortunately when astrid wakes up it's unlikely she'll fall back to sleep so she decides to start her usual warm-ups, which is jogging across the neighborhood until she's content with the amount of sweat she just lost.

After 20 min of brisk jogging she jogs back to her house, astrid is usually safe from her dad in the morning, mostly because he'll be asleep half of the day or if some miracle happens where he's awake he'll be too tired and hung over to even say good morning, not like he greets her good morning in the first place. But somehow today was oddly different, he was still hung over but he was standing up reading the newspaper while taking quick short sips of his coffee, naturally astrid plans to ignore him and quietly walk upstairs but before she can get past him he spoke up "oh astrid, good morning" still focused on his paper

"Yeah, you too" she nonchalantly says, while still facing the stairs she was determined not to look in his direction. she doesn't take the initiative to prolong the conversation, so she advances one step until her dad asks her a question

"Where were you last night?" He says with a curious tone that was different from his usual stern voice or even his slurred manner of talking when he's wasted

"I was out, at a friend's birthday party" she says while taking another step forward she could see the door of her room from where she was standing, she wished she could just run towards her room and avoid any kind of conversation with her father

"Oh.. Why didn't you come home? I was worried about you" he finally closes his newspaper and looks directly at Astrid's back, it was the only thing that was facing him

She scoffs just before responding "i did, you were just too drunk to even remember it" she coldly exclaims she felt that her dad was somewhat confused at her answer and tries hard to remember

"I guess i was...listen astrid, abou-" he tries to recall some of his last actions and was able to somehow piece together the fact that he was indeed wasted last night, he tries to change the subject by explaining his past deeds, but astrid wasn't having any of his excuses it all seemed pointless to her by then.

she stops him with a loud step on the stairs and says "save it" and just like that she calmly strides up the stairs and into her room not even bothering to glance at her father's reaction. She honestly just wanted to go to school at least there her schoolmates respected her, at least there she had control over everything she practically was an idol, a symbol of what it's like to be on the top, and there wasn't anyone to exploit her...

She takes a warm shower, after 15 min she walks out, towel curled carefully in her hair and at her body covering her chest down to her thighs, she quickly blow dries her hair and carefully applies her makeup, she has to look the part of the Astrid Hofferson and it helps cover up some parts of her face that was still slightly bruised from her father's previous "talks". After putting on the finishing touches she puts on her training outfit, mostly short shorts for mobility, training bra for support, a simple t-shirt and her jersey. She walks out the door inspecting her surroundings, although she already expected her father to be gone and she was right her father was nowhere to be seen, that's his lifestyle, he sleeps half of the day through and then spends the other half drinking, but not before taking the time to "talk" to her daughter about his problems about life and apparently about her.

She heads towards her car and drives off to school "berk high academy", after 45 min of driving she arrives at a giant billboard with a giant viking holding a number of different sports related items on it, it was the school's mascot and her usual parking space marker. She turns off the engine, exits her car and proceeds to the gymnasium to attend her practice match. it was supposed to be at 7:15 am, she got there 25 minutes earlier and as expected no one was there she was the first to arrive and she had no way of getting inside since the doors are locked and only her coach has the key. Coach Bernard Gunderson or "Gobber" for short, he was a former professional athlete, a viking in his youth as a matter of fact, but a car accident took his left hand and right foot, it permanently ended his professional career, i mean how can you play basketball with only a foot and an arm, although he did try but it ended badly, so he focused on the only thing he can do, pass down his athletic experiences and knowledge to the future of sports, the children of the world or so he says... But he's kind and he means well plus his workouts are actually helping young athlete's improve, one of them being Astrid

Since astrid was already in school she settles for jogging again to the only wide enough place that doesn't have a locked door, the soccer field, she takes off her jersey and puts on her blue hoodie with a viking logo on the front and starts running towards the soccer field, it wasn't that far away luckily it was just behind the gym. When she got there she was surprised to see someone other than herself this early in the morning but he or she was too far away for her to see his or hers face or what he or she was even doing so she disregards his or her presence and proceeds to her jogging exercise. After circling half of the field she was about to jog to a straight open space, so she decides to close her eyes it apparently helps relax the body and mind according to Gobber but just as she was getting psyched up for her match, her feet steps on something hard and circular causing her to be off balanced and fall flat on her but.

