Author's note: All comments will be noted and taken seriously, as to improve my writing more. Thanks all! Fourth Chapter is up, and if there's any mistakes or errors, please point it out. :)

Legal junk: I don't own Hey Arnold, but Nickelodeon does and Mr. Craig Bartlett created it. But this fic belongs to me. Clear? Good.

Chapter 4: Upon further reading.

The three-storey home that houses Arnold's family was one of the most beautiful houses on the block. Coated in whitish-cream, with flowers blooming at the front of the house with a brown picket-fence guarding it, it was the dream house purchased by his parents. Never in their whole married life have they ever thought of wanting to live in a dull, sleepy suburb some 10 miles away from the city to raise a family, since this place held some nostalgia values to them, especially to Miles and Arnold. Almost everything about the house resembled quite eerie to that of Helga's house, minus the paint job. When they first moved into there, Arnold felt weird about it, because he would be worried that Helga might greeted him when he entered the house. It had been three years now, but he had kicked the habit out.

"Honey, we're home." Miles announced as they entered the house. "Hi mom," Arnold greeted. "He then went straight to his room.

"Hey, sweetie." Stella replied. "How was at your parents'?" she was in the living room, watching a rerun of Oprah.

"Meh, as always." He said nonchalantly as he walked in. "I did have an interesting conversation with mom, though."

"Oh, really?"

"Yeah, something about dad. I'm kinda worry about him." he said with a concern. "Hey, is that Oprah?"

"Yeah, and this time around I won't let you change the channel! Now come here and watch the show with me, 'cause they've invited some expert on the show and they're talking about on what married couples can do to further enhance the communications between themselves, so, namely us." She informed, hoping for a positive feedback.

"But honey, come on! Can we just watch ESPN together? I'm sure it'll improve our communications better rather than taking an advice from some bald loser who has no idea on what married life is actually about."

Stella gave him an angry glare, thus instantaneously making Miles cower. "Shutting up, watching Oprah." He said scarily.

Arnold's room in that house, in everyway almost similar to that of his in the boarding house, minus the skylight, the bed attached with the cabinet and the revolving couch. He missed the skylight the most, because that was the only thing that stands out from his friends' room and made it very unique. Grandpa had always welcomed him to stay in his old room, since his room in the boarding house was still left intact. Only in few occasions Arnold did went there to stay overnight, such as when grandma cooked his favorite food. He put the letters next to his computer, but had no interest to read it. Instead, he booted the monitor up (he left the computer on because he was downloading something) and started to play a World War II shooting game.

After around an hour and a half, he got bored with it, and quitted the game. He then checked the download progress, only 13.37% left. Dissapointed at the progress, he leaned back against the chair with his arms crossed behind his head. He then looked at his grandparents' letter.

"Eh…What the heck…"

He grabbed it and starts to read.

February 28th 1944,

Dear Gertrude,

I'd like to offer you my sincerest condolences to you and to Margaret's family. I'm sorry I didn't know sooner that she died. Also I'd like to apologize to you that I broke my promise to you. I reiterated to you many, many times that I will take care of her, but I failed. I was my fault. Actually, it was not by her own will that she wanted to go to England. For you see, I was the one who told her to go to there in fearing that she could get hurt in the Italian offensive since things were started to get extremely messy there. In reluctance, she agreed and took the very first ship on the next day. Unfortunately, she and I weren't aware that the Mediterranean was heavily mined. I sounded like I was running away from my responsibilities. God, I was so stupid. It was my own stupidity that cost her life. I am so, so sorry. Please forgive me.

Arnold was stunned reading that.

Margaret was a great person. She was bright, smart, beautiful, fun, and intelligent girl. I believe sincerely that she was absolutely glad to be your best friend. She was your voice of reason, a good friend to hang around with, and she was always there for you. Remember the time when she defended you that you're not a thief when you were accused of stealing clothes at a boutique in the neighborhood? And the time we and the gang went to the carnival and she bought ice-cream for all of us, and she won Robby a stuffed toy instead of him winning her one? We all have great memories with her. We all do. Speaking of Robby Fisher though, I couldn't imagine how he would accept the news that the fact his fiancée died. Poor guy. I know he's my rival in Chinese checkers and all, but checkers are trivial and stupid when it comes to a death of a friend.

