Chapter TEN!!! Can you believe it? Double digits already!!! But the trip may be ending soon, seeing as I probably will only have 13 or 14 chapters to this story. I know, I know, I don't want it to end either, it's my firstborn!!! But all good things must come to an end, like the chocolate swirl cheesecake I'm eating. See, it just ended! It was a very good thing, but it had to end. Cuz if it didn't my dad would have ended it, and you don't want my dad to end this story. Okay, here I go!!!!
I do not own Hey Arnold…what's up with that?
Chapter Ten: The Morning After the Morning After
"But as you sleep,
And no one is listening,
I will lift you off your feet
I'll keep you from sinking,
Don't you wake up yet,
Cuz soon I'll be leaving you,
But you wont be leaving me."
"As You Sleep", Something Corporate
"How can you say this is natural?!!! This isn't natural!! Sleeping for 17 hours straight isn't natural!!!", Arnold began to yell into the phone.
"Actually, it's quite natural for humans to sleep for long periods of time."
"Yeah, maybe if your narcoleptic!!!!!", Arnold retorted, throwing a little bit of his textbook knowledge back at her.
"Actually", Phoebe repeated. "Narcoleptics suffer from uncontrollable sleep attacks that usually last a short period of time.", she said, hurling her textbook knowledge and vocabulary back at him with equal force.
"Yeah, uh huh, that's great. How does that help the current situation, again?", Arnold asked, trying to get back on the subject.
"Just let her sleep for a while. Eventually she'll get hungry, or have to use the bathroom, and she'll wake up. She probably won't even remember last night, so don't spring it on her right away, okay?", Phoebe suggested.
"Alright. See ya later.", Arnold said, placing the beige colored phone back on the receiver, and continued pacing the room. He shot another worried glance at her sleeping form.
As soon as Arnold woke up, he knew something obviously wasn't right in the world. Helga always, always, always woke up before him. This little concern was not reason enough to call Phoebe and spill his concerns over the phone. It was more than likely sometime after noon, when Helga usually ate, that he began to worry. He didn't want to wake her involuntarily, or leave the room, for fear that she would wake up and find herself alone. After reading the warning label of the medication Helga had to take once a day, he figured it was best to just sit and focus on…not focusing on it. That proved to be easier said than done.
In turn, he sat in complete silence, reading a frankly boring magazine article about breakout stars who weren't even of driving age. Helga would shuffle in bed around a little, or make a slight whimpery noise every so often. A few times she would seem to be grasping at something, with a frustrated look on her face, or jerk around, as if she were about to fall of the side of a cliff before catching herself. Just watching her was altogether frightening.
Arnold's eyes were locked on Helga, expecting her to wake up at any second, until there was an abrupt knock on the door.
Arnold got up and answered it tiredly. He expected it to be Phoebe at the door, but instead, there stood Gerald, holding a bag of something that smelled delicious.
"Hey, I come bearing gifts.", Gerald said, obviously sent to lighten the mood that had encased the room for the past couple of hours.
"Thanks.", Arnold sighed, leading him out into the middle of the room and directing him over to the table where he lazily brushed the magazine onto the floor and letting it flop face down.
"Phoebe told me what happened…", Gerald said, obviously avoiding the sleeping Helga, and taking a seat across from him at the table. "You can't beat yourself up about this.", he told Arnold, a little firmer than his usual Gerald-like tone.
"It's hard though, being as she's been asleep for almost 18 hours.", Arnold stated, still painted the color of guilt.
"Here's what I think. You need to get out, just for a while. Me or Phoebe can man the fort while your gone."
"Wonderful suggestion, Gerald. 'Hey, Arnold, you just poisoned your friend with strawberries, what are you going to do now?' I'm gonna forget about her and hop aboard the Party Wagon!!!!
(AN: If your not either laughing or saying "Oh I get it"…, you have a lot of catching up to do…)
"(Sigh) I don't mean like that, Arnold. Just, go for a walk or something. Clear your head. You could use some time outside of this room.", Gerald, with genuine concern in his voice.
"I don't think so. Not until she wakes up at least."
