Chronicles of a PS118 Dropout: Too Booold For His Own Good
Arnold sat crushed, on the edge of his bed. Grandpa had just broken the news. His first series on Nickelodeon was canceled. Arnold's football shaped head raced with thoughts as he searched for a way to get himself back together and move on with his life. They say that the answers for the future lie in the past, so that was exactly where Arnold turned.
"I didn t think it would come to this," Arnold admitted to himself as he lifted the costume out of his drawer. Arnold carried the apple suit over to the mirror and hesitantly put it on. He remembered that first magical episode of Hey Arnold!, where Gerald and him daringly rode the bus dressed as fruits. He slipped into the costume and gazed at his reflection. Then he did his best Tom Cruise impression.
That settled it. Arnold needed to get a real job, and not just selling wacky watches like Gerald did in episode 116. After a few minutes of flipping through the cartoon yellow pages, Arnold found the number that he was looking for. It was the phone number that just might put him back in control of his life.
"Is this Fruit of the Loom?",the courageous soul searcher asked.
"Well ahoy there!", the voice on the other end responded. "How can I help you?"
"I...well.. I am calling to find out about a job modeling. I have my own apple suit if it's going to be a problem. And I m willing to work flexible hours and I m not at all persnickety. You name it; boxers, briefs, thon-"
"Wait just a minute, young man!", the voice on the other end cut him off. "You re Arnold! Aren't you! You played that charming boy on that Nickelodeon show! Yes, you must be! I'd know your voice anywhere. My daughter just loved the one where you and Kimi tried to convince Angelica to give Tommy back his Reptar doll..."
This roller coaster of emotions was too much for the young star. "I'm Arnold from Hey Arnold! Not Arnold from Rugrats! In fact, I don t even think there WAS an Arnold on Rugrats. Not that I would really know. That show lost its zest as soon as the writers went politically correct on us and added Kimi. I just stopped watching it altogether. Oh, and the Rugrats movie...don't even get me started on that. That show experienced one bad decision after another. Not even Doctor Lipshitz could resolve their problems."
Arnold stopped himself and hung up the phone. He was too bold for his own good. As Gerald always said, he was a boooold kid. But bold or not, something deep inside Arnold's heart spoke to him. Not literally in his heart, because that would just be gross. And not literally speaking either, because internal organs don t actually speak...Or do they?
Figurative hearts and figuratively speaking, Arnold just didn t care anymore. Everything was going wrong in his life. First Eugene crashed The Mauve Racer onto Gerald Field, and then Grandma made him sing Christmas Carols in the sweltering summer heat. But on top of it all, the icing on the cake, the cheese on the pizza pie that the boarding house made in episode 64: his first real show was canceled. It was a hard day to be a cartoon character.
He remembered all the health videos that Mr. Garrison had showed, but they didn't seem to matter anymore. Nothing mattered anymore. And no one understood him, not even Lila. Arnold took a pencil from the top drawer of his desk. Usually when he had a hard day, he would vent with some Emo poetry. Arnold had written some highly depressing poems about Big Bob s beepers and even the Jolly Olly man.
Today was different though. Arnold wasn t going to use his pencil to express the nothingness of his cartoon existence through poetry.
He was going to erase his wrists.