Chapter Seven. Hmm, I think you guys will like this one. I do, but that tends to change sometimes. Oh yes, and yesterday, I got the most awesome idea for another fanfic! But I'm not sure if I should put it up now or wait. But Ruthie (Ruthless) is halfway in her body bag, and even though I love her to death, the end is nigh. Oh well, I'll figure it out when I figure it out…
And I'm very, very, very, very, very (you get the point) sorry, that it took me so L O N G to update! My computer's been broken, and I was bursting with ideas, and no where to put them! And a humungous thank you to Jae B and RuffMaster, which helped me to surrender to my weakness, and crawl to my Dad and beg him to fix this thing (Which made me sick, because he fixed it in 20 seconds, and I've been sobbing over it for almost two months!) Okay, time to read!!!
Disclaimer: I don't own Hey Arnold
Chapter Seven: Who, Where, and When
Dear Helga,
How are you? I think it's about time to wake up, or speak, or something. Dr. Phelps, or Bliss, or whoever, is beginning to stare. But what if she is Dr. Bliss? No, don't even think such things. Dr. Bliss is probably sitting in her office, at the Hillwood Medical Center, sipping coffee, trying to understand the complex goings on of some tortured twelve year old. Dr. Bliss is miles away…
Sincerely,
-Your Conscience
P.S. Say Something-Quick!
"You're not Dr. Bliss.", Helga said, more or less out of nowhere. 'Is that the best you can do?', she asked herself. Her conscience told her to speak and she stated the obvious.
"No, I'm Dr. Phelps.", she said, smiling across the room. Even though Dr. Phelps was all the way over there, Helga couldn't help but feel like she was under a magnifying glass, being peered at by a large, familiar brown eye.
"Then how'd you know my name?", Helga asked, now on the questioning end of the spectrum.
"It's on your transcript.", she replied, holding up the manila folder that once rested on her desk. "But I used to be a Dr. Bliss.", she said, smiling, knowing she'd practically outsmarted one of her more intelligent patients.
For the second time that day, Helga's jaw graced the floor. How did she not see this coming? No one else could have been so calm to her aggressiveness. No one else could have gotten her talking like a normal person so quickly without a fight. And, most importantly, no one could have made her open up like that. She should have known from the second she walked through the door that this was no ordinary "guidance counselor". This was one of those guidance counselors that doubled as a Jedi, and did not hesitate to throw a mind trick at you the moment you weren't looking.
"What happened?", Helga said, ready to leap out of her chair, and question this…person to confirm if it really was Dr. Bliss.
"I could ask you the same thing.", she said, in equal surprise and joy.
"Yeah, about that…", Helga started, at once silencing herself little by little. Despite her trying to avoid the subject entirely, Dr. Bliss turned the compass back north and Helga found herself cornered. "Ya want the long version, or the much less painful short version?"
"Which ever one you like.", Dr. Phelps, replied, crossing her legs and sitting up straighter than she already was, in configuration for intense listening.
Helga began with their last visit, just to refresh Dr. Phelps' memory. She mentioned noticing how her father had seemed different for about a week leading up to everything. He'd taken more days off of work, and insisted that her mother not bother to replace him for his absences around the office. "…And that was it. I never saw them after that." She thought about adding another quickly composed spiteful comment somewhere around the end, but declined. The situation was already far beyond snide comments to turn around and make it into Standup Comedy Night.
"I'm very sorry to hear about that.", she remarked, actually sounding melancholic. Essentially, Helga's aim wasn't to get a sympathy card from everyone she met. But a little pity never killed anyone, right? "Has it helped you vent a little anger?"
"If your asking if I'm less angry, than before, I don't know, maybe. But if your asking if I'm angry at all, then yeah, I guess I am."
