Thirty Chapter 13: Sid, just eat the spaghetti, a hey arnold fanfic

Disclaimer: I don't own Hey Arnold, or anything else that I've mentioned.

Full Summary:: "So Helga, remember five years ago when we agreed that if we were still alone at thirty we'd just get married and be done with it?" "Yeah...so?" "You do realize my birthday was yesterday. You were there...shouting 'Brian's dirty thirty!'" "Oh my God…"

A/N: Alright, alright, alright. First thank you to the kind guest who left a lovely review, defended this story and was then attacked by a reviewer, who apparently made it twelve chapter and couldn't figure out that this isn't a typical H/A fic. And that's all I'm saying about that weirdness.

Veganmama - So actually I've spent very little time coming up with the trivia names because...they are all old names from back in college. The campus I was on had a very active student bar scene and trivia on otherwise dead drinking nights was everywhere. At that time Harry Potter and The Office (I'm probably dating myself) were popular themed trivia nights. Anyway, me and my group of fraands went to a lot of them and the names I've thrown out were old ones that we used. The better ones anyway, lol. Some of them (mostly dirty trivia ones) I will never repeat.

Nep2unne: I'm happy that you picked up on that. I was trying to leave that question very subtly in the air before having Gerald be the person to say it aloud.

maryLamb: I never pieced it together either and its me! Lol. I guess maybe its my subconscious creating the theme of everything (plot, characters, etc) always being under construction.

anomarlly: Well, you got your wish for Dark Forest. I haven't laid off of that story because of writers block. Hell, I've pre-written a lot of it, I've just been super stressed with work for quite awhile now and have wanted to focus on a happier story. I tend to write comedy when I'm SUPER stressed and more dramatic things when I'm...regular stressed. lol

Kryten: lol, I mean...it's Arnold. He can be a little dense.

Call Me Nettie: Helga does have a slight history of overthinking and self sabotaging. I am so glad you have enjoyed the pairing. I knew this story wouldn't be super popular because it wasn't traditional but hey, an idea is an idea. I've experimented with Brainy's character in two other stories but this was the first one where he got to a staring role and I'm mostly happy with the way he turned out.

Sid, Just Eat the Spaghetti

"Who's saying you have to?"

"Fate! Destiny. The...predetermined universal order...the, the agreed upon ending to the Helga and Arnold saga, that's who."

"...Seriously?" Phoebe deadpan stared at her friend, having never heard something more ridiculous, and she'd heard a lot of ridiculous things from Helga over the years.

"Well yeah..." Helga blinked before her face nearly slide down her palm she was leaning into it so hard. Groaning, she brought both of her palms up and ground them in circles on her temples to avoid smearing her mascara everywhere, "And I think it's all a giant crock of shit."

"Well..because it is."

"To you, but it never has been to me," Helga finished her menstruation, dropped her arms back onto the table with a fleeting exhale, "Oh who am I trying to kid? I don't even know who the hell I am anymore."

Phoebe quietly snorted, "Probably because you've done more stepping out of your comfort zone in the last few months than ever before."

"Tell me about it," Helga reluctantly agreed aloud, "I certainly didn't expect to be married this time last year."

"Hmm, yeah I was sure for a moment that you'd completely lost your mind. More than usual."

"Hey..."

"I think it's been great for you," Phoebe explained as she gave her friend a careful but tilted look, "I've actually seen you have some direction for the first time in a long time."

Helga rolled her blue eyes at that. She didn't exactly view herself as wayward, "You act as if I was just running around, not knowing what was going on."

"Well, your love life was kind of a dumpster fire, let's be honest," Phoebe popped her eyebrows before leaning in for a sip of drink as she watched Helga's mouth fall completely a gap.

"Small brush fire at best. Dumpster fire is a bit over the top, don't you think?"

"The point is, it's not anymore, and you're happy, and I know you're happy and you know you're happy."

Helga chuckled, playfully thinning her eyes at her friend, "I could be just content and lazy. Never underestimate my laziness, Pheebs."

"Even you aren't this lazy. Besides, you've told me you're happy," Phoebe shook her head with a small smile, "And even if you were lying, I know you. If you weren't happy you wouldn't still be there. You broke up with a guy once because you were annoyed by way he walked, need I remind you of that?"

"Ah..." Helga popped her eyebrows, "Yes, Keith, the power walker. Look, I like to get where I need to go quickly just as much as the everybody else, but he acted like there always a building burning behind him, and it was ridiculous."

"And somehow Brian is still hanging in there. He loves you. You can see it his eyes when he watches you and I know..." Phoebe wanted to tell her that she knew Helga loved him too, but also knew, even at that point, as far as her friend had come, Helga still wasn't ready to bite that much off, so she threw her a softball. Something more digestible, "You have a lot of deep feelings for him too."

Surprisingly, Helga didn't pull back and try to throw up her ever popular great-wall-of-defense, instead choosing to just exhale, appearing to not even notice the slight smile pulling the corner of her lips upward at even the briefest mention of Brian, "Yeah...you're right," She owned up, before becoming almost fidgety in the way she began playing with her ring, "Anyway, I know what you're doing here."

"What? Trying to talk you out of doing something stupid?"

"Yeah, yeah...I said I didn't want to leave him, not that I was actively thinking about doing it. Hell, I might would stay even if I wasn't happy," Helga trailed off as her brain momentarily got stuck on that conclusion.

Phoebe snorted, leaning back in the booth, "I guess you weren't exaggerating when you said you were having the best sex of your life."

At which the blonde snapped out of her thought trance, responding with her own exhale of a chuckle, "Yeah, well...boy has a gift—gifts," She smirked before shrugging and glancing off, "Besides that, I just know that it would crush him if I did, and...I...I couldn't do that because his happiness has come to mean a lot to me. Maybe everything." It was true. Every bit of it. Helga Pataki—Miller had never cared for a single other person perhaps as much as she'd come to care about Brian. Arnold being the closest, but it had grown to be so much more than her only other serious relationship. Of course, she'd contributed it to the fact that she'd grown up a lot in five years, however, perhaps there was something deeper there, something more complex with Brian. On several occasions she'd thought that it shouldn't have been so easy to start forgetting Arnold, but maybe that was just part of the process of...growing up and moving on.

It was still absolutely surreal to her.

"It's amazing how it's like that," Phoebe smiled at her friend, feeling a sense of relief begin to wash her entire being as she was now confident that Arnold wouldn't be capable of causing problems for Helga and there wouldn't be a second round of turbulence out of a couple who'd out grown one another long ago. Of course she also wanted to lunge across the table and shout, 'It's called love you daft Muppet!' while shaking her like a rag doll, but such actions were best left for the imagination.

"Truly."

"How's the house hunt going?"

"Uh, surprisingly good. I think our realtor is a lot better than the one I had last time," Helga surmised. Tara had been great, her only problem was that they had liked every house that they'd been shown, which was a one-eighty from last time when she hated everything. Yet, they still kept coming back to that first one. Though she wasn't sure if it were the house or Brian's talent for persuasion.

And did he ever have a talent for persuasion.

"We weren't thrilled with ours when we bought either," Phoebe casually remembered, "Live and learn though. Have you put yours on the market yet?"

"No," Helga quietly groaned, ever reminded of how they really needed to get on the ball with that. She was just dreading having to keep everything in a spic and span condition for it to be shown to potential buyers. They weren't messy or dirty by any stretch of the imagination, but keeping a home in pristine condition was a damn chore, "I'd like to say it's because were afraid of it selling faster than we can buy, but really it's because we've been lazy." And it would force her to pick between all the fantastic houses they'd seen.

Phoebe chuckled, "Which is why we probably wont buy another house until the kids are grown. It's entirely too much work to move."

"Yeah well, that's what we're trying to avoid. It's hard enough with two people," Helga laughed, leaning back in the booth, "Though not having to listen to Brian's salty little remarks over losing his condo, can't happen fast enough."

Predictably, Phoebe was confused by everything at the end of that sentence, because it made absolutely no sense to her, "What do you mean?" She frowned.

Helga returned the frown, "I never told you about that?"

"Definitely not. I thought he sold it?"

"Oh, no he did. So we've literally made almost every major decision in our marriage by playing rock, paper, scissors," Helga casually explained as if it weren't any big deal, though she supposed in the grand scheme of her and Brian, it really wasn't. "Anyway, that's how we decided who's house to move into, and he's been salty about having to sell his condo ever since."

Phoebe eye's became noticeably wider as she snorted a little, "Do what?" She'd never heard of anything so off the wall, but again...she shouldn't have been surprised. It was Helga after all.

The blonde absently shrugged, "We play rock, paper, scissors. Frankly, it's easier than debating over things," Phoebe had to laugh, because at that point, it was so Brian and Helga that it wasn't even shocking. Helga just watched her friend crack up while asking, "Yeah, yeah we're weirdos."

Phoebe could only shake her head, "It's kind of precious, though."

Boarding House.

"Arnold, dude, you just need to take all of this stuff to Good Will, or have a yard sale. Something!" Harold shooed dust away from a single box that he'd dared to peek inside of. It appeared to contain nothing but miscellaneous clothing. His adventuring, blonde headed friend had insisted that it just be moved to the attic, where it was already busting at the gills with junk.

"I can't. It's probably a lot of my grandparents stuff," Arnold replied from across the room where he was dropping a few boxes onto a single dolly.

Harold inhaled and turned away, shooting Gerald a look that was received with agreement, "Yeah man. You should probably eventually go through this stuff and pick out a few keepsakes. It's just going to deteriorate up in that attic."

"I'm going to get around to it," Arnold sighed, tilting the dolly back with his fresh load, preparing to head towards the attic access, "I just need a place to sleep at the moment."

"Knock, knock," Brian poked his head through Arnold's bedroom door, waving quickly to his friends.

"Hey!" Gerald cheered, holding his arms out wide, "You made it. I thought you said you were tied up."

"Apparently our girls had made lunch plans before," Brian shrugged as he absently lifted the corner of a box stacked next to him with index, peaking inside it, "So what can I help with?"

