Chapter #4
Helga was pulling up in her red mustang with tired eyes and a sleepy smile. She recently had a wonderful dream of her being Kate Beckett from Castle, solving crimes and handing ass over to the law, while, messing with Castles emotions like a boss. She almost choose to be a detective like her but Helga knew she wouldn't have enjoyed it as much as she does what she's doing now. Helping others come back to life, instead of, catching the takers.
She pulled into a space three cars down from the 3rd floor door and parked. She grabbed her belongings, including, a New York Giants fuzz blanket Jacob gave to her last christmas. She wasn't all into the football scene but more Boston Red Socks. Jacob only bought it for her so anytime he came over he could cuddle with it. She smiled at the memory of her pretending to lose it when he came over for the big game that determined the Super Bowl teams and he flipped his lid trying to find it.
She climbed out of her car and turned to lock the door. She was pulling her key out of the lock when a man's hands blocked her sight, the soft hands were pressing against her eyes gently. She was still and straight as a twig. She didn't move and made her breathing slow down to a steady rate. She really didn't need an anxiety act now in the middle of the parking garage with a stranger behind her. She felt his breath on her ear with an intense heat.
This isn't the first time this has happened to her and probably won't be the last. It was always Jacob trying to get some information out of her or asking her out to some food place to get tasty treat like those wonderful doughnuts from the little bakery downtown in Little Italy.
"Miss Pataki. You have a treasure that I need. Will you hand it over nicely or should I have to take action?"
She was confused at the voice not being Jacob's. Then she realized it was someone else. A million things started to run through her mind, but, something kept telling her not to freak and to stay calm, and try to run away.
"Who are you? You're not Jacob and I honestly don't recognize your voice so please would you just let me go on my way."
He started laughing then dropped his hands, gripped her shoulders, and turned her around to face him. Helga was shocked to see Thaddeus Gammelthorpe aka. Curly. His smile was a sly one reaching the top of his, now wide red/brown eyes, laughing on the inside and out. Helga smiled and wrapped herself in his open arms, hugging him in a tight hug.
Thad and Helga grew close over the years, going to the same college, but, studying different things. They still took some of the same classes together and had a couple of drinks, got to know each other, and had a fling for a year. They eventually went their separate ways and lost contact with him when he left to study a new cancer research medication in the rain forest.
She looked into his eyes and saw that crazied and excentric man she fell in love with a long time ago. She started to lean forward into a kiss but then she remember that they weren't together anymore, which depressed her a little, but, she then reminded herself about him being her right in front of her, instead of the rain forest searching for a cure.
"What are you doing her Thad? I thought you were still in the rain forest searching for a cure for cancer." She was still holding on to him so tight that if she let go her life would dwindle down to an atom.
"How about I tell on the way to your office? I think it would be more, private, then this parking garage."
He smiled a soft smile and turned her away from the car, leading her towards the blue double doors. Helga held onto his waist acting like if she let go he would leave immediately disappear into another life far away from her, but, as they reached the main corridor she let go of his side and he followed suit. Their hands still brushed by their sides from time to time when walking and the same guy from the other day noticed.
"Hey, Doctor Pataki, did you change your mind or are you going to give him one?" This made both of the two adults stop in their track.
Thad turned and stared down the immature boy while, Helga crossed her arms over her chest, thinking of twenty different ways she could kill him and hide the body. Thad started laughing, his shaggy charcoal silk curls bounced with his every movement. Helga started to get lost in those curls with her eyes, remembering her precious memories, when she felt a hand on her waist and squeezing in someone's side that it brought her back into reality.
She turned her head to look into Jacob's crystal green eyes and smiled a grin so wide that it touched her joyful ocean blue eyes. Jacob matched it with his own and turned to the intern and his friends.
"Well, Chase. I never knew you liked girls. I mean, when you flirted with me and tried to take me to the supply closet on the fifth floor. I thought you were all gay but now that I see you hitting on Miss Pataki, here," He made a hand gesture pointing towards her and winked secretly for only her eyes to see. She registered his plan and started to follow along by acting surprised by what her best bi friend Jacob was telling the now growing crowd around them. " but, I knew you were just looking for a quickly so I declined. You're not worth it and definitely not cute enough for me or Helga here and definitely not for her sexy friend here. I am pretty sure too, that, since she is your boss she can charge you with sexual harassment and get your slimy ass fired."
