Time for a lighthearted piece!
The Second First Anniversary
THUD.
"Why does Mom have so much junk?" Finn asked as they dumped the third chestful of miscellaneous items onto the kitchen table.
"Why do you give Mom so much junk?" Adrianna retorted, pulling a poorly carved miniature bow and arrow set which Finn had made for their mother's birthday when he was six. "Oh dear, it's broken. And the blueberry-staining is wearing off."
"Shut up." Finn snapped. "Its not like your one-glove wonder is much better."
"It was supposed to be decorative."
"Calm down, you two," Benen called from under the heap of discarded knickknacks. "Your parents will be back any time now from the Academy. We only have a few more minutes for you to finish your...er... 'cleaning.'"
"It was your idea we do this instead of making something for Mother's Festival this year." Finn said as he began to sort through the items to "re-sort" into drawers which they would be able to close. "Father's Festival is always better than Mother's. All we do for Mother's is clean, and decorate, and have dances, and sewing competitions, and other girly things."
"We have a baking competition," Adrianna threw in, helpfully. "And we all know how much you like-"
"Eating," Finn interrupted, reddening slightly. "And I do love eating, but in all honesty it's much more exciting watching the ax-throwing and the sports meet, and the great hunt-off. I mean, when else get to eat fire-roasted eagle?"
"When someone accidentally shoots one into forge?"
Finn glowered at his sister over Benen's laughter. "That was a rhetorical question."
"Wonder who taught you that one..."
Finn's comeback was choked back in his mouth as he opened the worn out parchment he had just pulled from inside of a misplaced slipper. The smudged and faded charcoal on the outside of the folded sheet was labeled, "To My Beautiful, Talented, and Patient Wife".
"What in Asgard's name is this?" Finn gingerly began to pull open the document.
"Don't read that! That looks like it's a personal letter from Dad to Mom!" Adrianna took a swipe at the paper, but Finn pivoted on his heels to prevent her grasping hands from taking their prize.
"Oh, come on. When will we have this chance again? And its not like she was hiding it, really—I mean, it's in the kitchen!"
"But it could be a love letter, and do you really want that?"
"If it's Dad, yeah. Mom's letters to him, not so much." Finn cleared his voice to begin reading aloud. "'A Proclamation of My Love, on This Day, Our Second First Anniversary, to My Dearly Beloved Wife-"
Adrianna groaned, "This is going to be horrible! What on earth is a 'second first anniversary'?"
"Sounds like he messed up pretty badly," Benen winked at Adrianna. "Are you sure you don't want to know?"
It was too late, Adrianna and Finn were both poring over the writing at once, stifling giggles and battling for prime reading positions.
"What on earth is this? It makes no sense-" Finn began, just as the main door swung open.
"-But if they can't keep their dragons out of Gobber's outhouse, they can't very well complain about us telling them to bathe them more often, Hiccup!"
"Look, it's not their fault that Gobber-" Hiccup stopped speaking suddenly as his eyes landed on the paper his children had. He made a mad lunge for it, snatching it forcefully from their hands.
"What did you have there?" Astrid asked, raising an eyebrow at her husband's behavior.
"We were just about to ask Dad that question." Adrianna replied.
"Its nothing. It should have been burned. Destroyed. I already have to hear about it every October-"
"Oh!" Astrid's eye lit up with realization. "That! How could I ever destroy that? Its the perfect pick me up after a bad day!"
"Whose?" Hiccup snapped back.
"You should have heard him singing it to me... in front of the whole village..."
"They did, but they were crying the whole time." Hiccup deadpanned.
"Maybe they thought you were crying as well?" Astrid quipped, grabbing the paper out of his hands. "We had a bad day today, perhaps I should read it aloud for us all."
"Or for the full effect," Benen added helpfully, smiling quietly, "you should sing it."
"I can't carry a tune," Astrid stated without looking up, "then again, neither can Hiccup."
The twins grinned mischievously as they saw their father shift uncomfortably from leg to peg. "Mom, why was Dad writing you a love song?"
"Obviously for our second first anniversary." Astrid pointed to the top line on the sheet. "You should have at least read that far."
"What happened at the first first anniversary?"