"We're just moving Arnold's junk to the attic to rot."

"Hey..." Arnold shot the big guy a look that was wordlessly asking for him to cut-it-out as he wheeled his dolly towards the bedroom door. Brian scooted out the way before, kneeling down and lifting the stack of boxes in front of him.

"After you, bud," He said, peaking around the cardboard in his hands. Arnold led the way down the hallway to the attic access, which was the draw cord style extending stairs. Brian set his boxes down as Arnold climbed the stairs with one in his hands, "I'll just pass them up to you."

"Sounds good."

Once Arnold turned back around Brian climbed the stairs to hand off each box that they'd brought before the pair retreated back to Arnold's bedroom, passing by Harold and Gerald toting a load to the attic themselves. Once they walked back into the room, Brian watched Arnold busy himself with sorting more boxes. He had a million and one thoughts about the guy, a lot of them not good, but the last thing he wanted to do was drive a wedge between he and Helga by being mean to Shortman. He didn't even know why that even a something he was thinking about in the first place but it was.

Maybe because they had history?

However, he and Arnold had been nothing but friends before and it seemed ridiculous that he was having to walk on eggshells around them. It was better to just...play nice. With a quiet sigh, Brian turned, scratching the back of his head and said, "Hey man, sorry if I seemed a little put off when you stopped by the other day. We aren't used to visitors," He tried a small joke.

Arnold turned around, his brows raised a little, "Yeah, no worries. I haven't been the best at calling," He nodded before turning and continuing to move boxes, "Helga seems happy."

"We are," Brian nodded, though the man couldn't see, but he made sure his voice got across how sure he was of that.

"You'll have to tell me how you two happened sometime," Arnold casually requested.

"Yeah, sure."

"Cause it still...it just seems so off the wall. You two together," Arnold turned back around to face his friend for a second time. He was wearing a small smile, but Brian didn't like the tone of the statement, "I guess stranger things have happened though, huh?"

And that was the thing. It wasn't as if Brian was blindly unaware that she'd had other relationships with other men, that was just...dumb to think. He was just really wishing it had never been that one. The one whose boarding house he was in and who was standing on the other side of the room from him. All the others, no threat what so ever.

But Arnold Shortman might as well have been a shark at that point, and Brian was getting the impression, more than ever, that was sniffing for blood in the water.

Paint and Pour. Saturday Night.

"Rhonda...what the hell is that?" Her best friend Nadine spared a skeptical glance at the fashionista's painted canvas. It had been awhile since they'd done one, but the girls had a paint and pour night out where they diddled on canvases and got buzzed on a few bottles of wine while snacking on a cheese and smoked meats. Or well, in that case, the ones that could drink did.

"It's a palm tree, Nadine," Rhonda insisted, looking mildly offended that her best friend would dare critique her work of art.

Yet, Nadine was unaffected by Rhonda's typical snarky responses, simply raising a skeptical brow before asking, "How do you paint worse while completely sober?"

The rest of the group snickered, "Yeah, Rhonda, you're a real Thomas Kinkade with a martini," Patty jibbed as the socialite huffed, and sat her paint brush down.

"Honestly, this isn't nearly as fun without alcohol," She dejectedly waved her hand at her canvas, "I don't have any inspiration."

Sheena's phone buzzed on the table and she picked it up, reading the text before rolling her eyes with a small scoff before muttering, "Sid..." Looking up at the rest of her friends and saying, "Wink face, eggplant emoji. I swear I have a few glasses of wine at girls night and he thinks I'm going to be in the mood to have my bones jumped when I get home. He acts like we never have sex. Like literally, it was yesterday!" She sat the phone down, chuckling, "Are they all like this, or is mine just broken?"

"I think they're all broken," Lila laughed, "At least mine is."

"I'd have to agree too, however, Helga would be the resident expert with that."

"What?" Helga paused mid-sip from her wine, "Why am I the expert?"

"Well, because you're the only one that's really played the field hard darling," Rhonda drawled.

"Yeah, and some of us are on a solo man adventure here," Sheena pointed out, to the nods of some of the rest.

And at that, Helga sat her glass down and drew back with an astonished look, "Crimeny, how many guys do you all think I've been with here?"

"Let's see..." Rhonda started counting under her breath.

"Okay, you do realize that a good many of those were only like...two dates, right?" All of her friends sort of blinked, and cleared their throats, and took some sips of water and wine or whatever which led to Helga rolling her eyes so hard she nearly lost her balance sitting in her chair, "Dinner only dates." She said as she thinned her eyes at them all.

"I mean...you still didn't answer the question," Nadine poked with a bit of a chuckle.

Helga deeply inhaled, holding her friends eyes before exhaling with a quick gust, looking away with an annoyed expression on her face as she re-clasped her wine, realizing she wasn't going to win this one, "They're all broken."

"Speaking of which..." Rhonda perked up with a new bout of interest fluttering to her face, which instantly made Helga envelop with dread and even more annoyance.

"No," She groaned. Anytime Rhonda Wellington-Lloyd Gammelthorp was interested in something, it was guaranteed never to be comfortable for the other party. Ever.

"Whose better in bed? Brian or Arnold?"

And there it was. The cringe question for the night. Helga had managed to make it eight months—eight months without being the target of one of Rhonda's embarrassing quests for scandalous information. This of course after being prodded after almost every break-up she'd had with any guy she dared to bring to trivia nights.

"Why does it matter?" Helga lolled her head back and exacerbated in a whiny tone that she knew would do little to dissuade her friend from further investigation.

"Because you've dated two gang members."

"Lovely," The blonde downed her wine, "Hopefully nobody else heard that, because now they think the worst of me," She casually looked around at the other groups of ladies there, hoping nobody did overhear Rhonda's poor choice for words and think she was into hardened men before refocusing back on the socialite with deadpanned expression, "Word your sentences better!" She chastised.

"You know what I mean."

"Again, why. Does. It. Matter?"

"My votes on Arnold..." Patty pipped up, shoving some cheese and cracker in her mouth while her friends murmured, "Look at him. He's rugged, and tan, and looks like he knows how to give you a good time."

"Oh girl," Sheena chuckled, "You better not let Harold hear that."

Patty snorted, and waved her friend's teases off with her hand, "Eh, he knows."

"Arnold is a dish, for sure," Rhonda agreed, before thinning her smoky eyes in thought, "But I don't know...there's something about Brian that I can't put my finger on."

"I'm right here." Helga announced in the midst of her friend's chattering about her personal life right in front of her.

"Yes, but you wont answer the question, so we're forced to speculate."

"My money's on Brian," Lila chirped, before Helga could say anything else, "He's just oh so unassuming," She said in a theorizing type of tone while bringing her wine to her lips.

And of course, Phoebe, who had been silent through the entire exchange, decided to giggle at the worse possible time. And like usual, it didn't go unnoticed by Rhonda, who immediately leaned forward, peering down the table at her friend with hawk eyes, "Phoebe knows something."

The petite raven haired woman quickly shook her head, "I do not." She insisted, and hoped that it sounded earnest enough to get Rhonda off her case.

It didn't, because Rhonda was too smart of that. She knew very well when she was hovering over a target, "Yes you do you little liar."

"Don't tell them anything Pheebs. Savages. All of them," Helga smugly smiled at her friends while triumphantly leaning back in her chair with crossed arms.

Rhonda merely blinked once at her equally as feisty blonde friend before looking back at the obvious secrete keeper and saying, "Spill it, Phoebe."

Phoebe shook her head, "My lips are sealed on this one."

"It's Brian..." Amy announced, her voice peppered with a fair of amount of unsureness, though she was sure her attention to detail had solved the puzzle and answered the question that Helga wouldn't.

"Amy..." Rhonda sighed and looked back at her friend, "Where are you drawing such information from?"

"Phoebe giggled when Lila said she thought it was Brian. She giggled because she knew Lila was right."

"What is this, the damn game of clue?!" Helga fussed before finally decided to shut everything down. Or attempt to at least, "They're both fine. Okay? Perfectly fine. No complaints! I was—am a satisfied customer." The silence that befell the group after her micro-outburst momentarily convinced her that she'd finally put a cap in her friends unnecessary interest in her sex life. "Okay? We good now?"

"It's definitely Brian."

"Oh one hundred percent."

Thursday Trivia.

"Alright, here you go lady," Patty came to the table with a cardboard box that she sat down next to Rhonda, "A pair of heels, a watch, and two pairs of leggings..." She began naming off each item she pulled out and sat down in front of her friend, "Of yours that have been sitting at my house for forever now."

Rhonda lifted a well-manicured brow as she peered at the items, almost appearing not to recognize them as her own, "I left these?"

"Yeah."

"I don't recall ever doing such."

"Seriously?" Lila snorted, "You've left something at my house every time you've ever gotten drunk there. I'm actually wearing a pair of your shoes now."

"I know I have at least two pairs of your heels and a cardigan in my closet," Sheena chimed in.

"I have a dress!" Amy tossed her hand up, "Not sure how you managed that, but it's definitely yours."

"I've got an entire full length fur coat!" Helga chuckled as Brian sat down with their drinks.

"Oh, and we found a necklace after Halloween," Brian pointed out as he slid into the chair.

"So would everybody that has ever been personally inconvenienced by Rhonda leaving her shit at their house after being drunk, please raise their hands," Gerald announced and watched while the entire group, sans Arnold, slowly lifted their hands, "Well there you go," He looked at the stunned socialite, "You leave your shit at all of our houses when you have a few too many."

While Rhonda was busy reconciling that new bit of information about herself, Helga took a sip of the beer that Brian had gotten her and immediately scrunched her face, "Oh jeez, that is not as good as I thought it would be." Her husband looked suspiciously at the beer before taking it and having his own sip, and shrugging because he didn't think anything was wrong with it, per say. "It's too hoppy," She explained further.

"It is very hoppy," Brian agreed with her assessment. He himself wasn't a big IPA guy either, but he wasn't about to waste a beer, "Want me to go get you something else?" He offered as he scooted the orphaned beverage over beside his.

