The early morning sun streamed in through the skylight over Arnold's bed, dappling his room in patches of light and shadow. He blinked his eyes open and shifted under his sheets. He'd been tossing and turning for the past two hours, but he kept pulling the covers over his head in hopes that he might just sleep the whole day away.

He yawned and reached up to grab his phone from the bookshelf behind his bed; he'd been checking it roughly every twenty minutes since he first woke up, although he wasn't sure what he was checking for—it's not like anyone would be texting him at 7AM, and especially not on a Sunday.

His old conversations glowed up at him in bright yellow and blue. There was Gerald, going on about whether a skinny tie or a cravat (whatever that was) would be more appropriate for the first day of school. Arnold, of course, had no idea—it's not that he didn't care what he looked like, but at this point his best friend probably knew more about style than most of the girls in their school, so he was at a loss for even marginally constructive feedback whenever Gerald brought up anything about clothes.

You lost me at 'bespoke suiting,' he'd responded, and imagined his best friend coasting in tomorrow morning looking like he fell out of one of those blogs he was always pulling up, with pictures of impossibly cool guys from Reykjavik wearing weird sweaters and red pants.

And then of course there was the message he'd sent Helga after their little incident in the park.

Helga. He groaned and buried his face in his pillow. He'd barely seen her all summer, and yet within the span of five minutes, everything was back to the way it always was.

Arnold replayed the scene over in his mind, trying to figure out exactly what he could have done differently, but the truth was that—as always—he had no idea.

He didn't even know any more if he was annoyed at her or himself or the fact that he was still thinking about it three days later, or just at the reality that somehow despite his best efforts, it seemed like things always deteriorated between them practically before he was even done saying hello.

He wasn't even sure why it bothered him so much—maybe it was just the fact that he'd made it through his entire school career being that one guy who could talk to anyone—geeks, populars, jocks, drama weirdos, whoever. Anyone except Helga Pataki.

Well, I guess it didn't help that I hit her in the face with a soccer ball.

Well, technically he hadn't actually hit her in the face, but that hardly mattered.

He scrolled down to their brief conversation. On Friday morning he'd checked in on her to see how she was doing, and on Saturday at 6:37PM she'd responded:

Don't worry, I'm still alive.

That was it. He'd followed up by asking her if she thought she'd be okay for picture day, but she hadn't answered.

Maybe if he'd just gone over to say hello? Invited her to come play soccer with them, like he'd considered when he first saw her wander into the park and set up camp under that tree?

But of course that most likely would have gone awry as well.

Hey Helga, I like your dress.

Hey! I saw you over here and thought I'd . . .

So, ready for school to start?

Hi.

As he ran through all the things he might've said, he remembered why he hadn't gone up to her in the first place: after fourteen years, the one thing he knew for sure when it came to Helga Pataki was that no matter what he said, it was always the wrong thing.

Why am I even worrying about this?

Before even he finished his thought, however, he already knew the answer was that worrying about his infinite squabbles with Helga was exponentially better than letting his mind crack open the Pandora's box he swore he'd never let himself touch again.

His eyes wandered down to the message he'd read more times than he cared to admit.

It was so nice to see you! I've really missed you! Let's catch up soon.

He sighed. Maybe going to the park had been a mistake all around.

Before his mind could wander any further down that familiar old path, he tossed his phone to the side and forced himself to sit up and plant his feet on his bedroom floor. The distinct smell of raspberry pancakes and bacon had wafted up to his room, and he wasn't about to let the boarders polish everything off before he made it downstairs.

He threw on his robe and plodded down to the kitchen, where his grandfather sat happily eating a plate of bacon on the edge of a table that was otherwise covered in a clutter of office supplies, from Elmer's glue and crayons to packages of resume paper.

Even though Arnold had grown up in a house filled with "strange," somehow things like this still never failed to surprise him. He grabbed a plate, loaded it up with a few pancakes and sat down, shoving aside a binder with a cartoon train on the front of it to make room for his plate.

"Morning, Shortman!" Phil just kept eating, as if using a coloring book as a place mat was a completely normal thing to do. Arnold furrowed his brow.

"Grandpa, what is all this stuff?" He picked up a little package of flower-shaped post-it notes.

"Well, I just thought you might be needing some supplies for school!" Phil said, as if the answer were plain as day.