"Nothing worth talking about." Hiccup grumbled, resignedly sitting beside the still partially buried Benen at the table.
"Now, now," Astrid grinned wickedly, "we might as well begin at the beginning. And you did only have one job, dear..."
"Hiccup, how could you forget to get a babysitter?!" The village seemed to shake with the force of Astrid's anger.
"I was busy!" Hiccup shouted back.
"With what? You've been out scouting all week with Toothless, while I've been watching the twins. Alone most of the time!" Astrid's voice seemed to hit a new decibel at this point.
"I thought you loved mother time!"
"I would love it more if they spent some time with their father!"
"I hold them every night when I get home before we put them down to bed!"
"For a half hour! I hold them, and nurse them, and clean them, and clean up after them all day!"
"I do it on weekends!"
"Rarely! You know, I've noticed, when they're calm they're your children, but if they start to cry or stink or spit up, they're my children."
"Have you ever tried to wash spit up out of leather? It's worse than dragon drool!"
"Have you seen my clothes?" Astrid made a wild gesture to her outfit. Hiccup was struck momentarily silent. In fact, the whole village center where the argument was taking place had momentarily gone silent. Every person was watching, waiting to see how he would talk his way out of this one.
"Look, you sprung this on me this morning! How was I supposed to get a babysitter in that amount of time?"
Astrid's chest heaved as she tried to lower her voice back to a more controlled speaking tone. "No, dear, we discussed this a week ago. We made plans a week ago, to spend this evening, just the two of us, and I reminded you this morning."
"Sunday evening is a rather random time to go on a date, Astrid, and I had to prepare for tomorrow's dragon rider tests!"
"It's our anniversary! Our first anniversary, how can you manage to forget that?" Astrid wadded up the edge of her skirt in rage, trying not to throw one of her axes in her husband's general chest area.
"We have children!"
"Oh, they're our children now!" Astrid began to finger the axe on her right hip menacingly.
"You know exactly what I mean!"
Astrid, in a lightning flash, pulled the axe from its place and implanted it with a solid THUD into one of the planks framing the well on which Hiccup was currently leaning. Hiccup hurled himself to the side as the axe sailed past him, and glowered back at his irate wife.
"Killing me is only going to make things more difficult in the long run, you know!"
Astrid grabbed the handle of her axe and ripped it out of the wood with splintering force. "Well," she hissed at him as she waved the weapon under his nose as she turned to stalk off, "it will certainly make me feel better."
Hiccup glowered at Astrid's retreating figure. A somewhat sheepish Gobber crept up alongside Hiccup and cleared his throat calmly.
"Well, that brought back memories." he announced in what he hoped was a firm, but friendly tone.
"And what does that mean?" Hiccup growled back at his old mentor.
"Well, your parents were similar when you were a baby," Gobber replied. "I mean, once they came to blows over a misplaced belt buckle—but, well, I imagine it is somewhat... complicated... by the presence of twins."
"So what should I do to prevent blows?"
"Well..." Gobber thought aloud slowly, "I might suggest dressing in full armor until she calms down, and maybe getting a touch better at hand to hand combat—"
"Not really helpful," Hiccup massaged his forehead with his thumb and index finger, brainstorming a way to work his way out of this mess. The village square had, thankfully, returned to its regular deafening roar, and he was out of the spotlight for a few minutes.
"Well, you should probably get a babysitter. And, well, if that still doesn't make her happy, you might consider the last resort of apologizing."
"I don't think she is very willing to listen to me right now." Hiccup countered.
"Well... Ask your father what he did in such circumstances," Gobber suggested in an almost too cheerful way. "I'm sure that what he did would work for you as well."
Hiccup never made it to his father that evening, as shortly after leaving Gobber he was stopped by Heather who had offered to take the twins for the evening as a 'parental trial-run' for Snotlout, her prospective fiance. Hiccup, for once, decided that while it may be against his better judgment to leave anything precious in Snotlout's hands and had easily abandoned them to the young couple. They embarked on an evening of cuddling, cooing, and playing in Heather's main room, while Hiccup and Astrid embarked on a far less enjoyable evening of stony silences, avoiding eye contact, and awkward conversation. It got so uncomfortable that Hiccup opted that rather than sleeping with his seething wife it would be far warmer and more inviting to sleep with Toothless in his pen behind the house.