Gerald stayed a while longer, but had to bring back word to Phoebe on Helga's condition which was, besides little movement, continued unchanged. Not long after Gerald had decided to leave, and after Arnold was .051 of a millimeter away from actually taking his advice did Helga decide to awaken.
She did so, rather silently, even quieter than when she slept. Of course, she was not fully awake in this state, but besides that, she still seemed a bit jaded. Arnold occupied himself in the bathroom, while Helga remained motionless in bed. Moving didn't seem like much of an option, just the thought made her wan to drift farther back into sleep. Despite the fact that she couldn't sleep, her lethargy didn't war off the shores of sound. Instead of immediately reacting to the sounds that obviously came from the bathroom, Helga stayed in the same position, on her stomach, rendering herself helpless.
All of this went unnoticed by Arnold, who tried desperately to occupy his mind with anything that would make him momentarily forget about t he entire ordeal, but later shove him back to reality with brutal force. As he emerged from the bathroom, he did a literal "double-take", convinced he hadn't seen the two half open white orbs on Helga's once sleeping face.
"Hi…", she managed to breathe out, still looking vulnerable, in such a state, so small under the comforter. She tried to form a smile under her dark-shadowed eyes, but the sheer look of Arnold's prohibited her.
"Hey", he replied, solemnly taking a seat on his bed, looking closely at Helga to make sure this was not an extreme hallucination. He fleetingly looked over at the orange container of Helga's
medication and water he'd placed on the nightstand that separated them, and thought of waiting a little longer to tell Helga. From the expression on her face, she was still fragile, and most likely so was her mindset. She attempted to bury her face farther into the blankets, but such endeavors were futile, Arnold wasn't going to cave in.
"You okay?", he asked, his voice a limitless void of worry for her well being.
In an effort to ease his anxiety, Helga replied, "You really wanna know?"
"Yes.", he said, unable to wait much longer.
"I feel like a Polaroid picture in an Outkast video.", she said, smiling.
"I guess if your well enough to crack jokes, you should be okay. Here.", he said, opening the container of small white pills and spilling a few into his hands before handing her one and pouring the rest back in the bottle. He handed her the glass of water, but she didn't make any motions to take them.
Arnold sighed, knowing the time to explain himself would come. He sat back a little on his bed, searching for the right words. Fortunately for him, the right words were written on the little orange bottle that he'd gotten her medications from. Helga's eyes immediately shot towards one of the words that stood out on the white label. Sitting up unexpectedly, Helga snatched the bottle off of the counter and staring hard, making sure she wasn't seeing what she thought she was.
Arnold was immediately aware, and somewhat startled by her sudden jolt of energy that had caused her to sit up in her bed. "Is something wrong?", he asked, already stating the obvious.
"This has adrenocorticotropic hormones in it.", she said, as if he were to have any idea what she was talking about.
(A/N: Pronounced: add-ren-oh-cart-ee-co-tropic. My entire family's in the medical field, what do you expect?)
"Okay…", he replied, hoping she'd skip to the part where she told him what that meant.
She could tell by the dumbstruck expression on his face, that she had no idea what he was talking about, and it would be her job to clarify. "It's the steroid that's used to treat allergic reactions."
Arnold hadn't expected her to know all of this before he was given the chance to tell her what really happened. Somehow, the situation played out completely different within the inner recesses of his mentality. Just as he was about to explain, Helga bursted out again.
"What did I eat?! Or drink or, ingest??!!!", she said, practically on the verge of hyperventilating.
"Calm down, it's okay.", he answered, without really answering. "Last night, you accidentally, well I accidentally gave you strawberries."
"How do you accidentally give somebody strawberries? Did you paint them purple and call them grapes? Was I drunk?", She said, spilling out questions faster than a leaking dam.
"No, you weren't drunk. I'm sorry, it was my fault, I wasn't paying attention to wha…", he began, but distracted by Helga's silence. From his position on his bed, he could see that she sat focused on her hands, which shivered, even when balled into a fist. Without much thought, he took both of her hands, and cupped them into his, trying to bring some solace to her tense figure. "It's okay, Calm down, it's okay…", he repeated, although in reality he was pleading for her to stop shaking and to just be fine. In his mind he wondered if this was an adverse side effect to Helga's medication or if there was really something wrong with her.
