Disclaimer: I don't own Hey Arnold
Summary: A 26 year old Helga has a near death experience with a drug addiction that sends her into rehab. While there, Gerald begins to dig into the past and brings out a skeleton in her closet that has haunted the both of them. And what exactly does all of this have to do with Arnold anyway?
Here In My Room
"Wake me till the morning after,
I'm so tired,
There has got to be an end,
To the pain I feel,
When I'm awake and alive." -Linkin Park (Morning After)
"You want to know the truth?" She finally blurted out, turning back around to face him.
Gerald nodded, reaching into his pocket and placing the recorder he'd always brought with him onto the table. He pressed the Red Circle button with the sole of his thumb. "Yeah, I do."
Helga closed her eyes, inhaling deeply. The salty mixture of tears surrounding her eyeballs were becoming too much for her eye lids to contain any further. With the sudden onslaught of raw emotion coursing through her body she knew when she reopened her eyes they were going to dump their fluid right down her face. She didn't want to cry. She was so tired of crying. She couldn't believe she even had anything left to cry. But as drained as she was of crying, it paled in comparison to her overall mental exhaustion.
Gerald was still waiting, and she knew she had to say something soon. She opened her eyelids, feeling the cool air hit her inflamed eyeballs again before feeling the thick wet streams begin to course down the sides of her face.
"Gerald, I…I honestly don't know," She sniffed, pulling her shirt sleeve down over her hand and whipping her eyes with it.
He rolled his eyes, "I've really had about en—"
"-I don't know! And that's the truth," She lambasted, "There are periods in my life that are just a…complete… blackout. I have drunk and taken so many drugs at times that I've completely lost days."
"That's so very convenient," He scoffed.
She crossed the room ignoring him while running her hands through her hair, the tears continuing to stream down her face with no signs of stopping, "I wake up and people tell me these things that I've done and I have no clue when they happened or why I'd even do it. Really, who knows what I'm capable of."
Helga went silent for a few seconds and stopped pacing. She stared at the floor through blurred vision, chewing over what she was about to say. There was no good way to admit something you didn't want to admit, and help certainly wasn't going to appear in the carpet beneath her feet. No matter how long she gazed at it.
She finally tilted her head in Gerald's direction, "I don't know what I could have been capable of like that...like this. Angry, confused, hurt, intoxicated, high…jealous! All rolled into one horrific bad trip. I'm not a very nice person!"
She wiped her face off with her sleeve once again, "I think I have an idea now though. I'm at the point now where… I don't put anything past myself. And neither should you," Dropping her head in defeat she sighed, the tears still continuing to spill over her eyelids like a broken dam, "So, you do what you need to do Gerald because I really can't help you. I can't even help myself."
She gulped hard, swallowing a large chunk of bile, "I…have to go, I feel like I'm going to be sick…" She briskly exited the room, hoping dearly that he wouldn't follow her. She needed to be alone.
She hadn't told him everything she knew. Quite deliberately of course. She had one last major piece to tell him, and she would later. She just needed a little bit of time alone. Though she hadn't been completely fourth coming with information, she felt that she had been honest with him. She really didn't know. As it turned out, she discovered that she didn't know more than she thought.
Gerald sighed, clicking the stop button on his recorder after she left. He wasn't quite sure what to make of the session with her. It had started out on a normal note for the two of them. Helga being a snarky, sarcastic pain in the ass and he pushing all of her buttons as far as he could. His Lila con had indeed evoked a severe reaction out of her. An almost a complete personality change. He made a mental note to graciously thank Phoebe later for her suggestion.
However, he still wasn't quite sure what to make of what she'd told him. Was that her own little way of confessing? She hadn't really given him anything to work with. It almost seemed like she'd just 'Okayed' it for him to pursue her as the prime suspect.
When Gerald exited the visiting room, he didn't see her anywhere in the lobby and assumed that she'd already returned to her room after her hasty exit. He wanted to go find her and continue drilling her brain for more information, but he knew he had to go make sense of what she'd just told him first. She wasn't going anywhere, after all. How could she?
He stepped out into the brisk air, filling his lungs with its coolness. It felt freeing after being in that rather intense situation in the tiny guest room. He made his way to his car, ducking into it and starting the engine, not really sure of what he wanted his destination to be. He probably had a few hours before Phoebe got home to sift through Helga's recording.