So much for anniversaries.
The next morning, after a cold and somewhat less than appetizing meal of vaguely carbonized fish and stale bread, Hiccup made the frigid early morning walk of shame up to his father's house.
"Dad, my wife hates me," he announced upon entering the house.
"So I heard her say yesterday, loudly." Stoick the Vast was still draped in his less than formal evening-wear. "In fact, I think the whole village heard it."
Hiccup groaned and sunk into a chair. "How do I fix this?"
"Have you considered apologizing?"
"She was oddly deaf anytime I tried to speak to her, so, no, I didn't. Oh, gods, my marriage is over. It's only been a year and it's over. Do you think I will be allowed to raise one of the children?"
"No, I-"
"Of course not, who would want a father like me? I'm horrible. I'm irresponsible. The gods never should have given me children-"
"Well, you played a role in-"
"Do you think I will have visitation rights? No—of course not, I will only get to see them once a year on their birthdays to apologize for being such a deadbeat-"
"Son!" Stoick shouted over Hiccup's confused ramblings, smothering a smile. "How long has it been since you got a full night's sleep?"
"I don't know. A week. A month. A few months. I don't know. I don't remember. I almost got one last night, though, minus the horrible thoughts of divorce and losing my family forever, and Toothless's snoring, and the itchy hay, and whatever it was that was digging into my back—"
"Son, I think you may be overreacting... just a touch."
Hiccup looked rather close to tears at this point, possibly from sheer desperation—or the lack of sleep, but who's to say—and was having a hard time absorbing his father's advice.
"It's over, you don't understand!"
"Just apologize, Hiccup! Women like it when men admit that they're wrong!"
"What if she doesn't accept it and I can't raise my children and I can't be there when they walk and talk and to teach Finn to shave or chase the boys away from Addie because she's so pretty and-"
"Run-on sentences are not going to help you win your case with Astrid, son." Stoick interrupted again. "You are going to need to find some way of expressing your feelings sincerely to your wife. Now, when your mother was angry with me I would write her love songs and perform them for her, or I would collect her favorite wild flowers from Itchy Armpit Island—I had to row there overnight to get them you see, among the wild, and then at war with us dragons—and she did always manage to forgive me once we cleaned the bloodstains up."
"Dad, what are you saying?"
"I am saying, that you need to perform an act of love for your wife that will prove your utter devotion to her, despite whatever circumstances might come against you."
"And if she won't take me back?"
"You're not moving back here."
"Thanks, Dad. Really encouraging."
Astrid was still stewing by that evening as she sat with two small infants, like bookends, swaddled on either side of her. Her food was basically untouched before her, which was rare as it was a feasting night on Berk, and the food was uncommonly tasty. She had not seen her pitiful excuse for a husband since early that morning, and Astrid was not feeling particularly forgiving at that moment. The babies had screamed all day, and without her husband to assist with diapers, cuddling, and playing between feedings, she had not been able to accomplish a single thing since she'd awakened.
Heather and Snotlout were, incidentally, not helping, as they sat on the opposite side of the table, giggling, occasionally canoodling or going in for a quick snog, between making faces at the twins and saying things like, "I hope our kids are cuter than Hiccup's."
"Our kids are beautiful!" Astrid had interrupted at once. "My genes made sure of that!"
Before Astrid had managed to work up enough ire to strangle the couple across from her, she felt a sudden, albeit slight, series of pinches and thwacks as something light, pointy, and distinctly floral fell onto her head. She just managed to catch sight of the offending delivery Terrible Terror as it took off, chattering to itself in its own tongue and whizzing around the Great Hall. She pulled a bouquet of large, though now somewhat bent, red flowers—complete with an ample arrangement of thorns.
"Ahem!" A voice cut across the general din of the eating Vikings. "AHEM!"
Silence. Astrid spotted Hiccup standing atop one of the tables in the front-most and most elevated sections of the room.
"Well, as I'm sure you all know, I have been somewhat... stupid recently."
"Here, here!" A few Vikings shouted in response to this opening, mostly female.