"Nah, I'll just go see what else is on tap," She slid back in the chair, grabbing her wallet from her bag before heading off to the bar. And wouldn't you know it, Football head just happened to need to go to the bar as well. What a surprise. Amazingly enough, as Brian so ruefully observed, he didn't even bother trying to down his current beer and at least pretend that he just happened to need another. His eyes followed Arnold as he trotted to the bar, said something funny to Helga which she slightly laughed about before they appeared to get into a nice little chat.

Brian didn't even realize how hard he was grinding his teeth as he watched the whole sequence of events innocently transpiring just a mere feet away from him. Nothing that would stand out to anybody else, and it did occur to him, that maybe he was letting his fears spiral into a mild amount of paranoia, because literally, all they were doing was chatting, and joking...and laughing and God bless he somehow figured out way to touch her arm in the exchange.

It became rather clear to Brian, in that moment, that Arnold was trying to see her, and not just to just shoot-the-breeze for old times sake. Or catch up. Whatever the hell he wanted to call it. He was feeling their relationship out and without—at least not on a surface appearance—the slightest care for the boundaries of marriage.

Friday Night.

"Oh hey, do mind grabbing my phone off of the counter please?" Helga called over the couch just as Brian was rounding the corner with a giant bowl of popcorn.

"Yep," He nodded, trotting back into the kitchen to retrieve her orphaned iPhone from beside the coffee maker. As he grabbed it, the screen illuminated and he saw that she had a single missed call and voicemail from…Arnold Shortman.

Brian stared at it for a moment, inhaling deeply in order to push down the frustrated anger that wanted to come exploding out of him at that moment. He finally decided that it wasn't worth it. The guy was just being a jerk, and a nuisance to boot. Blacking out the phone, he returned to the couch, handing it over to her as he flopped down beside her.

Saturday Night. Bowling.

"Turn, turn, turn!" Harold yelled at his bowling ball that was completely deifying his orders as it rolled straight down the right side, taking out only a few pins. He threw his hands up and stomped back to the pit to sit. The boys were out on one of their bowling nights, Arnold joining them for the first time in five years and to say that Brian was still feeling a little awkward about him being there was the whole truth, and nothing but. The high that he experienced around Helga always seemed to disappear in that dude's presence. Especially since he'd come to the conclusions that he was definitely going out of his way to try to cozy up to Helga. He couldn't technically prove it, yet, because Arnold was still newly back in town and trying to catch up with everybody, but he was pretty damn positive he wasn't just seeing things.

And if his observation were true, what an asshat Shortman was. Seriously, he expected better. And honestly, he hated how he was ruining what was otherwise a great dynamic between he and his wife by just existing in Hillwood. But hey, he may not have cared for Arnold's presence, but at least he knew the dude wasn't off trying to shack up with his wife while he was out.

Jeez, things he never thought he'd have to worry about.

"Whose turn is it?"

"Stinky."

They all looked over to their friend with his arms crossed, leaning back in the chair, having a nice cat nap. "How can he nap with all of this noise? Hey Stinky!" Gerald leaned over and swatted him on the shoulder.

Stinky jumped awake, slapping his hands on his knees, declaring, "I'm up!"

"Baby still not sleeping?" Curly asked with a touch of weariness, thinking about his own round two of sleeplessness heading down the pike in a few months.

"That kid hates sleep for some reason," Stinky yawned and stood up, "Is it my turn or what?"

"It's your time to shine, gorgeous," Harold teased while ridiculously batting his eyes.

"You're like a real life bugs bunny," Gerald said to the beefy guy, shaking his head at his friends absolutely ridiculous antics.

"You know, I've had about enough of all of this baby crap," Sid piped up as Stinky tiredly dragged his feet to the ball return.

"Okay, Karen." The gang snickered, "Would you like to speak to the manager about it?"

To which Sid rolled his eyes in frustration, "Yes, actually I would. Thanks to all of you, now Sheena's wanting another one too."

"Eh, it'll probably wear off," Harold casually suggested as he shrugged, "It'll be like when they all read those shade books. She'll just want to bang all the time for awhile and then it'll be out of her system."

"That was the best month of my life. I've never done so many exciting things," Eugene reveled as he fondly recalled the summer of shade.

Curly chuckled. "That was a once in a life time thing gentlemen."

"No! It's not a fifty shades of grey thing!" Sid exacerbated, almost coming off as a little unhinged to his friends, "She really wants another kid! And it's so bad, that I'm afraid she's going to break out the spaghetti soon!" The man nervously ran his hands over his head, leaving his hair sticking up every which or way and doing nothing to dissuade him appearing off his rocker crazy.

"Uh...spaghetti?" Arnie repeated with a frown, "For...?"

"Me!"

"To...eat? Or what...? I'm...I'm lost."

Sid tiredly sighed, "It's my grandmother's recipe. Nobody has ever been able to cook it like her...except for Sheena. It's spaghetti so good it's like an out of body experience," He explained in a rather panicked tone of voice while wringing his hands, "She always cooks it when she really wants something because she knows I can't say 'no'. And I just know that I'm going to come home, any day now and she's going to have a pot of it going and I'm going to eat it, and then next thing I know, I'm pumping a baby into her."

All of his fellow friends just blinked before..."This doesn't sound real," Arnie concluded, "How much have you had to drink tonight?"

To which Curly also chuckled, "It just sounds ridiculous. I like it, but ridiculous."

"Have you ever had Sheena's spaghetti?" Gerald point blank asked Arnie and Curly, both of which shook their heads, "Well I have, and my man's right. It's a religious experience."

"See!" Sid hastily jabbed his finger at Gerald's confirmation, "I'm not crazy. It'll make you do crazy things!"

"Bro, I'll be honest though," Gerald turned back to Sid, quietly chuckling, "I'm kind of jealous. I wish Phoebe would catch some baby fever."

"Oh, why? Going through a dry spell?" Sid asked.

At that, Gerald deadpanned him, "No motherfucker I want some more kids!"

"You have the most kids of everybody! How many more do you need?" Harold asked.

Gerald snorted, "I want six or seven, but she keeps insisting that we're done."

"Six or seven?!" Curly grimaced with surprise, "God dang man. I'd cut your ass off at three too."

"Three what?" Stinky asked as he tiredly slunk back to the pit.

"Did you know Gerald wants seven kids?"

"Wilikers...are you and Phoebe planning on buying a farm or something?"

"Man..." Gerald scoffed as he rolled his eyes, irritated he was having to defend himself, "There isn't anything wrong with wanting a big family."

"And some of us like having a small family," Sid pipped up, holding his index finger in the air, "I really like having one kid. Nick is at that age where he's becoming self sufficient. Sheena and I have so much more us time now, and she wants to ruin it!"

"You could always secretly get the snips," Arnie suggested.

Eugene's face dropped, suddenly looking completely mortified by the suggestion before hurriedly pointing out, "That's conniving."

"Whoa, whoa, wait," Sid quieted him down with his hand, staring at Arnie, "Wouldn't I like...shoot blanks?"

"Yeah. That's the point."

"So...nothing would come out like pre-puberty again," Sid sighed, a thwarted and disappointed look dulling his grey eyes, "I think she would figure that out real fast."

At that, Arnie rolled his eyes at his friends complete cluelessness. Though he wasn't all that surprised. He had once been woefully misinformed himself, "Dude, you still jizz the same. They just snip the tube that contains the sperm so it like...can't get out."

Sid's eyes thinned in consideration as he crossed his arms, "So she wouldn't know..."

"Oh don't even," Eugene shook his head, attempting to be the voice of reason in the bad-idea mob that was forming, "It's conniving. She'll probably divorce you, and then we'll have to pick sides and I'll be honest, I'll probably pick hers and—"

"I know I would divorce you," Harold side-eyed Sid with a snicker.

"Hey!"

"What? I wouldn't have married you either, so..."

"How do you know all of this, exactly?" Curly leaned forward, staring at Arnie with an inquiring eye.

Arnold's cousin shrugged and leaned back in his seat, "Oh, I had it done two years ago."

"Damn man...you and Lila are really taking this whole 'child free is the way to be' thing to the max," Gerald remarked. He didn't understand it. Not one bit. But hey, different folks, different strokes. He'd just assume to be run over by a car and dragged through glass before ever letting somebody snip his manhood away.

"Hey, when you know what you want, you know what you want...or...in our case, know what we don't want."

Gerald blinked at Arnie for a solid five seconds before turning to Sid, "Sid, just eat the spaghetti and give your wife another baby. Be a man," He lectured him as if he were the guy's dad. The entire time that whole conversation had been transpiring, Arnold hadn't made a peep, and Brian had merely sat back and watched it all, quietly laughing the entire time.

Something that Harold finally noticed, and amazingly not sooner, "You're awfully quiet over there," He said to Brian, effectively calling him out, and taking the attention off of poor Sid.

"Probably terrified of Helga catching the fever," Sid remarked, hoping that somebody else was in the same boat as him.

Brian chuckled before shaking his head. In the midst of all of that, he had noticed, subtly out of the corner of his eye, that Arnold's attention had suddenly perked. Like, there was no doubt that he was interested in their business and, well, if he was interested, Brian would give him a little something to chew on. "Guess again."

"More like the plague at this point..." Sid muttered dejectedly.

"There you go," Gerald gave Brian an approving nod, "A man after my own heart. What's the problem? She all child stingy like that wife of mine?"

"Nah, we're just waiting until we move."

"No shit?" Curly replied, "You guys looking?"

"Yeah. Like crazy actually."

"What's wrong with her house?"

"For one it is entirely too small."

"That's right, it's like two bedrooms or something right?" Stinky casually remarked.

"No it's a three. The two spare bedrooms are a laughable size though." Brian explained, flicking his eyes at Arnold for a nano moment to see if he'd heard enough yet, "I watched the neighbors move about three houses worth of kids stuff, and realized I don't want to have to do that."

"Smart. I wish we'd thought like that," Eugene confirmed, "Trust me, it was a real pain in the butt moving with a small child."