She quickly stood up and scanned the field in front of her, she lets out a sigh of relief as the man or woman was nowhere to be seen, it would be embarrassing if someone saw the "iron clad beauty Astrid Hofferson" fall flat on her ass like some dumb blonde girl, she pats her butt clean

"ow.. Great, no one saw m-" before she can finish her remark a voice from behind her takes her by surprise making her step back "hey" said the teenage boy, he was taller than astrid probably 5ft 8 since astrid was 5ft 6

"Woah.. are you ok?" Astrid's reaction shocked the teenage boy making him step back as well

"Huh? Why wouldn't i be ok?" She instantly snaps the question back at him in a irritated tone followed by furrowed eyebrows

"Well... You kinda hit the grass, pretty hard" he slowly states wondering if what he's saying is right and in any way won't offend her

"You saw that?" asking with a scowl and irritated tone

"Umm. N-nooo?, i don't know?" Confused on the situation, he has no idea what to say next and his stuttering isn't helping him at all

She takes her palm and places it firmly on her face followed by a sigh "great, just great..." She pauses and looks at the teenager from head to toe, he was wearing thick glasses and had green eyes, his hair was a mess and was a bit too long for her taste, he had bangs that comb to one side covering his eyebrows, he had several freckles on his cheeks and he wore a green long sleeved shirt with a brown vest and regular looking jeans, he was skinny but not in a malnourished way, well compared to scott everyone's skinny. The first thing that astrid thought to describe him was a complete and total nerd "well, at least it was just a nerd who saw me" she calmly says

"i can hear you, you know I'm right here" he frowns and looks at astrid slightly frustrated

"I know.. i just don't care" she exclaims with smug look on her face while observing the teenager again

"Geez.. I was gonna apologize" he says with an irritated tone

"Apologize? for what? Oh.. So this is your ball?" She slowly says mischievously while picking it up and looking at the boy

"Noo, it fell from the sky... Of course it's mine, what'd you think, it magically rolled to your feet on its o-" he adds insult to injury but before he can finish his sarcastic insult astrid kicks the ball as hard as she can making it fly into the woods just across the football field and past the school's fence, his jaw slacked in complete disbelief. The boy can only watch as his ball entered the forest until it was out of his sight, completely engulfed by the trees. The boy gives astrid his version of a death glare which in her opinion was pathetic and way to soft "what the hell was that for!?"

"Well, what do you know... it magically flies too" astrid replies evily while looking at where she supposedly kicked the ball and then returning her view to the nerd and coldly saying "fetch.. Your ball"

"Oh yeah.. real mature" he stated with an irritated tone, but what can he possibly do, what can he possibly say, nothing. He decides to ignore her and just take deep a breath and at least try and search for his ball he starts walking towards the direction of the forest ending their conversation, astrid walks to the opposite direction feeling satisfied, she got her revenge quite well, but not before giving the nerd some final advice

"hey, next time try not to get in my way" she says almost begging for a fight while keeping her deadly serious face on

"Next teme trey net te get in mey wey,... Jerk" the boy imitates her voice in a childish manner but unfortunately astrid wasn't far enough not to hear it although she was not close enough to completely hear the whole remark

"What, was that?" She turns her head angrily and looks at the nerd from behind

"What? i didnt hear anything" he quickly responds in an innocent tone while continuing his walk and increasing his pace, she might just run and attack him so he's trying to cover as much distance as he can

"Whatever, i don't have time for this" she turns her head back to her direction and looks at her watch, and was surprised to see that it was already 7:30 am, she wanted to chase the nerdy boy and punch his lights out, he ruined her warm-up exercise and made her late for her match but she disregards the idea, since she was already 15 min late she immediately dashes through the field and enters the gym, the match had already begun and her team was down by 6 points, gobber was sitting at the corner busy coaching the other girls mostly shouting more than coaching "get yer asses up" "ya call that a serve" it was his form of motivation. Astrid hurriedly walks up to the bench where her coach sits

"Where have ya been lass, -WHAT WAS THAT!? A spike?- " he shouts at the player who's spike was just blocked by the opponent

"Sorry coach, i got distracted on the way here" she says while taking her hoodie off and putting her jersey on

"What? Never mind that, just get in there, they're getting killed" pointing both hands, well a hand and a hook at least, furiously at the court. And just like that she rushes to the referee and asks for a substitution and a time out. She gathers the team into a circle and shows off her leadership skills, instructing everyone a specific job and then giving a considerably fair pep talk. Two and a half hours later the whistle blows and the berk Valkyrie's win with both sets 1rst 19-21 and 2nd10-21.