Hiccup pinkened slightly at the attention, suddenly beginning to regret that the entire tribe was staring at him during his confession of love. "I have felt the need to apologize. Just as publicly as our argument. So hopefully my wife can't walk away." He cleared his voice, feeling nervous. "So on the advice of my father," Stoick could be seen behind Hiccup, vehemently shaking his head and making slicing gestures across his throat, "and with the assistance of Gobber," who was holding up his panpipes and grinning widely, "I am going to present my adamant song of love to my wife."
Astrid could feel the eyes slowly shift from her husband to herself as at least a hundred Viking bodies rotated in their seats so that they could get a better look at her. Gobber blew a few notes on his pipes to warm up, and Hiccup cleared his throat as he pulled a peace of parchment out of the inside of his shirt.
Astrid already knew this was not going to go well.
"'A Proclamation of My Love, on This Day, Our Second First Anniversary, to My Dearly Beloved Wife, Astrid. A Song, by Hiccup, her Husband.'" He read. As soon as the introduction was finished, Gobber began to play a series of somewhat doleful notes on his panpipes. Hiccup glanced down at him in concern. "Gobber, I told you to play a song that I knew how to sing and one that would fit the poem!" He hissed.
Gobber paused his performing to hiss back, "I did read the poem, and this song is definitely the one which will best represent your relationship with Astrid when this is over."
"A funeral dirge? You have nothing more upbeat?"
"It's this or 'A Viking Through and Through'. Take your pick!"
The audience had begun to giggle. Astrid could feel her face beginning to flush in embarrassment.
Hiccup cleared his voice again, and opened his mouth to release one of the saddest, off-pitch, and possibly most painful sounds known on the island of Berk. His singing.
"'Your eyes are as blue as the sea,
And it makes me so happy when they're looking at me.
So don't look away, my love!
I pray to all the gods above.
I love you more than flowing springs,
I love you more than studying dragon things,
And we all know how much I love that
Because you're always yelling at me to do my housework instead of that,'"
Hiccup and Gobber had obviously not thought to match the line length to the pattern in the song, and they were beside themselves speeding up and slowing down their tempos to match the words.
"'I love you more than the things we pilfer,
Which is nothing but if we did I would love you more than the gold and leather and the silver.
Your kisses are much better than a yak's,
And you look so much better from the back... than a yak of course...
You are such an amazing Mom to Finn and Addie,
Much better than their crazy deadbeat daddy!'"
It was beginning to get hard to hear the song over the gales of laughter, but judging from the fact that Astrid's face was no less red than the flowers she was smothering her face into, it was plain to see that Astrid could hear every horrible word. She had, in fact, begun to shake, almost violently.
"'I love everything about you from head to toe,
And from flask to flagon!
If I had to choose between you and Toothless, it'd be hard
But I wouldn't choose the dragon!'"
Astrid got up and quickly began to walk towards the entrance to the Great Hall, a fact that was not lost on Hiccup, who instantly sped up his singing in hopes of being able to chase her out before she managed to hide herself. This was not working out as well as he had hoped.
"'Astrid, dear, forgive this wretched man
And take me back into your heart agan!'"
As soon as the last, painfully forced, rhyme had left Hiccup's mouth, he raced across the table top and jumped to the floor, giving chase.
"Wait, Astrid!"
He got to the door just before it slammed close, and he slipped out into the cold October night right behind his red, shaking wife. He could hear her breathing heavily and she turned resolutely away from him.
'Great,' he thought, 'I've gone and made things worse. Now she's really mad!'
Fully expecting her to explode at any moment, Hiccup crept forward gingerly. "Astrid?"
He had barely gotten the name out from his lips before Astrid exploded into laughter. Her body shook and she had to drop to her knees on the stone steps to keep herself from falling. When Hiccup finally got a look at her face, he could see that she was in tears.
"You idiot!" She smacked him hard on the shoulder. "Why would you sing that? It was terrible!"
"Eh?" Hiccup felt somewhat confused, and was not sure if he should be insulted or not. "I was just trying to express my sincere apology for upsetting you-"
"By embarrassing us both in front of the whole village!" Astrid was finally catching hold of herself again and was able to look at her husband (though, not quite in the eye yet).
"Look, Astrid... I'm really sorry. I just didn't want you to leave me or to stay mad at me forever."