"Exactly. So, yeah we're house hunting. In the meantime though," He began, figuring he'd really lay it on thick for Arnold, "Sid may hate the fever, but I'm getting a boat load of practice sex out of it so," He popped a double thumbs up, "You're doing God's work guys."

Everybody but Arnold...and Sid chuckled. "I'm telling you, it's fifty shades of grey all over again," Harold once again began theorizing.

"It's wild right now. She wouldn't let me out of bed until almost noon last weekend," Brian bragged, and not because he cared that anybody knew, because he didn't. He hadn't ever been one to bro talk his love life, much less his sex life with the guys. No, no, he one hundred percent said what he said to piss off Arnold, and to maybe send the signal for him to back off.

"Oh so that's why you showed up late to help us move boxes," Gerald teased him.

"Like you would have chosen differently if you were me," Brian chuckled. And his plan seemed to work, because his wife's ex, who had already appeared to be in pins and needles judging by the nervous bounce of his leg, rather abruptly got up and headed off to the snack bar. "Happy wife, happy life. It's the truest thing ever."

"Unless you're Sid."

"Come on guys!"

"Join us Sid...join us!" Harold began chanting.

In the midst of all the continued chatter, Gerald saw Arnold wander off to sit at the row of chairs as he ordered something. He took his own leave from the group, choosing to go quietly slink into the chair next to his best friend to see if everything was alright.

"Everything okay, man?" Gerald asked as he propped his elbow on the bar top.

Arnold shrugged in reply before saying, "Yeah I guess. It just seems like...everybody is so far along in life now."

Gerald knew that Arnold was having a hard time adjusting back into the group. He didn't need his vocal confirmation to know that, because it was so obvious by how much of a wallflower he'd been in their group outings. However, he suspected that it was less of the group life milestones and more Brian and Helga that was the source of his internal kerfuffle, "Yeah...well...a lot happens in five years," Gerald replied, feeling a little inconsiderate by pointing that out, but not willing to baby his friend with niceties. He felt that Arnold would adjust, he just needed time.

"Sure," Arnold nodded, tipping the beer he'd been provided to his lips.

"She's moving on with her life too," Gerald tilted his head to look at his friend, "You heard the man. They've got plans. And good for them," He said before trailing off for a brief moment, "I think it's about time you re-assessed what your plans are too."

Gerald wouldn't exactly say that it was a warning that he gave Arnold. He didn't see it as that, but he could see how it could be taken that way if one chose to study it hard enough. He didn't think Arnold had bad intentions, but it was clear to him, more than ever at that point, that Arnold's plan for arriving back in Hillwood, had involved Helga, and nothing but Helga. Probably try to pick up where they left off or even try to take a stab at some milestones themselves. He had had no backup plan as far as Gerald could see.

"Where is this house at again?" Helga frowned as Brian turned onto the interstate, heading West.

"Over on the edge of Kipson county."

"And we're going that far, why?" That would easily be a twenty minute commute for her and a forty minute for him. Not that that was unreadable per-se, but both were used to fairly short commutes.

Her husband chuckled, "Because you won't pick a damn house in town." Before Helga could fire back with some snarky remark, her phone began ringing, sending her into a frenzied search for it in her tote bag. Brian looked over just as she retrieved it, and silenced it, catching the name, Arnold on the caller ID. "Who was that?" He innocently asked, diverting his eyes back to the road quickly enough that she couldn't tell he had seen her.

"Uh, spam," She absently said, tossing the device back into the contents of her bag.

Brian didn't say anything else, instead choosing to try to find any reason at all as to why she would lie to him about something so small. And none of the reasons were all that great.

Unfortunately.

Cinco Di Mayo.

"Yo!" Sid greeted Helga and Brian at the front door of his house, "Whose ready to lose tens of thousands of pennies on illegal horse race gambling?"

Helga rolled her eyes as she walked past him, "I'll leave you two, to that." She waved him and her husband off as she strolled into the kitchen with the rest of the girls, quickly procuring herself a glass of rose' while watching the guys file into the back yard. It was Sid and Sheena's annual Cinco Di Mayo party, that year it fell on derby day or the its-an-excuse-to-gamble-and-whip-out-the-tequilla party.

And that was a bottle of mystery every single year. A mystery that Helga usually avoided in favor of safer alcohol. For her anyway. It may have been a blessing in disguise that they were at half capacity with drinking. Not as much peer pressure.

"Rhonda I swear, if I find one item of your clothing after this I'm going to set your closet on fire next time I'm out your house!" Sheena declared as she rounded the corner into her kitchen, keenly observing their tall, ink haired friend shuffling off to the bathroom.

"I can't even drink! Remember!" Rhonda fired back, "I think it's all a conspiracy anyway!" Was the last thing they heard before she shut the door.

"She's going to leave something out of spite," Sheena turned and said to the group, "Watch."

"Oh she definitely will," Nadine agreed, and after all, she would know, having only been Rhonda's bff for over twenty years or something, "I'm thinking about staging an intervention."

"I'm thinking about staging a garage sale," Lila chuckled, already on her second margarita, "And calling it like...Off Broadway or something, with nothing but Rhonda's forgotten designer clothes."

"Rhonda's misfit clothes island," Helga joined in, holding her hand up and making a wiping motion as if she could imagine the words in bright neon lights.

"Or," Phoebe butted in, already laughing at her idea, "As a good prank, we could just leaving a gratuitous amount of our own belongings at her house next time they host game night."

"I like it," Patty nodded with thinned eyes, "I have a whole crap ton of things to get rid of."

"It would be a good excuse to do some spring cleaning already..." Amy scowled with a considering nod, "I mean, I still can't figure out how she left a dress at my house. How did she make it out...not naked?!"

"Rhonda moves in mysterious ways," Nadine expertly concluded before going to refill her margarita.

"I what?" Rhonda asked as she quietly slinked back into the kitchen gathering, looking around at her friends as she twisted open a bottle of mineral water.

"I said you move in mysterious ways."

The black haired woman chuckled while perching a hand on her cocked hip, "You're damn right I do, bitches."

"Anybody want another margarita?" Sheena asked, heading to the freezer to retrieve the blinder she'd stuck in there earlier. Lila, Amy and Phoebe all immediately brought over their glasses, leaving the hostess to shoot the remaining blonde an inquisitive eye, "None for you Helga?" She asked, seeing the girl about finished with her pitifully poured glass of wine.

The blonde sighed, giving what was left of her rose' a slight shake. So much for lack of peer pressure, "I'm trying to decide if I want to open up that box tonight." Helga didn't drink tequila often, or well...ever for the most part, but when she did, strange things always happened. Which is why she stuck to wine and beer. Those were steady eddies for her.

"Why?" Lila snorted, "Does it make you take off your clothes?"

"Once or twice," Helga chuckled.

"It's been known to cause you to dance," Helga turned to see Arnold leaning against the doorway of the kitchen, a beer loosely clutched in his hand and a small, lopsided smile on the edge of his face, "And also to make pancakes and bacon at two in the morning. Naked. Once or twice."

Helga felt her whole entire body heat up, her mind waltzing across the exact memories he was recalling, and good lord was that forever and a day ago. And she was one hundred percent sure that it only happened once. The naked breakfast part. The dancing had happened on many occasions, because lord knew, she had to have a whole lot of liquid courage—the strong kind too—to shake what her mama gave her. Finally she turned to her ex-flame and copped him one of her famous eye rolls, "It was pancakes and sausage. Not bacon." She smartly informed him of his slightly incorrect retelling.

Yet, Arnold merely offered her a quiet snort of a chuckle, "I remember the sausage being before," He then replied before tipping his beer to his lips.

The blonde blanched and died a little inside at how good he'd just gotten her on that. She was used to getting caught in little traps like that with Brian, but Arnold had never been so forward that way. Though she supposed she hadn't been around him in five years. Everybody changed. "Asshole," She shook her head, but smirking at him none-the-less, "You got any orange juice, Sheena? I want a tequila sunrise."

"Sure do. I've got grenadine too."

"Where'd Arnold go?" Gerald said after throwing his bean bag and not landing it anywhere close to the corn hole board on the game he in the rest of the guys had gotten rolling in the back yard.

"He went inside to grab the tequila and some shot glasses," Sid replied, throwing his bean bag back across and at least landing on the board.

"Damn, did he get lost on the way back?"

"Where in the world is Arnold Sandiego?" Harold snickered.

"And he calls himself an adventurer," Sid laughed.

To which Arnie finally snorted, "What if he was just lost this entire five years?"

"I've got to run in to take a leak," Brian finally pipped up with a lie, feeling his blood begin to simmer a little over Arnold prolonged absence, because he was sure it had nothing to do with a hitch in procuring liquor, "I'll go see what happened." He finished as he sat his almost empty glass of whiskey down on the rail of the deck. Ducking into the house, he caught sight of his blonde headed nemesis leaning against the kitchen bar, animatedly in conversation with Helga over something that the rest of the girls were in hysterics over. With a jaw that was setting way harder than he wanted it to be, the walked up behind them and said, "Hey man, what happened to grabbing the tequila?"

Arnold smiled as he shrugged, "Sorry man, I just got caught up in a pretty funny story."

"Did you know your wife will cook you breakfast, naked at two a.m. if you get her drunk enough on tequila?" Rhonda chuckled as she cast Brian a teasing smirk.

"Hard liquor leading to nakedness. Who would have thought?" Brian put on a forced smile as he looked back and forth between Arnold and Helga.

"After sausage of course," Lila clarified with her own tinge of red forming under her freckled cheeks.

Helga was more than aware of the stiffness in her husband's posture and the way that little muscle on the side of his cheek flexed back and forth that he was clearly being bothered by something. An irritation that she should have been more keen on figuring out, but the alcohol was already beginning to dull her perception and she was certainly in no condition to begin hunting for subtleties. Arnold trashed his empty beer bottle into the recycle bin before turning to Sheena to request, "Your husband wants tequila and shot glasses."

"Of course he does."

When everybody's attention dissipated away from the pair, Helga turned to her husband, looking up at him as she ran her free hand around his waist, feeling him tense up a bit, "What's got you so on edge? Sid stealing all of your pennies already?" She teased him.