The crowd started to do the normal o'ing of a crowd when someone was insulted and Helga looked up at Jacobs face that had success and pride plastered all over it. She turned to look at Thad and saw his face was full of enjoyment and laughter, like a little kids when they catch their friend doing something stupid and is swore to secrecy from telling the parents. She turned to Chase and saw his face was tomato red burning through his skin and big eyes filled with surprise. He was staring Jacob in the eyes then looked at Helga's. She saw embarrassment and his self-confidence breaking up like little shards of glass, but she also saw something else. Something she hadn't seen from anyone for a while. She realized it was pure hatred, which, made her flinch back in surprise, and he grinned a little then opened his mouth.
"She won't do shit to me. I am leaving and I'll be back tomorrow when you don't have your men to protect you."
She was instantly filled with rage and started to walk fast after his fading figure when someone grabbed her waist and held her back from beating him to a pulp. She thought to herself that she didn't need anyone to fight her fights. She was Helga Pataki and she could fight her own battles. Then why had she let Jacob stand up for her? Because Jacob was her best friend besides Phoebe and was only sticking up for her like any friend would. She swore to herself she would get her revenge some day but, right now she wanted to know who the hell stopped her in her tracks from punching that jack-ass square in the face.
"Let me go! That little worm needs to learn his place and I would be more than willing to put him there!"
"We're having a great start to the morning, aren't we Helga?"
Helga immediately let her shoulders fall and all the tension ran out of her. Phoebe always knew what to say, or more like it, what pressure points to push. Helga loved it when Pheebs would do that especially on such a stress-full days, but, she wanted to punch him and she just took all that fight away by pressing one spot. Helga shook her head and turned to look down at Pheebs petite stature.
"Why did you do that Pheebs. I was going to get him. I haven't punched something, or someone, in years..."
"You can punch me in the shoulder, or anywhere, but, just not the face or down there please." Thad pointed a finger down between his legs that Helga couldn't help but glance down at.
She immediately looked back up to him and smiled.
She hugged him, then when she knew he was comfortable in their arms she let go and punched him square in the shoulder as hard as she could. She pulled her hand close to her chest and turned around to let out a silent ow and look at her, now, red bruised hand. She didn't think he was stronger or gained muscles over the years because she couldn't see it under his New York sweat shirt. Now that she looked at his arms and chest she could see some muscles forming and his low chuckle shook his tan body.
"You jack-ass! Why didn't you tell me that you had muscles now?! Ow! Man, this really hurts. Did I at least get some pain through you?"
He shook his head and lifted up his sleeve to show just a tiny red dot where she punched him. She starred him down with a glare that only made him laugh harder. She turned from him to look at Phoebe hoping he would get the message to go away from her embarresment. She saw Phoebe was laughing too at the sight of Helga punching a thirty-two year old man that traveled through the rain forest for five years.
"Phoebe!" Helga was shocked to see her best girl friend laughing at her shame.
"Oh, Helga. I'm sorry, but that was really funny. Um, I came to find you to tell something disturbing. Did you know that Arnold was still working in the E.R.?" Helga felt Thad stiffen at his name and she raised a hand to her shoulder to calm him down before he did something stupid and dangerous. "I figured he just wanted to make you mad but, he claims he is still working here. Do you know anything about this?"
Helga nodded her head and turned to face Thad. His face was tight and emotionless, until, Helga moved her hand to his face and his eyes turned to her's. What she saw made her feel sad on the inside. Thad went through so much with Helga that he didn't want to see it all crash down because of one boy. He found her at the college alone and depressed, she told him all that happened over the summer leading up to that day. He stayed with her for years being her friend when she needed one and a lover when they fell for the other. Helga understood why he would be acting this way. He put on a smile for her, and, only her.
"I have to leave soon, to go back to South Americaand finish my research. I was wondering if we could catch up over some dinner later tonight if you weren't busy."
Helga made her face a thoughtful one pretending to wiegh her options in her head making him feel uncomfortable for asking. She looked down at Pheobe who was now pretending to flip through important papers. She sighed and amiled up at her old lover and best friend.
"Why not? I get off work at eight tonight for a couple of hours and I know this fantasic asian resturaunt on third street."
"Sounds perfect to me. I'll pick you up at eight then. Oh, and Jacob is pretty funny. I am glad you found someone like him to keep you sane, besides you Phoebe." He smiled his perfect smile and gave her a hug lasting a little too long for just friends zone. She enjoyed it a little to much too, breathing in his scent of fresh rain dew and the trees he would climb sixty feet high to achieve just one leaf. She let go first noticing Pheobe's tapping impatient foot on the hard marble. He gave her one last look and left on his way while Helga stared after his retreating figure.
"Helga. You aren't going to get involved with Curly again, are you? He's leaving soon to go back to South America and probably won't come back till, who-knows-when. You can't wait for him Helga. You're wasting your life on a impossible chance."