He felt terrible for always bringing this stuff home with him. Home is where one goes to get away from work. That case was so personal though, he couldn't get away from it even if he tried. He slept, ate and drank this case anymore. Not to mention Phoebe had been a better investigator with him than guys he'd worked with that were trained. That thought settled it for him. He'd go home, mull over his collected data until Phoebe arrived, and then he'd pick her brain about it. One way or another, he was going to figure out what Helga's angle was, because everything felt terribly unfinished.
Helga stared at herself in the mirror. It frightened her to see the withered being looking back at her. This wasn't her. This creature looked like it used to be her at one time, but that was long ago. She sighed heavily remember thing things she had to do, before she made a phone call tonight that would cancel out any kind of future that she would have. Right now, in this moment, she was perfectly fine with that. She'd been dancing around in this particular party for long enough now. And maybe, deep down, in that tattered black heart of hers, this is exactly what she'd wanted all along.
She was definitely sick.
She turned and exited the bathroom, her vision still significantly blurred with moister. She wiped the wetness from them as best as she could to no avail. They were like a pair sinking ship. The water would not stop coming. Zombing over to her bed she sat down on the mattress slowly in a delicate manner. Reaching a shaking hand for the telephone she fumbled the receiver off of the cradle, bringing it to her ear and dialed in the one of two numbers that she knew by heart.
It rang.
It rang.
It rang.
Voicemail.
She sighed, waiting for the beep.
Sitting on his couch, staring at the same photos, the same papers, he sighed. The same stuff he'd been staring at for weeks now. Nothing new that was for sure. He couldn't help but feel that the playing field had changed though. The atmosphere had evolved into something else. On the drive home he kept asking himself why he'd allow her to end the conversation there. Why had he allowed her to run away from the fight as she usually did. Maybe perhaps, it was because he had truly seen something break in her eyes today.
Something extinguished. Something…died.
She was tired, he knew that much. He was tired too. This battle of willpower was coming to a head, and he felt he was winning.
He heard the front door to his home creak open, realizing then that he'd been staring at the same piece of paper for half an hour now. Phoebe glided into the room, setting her purse and bag on the table.
"Hey!" She greeted him cheerfully.
"Hey!" Gerald replied, "You're home early."
She laughed, "Did you fall asleep? Its 5:45. I always get out of the lab at 5:00 on Fridays."
Chuckling, he smiled and nodded his head, "Right."
Helga sat on her bed quietly brooding at the floor. The one person that she wanted to talk to wasn't answering their phone. They certainly weren't making this easy for her. She'd been sitting here for over an hour and her frustration was reaching its critical level.
"Why couldn't you have for once just done what you wanted instead of worrying about everybody else's feelings? Instead of worrying about me!" She yelled at the ceiling, "It was foolish of you to ever believe that we could fit. It was foolish of us! I've always only hurt you!"
"I killed you...didn't I?" She murmured.
She left the bed, trudging into the bathroom once more and stared at herself in the mirror for the millionth time. As before she was absolutely disgusted with what she saw, although she kept hoping that she would see at least one redeeming quality about herself. The only thing that stared back was a selfish prat that ruined the lives of everybody she came in contact with.
She caused her parents and sister turmoil by being an obnoxious, arrogant troublemaker, she was considered scum by society; she'd ruined Sender from birth simply because the child was cursed to have her as a mother and she'd managed to kill the love of her life.
She. Helga G. Pataki.
While she had no memory of it, she was fairly certain that Arnold hadn't any enemies. Not that she would have ever have wanted to hurt him, but it was very likely that she did.
He had trusted her, had loved her, and had believed in them.
And she had ruined it.
She started to hyperventilate at that very thought. Her heart beat wildly out of control and she felt the thick bile building painfully in the back of her throat. The tears began to dump from her eyes and the most pained groan tumbled out of her aching throat.
She had killed him. She had to have.
There was nobody else.
Before she realized what was happening, she felt her hand colliding with the smooth glass of the mirror, shattering the image of herself in all different directions. Bits and pieces of the reflective scrap tumbled to the floor by her feet with a sharp clatter.
She slowly pulled her fist back, examining her knuckles in wonder. Small but deep slices slashed all different directions on the tips of her knuckles. Blood was beginning to pour out of them but curiously, she felt no pain from the lacerations.
