Chapter 3: Tuesday
I don't know why I'm being this way. I don't have any real reason, other than the fact that I'm a selfish jerk, who really doesn't care about anyone else. ... But I'm not being fair to myself. I know that isn't true. I care too much. Far too much. I could've been happy, exuberant. My life could've been... Could've. Yeah, that's the word. Compound word, actually. Could have. Could have.
I guess there weren't ever any guarantees, though.
Helga would admit, she was starting to get a little nervous. She'd never actually been to a dance before, much less with Arnold. This was the chance of a lifetime, and she didn't want to blow it by not being prepared.
She stared out her window. It was a miserable-looking day. Dark, malevolent clouds blotted out every hopeful ray of sunshine that tried to force its way through. The air was completely silent, no birdsong, no cars, no wind.
Just as she thought that, a slight breeze began to blow. It stirred the leaves in the tree. With a slight grin, Helga watched a squirrel peek its head out from inside a hole, then scamper out and down the trunk, probably off to find food. She sighed. Survival--simplicity at its best. Survival was what she was used to. Now she was having to adapt to things that were completely and utterly foreign to her. It was a tearing experience.
Her room was a wreck, she observed, turning from the window. She hadn't cleaned it at all since she had talked to Arnold at the park on Sunday. Dirty clothes, plates, napkins, all lay in heaps on the floor. She shrugged to herself--it didn't matter much, since no one really cared enough to check up on her. She rarely had company; even Phoebe barely came by anymore. The day after her birthday had been an exception to what was rapidly becoming the rule--Phoebe was losing interest in her as a friend.
With that depressing thought, Helga put her shoes on and opened her bedroom door. The house was dark. 'Strange,' she thought, peeking around the corner nervously. 'I thought everyone was home today.'
She decided she didn't really care, though, and stomped down the stairs. Then, realizing what she must look like, she bit her lip and ran back to the top. This time, she walked down slowly, casually, lady-like. Satisfied, she opened the front door and stepped outside, grabbing an umbrella as she did, just in case.
...
She nearly ran into Olga.
"Hey, what the... Olga?" she said, befuddled and a little upset and having nearly fallen over.
"Hi Helga! How are you, Sweety?"
"I'm ... fine. What are you doing here? I mean, I thought you were..."
She laughed, effectively cutting Helga's inquiry off. "Oh no, that all fell through. But both of us are happy now. Boy, it feels so liberating to be single again!"
Helga threw Olga the most horrified look she could manage, and she actually meant it. "You got a divorce?!"
"Oh yes, last month. Didn't Mom and Dad tell you? I would've written you myself, but you see, after ..."
"Never mind that! I'm so sorry! That's horrible! I mean, you two were so close!"
Olga patted Helga on the head, then, realizing that she wasn't a little girl anymore, placed a hand on her shoulder. "Oh Helga. I'm perfectly fine. Like I said, neither of us could be happier right now. It was the right thing to do."
...
Olga was a woman of many layers; Helga knew this for certain. Olga wasn't being up front about her feelings, and Helga knew why.
They were sitting in the car, at a red light, catching up. Their conversation had been fairly idle up to this point, consisting basically of 'How's school?' 'Meet any cute boys?' 'What's your take on the Global Warming problem?' and such. But Helga decided enough was enough and just came out with it.
"You're miserable, aren't you?" she asked, staring straight ahead, knowing Olga would feel more comfortable talking about it if she avoided eye contact.
After a long pause, Olga answered. "Yes."
"It's Mom and Dad, right?"
Another pause. Then: "Yes."
Bob and Miriam were, to put it mildly, extremely unhappy with Olga's choice in a husband. He was an author, unknown and broke. He had high hopes for her; her husband didn't fit into the image of their "ideal son-in-law."
But she had loved him desperately, and when they refused to consent to the marriage, she married him anyway. It was at that point that Bob and Miriam broke off all contact with her. She hadn't heard from them at all for two years, which was, of course, extremely hard for her.
"Look, why do you let them run your life? You've always been so outgoing, so popular, so... so... you know, so good at everything. You could be whatever you wanted to! And you darn well should be able to marry whoever the heck you want! Why did you leave him? Honestly? What was going through your mind when you decided to move back in with us? Was it his feelings, or was it your own? Honestly, Olga, I don't understand you."
"Helga, of course I care about his feelings! I love him! He..."
"You sure have a funny way of expressing love."
Time passed. Helga wasn't sure how much time, but she knew a lot of time had passed, as they had driven by the butcher shop three times before Olga spoke again.
"I've lived my entire life as some... some... glorified flesh-born Barbie doll. They've dressed me up, sent me out to do everything, to be everything they weren't but wished they were. That's my life. When I broke away from them... I just didn't know what to do. I lost all meaning in my life."
Helga sighed, then noticed out of the corner of her eye that Olga was crying. She kept her eyes trained on the dashboard and answered.
"That's because you were living their life, not your own."
She heard a slight chuckle from Olga, followed by a tiny sob disguised as a hiccup. "I don't even know how to begin being my own person... I think I've proven that."
...
She hated herself. Not only that, but she was positive that he hated her. And if Helga knew, then Helga would hate her, too. But Helga couldn't know. There was no way that she could allow Helga to find out the truth.
That was why she had been distancing herself from Helga--guilt. She felt guilty for taking the love of her best friend's life. True enough, though, he never expressed any interest in her whatsoever (and she was sure he was merely going to the dance with Helga to make her regret having forced him to keep their relationship a secret.) But she still felt terrible.
And she wasn't much of a liar, either. At least, she was never one to carry a lie on for so long. This was a lie that required her to create more and more lies constantly. She hated herself.
