Chapter Eight!!
Excuse my lateness for this coming up, I seem to have caught a bit of a cold. But seriously, I sound like a Backstreet Boy. Sorry if anyone likes them, but I do, and it's a bit of a problem, being as every time I answer the phone, someone calls me "Howie" or "Nick" or something. No one in my house has a cold, so I must have gotten it from that piece of crap excuse for a high school I'm forced to drag my half awake self to five times a week( actually, my sister drives me, but that's beside the point!) Speaking of which, this chapter is dedicated to my sister (she's in it! Shhh, don't tell her!) She doesn't really like Hey Arnold that much, nor does she understand my inane obsession with it, and she kinda has a habit of bringing it up in front of people who really have very little business knowing about it, but oh well. (Sigh) but anyway, this one's for you!!
Oh yes, and I forgot last time! Where to Begin is one of my favorite stories on FF.net and it's by one of my favorite authors, Zero to Hero, so if you don't understand why there was a little star next to it, you should read this chapter, review, and go to Search and look for it, because it's really good!
I don't own Hey Arnold (Or the shirt I'm wearing. It's my sister's Shhh…)
Chapter 8:
"In vain I blame my trembling on the cold air
But I can't hide that I've relied on you
Like Yellow does on Blue
And you're my
Good feeling, I'm kneeling
Inside a room, She paints me blue
And you are
My reason
For Breathing
Inside a room, She paints me blue again"
(The Best Song in the World) She Paints Me Blue
By: Something Corporate
"I feel terrible…" She'd stated this over seven million times within the past four hours, fifty-two minutes and thirty-one seconds. It was evident, she was feeling pretty terrible.
"Don't. There was nothing either of us could have done.", Arnold said consolingly. Nine times outta ten, such comforting remarks would have set the most nervous heart at ease. Not this one.
"What's going on? It's been nearly five hours! Why haven't they told us anything?!!", Helga said, almost angrily, abandoning her chair and pacing the room anxiously. Evidently, Arnold's words had little to no effect on her in such a panicked state. "I'm not going back to the hotel.", she finally stated, her head bowed and back turned, her undying indication of defeat.
"What?", Arnold asked, not quite understanding the sudden change of tone that had occurred in Helga's voice. "Not going back? Why not?"
"My best friend is in the hospital, I can't very well leave her here.", she said, leaning against the cold wall of the hospital. The waiting room was an overly furnished scene of pastel blue and white, made accessible only by the most hideous linoleum imaginable.
"That's very noble of you, Helga", Arnold smiled.
And it's too late to go back to the hotel.", she said, sheepishly. She couldn't just waltz up to the hotel concierge at all hours of the night, looking the way she did, with her hair a mess and her clothes wrinkled, followed by Arnold, who was equally (as my sister says) "torn up" and expect him to believe that she really was at the hospital, tending to her injured friend.
"What? What time is it?", Arnold asked, his eyes darting here and there for a clock. At some point, his gaze may have shifted to his own bare wrist.
"Ten till.", Helga state simply, not sounding too broken up.
"Midnight?!! We've been here that long?", Arnold asked, a little outraged himself.
"Yes, we have", Helga replied, her turn to be the calm one. "Now, go to sleep. I'm gonna go check on Pheebs."
"But you don't know where her room is.", Arnold brought out, much to the disdain of Helga.
"I'll find it.", she retorted, making her departure around a corner to the left. The hallway resembled the waiting room in more than one unattractive ways than one, from the blinding white walls, to the unsightly linoleum tiles.
Not quite knowing (or caring, for that matter) if what she was doing was "legal", Helga checked the tiny name plates on each of the doors. She came to the end of the hall and was disappointed to learn that Phoebe's room wasn't even on this floor. What was on the end of the hall was a sheet metal elevator, with a bright red sign above it that read "ELEVATOR".
