A Better Version of Our Best
Chapter 6: Being Intimate With Brokenness
Five years ago…
Astrid barely remembered the funeral itself, though she was aware that they'd burnt an empty pyre. (Vaguely, she recalled Hicc setting it ablaze when her own shaking hands hadn't even been able to notch her own arrow.) She'd gone through the funeral- and the first few weeks after- in a haze.
Every day, she'd follow the same patterns: she walked to the mead-hall at meal times, pretended to listen as Snotlout or Gustav or Ruffnut or whoever had come over to try and talk to her babbled on about something or another, then dragged herself back to her house and curled back up in her bed.
She didn't know where Hicc or Zephyr or Nuffink were during that time, and she didn't think to ask. (Much later, she'd learn that her parents and Brenna had taken Zephyr to the house she herself had grown up in, that Nuffink was staying with the Thorstons, and that Hicc had disappeared into the woods shortly after the funeral and hadn't been seen since.)
Sometimes, she'd wake up in the night and slip downstairs to sit by the fire, just staring at the flames for hours. Sometimes Stoick joined her, and she'd have some vague idea that he was trying to say something to her, but she never really heard him.
One day, however, she returned to her house after lunch to find Stoick, Gobber, Snotlout, Fishlegs, Ruffnut, Tuffnut, and both of her parents sitting in the main room. Ignoring them, she tried to walk to the stairs, but Brenna stood in front of them, blocking her way.
"Go away, Brenna," she said half-heartedly, not even able to muster up the energy to yell.
"No," her sister said, pushing her slightly backwards. "We need to talk to you."
"That's nice," Astrid said, not really listening. "I'm going to bed now."
"No, lass, yer not," her father-in-law said, standing up. (At any other time she might have protested being addressed that way. Twenty-nine years old wasn't exactly a child.)
"We just want to talk," said her mother, patting the seat beside her. (When had she ended up back in the center of the room?) "We're worried about you."
"Worried?" Astrid said, tilting her head in confusion. "I'm fine. There's nothing wrong with me."
"Yeah, right," Ruffnut scoffed. "Like anyone would believe that."
"What do you all want?" Astrid said, feeling a simmer of annoyance. "Why are you all here? Can't I just get some peace and quiet in my own home-"
She froze, looking at Stoick. It had been years since she'd thought about the fact that technically this was his house, that he hadn't transferred ownership of it along with the chiefdom. Which meant that, while he might not be able to force her to leave (she had married into the clan, and she still carried the Haddock name), she also had no right to send away those he himself had invited in.
"Sit down, Astrid," her father-in-law said.
May as well get whatever this is over with, then.
Sighing, she sat down between Gobber and Snotlout. (Out of everyone in the room, the two of them looked the most uncomfortable with being here, so maybe she could at least convince them that this was all a waste of time.)
"Fine," she said. "Talk."
"Astrid, you can't keep going on like this," said her father, shifting his leg. (She could see the edge of his false foot poking out from his leggings. Hiccup had made that foot, hadn't he?) "I know this is a hard time for you, but what you're doing to yourself isn't the answer."
"Doing to myself?" Astrid rolled her eyes. "I'm not doing anything."
"Uh, that's the problem," said Ruffnut, rolling her eyes. "You're not doing anything."
"What do you want me to do, Ruffnut?" Astrid said, raising her voice.
"You could try screaming," Tuffnut interjected. "That works for me sometimes."
"I suppose I ought to cry, too?" Crossing her arms, Astrid took a moment to look each person in the eye. "That's what a grieving widow is supposed to do, right? Just scream and cry and rage and then get up and move on with my life."
"Honey," her mother said, "no one's saying-"
"I suppose you're here to tell me I ought to get remarried, now," Astrid laughed, but there was no humor in it. She gestured at Fishlegs and Snotlout. "Is that why you guys are here? Because last time I checked, you," she pointed at Tuffnut, "were still married."
"Now that's crazy talk," Ruffnut said. "Would you stop putting words in our mouths? We're here because you're our friend, Astrid, and we care about you."
"Oh, please," Astrid said. "Since when have you ever cared about someone whose last name wasn't 'Thorston?' You couldn't even stand to stay married for more than a few months, so don't you dare think you can come into my home and tell me how I ought to be mourning my husband."
