Events of Nine Years Earlier to Present

"What?" Arnold asked, stunned.

"Okay. For the fourth time, head boy, I'm pregnant," Helga had repeated.

"What?" he asked again.

Helga sighed.

"Forget it," she said, turning and walking away.

"You cant be pregnant!" he yelled at her suddenly.

"Excuse me?" she said. "Are you saying I'm lying?"

Arnold was silent, thinking it all over.

He had cheated on his girlfriend. He knew it was a mistake. He and Helga had been partners on a project, and it had gotten intense, and his grandmother had died, and his girlfriend had been away and . . . and . . .

He and Helga had started "mucking around".

He looked at her.

"You have to be," he said. Yeah, she was lying. He knew she loved him. She was lying so that he would break up with Rhonda, and be with her. That's what this was. It had to be!

Helga looked like Arnold had slapped her. He could see she was either going to cry or attack him. But instead she just turned and walked away.

"Whatever, football face," she said, and stormed away.

Lila, who had been near by had heard everything, and it was just too good not to tell other people. So she'd sent a mass text message to everyone on her phone, knowing it would be around school in minutes.

And it had been. Rhonda had found out and confronted Arnold.

"We never slept together," he's lied. "She's lying. We worked on a project, and she hung out with me when grandma died, but we never did anything."

Rhonda had then confronted Helga, with a group of girls at her back. Helga had looked past them and seen him, and the look of hurt on her face hurt him. She didn't argue with Rhonda and her friends, which they took to mean that she was indeed lying. The last month before graduation had been hell for Helga. He'd known that, but he couldn't bring himself to come clean. A week after it all broke out, Phoebe stopped talking to Helga. Probably supported by Gerald in the whole thing. He would often later wonder what went through her head after she and Gerald broke up that summer. She'd turned her back on her best friend, only to be dumped by her boyfriend a couple of months later.

By then, Helga was long gone. She left the night of graduation and no one had ever heard from her again, or seen her. She went down as the girl who tried to break up a golden couple by lying about being pregnant . . .

…...

Helga had told her family. They were all quiet. It was Olga who finally said something. She wrapped her arms around Helga's shoulders and told her everything was going to be okay. After graduation she could come with Olga to New Zealand.

"New Zealand!" Bob had roared. 'Here we go,' Helga had thought. 'His precious Olga leaving…'

"Your not taking her to New Zealand! She's pregnant! She needs her family!" He'd yelled.

"Helga, honey," Miriam had said. "You can stay with grandma, and maybe we can find a new home for the baby . . ."

"No one is taking that baby anywhere!" Bob roared again. "Where's the father? What has he said?"

Helga had shook her head and started crying.

"It was that football headed kid, wasn't it?" he demanded. Helga just cried more. Bob had shook his head, and muttered "Coward."

Graduation came, and went, and Helga was now past her first trimester. She'd had no morning sickness at all, so it was with shock at 18 weeks that she suddenly felt ill all day and night.

"Just eat heaps of small snacks," Miriam had told her.

It seemed to work. But as soon as it came, it went.

Olga had snuck into her room one night.

"I leave for New Zealand next week," she said. "I've checked with your obstetrician and the airlines, they will let you fly up to 34 weeks, with medical permission."

Helga hadn't needed to be told twice. She had agreed immediately.

At 20 weeks she went to the airport with her parents to see Olga off. Then snuck away, and into the departures and gotten on the plane without Bob and Miriam knowing. She sent one last text to her mom, then turned off her phone.

She was going as far away as she could.

And she never wanted to come back

…...

University had been a major ego booster for Gerald Johansson. He was they're star basketball player, going in on a scholarship, getting onto the varsity team. He met Indi, and fell in love . . . By the first break, they began living together, and Gerald had been ignoring calls and emails from Phoebe. It seemed as though she had finally gotten the hint and stopped trying to contact him, as he hadn't received anything for the past two weeks.

Then there was a knock on the door, and Indi had opened it to see Phoebe standing there.

