CHAPTER 2 - Setting The Trap

After lunch, Helga and Phoebe made their way back to their classroom. Phoebe wanted to do a little more work on their science project. Helga smiled at her friend. In the face of adversity Phoebe Hyerdahl would always resort back to the one thing that kept her sane; education. Helga had been more than willing to go with her, she needed to get away from the cheerful voices of the classes of PS118 in the cafeteria. While Phoebe worked, Helga just lay her head on the desk and it wasn't long before the warm classroom and peaceful calm sent her off to sleep.

Helga was standing on a wooden platform, surrounded by a bustling crowd. They all seemed to be clamouring for her attention, and Helga noticed that the faces belonged to her classmates. Phoebe was standing closest to her, sobbing quietly, twisting a tissue in her hands. Helga called out to her, but she didn't think Phoebe could hear her over the chattering of the crowd. Phoebe started to walk away from her, and she wanted to follow and make sure she was alright. She tried to get down from the platform, but her classmates were blocking her way. She balled her fists the way she always did when she felt trapped, but no one seemed threatened by her today. Instead they started pulling at her, at her dress, at her hair. She screamed at them to stop, they were hurting her. They had mean looks on their faces, and now they were all growling and snarling. Gerald reached up and pulled at her pink bow, unravelling it. He ran away, trailing it above his head and laughing.

"No!" she screamed at him. "Give it back! I need it!" Again she tried to step down, but found Rhonda and Sheena standing in her way. Suddenly, a fanfare sounded in the distance, and Helga heard what she thought was marching.

"Make way!" a voice was booming. "Make way for the King!" She looked over and saw Bob riding in a chariot. Miriam was asleep next to him, wearing a small crooked gold crown and cradling a sceptre in her arms, her head bobbing around as they proceeded. The chariot was being pulled by two men in red uniforms. They had big black bearskin hats on, and Helga recognised them as the Queen of England's guard from a documentry she had watched in class once. In front of the chariot was a parade of musicians and majorettes, and heading the march was a weedy looking man reading from a scroll. "Make way for the Beeper King!" he screamed again in a nasal voice.

The crowd's attention was caught by the parade, and Helga took the opportunity to step down from the platform. The procession came to a halt in front of the crowd, and Bob stood up in his chariot. Helga saw that he was wearing the faux fur lined robe and gold crown that he wore in his commercials. "Where is she?" he yelled grandly. "Where is the Beeper Princess?" The crowd looked around, searching and puzzled.

"I'm here Dad!" Helga yelled, jumping up and down, trying to push through the mass of bodies. "I'm right here!" She waved to him from the front, a large smile on her face.

"Ah there she is!" he yelled. "Come up here why don't you?" Helga beamed and went to step forward, but she was roughly pushed to the side by someone rushing past her. They strode up to her Dad and climbed on the chariot exceptionally daintily. Helga frowned, she should have known. It was Olga. "My beautiful Beeper Princess!" he gushed as he placed a silver tiara on her smooth blonde hair. Helga folded her arms and scowled.

"What about Helga Mr. Pataki?" came a small voice beside Bob. "She's your daughter too."

"Eh?" grunted Bob, who was now fastening a purple robe over Olga's shoulders. Helga looked up. It was Arnold.

"Helga, Mr. Pataki. She should be a Beeper Princess too," Arnold insisted, motioning towards Helga with a wave of his hand. Bob looked up.

"Oh. The girl," he said gruffly. "Sure, she can come up if she wants. I don't have a tiara for her though." He looked completely indifferent. Arnold smiled at Helga, but she just shook her head.

"He doesn't want me up there Arnold," she said sadly. Everyone else had disappeared.

"He's taking you to England, isn't he?" Arnold reminded her sweetly. She gritted her teeth.

"He has to football head!" she shouted at him. "He's got no choice!" Arnold recoiled. She wanted to apologise but she didn't see the point.

"Jeez Helga, I was just trying to help!" he yelled at her. Helga was shocked. She'd never seen Arnold get mad before.

"Oh you're always just trying to help!" she roared, and then immediately covered her mouth. That was a little too below the belt, even for her.

