"I'm not going to lie to you," Hiccup began as he took a sip of his coffee. "I was skeptical to whether or not we would actually end up getting coffee together."

I rolled my eyes at him. "You asked me just this Tuesday, Hiccy. Usually some big event stops us from doing things like these."

Hiccup laughed as he bent down to feed Toothless a doggy snack. I smiled at the pair as I took a sip of my steaming black coffee. We were sitting outside the Nadder Café, enjoying the chilly January air on a relatively calm Saturday morning. There weren't many people out at that hour of day, but we certainly didn't mind. It felt good to just be the two of us and Toothless, Hel, what was I saying? It felt so damn right, like that was what we had been made to do. Like we had been made to be together.

I buried my face in the scarf Hiccup had borrowed me, attempting to hide my heated cheeks as I feared Hiccup would catch me blushing. The scarf smelled of him, which sent tingles down my back. Fortunately for me though, Hiccup didn't seem to catch me obsessing over his scarf. He was far too busy with that adorable dog of his to even sense my blushing. Gods, was I glad that he could not read my mind.

"You know, it's really nice just hanging out with you again. I missed this." Hiccup admitted as he scratched Toothless behind his ear, causing the dog to waggle his tail like crazy.

I smiled down at my coffee, happy to know that I wasn't the only one who had that exact thought. "I agree. I missed you too, Hiccup."

Hiccup looked like he was about to say something when we were interrupted by a call. Hiccup furrowed his brows in confusion as he pulled up his phone from his pocket and answered. "Hey, isn't it a bit early for you to call?"

I eyed the phone in suspicion. Who would call at this hour? According to Hiccup, Valerie was not much of a morning person, (I hope that he hadn't learned that from experience) so it probably wouldn't be her and we both knew that the rest of the guys don't wake up until at least 1 pm on weekends so it couldn't be them either.

"Huh? No, no, she's fine. We're at the Nadder Café right now, getting some breakfast." Hiccup informed the person on the other side of the phone. I raised a brow as I crossed my arms. Who was he talking to?

Suddenly, Hiccup groaned. "What? Why can't you just do it yourself? I'm a little busy right now."

I exchanged a look with Toothless, who seemed just as clueless as I was to what was happening.

"Thor Almighty, the girl was sexually assaulted just last night! I'm not just going to leave her to go clean up your place!" Hiccup snapped into the phone, causing both me and Toothless to jump up in surprise. It was definitely unusual for Hiccup to get that mad so quickly, at least from what I had gathered on him for the past year.

Sexually assaulted. I blinked as I was reminded of what had happened the night before. The way that college freshman had taken advantage of me while I was wasted and almost taken me away from the party to the gods know where ... I shuddered as I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. Having spent time with Hiccup had made me forget about my troubles, he just made me feel so safe and ... happy. But was he just hanging out with me because he felt bad for me? Because he pitied me?

Once again, I met the large green eyes of Toothless. The black Labrador tilted his head at me as he let out a low whimper, as if he could read my mind. I shot the dog a half smile, fighting the urge to pet him as I tore my gaze away from him and focused on my coffee.

"Listen, Val, I'm sorry for lashing out at you. I'll come over once we're done, alright?" Hiccup spoke in a much softer tone this time as he finally revealed who he was talking to. Why was I not surprised that it was Valerie?

I tightened my grip around the paper cup that stored the last drops of my coffee. Gods, how could I have been so stupid? So stupid that I thought that for even one tiny moment that he still had some feelings left for me, that he was still mine?

I pursued my lips as I furrowed my brows and got up from the metal chair. Hiccup and Toothless both eyed me curiously. "I'll talk to you later, alright? See you."

I unraveled the green scarf from around my neck, bunching it up before handing it over to Hiccup. "Here you go, thanks for borrowing it to me, but I won't be needing this anymore."

Hiccup raised a brow as he looked between me and the scarf. "What?"

"I'll see you at school. Tell Valerie I said hi." I informed him as I turned on my heel and left, not even bothering to wait for him to reply. Not only was the whole thing with him and Valerie weighing upon me like a goddamn boulder, but the whole assault seemed to be creeping back into my brain, begging for me to give it attention.