"I understand why you'd be angry…"
And so began Dr. PHELPS twelve minute discussion on why it's perfectly normal for Helga to be upset about what happened, and that it wasn't her fault. Helga, while evidently enraptured with the new idea of having Dr. Phelps there to talk to on a regular basis, she was involuntarily forced to tune her out a little. Some phrases, for instance, made Helga get the notion that Dr. Phelps had watched Dr. Phil obsessively, waiting for the chance to spring her newfound ideas on some tortured child.
But of course, Dr. Phelps (She often had the tendency to come close to reverting back to Bliss) wasn't one to be blocked out forever. She found a way to make her words so permanent, that they moved into your brain, and despite how many eviction notices you left pinned to the door, they refused to budge until you gave in. Helga waited until there was a pause in her lecture, to start paying attention again.
"I guess your right. I mean Olga helps…a little.", she mumbled. She hadn't meant to divulge that about herself, but it seemed as though she had a secret portal that led straight to her mind, and could look up anything she wanted. And it was probably written somewhere in her transcript.
"So your back in touch with Olga?"
"You could say that. I'm living with her…for now, anyway." This time she couldn't help adding that to the end. After all, how was she to know if this thing would work out? Just because the past two days were bearable, didn't mean the next two months would be.
"So how is that-"
Dr. Phelps found herself promptly interrupted by a loud, and altogether annoying, beep, signaling the end of Helga's lunch.
"I didn't mean to take up your entire lunch.", she said, separating herself from her chair. Helga proceeded to do the same.
"It's fine. I had a big breakfast.", Helga replied, flashing a genuine smile. Making a connection with someone who she could be herself around was amazingly refreshing. But then again, that was debatable as well. She probably wouldn't have had to morph into someone she wasn't, but it'd just be a little bit safer.
"In case you need to talk, you know where my office is.", Dr. Phelps assured her, as she left. But before she could properly depart, she was handed a folded piece of stationary.
"Give this to all of your teachers."
"Thanks", Helga called, over her shoulder. Helga dared to take a peek at the paper and found a neatly written note to all of her teachers, asking them to address her by Annabelle. She smiled, and stuffed the note in her pocket.
Candy had told her what classes she had in what building, and from her now crumpled schedule, she had to be across the campus in exactly 3 minutes. Nothing like showing up late to a class full of people you don't know, or probably do and wish you didn't, and not even know what anyone is saying.
In a terrible attempt to multitask, Helga somehow avoided running into walls, people, even an empty trashcan. But somehow doors were a little too crafty, especially since half of them were "clear" from the corner of her eyes.
When she finally came to, she was surrounded by about eight blurry faces. All of them looked up at her as if she were molting and she was about to crawl out of her skin at any given moment. Some idiot even had the audacity to wave his fingers in her face and ask how many of them he had up.
Helga promptly brushed the hand from in front of her face, mentally cursing whoever it was that thought that they may have actually been helping. She sat up, and tried to retrieve her books from wherever in the hallway they decided to land. By this time, a large number of people had left, seeing as there was no blood, or loss of memory, there probably also wasn't any interest in some clumsy kid running into a door. Unknown to Helga though, someone was talking to her.
"…And I'm sorry, I shouldn't have opened the door so fast, and it's my fault…"
Helga tried to throw in a few, "It's okay", and "Really, I'm fine", but talking to this kid was hopeless. After about another minute, Helga merely got up and uttered one final, "Thank You" over her shoulder, and resumed trying to find her class.
After safely locating the correct building she sighed, long and deep, and the three flights of stairs, it'd take to reach her classroom. Knowing that she'd be late, she began to run frantically up the stairs, glad that she was the only one on them, figuring that the rest of the student body used some hidden escalator that was only known by people who'd lived there since forever.
Finally, arriving at the top of the stairs, she was pronounced late by the annoying "bell, that in reality, sounded nothing like a bell. Her classroom was just around the corner, from the numbers situated above all the classroom doors.
To her surprise, there were many other students who were equally tardy, and rushed inside, before their teacher could notice that they weren't there. She joined the throng, more like rode the coattails and ushered herself inside, and scanned the room for the teacher.
