#nerd!au

“Oh ‘ello Jack!”

“Hello Mr. Haddock. Is Hiccup home?”

“’Es, he’s up stairs. I reckon ye boys are havin’ another study session?” Stoick, a rather hefty man with a beard that can challenge Saint Nick’s, said as he allowed a young boy with powder white hair combed neatly to the side to step inside his humble home.

“Yes, yes we are,” Jack said before he politely thanked the usually intimidating man and he shuffled out of his shoes to leave them by the door in orderly fashion. Stoick watched the young boy run up the stairs while hugging his backpack to his chest, almost tripping twice, and shook his head with a small smile. He knew that in a matter of time, his usually quiet house will be filled with the laughs and happy chatter of those two boys. And it all started as soon as Jack softly knocked on Hiccup’s door, where a sign that read “Hiccup’s Room” hung on the door.

“Hey Hic, guess who has the latest issue of Captain American?” Jack said in a sing song voice as he opened the door and stepped inside his best friend’s room. He instantly went and sat down on Hiccup’s bed with his backpack on his lap as he looked over at the freckled boy who was sitting at his desk no doubt doodling ideas for the science fair three months from today. Jack grinned a mouthful of metal when the brunette looked up and twisted around in his seat to look at him.

“Don’t tell me anything! I haven’t read it yet!” Hiccup said as he pushed his slipping glasses back on his nose. Jack let out a silly snort.

“Naturally. That’s why I brought it over with me so we can read it together!” Jack said as he unzipped his backpack with excitedly trembling fingers. He carefully pulled out the comic book, which he had wrapped in two plastic bags just in case the unspeakable happens. He handled the book as anyone else would handle a pint sized diamond. Once he had it properly out of his backpack, Jack held out the comic book in front of him with both hands, and just simply admired the artwork on the cover. “I’m just dying to know what’s going to happen to Steve Rogers and Bucky!”

“You’re going to have to hold off on your death, because we need to do some homework before we even think about opening that book,” Hiccup said as he pulled out his math book from his desk drawer, and held it towards Jack to see. The fair haired male pouted heavily before he let out a heavy sigh.

“Fine…I’m just glad that math is one of my favorite subjects or else I really would be dying to know,” Jack said as he carefully placed his book on the bed and out of harm’s reach before he got up and pulled the extra chair in the room over beside Hiccup’s.

“Well for you. Math is my worst subject! Now if it were English, then I’d totally be an Einstein,” Hiccup said as he leaned back against his chair, his head falling back in exasperating way. Jack stared at his friend for a moment with an expression that almost looked like he was contemplating whether he should stick his hand inside an open crocodile’s mouth. Hiccup was far from being a crocodile but…

“Oh come on, Hiccup, you can’t be that bad!” Jack said with that dorky snort of a laugh he used when he was either nervous or very excited. Kind of like when Hiccup tried to lie, his voice would get very high in pitch. This of course didn’t go unnoticed by the freckled teen, who lifted his head and gave his friend a suspicious look as he pushed his glasses back on his nose.

“Oh yeah, because I totally don’t have a C in that class, unlike someone I know,” Hiccup said sarcastically with a roll of his eyes. Jack snorted again, and this only made the brunette grow more suspicious. Was something bothering his friend? Was he getting bullied at school again because of his fancy with Captain America?  Of course there was nothing he could do because he was just as puny and feeble as his best friend, but he could at least report it to the principal and have the bullying be put to a stop. Hiccup got bullied too for his own fancy with dragons, but the brunette’s learned to ignore it and just not give a Terrible Terror’s behind what they thought about him. Jack was just a little more sensitive than he was, as well as more reserved, which can be a little annoying when he was trying to help.

“Jack, is th—“

“Here, look. If you can solve this problem, then you’re not as bad as you think at math,” Jack said over Hiccup’s words. The freckled boy sighed softly as he looked down and watched his friend right down a problem down on his open journal. Guess he’ll ask him later. “There, now solve for ‘i’.”

Hiccup looked down at the problem and frowned softly.

“9x-7i>3(3x-7u)? Jack, this is easy stuff even for me,” Hiccup said, turning to his friend with an unamused look.

“Will you just solve it?!” Jack huffed as he puffed his cheeks out in a pout. Hiccup rolled his eyes but smiled a bit.