"Well duh, what else would it be?", Helga said to herself as she stabbed at the down button with her index finger several times until it opened. The elevator doors cascaded open, revealing no one. Helga smiled as the doors whooshed closed behind her.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Meanwhile, Arnold sat, bored, in the waiting room just…waiting. Unlike Helga, with her short attention span and her constant confessions of boredom, Arnold was able to sit in one spot for a long period of time. Despite this, the clod, uncomfortable blue chair, the sounds coming from…somewhere (A/N: What is it with this kid and "sounds"?) and the occasional "ping" of a nearby elevator, it would have been hard for anyone to do much of anything, including sit…and wait. In a brief lapse of common sense, he rose from his chair, and walked inconspicuously over to the nearest elevator. Being as it was midnight, or close, he figured there would be no one in it.
'After all', he thought. 'Who would be roaming around a hospital at this hour?'
'Well…you.', his conscience said, echoing through his mind.
Unfortunately for him, that was not the case, proven by the very uptight-looking man, in a monotonous gray suit holding an equally dull black briefcase, standing in the wood paneled elevator. Inside, Arnold immediately noticed the number six lit up, signifying the dull-as-dirt man's destination. He hesitated a moment, not quite remembering what floor he was on. In following Helga as she ran block after block (literally) to hail a cab, direct it to a hospital unknown to them, and upon finding it, dashing in and, in a half panicked, half impatient state, right up several flights of stairs. Of course, Helga had more practice, being co-captain of the track team, which caused her to call in an impetuous tone, "HURRY UP!!!", down several flights of stairs, only to be answered by Arnold gasping for breath. Either way, he figured that anywhere was better than that waiting room, and resumed to just go wherever the wind (or in this instance, the elevator) took him.
On the other end of the spectrum was Helga, looking rather puzzled at whatever floor she now found herself on. Either way, she began checking name plates, frustrated with everyone that did not read Phoebe Hyerdahl, or P. Hyerdahl, or Phoebe H., or something of that nature. Finally, she came across a room, to which the tiny black name plate read: Hyerdahl, P. She opened the door slowly, just in case she may have been asleep.
"Helga?", came a voice from inside the room. The crack of the door must have given her away.
"Phoebe, are you awake?", Helga said, halfway in the room by now.
"Ugh. How can anyone sleep in this place?", Phoebe said, leaning her head back on the pillow. She didn't look any different, besides her attire, which was an identical blue to the ones that were on the chairs in the waiting room.
"Are you okay?", she asked, regretting the question moments after it flew out of her mouth. 'Of course she's not okay, Helga.', she thought. 'She's in a hospital, for cripes sake.'
"I'm alright, I guess. Twisted my ankle.", she said, ignoring the tiny television that sat on a mobile stand on the other side of the room.
"How?", Helga asked, taking a seat on the cold, metal chair next to Phoebe's hospital bed. It wouldn't have been such a shock if it were her. She was used to being clumsy and falling over things, but not Phoebe, Phoebe was the epitome of coordination.
"I fell down the hotel stairs.", she said, grinning. "They said I can go home tomorrow afternoon."
Helga smiled back. The tension had been lifted, knowing Phoebe was safe and smiling and would be back home in less than 24 hours. "So, where's Gerald?", Helga asked.
"He went off to get something to eat. I swear, his stomach is a bottomless pit.", she remarked, laughing. "So, where's Arnold.", she asked, mimicking Helga.
"In the waiting room.", Helga replied, mindfully ignoring the part wherein they had to stay in the hospital for the night to escape a verbal lashing from their chaperone.
Helga sat for a few minutes, entertaining Phoebe with the story of how she'd rushed up the stairs of the hospital in seconds and then had to wait at the top for Arnold, in his exhausted state. Eventually Helga was forced to leave, not wanting to be caught in the awkwardness of trying to say goodnight to Phoebe in between her "hello's" with Gerald. She'd been there once before, and it wasn't pretty.
After leaving Phoebe's room, she headed back towards the elevator, only to be intercepted by another body.
"Excuse me, are you lost?", said the voice, that had come from a MA, (medical assistant) from her badge, holding a clipboard and pen. She was of medium height, African American, with wavy ebony hair, that was tied back by a red headband (a nice contrast to the blues and whites of the halls) and that fell just past her chin. The top of her scrubs (as they are called) was a floral print, and the pants were a solid red.
"I was…um, just…I was going to um…", Helga stammered. It wasn't like her to be intimidated by…well anyone. But despite her age, she seemed to have a stern, yet soft look on her face, with a hint of confusion thrown in there somewhere. "I couldn't find the bathroom.", Helga blurted out, without much thought.
