Songs that inspired this chapter:
"Sorry" by: Meg Myers
"The Scientist" by: Coldplay
"Smother" by: Daughter (HIGHLY recommend listening to this song)
After agreeing to meet with Arnold after school, the rest of the day moved by at a snail's pace. Helga couldn't tear her eyes away from the digital clocks that seemingly lingered on minutes; the feeling of anticipating completely taking over both her mind and her senses.
Could this all be over soon? Could Arnold and her make amends after such an ordeal? Could it be possible? Could it?
Questions like these and daydreams of the pair making up to share a romantic kiss while in the foyer of Hanson Middle School flooded Helga's mind. Despite her persistent imaginings, the day continued to move slowly and the stubborn clock refused to tick away at the speed she desired.
At long last, the final bell of the day rang and Helga jumped out of her seat in her last class to practically fly out of the room and into the hallway. She zoomed through her fellow students who talked with one another about their nightly plans or a pop quiz they definitely didn't pass. Helga moved so quickly, she didn't even stop to notice Lila and Stinky as she had been doing all prior to lunch- though Lila had stopped to watch Helga as she ran passed in pursuit of the foyer.
Silently, Lila hoped that Arnold could forgive Helga and the two would resume their relationship. With hope in her heart, she smiled long after the blonde was gone and Stinky tugged at her arm to regain her attention and they at last departed for the bus they shared home.
Helga's excitement brought her to the giant steps in the foyer far earlier than anybody else. Usually the steps had a collection of students sitting and waiting for their parents to pick them up at the front door, yet as she approached the looming, carpeted steps, not a single person was seated upon them.
It was odd to see the stairs so empty. The last time she had seen them this empty was at the dance just moments after the heartbreaking events that had taken place in cafeteria.
As Helga climbed up the first step to sit on the second, she looked out on the empty foyer; her eyes gravitating towards the furthest door leading to the cafeteria itself. Though empty now, Helga could almost hear the muffled beat of the dance and the mumblings of students milling about. As she stared at the entrance to the lunchroom, Helga could almost see herself, ragged and shaken, stumbling out and into the foyer.
With countless pairs of eyes still watching her where she stood, Helga caught eye of the second door leading to and from the cafeteria. Not wanting to feel the hot gaze of judgmental teens any longer, she ran towards the door to finally escape everything and everyone who remained in the cafeteria.
She stumbled out of the lunchroom into the foyer that was much emptier than it had been when her group had first arrived. The karaoke machine had long been abandoned after Sheena and Eugene had probably ran out of flawlessly rehearsed duets. From where Helga stood, it appeared that the carpeted steps were housing nobody at the moment and suddenly feeling the need to sit down and collect her thoughts, she made her way towards them. Once within inches of the steps, she finally allowed her body to give in to the weight of the world and her limbs gave out underneath her which forced her to collapse and sit on the first of the steps.
"Why," she whined to herself as she pushed the torso of her body to hunch over so she could rest her head in her hands. "Why, why, WHY?!"
It was the only word that she could think of; the only question that looped inside her skull like a melody she couldn't shake. Why?
Why had things gone so awry?
Why did this have to happen?
Why couldn't she just be happy with Arnold like she had always planned?
Arnold.
His name stung from where it resounded in her thoughts and as she lingered on the name, another question popped in to her head- one that she felt the need to either dismiss entirely or defend herself against.
Why hadn't she trusted Arnold?
"Lila," she mumbled to herself from the safety of her palms. As she held her face in her hands, she rubbed her flesh despite the make-up that coated it. "If she hadn't... if she didn't..." Though angry she was at the redheaded girl, Helga couldn't seem to come up with the words in which to prosecute her the way she felt she should be able to, or she deserved.
"The little miss perfect, the little miss 'ever so' and 'oh so certain.' It was her lips that grazed my beloved when the bottle had landed upon her this last summer," Helga began speaking to herself as she had many a time about Arnold. Yet this time, on this night after such tragedy, Helga felt the need to use a monologue on anger and frustration rather than love.