"Those Knights didn't know what hitem" said coach gobber, too happy at his star volleyball player, patting her back and laughing merrily

"It was a team effort, i didn't do it alone, you know, thank these guys too" she points to her team members and gobber was happy enough to oblige

"Cmon captain, we would've been crushed if you hadn't stepped in" a team member says "Yeah she's right, we owe this one to you"

"Thanks guys but seriously it's ok, and besides we should've destroyed them a lot sooner if i wasn't late in the first place" she jokingly says, at that moment her mind recalls the nerdy weak looking guy and quickly makes her visibly irritated, wanting more than ever to punch that guy in the face but she settles for squeezing the volleyball hard enough for her teammates to notice

"Woah astrid, didn't think you'd be that upset about being late" one of her teammates says "don't sweat it lass, it's normal, everyone comes late once in a while, even me" he jokingly says with a smile and a laugh

"More like everyday coach" one of her teamates says while laughing "having one leg can only take you so fast, so i guess your late is my early" he wittingly says but her teammate quickly apologizes for saying something in appropriate and in sensitive "um sorry coach i didn't mean anything by that.. I ju-" gobber cuts her off "i know you didnt lass, no harm done, i still have my one good arm and leg" then her other teammate stops the conversation before it can cause any further awkwardness

"anyway.. Coach is right dont sweat it too much what's important is that we crushed the knights" the team including coach gobber all gave a resounding nod and smiles of approval

"Yeah, Valkyrie's are the champs! We're going straight to the to-" but before she can finish her sentence a familiar face walks through the door "scott?" Says astrid all to surprised at the sight of her boyfriend although he looked like hell obviously he was still hungover. Astrid's teammate's on the other hand all gave a collective silent shriek "kyaa oh my god it's him it's scott"

"hey babe, how was the game?, obviously you won right?" Walking ever so slow and hungover towards astrid and her team members

"yeah, you just missed it" she says while still trying to figure out why scott was here when he should be in his bed sleeping like a rock, he never shows up for any of her games, well not since they started dating since then he only dropped by a few times maybe twice a month "i knew you would beat them, that's my girl" astrid winces at his words it somehow felt very wrong, it's supposed to be sweet but instead it made her stomach churn.

"Can you give us a moment?" Astrid asks her teammates with a polite smile

"Sure, We should give you two some privacy, let's go girls" one of her teammates responds and herds the rest of the group outside while gobber on the other hand doesn't quite get the message and just sits their at the side. "Ahem" astrid intentionally coughs and gobber just looks at her like a dog curious of its surroundings

"AHEM" she repeats but raises her voice even louder, gobber still only looks at her but this time he asks her a question "what lass? You sick or something?"

"not really, maybe i just need a little Privacy..." She says irritatedly and stresses the word privacy in her sentence, after one last repetition of the word privacy this time slower and clearer " y"

" y?... Oh, oooh you mean-" his eyes widen a big gray round and it seems like he was embarrassed for not getting it sooner

"yeah, not what you're thinking, but whatever.. so could you" astrid cuts him off from making any other unnecessary comments and just pointing him to the doors direction, gobber took her sign and was about leave but not before giving her star athlete a helpful advice "one last thing lass, don't forget to use protection"

"And Astrid, don't get pregn-" "Ook!, out, go.. just go" she pushes her coach to the direction of the door and stares at him until he was finally out of sight "im serious astrid" he warns her for the last time peeking from the gym's door, she coldly replies "and I'm seriously gonna hit you if you don't get out now" so finally gobber left and they had the gym to themselves. As soon as gobber left, scott grabs her by her waist and pulls her neck towards his face, he kisses her lips but astrid quickly pulls back "scott! Stop, can we not do this here?"