I attempted to avoid all my thoughts as I walked in the direction of my neighborhood, the cold air whipping my neck and making me regret I hadn't given Hiccup his scarf back. Oh, how I missed that scarf.

***

The walk home was even longer than I thought it would be. This wasn't the first time I had walked home from town — I had done it multiple times over the course of my childhood — but on that day it just seemed to be a hundred times harder than ever before.

I wrapped my arms around my shivering body in an attempt to both warm and shield myself from the weather. It didn't really work.

When Hiccup wasn't there, the world just felt a whole lot worse and I felt much more unsafe. I passed about three men on my way home and each one of them seemed to eye me as I walked past them, as if they were drinking up the sight of my heavily clothed body. Even though I was wearing a large jacket and several layers of clothes underneath it, I still felt so exposed and disgusted by the way those men had looked at me. Had it always been like that? Was I just noticing it at that moment because of what had happened to me?

I made sure to keep my distance from them regardless. Quite frankly, I was terrified of what they could possibly do to me and I wanted nothing more than to hide in my room and never come out again. None of these men made me feel the way Hiccup had, none of these men had even given me the slightest sense of security. Which is why the second I got home I ran up to my front door, slipped inside and made sure that it was locked before I rushed up to my room.

It wasn't before I had sat down on the bed that I realized how much I was really shaking, but not from the cold. I looked down at my hands and saw them shaking like leaves in the wind. I glanced over at the mirror in the corner of my room and almost crashed to the floor at the sight of what was staring back at me.

In the mirror was a young girl. She might've been pretty, but with her sickly pale face, glassy eyes and messy blonde hair, I couldn't really tell. She looked absolutely terrified, like she had seen the face of death itself and lived to tell the tale. The black top she wore had a small gash in it, which stopped right beneath her breast. The knees of her pants were a weak black, like she had been dragging herself across a dirty floor. It took me a minute, but in the end I realized that the girl in the mirror was in fact me and I had never looked worse.

I couldn't keep it in a second longer. Tears began streaming down my face as the events of the night before washed over me like a nightmarish wave, filling me with guilt, anger and disappointment.

Why had I been so stupid? Why had I let him take advantage of me like that? Why hadn't I fought back? Why hadn't anyone helped me? Why had I almost let him take me away to do something even worse to me?

I sobbed, sobbed and sobbed. I had never been so disgusted with myself or my body as I was in that minute. I wanted to cut off every inch of the skin he had touched. I wanted to scream at that stupid Jake Peters, I wanted to beat his ass so badly that he would never be able to stand up straight again, but I couldn't bring myself to even think about him. The picture of him in my head already made me want to curl together in a ball beneath my sheets and never return. I felt so small, so weak, so fragile.

I tried to pull myself together, which I managed only for a minute as I ripped those wretched clothes off, disgusted by the sight of them. I tossed them in a corner of my room as tears continued to stream down my cheeks, vowing that I would burn them at the first chance I got. After I had gotten rid of my clothes, I was left standing stark naked in my room and as I looked in the mirror, I wanted nothing more than to rip my own skin off.

I pushed the thought to the back of my mind as I attempted to find some fresh sweats in my closet. After gathering up a change of clothes I moved to the bathroom, where I turned on the shower and got in as quick as possible.

Did I shower properly? No, I did not. At first I took the nearest loofah and scrubbed it so hard against my skin that I began to bleed in some places. Tears streamed down my face as I felt unable to rid myself of the sickening feeling of being touched by a stranger for the second time that day. I eventually ended up sitting down on the shower floor, wrapping my arms around my knees and pulling them close to my chest as I once again sobbed, the hot water pounding down onto my back like rain in a hurricane.

I had no idea how long I had been in the shower, all I knew is that every emotion I had felt during that shower had completely disappeared and it was like I had been drained  of everything from my opinions to my thoughts. I didn't even feel like I was physically present.

I got dressed and did my best to avoid looking in the mirror. I just couldn't take staring at that miserable face of mine for another second. Time didn't even seem real as I floated from the bathroom to my bedroom in a daze. I was so out of it I didn't even hear my parents come home from their usual Saturday morning walk.

I just dragged myself to my room, slumped onto my bed and sighed as I wished to fall asleep and never wake up again.