"Arnold!" his mother shouted from downstairs. "Dinner's ready!"

"Coming!" he shouted back.

Well, I'm still in England doing my training, and we still don't know where are we going to ship to. Word on the streets is that we're either heading to ------- or to ------. But the only thing we can do now is speculate. And it has even driven some of my platoon guys nuts. Even my captain sent them to see the psychiatrist just to make sure they are okay. Myself, on the other hand, are quite nervous too, but never near the breaking point.

I'll just end my letter here because I'm still feeling guilty about Margaret's death. I would write more, but each and every word I've written is worsening my guilt. If you don't want to reply to my letter anymore, well, that's very understandable. I bid farewell and adieu to you. Again, I'm sorry.

Sincerest apologies,

Phil

"Arnold?!" his mother called again.

"I'm coming! I'm coming!" he replied. He then put the letters next to the keyboard, and then he finally came down to the dining room. On the table, it was the special of the day, liver and onions.

"Aw man… not again… I should've stayed at the boarding house for dinner…"

He cringed. But then he saw his mother smiling at him, as if she was proud of her cooking. He gave her a smile back weakly, and proceeded to sit down. Arnold and Miles forced themselves to chew, munch and swallow the rather bland dinner with a soft smile on their faces as to conceal their real thoughts from Stella.

"Well, if you guys thought my cooking is that bad, just say it." She said, as if she had already known.

In unison, but not in synchronize; Miles and Arnold replied to her with some throwaway comments, such as "No… it's really great." "Delicious." "It's good." "Best dinner ever." "I would want some more." "Yummy."

"Yeah, right." Stella was not convinced, but still smiling nevertheless.

The dinner table became silent again, with the exception of the clattering noises coming from the spoon, fork and the plate.

"Hey dad," Arnold broke the silence, "Have you ever been in a battlefield before? I mean, after Vietnam, have you?" he asked, which struck his father as odd.

"Well… no. I tried to avoid it since Vietnam gives me a lot of bad memories," He replied. "Though, my editor wanted to send me Iraq to cover about the post-war, I turned the offer down. After Vietnam and that hullabaloo in Central America, I'm sticking to writing articles about old western civilizations now. There is no way I'm ever going back to a battlefield." Prior becoming an archeologist/journalist for National Geographic, Miles got drafted in Vietnam and worked as an archeologist for a local museum. "Why you ask?"

"Nothing, really. Grandpa's letters must've got into me so much that they keep playing in my mind again and again. It's all about war now in my head."

"You're still thinking about the letters?"

"What letters?" Stella intervened.

"Grandpa gave me letters that he sent to grandma during World War Two for me to keep. I still don't understand why did he give me those. Weird."

"What's weirder is that he never told anyone except mom about his war stories. If he did, he'd told a fake one. And what I've seen today, he looks like as if he doesn't even care about it." Miles added.

"Strange indeed…" Stella said, quizzically. "Maybe he wanted to prove something."

"Could be." Miles replied.

"Well, I'm done. Thanks for the dinner, mom." And Arnold got up.

"Ah-hah, not so fast there young man," Stella scolded. "Go and do your own dishes."

Arnold gave an embarrassed smile, "sorry," he apologized.

"This household is not like the boarding house, Arnold. Grandma's not here to do it for you. In this house you do your own dishes, is that clear, mister?"

"Yes, ma'am." Arnold nodded.

"And you, honey," she pointed her fork at Miles, "you also do your own dishes."

"Crap, and I thought being your husband has given me special privileges."

"Well, you will get your 'special privileges' tonight at bed," Stella winked with a flirting voice.