Helga pulled back a little, but keeping her hands in place. "I'm sorry, it's just that…I've had allergic reactions before, but not this bad.", she stated. Part of her, a small part was slightly taken back by how much Arnold actually cared about her. Of course, Arnold cared about everyone. Arnold probably even cared about the little old lady who was struggling to get herself across the street at this very moment. He came fully equipped with a homing device for any and everyone who was in any sort of turmoil anywhere on the earth. But somehow, it seemed as if he'd made an earnest effort to make sure that she was okay.
"Here.", he articulated, with a little difficulty. Seeing anyone in such a state could unnerve even the guy on the Brawny paper towel commercials. He commenced in handing over her medication and a full glass of water. She took the pill and imbibed the water so quickly, he felt like he'd need a VCR to rewind and make sure she'd actually taken them.
"What time is it?", Helga asked, after finishing off the last of her water.
"About…", Arnold began, looking at his wristwatch. "4:20."
"In the afternoon! I didn't think I slept that long."
Just as she finished her sentence, the ugly beige phone rang, and Arnold picked it up the moment he heard the annoying ring.
"Hello?" he spoke into the mouthpiece. He had no real reason to even say anything. There was a 96% chance that Phoebe was on the other line, waiting for a half-hourly update on Helga's once unstable condition.
"Arnold, disregard everything I said! I don't care if you have to throw her down Niagara Falls in a barrel, find a way to wake her up!!"
"Phoebe."
"Yes Arnold?", she said panting a little into the phone. Such an outburst was unusual for Phoebe, and when the occasion came to execute one, it wore her out rather quickly.
"She's awake."
"Oh, okay, well that's a different situation altogether. Is she okay?", she asked, her tone changing completely from accusing to caring.
"More or less.", he said glancing back at her. She seemed "okay", if that's what you chose to call it. "I'm not sure if she's up for doing anything right now."
"That's fine. Call me back if she needs something, okay.", Phoebe voiced supportively over the phone. It was pretty clear to see, that having a lot of people around to pet your head and throw out an "I'm Sorry" at every bad time in your life wasn't worth half a copper penny. But Phoebe, made up for all the pain that people had overlooked, or just…ignored.
"I will. See ya later."
Arnold hung up the phone, and tried to clean up what part of the room he'd messed up, which happened to be all of it. After trying to tidy up the room, Arnold figured it'd be best to see how much Helga could remember from the previous night.
"So,…feeling any better?", he asked, still nervous and slightly troubled about having told her that he may have possibly landed her in a coma all over a strawberry muffin.
"A little. What about you?", she retorted, not the least bit spitefully. She managed to pull herself up the pillow enough just so that she could shift all her weight from her back, to her right arm. As hard as she tried not to look as though she was in any pain, her face told a story of aches.
"I'm good. Hey, how'd you know that adrenaline cardio- whatever stuff was in allergy medications?", he asked, throwing in his three cents in on lightening the mood.
"Adrenocorticotropic. And once, when I was like, eleven, I ate some sun-dried strawberries, and broke out really badly. So, after I came back from the hospital, I just memorized whatever medication I took, so next time, I'd know what I needed.", She said, smiling weakly.
"I'm just glad you didn't lose your memory or something.", he said, this time taking a seat on the foot of her bed.
"No, I'm not trying to do that again.", she laughed, only to be ended with a cough.
Arnold sat for a moment to think about this. It seemed as though he'd been responsible for a number of Helga's "medical emergencies", the most tragic of which was when she'd lost her memory. Accident or not, something like that can have adverse affects, especially on someone like Arnold.
"I never realized I'd hurt you that much…"
"You couldn't hurt me if you tried, Arnold.", Helga said, reassuringly. It wasn't too Helga-like to try to comfort other people, especially those who'd done something to her. And yet in her sincere and honest consideration for Arnold, she had no clue about the hole she was burning in him.
Of course, what she said was partially true. Arnold probably couldn't hurt her if he tried. But last night he wasn't trying. And somehow, he sensed that, even though she probably couldn't remember it, he'd hurt her more than he had anyone.
