I DO NOT OWN HEY ARNOLD!!! DON'T SUE ME!!! (I don't have any money anyway so you wouldn't get much out of it if you did)
Return To Innocence
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"I'll see ya' around, football face," Helga says, slightly waving a goodbye. She walks a little ways down the hall and stops in front of her locker. She turns the lock combination without success and angrily slams her fist on her innocent locker door. She grits her teeth and tries again, this time popping the lock open with ease. She smiles smugly and begins digging for her books through the ill-maintained locker, dropping wrinkled pieces of paper in the process. Although I'll be late to class, I stand and watch her as she does this. I like that she's unaware of my curious eyes as she goes about her normal routine. I smile once then turn and head for my first period class.
Mr. Rieker.
A good man, but a senile one. He must be in his eighties, at least. His hair sometimes resembles Einstein's, the way it's untamed and sticks out every which way. His hair is also almost a bleached white yet he insists on wearing a dark brown toupee to cover the terribly large bald spot atop his head. He sometimes forgets where he is, or falls sleep in class, or even once he was convinced he was the 3rd president of the united states, reincarnated. He went around all day complaining about how he was once the great man who co-wrote the Declaration of Independence yet he can't get paid a decent salary.
I get the feeling that he and Grandma would get along very well.
I guess that's what being a History teacher all your life will do to you.
There's another side to him, though. He has more knowledge than ANY text book I'VE seen. He's extremely driven and can teach you something even if you don't realize it at the time. He fought in WWII, or so he says, so I wouldn't be surprised if he learned or saw, rather, a thing or two out in the "field" that the history books don't even know.
I walk into the classroom and everything falls into a hushed silence. Eyes all on me. I blush as I hurry to find my seat in the middle of the room. Mr. Rieker, sitting at his desk quietly, looks up at me over the top of his reading glasses. He smiles his old yellow-toothed smile, then stands up and walks to the middle of the classroom. He removes his glasses before he begins, "You should thank your lucky stars, son, that I hadn't turned in the attendance sheet."
"I-I know," I stutter and blush.
"Well, aren't you gonna sit down, boy?!" he says joyfully, his huge gut giggling as he moves with enthusiasm.
I take my seat and watch as he prepares for the day's lesson.
Lunchtime.
I couldn't wait for lunchtime to arrive, and now that it's here I've suddenly lost my appetite. I can't explain it, but it happens on occasion. I walk into the lunchroom and see the sea of people, all either scurrying to their table or to a lunch line. The cafeteria has a run-down appearance to it. The walls look dingy and worn out. The whole room has a tiredness to it.
Through the crowds I could still see one person of importance. Gerald. He sat at a table, a mysterious girl by his side, with an empty seat beside him. Good old Gerald, always thinking of me. I smile.
"Hey, man, I want you to meet Roxanne." Gerald says as I approach. He promptly stands up from his seat to introduce the girl. She holds out her hand and we shake, a polite was of saying 'pleased to meet you' without words.
"So you're Arnold, huh," she starts, twisting her raven hair around her index finger. She smiles and winks. Right off the bat she strikes me as annoying and unpleasant. The way she wears too much make up; the way she presents herself as, excuse my vulgarity, quite easy; the way she continues to chew on her piece of gum like a horse. I smile to be polite, but I'm secretly wishing she were miles away from me. Don't get me wrong, she is quite beautiful. Ah, there's that word again, but see, this time not everything is beautiful. SHE is not beautiful. Her attitude and personality scream follower, brat… and… complete and total unoriginality.
"Yeah, I'm Arnold," I force a smile, and slowly sit down in my chair.
"Gerald and I are going to the mall after school, wanna come?" she asks before blowing a bubble and popping it obnoxiously. She taps her long, manicured nails on the table's surface, causing an annoying and intolerable 'tap tap tap' that makes my skin crawl. She smiles again, knowing nothing of the disliking thoughts of her I harbor in my head at the moment.
Suddenly I feel someone plop down into the seat next to me. "Hey, football head, do me a favor." says Helga, before I even have a chance acknowledge her existence.
"Hmm, what?" I shake my confusion away with a simple double blink.
"You have to do something for me," she states, leaning in the chair.
"I do?" I question.
"Hey, we're having a conversation here," Roxanne says, furrowing her brow.
"Psft, ask me if I care," Helga simply says, paying no more attention to her as Roxanne mumbles something under her breath. That was awesome. No other girl would dare shrug off someone like Roxanne. Most others would be so intimidated by her social status that they would bend over backwards to please her. Not Helga, though. Helga's too stubborn and opinionated to abide by ANYONE other than herself.
THAT is beautiful… on some level.
"ANYWAY," Helga starts again, glaring at Roxanne for a minute, maybe hoping for another interruption just so she had a reason to bring 'old Betsy' into it, "see, I have this project to do with that guy, Charlie, you know that always sits alone at lunch and won't talk to anyone?" she asks, pointing rudely at the guy. Indeed he IS sitting alone.
