Look who's baaaack! After six months I believe. I told myself I would wait until HTTYD 3 came out to finish this story just in case I needed to change a few things. Turns out I don't need to change much. But, anyway, I just wanna say to those who are still reading this, thank you so much. I really do hope to finish this story, and with your support, I hope I'll have the motivation to. I'd like to thank aaquater for commenting on almost every chapter, you're the real MVP! And a warning for those who don't like it, Eretstrid will be blossoming. It's a plot device for Ruffnut's character development. Don't worry, it's only until snoggletog and I'll do my best to get there quickly. I do not appreciate death threats over a ship though, so if this isn't your thing, go read another Hiccstrid slowburn and leave my story alone. I hope those who are still gonna stay and read enjoy this chapter. I love you all!

She was on cloud nine. She had met the most handsome man in the world and she was in love! Nothing could ruin this!

"So, Astrid, what's your favorite subject in school?"

Except for the fact that he wasn't even looking at her. When she had asked if he wanted to sit with them for a while, she had expected for him to talk to her, not to Astrid. Ruff turned to Astrid, who was sporting the tiniest hint of a blush.

"Oh, you know," she started. "I'm kind of into my government class. I like hearing about politics."

"My favorite is wrestling," Ruff announced. But he was still talking to Astrid. Damn! She should've let Tuff have the window seat!

"What about you, are you in school," Astrid asked.

"I actually dropped out two years ago," Eret explained. "I was seventeen, making bad choices. It wasn't until Draco took me in that I started getting better. I'm taking night classes now so I can work here in the mornings."

Astrid, to Ruff's surprise, smiled. Astrid wasn't supposed to like bad-boy-dropouts! That was Ruff's thing!

"You don't have to answer this, but what made you start making bad choices?"

He leaned towards her just the tiniest bit and Ruff had enough. "Hey, Snotlout!" She yelled, interrupting what Eret was going to say. "Isn't it about time for you to take us to that pinpoint?"

He stopped his conversation with Heather and turned to her with a smile. "Yes! We should totally start heading over!"

"Oh, mighty Thor, you guys are gonna love this," Heather exclaimed.

"It's gonna be so fun!" Fishlegs agreed.

"What is it," Tuff asked, pushing away his barely touched ice cream.

"You'll see when we get there," Snotlout laughed.

They all looked to Heather as she whistled and a giant grey bird came flying from the kitchen doors and landed on her shoulder. Eret pet him with a finger before turning to Astrid.

"It was nice meeting you Astrid. Hopefully I'll see you again soon."

Astrid nodded with a smile. "Hopefully."

Ruffnut stepped in between them and hastily shoved a piece of paper containing her number on it. "Call me," She exclaimed before dragging Astrid away. The face he had made wasn't promising, but, whatever, he would come around and see that she was twice the woman Astrid was.

"Alright, everyone to my car," Snotlout announced once they were all outside. They all started heading towards the parking lot.

"Eret was nice," Ruff commented to Astrid.

She had the tiniest ghost of a smile. "Yeah, he was."

"And he was so dreamy, with his muscles and tattoos."

"If you're into that."

"Oh! I am!" She turned to Astrid with piercing eyes. "Are you?"

Astrid sighed. "No. I'm not. I can't be. You called dibs."

Ruff smiled before bringing Astrid into a hug. "You're the best!" She broke the hug and started running forward. "I call shotgun!"

Astrid sighed as she watched her go. She didn't mind it when Ruff would call dibs on a guy that was interested in her. Usually because she wasn't interested in them. But there were times when she did mind. She was interested in Eret. She could see herself with him. But Ruff was her best friend. And she had called dibs.

"Hey," Heather said, coming up behind her. "You and Eret seemed to be hitting it off."

"Squawk! Hitting it off!" Windsheer repeated.

Astrid chuckled a bit. "Yeah, we did."

Heather smiled. "Why don't you go for it?"

"I-I can't." She looked ahead to see Ruffnut push her brother to the floor in an attempt to get the front seat. She sighed. "Girl code."

