DISCLAIMER: I do not own the characters in this story!
UPDATED: May 16, 2003. *The update date is here. So if it is May 17, for example, there will be more for this chapter, etc.*
This is PART ONE of Chapter One.
**There will be more parts to chapter one so please wait patiently. Thank you for cooperating.**
Yay! I got one review!! Ain't that great? Since I promised and told you that if you reviewed even one review, I'll continue.
This story, The Getaway Bride, is a new change of Arnold. You'll see what I mean. I updated Chapter One. So please read!
Well, then .. Let's begin!!!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Helena Price wasn't exactly popular with the people she saw on a daily basis and she knew it. In fact, she wanted it. She
went out of her way to hold them at more than arm's length. She had no place in her life for friends.
Every morning at exactly 7:30 AM, she went to work in a office at the second floor of a tax collector building,
where she efficently filed and processed paperwork in Chicago, Illinois. She worked there in an almost undisturbed solitary
area for 10 hours a day, 5 days a week. The people who work in the first floor contact her and give her many files of
clients, give instructions, deliver mail to other employees that need the file. The other people working with her on the
same floor, gave up trying to become friends after their early efforts had been firmly declined.
Helena was never actually rude to the others, but she made no effort to be particularly friendly, either. She had worked
hard to create the facade that everyone would think that she is an eccentric loner with no social life. Sometimes, some
well-intentioned person would try to befriend her. Invite her to lunch. Make an effort to make friends with her out of pity
and kindness. Helena had the same response to anyone wanting to be friends with her. No. Can't, sorry. Maybe next time.
(which will be never) Sorry, I can't. I'm busy. And so on. She wears a cool smile and an unwaveringly response of rejection
to any friendly overture.
Jake Smith, the newest employee at the tax company, was proving to be more annoying and persistent than the others had been.
"Morning, Helena." he said walking in a lazy manner into her rectangular office with a stack of files/paperwork. "Don't you
look lovely today."
She was wearing a black leather jacket with a navy blue dress that made her skin look pure white and did nothing to
enhance her hazel eyes. She hadn't tried to change her jewelry. She wore only a plain, leather-banded watch on her left
wrist and a thin silver chain that disappeared beneath the high collar of her unflattering dress.
She pulled her mousy hair into a severe bun that would have been more suited to a woman twice her age. She wore no makeup
and her oversized (non-prescription) glasses had slid down her nose again, forcing her to push at them with her finger.
"Thank you.", she said coolly, reaching for the papers. Her tone impied that the conversation ended there.
Jake didn't take the hint. He'd worked for the company for two weeks. For some reason, he'd been determined to befriend
Helena, despite her resistance. She sensed from the beginning that his interes in her was not sexual. A woman usually
suspected when a man was genuinely attracted to her, and Helena knew that wasn't the case with Jake. Yet he continued to try
his best to draw her out. She could only guess his motive to be pity or conceit. Pherhaps he was the type of man who
simply cound't stand it if a woman didn't succumb to his considerable charms.
He was definitely attractive. Boyishly tousled golden-brown hair. Wicked brown eyes. Killer smile. A sleder boy that nicely
set off his loose shirts and softly pleated slacks. A thirty-something heart-throb.
He had no way of knowing, of course, how she feels anyway. Plus, Helena's heart had long been locked away in a place where
no one would ever make it throb again.
"I was thinking about trying out that new Italian restaurant down the street for lunch today," he said. "Would you like to
join me?"
"No, thank you," she replied, deliberately turning her attention back to her work. "I brought my lunch."
Resting one lean hip against the wall in her small cube-like office, he picked up her stapler, tape dispenser, and a brass
paperweight and absently began to juggle them. Helena's eyebrows lifted as she watched the heavy items arc lazily through the
air.
"It's a beautiful day" he said enticingly. "It's finally starting to look like spring. Much too nice for a brown-bag
lunch. Wouldn't you rather get out of the office for an hour or so?"
She was momentarily diverted for a few seconds when he skillfully shifted into a new pattern of tossing the desk accessories
from one hand to the other.
"You missed your calling," she couldn't resist saying. "You should have joined the circus."
He stilled his hands and replaced her possessions on her desk. The sleeve of his pale orange shirt pulled back when he
reached out, revealing a glimpse of what might have been a small tatto on his right writs. Before Helena could identiy if,
he'd hidden it again beneath his cuff. "Been there. Done that," he said without hesitation.
"Last chance for Italian?"
She shook her head, no. He let out an exaggerated sigh and walked toward the doorway. She'd noticed that Jake rarely seemed
to move in a hurry.
"Some other time, then," he said.
She didn't respond to that reply. She had no intention of having lunch with him at any time, but she didn't want to issue a
challenge by saying so now. He would lose interest in her soom, she hoped. They all did, after a while. Ignoring the hollow
ache of loneliness inside her, she turned back to her work. She was very good at her job. It was all she had.
Helena stopped at a take-out Italian store on her way home that evening, ordering spaghetti and meatballs. She'd been
craving Italian food ever since Jake had asked her out for lunch. She spent the remainder of the day on her sofa in her tiny
but comfortable apartment. The television was on but she paid no attention to the program. She only turned it on for the
comforting sound of human voices.
