As if all we ever needed was yet another parody of The Princess Bride, here's my version. (If you haven't seen the movie, do it now! Jump on the bandwagon! Be a conformist!! Sorry...that was a rather shameless plug.) But first, I ought to warn anyone reading this:
This story may be quite long before it's over, if it ever actually ends (despite the fact that some parts are relatively short and therefore stuck two or three at a time in chapters.) Plus, I'm usually too lazy to update.
It isn't entirely original...I stole plenty of material and ideas and direct quotes from the book and the movie. (Sorry Mr. Morganstern and Mr. Goldman) Heck, it's a parody. What do you expect?
And I don't own anything even remotely connected to the Hey Arnold cartoon. Not unless a plastic football counts. However, I do enjoy using the characters for my own fiendish devices when writing...(Sorry, Mr. Bartlett) Anyway, I guess this qualifies as a big, fat disclaimer. It applies to the whole story, just so's ya know.
Well, that covers the important stuff. All that's left now is to read this silly thing. Enjoy :)
Arnold lay in bed, coughing and sneezing. He groaned and flopped around on the pillow, trying his best to get comfortable. There was a knock at the door and Arnold's grandpa entered, carrying a tray with cookies and milk. After he put the tray on the end of Arnold's bed, he pulled over a chair to sit on. "Feeling any better, Short Man?" he asked.
Arnold sighed. "Nope. I still feel awful. I'm miserable, my throat hurts from coughing, and I can't get to sleep, no matter how hard I try." He grumbled again. "I HATE being sick."
"Well, Arnold...that's a shame," Grandpa said, sympathetically. "Seeing you in this horrible state of affairs kind of reminds me of the time I came down with the Bubonic Plague, back in the winter of 1926--although come to think of it, I guess it might've been the chicken pox..... Anyway, I was so sick I couldn't move. Stayed in bed for two weeks. My best friend Jimmy Kafka came to see me--said he thought I was faking. And do you know what I told him? Nothing!! I took one look at him and threw up all over his shoes!!" Grandpa slapped his knee and laughed. "Mama Leone!!...I never saw Jimmy get so mad in all my life! Woo-hoo-ha!..He didn't speak to me for a whole mon....."
"Grandpa....." Arnold said, sternly.
Grandpa stopped laughing. "Oh...I'm sorry Arnold...I guess I'm not really helping your sad and sickly condition with crazy nostalgic stories of my youth, am I?"
"No, Grandpa...not really."
"Well, your Grandma sent up some milk and oatmeal raisin cookies--and between the two of us, be glad you missed dinner tonight. Never eat fresh clam chowder with refried beans. If you thought raspberries were bad..."
"Thanks, but I'm not very hungry." Arnold said. "I just want something to take my mind off this cold."
Grandpa took a bite of a cookie and thought for a minute. "Hmm....tell you what, Short Man--how would you like to hear a wonderful, magical yarn of a bedtime story that my father used to tell me when I was sick? Of course you would! You aren't doing squat right now, and I'm in a talkative mood...maybe it'll make you feel better. Or maybe it'll just bore you to sleep, like it did me. Heh-heh-heh!"
Arnold smiled and sat up a bit. "That might not be so bad. Sure, Grandpa...I'd like to hear it."
"Okay, then.....But I gotta warn ya'--this one's a doozy" Grandpa finished the cookie and Arnold's milk, then he cleared his throat, and began.
Once there was a young woman called Helganna, who lived on a farm in the valley of a prosperous little country known as Florin. Like all heroines in fairy tales, she was pretty enough...except she scowled a lot and didn't pay much attention to her looks. Her favorite pastimes were riding her horse, and tormenting the farm boy with the strangely-shaped head. His name was Arnold, but she never called him that. She usually addressed him as 'Yutz' or 'Bucko'....or her insult of choice; 'Football-Head.' Although he was about her age, and therefore really more of a young man than a boy--he had been orphaned as a child and worked for her father ever since--Helganna never treated him as an equal. It delighted her to order him around like a dog. "Football-Head, fetch me some water"; "Polish my horse's saddle, Football-Head. And hurry it up. I don't have all day."
"As you wish."
That was all he ever answered as he politely carried out her orders. "As you wish." Dry this, Football-Head. "As you wish." Carry that, Football-Head. "As you wish." He lived in a small hut out by the pig sty, and would read every night by candlelight.
"Uh, Grandpa," Arnold interrupted, "...are you sure this is the same story your father used to tell you?"
"Well, no...not exactly," his grandpa admitted. "Of course, I'm old and feeble and I forget things, so sometimes I have to make up new ones...like puttin' you in the story. I thought that might make it more interesting!"
"Actually, it makes me feel kind of weird..."
"... But the rest of it is pretty much the same as it was 70 years ago--or was it 71? Anyway..."
"What does that 'Alfred' kid think he's doing, trying to educate himself?" Helganna's father, Bob, would sometimes say. "He's an orphan and a servant, for cryin' out loud! How'll a stinkin' education ever help him?"
"Dad.....his name's Arnold. And he works really hard around here." For reasons she didn't quite understand, Helganna always stood up for Arnold.....at least, behind his back. Somehow she felt as though she was the only one with a right to insult him.
"Whatever, Olgalia," Bob would answer--always referring to Helganna's older, perfect sister. (She was rich and successful, working for some kind of duchess, somewhere...but who really cares about her?)
Then, Helganna would roll her eyes, and excuse herself to go take a walk outside in the cool evening. As dusk approached, she could usually see the candlelight glowing from Arnold's window, and she wondered what new things he might be learning from his books. Sometimes she felt the urge to visit him and apologise for her constant rudeness and unkind remarks...but it was such fun bossing him around--and besides, he didn't seem to care. All he ever said was "As you wish."