"And it is with that kiss that my nightmares took root. It was with that kiss that our downfall ensued- because of Lila and her stupid perfect ways. Why couldn't she just leave him alone? Why couldn't she have asked somebody else to do her dirty work with Stinky? It just had to be Arnold, didn't it? My beloved whom perhaps cares too much and can't help himself from assisting a poor, pathetic excuse of a girl like Lila."
Helga pushed herself to sit up; her face leaving the safety of her hands to look out at the few students still wandering around in lieu of staying in the gym where the action was.
"Yet," she continued softly, her tone changing to a softer one as she kept her gaze on the students who took no notice to her, "Arnold will never see what I see. Him and his weirdly shaped head will never truly understand such jealousy. It isn't like anyone is out there trying to swoop Helga G. Pataki away from him..."
Sighing, she scooted herself up onto the step more completely; her back now resting against the step above her. She pulled her legs up as close as she could get them to her body and she clasped her arms around them as if holding herself together. There she sat in an upwards-positioned human ball watching those around her enjoy the night like she had supposed to enjoyed it.
"Oh Arnold," she whispered, "if only you knew. If only you understood that it is not you whom I hold no trust for, it is her- that Lila stinkin' Sawyer. It is her who I do not trust. With her sickening sweetness and overly kind disposition, could you not blame me for fearing she would take you away?"
Softly, Helga shut her eyes as she continued to talk to herself in the gentlest of voices. "You, who I've loved since the tender age of three. You, who showed kindness to a dirt-clad toddler desperate for affection. You, who believed in me when nobody else did nor could. You who-"
The sound of snorted breathing filled her ears and she kept her eyes closed for a moment to be sure that was exactly what she was hearing. After a few continuous loud breaths, Helga opened her eyes without having to turn and face who she knew was somehow just behind her.
She sighed as she kept her eyes forward; refusing to look towards her lone audience member as she addressed him. "Seriously, Brainy? Can't you ever just let me get through one monologue or something? Criminy!"
Finally turning to look at him, he remained sitting on the step above while looking down to where she glared in his direction. All the while, he did not answer. Instead, he continued to breathe that heavy snorted breath while looking on at the frustrated blonde he had stalked for so long.
With a sigh, Helga turned away from Brainy once more and returned her attention forward to watch her unwitting classmates enjoy the ambiance of this year's first middle school dance. "Oh Brainy," she breathed out with a minimal shake of her head, "look at those dopes. They just wander around indulging in all the gossip that an event like this dishes out best. They're so... caught up in it... just like I allowed myself to get caught up in the very rumors I made up myself."
Turning her head only slightly to look up and behind at Brainy from over her shoulder, Helga laughed to herself without humor before speaking up to him again. "If you're just going to sit there breathing like that, you might as well pop a squat." As she spoke, she gestured with her head for him to join her where she sat.
Cautiously, Brainy thought through her suggestion before sliding down his stair to sit adjacent to the young blonde on the first step just below. Once seated, Brainy turned to look in Helga's direction as she continued to stare blankly ahead; her thoughts far away from where the unlikely pair sat together in the near empty foyer.
Helga had became much accustomed to that annoying brand of heavy breathing Brainy always displayed when showing up out of the blue at the most inopportune moments. After his kind gesture of saving the locket she'd long given up on in the jungles of San Lorenzo, she had developed a kind of understanding towards the outcast. Sure, his constant breathing over her shoulder and pushing his way into her privacy were annoying, however she couldn't help but feel like they shared some kind of commonality. She often wondered if Brainy and her could perhaps be a couple of kindred spirits.
And as they sat together on the stairs, Helga even ventured to wonder if Brainy was the one person who truly knew her best. Could it be possible that Brainy knew Helga even better than Phoebe, her very best friend in the world? After all, if it was anyone who knew the inner workings of her own brain, wouldn't it be logical that it could Brainy? Who else had heard her deepest, most inner thoughts, dreams, musings and desires but the heavy mouth-breather himself?