"Um, the bathroom is down that hall," she began, using her pen to point down the hall. "and to the right."
"Thanks," Helga managed to say, her face covered overcome by a shadow of red. She ran, just in case the MA was still watching, into a bathroom to the left and jetted into a stall. But wait, did she say right? Or was it left? It was then that in Helga's rush to get out of sight from anyone who may have seen her performance in the hallway, she'd passed several funny looking things on the wall of the bathroom.
Helga's eye's suddenly grew to the size of grapefruits at the realization of what she'd done. She was in the men's room!!!! She screamed mentally for a moment, and then began planning her escape. She peeked around from behind the locked door and quietly unlocked the stall. Halfway past the disgusting urinals, Helga heard the voice of someone (a man evidently, unless there were more eighteen year old girls who just happened to walk into the men's bathroom) and immediately ran back into her stall and, after locking the door, stood on the toilet seat. She listened as "The Man", ran some water in a sink, and turned off the lights. She sat, in complete darkness, wondering how this could possibly get any worse. That is until she heard the turning of a key in the lock and footsteps walking away.
Arnold, on a completely different floor (so he thought), walked around aimlessly, until he found himself at the Cafeteria. As soon as he stepped in, he was overcome with the smell of cleanliness. I mean real clean, a counterpoint to the cafeteria of his school. He decided, after a moment of brainwork (A/N: I didn't make that word up! It's really in the dictionary…go, go and see for yourself!! Oh wait, finish the story first!) that as long as he was there, he might as well grab something to eat. After paying for his food (the little he decided to take with him) he looked for a seat in the large dining area, just beyond the cash registers. There weren't many people there, which was expected, but one, seemed to be awake as anything.
"Mind if I sit here?", he said, putting his food down on the table, without waiting for a response.
Gerald looked up from his food, and gestured him to sit down, despite the fact that Arnold had began this process beforehand. In his chair, he tried not to watch Gerald as he finished…whatever it was he was stuffing his face with. "So, what's up?", he asked, after finishing his last bite.
"Nothing. How's Phoebe?", Arnold asked, not bothering to touch his food. Oh well, he could just give it to Helga.
"Much better. Her rooms on this floor, actually.", he said. "So where's Helga?"
"Um, she went to go find Phoebe, actually. Hmm.", Arnold said, opening a small bag of chips.
"What do you mean 'Hmm'?", Gerald asked, finished with his food, and possibly contemplating if he should get more.
"I mean…Hmm. Is 'Hmm' supposed to mean something significant?", Arnold asked.
"Uh, yeah! The word 'Hmm' can have a thousand different meanings.", he said, acting as if he were quoting Socrates.
"First of all, 'Hmm' is not even a word. It's barely a sound. And two, even if 'Hmm' was a word, which it's not, it would have no meaning, because it's not a word.", Arnold stated, recognizing his own ignorance in having an argument based on whether something is a word or not.
"You two are by far, the most complicated people I will ever come to know.", Gerald said, standing up. "I'm gonna go make sure Phoebe's okay. See ya tomorrow."
"Yeah, bye.", Arnold replied, remembering Helga's "mission" to find Phoebe's room. She'd probably returned to find him gone, and in turn, left. Either way, she'd eventually come back.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"Stupid…ugh!!!! Come on!!!", Helga yelled out in the darkness. She'd used two hair pins, an earring, and even her hotel key (don't ask) to open this stupid door, and it still refused to give in. The only light in the room came from the crack beneath the door, and even with that, she couldn't see two inches in front of her. She tried banging on the door for a while, to no avail. She sat in defeat on the floor of the putrid men's bathroom. Despite the fact that she was wearing jeans, she still felt a chill from being in such a poorly ventilated area. She leaned over to the door, and waited for the sound of footsteps. At once, the door shook, as if someone were trying to jiggle the lock.
"Man, all the bathrooms are locked.", said the voice outside.
"Hey!!! HEY!!!! Hello??". Again silence. It seemed as though her last chance of salvation had slipped through her fingers. As soon as she was about to admit defeat, she fell backwards, her only back support snatched away, and lay on the ground looking up at a rather scruffy looking man.