It pleased her to see his features soften back into place as he glanced down at her, moving to wrap his arms around her shoulders, "Something like that. Are you drinking orange juice?" He quirked an inquiring brow at her beverage.

"Tequila sunrise. Want some?" She pulled back and offered it up to him.

Brian released her and took the cup, "Don't mind if I do." He smiled before downing the entire thing and handing it back to her.

"I meant a sip, not the whole thing, but okay."

"Helga and Brian are fucked up," Rhonda rolled her eyes at the pair standing over by the deck, using one another for physical support in-between fits of laughter.

"Well, they've only been pounding tequila sunrises all night, what do you expect?" Nadine deadpanned her friend.

"Honestly, it comes from a place of jealousy...but also concern. Should we call them an Uber or something? Poison control?"

"They aren't staying here," Sheena shook her index finger. Four strong drinks and the sass just hopped right out of her, "I'll be damned if I get up to those two eating pancakes and sausage at two a.m. in my house."

"Judging by how touchy feely they are, I'd surmise that there'd be more sausage than pancakes."

"It doesn't matter. They can take that mess home with them."

"Maybe Phoebe can take..." Rhonda abruptly trailed off seeing her other friend standing over by her husband, looking a little worn for the night, "Never mind she looks pretty drunk. Not as drunk as they are but still. Her little body can only handle so much," She said as her eyes scanned around the rest of her friends with a hope that faded quickly into disappointment, "My God, are we the only sober ones here?!"

"Yep," Patty yawned as Nadine nodded.

"I forgot how awful this is."

"Yep."

"Well darlings, I guess it's up to us to make sure our friends get home in...at least the pieces they arrived in. I promise nothing more," She absently waved her well manicured hand before gliding off towards the pair by the porch, "You two sit down before you fall. I'm ubering you home."

Helga and Brian fell in their front door. Like literally, fell to the floor, after the door unlocked and opened way too quickly for their dulled down reflexes to handle. It also could have had something to do with trying to open the door, while also making out against it.

But these were unsolved mysteries.

There would be plenty of bruises in the morning to show and probably a few mysterious aches that seemed to always be present after a night of heavy libations, but it was par the course. Brian hovered over her, where she was still laying on the floor, flat on her back, "Last time we were tore up, you forgot who I was. Do you remember that?" He chuckled.

"How would I remember it, I was blacked out?" She shot him a very boozy glare accompanied with an intoxicated grin as she reached for him.

"Good point," He agreed as she pulled him to her so their sloppy make-out from before could recommence, "God bless America, where is our room at?" He pulled away in a jerky like fashion, attempting to get them up off the floor because the hardwood was killing his knees.

But his wife was of little help, "Where it's suppose to be," She surmised as she pushed up, going for his neck with a series of hot kisses. Somehow, they managed to both get to their feet, Brian pausing for a moment as he liquid in his stomach sloshed, making him feel a little sea-sick. After a moment, they both stumbled through the house and into their dark bedroom, pretty sure they shut the front door, but neither really possessing the presence of mind to double check it.

Crawling into the bed, Brian stretched out across it and yanked the chain on the bedside lamp, evaporating the blanket of darkened silence from the room, finally rolling just in time to see Helga, whose shorts had mysteriously vanished, come crawling over top of him, her lips quickly assaulting his, "Where are your pants?" He asked between bouts of sloppy kissing.

"I don't know," Helga shrugged. Brian pushed up, rolling them to their sides, grabbing her hips and pulling them tightly against his while she took the opportunity to discard herself of her shirt before snaking her arms back around his neck to rejoin their parted lips.

"Tequila makes your clothes come off, is that right?"

Brian felt her smirk against his mouth. Her hips, having a mind of their own, began to grind into his very slowly, "Something like that," She replied in a low voice before making quick work of peeling his shirt from his body, "You have the best D you know that?" Brian's face having moved to bury into her neck and hair as she squeezed the back of his head, fisting his hair between her fingers.

A gruff sounding, rumble of a chuckle echoed from his throat, "Yeah?" He asked as his lips delicately found her spot below her ear.

His wife gave her own breathy chortle, feeling a wave of goosebumps trickle down her body from those pillow like lips of his, "D stands for dad bod."

Brian smirked, truly appreciating her cleverness even in his inebriated state, "Its what women want. They just don't know it."

"Fuck," Helga moaned as she began to rock her hips much harder into his, feeling his erection beneath his jeans, and just wanting as much friction as possible. Or better yet, him to be out of them, "Why aren't you inside of me already?" Brian was almost used to her ability to be so forward, and sexy about it at that, but it never ceased at taking his breath away a little. He pushed up, turning over while bringing his knees underneath him as he pulled her legs around his waist. The whole process seemed slow motion to him, and the sudden change in position left him feeling a little woozy again, but nothing that he couldn't power through though.

Or so he thought.

"My pants," He lamely said, a lopsided smirk on his face while he stared down at her flushed body through half lidded eyes. He fumbled with the button and zipper on his jeans and had just cracked them open when he felt her hands grab his, intertwining her small fingers through his much larger ones, bringing them up and resting them on her chest before running them down her body. Seeing her bite her lip, in such ecstasy, eyes almost closed sent a jolt through his gut, aggravating that mild sea-sick feeling he'd shoved away, and presently, still had no time for.

As he went to lean over her, desperate to have her flesh under his tongue, he felt that woozy feeling roll right into full blown nausea, barreling right past all desire and will power he possessed, "Shi—" He choked, barely able to fling himself over the side of the bed in time for the contents of his stomach to evacuate themselves onto the floor.

"Brian!" Helga jumped, seeing her husband pick himself up off the floor and stumble to the bathroom, where she heard him throw up again.

Pushing past the vertigo whirling her head, she grabbed the nearest piece of clothing, which happened to be his shirt, pulled it on over herself and stumbled after him. He was sitting next to the toilet, eyes rather watery as his head rested in his hand, elbow propped on he toilet seat, "I shouldn't have been mixing liquors," He groaned, recalling his alternating between whiskey neats and sunrises as he reached out to the toilet handle, flushing the disgusting cocktail away.

Helga leaned against the vanity, not feeling too steady herself, but at least the room wasn't spinning and at least she wasn't feeling sick like he was. Talk about a buzz kill though. She'd never been reality checked so hard in her life, "Tequila is sleeper liquor." She said before reaching for a dirty towel in the hamper. There was puke all over the floor still and it couldn't just keep sitting there.

Thank God for hardwood floors.

Thankfully Brian didn't feel anything else wanting to come up, and while he knew he had definitely had too much, he partially blamed his weak stomach on all the motion. Falling into the house, falling into bed, flipping all around. He'd probably shaken himself up when he'd otherwise had been just fine for the night.

He pushed himself up off the floor, giving the toilet one last flush for good measure and proceeded to rinse his mouth out with a little listerine at the sink. Helga came up behind him, tossing the soiled towel back into the hamper before wrapping her arms around him. Her eyes looked so red, no doubt full of drunkenness and exhaustion. "Sorry," He turned and looked down at her with a tired frown.

"It's okay," She assured before leading them back to bed. Usually Helga had a habit of curling into him at night and using him as a body pillow, but that wasn't the case that night. Brian was the one to curl into her, resting his head between her shoulder and chest while wrapping the rest of his body around her. It probably looked comical because of how much bigger than her he was.

There was a dull throb of a headache already beginning to form right behind his eyeballs. Something that always happened any time he'd ever thrown up. God how far south that night had gone. And fast! Sort how he felt about his marriage. He was being dramatic, there wasn't anything wrong with his marriage. But there was an Arnold Shortman. And he was definitely on the hunt. In his still alcohol riddled mind, that no longer had sex to focus on, he couldn't help but wonder if this would be the poetic outcome of everything.

It was the last thing he felt like thinking about because he didn't want to feel aggravated on top of sick. "Helga…" He murmured against her shirt. His shirt.

"Hm?"

"Please don't leave me."

He felt her chuckle under his ear, the hand that had been playing with his hair still, "As long as you don't throw up on me."

Tuesday Night.

Helga was in the zone. She was having one of those rare, perfect storms where creatively, she was firing on all cylinders. Which meant she was going to churn out a least a couple chapters of her book before she decided to call it a night. Those fits of creative mania were both a blessing and a curse.

Sure she was super productive and created her best content in those episodes, but sleep was going to be an absolute bitch. She always had a hard time turning her mind off during those bouts. Luckily, Brian was pretty understanding, and always found something on his own to do when she was laser focused that way.

He'd been in his vinyl room, re-organizing some of his albums after acquiring a few new pieces for his collection before choosing to grab a shower, hearing her still typing away as he walked across the hallway.

Helga had just cracked open a la-croix that she'd forgotten she'd brought with her to her room when her phone began buzzing not the desk. Arnold Shortman. She was surprised at the automated eyeball that it elicited. A sign of the times she supposed. He'd probably called her at least three or four times at that point, calls she'd always silenced and ignored, thought at that point she figured she might as well find out what he wanted so badly.

"Hello?" She answered in a nice voice, if not purposefully sounding a little rushed. Innocently enough, that was the exact time that Brian decided to be done with his shower and heading to the kitchen for a bedtime snack. "Hey Arnold…" He stopped just short of the door opening, quietly leaning against the wall to eavesdrop.

Helga pushed back in her chair, propping her legs up on her desk as she listened to her ex-boyfriend yap, "Yeah, we can go to dinner sometime." She didn't really want to go anywhere with him, but she'd humor him in order to be nice, "Uh…let me look at my calendar." She actually did flip open her and Brian's shared events on her computer and looked at the upcoming week, "How about next Friday?" She suggested, noticing that Brian was scheduled for a night flight, and figured she wouldn't be missing anything but a night on the couch, "I don't know…how about the roof top?" It was more of a bar than anything, but she didn't want him getting the wrong idea by her suggesting a nicer restaurant. In fact, she didn't even want to grab any food with him. A quick drink would suffice, "Alright, sounds good. I'll see you then."