Taking a breath, Helga opted to continue talking to her mostly-silent neighbor as he stared at her while she continued to look away from him as though he wasn't even there. "You've known since day one about how I felt in regards to Arnold, haven't you?" It was a question not meant to be answered and she sighed before continuing with her one-sided conversation. "I don't understand, I guess. I've imagined what a relationship with him would be like for as long as I can remember, but I never thought it would end like this."
She smirked to herself at her own statement. "I never thought it would end period, is more like it."
Sucking in additional air, she kept her eyes forward while proceeding to speak. "We lost ourselves, though, didn't we, Brainy? I mean, for cripes sake, we're not even 13 yet! What did we know about a relationship? I should have been prepared for this to end and yet..." Her voice trailed off as her thoughts continued to escape her as soon as they entered her mind.
Suddenly, she sat up straight, her mind latching onto one passing thought in particular; soon voicing it to her unlikely companion who sat curiously waiting beside her. "Yet he never said we were over, now did he?" Her words were confident in this loophole she'd found. "If he never said that we were officially breaking up, then it can't be official yet, right? He'll have to talk to me again, won't he? And when he does, I'll have a chance to explain myself and this will all be fixed!"
Nearly jumping for joy, Helga stood up with a new determination filling her soul. "I mean, am I right... right? This is all going to be fixed in a matter of hours, won't it?" As she asked this aloud, she twisted her body to look at Brainy; his eyes focusing on hers with a quiet sadness behind them.
And just like that, the light in Helga's heart flickered once more like a candle being thwarted by a strong wind.
"What, you don't think that good-two-shoes football-head will wise up and work this out with me? C'mon, Brainy." She was pleading with him, or rather herself, as he watched her without a response of any sorts; his breathing being the only noise shared between the two for a good minute.
Growing irritated, Helga groaned, huffed and ultimately sat back down beside him; her elbows resting on her knees as her face followed suit and in turn rested on her palms in defeat. "Cripes, this is worse than I keep trying to tell myself it is, huh?"
Tilting his head, Brainy moved to look as directly as he could at Helga; her line of vision avoiding his. Despite her lack of acknowledgment, Brainy cleared his throat a little as he continued breathing loudly from where he patiently sat.
"And you know what?" Helga asked while moving her face from her palms to hold itself up. "This is all your fault, isn't it? It isn't Lila's as annoyingly perfect as she is, it's yours, Brainy!" She exclaimed while snapping her head to face him and glare in his general direction.
"I mean, if you hadn't given me back that STUPID locket," her voice raised as she spat the words at him and leaned closer with each statement, "if you hadn't gone making me BELIEVE that I could be with Arnold, that WE could be together and live happily after after... if you had just left me, my locket and my feelings ALONE, I wouldn't be IN this mess, now WOULD I, Brainy?!"
Her fists clenched as she spoke; her body wanting to let out of all the rage she kept trying to displace. It didn't matter who took it, Helga was desperate to find a victim who would take on the blame and guilt she felt. While she knew that she rightfully deserved to feel every second of anguish at her actions, she didn't want to face it any longer and as she began to raise her fist while eyeing Brainy, she knew that he might just be the victim she had been looking for.
In the heat of her anger, Helga knew that Brainy would willingly take on her pain. She could get away with hitting him like a child gets away with hitting a pinata.
As Helga looked at him, Brainy simply maintained his heavy breath while instinctively leaning back with each inch she grew closer to him. He watched as her usual blue eyes turned so red hot that they could practically shoot lasers out at him. Fearful as he may be, he'd dealt with Helga's anger more than enough times and another punch to the face wasn't going to hurt him any more than usual.
However, right as he closed his eyes and prepared himself for the immanent impact, Helga pulled herself away from him. Opening one of his tightly shut eyes, Brainy could see that she had shifted her attention out towards a group of their peers. She seemed distant as she listened to the group of girls' laughter which was emanating in their direction.