"You know what Helga? I'm glad you're going! And you know what else Helga? Helga? Helga?"

"Helga?" Helga's eyes snapped open. "Helga, wake up, the class is coming back in." Phoebe was nudging her elbow gently. Helga lifted her head and yawned widely, while Phoebe went back to her own desk. The class sat down in their seats while Mr. Simmons chalked something on the board. Helga rubbed her eyes and thought back to her dream. It had bought something to her attention that she knew she had been denying. Maybe it was her subconscious' way of making her face reality. Making her finally acknowledge that when she went away to England, Arnold really wouldn't miss her at all. She was going to miss him so much, and he would never ever know. So much passion, so much yearning, so much energy wasted on a boy who barely knew she was there. Something in her mind snapped. How dare he be so blind to her pain? How dare he swan about, not registering that he was breaking her heart? Well, the time for that was over. She was going to make him notice her, once and for all.

-

That afternoon the class got to work on their art projects. It was usual kid's busy work; paint a picture of yourself as a Superhero. Arnold's imagination was kicked into full swing, and the lack of Helga's spitballs on his neck made it that much easier to concentrate. At first he had felt embarassed about painting himself with all these new super powers, but once he had gotten started he just couldn't stop. He had been modest to begin with, just laser eyes and all the other obvious stuff. When he leaned over to glance at Gerald's painting, he noticed that Gerald had drawn himself with a baseball theme. He smiled to himself, that was how his painting should be. About him.

At the end of the class Mr. Simmons asked them to come up to the front and explain their paintings. Rhonda went up first.

"My Superhero self is called Rhonda of Fashion Justice. She seeks out the style-less and mismatched, and, using her amazing new season vision, she makes them over into catwalk superstars. As you can see, she is wearing sleek white pumps with kitten heels and a sleeveless print dress with a retro feel. She has minimalist accesories to really complete the look." As far as Mr. Simmons could see, Rhonda had simply drawn herself in a snazzy new outfit, but he smiled anyway.

"That was very good Rhonda, very well done. You captured your essence perfectly." She smiled and sat back down at her desk. Curly leaned over to her.

"Hey Rhonda, maybe your alter-ego self can make me over some time?" He raised his eyebrows suggestively.

"In your dreams, geek," she said, and pushed him away. He seemed to go giddy at her touch.

"Arnold, you're up next," Mr. Simmons said, reading from a sheet. Arnold got to his feet, his cheeks tinging pink as they always did when he was presenting in front of the class. Helga looked up from her desk, her scowl more prominant than ever, her rage at his oblivious ways not calmed at all while they were painting. He held up his painting, which showed definite promise of an artistic flair.

"Er, right. My Superhero self is called, um, well, Arnold." The class snickered a little and Arnold blushed even deeper. He expected Helga to call out something, but her teeth were gritted together and if she was honest she didn't trust herself to speak. "Uh, anyway, Arnold patrols his neighbourhood sorting out the perpetrators of street crime. He has special vision to see through walls, amazing hearing and super strength. Oh, and he can climb walls," Arnold finished nervously, feeling rather stupid. The class was all looking at him with fixed smiles on their faces, as though they were thinking nice try Arnold, it's just you in Spandex.

"Can Arnold fly, er, Arnold?" Mr. Simmons asked, examining the picture.

"Er, no Mr. Simmons," Arnold answered, knowing he could just as well of said yes and Mr. Simmons would be none the wiser.

"So how come he's wearing a cape?" Mr. Simmons had obviously seen one too many Superman films.

"I just thought it suited him," Arnold confessed, and the class laughed, but with him rather than at him.

"Very good Arnold," said Mr. Simmons smiling, and Arnold went and sat back down next to Gerald. They exchanged their best friend handshake. "Helga, your painting please," Mr. Simmons called out.

Helga got to her feet rather sheepishly, holding her paper close to her so nobody could see. When she got to the front she held it up to her chest and didn't turn the paper around. "Right, well, instead of a Superhero I drew a Supervillain. Her name is Helga the Mighty and she beats up kids who dare to laugh at her artwork." Here she growled at them.