On the other side of the wall, Brian was speechless. It was bad enough that Arnold was calling. It was bad enough that she'd picked up the phone. It was bad enough that they had agreed to go to dinner, and then she went as far as to deliberately pick a day that she knew he wouldn't be home.

Everything was going to hell.

Everything was going to hell in a hand basket.

There had to be a reasonable explanation for it all. With a deep inhale, he casually strolled around the corner and into her room, leaning against the door jamb with his shoulder.

She had been browsing something on her phone—probably divorce lawyers—which she sat down, spinning in her chair to give him a warm smile that usually made everything feel okay. "What's up?"

Brian shook his head, still playing mister cool despite absolutely dying on the inside, "Just going to get a snack before heading to bed. Seeing how you are."

"Manic-creative," His wife chuckled, "If that's an actual thing."

"Maybe. You want to come get in bed?"

"I'm way too wound up right now."

"Okay," Brian nodded, straightening, "Goodnight then."

"Goodnight."

Saturday Night.

Brian had been in a right funk since Tuesday. And nobody would blame him if they were in the position he was in. He'd made it a point to spend as much time at the airport as possible because he was finding it hard to be around her, and what made it so hard was that everything felt so normal. She felt normal, she acted normal, nothing felt off and it just furthered in screwing with his perception of the situation.

She still hadn't uttered a peep about her dinner with Arnold, and he figured that that had to mean she was up to no good. What else could it have meant?

That she was forgetful?

Doubtful.

As much as he just wanted to explode and dump every single one of his frustrations out on her, somewhere in his confused mind, he'd come to figure that it wasn't actually her fault.

It wasn't her fault that he'd fallen in love with her. They had a marriage out of boredom. Out of convenience. It hadn't come about because of real feelings. They had simply agreed to entertain one anothers wants and desires in order to not have to put up with the shit show that was dating.

He was simply somebody that she'd had to settle on, and now, now the guy that she really wanted—had always wanted—was back and rearing for another go at things.

How could he compete with that?

Better yet, how could he blame her?

What he couldn't figure out was why she hadn't just dropped their safe word on him already.

His fear and anxiety was some what quelled when the two finally got the better of him while at dinner when he blurted out, "I think we should shelve buying a house for right now." After all, why bother? Especially if she were making other plans, that didn't involve him.

Helga paused, mid chew, shooting her husband a look that had suggested that he'd lost his marbles, "What? Why?" She frowned after swallowing.

Brian sighed, "We've looked at a million houses at this point and you haven't agreed to a single one of them. I think…" He deliberated for a moment, refusing to look at her in the eyes, and instead staring at their kitchen bar top, "I think you really don't want to go forward with this and just didn't want to tell me no."

The small blonde thumbed her fork down on her plate and reached out to touch his arm, feeling him flinch a little just like he had the night of Sid and Sheena's party. For the life of her, she didn't understand where any of that was coming from, though his slight mood change as of late hadn't gone unnoticed by her. He was busy with work, she understood that, she herself was currently at her busiest of the year, but there was something off with him, "If I didn't want to do this, I would have shot you down when you first brought it up," She pointed out, "Trust me, I have no problem with bursting your bubble. You know that."

"Then why does it feel like we're going in circles with everything then?"

Helga went to respond back but halted, her mouth bobbing open and closed a couple times before she finally just sighed, "Because I'm…lazy and stubborn and…sometimes have a hard time of letting go of the things I know to embrace better things." Brian thought that was a pretty candid and honest reply from her, and he would be lying if he said that it didn't make him feel at least a little better about everything going on. Even more so when she then pulled his hand up and gave his knuckles a gentle kiss, "Look, I know I'm frustrating, but I do want to do this, and I do want to pull the trigger on something soon."

Wednesday.

"You've been awfully quiet today," Phoebe looked over to her friend from where she sat in her pedicure chair, "What's going on with you?"

"Nothing I guess," Helga shrugged, running her index finger around the rim of her cucumber water. As usual, Phoebe wasn't buying that any further than she could spit, and the blonde wasn't a stranger to it, though she didn't have the desire to play hard to get with information at that point, "Other than Brian just kind of being in a weird mood lately. I'd go as far as to say he's even been a little distant."

"Well, we know he isn't having an affair," Her friend chuckled.

"Obviously not," Helga agreed, it being the absolute furthest thing from her mind.

"He's probably having his first bout of married man's PMS."

"Do what?"

"Its when married men experience a bout of moodiness every so many months for absolutely no reason," Phoebe explained, "Though I'm convinced its caused by them thinking about their youth and own mortality simultaneously. Gerald has it at least three times a year."

"Yeah, maybe its that," Helga wearily agreed. She had nothing better to explain why her normally bubbly husband had taken on an almost sullen like quality. Almost as if he was mourning something. He was still being himself but there was definitely something bothering him that he wasn't sharing with her.

Friday Night.

That little conversation at dinner had put a pep back in his step for all of a few days before the sinking feelings of dread and despair crept right back up into Brian's chest where it firmly took root. He walked around, wondering if that was what full blown depression felt like. His chest of practically on fire when it was time for him to leave for his night flight the faithful day of her dinner date with Arnold.

And again, she made it so hard for him. Especially when he saw her, standing in the kitchen at the bar, flipping through and marking some papers he assumed she was grading, barefooted, hair pulled back in that messy french braid she did while wearing nothing but a tee-shirt and some shorts. Looking like she hadn't anywhere to be, of even any plans of being anywhere.

Was he missing something?

"I'm heading," He announced as he stepped into the kitchen, surprised at how even his voice sounded considering he was dying inside.

Helga set her pen down and turned, casting him a quirky little smile that usually sent the biggest butterflies blooming in his gut, "Already?" She asked, quickly glancing at the clock before holding her arms out to him. He humored her, like a dweeb and stepped into her embrace, draping his arms around her shoulders.

"I've got a lot of stuff to get ready..." He rattled off. He hadn't anything extra to do, he just wanted out of the house. "What are you getting up to?" He tried again.

"Probably binging Pen15. That show you hated," She chuckled and looked up at him.

"Sounds fun," He said, feeling his mouth completely dry out. He wasn't sure what bothered him more. The fact that she wouldn't tell him what her real plans were, or the fact that he couldn't bring himself to confront her. He wasn't a prideful man, but he wasn't exactly confident in expressing his feelings. She'd brought him out of that shell, and it made him sick that he couldn't muster the strength to fight for something he really wanted.

He supposed it was the circumstances, and it made it easier to just retreat and pretend he'd known this day would probably come. "You okay?" Brian blinked away from his thoughts and re-focused on her newly concerned face.

"Yeah," He nodded, "Just...a lot on my mind with...work."

"Okay," Helga replied before he leaned his face down to her. As much as he didn't want to kiss her, because it would just torture him further, he couldn't bring himself not to. Her lips caught his like muscle memory, and he couldn't help all the emotion that poured into it. Maybe to wordlessly tell her what he still hadn't found a way to verbally tell her. It would probably be the last time he ever kissed her if he's fear came true.

Pulling back, he realize that his intensity had left her a little breathless, "I'll see you in the morning." He whispered before he left.

The whole episode felt strange to Helga. She'd gotten a little used to the little funk he'd been in, but the way he kissed her, like he was afraid he'd never see her again, it felt weird to her. She tried not to entertain terrible thoughts about it. What if he was dying? She had papers grind through before she could chill-axe for the night. Maybe Phoebe was right. Maybe he was going through the—what did she call it? Married guy PMS? Maybe he was having a little mini pre-midlife crisis.

Men could be strange creatures. She very much knew that. But she'd never been married to one, and apparently, marriage did peculiar things to them.

She had barely gotten back into grading her papers after he'd left when her phone buzzed. A text message from Arnold that read, 'Can we do 6:30 instead? Running late leaving hospital.'

"Ah, shit..." Helga swore, dropping her pen to the table.

She had completely forgotten that she'd made plans with him that night. Like...completely! Shit...she had half a mind to text back and cancel. The idea of her having to go get redressed to go somewhere, after already getting into her comfy clothes for the night might as well have been a form of torture. Would it make her an asshole to cancel so short notice? After all she really didn't want to go in the first place. Still...she agreed to it. It wasn't his fault she never wrote it down and then completely forgot.

With a loud groan she hit the reply button and typed, 'Sure.'

After which she finished grading most of her papers before begrudgingly going and throwing on some nice leggings and a presentable shirt, grabbing her bag and keys and leaving.

Airport.

Brian walked, like a zombie through the hanger, heading towards his office to gather up all his things for his flight that night. Opening the door, he flipped on the light, staring at his basic set-up before walking to his desk and sitting down behind it. He was trying to read a chart pattern for his route when he realized how shaky he was. His hands, his legs. He wasn't in a good place mentally, he very much knew that, but up until that point, it hadn't effected anything, much less his ability to fly.

Yet, it would be near negligence for him to operate something like that at that time.

Rooftop Bar.

Helga climbed the last flight of stairs up and onto the open air bar at the top of one of the more popular buildings in the Hillwood Business park. A neat shindig that she'd gotten turned on to by her campus colleagues many years prior. Arnold waved to her from where he was seated at a tall barista table. Returning the wave she made her way through the decent sized crowd to grab the seat beside him. "Hows it going?" She greeted, slinging her back over the edge of her seat.

"It's going," Arnold smiled, "I got you a Cabernet. Pacific Peak," He pointed to the drink that Helga and just realized was sitting there for her. Mostly because her attention had been so focused on how well dressed he was. Like, not over the top, but he'd clearly put more effort into the occasion than she had.

"Ah," She popped her brows as she reached out and took possession of it, "You remembered." He'd always been very good at ordering her drinks, remembering what she liked, having an intuition about what she wouldn't like. Brian was learning well though.

"So what have you been up to lately?"

Airport.

The problem with having anxiety at the level that Brian had it, was that the only thing that could chill him out, be it medication or alcohol, would make it impossible for him to operate a plane. The problem with that? His anxiety was going to make it damn near impossible for him to operate a plane too.