Not long afterwards, Phoebe accompanied by Gerald (when isn't she?) paid a much needed visit to the two "Flowers in the Attic". Phoebe used her time to catch up with her best friend, and try to dig up any thing that could explain the events of the prior night. At the other end of the room, however, a similar conversation was underway, only with a slightly different conclusion.
"Arnold,…hello?"
"Yes?", Arnold replied, unaware that he was distracted, even momentarily.
"Yeah, I just wanted to tell you that she's awake now. You can stop staring." Despite the television being on, and the sound of some show that none of them paid any attention to, Gerald was obviously trying to keep his voice slightly lowered.
"Whatever…", Arnold replied. He'd taken the initiative to monitor Helga, without spying in on she and Phoebe's conversation. Every once in a while, he'd notice her start coughing, a little uncontrollably, and then take a sip of water, and be fine afterwards. But such could just be another side effect of the medication. There sure were a lot that Dr. Holmes hadn't warned him about.
"Yes Phoebe, I'm positive.", Helga repeated. Once worry had been rooted in Phoebe's brain, it was very difficult to uproot it.
"Well, don't get up or anything, until you're one hundred percent sure, okay?"
"Yes, I promise.", she said, rather monotone. By that time, however, Phoebe had taken it upon herself to decide when to leave.
"C'mon Gerald, we've overstayed our welcome. Bye you guys."
"Remember what I said, okay buddy?", Gerald uttered, just before exiting the room.
"I'm erasing it from my memory as we speak.", Arnold replied, giving him a very sarcastic looking smirk, right before Gerald left the room.
In a few short hours, Helga was ready to fall back into slumber. Arnold wondered if Dr. Holmes meant that Helga would only be restless for the first day and near coma the next. Either way, he figured Helga's half of the silence would make his slight shuffling sound like a Thanksgiving Day parade. After all, silence breeds silence.
About 5 hours after they'd bid each other their final goodnights, Helga began coughing. Unlike most of hers, it started slow, and picked up speed as it went on. Arnold heard the coughing halfway through, but figured she'd take a drink of her water and go back to sleep. But after hearing a rather frightening sputter, and a series of long, harsh coughs, he knew she wasn't okay.
There was no time to find a light switch, or runt o the bathroom for a glass of water. Even if she wasn't choking, whose to say that he wouldn't choke her with his. Looking over, he could tell from her silhouette she was already in an upright position, now both hands cupping her mouth. He sat next to her on her bed and began hitting her back with his open palm, trying not to inflict as much pain as he was capable of inflicting.
Aware of his presence and attempt to help, Helga turned directly to Arnold, only to be shoved into his broad chest. Her coughing was muffled, and eventually stopped and ended with her heavy breathing. Even after her coughing had suppressed, she remained in the same position, her face planted under Arnold's chin. For a brief moment, Arnold forgot how tiny Helga was. Even with her arms locked in front of her, the own real barrier between them, Arnold was easily able to wrap his arms around her. It was then, that Arnold's mind registered: He had his arms wrapped around her.
Eventually, after a mutual detachment, both slid into their own beds and returned to sleep. Or tried at least.
'What was that? I should have pulled away…what's wrong with me? Why couldn't I move…no. No it can't be. It's been years, Helga. Years…', Helga tried to erase the words that were etched onto her brain. She found it harder still to ignore the momentary joy she felt, knowing Arnold was right there and cared so much. But worse, she knew that at the exact same moment, Arnold lay less than three feet away from her, with the same thoughts running through his mind.
'A reaction. It was just a perfectly normal, human reaction…", Arnold reasoned. He'd tried ot get the thought, and the unique scent of Helga's hair. He didn't need things like this running through his head. He just…didn't.
Don't you love that ending? I loved it more when it was in my head, I'm not so sure how much I love it now. But hey, what can ya do? Okay, there was something I wanted to say before I close this, but I can't quite remember… nope, still nothing. Oh well, I'll remember first period tomorrow, while my Chemistry teacher drones on about something everyone will forget about by the end of his sentence! BYE!!
-Pointy Objects