She'd only really taken in the space once her food tray was full and ready to go.
Dinner was held in the mess hall, the structure's substantial interior kept simple, resembling a gutted timber construction if not for the tables that filled the space. Its surfaces, from the baseboards all the way to the exposed wooden beams and rows of visible rafters overhead, were all dark-stained and wax treated. The evening was cool, and the space would have been quite dark with such a pitched, steep ceiling, had it not been for the long lines of warm-toned lights that cast an inviting 'gather here' coziness that Helga felt was well done, but didn't appreciate. She waved off Phoebe's offer to sit with her.
"Go ahead and get chummy with Tall Hair Boy, Pheebes. I need to think."
Students from other schools really started piling in, obscuring her line of sight as she scanned the hall. Her shoulders tightened as she thought absently toward her near future in highschool, where her pool of classmates, grown moderately since elementary, would be dumped in a much larger pond. The closer they approached the change, the more it unsettled her. Not its inevitability, or having to navigate a new unknown, but feeling the recent unraveling of familiarity in her life moving faster. It inflated a sense of urgency to 'make something happen' that she knew could ultimately undermine her.
Not that she was the patient type to begin with.
Helga searched the crowd, a mix milling around, taking their seats, idling like idiots, or standing up on the table benches between rows—dicking around and of course, blocking her view. She couldn't find him. Yet.
He'd developed quite the skill of avoiding her gaze-–or acting as though he didn't even acknowledge her existence, when he wanted to. But since the day before graduation, which he didn't even attend, his aggravating efficiency was ever atrocious. He'd even gotten away with taking his non-assigned bus over here, just to avoid being lumped in the same one as her.
It took years for him to really ignore her like that. He couldn't, or wouldn't, before, well.
Before she'd cornered him at the top of a skyscraper, confessed her undying, stalking, obsessive love for him, and gobsmacked the poor idiot with an obliterating kiss.
But, you know, 'heat of the moment' and all. And him providing the 'out' she needed to survive his rejection. A return to the status quo.
At first his everyday changes afterward were so subtle that you could almost dismiss them, but were punctuated with occasional bursts of intensity that begged re-examination. Their April Fools dance particularly came to mind whenever she'd think back, tracking a timeline of his shifts.
Their dynamic slowly turned away from bully and target with the moral high-ground, to that of light banter, stepping around each other strategically as if playing a game neither could call by name. Her, for fear that he'd call it by a different one than she would. And him, well. She couldn't stand to think long and hard on that one, when she struggled enough just keeping the trembling in her limbs undetected, her nerves fritzing like live wires as she kept a casual front in his presence.
So she kept that pace with him. Always forward facing, but with the fear that if she dared look down to truly find her feet, the illusion of solid ground would unveil itself, and she'd fall.
And when their banter eventually gave way to sparring, her heart was already braced, protected by the raised shield of her brusque guard. It became less about hiding her feelings on the pretense of a take-back, and more about beating him. Whatever she could lean into, to relieve and embolden her shaken resolve, to deny just how vulnerable she always felt playing that game of theirs, how weak her self-soothing insistence that maybe he really didn't know. Maybe if he could also believe the lie just enough, it would get easier, and behind each high of excitement she got from their jousts, she wouldn't have to keep straining to push back her breaking point.
Then one day Arnold showed up without his hat, and an uncanny shift displaced something that never quite came back.
Their quartet—two of whom were already dating, never felt the same way, either.
And when that school year ended, and he withdrew even more that summer, that old normal fractured further.
Unnerved, she clung to their pretense like a lifeline, her inner faculty for bullying him as a means of re-establishing normalcy disrupted; his dysregulation dysregulating her in kind. If she could hold onto any sense of normality between them, she'd take it. Even if it meant adhering to a self-mortifying falsehood, and focusing on what remained, even if familiar traits were reformed and refitted to this new him. True, though the contrasts stuck out painfully to her, there were things about Arnold that were still very much Arnold.
He still cared for and guided his peers—but like a chore, and often only by request. His deadpan silences, though longer and more detached. His voice of reason, still even and clear, but lacking optimistic ideals, replaced instead by blasé realism and little expectation.