That little remark that his mother said freaked and shuddered Arnold a little bit, "Umm… eww. In case both of you still haven't noticed, I'm still here." He said as he placed his washed plate on the tray.

"Well if you didn't want to get freaked out more, I'd suggest you to immediately remove yourself from the dining room." Miles said with a smirk, and with that, Arnold hastily exited from the dining room.

"God, everyone in the family is acting weird nowadays…" he thought, as he walked over to his room, thinking maybe the download had completed.

"95.6%…" he muttered disappointingly, "anytime now…"

The letters next to keyboard were as if inviting him to read them. He rolled his eyes, and read the next one. It seemed that he'd love to read it in a chronological order.

March 26th 1944,

Dear Phil,

You last letter at first outraged me that the fact I thought you're actually the reason why she died. Even though letter was short, I can't even bear to read the first paragraph to the end because I was so furious at you. I then threw it in the wastepaper basket, but a couple of days later, I thought that I was being too harsh, so I dug the basket up and searched for your letter. Reading it again, well, it's not your fault. I'm impressed that you are being honest about it, and I can understand why did you asked her to go to England. You really were concerned and worried about her. It's pretty reasonable, since its war after all and everyone is worried. You did look after her.

Margaret was a great person. She was a great friend and a great companion. I want her to live in my memory until the day I die. I miss her so much. You know, I first met her when I was alone on the school grounds eating my lunch. She just happened to walk pass me on that day and saw me eating alone with no one to accompany me. She then came over to me and wondered if she could join me. I said yes, and we became close friends ever since. I did send her letters, and like you, she also replied to me once in a while. Her last letter said that she missed her home, family and friends (especially me.) I wish I could apologize to her for all the fights we used to have. Hey, even the best of friends quarreled sometimes. Don't be guilty about her death, Phil. She's at a better place now, looking at us with a smile on her face.

Arnold smiled softly.

Like everyone else Robby received the news with great disbelief. He tried to take the news like a man, but he couldn't and wept instantly. I feel sorry for the poor guy, because he and Margaret had outlined their plans even before Margie had gone overseas. So because of his fiancée unexpected death, he has nothing now. After the funeral he isolated himself inside his room from everyone, without drinking or eating, and not going to his job even. What's more worse, days after that his mother went to check up on him but he wasn't in his room. He was suddenly gone, but he had left a note. It says that he won't come back until his 'personal business' is done. We were all shocked at that. Soonafter, the whole neighborhood did a search party, and his parents even went to the Army Recruitment Office to check if he had registered but they couldn't find his name. His family hopes that he would return eventually someday.

"Well… thankfully he's still alive. I wonder who he got married with?" Arnold asked himself.

Hey, guess what? Looks like Mae and Diane and the rest of their baseball team actually managed to bring our city to the quarterfinals. Just a few days ago, the whole team went to meet the Mayor so he could congratulate them for the great job they are doing for the city. Mostly every one of them is now being sought by magazine photographers to grace the front covers of the magazines they are working with. And if Mitzy were looking at those pictures of them on the cover, she must've regretted her decision of ever going to New York, because I still haven't seen her pictures on any magazines yet. Oh, the quarterfinals are scheduled to play on the 29th of March here, so I'll tell you the score once game is over. And thanks to Diane; me, Lisa, Marie and Cindy got the tickets to the front seats at the ballpark.

As for you, things will start to get better hopefully, and sooner or later, they have to eventually reveal what the fuss is all about. You have my word on it, Phil. And keep writing to me, it seems like I've grown to like reading your letters. Together with this letter I send to you a jar of cookies that I made. Don't ask why, I just felt like baking it.

No apologies necessary,

Gertrude.

That letter was the first one without the word 'chin-boy'. Indeed, grandma did become friendlier, heck she even sent him cookies. He then glanced at the monitor, 3.1% left. He then put the letters aside, and opened Solitaire as he waited for the download to finish.

And so ends Chapter Four. Chapter Five will be up when its done.