Helga sighed and looked at her child-hood friend, showing longing and yet, she understood everything that she was saying. But, something inside kept made her pissed that Pheobe, her best friend since one, told her she couldn't wait for someone she was in love with. She had been in love with Arnold since she was three till the summer before she left for college. She didn't ever tell her that it wasn't worth waiting for him. She never held her back from deciding, following, stalking him!
"Phoebe. You have no right to tell me who I can and can not date and/or wait for. If you wan't to know, Arnold never left. We made a few rules and things he couldn't, no, wouldn't do. He is aloud to stay until I fire him or he quits."
Helga looked pissed and Pheobe understood why. She was upset that she wasted most of her younger years on a guy who never wanted her back. Pheobe sighed in concentration and frustration, trying to find a way to calm Helga down when she came upon a curious idea.
"Helga. Are you, you know, starting to fall for Arnold, again? You and I both know that you would never re-hire or even hire someone with previous history with you and I or anyone that was in Hillwood. You turned down so many of our friends that, Lia had to go to a different department to even get a job at this hospital, but not him. Not the man who broke your heart, the one who left you standing in the rain crying tears of pain. If you still held that grudge that I know you, Helga Geraldine Pataki, would hold agianest anyone that would cause you an ounce of pain like he did, you would have them immediatly thrown out of the state with some sources I don't know. Admit it Helga. No matter what he does, or say, you will always be in love with him."
She turned and left her standing in the hallway, alone while machines were transported to seperate rooms for seperate things and the sounds of wheels squicking and beeps from many rooms montering heart rates. The only thing that Helga was hearring in mind was the hurt and anger in Pheobe's voice that she had only heard once before when Pheobe and Gerald had a fight over a very stupid topic that matter a lot to her at the time but soon forgot afterwards, but, she didn't talk to him for about three months till he started to sereinade in the middle of her work that made her forgive him.
Helga felt one solid emotional tear going down her cheek, she furiously wiped it away, and went striaght to her office. She slammed the door and flopped into her chair, curled up, and covered herself with the blanket, drifting softly to sleep...
Three Hours Later:
Helga woke to a knock on her door, letting her eye lashes flutter open to see a certain petite asian holding stacks of thick envelopes, placing them on her desk in a huff, and started to walk out when Helga stop her before she could barely open the door. She turned her around in a gentle motion hoping that she would be opened minded and take her back with little questions asked.
"Phoebe. Please listen to me. I'm not going to allow him to be injected into my heart while it is still pumping my stubborn through my purple and blue veins. I know you're scared that I will, go back, to the state I was in before until you, Thad, and Jacob helped me through. I learned from my mistakes and I won't be stupid to re-make them again."
Phoebe stared into Helga's crystal blue eyes and saw she was telling the truth and desperation that Phoebe would believe her. Phoebe let go of the breath she was holding onto and sighed. Helga did the same and started to wrap Phoebe in hug until she held up her hand and single index finger lifted meaning wait. Helga looked confused but Phoebe had a good motive to stop it that she would soon explain to Helga.
"Hold on Helga. I am not excepting your apology yet," Helga let her head hang low and stared at her shoes. Phoebe felt sorry and knew she didn't need this right now. Neither of them truely needed this new stress on their shoulders. She was sure that Helga had some more since Curly decided to come back from his trip. " but, we need to talk about all this, and, you need my support right now. So. Come here and give me a hug."
Helga immediatly picked her up in her arms and swung her around the room. She knew, even if it was just a few hours, that it was too long for them to be seperate and mad at each other for Helga. She never had been this far from her for more than thirty minutes and it had made a little hole in her spot for Phoebe in her heart.
"Oh Phoebe! I am so happy you forgave me so quickly! I knew you would understand. Ooo! This is why I love you so much! Don't ever scare me like that again! Oh. You smell like fresh flowers. Let me guess, Gerald?"
Phoebe giggled a girlish one and Helga placed her on the floor gently reaking of fresh flowers that she knew smelt of daffidels and Lilacs. Those where what Gerald always bought her when he knew she had been stressing out, for some reason Helga never understood, the scent of the two flowers mixed always seemed to work. Helga just had a headache from it if she sniffed too much.
"Alright Phoebe's. Get out of here before your, scent, gives me another migraine. Oh and did you get the paychecks from the office? I have to hand them out today before people start bumbarding me with complaints and my door will never be closed."
"Actually, the checks are on your desk and everyone that's supposed to be working today is except Jessica and Kyle. And if you want to know, Arnold is on the third floor."