His sense of altruism was just as powerful—but even their class saw less of that. Usually distant and preoccupied at school, his availability dwindled even further outside of class, volunteering long hours at local animal shelters and soup kitchens.
His ever-present calm. Well, present except for some very notable, rattling exceptions… And there was a difference between quiet and disquiet, between his presence and being present. But she knew. They all did.
Something troubling and absent. And missed. But they'd gotten used to it.
Not Gerald, Phoebe or her, but. She wasn't expecting any other classmate interventions happening again anytime soon.
And when Gerald tried last time, well…
Helga pushed the thought aside. She had her own reckoning to bring.
She walked past her class and down the length of the mess hall to one of the only sparsely populated tables left, surveying its occupants. The few currently sitting there seemed anti-social enough, and figured she could eat and think without being bothered.
She spotted Gerald withdrawing from his seat to approach someone she didn't recognize in a gray oversized hoodie across the hall as she sat down, their back turned to her. She watched him give the guy a long, appraising look—who turned his head away and shifted with impatient discomfort. When Gerald didn't waver his inspective gaze, they gave a nod at last, and leaned forward with a distracted, yet unmistakable handshake. Her hands fisted.
Why that little sneak.
Just as she made to stand, one of the counselors shouted to the crowd that if they wanted to mingle with kids from other schools, they had a designated table just for that, pointing out its just-cleared surface. Before she could even shift around her bench and fight through the bodies, the table was already filling—and wouldn't you know it, he took the very last seat.
She fumed, resigning herself to her spot and glared daggers at his back.
Arnold,
You traitor.
Turncoat to your own truths.
Thinking you can hide.
That you won't reap what's sowed,
And fallen so far from yourself.
How I despise you.
She watched as he engaged with complete strangers more than he had with their own—with her, and handed his pudding to the guy who'd been behind her in line earlier, who glumly watched as she snatched away the last dessert in the queue. She reeled, an ache swirling in her chest at the sight, her face pinched with pain as her eyes slipped away.
And yet…
She slouched and opened her mini chocolate milk carton absently, tossing back a swig. She made eye contact with Phoebe when her gaze eventually wandered back up, catching her watchful concern. Nope. Can't have that. Helga gave a quick nod of assurance and hoped that'd be enough. When her friend's worry didn't abate, she took on the mocking brain-dead look she had during Mr. Simmon's info dump earlier and really hammed it up, zombified gestures and all, until Phoebe finally rolled her eyes and cracked up at last. She smiled, appeased, and turned back to Gerald.
When Helga turned back to her tray she realized a gaggle of girls looking for a place to sit together were giving her weird looks. She shrugged.
"What, never ate with the undead before?"
She kept a straight face as her negative first impression went over as anticipated, scattering them and their snobbish, preening hairflips. Most kids wanted to make new friends at summer camp, or guarded against any risk of coming across uncharmingly or peculiar in any way, yet these were inclinations she gave zero fucks for. Particularly now. And as a reformed bully, if glaring and saying whatever offbeat thought that came to mind was all it took to keep people the hell away from her, she'd take it.
Too bad it didn't work for her present company. The anti-social duo who were already sitting there not only hadn't left, but had lowered their phones and were surveying her like she was suddenly worth noticing. She arched her brow and let her glower drag.
The one on the left played with his barbell tongue piercing absently as they sat across from her, regarding her detachedly. The one on right, whose purple-streaked hair fell forward enough to cover half his face through his hoodie, addressed her with a low, dispassionate rasp.
"So where're your brains, zombie?"
Helga eyerolled and took to mashing her shepherd's pie with her fork.
"I'm settling," she replied with a scoff, then scanned the table of noisy preppy kids who filled the table nearby. "But I'll let you know if I wind up finding where I can get any."
The boys gave a soft snort, smirks tugging their lips.
"You like monsters?" the other one asked with a quirked brow, his voice low and unhurried. He looked like he'd just rolled out of bed, his hair worn like a floppy dark mop and wearing a paperclip necklace over a faded black t-shirt.
She sent a dead glance down the room to catch the back view of a large gray hoodie that hid away grunge-chic flannel and scarecrow cowlicks.