Heather looked forward and shook her head. "But he's not even interested in her."

"She's my best friend," Astrid rushed to defend. "He'd be lucky to go out with her."

"And what about you?"

"Squawk! What about you!"

Astrid shrugged. "He wasn't that cute." She knew Heather could tell she was lying, but that didn't matter. Her feelings didn't matter. She walked faster and spoke to Snotlout, changing the subject. "I figured you'd have, like, a sports car or something." Instead, she was staring and a red SUV.

Snotlout laughed. "We all wouldn't be able to fit in a sports car, now would we?" He opened the driver's door. "Now get in!"

After they were all buckled in, Snotlout started their drive. "Alright, I hope you all have bathing suits!" He pressed on the gas pedal.

"Wait, what!" the trio yelled.

"You didn't say to bring bathing suits," Astrid yelled.

"It's California," he laughed. "What did you expect for a cliff?"

"I don't know, a view!"

"Don't worry," Heather assured. "I brought us shorts and t-shirts. We have sort of the same build." She nudged her in the arm with a smile.

"What about Ruff?"

Ruffnut waved it off. "I'll just swim in my undies."

"Ew," Tuff gagged. "Nobody wants to see that! Looking at you in your clothes triggers my gag reflex!"

"Shut up, idiot!"

"Not a chance, ugly!"

"You take that back, baby brother," she yelled, turning around in her seat to try and hit him.

Tuffnut gasped dramatically as he tried to dodge her hits. "You're only older by eleven minutes!"

"Hey," Snotlout yelled. "Sit back! You're gonna get us pulled over!"

It was to no avail as the twins continued to fight.

"Ruff, sit down," Astrid ordered.

"Fine," she groaned and she turned back to her seat.

"And put your seat-belt on!" Snotlout added.

Ruffnut rolled her eyes as she did. "So this cliff? Is it too high to jump off of?"

"Nope," Heather exclaimed enthusiastically. "It's the funnest thing in the universe jumping from it. We do it all the time when the weather's nice."

"Now, it's the edge that's way too high," Fishlegs informed. "If you jumped from there, hitting the water would feel like hitting cement."

"Squawk! Cement!"

Ruffnut narrowed her eyes at nothing in particular. "I've heard that somewhere before."

"Stranger Things," Snotlout, Heather, and Fishlegs said in unison.

"That was a good show," Astrid nodded.

"Right! Elle was my favorite character," Heather said.

"Mine too. Imagine being able to do shit with your mind," Ruff exclaimed happily.

The car was filled with mindless small talk until, finally, Snotlout yelled, "We're here!" Astrid looked out the window to see a small clearing near trees with blocks of wood to indicate parking spaces. It was empty at the moment. Snotlout parked next to one and they all got out. "This way!" They followed him up a path that lead to another small clearing.

While Snotlout and the others started to get ready for a swim, Astrid made her way to the edge of the cliff. There she could see the clear, blue waters lit up by the midday sun. Heather was right about the cliff not being too high. There was even a spot where it looked easy to climb back up from. She closed her eyes and let the ocean breeze flow over her. All her life, living in New York, she never got to do things like this. Especially in the area they lived in. But a part of her always yearned for something like this. She didn't know why, but this feeling felt very familiar. Like she'd been somewhere like this before.

"Beautiful isn't it," Heather's voice broke through her thoughts.

Astrid turned to her as she let Windsheer fly off somewhere. "It is. It feels calming."

"Yeah, that's why we like it here." She handed her some shorts. "If either are too big or something, I have hair ties to make them smaller. Let's go!" She grabbed her arm and lead her behind some trees, where they got changed.

"Cannonball," Tuffnut and Snotlout yelled when both girls emerged. Astrid watched as they both started running towards the edge.

"Bet," Ruffnut yelled in delight before stripping her shirt and revealing a white bra with brown polka dots.

Astrid and Heather laughed as they watched Snotlout become momentarily distracted and trip and fall into the water while Tuffnut landed a perfect cannonball.