UPDATED: May 16, 2003. *The update date is here. So if it is May 17, for example, there will be more for this chapter, etc.*
This is PART ONE of Chapter One.
**There will be more parts to chapter one so please wait patiently. Thank you for cooperating.**
Yay! I got one review!! Ain't that great? Since I promised and told you that if you reviewed even one review, I'll continue.
This story, The Getaway Bride, is a new change of Arnold. You'll see what I mean. I updated Chapter One. So please read!
Well, then .. Let's begin!!!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Helena Price wasn't exactly popular with the people she saw on a daily basis and she knew it. In fact, she wanted it. She
went out of her way to hold them at more than arm's length. She had no place in her life for friends.
Every morning at exactly 7:30 AM, she went to work in a office at the second floor of a tax collector building,
where she efficently filed and processed paperwork in Chicago, Illinois. She worked there in an almost undisturbed solitary
area for 10 hours a day, 5 days a week. The people who work in the first floor contact her and give her many files of
clients, give instructions, deliver mail to other employees that need the file. The other people working with her on the
same floor, gave up trying to become friends after their early efforts had been firmly declined.
Helena was never actually rude to the others, but she made no effort to be particularly friendly, either. She had worked
hard to create the facade that everyone would think that she is an eccentric loner with no social life. Sometimes, some
well-intentioned person would try to befriend her. Invite her to lunch. Make an effort to make friends with her out of pity
and kindness. Helena had the same response to anyone wanting to be friends with her. No. Can't, sorry. Maybe next time.
(which will be never) Sorry, I can't. I'm busy. And so on. She wears a cool smile and an unwaveringly response of rejection
to any friendly overture.
Jake Smith, the newest employee at the tax company, was proving to be more annoying and persistent than the others had been.
"Morning, Helena." he said walking in a lazy manner into her rectangular office with a stack of files/paperwork. "Don't you
look lovely today."
She was wearing a black leather jacket with a navy blue dress that made her skin look pure white and did nothing to
enhance her hazel eyes. She hadn't tried to change her jewelry. She wore only a plain, leather-banded watch on her left
wrist and a thin silver chain that disappeared beneath the high collar of her unflattering dress.
She pulled her mousy hair into a severe bun that would have been more suited to a woman twice her age. She wore no makeup
and her oversized (non-prescription) glasses had slid down her nose again, forcing her to push at them with her finger.
"Thank you.", she said coolly, reaching for the papers. Her tone impied that the conversation ended there.
Jake didn't take the hint. He'd worked for the company for two weeks. For some reason, he'd been determined to befriend
Helena, despite her resistance. She sensed from the beginning that his interes in her was not sexual. A woman usually
suspected when a man was genuinely attracted to her, and Helena knew that wasn't the case with Jake. Yet he continued to try
his best to draw her out. She could only guess his motive to be pity or conceit. Pherhaps he was the type of man who
simply cound't stand it if a woman didn't succumb to his considerable charms.
He was definitely attractive. Boyishly tousled golden-brown hair. Wicked brown eyes. Killer smile. A sleder boy that nicely
set off his loose shirts and softly pleated slacks. A thirty-something heart-throb.
He had no way of knowing, of course, how she feels anyway. Plus, Helena's heart had long been locked away in a place where
no one would ever make it throb again.
"I was thinking about trying out that new Italian restaurant down the street for lunch today," he said. "Would you like to
join me?"
"No, thank you," she replied, deliberately turning her attention back to her work. "I brought my lunch."
Resting one lean hip against the wall in her small cube-like office, he picked up her stapler, tape dispenser, and a brass
paperweight and absently began to juggle them. Helena's eyebrows lifted as she watched the heavy items arc lazily through the
air.
"It's a beautiful day" he said enticingly. "It's finally starting to look like spring. Much too nice for a brown-bag
lunch. Wouldn't you rather get out of the office for an hour or so?"
She was momentarily diverted for a few seconds when he skillfully shifted into a new pattern of tossing the desk accessories
from one hand to the other.
"You missed your calling," she couldn't resist saying. "You should have joined the circus."
He stilled his hands and replaced her possessions on her desk. The sleeve of his pale orange shirt pulled back when he
reached out, revealing a glimpse of what might have been a small tatto on his right writs. Before Helena could identiy if,
he'd hidden it again beneath his cuff. "Been there. Done that," he said without hesitation.
"Last chance for Italian?"
She shook her head, no. He let out an exaggerated sigh and walked toward the doorway. She'd noticed that Jake rarely seemed
to move in a hurry.
"Some other time, then," he said.
She didn't respond to that reply. She had no intention of having lunch with him at any time, but she didn't want to issue a
challenge by saying so now. He would lose interest in her soom, she hoped. They all did, after a while. Ignoring the hollow
ache of loneliness inside her, she turned back to her work. She was very good at her job. It was all she had.
Helena stopped at a take-out Italian store on her way home that evening, ordering spaghetti and meatballs. She'd been
craving Italian food ever since Jake had asked her out for lunch. She spent the remainder of the day on her sofa in her tiny
but comfortable apartment. The television was on but she paid no attention to the program. She only turned it on for the
comforting sound of human voices.