"Less lately."
The pair responded with slow, knowing nods.
"Classics get kinda boring after a while. I'm leaning more towards liches nowadays."
"Yeah, I'm more into the Ancient Greek shit now, too," the mop-head added, dipping his fry absently in a pile of way too much ketchup. "Gorgons, hydras."
Helga tried leveling her glare back at them, but her brow arched with a look she hoped didn't betray her mild surprise.
Huh. Good picks.
It was then that she realized when you looked past the contrast of piercings, attire and hairstyles, that the pair were actually twins.
She stilled.
Her periphery alerted her first, more attuned to any turn of his body toward hers than her own conscious awareness. Her eyes flashed to the source—sure enough, she'd caught him staring at her over his shoulder. Their eyes met, and hardened their focus on each other.
For the first time since then, he didn't back down.
Arnold's eyes were tight and unreadable, but she caught them flickering between her and the two guys she sat alone with and back more than once.
She scoffed, the sound a soft, hollow laugh.
Of course.
The busy hall and its occupants fell away, her perception reduced and tunneled in vision between the two of them. Oh, she felt so sorely tempted to just strike him down, then and there, with unleashed fury and words that could flay the flesh off his bones, and make him own everything that was his and coming to him.
But instead, she slid forward on her elbows, lowered the brim of her blue baseball cap at him, and returned his look with a smile that was promising, and not nice.
His eyes thinned, simmering back at her, before turning to face away from her again.
She could practically feel the steam evaporating off of her, the skin of her face and arms flushed hot in the cool air of the mess hall.
In a way, it was nothing new. They'd spent years casting each other looks that both hid and said everything, even if they misread each other, or if the messenger wasn't honest.
But just the fact that he'd been caught and hadn't tried to hide—and responded, however minutely, to her nonverbal response… It almost felt like some return to normalcy, just to be acknowledged in that small way by him. Their pattern entailed him drawing in, then pulling back, and in again, as they boomeranged past each other. For anything to return to form brought a sense of relief that was untrusted and unwanted, and only seemed to loosen the restraint that barely reined in her fear and ire at him.
He had another thing coming if he thought things could return back to normal now.
She glowered at the mashed, uneaten food on her plate. She retrieved a small, pale pink notebook out of her knapsack and just as she thought she'd have to tell the two weirdos sitting across her to buzz off, she looked up to see them tuned out, eating and engrossed in their phones. Fine.
She clicked her purple pen, and hovered it over the page.
Nothing came.
She'd planned to use dinner to plan her next moves, to sort out a scheme to set things up so that… something would happen, and yet. She couldn't think past the churning desire to just… rage at him. Interrogate him. Or punch him in the face. Or, to finally give into her most damning impulse and just kiss the living daylights out of him, despite her fear, vengeful wants and better judgment.
And beyond that, she didn't know if she'd even get what she wanted if she tried, or even grim satisfaction if all he did was fight back. A fleeting part of her—in the voice of his younger self—gently insisted that the best policy would be to just sit him down and talk things out.
But this Arnold didn't talk things out.
And neither did she.
Or at least, not with him. Even in their smoothest moments, their barbs at their lowest and playing off each other with an unplanned synergy that shook the wings of her beating heart free—she always crashed after they'd flutter and soar to their peril. Always retreat with anguished confusion with each dangling carrot he either yanked away or that she couldn't dare grab herself.
When he'd sometimes wallflower with her, or smirk at her cracking wise, or even share deeper conversation, there was always that guard. And when they had their flare ups and things settled down afterwards, it was never because they'd talked.
But that last time…
Yeah. No.
There would definitely be punching.
She conceded a small delay in drafting plans, grabbed her fork, and shoveled her dinner down, barely registering its taste. It wasn't awful, and that was good enough.
The last of the students in line were finally served and made their way across the hall, scoping out slim pickings for seats. An informal procession approached from her left side down the row of tables, and Helga caught an angular face she wished she hadn't seen watching her with a mix of longing and anguished trepidation. She turned back to her food with a bitter frown, and felt thankful she had commandeered the one table that felt unwelcome enough for anyone else to join.