"Er, Helga, we can't see your picture," Mr. Simmons said. Helga sighed, and turned the paper over. It was a line drawing of her, as she was, and only her bow had been coloured in. Over the top she had scrawled Helga the Mighty, and she had doodled a small game of hangman in the corner. The class looked at her with grins on their faces, they thought this was her just clowning around. She grinned, glad of the assumption they had made. In actual fact she had spent the lesson stock-piling paint and charcoal sticks in her desk. She had scrawled the picture when she found out they were to display their artwork five minutes before the end, and had coloured in the bow while Rhonda and Arnold were speaking. Mr. Simmons frowned at her.

"It, well, it's a very "special" picture Helga, but the assignment was to draw yourself as a Superhero, not villain. I don't wish to stiffle your creativity or anything but..."

"Fine, fine, I'll stay in and do it at recess," she muttered with a wave of her hand. Mr. Simmons was stunned, but in actual fact Helga was just plotting further in her plan to get Arnold back. As she went and sat back down, she wondered if she was going too far. Arnold couldn't really be blamed for not seeing her, could he? She had never exactly made it obvious. She looked over at Arnold as she pulled her seat in. He was ogling Lila, and complimenting her on her picture. Little Miss Perfect had drawn herself as some sort of cowgirl, a female Lone Ranger. Helga snorted and narrowed her eyes. No, Arnold deserved everything that he got.

-

As she listened to the kids running around outside, Helga made a big show of tracing the outline of her Superhero picture. She acted as though she was totally absorbed in it, while Mr. Simmons sat at his desk supervising her and marking test papers. She didn't mutter a sound of protest at being kept in while the sun shone magically down, and Mr. Simmons thought it safe to leave her for a little while. "Helga, I'm just going to step out and get a cup of coffee from the teacher's lounge. Will you be alright?"

"Mmm," Helga muttered, not looking up from her paper. She waited until she couldn't hear Mr. Simmons' footsteps any longer before crossing the classroom and opening the door.

Helga had never been inside the cafeteria outaide of lunchtime before. It felt somewhat eerie. There were no kids trying to inspire the usual food fights, no tight circle of boys cooking up pranks to play on the girls. It was so quiet that Helga's footsteps sounded like gunshots to her and she felt very exposed as she crept through the maze of tables. She crouched down by the till, listening to the voices of the lunchladies in the kitchen.

"No, leave it Jane, we'll do it tomorrow," one was saying in a wheezy gruff voice.

"Are you sure," said another voice, this one very high-pitched and squeaky. "I mean, all those kids we have to feed tomorrow Angie and none of the plates are clean."

"Oh they will be. Now lets get out of here, I've got a date with a bingo card," and both ladies put on their coats and left through the back entrance to the kitchen. Helga stood up, checking they were really gone. She looked at her watch. She had five minutes until the end of recess, but Simmons was bound to be done drinking his coffee before then. She crept quickly around the till and into the kitchen, a place she had never been before. She felt like she had just crossed into enemy territory.

Her eyes scanned the stainless steel counters and large cupboards for something she could use. She saw the large pile of dishes in the sink, but they had been scraped clean and were no use to her now. Finally her eyes settled on a large silver fridge that was tucked away into the far corner. She made to walk over to it, but the sound of voices made her stop in her tracks. She froze, looking for somewhere to hide.

"I can't belive I forgot my purse," said a voice that Helga recognised as Angie's. She saw the small brown handbag hanging from a coat hook right next to where she was standing. As the rear door creaked open, Helga dived under the counters used for preparing food and gathered herself up into the smallest position possible. She watched as Angie's ruby red heels clicked across the cold blue tiles, and she held in her breath. Angie retrieved her purse and began to walk back to the door, before stopping right in front of Helga.

"Everything alright Angie?" Jane squeaked from outside.

"Yeah, can't remember if I made up the tapioca," she said in a far off voice.

"I did," called Jane, "I put it in the fridge." Angie was satisfied with this answer and left the cafeteria once more. From underneath the shiny steel counter, Helga's eyes twinkled mischeviously.