Surprise #2: Teachers look like kids. Had Mrs. Walters not been trying to hush the class, and yell at them to begin conjugating verbs, Helga would have mistaken her for a short freshman. Despite the lack of sun outside, the room seemed to suck in light from some secret place, illuminating the room.
Mrs. Walters was short and light-skinned, with short black hair, cut into a bob. She wore thin, frameless glasses, and spoke faster than the ear could comprehend. Helga, approached her immediately after she snatched some kid's hat off, and set it on his desk. Handing her schedule and "note" over, she waited to be assigned a seat.
"Well, hello Annabelle," she began smiling long and wide. Her teeth were awfully straight. "You can take a seat, wherever you like, there are plenty of empty desks here." She said, pointing to one area of the class room. It was, for the most part desolate, with one or two people scattered amongst the 5 empty desks. Helga decide to place herself an equal distance from both of them.
She sat quietly, waiting as the class began it's opening activity. There wasn't much of a variety of different people in this school. It seemed as though all of the students, save a few creative souls, shaped their entire appearances after Catherine Zeta-Jones or Brad Pitt. It was near sickening.
The class was unusually loud, an this suited Helga just fine. The louder other people were, the quieter she seemed. And the quieter she seemed, the less noticeable she became. Invisibility, the perfect disguise.
"Do I know you from somewhere?" Guess the invisibility costume had a hole in it.
"I doubt it.", Helga said turning to the direction of yet another unidentified voice, that chose to talk to her. She wasn't trying to be out-and-out rude, but at least tell people who you are before you engage in a conversation with them.
"I think so. Were you in any of my classes this morning?"
Helga decided to turn and glare at her unwanted audience, hoping it'd turn him the other way, and he'd decide to talk to someone else's ear off for the rest of eternity. Unfortunately, she had seen this guy before, without really knowing that he'd seen her too.
"I thought I'd seen you somewhere. From Mr. Hertz' class. You're the new girl right?"
Helga was slightly speechless. From across the room, he looked like a spoiled selfish kid who'd spent all of his life up until now in some private school that Bill Gates would have needed a student loan to attend. But close up, he was nothing short of…gorgeous. He had dark hair and eyes, both intoxicating and a tad frightening. Either way, his dark eyes stayed locked to hers, while hers drifted here and there, desperately searching for something else to look at.
"Yeah, Annabelle."
"Cool. I'm Sean.", he said, flashing a rather nice smile. Two rows of perfect, white teeth. She searched his face, while flashing an equally beaming smile, for a mole, a case of acne, something that would make up for the perfection that was spilling out of this kid's ears. Suddenly aware that she'd been smiling far too long, she directed her gaze back to the chalkboard, and began recopying the notes she'd just finished writing on a separate piece of paper. Thank goodness, she'd taken a whole pack of paper had such a situation should arise.
"It's future tense."
Evidently, Sean hadn't taken her return to work as a subtle hint to stop talking to her. "I realize that.", she replied, looking back up at the "FUTRE TENSE" written in big yellow letters on the chalkboard, and Mrs. Walters scribbling notes quickly under them. If she spent too much more time talking to him, she'd more than likely miss something she didn't catch the first time around.
"I don't think you're writing it correctly.", he said with simple and clear confidence.
Great. She'd discovered his imperfection after talking to him for thirteen seconds. He was conceited, and if she knew anything, he was probably some rich conglomerate's spoiled little brat. Wonderful.
"Look, I'm in this class, same as you are. That and my 3.8 GPA is more than enough evidence to support the fact that I know what I'm doing." In reality, her GPA was a 3.76, but a 3.8 was justifiable too. Needless to say, Helga could share her have of self-confidence as well. No one, especially some…some boy, who she didn't even know, tell her what she was and wasn't.
"Interesting."
"What?", Helga replied. She wasn't really in the mood for this guy's crap.