Remaining what composure she hadn't lost after getting herself trapped in a men's bathroom, then falling at the feet of a complete stranger, she quietly thanked him and walked away. At the elevator, she was almost certain she'd come from floor four to floor six. Or was this seven? Inside the elevator, which obviously wasn't the one she came up in, she found it most logical to go to floor four, and if that wasn't it, proceed downward from there.
'But then again,', she pondered, 'If I am coming down in a different elevator, wouldn't it be twice as hard to find the waiting room? And what if there was a waiting room on every floor? Simple, just go to every waiting room in the hospital, and find the one with Arnold in it. But what if he left?'
Each question or "What if?" found it's way into her mind and took up vacancy until another, more than likely much worse, came in and took up residence.
Eventually finding her way to the fourth floor, she turned the all too familiar corner and there sat Arnold. She took her original seat next to him, acting as if nothing happened, as if she had just left to…use the bathroom (which, in reality, she did). She picked up a rather old issue of Advance: For Respiratory Care Practitioners, and flipped to a random page and stared, trying to figure out what MOD stood for. It was a while before either of them broke the silence.
"Find Phoebe?", Arnold asked, still absorbed in his old newspaper. Helga figured he aged at least twenty years, just from reading it.
"Hmm?", she replied, caught a little off guard by his question.
'Here we go again… "I said, Did you find Phoebe?", he repeated, purposefully speaking to her like a child.
"Yes.", she said, not taking her eyes off the non-color page. Hopefully he wouldn't ask…
"What took ya so long?", he asked, still spouting questions, acting very much like he didn't care.
"Oh, you know." , she stated, not really having any desire to go into details her excursion through the hospital. "And you?"
"Oh yes, the same.", he said, trying to mimic her change in pitch and the grammatical errors that had freed themselves from her speech.
Helga couldn't believe it. She put down her magazine and looked him straight in the eye. "Are you trying to tell me, that you sat in this chair for…fifty-eight minutes, without moving at all?"
"Well, I'm quite certain I blinked a few times.", He said, smiling. It was so easy to antagonize her.
"You're a terrible liar.", she said, picking up her magazine.
"Are you calling me a liar?", he said, returning her questioning gaze.
"If the shoe fits…"
"Well rest assured, that while you were off gallivanting through the halls, I sat here and silently read the newspaper like a well distinguished gentleman."
Helga was listening intently, that is until she caught sight of a bright yellow bag, that was practically hanging out of his pocket, spilling crumbs on the worn out blue chair. "Really? Well, where did you happen to get these?!!", she said, snatching the bag out of his cargo pocket before he knew what happened.
"I bought those…at lunch.", Arnold stammered.
"I was there, you didn't buy any chips.", she retorted.
"Okay, so what? I went to the cafeteria. Is that a crime?", he said, astonished that he was beginning to sound so much like her.
"Uh, Yeah!! Did you even bother to get me anything?", she said, serious.
"Actually, I did.", he said, pulling a near crushed muffin out of his opposing pocket. He dropped it in her open hand and turned around, ready to sleep.
"Thank you.", she remarked, at the muffin. "What kind is it?"
"One of those fruit combinations or something. Cranberry Orange, I think.", he said, dozing off little by little.
She let it fall onto the table, and figured if she was hungry enough, she'd eat it in the morning. She moved her chair over a bit, and leaned her full upper body weight on one armrest, and feel asleep.
~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~
"Hey, you guys? Hey, wake up!"
Helga shot up, a long red mark across her forehead, from where she'd positioned her head on the armrest. She awoke to find Gerald, standing over them, looking slightly puzzled.
"What are you guys doing here?", he asked.
"We…um, we thought that…that um…", Arnold said. He couldn't lie his way out of a paper bag.
"We came by early to see Phoebe, and dozed off.", Helga said, still very much asleep.
"Early? Whatever.", he said.
Helga immediately fled, taking her only source of food with her up to Phoebe's floor, and found herself at her room. Inside however, there was no one in the bed. Phoebe sat, in the same metal chair that she had last night.
"Phoebe, what are you doing out of bed?", Helga said, confused.