"I'm not going to punch your lights out tonight, Brainy," Helga suddenly said while keeping her eyes locked on the group of girls who continued to giggle with one another. Her words gave filled Brainy with the relief he needed to relax his tensed muscles.
Instead of running away like any sane person, Brainy chose to keep his spot on the stairs. He kept his ears perked to to listen, despite his better judgment. Even if she changed her mind and delivered that familiar blow he was so used to, Brainy wanted desperately to give Helga a chance to purge whatever thoughts and feelings she knew he would never divulge.
Brainy had never given her away. The two had developed a silent trust which had taken years to cultivate from his consistent listening to her private conversations between herself and her locket.
Yet, as he sat there waiting for her next monologue, Helga didn't speak. Rather than say a word, she turned to look at him once more before at last leaving him to descend down the stairs. As she reached the linoleum ground of the foyer, she sighed and shook her head to herself.
"This whole vengeance thing isn't working too well for me, anymore," Helga muttered to herself, though Brainy had heard her every word. "Maybe it's time I give it up." A moment passed as Helga thought on this until her head slowly raised to look out at the foyer ahead of her; her eyes lingering on the restroom sign signaling her next destination for the night. "Maybe it's time I gave it all up... our relationship... my love... Arnold himself..."
Chewing on her lip for a beat, Helga spun around to look at Brainy yet again. "But who am I if I don't have Arnold to be with or to pine after? Who even AM I, Brainy? Huh?"
Blinking once at the question posed to him, Brainy snorted his breathing while raising his shoulders to offer Helga shrug. "Uh..." he breathed out, "...I don't know."
Nodding her head, Helga stared at Brainy as though the extended look would help her absorb his words more completely. "You don't...know..." she repeated before spinning around again and walking away from Brainy altogether.
"You don't know!" She said loudly while throwing her arms in the air. "Arnold doesn't know, Phoebe doesn't know," she went on as she left Brainy behind; her own focus now headed for the bathroom. "Heck, I don't even know who I am without that, no good, twerpy and... dependable, kind... paste-for-brains, football-headed hair boy!"
As she made it to the restroom, she exclaimed, "Criminy!" before pushing the door open with force; soon disappearing into the small room she believed had the privacy needed to help gather her thoughts.
Helga's eyes focused on the bathroom sign just ahead from where she sat on the steps in the foyer. While she physically remained in the present waiting for Arnold to appear, Helga herself was lost in within her thoughts; completely captive to her memories. With each new thought, she furrowed her brow further while remaining fixated on the events that had happened in the bathroom with Rhonda just moments after her talk with Brainy.
What Rhonda said was wrong, Helga repetitiously thought, I am not a spider. I am not a spider. I am NOT-
"Helga?" Arnold's voice yanked the daydreaming blonde from her imaginings.
Once brought back to reality by the sound of her name, she turned to look where the familiar football-headed boy stood.
"Oh," Helga choked out, "Hey Arnold."
With a quick inhale, Arnold asked out with visible nervousness, "Can I uh, can I sit there?"
Rolling her eyes, Helga quickly replaced her hurt with agitation. "I don't know, I can you?"
Arnold pressed his lips together and huffed while giving a lone nod. Effortlessly, he stepped up the 2 stairs it took to reach where she was seated. Once at the same level, he swung his backpack off of his shoulders and set it to rest just beside Helga's feet before he at last sat down next to her.
While looking at her as she avoided his gaze, Arnold carefully began speaking. "How are you... how are you doing?" He asked and as soon as the words left his lips, he knew he had chosen the wrong thing to say.
Without humor, Helga laughed to herself. "How am I doing," she repeated to herself softly before shaking her head and looking in the opposite direction of where Arnold sat. "I'm just doing great, football-head. Being dumped has really done a lot for me- my skin has cleared up, the sun smiles at me when I wake up and the joy I feel inside has helped me find the cure for cancer." Arnold frowned as she smacked her lips drenched in sarcasm while trying to withhold tears from spilling passed her eyes.