“Okay fine, fine,” he said dismissively before he grabbed his pencil and started to work out the problem by subtracting ‘9x’ to the other side of the greater-than symbol. He then distributed 3 to ‘3x-7u’ and added the result together with ‘-9x’ so he was left with -7i>-21u. “Then I just have to divide negative seven to negative twenty-one, and I’m left with i is less than three-u. See. Easy as pi Jack.”

Hiccup looked at Jack and was confused to see his friend a bit red in the face. Was he sick and maybe running a fever? The freckled teen knitted his brows together and shifted his glasses back on his nose again, a nervous habit he had if it wasn’t obvious enough.

“Jack are you—“

“That’s all you think?” Jack interrupted once again. Hiccup’s worried expression morphed to a bemused frown. He looked down at the problem for a few moments before looking back at Jack.

“’i < 3u’, what else should it be?” Hiccup said with a shrug of his shoulders. Did he get the problem wrong or something? He watched as Jack pursed his lips together and looked off to the side with this troubled and unpleased expression, like he were disappointed of something. But disappointed of what?!

“Okay… Well then, can you solve this question?” Jack said, now looking more optimistic. Hiccup was starting to wonder if his fellow nerd was bipolar or something. He sighed and rolled his eyes, but let the fair haired male do what he wanted as he scribbled another problem on his journal. “Okay, solve this one!”

Hiccup looked down at his paper, and his eye bulged.

“128√e980!? Jack, I can’t solve that!” Hiccup said in alarm while he looked at his friend. This seemed to please the other, since he gave him a smile that showed off his blue colored braces, and Hiccup swore he saw a little twinkle of mischief in those blue topaz eyes. Was Jack trying to show off his math skills, because that wasn’t very humble of him!

“It’s easy, Hic. All you have to do is…” Jack grabbed Hiccup’s pencil from his hand and used the eraser end to erase the top half of the problem, “this…and tada! It’s solved!”

Hiccup narrowed his eyes, almost squinting at the now half erased problem, before he looked at Jack with those squinty eyes.

“Are you making fun of me?” Hiccup asked, suspicion dripping thickly off his tone. Jack snorted before he looked off to the side and mumbled something, but Hiccup couldn’t quite catch it, but it did sound a lot like ‘hardly’.

“Just look at it for a while. The answer will become clear soon, okay? Anyways, I know I said I’d stay late to work on math with you, but I just remembered that I’m supposed to be home today. North wanted me to help him with some things. So I’ll catch you later Hiccup! And you know, I’ll lend you my comic book too, just don’t damage it or tell me anything about it tomorrow okay?” The entire Jack spoke, he was gathering his things in to his backpack just as fast as he was talking. And by the time he was done talking, he was already opening door with one hand while the other held his backpack close to his chest. “Well see you at school, Hic. Bye!”

And with that said, Jack quickly left the room and left a very confused Hiccup behind.

“What’s up with him?” Hiccup mumbled to himself as pout started to settle on his freckled features. He sighed and turned back around to look down at the problem, resting his cheek on his open palm. It didn’t look like a solved problem at all. It didn’t even look like numbers anymore! Well maybe if he turned it to its side… Hiccup turned his journal to right….then right again…then right once more…and one last time only to be where he started: feeling stupid and confused. “What the heck Jack… You are your weird behavior and your weird equations. They don’t look like numbers! This one looks like and ‘I’, and this one like an ‘L’ and this one—“

Hiccup froze and stopped talking to himself as he stared at the half erased equation with wide eyes. A few seconds passed and his mouth dropped a little while the skin under his freckled cheeks flushed to scarlet. The brunette then glanced up at the first problem and the solution, and he felt his blush travel up to his ears and down his throat. Before he knew it, Hiccup’s hands flew up and smacked against his red face, making his glasses go askew and almost fall off his face.

“The answer to 128√e980…is ‘I love you’,” Hiccup said in a quiet voice, as he peeked through his trembling fingers down at the “math” problems on his paper. The more he stared at it, the more Hiccup felt a smile form on his lips and butterflies flutter about in his stomach. The freckled teen, still red in the face, pulled his hands away from his face and fixed his glasses before he grabbed his phone that laid a few inches away from his hand. He opened a new message, clumsily pressed those small buttons to form a text, and then sent the message to Jack with his heart pounding against his chest.

Jack, who was already at his doorstep since he and Hiccup only lived a few houses away from each other, jumped when he felt his pocket buzz. He grabbed his phone and, forgetting to check who the sender was, opened the message that showed on his screen. What he read had his pale skin blush several shades of red and almost drop his phone.