Removing her eyes from her hand, she returned her blurred stare to the broken mirror before her, still breathing heavily. Her gaze settled upon a chunk of sharp glass, the length of a pencil cocked forward on the mirror. Reaching up, she tugged on it delicately, popping it loose from the rest of the shattered glass, holding it in her hand she stared at, suddenly becoming much calmer.
Her breathing slowed, and her tears, while still running, felt a slight let up. She stared at it, sniffing back the fluid in her face.
This piece of glass could be the key. It could do away with every bit of her suffering. Her future was fixing to cancel, but it could be on her own terms.
The mere idea burnt like wildfire through her mind. It should have repulsed her. She should have frowned at the idea, but she didn't.
It didn't turn her off. In fact, the ecstasy it left behind was mouth watering.
No jail. The idea emerged. No addiction. No battles. No hurt.
She could get way from all of this. Forever.
Seven years. Seven years she'd wondered. Seven years she'd been running away. Seven years she'd lived in constant agony.
She focused her eyes in again after briefly zoning out in thought, clutching the glass a little sturdier. Sucking in a deep breath she raked the sharp piece up the inside of her right arm, clenching her jaw in pain.
She watched her flesh tear apart into two ragged pieces and her rich red blood spew out.
Yes. This was her way out.
Out of her pain. Out of her responsibility. Out of her hell.
She dropped the glass to the floor, looking around as the blood from her arm began spilling onto the floor tiles. She knew she didn't have much time but she did need to make one last phone call.
While she would have loved to have left his self righteous ass hanging, she felt the slightest twinge of guilt about it. He had worked rather hard on this case to not be informed of the one piece of information that she did know. Besides, why would she care, she'd be gone.
She dragged herself back into the room towards the bed, leaving a smearing red trail behind her. She grabbed the receiver with her left hand, punching in one last number that was written on the notepad paper that Bob had been so kind to throw into the last box of stuff he'd sent her.
It rang.
It rang.
It rang.
And it went to voicemail.
She waited, hearing his personalized voicemail message and the beep.
Sighing, she sniffed back the tears, "I did steal my father's gun from his shop. It has his store initials engraved on it."
She hung up. Gerald could find his closure. If it was there, which it probably was, then he would find it.
She was finding hers.
Stumbling woozily from the bed she attempted to wobble back to the bathroom but realized, she just wasn't going to make it that far though and collapsed onto the floor about half way. The smell of iron was all around her. She dropped her head down in a damp spot from her earlier travels to the bed. It still felt warm.
The world around her was becoming slowed down. She liked it. She wished everybody well. She hoped they wouldn't mourn her long, or at all. Olga would say, "She seemed fine when I saw her," But deep down she'd realize that she'd always known something bad would happen. Her Father would say, "Good riddance," And her Mother would likely remain opinion-less, as always. Friends who truly knew her would probably say that they were surprised that she lasted as long as she did. Whether accident or intentional.
Her parents would tell Sender that her Mother had become ill and just didn't make it through. Or something to the effect. Her young, innocent, and unknowing mind would believe it, not yet understanding the true evils in the world. Perhaps they'd tell her the truth when she became older, or she'd just find out on her own. In a way, Helga hoped that Sender would one day come to hate her. At least then she wouldn't get bogged down longing to have her back or thinking that she was somehow missing something in her life. She wasn't overly worried about her daughter turning out like her either, there was just too much natural good in the girl that Helga had never really possessed, and that thought alone put her a ease with leaving her baby.
And then she felt an odd peacefulness wash over her. Like being light as a feather. Her vision was blurring. Her hearing was totally gone. She could hear, on the inside, her breaths, and her heart beat becoming slower.
This is it. She thought.
A/N: Long time since I updated. To be fair it took awhile to write this chapter. And I've been busy. I thought long and hard about this one. I've progressed Helga to this point because, while I don't think she has a suicidal personality, I truly believe that sometimes people can get blow, after blow after blow until they finally just give up. So, I think at this point in her life, she's been thoroughly kicked around, particularly by Gerald as of lately, and has just reached a rock bottom breaking point. Plus she truly believes that she killed Arnold. Maybe she did, maybe she didn't. Story has still got a ways to go with her.