"So don't you worry your freakishly large head over me, Arnoldo," she finalized, "because, as you can see, I'm doing just GREAT!" Helga at last shouted before turning to face Arnold with narrowed eyes.
"You know that I didn't mean it like that," he responded in a calm and collected manor.
"Well what do you want?" the broken-hearted blonde spat at her once-boyfriend, "What do you want me to say?"
"I thought you might want to talk about it, or maybe you'd want to apologize-"
"Apologize?" she repeated with audible anger laced in her tone. "Apologize for what? Losing our love? Ruining our relationship?"
"No, Helga, that's not-" Arnold tried but ultimately was drowned out by her furious voice.
"I swear to God, Football-head, if you seriously think that the reason we broke up is completely my fault, you have got another-"
Frustrated, Arnold loudly said "STOP!" in the hopes that he could silence Helga and keep her from attacking him.
Halting at his command, Helga held her glare on him. "What," she stated without inflection.
"This!" Arnold exclaimed while gesturing about himself, "This is the problem, Helga. You get on these train of thoughts and you just—you just... you never jump off!"
Swallowing hard, Helga tried to maintain her glower towards him. "What do you mean I never jump off?" The words were dry as she spoke them; each one like puffing out of her like a mouthful of sand she was desperately trying to dispose of.
Arnold sighed and took the smallest of moments to compose himself in preparation for their sure-to-be difficult conversation. "Look, I wanted us to have a chance to talk about what happened, you know... at the dance on Saturday-"
"I know, I know, okay? I'm not an idiot for cripes sake." The words came out of her almost instinctively before she took a centered breath and spoke in a softer- albeit still irritated –tone while looking Arnold dead in the eye. "What about it?"
"Well, first off, I wanted to say that I'm sorry," he said earnestly while eyeing her; his regard matching the intensity with which she looked at him.
Tilting her head while keeping hold of his eyes, Helga smirked, "You're sorry?" she said, not impressed.
"Yes, Helga, I'm sorry," Arnold said more firmly before pausing only to at last break eye contact with her. Sighing, he shifted his gaze downward to look at his hands as they fiddled with one another in his lap. "No matter how frustrated or angry I was in that moment, I shouldn't have snapped at you where and how I did."
"Yeah," she agreed with conviction, "You shouldn't have!"
"I shouldn't have chosen that moment with everyone watching to say the things that I said-"
"You definitely shouldn't have," Helga agreed while cutting him off from finishing his statement.
"And..." he said while looking at Helga out of the corner of his eyes; the emphasis heavy as he spoke the word so she knew there was more to what he wanted to say. "I also shouldn't have thought that as twelve-year-olds we would just be able to easily navigate and understand... dating."
"You...shouldn't have...?" Helga repeated sadly while turning to look at Arnold who merely continued to look down at his fiddling fingers while nodding his head.
"I thought about what happened for the rest of the weekend," he began to explain while keeping his eyes downcast. "I wondered if I should call and apologize or wait for you to call and apologize when I realized how—how... how we aren't even teenagers yet and here we are trying to date when we don't even know what that means to either of us in the long run."
As Arnold twisted to look at Helga once more, he was met with her confused eyes which stared back begging for him to explain further what he meant.
"It means that we—we-we spend time together and we hang out and—and-" she stuttered out as if she could simple use her stutter to swing onto her next new reason like the bars on a jungle gym.
"Isn't that just being friends though?" Arnold asked suddenly and Helga frowned at his suggestion.
"How many friends you know who hold hands every day and... and kiss each other, huh?" She countered defensively "Is that how friendships work these days because if so, let me tell you, I've been doing it wrong with all of my 'friends.'"
"Helga..." the boy deadpanned and his counterpart narrowed her eyes to give him a pinpointed glare.
"What?" she spat with acidity.
"That isn't what I meant-"
"Then what is it, football-head?!" Helga exclaimed while gesturing wildly in the air around them. "What is it that you meant exactly? Because you seem to just expect me to know what's going on inside that freakishly shaped headof yours! But guess what? I never ever do, now do I! So why don't you do me a favor and just tell me what it is that you do mean so I can go about my life already? Go about my life and just get on with whatever else is to come!"