Astrid didn't miss the way Snotlout shifted uncomfortably away from her, or the hurt that flashed across Ruffnut's face. But she also didn't care.
"Come on, Astrid," Fishlegs said, finally putting his oar in. "Don't you think that was going a little far?"
"No," she said, staring forcefully at him until he looked away. "I don't have to-"
"Enough!" Stoick's booming voice cut through the chatter. "It seems Astrid and I need to have a talk. Everyone else, out." After a bit of protest, the crowd of people filtered their way out of the house.
The last one out was Gobber, who hadn't spoken at all since she'd come into the house. As he left, he put a hand on her arm.
"Yer not the only one grieving," said the old blacksmith. "I know it's not the same, but we loved him too."
Astrid flinched away as though she'd been burned.
Loved.
Gobber sighed and followed the others out.
"Alright, let's talk," Stoick said, once everyone else was gone.
"Is that not what was going on over there?" Astrid gestured at the empty seats.
"Astrid," her father-in-law said seriously. "Astrid, you need to stop this."
"Stop-"
"Astrid," he said again, sitting back down. "Astrid, I know."
"Know what?" For a moment, a sliver of fear went through her. Did he know about… that?
"You're doing better than I did," Stoick said, looking down at her. "I don't think I had my head out of a tankard for a solid three months."
"What are you talking about?" Astrid asked, confused. She'd lost track of time, but she didn't think it had been that long since… the funeral. It wasn't even winter yet!
"After I lost Valka, I was a wreck," Stoick said. Her eyes widened. She'd been living in this house for a dozen years, and she'd never once heard that name pass anyone's lips.
(She'd asked Hiccup once, after Zephyr's birth, if he wanted to name her, or maybe some future daughter, after his mother. He'd shaken his head and told her that he didn't think his dad would be able to handle it.)
"Y-you were?" Astrid stuttered. The former chief had always seemed so… unflappable. She'd seen him cry a handful of times since her marriage, but once he was done, he always picked himself up and 'got on with it,' as Gobber would say.
"Aye," said Stoick. "And then one morning, a few months after she was gone, I woke up under a table in the mead-hall, picked myself up, and I asked myself an important question."
"Wh-what was it?" Astrid asked, not sure she wanted to know.
"Where was Hiccup?" Stoick said, and Astrid's heart dropped.
"I-I don't-" she didn't want to understand, didn't want to admit the truth.
"I realized I hadn't seen him since the night I lost her," said her father-in-law, sighing. "That some kindly soul must have taken him in to make sure he was taken care of. That I might have lost my wife, but he'd lost both of us."
"But I-"
"Astrid," said Stoick. "I can't believe I'm saying this, and I'll deny it if you ever repeat it, but Tuffnut is right."
"About what?" Astrid asked, heart thumping painfully, knowing the answer.
"It's alright to scream," said her father-in-law, putting a gentle hand on her shoulder. "It's alright to cry, and curse the world, and have days so bad you can't even leave your room. But then you have to get back up again."
Eyes watering, Astrid buried her face in her hands.
"It's alright, lass, let it out," said Stoick, gently patting her back. "Let it out, and let it go. You're still here, and you still have a job to do. Your children need their mother, and the village needs its chief."
"I-I can't," Astrid said brokenly. "You know that's not me. I've never been a 'chief,' not really."
"What do you mean?" Stoick said calmly, but it didn't sound like a question. Because of course he knew. It had been an open secret, one everyone on Berk seemed to know, though none of them ever admitted it out loud.
"I was only really in charge for a year or two after you retired," said Astrid, wiping her eyes. "Hiccup was the real chief."
They hadn't planned it like that, of course. When she'd needed to step back on her duties during her pregnancy with Nuffink, Hiccup had stepped in. Temporarily, of course.
But he'd been good at it. Much better than she ever had been, despite the five years of training she'd had before Stoick had stepped down. Hiccup knew how to talk to people, how to navigate treaties and diplomacy, the best strategies to defend against the dragon raids.
So she'd just… let him continue doing that.