Ruffnut stripped her pants off before running towards the edge herself. "Cannonball," she bellowed as she plunged into the water. She emerged with the grace of both a mermaid and a witch. "Ugh! I love the ocean! Astrid come down here!"

Heather turned to her. "You coming?"

She shook her head. "Nah. I'll go in later. I just wanna enjoy the view for a while."

"Suit yourself," she smiled before turning to Fishlegs. "Last one in the water has to cite the entire alphabet of scientific fish names!"

"Wha-" She was already running towards the edge. "Hey! No fair! I'm all the way over here!" Fishlegs started running even though there was no possible way for him to win.

Astrid once again made her way to the edge and sat down, letting her legs dangle. She watched as Ruffnut tried to drown Tuffnut and as Snotlout started a splash war. Berlood didn't seem so bad. Her mom was getting the help she needed, she was living with her best friends, and she had made three new ones. She guessed the only downside had to be…

She turned around as she heard footsteps approaching and dramatically rolled her eyes and turned away once she saw who it was.

"Um. Hi, Astrid."

"Henry," she spat as if his name were a curse. And, to her, it was.

"You're not gonna join the others in the water."

"I don't have to if I don't want to," she barked.

She heard a bit of shuffling before seeing out of the corner of her eye that he sat next to her. Really? He had nothing better to do? "It's beautiful, isn't it? I forgot how we found this spot, but we've been coming here ever since."

"Interesting." Not! Couldn't her let her sit in peace?

She noticed he shrugged. "I guess." He didn't say anything after that.

Good. She wanted her silence.

"I know you hate me." Great, he was talking again! "And I don't expect you to change your mind about me anytime soon. But, if it's any consolation, I'm gonna ask Ms. Gerund to take down the portrait on Monday."

Yeah, yea- Wait, what?! She turned to him surprised and mouth open to say something, but nothing came out. And before she could think of anything to say, the others had noticed his presence and started calling for him. She watched as he smiled and got up. He took a few steps back before running forward and jumping into the water with a graceful dive.

Ok. Ok! She could admit it. That was...a nice gesture…

No. No! It was an appropriate one! One he should've done the moment he met her. In fact, he shouldn't have made it in the first place. Doing something he was supposed to do didn't make him a better person in her eyes, it just made him average.

And with that conclusion, she got up and jumped into the water, joining in on the fun.

It had been a week since then and Astrid had yet to let go of her conclusion. Henry had yet to prove her wrong. Nothing he did sat right with her. How he acted so humble when it came to his peers. How he would barely spend time with the ones he called friends, instead choosing to stay in the Art room. How he let every girl who confessed to him down gently. How much Stormfly loved him. How he was obviously his teachers' favorite seeing as Coach Belch let him take a phone call whenever. The only thing that could possibly redeem him was that he was true to his word. When she had gotten into school on Monday, the painting was gone. But he had yet to apologize for making it in the first place. And until he did that, she wasn't going to warm up to him any time soon.

Ping!

She was startled from her thoughts by a notification. She looked at the homework she was supposed to be doing and found it blank. She really needed to put that Stalker out of her mind. She checked her phone. It was a facebook notification. When was the last time she had used facebook?

D-rangednGorgeous: What are we gonna do this weekend, cause, I gotta say, this house is boring when my uncle's not here.

Valkyrie: Who is this?

D-rangednGorgeous: It's Heather.

Heather? Why was she texting her through facebook? They had each other's numbers. And what was with the nickname?

DropDeadHandsome: Yea IDK i forgot 2 plan somthin sorry

Fishface: Snotlout, could you please not text like that! It gives me a headache.

Oh, so that was Snotlout. Of course it was. Astrid rolled her eyes and went back to her homework. Another ding. And another. And another. She picked her phone up, exasperated.

DropDeadHandsome: Noway fishface i do wat i want

DropDeadGorgeous: We were supposed to do something this weekend?

ILoveChickens: Uh, yea. Dont u remember? Thor your so stupid.

DropDeadGorgeous: You're*

Valkyrie: What it going on?!

Valkyrie: is*

DropDeadGorgeous: Oh, dear Astrid, don't you remember! I told you about the groupchat?