"Is Gerald in?" she asked. Indi looked at her confused.

"Um, yeah, who's looking or him?" she asked.

"His girlfriend," Phoebe said sharply.

Indi's jaw dropped.

"Girlfriend?" she asked, stunned. "What . . . but, I'm his girlfriend. Have been since a week after Uni started . . ."

"Who is it babe?" he asked, coming into the lounge. He saw Phoebe, and then Indi turned to stare at him, confusion on her face.

"Your girlfriend?" she said and asked at the same time.

Gerald didn't know what to say or do.

"Gerald?" Phoebe asked.

"I don't love you anymore," he blurted out.

"Oh my god!" Indi yelled. "You had a girlfriend?"

Gerald looked at her. How the hell was he going to get out of this one?

"Forget it," Phoebe finally said. "I guess when you stopped answering my calls, texts and emails I should have got the hint, right?"

Gerald just nodded. Phoebe turned and walked away. Gerald walked up to the door and closed it, sighing. He looked at Indi.

"Awkward," he said with a smirk. Indi slapped him.

"You're a pig, an absolute pig!" she yelled at him. "If you'd do this to her, I wouldn't put it pat you to do it to me."

She turned and went into their bedroom, pulling out a suitcase and pulling clothes from the drawers.

"Wait, Indi, no," he begged. He pulled clothes out of her suitcase, then threw it on the floor. "Indi, babe, I can explain-"

"Save it!" she snapped. She threw her clothes back in. "Once a cheater, always a cheater."

She left.

And she never came back.

…...

Phoebe had been heartbroken, but at the same time it had cleared some things up for her. She too, had met someone else, but had been pushing him away because of Gerald, never mind her growing attraction for this new guy. But knowing that Gerald had no problem moving on helped her make that final move.

So what? It had been a school girl crush. Run it's course. Over now, so she could move onto a more mature relationship with someone who she could talk to everyday, not just when he decided to pick up his phone.

Still, when she got back to her dorm she dialled those so familiar numbers she had dialled everyday since she had been able to use the phone. She just wanted to hear Helga's voice, mend the bridge she'd burned at Gerald's insistence.

How could she have been so stupid?

"Hello?" she heard Helga's mom answer.

"Um, hi," she said quietly. She had no right to be calling. "Is Helga there?"

Miriam was quiet on the other line, and Phoebe thought she'd hung up.

"Hello?"

"She's gone," Miriam said. "Her and the baby are gone."

"Gone?" Phoebe asked, but the phone had been hung up.

What did Mrs Pataki mean by gone?

And the baby was real!?

After University she married Louis and they had their first baby - a boy - a year later.

One night she went into her email and looked up and old email address. She had just gotten her son down for the night and had realised she actually owed Gerald. After all, if he hadn't shown his true colours then, she may have made the mistake of staying with him and marrying him!

She never would have given Louis a chance, never would have had such a beautiful little boy. Never have been so happy!

So she sent two words to him in an email.

Thank you.

…...

Rhonda followed Arnold to University. It wasn't that she was serious about learning. She wasn't. but man, she loved being in a sorority and the parties.

And Arnold.

He attracted a lot of attention from other young woman at university, but he was hers and she made sure they knew it. She also wasn't above destroying their reputations if she had too.

After graduating from University, they went on vacation to the south of France, where he proposed to her. She had immediately said yes. They talked about children. Arnold said he wasn't fussed either way, Rhonda flat out told him she wasn't interested in children. He'd just shrugged.

She wondered if the stunt Helga had pulled in high school flashed through his mind.

It certainly did hers!

A couple of weeks after the proposal he told her he had to go on a trip for his new job. It was going to be a bit hard at first, he was going to be away often. But he loved her.

Two weeks later he finally walked in the door, looking stunned and shocked. He sat down on the couch, staring at nothing.

"What's wrong?" she asked, sitting down next to him. He looked at her, glassy eyed.

"What's happened?" she demanded. What had gotten into him.

"I have a daughter."