Officially, of course, she'd still been the chief. She'd been the one to perform all the ceremonies, to marry people and bless babies and all that, the one people nodded to at the market, the one to call meetings of the council.
But Hiccup had been the one to do most of the speaking at said meetings.
Astrid was the brute force, the warrior, the one who led the charges on the battlefield. And Hiccup was the who rebuilt out of the ashes.
So what was a fraud like her supposed to do without him?
Present day…
Astrid paused as she headed up to bed, standing in front of her father-in-law's door.
She should stop and talk to him, say something, or at least bring him something to eat.
Instead, she hesitated, her fist frozen in the air above the door. Sighing, she dropped her hand and turned away. What was she supposed to say?
'I'm sorry, but it's time you come out and rejoin the real world?' Of course not. Stoick wasn't her. He always managed to pull himself out of these slumps on his own, and would resent anyone else interfering. He'd be out tomorrow or the next day, rowdy as ever. Of course he would.
Then she heard a noise behind her. Someone else was there.
Zephyr and Nuffink had already gone to bed, and neither was the type to get up in the middle of the night if they didn't need to. Hicc was still off on that fishing trip of his, so it must be-
"Mom?" The soft voice of her youngest child called. "What's wrong with Grandpa?"
"He's just feeling sad right now, Freckle," she said, picking up her little boy and looking down at his face. That dark hair, those bright, curious green eyes… He really does look just like-
"Because of Dad?" He said it in a manner of vague curiosity, as though asking about the weather. There was no sadness, no anger, not even resignation.
Of course there wasn't. Why should there be? 'Dad' was a story, a concept, something Freckle had heard about but never known and never would.
"Yeah, sweetheart," she said, sighing and hugging her child closer. "Because of Dad."
Five years ago…
"You know, I think he might have been the only one who didn't know," said Astrid, wiping the last of her tears away.
Her father-in-law stared at her curiously.
"It always surprised me, you know," she continued. "How someone so good at solving all kinds of problems could miss things that were right in front of his face."
"Ah, Hiccup was always that way, even as a child," said Stoick. "Brilliant mind, able to solve problems that baffled even me, but couldn't seem to figure out that the only way to make friends with kids his own age was to actually talk to them, instead of at them."
"Yeah, I can imagine," said Astrid, sighing. "It was just… easier, I guess, not to say anything, not to point out what everyone else already knew. Why rock the boat, right?"
If her husband had just thought of himself as a blacksmith who happened to advise the chief on occasion, what was the harm?
But if he'd ever realized the truth…
"Oh, Astrid," Stoick said, shaking his head. "You didn't really think-"
"That's why he married me, right?" Astrid shook her head. "Because someone had to be chief, and none of us thought it could be him. We were wrong, of course."
"Astrid, Hiccup loved-"
"I know," she said, shaking her head. "It wasn't like I thought he'd send me back to my parents or anything like that. I just… oh, I don't know."
"I get it, lass, I do," said her father-in-law. "Sometimes it's easier not to talk about the things right in front of our noses."
"And now he's gone," she said, shaking her head. "Why I let him go on that stupid fishing trip-"
"Don't do that, Astrid," he said. "It's no use thinking about what you could or should have done differently. There was no way you could have known what was going to happen."
"I know," she repeated, stomach lurching.
Suddenly, she felt dizzy. Leaning over the side of her chair, she gagged, nausea rising.
"Astrid?" Stoick said, sounding concerned. "Are you okay?"
But Astrid wasn't really listening, her mind whirring, trying to put together numbers and days and weeks and-
"Oh Frigga," she said, eyes widening as she gripped her father-in-law's arm.
"Astrid?"
"I think…" Astrid gulped as the truth she'd been too wrapped in grief to notice finally sunk in. "I think I might be pregnant."
"What?" But she watched as she processed what she'd said, grief and joy warring across his face. "Did… did Hiccup know?"
"How could he have?" Astrid said, letting go. "I didn't know until-"
Her words were cut off by the sound of a loud horn, one that only signaled one thing.
"Dragons," Stoick said, rising to his feet.
"Dragons?" Astrid said, as all other thoughts were instantly swept away and replaced with a single, burning question. "Dad, where are the kids?"