He didn't want to do it, because he prided himself in being a model employee who had to be near death or severely contagious to call out of work, but he was burning up with anxiety. Feverish with dread and restlessness and the last thing he needed was the be in charge of a eight thousand pound flying machine. He finally stood up from his desk, his eyes feeling like sand paper he'd been hard checking his emotions for so long at that point and hurriedly made his way down to Sergio's office, who he was thankful, hadn't left for the night. "You got a minute?" He asked after rapping his knuckles on the open door.

The older gentlemen looked up from his desk and over his reading glasses that he was embarrassed he was at a point in needing, "Yeah. What's up?" He pulled the spectacles off and dropped them on his expense reports.

"I uh..." Brian waffled a bit, wondering if he were being over dramatic, but deep down, knowing he wasn't, "I have some...personal things going on right now that are causing a lot of stress on me, mentally and...I...don't trust myself to fly this plane tonight."

Sergio cast the younger man a careful look, a small frown pulling down his bearded face, "Everything okay, Brian?"

"Yeah," Brian nodded, but ran his palms over his face and eyes, "It's just...some stuff I'm trying to work through, at home and...right now...I'm just so distracted by it that...its just not a good idea for me to be in the air. I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry. I appreciate you being honest with me, and I trust your judgment," His boss looked away and pulled out his cell phone, "I'll give Leo a ring and ask if he will take the flight."

"Thank you," Brian nodded, feeling a little relief.

Sergio looked back at his favorite employee, observing how truly worn down he really did look, "Are you sure you're okay? You need anything?"

"Just some time to decompress."

"Yeah, no go take care of yourself. Just call me Monday and let me know."

"I will."

Rooftop Bar.

"School mostly," Helga shrugged, "And writing a book."

"Oh really?" Arnold's eyes seemed to perk up. He wasn't at all surprised that she delved into such a project, he was more or less surprised that she hadn't done it sooner.

"Yeah, I mean, kind of because I had an idea, but also kind of because I really want to tenure into Hillwood." She admitted, pulling her wine to her lips and taking a sip. She had forgotten that she'd never told him about that. Thought, she had just started putting together the skeleton for the story and he'd decided to get all breaky-upy with her.

"Ah, you want to set yourself up for good huh?" He smiled.

"I mean why not? The money is okay, but mostly the benefits and schedule are good," She figured with a chuckle, "That made me sound super lazy. Which I kind of am I suppose."

"Hey, job security is important."

"How's your new job going?"

"Boring," Arnold reached for his beer and took a decent gulp, "But when has pharmacy ever been an adrenaline rush."

"I mean, you could kill someone. I feel like that would be incredibly non-boring."

"Unlikely, but I guess you are correct," He chortled. "So I hear you are house shopping."

Helga's brow knitted ever so slightly, wondering how he'd gotten a hold of that information, figuring it had to have been from that husband of hers. It wasn't a secret or anything, they just hadn't exactly volunteered the information to the group as a whole. "Uh, yeah, actually. Why? You selling something?" She teased.

Arnold chortled and shook his head, "Afraid not. Unless you're in the market for a boarding house."

"Not currently, no." Helga laughed.

"You sure? It's fully rented. Instant income."

"I'm still going to pass," The blonde took a sip of her wine, "I'm kind of afraid of taking on the size house we're currently looking for. I'd be overwhelmed by an entire complex."

Arnold waved off her speculative fears, "Eh, it basically takes care of it's self."

"Said anybody who has ever tried to dump a severely haunted house onto an unsuspecting buyer," His ex-girlfriend pointed at him with a pair of deeply thinned eyes.

"It's haunted with characters that's for sure," Arnold popped his brows one good time, thinking about all the personalities in that place, "What's Brian up to tonight?"

"Probably in the air on a flight by now," Helga replied, glancing at the time on her phone.

"You know I've been thinking about us a lot lately," Arnold said, eyes drawing away from fidgeting with his beer and to her.

Home.

He knew that she wouldn't be there, but he had the smallest hope that she would have been. Walking into a dark empty house was something that he'd thought he'd never have to experience again. Flipping on the kitchen light, he walked to the cabinet they stored all of the liquor in and pulled out the bottle of whiskey and a glass, pouring himself a generous three fingers. That would be it for him, because he refused to be drunk when she got home. He would not be that person. Not only that, but he also wanted to hear what she had to say and he wanted to be in his right mind enough to articulate the things that he had to say as well.

The house felt suffocating though, and he was too pent up with burning frustration to be trapped within its walls, or better yet, spend his time pacing the hallway. He chose to step outside into the still cool May night instead, realizing that he still had some wood left from winter to burn, and enough accelerate to set it all ablaze. And he did just that, tabling his liquid comfort long enough to throw the logs in the pit and indulge his inner pyro with lighter fluid.

At least watching a fire was somewhat soothing while he drank.

Rooftop Bar.

Helga gave Arnold a tight grin, choosing to divert her eyes away from his and bring her wine to her lips as an excuse not to answer. "Some of the fun things we used to do," He shrugged, "Being gone had really over dosed me with a lot of nostalgia."

"We had some times..." She finally agreed, not wanting to appear rude, but not really caring to take a stroll down memory lane necessarily. And honestly, she had feared this would end up being what that whole outing was about. But whatever, they had some good times, she wouldn't deny that and if he wanted to entertain it for a bit she would. For old times sake.

"I enjoyed doing my work over seas, but...for what is worth I have always regretted leaving things the way I did."

Helga gave him the old side head tilt, "Yeah, in hindsight you probably could have given me more of a warning, hell," She took a sip of wine, "I thought you were going to propose that night. Imagine my shock."

Arnold chuckled, his face turning a light tint of red, "Yeah, looking back, booking a nice restaurant wasn't the best way to drop that information."

"Just a bit," She held up her index and thumb about an inch apart, clicking her cheek. If she were being honest, she was still a little salty about that, but whatever. Like it mattered anymore.

"Sorry for the mixed signals. I didn't know that's what you thought."

"I don't even know why I thought that," Helga waved him off.

"Probably because we had a really good thing."

"We did."

"You know, the entire time I was gone, I kept thinking about what you said about us being meant for one another because of how we just kept falling into each others lives since we were kids."

"Yeah. What about it?"

Arnold shrugged, "I think you were right. I think the distance made that a little more clear to me."

Helga just kind of blinked at him for a moment before finally asking, "So...what are you saying here exactly?" She hoped her voice didn't sound too harsh, but at the same time...she did.

"That...I think we could still be happy like we used to be and that...it could still be an Arnold and Helga story...if we wanted it to be."

"Oh wow..."

The boy, who her patience was rapidly waning with, had the audacity to give her a sheepish grin, rubbing the back of his neck with his hand, "My timing was a little off, I know."

"I'll say," Helga frowned, dumping the last of her wine down her throat, which in hindsight, wasn't smart because it was like half the glass which led to her having an alcohol head rush, "Anyway, I think I'm going to be going now." She blinked the vertigo away as she reached for her purse and slid off of the chair.

"Wait, what?" But Helga didn't spare him anymore parting words, at least not at that point, simply choosing to quietly keep walking. Yet, he insisted upon toddling after her for a, what? An explanation? If anybody deserved an explanation it was her. "Helga!"

He was hot on her heels the entire two flights of stairs it took to reach the sidewalk, when she finally had had enough of the pathetic pleading, "Helga, please wait."

"Crimeny," She rounded on him, almost causing him to jump, "I dragged my ass down here to shoot the shit for a bit, but obviously you had other ideas," She glared up at him, "In case you forgot, I'm married, Arnold!"

"So?"

She didn't think it was possible to be anymore shocked by him, but she had to admit, that simple little response took her breath away, "So? So? Well, I honestly never expected that out of you, of all people." She huffed turning and walking a few steps before turning and rounding on him again, "I mean, do vows mean nothing to you?!"

"I didn't mean it as if I don't have any respect it's just..."

"It's just...what?" She narrowed her impossibly angry eyes at him, squeezing their electric blue hue into little black lines.

Arnold quietly sighed, "Look I know there have been other guys while I was gone and not a single one of them worked out."

"And?"

Arnold, appearing to have gathered a second set of brass ones actually shot her a fairly serious and audacious stare before remarking, "I think it's pretty obvious it's because none of them have been me."

His exes mouth couldn't have fallen any further open, any faster. She finally gathered her wits enough to snap it close and shake her head, having to fight the real urge to slap the bejesus out of him, "That's incredibly presumptuous of you."

"Helga, I'm not dumb."

The small blonde snorted at the sheer absurdity of it, "Lots of people date around before they find someone they click with, Arnold." She again, turned and began to stalk off.

And again, he just had to follow her, "You and Brian though? Come on! It's...its just hilarious!"

For a third time, her anger and need for having the last word got the better of her and she rounded back on him, forcing him to take a few steps backwards, hopefully out of fear of his life, "Why, what seems to be so funny about it to you?"

Still, he didn't back down. He had a conviction and lord help him, he was going to see it through, "It just screams...last resort."

"Excuse me?"

"You're getting older. And don't even lie and say you didn't want to settle down, because I know you did. This feels like an attempt to do just that for the sake of doing it."

It stunned her a little that he was so very over the target of how she and Brian fell into their current situation, "Yeah, what do you know..."

And apparently her momentary lapse in a forceful comeback emboldened him enough for him to roll his eyes at her, "Married or not, do you really think he is going to be any different from the other guys?"

"Yeah, football head, I do." She defensively crossed her arms.

"Why?"

"He just is."

"Why?"

"He just. Is."

"Then tell me why."

"Because I..." Helga abruptly stopped, almost feeling her breath get taken away as she caught the very thing she'd been wildly denying about to come tumbling out of her mouth, and as much as she was ready to just get it out and in the open, she absolutely refused to allow Arnold to be the first to know. Especially before the person actually involved knew. Instead she began quietly laughing, and then a little harder before finally inhaling and running her hand over her braided hair with a more care free smile finally coming to rest on her lips, to the absolute confusion of Arnold, "You know what, Arnold?"

"What...?"