Helga had walked over to her desk and stopped shuffling through the pay checks and stared straight ahead. She knew who was on the third floor and running their operation. She knew he went up there to see Lila and couldn't help thinking that he reknidle some more memories from the past.
"Thanks Pheebs. I'll be right on this. Don't worry about me. I have this all covered."
Phoebe nodded then left the room, closing the door softly with a click. Helga huffed and ran her hands over her face, squizzing the bridge of her to dull a creeping headache. She opened her eyes with irration and went to her coat hanger, grabbing her pink lab jacket, stuffing her coat pocket with the thick envelopes, walking out of the comfort of her nice, commfy, warm, office.
She walked around the floor handing checks, stuffing busy others with surprises of the touch of her hand near their thighs or breats pockets. Some even gave her the occaisoinaly wink or fake play flirtation that friends would do. Of course one, a newbie that Helga thought of as a little brother, dared to take a chance, hoping she calmed down a little to take his joke lightly and laugh.
"Mmmm... Dr. Pataki. You look so good in these halls, I should be paying you to be here everyday. Not the other way around." He smirked and she just shook her head and chuckled at the little comment that her newbie made.
"Oh Markie. I love you too much to threaten to fire you, but, sadly you might deserve it. Plus, I would miss you too much." She had a smile from ear to ear and started to turn away from him and walk towards the elevator when she heard Mark whistle at her retreating figure. She just shook her head and laughed.
She pressed the elevator up button tapping her foot impatiently, waiting for the electrical box to come down from the seventh floor. She started to imagine thoughts about the conversations that Arnold and Lila could be having when the doors opened. She stepped inside and the doors closed slowly. Her thoughts came back to the whole Lila and Arnold situation accurring. He could be hiding in a closet, or even worse, a patients room doing, un-mentable, things. Helga's face flustered with anger and forced her thoughts to change. She thought of the kids on this floor and how they would look in their 'beds', sick and recovering room terrible accidents. She felt sick stepping off the elevator to the pediactrics ward. She loved kids but her heart broke when she saw them in any of these conditions.
She walked down the hall way a few feet stopping to look in the nursery glass. Six beautiful healthy babies were on the other side. Four little girls wrapped in light pink blankets, and , two little boys covered in blue. She smiled at the new future children and what they might accomplish, but, right now they had a cute soft faces with rosey cheeks. They were perfection in human form.
She wanted a baby. She had always wanted a husband to bare children with. The only problem was the men she had dated only wanted one thing and most were intimidated by her and her job. Plus the 'men' at her work didn't really prove any of her doubts wrong. She sighed in frustration and sadness, knowing there wouldn't be any new borns in her near future.
"I want to cry everytime I see them. I will never know what it's like to be able to care for another like a mother and her child." She felt someone's presence beside her and just started talking, wanting to just get her thoughts out. Her hand touched the glass and then retracted it, looking away from her own depressing thoughts, looking into his grass green eyes. They were stricken with pain and sadness for his old friend, but his face told it all. It was based with shock that she would something so personal to her, coated with conteint that she trusted him with such, and splashed with some guilt about thinking he could be her husband right now with five kids if they wanted. He should have taken his chance with her when he had it.
"Helga, I am so sorry. I didn't know... So, when did you find out your overies and eggs weren't responsive?"
Helga's face went wide with shock and her already flustrated pink cheeks increased in redness. She couldn't believe, Arnold, of all people would say something as ridiculous like that. At first she thought it was a joke he was playing on her, until, she realized he was being serious and there was no hint of laughter anywhere on his face. She huffed out the breath she was holding on to and gestured for him to follow her back to the elevator, handing him his paycheck along the way. He leaned forward and pressed the button to go down, thanking her at the same time.
"My ovaries are fine by the way. It's just the stupidity of man that have refused me of love to make me want to commit to them."
Arnold just looked at Helga and shook his head. He couldn't believe she was so pickie, but, then again, most of the guys he's seen around Helga, except Jacob, were real jerks and sleeze balls around the hospital floor she worked on. He just couldn't believe she wouldn't already have been in love with one already. He kept contimplating until the elevator ding sounded in his ears. Then he blurted his stupidest thoughts out in a whisper.
"What about me? What if we had kids together? I mean, I'd let her keep her job and I'd stay at home with the kids... Why did I let my stupidity of being a child get to me..."
Helga stepped inside the metal box and looked away from his face blushing, making sure Arnold couldn't see her suprised happy face. She shook it off the second he leaned in and pressed the button for the ground floor. She stuffed her hands in her pockets to calm her shaking hands.
"So. How's Miss Lila Sawyer? I haven't talked to her in a while." Helga looked over at Arnold's staring eyes and looked away, feeling like a piece of art he was examinging. Arnold noticed his wandering eyes and darted his eyes straight ahead. He felt the air start to tense and wished to himself that the elevator would hurry up.