"You're not as passive as you look.", he said, resting his chin on his fist, awaiting her eruption.
'Passive??!!!' If Helga wasn't one thing in the world, it was passive. Anyone who knew her knew she was anything but passive.
Just as she was about to give Sean a glimpse of "Passive Betsy" and the "Passive Avengers", the annoying excuse for a bell rang and left her hovering over him, set to kill. Saved by the Bell. Literally.
Instead of beating him to a pulp right there, she ignored his snickering, and headed for the door. Down the three flights of stairs, and out into the main courtyard she was sneaking around earlier that morning, she was thrown back three feet at the multitude. There was at least a thousand kids in the school, how was she supposed to commute around here? As soon as she stepped outside the door, she felt more like a little metal ball in a pinball machine. Like a drunk crowd surfer, she was passed from person to person, none of them really looking to see who they were passing her to. After a few minutes of whizzing around in the courtyard like a grape in a blender, a hand reached out and grabbed her shoulder, pulling her to the side of a building.
"Ya okay? Ya look pretty shaken up."
Thank goodness, she'd been tolerant to one person today. Candy watched as Helga…er, Annabelle, smiled while trying to catch her breath. How did anyone get through this crowd? It was like sawing a tree in half with a piece of hay.
Almost as if her mind were being read, Candy spoke. "The trick is to walk out there like you own the place. And never forget the one and only rule: Never say excuse me, sorry, or pardon me. People respond to an assertive demeanor.", she stated. Without much time to think, Annabelle was lead into the crowd of people, many much taller than her. At first, she was shoved a little, but remembering what Candy had said, made her remember she was Helga, who let no one get away with doing anything to her. She stood up straight, and walked through the throng of souls like she was the Queen of this chessboard, and no body could step in her path. She sliced through the crowd like a knife through butter, and didn't give anybody a second glance.
After walking what seemed a few feet, she found herself at the curb. Candy was right at her heels, beaming at her success, even if it was just walking through a crowd.
"Not bad, rookie. Ya only ran into three people. Guess you're not as passive as I thought."
Helga turned to face her. Twice in the same hour! She had to say something this time. There weren't any bells to distract her, and Olga probably wasn't even within eyeshot.
"I was in class when Sean called you out. I swear you had flames in your eyes.", she laughed.
At least she'd revealed the butt of the joke before she near killed her. She had to smile at remembering how she wanted to maim him.
"Ugh.", Helga sighed. "You know him?" Candy was so nice, and reasonably bearable, while Sean was annoying, bothersome, and most likely a womanizer. Why would she choose him for company?
"Kinda. He's my brother."
For the first time that day, Helga was about to choke on air, if that was possible. 'Her Brother??!!! How could they crawl out of the same gene pool?' Candy must have noticed the look on her face, and took the chance to clarify.
"Step. I'm in no way related to that."
Helga looked over her shoulder at the Honda Accord that pulled up behind her. Bidding a short goodbye to her newest companion, and stepped over to the car. Opening the door, laying her backpack on the floor, and sitting in the front seat, she awaited Olga's hundred questions.
"I see you made a friend…", she began.
"I wouldn't quite call it a friend. I made…an acquaintance.", she retorted, as Olga drove straight, then tuned, swerving a little.
"See anyone you knew?", she asked, waiting for a red light to turn back to green.
"A few." Despite the hint of fear that remained since the morning, she didn't mind letting them see her. But talking to them, having and actual conversation with any of them, was near mortifying. She wasn't quite ready for that, not yet.
Hoped ya liked it. Oh, and Amelia Bedilia, I really didn't know paragraphs were that long! Looking back at the original draft, I didn't realize they were inches long! Sorry!!! Turns out my computer isn't quite as fixed as I'd hoped. We have that old, crappy virus, that give you 59 seconds to save and shut down everything you're doing. Yeah, So back to Best Buy we go!! I think I'll pick up some CD's while I'm there. Oh well, please review