He sits, picking at the food on his plate, looking as if he is in deep thought; he doesn't look sad; he doesn't look lonely; he just looks ask if he's pondering something. Using his plastic cafeteria fork, he picks up pieces of the seemingly inedible 'food' and lets it plop back down on his plate, unmoved.
"What do you need me for?" I frown, not getting the validity of her point or where she is going with this.
"Well, he… creeps… me out." she says, eyeing him strangely, "Could you please go over there and talk to him for me and tell me if he's really ask crazy as people say he is?" she pleads. See, here is where the 'friendship' part in our 'relationship' comes in. She just comes out of nowhere and asks me for a favor, one, I might add, I'd rather not do. Then again, doing this little 'favor' would give me a reason to get away from Roxanne and Gerald's miss-placed affection for her.
"Are you absolutely sure you want me to do this?" I ask, in one last effort to dissuade her from making me to it.
"Look, chick, he doesn't wanna go. How about you leave now and go back to wherever you came from, hmm?" Roxanne gives a fake smile and tilts her head.
"Right, like I'm gonna listen to you!" Helga bursts out laughing and waves her hand dismissively, "You're too funny."
"I wasn't being funny!" Roxanne says, frustrated.
"Oh, I'm sorry," Helga replies sarcastically, then gives her a look.
"Uh… yeah, I'll do you that favor." I cut in, feeling the tension in the air rising. Helga and Roxanne continue to glare at one another. I exchange a look with Gerald then stand up from my seat and grab onto Helga's shoulders, breaking her from her staring game. I motion for her to follow me, then we leave the table.
"That was… interesting." I comment, stifling a laugh.
"Shut it, hair boy." she says with a smile.
We exchange our own kind of 'knowing look' then we go back to our usual manor.
"Look that's him, talk to him Arnoldo," she says, slightly panicked, grabbing onto my shirt sleeve to stop me, "I'll be waiting here," Helga says quickly as she sits down at a table near Charlie's.
"Uh, o-ok." I look nervously at my destination. He somehow reminds me of Arnie. Maybe it's the bland, boring, message I get from him as he's still sitting there, playing with his disgusting cafeteria food.
"GO ALREADY!" I hear Helga whisper hoarsely, demanding me to go forth.
I gulp and take a few steps forward to the table and, not before taking one last deep breath, sit quietly down in the chair across from him. He still sits there, unaware of my presence before him. He looks down at his food as if he's looking straight through it; he seems as if his mind has completely left his body. I clear my voice in hopes that I'll get his attention… without success.
After what seems like forever he drops his fork, letting make a disgusting 'plop' noise as it does so. He then, as if following a line, looks from his food to the table then to me. I smile awkwardly, feeling as if 'now that I've got his attention, I'm not sure I want it anymore'.
"H-hi I-I'm Arnold." I say, my voice climbing octaves as I speak. I hear Helga laughing in the distance. He's still completely unmoved and continues to stare at me.
So uncomfortable.
So awkward.
I want to run away right at that very second and back out of this 'favor' I'm doing.
"What do you want?" he finally speaks, looking down at his food again.
"My uh fri-" my voice climbs octaves again just as if I were going through puberty, so I clear my voice, "my friend wanted my to talk to you. She says she's doing a project with you and sh-she doesn't know you too well so I offered to talk to you." I smile awkwardly again.
"I see."
"S-so, you new here?" I scratch nervously at the back of my head.
"No."
"Oh," I look around the cafeteria for something, ANYTHING, to start a conversation between us.
"Can you go now, I'd like to be alone." he says, rather rudely.
"Hey, I just wanted to talk to you," I reply defensively.
"Well you did. Now you're done. Please, just go." he looks to his left then down to his food again, picking up the plastic fork. He was deliberately trying not to make eye contact, I decide, and I suddenly feel troubled. He proceeds to pick at his food, mindlessly, again. I frown.
"Ok, bye," I get up from the table and walk quickly back to Helga. She looks expectantly at me as I stand before her.
"So?"
"He's not crazy."
"You sure?" she looks skeptically at me and folds her arms.
"Pretty sure. He's just kind of, well, mean."
"Oh, hell, I can live with mean, it's CRAZY I have trouble with." she looks over to Charlie again. I watch as a few emotions play across her face. She first looks wearily at the boy; then she looks confused; then she looks skeptical once more. she shrugs, then looks back at me. "I owe ya' one." she says with a smirk.
"Don't mention it," I shrug it off. I look at her for a few seconds more then walk back over to my table, feeling disturbed by my 'conversation' with Charlie. What could make someone act that unsociable?
Even if he didn't look it, there seemed to me a sadness about him. I look back at his table and see he's pushed his plate away and is now simply sitting there, staring off into space. I feel sympathy towards him, but after our talk I feel it's better to leave him be.
Poor Charlie.
There's something wrong with that kid…
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Tah-dah! Chapter three! I hope that thing about the spaces I put in the reviews helped clear things up for a few people. Maybe I was coming off as a little angry, but I wasn't. I just want my readers to understand where I'm coming from. I hope you're enjoying my story, and I promise you'll understand where I'm going with it soon. Review, too, I wanna know what you think about it :D