Arnold eyed his grandfather and grabbed one of the more confusing objects from the array.

"A staple gun? Grandpa, I'm pretty sure I don't need this."

"You never know Arnold, you never know."

Arnold rolled his eyes.

"Come on grandpa! A label maker? A box of 48 yellow highlighters? Kitten stickers? You know I don't need any of this stuff."

"Really? I thought for sure you'd love the stickers. Oh those adorable little cats, they'll look so cute—"

"Grandpa—"

"Well, if you don't need any of it I guess you'll just have to go return it all and pick up the things you want! Of course I'd do it for you, but I'm an old man Arnold!"

Arnold knew his grandfather was up to something, he just wasn't sure what it was.

"All of that driving and shopping and lifting, the old ticker might explode any minute! Of course none of this was a brilliantly calculated scheme to get you to stop moping around and get out the door—that would be manipulative and sneaky and—oh alright Arnold, you got me! It was all a scheme to get you to stop moping around and get out the door!"

"You don't say." Arnold looked at his grandfather through narrowed eyes.

"I do say!" Phil moved his chair closer to Arnold's. "Don't think I haven't noticed the way you've been dragging around here all weekend, sighing and looking tortured the way you teenagers do."

Arnold rested his chin in his hands.

"I haven't been 'moping' grandpa." He hadn't. Had he?

"Oh come on Arnold, you can't fool me. Every time I turn around, there you are, sighing and slumping over like someone in one of those depressing music videos you kids love to watch."

"Are you trying to call me 'emo' grandpa?"

"Yes! What's an emo?"

Arnold laughed and sat up straight in his chair. As ridiculous as all of this was, maybe Phil had a point after all. When he thought about it, he hadn't even left the boarding house since Thursday night when he'd gone to the store for some milk and cereal.

"Maybe you're right grandpa. I don't know. I'm usually pretty excited for school to start, but lately I just feel like . . . well, I don't even know what I feel."

"It's normal Arnold! It's your last year of high school. Soon you'll be an adult and then you'll have to face the crushing responsibilities of finding a job and supporting a family of seven on a coal miner's salary! I don't blame you for wanting to sleep all day, Shortman."

"Thanks a lot," Arnold said sarcastically.

Phil winked at his grandson and offered him a second serving of bacon.

"Whad'ya say we finish up breakfast and then return all this junk to the store? Except the kitten stickers. I'm keeping those."

"Sounds good grandpa." Arnold smiled to himself as he finished up his pancakes. Even though his grandparents had never been what he'd consider "normal," somehow in their own strange and roundabout way they always seemed to know how to cheer him up.

After breakfast, Arnold and his grandfather returned the pile of supplies to a very confused cashier, and then they both bought new shoes and stopped off at the supermarket to do the week's grocery shopping before returning to the boarding house.

It turned out that as usual, Phil was right. Just getting up and out the door was enough to make Arnold realize what a rut he'd been in for the past few days. Whatever it was, it seemed that an afternoon with his grandfather had helped him shake it off. After he unloaded the shopping bags from the car and restocked the pantry, he wandered up to his room with a renewed sense of excitement for the new year.

Arnold stretched out on his bed, wondering what the first day of school would bring. He yawned. He was starting to feel the effects of waking up at 5AM, and he decided to pop in a movie and relax for a few hours before getting everything together for the morning.

He leaned against the pool table.

"I got it from that record store downtown. The one by—"

He stopped mid-sentence. When he felt her hand on his shoulder, he realized why his best friend's expression had changed so suddenly.

"Can I talk to you?" she whispered. She was close enough that he could hear her over the music pumping through the house and the excited roar of everyone flirting, talking and singing all around them.

"Of course," he said as nonchalantly as he could manage. A dizzying mixture of curiosity, panic and unbridled hope shot through him. Gerald raised an eyebrow.

"Catch you later man?"

He nodded.

She grabbed his hand.

She was leading him upstairs, outside, away from the party. The muffled sound of the music thumping from behind glass doors echoed the thumping in his chest as he wondered if this was it—the moment he was sure was never actually going to happen—unfolding in front of him here on Rhonda Lloyd's balcony.

"Gosh, can you believe we graduated?" she said, hovering closer to him than he could ever remember her doing before. "It seems like just yesterday we were in fourth grade." She laughed.