"What's wrong babe? You used to love it when i kissed you like that" he asks whilst attempting to kiss her again, astrid evades his lips and retaliates with a question

"Wait, why are you even here?" She asks with a confused look

"Why? I just wanted to see you babe" smiling ever so handsomely but through the years astrid has had hundreds of instances where he answers her questions with half-assed answers followed by his winning smile, astrid already got used to its effect and was now partially immune "plus you owe me last night, remember? You gave the go signal" He trails off and starts kissing her neck again

"i don't owe you anything scott, You were out cold last night, remember? I dragged your drunken butt all the way back to your house" She calmly explained while avoiding lip contact as much as possible. So that was his goal all along, it left her feeling somewhat disappointed, astrid had her hopes up that scott would somehow suddenly change into someone who legitimately acts sweet towards her and actually cares what's happening with her life so being with him won't be such a pain, but astrid knew better than to expect so much from him, after all he's still scott eventually everything he does just boils down to sex. Then again dating the quarterback has an upside to, like a status booster, envy of most girls and he wasn't all that bad if anything he was nice not in a gentlemanly way but these days no one's really a gentleman anymore he just wasn't sweet enough to make her emotionally attached and he was to wrapped up in his own world, but he has his moments, like when he's smiling and flexing his muscles, or when his mere presence would make the other girls swoon and blush, it made her feel powerful.

"That's just it babe, all i can remember was you last night" stopping for a second to utter the words and then continuing to kiss her "seriously babe, everything was a blur except for these" he looks down to inspect her chest and tries to feel one right now

"Scott i told you not here" she stops his hand and gives him a stern look, like when you're scolding your pet because he did something bad, scott looks at her with big puppy dog eyes mostly feeling disappointed and eager at the same time. Astrid lets out a big sigh, well at least he tried to be sweet in his own stupid way

"fine, but not now, ok maybe somewhere with a little more Privacy" she says while looking at the window that gobber apparently opened while standing outside the gym

"i knew you couldn't resist me, I'll pick you up after football practice" kissing her lips one last time before walking towards the exit door, but scott finally remembered why he went to see her in the first place "oh yeah, almost forgot babe... My mom wants you at dinner, to thank you or something?" He looks back from afar to see Astrid's response,

she gives him a thumbs up in the air "sure, I'll be there" and then he suddenly blurts it out "but we're still gonna do it right?" Good thing the gym was empty but she's pretty sure his voice echoed even outside, loud enough for her teammates and gobber to hear not that there is anything wrong with being heard she's not too shy of flaunting her "happy" relationship with scott to everyone since it's one of the reasons she's respected for, as "the quarterback's girl" what every guy in school wants and desired for, the girl they wished they dated, but she hated being "that girl" everyone only knows her because of scott, and because of her pretty face, not because of her brains or who she really was, but she can't just let go of scott, she just can't. She's convinced that breaking up with scott means giving up her perfect high school life, that if she lets go of scott then she's letting go of everything, everything she's worked hard for up until now, status, respect, control.

She presses her palm to her face but nods in his direction, scott giddily skips to the exit, surprisingly gobber didn't react to what he heard he should be all over her by now spouting contraceptive techniques and other inappropriate stuff. Curiosity gets the best of her, as she slowly walks towards the window and peaks through the open space. She scans the soccer field but sees no one but a small speck in the far away side of the field, she kinda makes out a face with a beard, a hook, and a peg, definitely coach gobber but there's another speck with him an even smaller one she can't seem to piece together the person's face so she decides to follow them outside but just before opening the door she's ambushed by her teammates gossiping and all girly and flirty about what they just heard "aaaastrid, what's he like" "hey, don't ask stupid questions... Ask the really good parts" "yeah the good "parts" how many times have you done it, was he good, what did it look like?" Astrid pulls back and laughs "woah, easy girls.." The team leans in eagerly waiting for her next words. Just before she can describe "everything" about scott, a tall blonde girl crashes inside, slamming the door behind her "where is she? Where's astrid!"

End of chapter Two