A/N: Hey, guys. Here's your longer chapter that you've all been waiting for. The next one after this is also short, so enjoy it. Remember, I only keep it short to keep you on the edge of your seats. Enjoy this one! Xoxo.
Disclaimer: I do not own Hey Arnold! or its characters.
"Arnold? May I speak with you a moment?" Lila approached Arnold immediately after sixth period the next day as they were leaving the classroom. Arnold, Gerald, Helga, Phoebe, and Lila all shared Calculus together during that hour.
"Um. Sure, Lila. Can you make it kind of quick? I am leaving school early to go see Helga in the hospital with Gerald and Phoebe." Arnold explained, gripping on the math books he was holding in his hands.
"I'm ever so sure I will. I'm so sorry about Helga. We all feel horrible about what happened. I just wish I could have done something. It wasn't the same without her in class today."
'All I could do was stare at that empty desk…'
'Wait, what was Lila saying?'
"Me too." Arnold couldn't discover any words to describe how he felt about Helga and her accident.
"Do you mind if we actually go somewhere a little more private? It's a more… personal question." She asked.
'A personal question?!'
"How about the janitor's closet across the hall?" A sickingly, strange smile emerged among Lila's lovely face from her suggestion.
"Uh, sure. Fine." Arnold agreed, not really paying attention or willing to argue.
'The sooner I get to visit Helga, the better. Let's just get this over with.'
Arnold willingly strolled alongside Lila as she linked hands with him into the dark, empty janitor's closet on the other side of the hallway.
Alone.
"I said what?!" Helga dropped her metal spoon into the chocolate pudding she was divulging in.
Her best friend couldn't bear to meet Helga's glare as she repeated what Gerald had shared with her this morning. Both girls were speaking in the room Helga was staying in at the Hillwood Hospital after the two left school early.
"You told Arnold you loved him before you were carried into the ambulance." Phoebe restated, and grabbed the bowl of pudding from Helga.
Helga just froze. She had admitted to Arnold, the boy she had been in love with since she was three years old, even though she denied it all through high school, that she loved him. No words could leave her mouth. No actions could leave her body. She just sat there in sudden shock.
"Helga?" Phoebe asked, and touched her arm to assure herself that she was okay. "Helga?"
"Phoebe…" Helga sniffled. "I… I…" She couldn't say anything. Now that Arnold knew her true feelings, she understood that she would have to confront him and accept the rejection she had been waiting for all these years.
Even though she had already revealed her feelings for him in fourth grade on top of the FTi building, they both had dismissed it off as "the heat of the moment." Neither of them spoke about it again. They just remained friends, and continued through middle and high school as friends. After Helga's transformation freshmen year, Helga finally thought she moved on from Arnold. Now, with the incidents, the blog post, and now the biggest secret of her life, she now comprehended that she was still in love with Arnold, and that everyone was right. She had never moved on, and she probably never will.
With the aftermath and this realization falling into place, Helga broke into another set of tears. Phoebe allowed her to lie in her arms as she sobbed. She wept not only for the predicament that she was in, but how she could have been so naïve for not recognizing it earlier. She was in love in Arnold, and he wasn't in love with her.
Phoebe combed her best friend's blonde hair, and quietly listened to Helga's cries. She knew that Helga had discovered the truth, and she had to conquer the emotions that came with it. The most supportive action she could think of to do was just to comfort her and to listen.
A gentle knock came on the door of the hospital room. Someone was here to visit Helga during visiting hours. Phoebe lightly shifted to obtain her cell phone from her front pocket of her jeans. Before she even opened the phone to see who had texted her, she saw the name of the person on the notification.
Arnold was here to see Helga.
There was no way to prepare her.
"Helga? There's someone here to see you. Do you want to see them?" Phoebe tenderly petted Helga's blonde hair.
Helga gradually sat up from Phoebe's lap and smeared the tears off her white face. "I suppose." Phoebe knew from the hopeless look in Helga's eyes that she knew it was Arnold.
"If you say so, Helga." Phoebe leisurely left the hospital bed and approached the door to unlock it. Helga smoothed down her wrinkled hair and straightened her hospital gown. Sealing her eyes shut, she took a breath before hearing the click of the hospital door.
"Helga?" The familiar voice of the football headed friend echoed throughout the hospital room.
"Come in, Arnold." Helga rasped, barely opening her eyes.
Phoebe nodded to Arnold, and glided past him and out of the room. The door closed behind her, and Arnold and Helga were now alone.