"You do mean Misses Lila Sisla? She got married two years ago apparently. She meet him at a bar somewhere on East Jasmine Street. They hit it off immediatly and she has never been happier. She showed me a picture of him and his family, their really beautiful and, from what's she told me, madly in love." Arnold didn't realize how much his words hurt Helga until he saw a single tear with such sadness roll down her face and landing on the bleached floor. He went over and ran his thumb under her eye to wipe the watery emotion from her face and Helga turned her face away from him. He wished he just shut up with the first sentence and left it at that.
"She deserves her happiness with all of the hard work she has done. I mean, she didn't get to where she was with just her 'free spirit' and beauty. She is wonderful with the kids she works with. If I ever do have a child, I would trust her with their life. She just that wonderful, and she's being working here for four years. She has the experence for it." Helga was looking at him with a soft smile on her face, speaking about a woman who has many terrible years of her life, but noticed a change for the past few years. Arnold just looked at Helga with surprise and loving for the woman she has become. Last time he saw her she still had the hateful lust for Lila.
"How long have you been here? Lila said you came before her. You know she was inspired by you doing what you are now. She said she came in one day for her cousin's liver operation and saw you prep-ing for the surgery. She thought if you were willing to help others than she should too. She's had bad experiences with adults and always loved being around the joy of kids. Plus she knew you were already going to take control of the whole downstairs operation soon because your talent shined through." He was smiling at her making her heart skip a beat.
Everything she thought about Lila changed in that moment. She never knew she was the reason Lila started to go back to school. Hell, she didn't even know she was married. She always thought Lila thought these jobs as a challenge between the two of them. Helga felt like a total bitch for even thinking about the thoughts before hand. She was so worried about Arnold that- Why was she worried about him? She didn't even like him like that anymore! Did she?
"Hey Arnold. Not to just change the subject or anything, but, Phoebe has had these weird thoughts and asumstions, that, it's going to be tough for us to work together. I keep telling her it'll be fine because we're on good terms, but, she doesn't seem to want to believe me. Do you?"
Helga turned her lowered eyes from her white nurse shoes to his beautiful grass ones. She saw so many emotions flash across them and hope was one of them. She truely wanted to believe that he did too but, from what was coming and going on his face worried her. He honestly didn't know how to answer her question.
"Helga... I honestly don't know how to answer that," He saw hurt flash through her eye's and immediatly felt terrible about his word choice but he felt it was true and she needed to hear it. He grabbed her chin in his hand and lifted it to face his own. "but, what I do know is, i am the first, besides Phoebe, to be hired by you from your past. You are a strong and, very stubborn, woman. I know you don't feel feelings for me anymore by what you did in the garage, making that very clear to me. But, I honestly don't know how I feel and wish you would hear me out for once instead of running away like always. Plus you're my boss and I'm not allowed to have any relations with you."
That last few statements he made Helga jerk her head out of his hands, not only noticing how close they were that she could feel his every speaking breath on her face but by saying she never stood for the truth. If he wanted the truth then she'll give it to him.
"Did you know Thaddeus is back in town and wants to take me to diner? Him and I had a thing back in college after I left town. He found me crying in the cemetery beneath an angel looking towards the sky. It sounds like a fictional novel to me but-"
Helga was interrupted by a sudden surge in the elevator, where she went flying into Arnold's arms. He caught her instantly, holding her close against his chest with his arms wrapped around her pressing her head close and closed his eyes. The elevator dropped for a few seconds with lights flickering in and out. Helga tightened her grip around Arnold's crisp blue cotton button up and felt him laughing from the shaking coming from his chest. She wondered why he even thought this experience was funny. They could die!
"Helga. You can let go now if you want. I suggest doing so before 'someone' gets the wrong message. It has stopped for now but, we're stuck. The doors are caught between the third and second floor. We only dropped one level so I think we'll be fine if we just decided to drop one more. Good thing we're in a hospital huh?"
Arnold was smirking, still holding Helga close to him, cherishing this moment for as long as he could. Helga noticed a few seconds later trying to get her mind in check from what just shocked her half to death itself, that, Arnold was still holding her in his arms. She immediately backed away into the corner farthest away from him, sliding down the wall and plopping in a heap, hugging her knees to her chest resting her head in her knees. Arnold just shook his head and sat down next to her.
"So," He nudged her with his shoulder and managed to get a growl out of her which caused a roar of laughter from him. "how's Mr. Curly? Still obsessed with Rhonda or did he change his obsession to you?"