Disclaimer: Hey! Arnold and the Beatles do not belong to me.

HA

The classroom was silent, save for the scratching of lead pencils onto paper. All the seats, save one, were filled with studious and semi-studious teenagers trying to finish their homework before the period was over and lunch began. Their teacher, an ever-observant man in his late forties, was sleeping deeply in his chair, feet propped on the desk and a snore escaping his mouth every other five minutes.

One young man with a football shaped head lifted his face from the work sheet to yawn and stretch his sore muscles. Eyes scanning the room, they fell upon the empty chair and lingered there for a moment before bouncing to the blonde next to him.

"I wonder where Curly is." He wondered out loud, causing those closest to him to look up as well. It was strange, this was day three of his absence and no one knew where he was. His sister Jolene hadn't even come in with an excuse.

"Yeah, it's odd, even for that crazy boy to be gone for more than a day without contacting someone." Helga agreed, and Arnold nodded dumbly with her.

"Perhaps our friend had a family crisis to deal with." Phoebe suggested, to which her boyfriend clicked his tongue.

"Nah, he's probably just freeing the animals from the zoo again." Gerald shrugged off, and Rhonda laughed. Gathering everyone else's papers, she brought them to the desk and set them beside the teacher's feet before turning to her friends.

"Probably biting the heads off of chickens." She stated smartly with a flip of her hair.

"And that was just the one time." A weary and rough voice added from the door. All heads turned towards Curly, who was slumped against the doorframe, dark bags under his eyes and looking a bit more than disheveled.

"Curly!" a few of his friends called out in surprise, and he smiled while massaging the bridge of his nose.

"Hey guys. Is it almost lunch? Cause I'm tired and just want to sleep for forty five minutes." He whined, and was answered by the bell ringing in annoyance. With a smirk, he turned and disappeared from the doorway, leaving everyone in confusion. Slowly they followed his steps down the halls, first one by one and then in a large group, although he was lost in the sea of students rushing towards the cafeteria.

They found him at a deserted table, his head collapsed on his arms and sound asleep, even with all the noise. To say the gang was amazed would be an understatement; it took more than the need for a nap to get someone to sleep in the high school lunch room.

"What do you think happened to him?" Helga asked when it was found that tapping him and calling his name wouldn't rouse him. The others just shrugged and proceeded to think up theories that could seem even remotely plausible to explain Curly's behavior. That was how they spent the whole forty five minutes allotted for lunch; to which Curly didn't wake once.

It was only after the first warning bell rang out, and they had started off in their separate ways that Arnold noticed one person was missing. Looking behind him, he found Curly still asleep at the table. He turned his attention to Rhonda, who just so happened to be standing next to he and Helga, and gave her the greatest pity look the Lloyd heir had ever seen. At least, from Arnold.

"Rhonda, would you please go get him?" he asked in his do-gooder voice, and Rhonda rolled her eyes.

"Why should I have to get the little freak? I say let him be late." She snapped a bit harsher than intended, but her companions said nothing about her tone.

"Well, because you two have the same class." Arnold started, as he and Helga slowly back away.

"And because you're closer!" his girlfriend shouted from down the hall, and Rhonda turned to see the retreating backs of her friends running towards their next class. With a few choice words under her breath that would make her mother cringe, Rhonda stomped her foot and marched angrily towards the snoozing Gammelthorpe. Slapping him on the back of the head, she allowed a small smirk of satisfaction to cross her lips as he lifted his face with a moan.

"Hey Crazy, wake up!" she tried to keep the hostility out of her voice, and thought she did a pretty good job. But he still stiffened at her words, turning slowly towards her face. It was only after he saw it was Rhonda who woke him did he relax, though Rhonda could still see some lingering unease in his gaze. Somehow that made her feel uncomfortable, and so she smiled softly.

"Hey, come on before you make us both late for class." She said quietly, and for the first time he looked away from her and noticed how empty the cafeteria was. He nodded, and let her help him up – although this she was aware she did – and the two made their way down the desolate halls towards the gym.

Rhonda watched in quiet interest as Curly ran his hands along the wall of lockers, delighting in the soft drumming of his hands along the metal. He looked dazed, no focus in his eyes. She was about to suggest he go home and just sleep until he can't anymore – when suddenly he stopped walking.

Turning on her heel to look at him, Rhonda found him standing in one place, shivering almost as if he were cold, something akin to fear on his face. Taking a step towards him, she was disturbed to find that her touch caused him to jump, although he still wouldn't look at anything but a spot only he could see.

". . . Curly . . . ?" she trailed off, unsure of what she had wanted to say. At the sound of her voice, he finally looked at her, and Rhonda felt her stomach drop at the look on his face.

"Rhonda . . ." he managed to croak out before collapsing in a heap against the lockers. He started shaking uncontrollably almost as if he were having a seizure. But she knew it wasn't one, because from what she learned watching those graphic health class videos, people lose focus and consciousness during seizures. Curly's eyes were wide and certainly focused; they were trained on her and filled with that unmistakable emotion of dread. He was scared.