Valkyrie: I don't remember that at all.

DropDeadGorgeous: Well, I did. It's not my fault you ignore me.

DropDeadHandsome: So i was thnkng wego tot he GH.

DropDeadGorgeous: What's that?

FishFace: The Great Hall. It's this awesome restaurant where they give you Viking Helmets and fur pelts to wear as you dine there.

DropDeadHandsome: They feed you all kinds of meat and they serve beer!

Fishface: Rootbeer for those underaged.

Valkyrie: Wait, how much is it?

D-rangednGorgeous: It really depends on what you order. They're a bit pricey, cause they raise their own animals and all that, but the amount of food you get is worth it.

ILoveChickens: THAT SOUNDS AWESOME!

DropDeadGorgeous: We are totally going!

Valkyrie: Um. ILoveChickens DropDeadGorgeous We can't go. We don't have the money.

ILoveChickens: I ofishaly hate life

DropDeadGorgeous: AW MAN! :C

DropDeadHandsome: I'll pay for you guys.

Just as she started texting a rejection, her bedroom door flew open, startling both her and Stormfly in the process. Stormfly barked and she yelled, "What the helheim, Tuff!" She grabbed a pillow and threw it at him. "You can't just barge into my room!"

"We have to go!" He literally hopped onto her bed with her. "Nothing is better than free food!"

"We can't just leech off of our new 'rich' friends, Tuff. We're not that kind of people."

"Ok," Ruff said, standing at the door. "Maybe you're not, but we definitely are!" Ruffnut made her way to the bed too. "Besides, we were their friends before we knew they were rich! So it's ok!" Tuff nodded in agreement.

Astrid rolled her eyes. "C'mon guys, have a sense of morality. It was ok last Saturday because it was just ice cream. But that's not the case this time. Heather said they were pricey. Pricey to us is 7 dollars."

"But Snotlout said he'd pay!"

Astrid gave them a look. "We don't have the money. I'm pretty sure even with their new jobs, our moms can barely afford this rent."

They all jumped at the sound of their front door slamming closed. "Kids," Astrid heard her mother yell.

"Get over here," yelled her Auntie Thor.

They all looked at each other, confused, before heading towards the living room.

Astrid's eyes widened at the sight of it. "Mom, what the heck is all of this!" She stared at the bags of food and clothes and finally looked at her mom, who donned an outfit she had never seen before and some sunglasses that still had the pricetag. Her aunt was in a similar state.

"STUFF!" The twins yelled before digging through the bags their mom handed them.

Her mom was handing her her own bag. "Mom, what is this?"

Her mom smiled brightly. "We just got our first paychecks." That explained...nothing, actually.

"You didn't think to save it!"

"Astrid, honey, of course I did. None of this was that expensive and I wasted most of it on food for the month." She lifted her glasses to her head, showing her smiling eyes. "And I got you this." She handed her a bag of clothes and another one with two boxes inside.

"LAPTOPS!" The twins yelled. They both took out boxes showing yellowish, green laptops on the cover. Astrid took one of the boxes out of the bag and found a sky blue laptop for herself. "Mom...wha…"

"We got them at thrift stores, don't worry," she assured her. "We can finally get rid of that crappy white one."

Astrid looked at the new blue one. "I kinda liked the crappy white one."

"Oh, isn't this wonderful, sweetie!" Her mom obviously hadn't heard her. "We're finally in a good place!"

Astrid looked at her bruise on her eye was finally gone. So were the bags under her eyes. And her worried expressions. And it seemed like she was growing less grey hairs. So much change was happening. All good things, though. Astrid smiled. "Yeah, we are."

"Oh! Also!" Her mom started digging through her purse and pulled out a wallet she had never seen before. Then her mom opened it, pulled out a bill and handed it to her.

Astrid took it, unfolded it, and then tried handing it back. "Mom, no! I can't take this! We need to save this."

"A hundred dollars," The twins yelled in excitement.

Astrid looked to her mom with pleading eyes. The most her mom had ever given her for anything was seven dollars, and she had always expected change back. Astrid couldn't possibly take this. What would she even do with it.