The two exchanged a prolonged look; Arnold's of pity and Helga's of rage. As they stared at one another, they huffed in sync as though their own bodies were trying to reconnect the former couple by breath alone. After a minute, they broke their eye contact to look at their feet as if the answers to all of their problems were written on the tops of their shoes.
"I really do like you, you know," Arnold said at last and Helga kept her eyes down as she listened intently to his words. "You're funny and sweet and talented and you have so much love to give, even if you don't want anybody to know it."
"But?" She added and Arnold turned to look at her with confusion.
"What?"
Helga sighed and shook her head while keeping her eyes on the scuffed tops of her shoes. "I know there was a 'but' coming. You know, 'you're really great and I like you a lot BUT...'"
"Right, well," Arnold responded with a pained look on his face, "as much as you may love me and stuff, sometimes it's just... it's too much."
Tilting her head up slightly, Helga thought through what he had just said. "What do you mean, 'too much?' How can you care about somebody 'too much?'"
"You're just..." he began before letting out the breath he'd been holding; a flood of thoughts he'd been harboring spilling out with his air. "You're always there! And that's fine because I like being around you, but when you are around, you're always like... feeding into these notions that I'll leave you for someone else or that I'm up to something or if I talk to this girl then obviously I'm in love with her."
"I don't-" Helga tried but Arnold didn't even hesitate at her attempt to defend herself.
"And I try to tell myself that it's just because you care, that it's because you love me but sometimes it feels like-like-like-" his tongue was stuck on the word as he tripped over it again and again.
"Feels like...?" the blonde girl tried to assist him in his speech and after her coaxing, he finally was able to spit out the words he was trying to say.
"You're suffocating me... or something."
The word circled Helga's head as she sat in silence with Arnold on the steps.
Suffocator...
...you're a suffocator
You suffocated him!
He was suffocating...
...Suffocating
Despite the chaos ensuing in her brain, Helga remained blank in front of Arnold as he waited for some kind of response from her.
Suffocator
You're jut a suffocator, smothering him with your love...
After a moment, Helga swallowed the growing lump in her throat and gave a half-hearted nod. "I was too much, huh..." It wasn't a question, though Arnold took it as such.
"It's not that you were too much it's more that you're just so... intense. I can't match that level of intensity, at least right now, and..." He paused for a moment to gather his thoughts before saying them aloud. "I can't feel like I'm walking on eggshells with everybody I come in contact with all the time. I shouldn't feel like I can't talk to people because you may find out and freak out on them over a conversation we shared."
Helga nodded her head slowly while focusing her eyes out across the foyer. "I get it."
"You-you do?" He asked and she simply nodded her head again before sitting up straighter and clearing her throat.
"Yeah, yeah," she said as nonchalantly as she could muster. "I suppose saying I'm sorry wouldn't mean much to you then, would it?"
Offering a small smile, Arnold shook his head. "You don't need to apologize for caring about me too much, Helga. It's a good thing to care about others and share that love which you hide inside yourself so graciously- and with me of all people."
"If it's so good then, why don't you forgive me and we can start this again?" Helga's voice was hopeful as she asked her question, "Can't we just learn from this and move on?"
This made Arnold sigh and he closed his eyes momentarily before forcing out an answer. "I just don't think we should."
"Why?" Helga replied with heavy cynicism in her voice, "You want to be free from me so you can prance around here and date some other girl instead; someone who's not so... suffocating to you?"
"See this is what I'm talking about," Arnold said, exhausted. "It isn't that at all, don't you see? I just don't think that either of us really know how to be in a relationship yet because we haven't even figured out what kind of people we are as individuals much less as a couple."
"Why can't we figure all of that out together? Why can't we grow together and be together at the same time?" Helga was clinging to the hope that they could continue their relationship; each sentence she spoke one of silent pleading for him to love her like he had once before.