It had yet to start raining, though Phoebe was positive that it would soon. She shivered, feeling the slight chill that the air had taken. Her room was completely dark, even the light from outside unable to drive the darkness from her room. 'Huh,' she thought, 'Life's good at throwing analogies my way just when I'd rather it shut up and leave me alone.' She looked down at her lap, at her diary which lay there. She picked it up. She looked at her most recent entry...
"I guess there weren't ever any guarantees, though..."
She had basically guaranteed herself that she would be with him someday. So this entry was a load of garbage. There was a guarantee--the person who made it was simply too stupid to follow through.
She touched her lips and felt blood. She held her fingers up, looking at it. The darkness shaded it, but she could still see the tiniesty glint of red glistening on her fingertips. She had been biting her lip, apparently. It was a nasty habit, one that only manifested itself when she was genuinely disturbed. She wouldn't cry anymore; she knew herself well enough to know that her tears were gone, at least for awhile. But she found other ways of showing her torment, whether she consciously wanted to or not.
She picked up the phone. She dialed. She waited.
"Hello?"
"Hi, is Helga home?" she asked, trying her best to sound her cheerful self, even to Big Bob.
"No, she went out for a drive with Olga. Is this Phoebe?"
"Yes sir. Could you tell her I called?"
"Sure. Take care." He hung up, but she held the phone to her ear for a long time, until it began beeping in protest. She set it down again on the receiver, touched her lips again, then stood and went downstairs.
"I'm going out for awhile, okay Mom?" she said, calling into the light of the kitchen.
"You really want to, hon? It's looking mighty gloomy out, might start raining."
"I know. I'll bring an umbrella. I won't be too long."
"Be careful, baby."
She assumed that Arnold was at school. After all, the prom committee had been meeting there every Tuesday for the past three months. She only knew this because she had been paying extra close attention to Arnold's every action. Had she been stalking him? She wouldn't have used that word. Much too harsh-sounding.
A mist had, by this time, covered most of downtown. It was like looking through a bowl of split pea soup. Or, at least, trying, to look through one. She wasn't in a good part of town, but she was walking along the shortest distance between her house and the high school. The buildings were mostly all red brick, and only one stood out from the drabness of the others. It was the local Outreach Center. Some church organization ran it, supposedly to help feed the poor in this area of town. She had volunteered there once, back in the bygone days of elementary school.
And she had been asked, on several occasions, to come and help again. But she wanted nothing to do with the place now. It was too "churchy" for her, too much preaching. It made her extremely uncomfortable. Arnold was big into church, at least since he entered high school. She knew, though, that he had stopped going entirely since the two of them had broken up six months prior.
She arrived at the school, and peered through a barred window into the gym. There they were, hard at work, putting up all the banners, the streamers, the lights, the sound system. And there he was, working his heart out for his school, his friends.
For Helga...? she thought, then shook her head. No, he didn't really want to go with Helga. He was doing it to get back at her. She didn't blame him.
She wasn't jealous of her friend; at least, not in the usual sense. Sure, she wished it were her going to the prom with Arnold. But she couldn't be angry at Helga for stabbing her in the back; it was she who had stabbed Helga, anyway.
She sat outside for a half hour or so, until it began to sprinkle. The raindrops splatted against her head, seemingly heavier than they ought to be. Their heaviness reminded her of her present mood, and she reluctantly opened her umbrella and walked home.
...
"Man, it's raining! I've gotta walk home, too. That stinks..."
"Easy man," Gerald said, slapping his friend on the back. "I'll give you a ride! No prob!"
Arnold almost laughed. "You're still driving that old thing, eh? Surprised it hasn't ..."
"Eh eh eh, Arnold, my man. Don't diss the wheels. You're just jealous, after all."
"Sure, yeah." Arnold chuckled, then followed Gerald outside. The sprinkling had turned into a torrential downpour, and puddles were growing into streams growing into rivers. Cars flew by, throwing sheets of water over the fence, nearly drenching the two as they ran for the car.
"Dang, man, this is nuts! Where'd this come from, anyway?"
Arnold shrugged. "I don't know. It was supposed to rain yesterday, but it was clear as it could be..."
"I oughtta become a meteorologist. I'd bring some dignity back to the profession," Gerald said, though not seriously enough to prevent Arnold from responding with a laugh.
"Mmhmm," he muttered afterward, then put his seatbelt on. "Hey, Gerald..."
"What's up, man?"
"Serious problem."
"Uh oh... what's up?"
"You remember Helga Pataki?"
"Yeah, sure I do. She's in my government class. What about her?"
"Would you believe me if I told you I... this is hard to say..."
"What?"
"What if I told you I agreed to go to the prom with her? What would you say?"
Gerald laughed, uproariously, for several seconds before answering. "You know what I'd say. And what I'm gonna say: What's the matter with you?!"
Arnold sighed. "I figured you'd react like this..."
"At least you know me well enough to know that," he answered, chuckling.
"I don't know, I guess it's kinda mean of me to be like this, but ... I really really don't like her at all... I mean, sure, maybe she's changed since I last talked with her and stuff, but... all that harrassment doesn't just vanish after a couple years..."
"Well, she is a lot quieter now. Hardly says a word in class. She's been turnin' some heads lately, though. She's nowhere near as ugly as she was... Heck, she's lookin' okay now, in my opinion."
"Yeah, but that's not the point."
"I know, man. You're an honest guy, I'll give you that. So, are you gonna take her or not?"
"Yeah, I guess I am... but ... It's digging up a lot of past hurt, you know what I mean?"
"I do. Just talk to her. Get all that stuff out of the way. Who knows... maybe you'll have fun."
"Yeah, maybe..."
They drove on in the downpour, neither saying a word, and Arnold hoping that his friend was right.
Maybe there could be life after Phoebe...