"You leaving has actually turned into the best thing that ever happened to me," She lifted her shoulders and a pop of a shrug.

Arnold frowned, his face taking on even more confusion as he continued watching her complete evaporation of anger and defensiveness, "Um..."

Helga shook her head, implying she didn't mean it to be hurtful, "I was kind of a needy jerk when we were together, you know that? I should have never made you feel guilty about going and doing something you wanted to do in the first place," She sighed, "I mean, yeah you should have told me you were thinking about it but...I understand now why you didn't and it's because I would have made you feel miserable about it. Making our break up about me was a real lousy and immature thing to do."

Her ex-boyfriend blinked, appearing to be completely caught off guard by her admission, "I...never thought you were being mean or needy," Arnold ran one of his hands over the back of his neck, brow scowling tightly, "What does any of this have to do with—"

"Just to say that...I think we had our moment and it was a lot of fun but...we obviously wanted different things," She began pointing out, "And instead of realizing that, I tried to put everything on ice and it wasn't the correct way of handling the change," She ran her one of her hands up her arms, absently scratching it, "Answer me something honestly, Arnold." She finally caught his eyes again.

"Okay."

"Did you move back to Hillwood because you really missed me, or because you're thirty-one and feeling like the world pressuring you to settle down too?" They teach you in law school to never ask a question that you don't already know the answer to. Helga never went to law school and certainly didn't follow it's good advice. She thought she might have known the answer, but she was also incredibly curious as to what he did have to say.

She intently watched as Arnold sighed, his eyes diverting away from hers and onto the dark concrete of the sidewalk they stood on. He made to answer twice, snapping his mouth shut each time before letting go of a defeated sigh and saying, "I'd be lying if I didn't say that it was a little of both."

Helga simply nodded at him, "And Brian and I ended up together, partially out of boredom and a little on a whim," She said, thinking it only correct to be a little straight with him as well, "At least we're both being truthful now," And that was about as much of the conversation as she felt having with him that night. She was kind of tired, had a little bit of a headache, and honestly ready to just get the night over with so she could see her husband in the morning, "You have a good heart and a belly full of wanderlust. Do what you really want to do," She offered up to him before waving, "See you around," And heading off towards her parked car.

Arriving back home she cursed a little when she saw Brian's truck curiously parked out front of their home. Of course she was also incredibly worried at that point. As far as she knew, he should have been on a plane, in the middle of the air. The whole reason she'd finally decided to humor Arnold with a friendly dinner. To pass the time. "Brian?" She asked when she stepped in the front door, becoming more and more concerned that something was wrong when he didn't answer. The lights were all off. Her panic some what subsided when she saw him sitting outside in front of a roaring flame in the fire pit. Stepping back out into spring night, she walked up beside him, noticing a glass of liquor in one hand. He didn't really acknowledge her, which had his wife even more confused by that point. "I thought you had a flight tonight?" She asked. Of course the whole situation at hand was so strange, it was forgotten to her that she also had some explaining to do.

Brian inhaled, refusing to look at her as he ran a hand over the top of his head and through his hair, "I needed a mental health day," He cryptically replied. Helga didn't get that at all. Not the need for a mental health day, but the fact that he was just so off. This wasn't like him. Over twenty years she'd known him and she'd never seen him get bothered by much of anything. Before she could investigate further he finally struck up the nerve enough to ask, "Did you have a good time with Arnold?" Helga blinked, her mouth falling slightly a gap for a moment, snapping shut when Brian's eye finally wandered away from the fire up to her, "I overheard you the other week," He answered her silent question.

Helga slowly nodded, realizing what his sudden demeanor change might have be over, and she suddenly had the worst feeling imaginable hit her stomach. She felt awful. He was jealous, and dare she say, deeply concerned about what her outing could have meant. It was a bit silly, but now that she thought about it, he had started to act off right around that time. No she'd even take it a step further. Basically since Arnold had shown up on their doorstep and learned the sordid truth. With a quiet sigh she took a seat in the chair right beside him, "Yeah, he's been bugging me about catching up." While completely true, it sounded like a half-assed lie.

"I bet he was..."

His wife chuckled. She had nothing to hide. Nothing to be ashamed of, so she wasn't about to sit there and feel guilty about anything, "I actually forgot I had even made the plans until like...thirty minutes before. I guess I never mentioned it because...I didn't really care about going all that much." Again...completely true, but one glance at his face told her he was having a hard time believing that.

"Did you listen to him drawl on about how he missed you while you forget about the fact that you haven't heard from him in five years?" He set his empty glass on the ground. He was by no means drunk, having only had that single glass of whiskey, but he was definitely emboldened a bit by it.

Helga merely rolled her eyes, surprisingly not irritated in the slightest by his jab. "Some of the first, not so much on the last." She smirked. It tasted weird to say that sentence, mostly because she'd thought she'd never, ever say such.

"Please. Isn't he all you've ever wanted. Your someone. Everybody has a someone, right? Isn't that what you said?"

"Well, yeah I think everybody has a someone."

"You can still go live happily ever after with him now, you know."

Helga lifted an eyebrow, a hint of a scowl cropping up as she couldn't quite make out what his strategy was at that point. She'd humor him though. "Is that what you want me to go do?"

For Brian's part, he didn't know what his strategy was either. He had gotten a case of the nervous chats that was manifesting his pain into meanness. But he shook his head, giving her a fleeting glance before looking back into the fire, "No." They sat in silence for a few moments and Helga almost thought that that was it. That was as much as he was going to give her before, "I'm in love with you," He finally admitted, and Helga couldn't help but notice how defeated he sounded. Like it was his last ditch effort to save them or something.

"I know," She confessed back, "I've known since our Napa Valley trip." She didn't want him to suspect that she'd actually heard him. Honestly, whether he'd said it or not, looking back it could be felt in his every action, however she still didn't want to out herself. Still, she leaned forward, placing her elbows on her knees and pressed on, "I'm more observant than most people give me credit for."

"Apparently..." He responded dryly.

"You know, my entire life I've had this...idea that life's a story. Everybody has their pre-written story. I knew what mine was and for the most part, who it was suppose to be with."

Brian robotically nodded, "I remember you mentioning that, the night we got drunk at the bar."

"When Arnold broke things off...it made me feel lost for the first time in my...adult life anyway. And I never really got over that lost feeling, no matter how much I dated. So, when you brought up our stupid marriage pact, as crazy as it sounded, I thought, what the hell, I'm sick of dating anyway, and if I'm going to wander story-less through life, might as well have a human companion instead of getting twenty cats or something."

"Hmm," Her husband hummed in a single laugh kind of way, "So that explains the cats."

"Pretty much," Helga cracked a smile, that turned into a resting expression, "Honestly, I expected that we'd drive each other crazy."

"Me too, actually," He chuckled a little more.

"I expected...well I guess that had no expectation other than that I expected that we'd never be able to jive and that this would go down in flames very quickly." She drew quiet for a second, before taking a small breath. "What I didn't expect, at all, was growing to love seeing you everyday, and going to bed with you every night. Going on little trips, and doing mundane things together. Missing you when I don't hear from you all day. Tossing and turning in bed when you aren't there because it feels empty. Loving that you never keep your hands or that amazing mouth to yourself. And...never ever wanting you to either." Brian tilted his head to look at her, "And it's because somewhere in this crazy, impossibly insane arrangement...I fell in love with my husband. And I went to see Arnold tonight, well..mostly to get him off my back finally, but I kind of ended up thanking him. Thanking him for…blowing up my life five years ago, because if he hadn't, you wouldn't have happened to me. You're my someone, Brian. Even though it took me forever to see that. So, no I'm not going to be flinging divorce papers at you."

"I never expected you to be my someone either. Yet, here we are. Life's very peculiar," The corner of Brian's mouth pulled into a lopsided smirk as he briefly looked off before refocusing on her.

His wife slightly smirked as she rolled her eyes and held her hand out, palm down, turning it from side to side, "Just a little." Brian smiled at her, chuckling for a split second before leaning over and across his chair, pulling her to him, their lips crashing heavily into one anothers as he dragged her into his lap.

"So no divorce papers huh?" He teasingly asked, pulling away from her mouth.

Helga chuckled, resting her arms on his shoulders, "I think I might retire them for good," She then shrugged, leaning her forehead against his, "Besides those two angels you call parents are expecting some grandchildren out of you, and I am their only hope at this point, because lets face it baby, you have less game than Stinky."

Brian rolled his eyes, a full on smile spreading across his face at that point, "Oh my God." He leaned up and gave her a few pecks on the lips, "I guess you aren't wrong though."

"I know," She smiled against his mouth, kissing him a few more times before pulling back, "I'm kind of looking forward to hearing your dad voice anyway. Probably wont be able to keep my hands off you."

"Want a preview? This was always my dad's favorite line when I was misbehaving," He cleared his throat, "Hey!" He barked in his deep deep voice, "Did you hear your mother?"

Helga. Loved it. Like good God, she'd take him right in that chair if she wasn't concerned about neighbors. Of course they were moving..."What do you say we go inside and have sex so passionately that you wont be able to tell where one of us begins and the other ends?"

Her husband snorted, "Are you asking me to make love to you?"

"Clever boy, Mr. Miller."

"Is that our last name now?"

"Yeah. I believe it finally is," She kissed him hard before pulling back one last time, "One more thing."

"What?"

"I want the first house."

"Oh, now you tell me."

A/N: There you go. This was never going to be an Arnold bash fest, and I tried to make his confusion about the whole situation as respectful as I think he could be expected to be. After all, of everybody in this story (besides maybe Phoebe) he knew Helga the best.

I've got an epilogue in the works. You guys that have been with me for awhile know how I roll. Well, I hope everybody enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you are interested in other fun stories, I recommend following me. I've got some stuff planned out. As much as I kept telling myself that this and Dark Forest were going to be my last full stories, I just can't seem to be done. Writing is a giant stress reliever for me, especially since I have a high stress job (I build and flip freakin' houses) that isn't getting any less stressful anytime soon.

Thanks again! I love you guys!