However, Arnold was firm in his decision. He had thought it over throughout the weekend and talked to both his parents and Gerald about what it was he should do. They weren't ready- neither him or Helga was ready to give their relationship all that it needed to keep going forward. But how could he make her understand?
"We could but," Arnold sighed and his shoulders crumpled into himself as he at last spoke from his heart. "I don't think that us dating, at least right now, would be good for us. I think we'd resent each other and break-up much worse than we are right now and..."
Helga waited for a moment as his voice trailed off, however, when he didn't resume talking to finish his sentiment, she decided to egg him on. "...And? And what, Arnold?"
The boy softly shut his eyes as he struggled with finishing what he knew he had to do. "This connection we have, these feelings we share with one another... they're really important to me, Helga."
"Okay, but what does that have to do with-" Helga attempted though Arnold was quick to hold out a hand to stop her from continuing.
"I'm afraid that if we continue dating now, it would ruin any future relationship we could have together." He turned to look at the perplexed girl beside him. "Does that make sense?"
"What, so like," Helga retorted, "I'm not 'mature' enough yet to handle dating you?"
Arnold frowned and shook his head. "No, we both aren't mature enough yet to handle dating at all."
Deciding to bargain in the hopes that it could change his mind, Helga spoke fast. "What about Phoebe and Gerald then? Or your precious Lila and Stinky? They're dating and doing just fine, aren't they?"
"Helga, they aren't us," Arnold simply replied. "I'm still getting used to having my parents in my life and you-"
"What about me," she snarled through her teeth.
He wasn't afraid of her though, especially when he knew she wasn't herself in this moment; she was just vulnerable. "I think you need to figure out who you are...without me."
Helga stared at him blankly, unable to comprehend what he had just told her. The longer she stared at him, Arnold grew uncomfortable and began to explain further.
"You've loved me for so long and spent years picking on me, making me the center of your world and I wonder if... if... if maybe you need to step away from me and figure yourself out, you know?"
At last, Helga turned away from Arnold to look down at her hands which were laying limp in her lap. Just above a whisper, she said, "Yeah, sure."
"I really am sorry, Helga. For this moment right now but," he stopped mid-sentence to reach out and set a hand on her shoulder though she didn't even flinch at his touch. "I really do hope that by stopping this now, we can end up starting again in the future. You know like how they say if you love something you let it go and if it comes back to you-"
"Then it was really yours in the first place," Helga quietly finished for him.
A sad smile took the place of Arnold's frown and he nodded his head. "Exactly. If we do end up together in the future, which I really hope we will... maybe by then we will be able to be a better partner to each other."
"Without the suffocating..." Helga murmured though Arnold didn't hear her.
Taking a quick breath, Arnold squeezed Helga's shoulder before dropping his arm to his side and standing up while swooping his backpack over his shoulder. "I still want to be friends though. I know it's cliché but... I really don't want to lose you as part of my life, Helga."
She shrugged while keeping her eyes away from his; she didn't want him to see the tears building up at the base of her vision. "Don't you worry, Football-head," she tried with little humor in her wavering voice, "you can't get rid of Helga G. Pataki that easily..."
While he knew she was hurting, he gave her a soft smirk while nodding his head. "Good." After a beat, he made his way down the steps to once again stand on the linoleum floor of the foyer. Just as he was about to walk away completely, he turned around to look where Helga remained sitting deflated on the steps. "I'll talk you later? I hope?"
For the briefest of moments, Helga glanced in Arnold's direction before looking away from him and shrugging her shoulders. "I'll see you around, Hair Boy."
It was her silent of way of telling him off, even if he didn't realize the change from 'talk' to 'see' had been intentional on her part.
For Helga, everything she did was intentional... but not this. She hadn't intended for their relationship to end or for her to be the cause behind it's demise. She hadn't intended for her own heart to be broken by the person she loved most in the world.
Yet, as far as she could see, she had. Once again, her big heart had let her get carried away and ruined the only thing she'd ever wanted.