The twin with the purple hair pointed vaguely at the brunette in question just as they passed. He gave a small indicating tilt with his chin.
"Guy got a weird thing for you?"
Her hand closed automatically in a fist around her fork. She set it down deliberately and retracted her fingers, knuckles cracking.
"Something like that."
"Yeah, feel you on that," the mop-head replied, barbell pin between his teeth and gaze tracking ahead with a focus she could tell meant he'd spotted someone of significance walking behind her. She didn't bother looking back or replying though.
His twin flashed his palms, shaking his head.
"Nah, screw that noise. This is vacation."
She gestured dismissively, already engaging more than she'd intended. Oh, what the hell, she already couldn't focus. She snapped her book shut and placed it and her pen back in her bag. Soon.
"I'd almost believe you if you weren't you," his brother scoffed with a crooked half-smile, drowning his mac n cheese with ketchup. And mayo. Helga's lip curled back in revulsion.
"Man, that's nasty," the purple, hooded one chided, biting back his lip with a low chuckle. "Look at that, you're totally grossing her out."
The offending twin indicated his murdered mac n' cheese laden fork in her general direction with a smirk. "Your loss."
"Why you gotta go so hard in front of new people?" the other twin asked with a smile, unselfconscious. Helga's brow arched with distaste and looked away as the abomination was consumed. At least the sicko had the decency to finish chewing and swallowed before he addressed her again.
"Hate that?" he asked with cocky amusement. "That's good, because for a moment there I was worried we might become friends."
Helga just stared before scoffing incredulously.
"Right," she eyerolled, "because I've been so freakin' friendly."
"See?" he waved his hand agreeably, "Just like I said."
The purple-haired twin tossed back his milk. He licked the resultant white mustache off and gestured vaguely to his companion. "Seriously, that'll fuck you up for tomorrow, especially if you still wanna swim."
His brother paused and dropped his fork and shoved his hands in his jacket with a sulk.
Helga stared.
"...Really?" she deadpanned, gesturing to the both of them rudely, indicating their—well, everything. "You guys actually care about camp?"
They looked vaguely affronted, hands clutching invisible pearls with feigned offense. Whether they knew, or cared that she cast shade, she couldn't tell.
"Well," mop-head answered, "I wouldn't use a powerful word like 'care', but…"
His brother opened his palms and shrugged. "Some of the activities are…" he gestured half-heartedly, "kinda fun."
"Kinda not shitty."
"Pff," she eyerolled. "Please. All those annoying sappy group 'pow-wows', those cheesy team building exercises—and not to mention we still gotta wake up at friggin 7am—during summer time? Trust me, if I weren't being forced to come here, I wouldn't be."
They pursed their lips and nodded thoughtfully, chewing her words over.
"Yeah, that 7am thing is… especially shitty."
"True."
"And the 'pow-wow' shit…yeah, that blows, too."
"Also true."
"But," the mop-head leaned on his elbow and tapped the table. "Think less team building and more… team destruction," he followed up with a growing smirk. "See, we've been here before. Couple of times."
His twin nodded. "Yep. Same class." When Helga raised her unibrow expectantly at them to press on, he flashed his eyes with an easy, amused eye roll. "We live around here."
"So, we kinda know the ropes a bit," the mop-head nodded, the end of his piercing clicking against the back of his teeth as he smirked.
"And as you can see, we've made many friends," his twin added with a sardonic grin that oozed richly with more amusement than she'd seen from either of them, gesturing vaguely to the otherwise empty table like a lowkey point of pride.
She snorted, despite herself.
Okay, these two weren't too bad.
"But yeah, you can have fun," the mop-head concluded with an anticipatory glint in his eye.
"And sometimes you can have even more fun if you sign up as an activities leader, and then… do nothing. Or, you know… mess around a little," he added slyly.
"'Supervise'," his brother added meaningfully, with finger quotes.
Helga fixed them with a look, her brow arching slowly as her focus drew forward. She reached into her bag and retrieved her pink book and pen again. She poised the tip over a blank page, pen clicked and ready.
"What kind of activities?"
… … …
Author's note: Dessert, Vulnerable, Pen.
Feedback always appreciated! :) They give me life!