Astrid stood up, still smothering the last of her giggles, and looked at her husband as steadily as she could.
"So... would you forgive me?" He asked, feeling terribly nervous and suddenly not as confident that this would go well.
"Of course. I wasn't thinking of leaving you or anything." Astrid replied honestly.
"Really?" Hiccup's face broke into a smile.
"Yeah, not at least until the kids were old enough to use the outhouse on their own. Trying to change all those diapers by myself is a real pain." Seeing a look of terror flood back into Hiccup's face caused Astrid a slight twinge of regret at her painful barb. She smiled slightly and leaned forward and pulled her husband into a well missed kiss. After a moment of surprise, Hiccup wrapped his arms around her and returned the affections.
"So..." Astrid pulled out of the kiss after a few moments. "Do I want to know how you know I kiss better than a yak?"
"No. Let's just say that some of our friends have a cruel sense of humor." He kissed his wife on the brow, "I missed you, Astrid."
"I missed you too."
The serenity was broken by a shrill, anguished cry from inside the Great Hall—which was rapidly reinforced by a second, slightly quieter and hiccup-filled cry. Suddenly the young couple realized that they had, in fact, been missing something in their touching scene. Two somethings. Two unhappy somethings.
"The twins! I left them with Heather and Snotlout!"
"What?!"
They turned and began to run up the steps, only to be met by the couple in question at the door.
"Hate to interrupt this precious moment," Snotlout said, "but I think these two want to eat."
"Ah, thanks, I was just coming back for them," Astrid reached for the nearest child.
Snotlout handed Finn over with no regrets. As Astrid looked around for a comfortable place to feed them, Heather leaned over an whispered into her ear. "Give the twins back when you're done. Snotlout and I will watch them for a while. He needs more practice... and, I think you two might like some privacy."
"Thanks," Astrid whispered back. "I think we'll take you up on that. It is our second first anniversary, after all."
"And to this day, we still celebrate our second first anniversary." Astrid ended the story resolutely.
"Well, we don't. Everyone else does."
"I wondered why everyone sang at you the day after your anniversary." Adrianna chirped, smiling widely to now be in on the joke.
"Does this mean we can join them this year?" Finn asked excitedly. "Since we know the words now, and all."
"Not on your life!"
"Will you write me a song for my birthday then?" Finn tried again.
"And me!" Adrianna chimed in.
"No, and no!"
"Wouldn't you choose us over Toothless too?" Adrianna tried again.
"Won't you stop asking loaded questions? Now you've had your stories, go to bed!"
"Its the middle of the afternoon!"
"Then take your naps!"
"We're twelve!"
"I'll take my nap then!" Hiccup stormed up the stairs, still red around the ears, and muttering under his breath.
"Now, now, kids," Astrid laughed, "it'll probably be a good ten or twelve years before you can tease your father about that and he won't stomp out."
"Though, admittedly, it does make a wonderfully memorable piece to your love story," Benen laughed.
"Did you ever write any love songs for Aida?" Finn asked, dropping down in front of his mentor.
"No, and I think she thought that was best as well. Especially after she heard about the song I wrote for my mother after I broke her favorite vase."
"This I have to hear!" Adrianna sat beside her brother and looked eagerly at Benen for the next story.
Benen opened his mouth to begin the tale only to be cut off by Astrid. "Before we start another story, does someone want to tell me what in Thor's name is the reason there's a huge mess in the kitchen?"
"Yeah, about that Mom... we'll get back to that! You go take a nap with Dad!"
"I think I'd rather hear the story," Astrid said, taking Adrianna and Finn's rapidly vacated seats.
"Well, then, as you clean, I will share with you my story of abject humiliation. It all began when my sister and I decided that, to defeat the winter blues, we should play a rowdy ball game in the house..."
Hooray, double update! Anyone reading the main story can mosey on over to Growing Pains when you're doing reviewing this one!
Special thanks to the amazing amyboomerag, who actually carried most of the story herself. It's nice to know I have someone who helps me out with comedic pieces (not that EmmerzK isn't hilarious either, of course she is). I thought, after the heavy stuff in the main series, it was time for you guys to laugh!
Don't forget to review!
~KateMarie999