They walked along the path leading to the center of the park, the old worn stones under their feet reminding them with each step of so many moments in their youth. How very long since either had been there. It was a nice park, really. Still huge--even though she no longer saw it through the eyes of a wistful child. Helga wondered if she had ever even seen the whole thing. (Most of her visits had involved a particular pink bench under an old tree, where more than a few times she had carved a particular pair of initials into hearts.) Certainly, she had often come in the evening like this, when the sun was just setting across the other side of the city. She would have liked to see that sunset.
She wouldn't have minded seeing it with him.
Perhaps some other time.
Right now, she'd rather pay attention to what he was saying--even if it was pretty unbelievable.
".....and was my professor mad when his eyebrows got scorched off! He looked like Groucho Marx to begin with, so this made him look really bizzare--all he had left were these two white spots where the hair used to be...Don't worry, they grew back. He did seem kind of impressed that we'd somehow set the desk on fire with only formaldehyde and a ham sandwich......" He paused to make sure she was listening, before he continued. "...Until then, I'd never believed those stories about someone almost burning down their school laboratory. But it was an accident, honest. .....So there--Archaeology is definitely not boring!"
She smirked. More wacky stuff happened to him in a day than in some people's lifetimes.
"You know, Arnold.....I get the feeling that parts of your story were entirely made up," she accused.
"Are you saying I'm a liar?"
"Hey, I call 'em as I see 'em."
He laughed. "Well, yeah...I guess I am starting to sound like my grandpa. I might have exaggerated a little when I told you the mummified cat went up in flames and we had to put it out with orange soda." A sly look crossed his face. "....Actually, I think it was grape..."
Well, they do say truth is stranger than fiction.
"So, what kind of crazy shenanigans have you been in lately?"
"None as...adventurous...as yours, that's for sure," Helga answered, still laughing. "Actually, I'm downright boring. I've done some theater--as you might have guessed..."
She always was a good actress, he remembered.
"...and also a little French. I'm going to France under a 'study abroad' program later this year. But mostly, I've been studying English literature and composition. Poetry, y'know. I guess I'd still like to be some kind of writer, eventually. I think it might be fun to write for a newspaper if I ever get the chance."
"As a reporter?" he asked. "Or do you mean, more along the lines of an advice column?"
She scoffed. "Advice? Phffft! ...Honestly, Arnold--can you imagine me telling a bunch of gullible slobs how to fix their problems?"
"Yeah, good point. You give the worst advice I've ev....."
She socked him lightly in the arm. "Very funny. I bet you'd get a big kick out of it if I told you what I really want to do someday." Once the words escaped, she wished she hadn't said them. "Er.....never mind."
"Tell me," he said, genuinely interested.
"Forget it, Chuckles. It's silly, and I refuse to let you laugh at me."
"Come on, I won't laugh. I promise."
Helga considered it, tumbling the thought over in her mind. It was Arnold...if anyone understood, he might. At one time, he'd had less sense of reality than she.....
She sighed. "Well.....I guess what I've always sort of dreamed about--ever since I was a little girl--was to...travel. To see everything." She grinned, her happy thoughts slowly beginning to spill out. "You know: fly around...see and do all kinds of strange, new things...visit those romantic, amazing, exotic places you only hear about--Brazil..Japan...Italy....Sri Lanka.....Milwaukee! The whole nine yards!!"
"Milwaukee is 'strange and exotic'?" he interrupted, amused.
"Okay, no...not really," Helga admitted. "But you get the general idea."
She spoke softer as she continued, trying not to blush. "...The thing is, though, I don't want to do all that alone. ....I think I've always had this hope of finding.....somebody...who, well..." She could feel her face growing redder by the minute as she skipped ahead. "...a-and then we could.....travel everywhere and see all those things together...and we'd--y'know, always be there for each other." Whew. There she went, exposing her softer side--the sappy romantic she always tried so hard to cover up. Stupid, lovable, honest Arnold. She wished he hadn't seen her like that...so obviously embarrassed, since half her childhood had been spent daydreaming such things about the two of them, (Coffee and roses in Paris, indeed! What a joke!) but in a small way, it felt good telling him. "Pretty dumb, huh?" she said, attempting to hide her discomfort.
"No. It isn't."
Gently, he put a hand on her shoulder. "It's a nice dream, and there's no reason it shouldn't come true for you, someday. Dreams give us hope. And hope is what makes life so worthwhile."
"Boy--that was schmaltzy. You really are impossible."
"I don't mind." He smiled warmly at the unusual girl who he'd known for so long, yet never truly begun to understand. Maybe that could still change. Every glimpse of herself that she shared, no matter how tiny, intrigued him. There weren't a whole lot of people whom he felt comfortable with--really comfortable, that is, as if one could just sit around and talk to them about anything at all...simply because they were so easy to talk to.
Maybe she was one of those people.
He was willing to find out, in any case.
"You know, I've always felt sort of the same way," he said. "My parents used to do that kind of thing; they traveled all over and explored a lot of places. I always thought it would be great to do some of those same things that they used to, visit the same places, see the same sights. Like you said....go everywhere. See everything. With somebody along to share all those amazing experiences, whatever they might be." Arnold laughed abruptly, chasing the slightly far-off look from his face. "I never would have expected you to feel like that, though. Looks like we're just a couple of dreamers with our heads in the clouds."
"There are worse things. Sometimes I'd rather live in a cloud than on earth." She paused. "...We're...We're not so different, are we, Arnold?"
He pondered that for a minute. "No, I guess not. I'm a little more optimistic than you...and a little more polite..."
"You forgot 'clumsier' and 'more ignorant'."
"--yes of course--and you're more pig-headed, stubborn, and critical than I'll ever be..." (She scowled in mock anger.) "But no. In some ways, we aren't so different at all."
Their eyes met, and they exchanged smiles.
"Thanks, Arnold."
They rounded a bend in the path, and found themselves in the little clearing in the middle of the park where people had already begun to gather, waiting for the film equipment to be set up. As they joined the other moviegoers, Arnold turned to her. "Even if all the movies stink--I'm glad we came. I'm glad you could come," he added.
"I wouldn't have missed it for the world."