As she walked herself home, one word followed her with each new step she took; the distance she put between herself and the foyer meaning nothing as the word traveled beside her.
Suffocator
Suffocator
Suffocator
Had she? Had she indeed suffocated him? And if she had, did that make her the one who murdered their love?
The moment she got home, Helga pulled her journal out and began scribbling in it as fast as she humanly could; her pen moving haphazardly across the paper in an effort to keep up with her racing thoughts.
Well, he did it, she wrote; foregoing the typical greeting she usually gave the inanimate object before continuing with an entry. He really did it.
He broke up with me. Officially. Officially as in he gave me the whole, 'it's not you, it's me' routine and EVERYTHING.
I could just scream. I could just cry. I could just... UGH I don't KNOW what I could just!
So much of what he said is still baffling me. He was like some little old wise man trying to peddle me some advice from a sketchy cart full of weird goods in the middle of an alley. It was almost like he was suddenly twenty years older and he was talking with me, the lowly 12 year old.
He actually said that I was not mature enough. ME! Can you believe that? Me, the girl who knew what 'love' was enough to write in-depth, complex poetry about it before most of her peers had even figured out how to rhyme words together.
He also said that he felt 'suffocated' by me. What does that even mean? Sure I was a little jealous and most of the time I accused him of things based off of my own paranoias and fears but that's no reason to act like I didn't let him
Helga stopped writing to look at the words she'd scrawled down. Over and over again she read them as though trying to memorize each loop and curve of the letters she'd written.
After a long minute, Helga skipped to the next line on the sheet and began writing once again.
Oh God. She wrote; the realization hitting her harder than the force she used to push her pen to the paper. Arnold... I smothered him.
My sweet and most truest love... I've smothered you.
As she looked at her newest epiphany from where the words stared up at her, a lone tear at last bean to slide down her cheek.
And this time she didn't even bother to reach up and wipe it away. There was no use in trying to hold back the waterworks that were sure to ensue at any moment.
Pulling the journal close to her chest, Helga looked out the window of her room as tears began to free-flow down her face. "Arnold," she cried out, "I'm—I'm so, sorry if I smothered you..."
The moment the apology left her lips, Helga fell back to lay on her bed while staring up at the blurry ceiling through the water in her eyes.
"Sometimes I just wish you hadn't been there all those years ago," she spoke aloud to the silence surrounding her. "Sometimes I wish we hadn't met or that I hadn't even been born... just so that I couldn't hurt you..."
Blinking through tears, Helga took a deep breath in that felt as though it were calming her very soul. As she let the feeling settle, she turned her head to look out of her bedroom window once more. "So I couldn't hurt myself like this either..."
As slumber overtook her, she dreamed nothing in particular or of value. Her dreamings were but endless blank sheets of paper for which Helga had no words. All the while throughout her subconscious, a sparkle of something continued to glimmer, though dull. With each turn of the empty pages in her mind, the sparkle remained ever shining, ever brilliant, just bright enough to be seen.
A flicker of hope.
A flicker of hope that in the end, everything would work out between the pair.
It was in that hope that the spark of what some may call true love, lived.
Helga slept soundly that night as the small light within her continued to illuminate her subconscious, even if by only a small amount. It was thanks to that hope, always there and never faltering, that she awoke to each new day with the strength she needed to continue forward.
Because even though things seemed grim, Helga knew that one day things would work out. Even the strongest of flowers need the right conditions to grow and in that way, their partnership was much the same. Unfortunately for the youngest Pataki, she would just have to wait a little longer for all of the right elements to come together in order for the couple to finally bloom with one another in the light of the sun.
Their time would come.
Maybe not now, but one day, some day, soon.
I truly hope this little ending gave you all the strength YOU need to continue on this giant love story between Arnold and Helga!
How did you enjoy this chapter? LEAVE ME A REVIEW and let me know what you thought! Any and all feedback is greatly appreciated.
Thank you for sticking around and I'll see you at the next chapter!
xo
Polka