And looking at Rhonda for comfort.

She could tell that he was seeing something, but she had no idea what it could be. Grabbing his face, she tried to hold him still, to keep him from whipping about and hurting himself. His eyes blazed as his own hands flew to hers, gripping them in a vice as he shuddered violently.

"Curly, Curly, calm down. I'm here, I'm here now. Shh, hush, calm down." She spoke softly, saying the first things that came into her head. Little did she know that he couldn't hear her words, or even the tone she used.

*

His mind was total and utter chaos. Nothing but shouts and screams and bangs and colors. He couldn't think, couldn't focus, could barely see the woman kneeling before him. The drug flowing through his veins was consuming him, overheating and over-pumping his blood and nearly sending him into cardiac arrest. But somehow, his vision began returning, even as the noise in within his mind grew more intense.

Reading her lips, he tried to decipher what she was saying, but couldn't and ended up rocking back and forth. And so Curly's fearful orbs traveled up to her eyes, and found the concern there to be the most comforting thing he had ever felt. He could feel her hands on his cheeks, and took hold of them, afraid that if he let go, Rhonda would disappear and he would be lost to the pandemonium of his mind.

"Shh, hush. I'm here now. Curly; Curly! Thaddeus! Thaddeus, calm down . . ." a soft voice entered the back of his mind, and he slowly came to the realization that it was her voice, Rhonda's. She was trying to calm him down, and she even called him by his name. Had she ever called him anything other than Curly or a derogatory for insane?

Rhonda breathed a sigh of relief when his shaking subsided and his eyes closed. Not a moment too soon, because his breathing had become so labored that his lips and cheeks were slowly turning blue. His grip loosened on her hands as his body slumped forward. Catching him against her breast, she couldn't hold back the action of stroking his hair. His breathing tapered out, and she could feel the sweat against his scalp dampening his black hair. Slowly he shook his head and moaned, and Rhonda realized that he must have lost consciousness at the end.

"Curly?" she ventured, and he leaned back, pale and tired and looking more than worse for wear.

"Sorry." Was all he could muster, and they sat there in silence for a moment before Rhonda stood and helped him to his feet. He wobbled a bit before leaning back to let the lockers support him. Clearing his throat, Curly brought Rhonda's attention back to him, as she had been stubbornly looking anywhere but at him.

"Listen, my love, you just head to class. I'm not feeling too well, so I'll just totter over to the nurse." He suggested, and she looked at him in surprise.

"Or I can help you to the nurse and then go to class. It's just gym, and you look like you can barely stand on your own two feet." She motioned to his subtle sway, and he smiled sheepishly.

"No, I insist you head to class. I don't want you to be late."

"Only the first bell has rung so far and the nurse is -" their bickering was cut off by the much irritating second warning bell, which caused Thad to smirk.

"The nurse is right around the corner. Go, I'll be fine." He assured, and she took a hesitant step backwards. After a few more similar steps while watching him, she turned quickly and scurried off towards the gym. Curly watched her go with a semi-sinking heart:

She didn't look back. Not once.

Heaving himself off the metal cabinets, he stood still for a moment before side punching a locker. Dammit, it was definitely a snowball's chance in hell for her to like him now. To her, not only was he crazy, but he also now has a whole bunch of fucked up problems none of them know about. And no doubt she'll tell everyone when they next convene.

She didn't even ask how the rally went. He moaned in his head. A few days ago he staged a rally to free all the animals in the zoo, or at least get them better conditions and care. That was it. No hidden agenda, no political motives to destroy America as the world knows it. Al-Qaeda wasn't a sponsor. Osama Bin Laden, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Kim Jong-il were not key speakers. In fact, the scariest members there were PETA.

He moaned again before walking over to the hallway phone designated for students so they didn't get in trouble for talking on their phones in school. Dialing his sister's number, Curly rested his forehead on the wall and hoped that she wasn't in class.

"City morgue, you stab 'em we slab 'em." Jolene's chipper voice came through the receiver, and Curly smiled at her image in the back of his eyelids.

"Hey Joe." He could hear her drop the phone and smirked.

"Thaddeus?! Shouldn't you be in class right now?" she shouted, and with the headache that was forming, he wished he had a less vocal sister.

"Yeah, about that . . . think you can come spring me out of jail? There's some stuff we need to talk about." He could almost hear the gears working in her head as she processed his request.

"You didn't get a girl pregnant, did you? I swear, Thaddeus, you need to learn to keep it in your -"

"This is serious Jolene." He cut her off, and for once she was oddly silent over the phone.

"I'll be right there." With that, the siblings hung up, and Curly rolled to his back and slid down the wall. Jolene knew some pretty good underground groups working towards changing the system; maybe she could introduce and help him get a foot in the door. After all, why should he let Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum torture him for nothing?

As soon as his butt made contact with the floor and his legs relax in front of him, Thaddeus Curly Gammelthorpe was asleep.

HA