"I'm about to go home. Why are you in the same clothes you were in yesterday?", she asked, sitting up straight. Her foot was bandaged up, but nothing that would keep her from walking without the help of the crutches that lay across the bed.
"Oh, I uh…", she said, disappointed that she'd barely been awake for two minutes and she was already on her second lie. "We came over early to see how you were doing. I thought they said you couldn't go home till this afternoon.", she asked steering the conversation in the other direction.
"It is.", Phoebe said, simply.
"What? What are you talking about?", the whole ordeal that had unfolded over the last few seconds had thrown her off completely.
"It's a quarter till two."
"In the afternoon?!!", she said, a mixture of anger and shock. "I have to, I have to go. I'll explain later bye!", she said, quickly exiting Phoebe's room.
#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~
"I can't believe you overslept!"
"Um, as I remember it, you overslept too.", Helga said back. She was already angry enough and Arnold wasn't exactly helping.
"Yeah, but for the past two days, you always wake up first.", he said, matter of factly.
"What does that have to do with anything?", Helga asked, not really looking at him, but scanning the streets for a store that sold whatever attire was appropriate for that of a play, even of it was just by a College's Drama and Arts Program. "In here.", she finally said, grabbing his arm and forcefully pulling him into the store without giving him so much as a split-second to object.
From the outdoor window, it seemed as if the store was split in two, one half tuxedos, the other half "Eveningwear", but the only logical explanation was it's angle to the sidewalk, because as soon as you steeped inside, it was obvious this store was intended to attract a more feminine crowd. Instead of devoting half of the store to each gender, a large portion of it was dresses and pant suits of every color known to man (and I few known only to monkeys) and the remaining area (approximately 1/3) of the store was tuxedos and suits.
"Well, let's go.", Helga said, maintaining her grip and leading Arnold over to the tuxedo section.
"Why are we over here?", Arnold said, obviously dumbfounded.
"Because, you need a tux.", Helga said, stating the obvious.
Helga sat, quietly watching as a man with a near fake mustache measured Arnold. While she sat, more or less unentertained by watching someone stretch bright yellow tape around Arnold's waist, began to eat the sorry excuse for a muffin she'd received last night. She figured if she was going to have to try on dresses, she might as well eat before hand. Just as she'd balled up the plastic wrapper and stuffed it in her pocket, the Measuring Man emerged from a door in the back of the store and promptly carried out a tuxedo with thin grey pinstripes going down the jacket and pants. Arnold eyed it from a distance, weighing in his mind if he liked it or not.
"Yes, no…", he said, finally asking Helga's opinon.
"Yes! Definitly! It's very…you.", she replied, feigning sincerity.
"I don't know. How much is it?", Arnold asked the Measuring Man, completely disregarding his name tag.
"Two hundred and thirty-five dollars.", he said. "And ninety-nine cents."
Helga's face literally dropped to the floor, as her mouth began to move. "No! Definitly not! It's much too…P. Diddy!", she said, miming him to put the tux down…slowly.
"Is there anyway I can…rent it?", Arnold asked, slightly taken back by the price of some cloth and grey fabric paint.
"Yes, the rent charge is one hundred dollars."
Helga hesitated a moment, waiting for him to add on "Ninety-nine cents", in his stuffy, uptight voice. "Is that for everything in the store ?", Helga asked. In her eyes, girls had a lot more to worry about in picking a dress, and if Arnold's was almost $250 (and ninety-nine cents) than her's had to be borderline $400.
"Yes, ma'am."
"Okay then, we're renting!!", Helga said, popping up out of her seat, already walking over to the "Eveningwear" section. She began to scan a rack of red dresses before Arnold eventually came over.
"What was that?", he asked, leaning on the rack, slightly perturbed.
"What was what?", Helga asked, stetching the elastic band of Arnold's temper much further than most would in such a situation.
"That! Back there! Did it occur to you that maybe I was planning to purchase that?", he said, trying to sound as believable as possible.
"Please? I saw your face when he told you the price!", she said, moving on to another rack. This one was draped in different (and frankly scary) shades of purple, which was immediately recognized by Helga, who moved on.