"Astrid, sweetie," her mother cooed. "This is the first time ever I've been able to do this for you. Take it." She folded Astrid's hand around the dollar bill.

Astrid smiled at her mom. "Thank you."

"Oh, this is perfect," Ruff yelled. "Our friends just asked if we could go out to eat tomorrow!"

"Yeah," Tuffnut agreed. "And Astrid was like, 'We can't afford it'!"

"And then our friend Snotlout offered to pay!"

"But we didn't take the offer because we have morals!"

Astrid shared a look of mirth with her mom as her Auntie Thor praised her children.

"So can we go," Tuff asked.

"Can we, can we, can we," Ruff repeated with excitement.

Her Auntie Thor shared a look with her mom before turning back to her kids. "I don't see why not!"

"Yes," the twins yelled before bashing their heads together. They both groaned in pain.

"Why do we keep doing that," Tuff asked.

"We really should stop," Ruff agreed.

Her Auntie Thor laughed. "Go on and finish the homework I know you both have. I want to see it finished before you even think about opening those computers." The twins groaned again.

"Go on you three," her mom ordered. "We'll be cooking dinner in the meantime."

"More like I'll be cooking dinner while you hand me the ingredients," her aunt laughed.

Her mom feigned innocence. "Is that not what I said?"

They all laughed before the three youths headed to their rooms. "Groupchat," Ruff said to her before following Tuff into their room.

Astrid rolled her eyes before entering her own room. She shooed Stormfly off her spot before sitting down and reaching for her already dinging phone.

DropDeadGorgeous: No need, snotface, our moms just gave us 100$!

ILoveChickens: EACH!

D-rangednGorgeous: Seriously! That's cool!

Valkyrie: Honestly, I was surprised. I still don't even know what my mom works as. All I know is that she took a job at my uncles company.

DropDeadHandsome: then were all set!

DropDeadHandsome: Hiccup are u in?

DropDeadHandsome: NorseGod u in?

DropDeadHandsome: NorseGod u in?

DropDeadHandsome: NorseGod u in?

DropDeadHandsome: i can keep goin man

NorseGod: One, I need to remember to turn notifications off. Two, who the helheim changed my nickname. Three, Tough nut, I love your nickname. And for, no, I'm not in. I have plans.

ILoveChickens: Tough nut?

NorseGod: Sorry, I'm using microphone. My hands are busy.

DropDeadHandsome: Cmon man u bailed last time

NorseGod: I did not. Can you please change my nickname back. Was it you who changed it?

DropDeadHandsome: im not changing anything til u agree to come with us

NorseGod: I have plans at the shelter. I'm going to be there all afternoon.

DropDeadHandsome: AGAIN?!

NorseGod: Yes, again. Now, my nickname.

DropDeadHandsome: no i'm being petty

NorseGod: Do I have to do everything myself.

NorseGod changed nickname to KingOfDragons

KingOfDragons: Be petty, then. I'll be helping cats give birth.

KingOfDragons is offline

DropDeadHandsome: Whatevs

DropDeadHandsome: so ur not gonna answer now

DropDeadHandsome: wow

DropDeadHandsome is offline

DropDeadGorgeous: Reading this was a religious experience.

ILoveChickens: lol

D-rangednGorgeous: Honestly, moooooood XD

Fishface: Same

Astrid shook her head at the replies. She wasn't going to give one. She found it very rude of him to bail on someone who was supposedly his best friend.

"Rrrrwoof," Stormfly barked which Astrid took as an agreement. She scratched her behind the ear.

She took one last glance at the messages. With a shake of her head, she put her phone on silent and went back to her unfinished, not-even-started, homework.

And that's the chapter! Astrid still has a ways to go before warming up to Hiccup. Don't worry, it'll be satisfying to those who believe Astrid is in the wrong. I can't say when the next chapter will be out, due to work and my tiredness, but I'll try to get it out as soon as I can. ALSO! Tabby Cat. That's a hint for next chapter. Until then, I love you all!