She had to know how perfect she was. She had to. Standing there in the moonlight with her hair done up in soft red curls, her skin perfect and pale, her eyes lighting his heart on fire like they always did.

"Yeah, it's pretty crazy." He tried to keep his cool, even though he was sure his nervous energy was radiating from every pore in his body.

And then before he had time to wonder what he should say next, she was kissing him. In that moment, fantasies of them holding hands, sitting together in school assemblies and laughing as their friends taunted them for sneaking off behind the bleachers during gym class flooded his mind the way they so often did, except now, finally, they were actually within reach. And then she was backing away.

"Arnold, I'm moving."

All of the wonderful things he'd felt just a second ago were sucked out, and replaced by—nothing. A void. Whatever you call the moment just before the terrible thing happens, when that tiny part of your brain is still clinging to the hope that what's about to happen isn't actually about to happen.

"You're moving? When?"

He struggled to make sense of what exactly was going on.

"Quite soon, actually." She looked at the ground and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "We're leaving in three days."

She said something about her father's job and it all being very new and sudden and wasn't it crazy how things could change just like that. She was in the middle of a sentence when he blurted out—

"Why did you kiss me?"

She hesitated for the briefest of moments, and then she smiled that perfect, intoxicating, innocent smile of hers that would haunt him for the better part of the next year and said simply "I suppose I've just always wanted to know what it would be like."

And she and took his hand and told him she hoped they wouldn't lose touch, and she reached up once more and kissed him on the cheek before she disappeared back into the house to say her goodbyes.

And before he could go after her, he was falling. Falling from somewhere he couldn't see and there was no ground below him and then there were sharp rocks and then nothing and suddenly Bruce Willis was shouting at him.

Arnold woke up with a knot in his stomach.

He glanced at the time. 6:12PM. "Die Hard" was still playing on his computer.

He'd only been asleep for about forty minutes, but it felt like he'd been out for three days.

He stared up at the ceiling as John McClane yelled and shot at things.

So Lila was back after three years, when he thought he'd never have to see her again. So much had changed since then. He'd changed since then. And hanging out in the park had been fine. It really had. There was no reason why everything couldn't be fine tomorrow, and the day after that and the day after that.

And then, before he could think about it any further, he went downstairs to see if his grandfather needed help with dinner.

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Originally this chapter was going to be Helga and Phoebe hanging out and debriefing after the incident in the park (which I'll probably still write), and then someone (Nep2uune) left a review that said "I think Arnold did that on purpose. So he would have a reason to come over there." And while I knew that that wasn't the exact direction I was going right now, it made me stop and think a lot about what exactly was running through Arnold's mind, and actually helped me fill in some back story to this larger arc that I hope I'll be able to create as the story moves forward (the events of the dream came about as a result of thinking about all of this—that wasn't even an idea before I started thinking about Arnold's state of mind more).

Helga has such a rich emotional life that it's really easy to just write everything from her perspective and gloss over whatever's going on with Arnold. I think he's got a deep well of emotion too, but to me he seems like he's a lot less in touch with his emotions than Helga is. At least that's my take. It was fun kind of putting them through this similar struggle thinking about their respective pasts and seeing how they both process things differently, especially since it fits in perfectly with the larger story I already knew I wanted to tell. This chapter was actually really hard to write (I must have started it six different ways!), but I'm really glad I didn't miss out on delving into Arnold's thought process more.

So I guess what I'm saying is, please review the story! Haha :) Seriously though, I do love hearing from people, or even seeing that people are following the story (which hopefully means you're enjoying it!).

I know I said I might start writing longer chapters, but this is my first time getting back to writing in quite a while and I'd forgotten how hard it can be. I feel like filling in 80% of the story is fun and wonderful, and then nailing down that last 20% and figuring out exactly how to make it all come together can be torture. So … I probably won't be writing longer chapters, in the interest of actually being able to update this regularly vs feeling totally overwhelmed and disappearing for a month. Wheee!

Oh, and finally-am I the only one who can totally see Gerald turning into a hipster? He's always been so cool, and I find it really amusing to imagine him growing up and always looking completely sharp in narrow pants & button-downs.

Till next time!

xox- FL

(oh PS, if anyone's wondering about the cover image I finally added, it's from Edward Hopper's "Morning Sun.")