"What about this?", she asked, holding up a red-violet dress that strapped around the neck and across the back.
"I don't know", Arnold remarked, as Helga placed the dress over her shoulder and continued looking. Before long, she'd had almost seven gowns on her arm, and one or two on Arnold's. "I thought you only needed one."
"I do."
"But you have over ten!", he said, frustrated by her non-chalantness of the situation.
"Nine."
"Just in Helga, this isn't the Grammy's, you don't need four-hundred dresses for one night!!", he said, his intensity growng little by little, with each passing dress she picked up.
"Are you doing this on purpose, or are you really starting to sound like me?", she said, smiling widely.
"Don't flatter yourself.", he huffed.
"No, you do that fine by yourself.", she said, taking a ticket from the fitting room lady and walking through a satin curtan that divided the fitting rooms from the rest of the store. "Don't go anywhere.", she said, anticipating his next movements.
Arnold sat down, uncomfortable only by the look on his face and the uneasy way in which he slouched in his chair.
"Ahem…", Helga said, poking her head out from the curtain, just to make sure he hadn't left."I think it's too long.", she said, her tone quieted again.
"Lemme see it.", he said. She had the utter enjoyment of watching him get fitted and measured, and would have loved nothing more but to see her in a dress four sizes to large and three feet too long. He was never a revengeful person, but every once in a while, it was nice to see Henry Higgins get his too. No such luck.
Helga stepped from behind the curtain, looking as embarrassed as someone wearing a chicken costume. The dress was a dark burgundy, and wide strapped on both shoulders. Each fell just beyond her collarbone to an elegant V-neck. She didn't dare turn around, too scared to reveal the low backline, criss-crossed by tiny red strings. No way could she wear this in publc.
Arnold had to admit, she didn't look awful in it. She wasn't one to look awful in much of anything. The color may have very well have been the only problem, somehow shrinking the size of her body and making her head much larger than it was. And the fact that, in truth, the dress was too long for her. By the end of the night, she'd have a grey line over the hem, and it'd be impossible to return.
"I don't know about the color.", he said, finally finding words.
"I know, it doesn't seem to work. Maybe thay have it in another color.", she said, more or less to herself, while walking back over to where she had found it.
Arnold, on the other hand, had decided to stay seated, while trying to mentally convince himself of something that his mind wouldn't let him. Since the beginning of this trip it seemed as though Helga had inadvertenly revealed several sides of her personality to him. Why she decided now to be as open as she had been, was a mystery and knowing her, it'd probably stay that way until they somehow were stuck together in ahotel room…again.
"Arnold? Hey-loo!!!", she said, now standing in front of him, holding two dresses. "I can't decide on the color."
If she knew him at all (which she did) his reply would consist of "It doesn't matter", or "Stop being so vain", or something like that. She never meant to come off as vain, despite the fact that she had over the past few days. But for some inane reason, she valued his opinion. There was no reasoning behind it, things for her just always seemed to run smoother if he added in his two cents. Or if she merely borrowed them.
"The blue one. The other one doesn't look right.", he said, trying not to sound as if he put thirty years into putting it together, as he may have had.
"I agree.", she remarked, saying so wholeheartedly for the first time.
She gestured for him to take his tuxedo over to the cash register, while she cleared out the dressing room she just came out of.
Exiting the store, Helga looked out into the early night air and waited for Arnold to emerge from the store. When he finally did come out it was time for them to get back to the hotel. They'd walked close to 7 blocks (more like ran) from the hospital to the store, so walking the short distance to the hotel, wouldn't be too hard. But, unlike herself, Helga resisted the insatiable Track Captain urge to belt down the sidewalk and walked, silently down the street. Next to Arnold.
~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+~
That's all! I'm done! Go away! Where's my Aspirin? Sorry, this cold is REALLY bad.
That certainly wasn't a cliffy, but I don't care. I'm actually really happy with this chapter. I hope all of you guys are. And for Amelia Badelia, I can't say how often I'll be putting up new chapters, sometimes it's four days, sometimes it's fourteen days, it all depends on how I'm feeling and if I have the time. What I want to do is upload a bunch of chapters, and just put them up whenever I need to. Oh well, we'll see. Bye everybody!!!