Alright, ya'll. This is part ONE of Arnold and Helga's final scene in this story. Yes, there is so much to discuss that I decided to write this into two parts. There will be a part TWO, and then we will have an ending sequence before the conclusion of this story. As I stated always and previously, this story will be FINISHED. Thank you for reading as always, and please enjoy!
Arnold Shortman did not remember the number of stairs he had to ascend eight years ago.
Was it this many? How could he forget? The panting and wheezing of his breathing stopped all of his desire to think. He could concentrate only on what waited at the top of all these stairs. If he could arrive alive.
The drive over to Future Tech Industries was difficult for Arnold, as he finally figured out where Helga Pataki was headed. He was surprised at her stealing the limo that the elementary school gang had ridden into the homecoming dance, and at the same time, was impressed at her ability to control such a large vehicle.
Despite the number of red lights he ran, and how many speed limit signs he ignored, he was able to keep the limo in his vision, but only briefly as it would race through each intersection and turn with no regard to others.
He was fortunate to be breathing, he figured, and still maintained his driving record.
Each feeling of another stair stung Arnold's feet, and he cursed knowing there would be another to follow. He should not be complaining; Helga was wearing heels. It seemed that there would always be another stair, just as there would always be another obstacle between Helga and him. There were no more chances and no more time. He did not know what would happen once he reached that rooftop, only that there would be nowhere else to go or nothing else to do.
It was a relief.
After days of chaos and confusion, there would be a cease. Although that emotion did exist for a few seconds while the two blondes tangled earlier in the evening, this time, there would be more than a few minutes to discuss what he had desired before a disco ball destroyed that opportunity he would have had at the dance.
"Why did you follow me? Why are you here?" Helga hollered as Arnold shoved the rooftop door out into the dark irony of the Hillwood night sky.
"Don't." Huff. "Ask." Puff. "Me. That. As if." Arnold struggled to exhale the words, as he placed his hands on his knees. He had emerged from the never-ending staircase, only to discover a panting pink princess herself. Her hands were thrown into the air as if she was defeated, but her insistence on not engaging in eye contact confirmed otherwise.
"As if you did not want me to follow you." Choking out the remaining part of his sentence, he took another breath to stabilize his oxygen once more. "I'm just glad it's you and not Deep Voice this time."
Helga shook her head, turning away from the blonde prince as she sauntered over to the side of the rooftop. "Someone still has their sense of humor."
"I'd give it up just so that you could see the bright side of the situation." Arnold inhaled, raising his head to stare up at her noticing the stars of their town nearby. "Heck, I'd give it up just so you can tell me how you were able to change your voice to that DEEP voice."
"I'm SORRY that I am failing to find the bright side of this situation." She seethed each word that even started from her mouth. "The ENTIRE school knows now that I see a shrink. I might as well just face the facts that Helga G. Pataki will always be the school freak."
Blowing out breath after breath, Arnold tucked his hands into his pockets, pondering his next play. "I doubt you could earn that title after Lila walked around looking like a chicken. I'm pretty sure they took a picture for the school yearbook."
"Is that supposed to make me feel better, Arnold?" Helga shifted around suddenly, sobbing in an attempt to gesture at Arnold's gaze. "You and I both know that not only does the school think I do drugs, but now, they probably think I do drugs because I am crazy and see a shrink! I can NEVER escape the past. Never. You might be able to look on the bright side, but I can't!"
"I'm so confused. I don't understand why you think it is so important what others think." Arnold whispered.
"I wouldn't expect YOU, hair boy, of all people to understand. Everyone likes YOU. Everyone thinks that you are cool! You have a squeaky clean image, and everyone comes to you for advice. You are Arnold Shortman, and I'm just…. me." Helga wrapped her arms around herself as if trying to hug herself.
"I am sorry, Helga. You're right in that I probably don't understand what that feels like. I've got a lot of things I don't understand. But I can tell you that not everyone likes me and that I'm not perfect." He started scuffing the bottom of his shoe with the concrete of the roof, focusing on any topic other than his fears. "I'm pretty sure Lila hates me now. She probably thinks I backed out of our arrangement."
"Pfft. Of course, your first thought is of Lila. Wow, you ditched your perfect date. I am sure she'll be 'ever so' angry. You ruined her perfect evening. Whoop dee do." Helga argued, still annoyed at Arnold's answer.
"Helga, I agreed to go to the dance with her for YOU. She was trying to publish that stupid story, and she blackmailed me into going to the dance with her with it." Furiously, he fumbled his fingers through his corn stack of hair. "I couldn't tell you. I was afraid she would know and publish it."
"She was the one who wrote it?
Did she put it in the disco ball?
But if she went to the dance with you, why would she have put it in the disco ball?"
Helga's eyes expanded as she played with the puzzle pieces of these problems throughout her head.
"She wrote it, but it would not have made sense for her to put the articles in the disco ball. I think someone else found them and put them in there."
"Someone else?" The possibility that there was another individual involved seemed to sadden Helga again. "But who?"
Arnold sighed. "I'm not sure. I'm just sure it wasn't Lila. Someone who had the opportunity and the motive."
"How can we be so sure it wasn't Little Miss Perfect? Did you forget that she has turned evil in the last few days?"
"Helga…"
"I'm not surprised at all you don't think it's her. After all, you're obviously crazy about her. She's all you think about."
"Helga!"
"Even after she got me kicked off the team and the newspaper…"
Arnold scooped two tiny hands into his before he shouted the stupidest sentences he could have stated to Helga G. Pataki and her team of Betsy and the Five Avengers.
"HELGA, will you please shut up for just one second?!" The storm of the blue irises that Arnold has always admired suddenly stopped, and ceased into a calm sea of silence at the scream of its vision's beholder.
"I'm sorry. I just couldn't get your attention." He swallowed, hoping to reverse his previous problem of an outburst that Helga could off him for even shouting.
"I am NOT crazy about Lila. It's been you. You're the one who has been driving me crazy the last few days." Arnold squeezed her hands even tighter as he navigated the nightmare of nights that occurred a few days prior.
"When I saw you being wheeled into that ambulance…" His confession crawled slowly. "That was it."
"I knew that my life wouldn't be the same without you. You've always been there…" Another breath and another swallow. "And just like that, you could have been gone."
"That's how I knew. I knew that I had feelings for you. What I felt for Lila, it was nothing like that."
"Helga, I want one more chance with you. I want you to give me a chance. To give us a chance. Give me the chance to be your friend, but maybe even the chance to be something more than that."
"Arnold…" Helga struggled to plead, slowly sinking into her own sin.
"Please, Helga. Just let me finish."
"No, I can't." She dropped her hands from his. "You can't like me. You won't like me. I wouldn't have even been in that ambulance in the first place if I didn't do what I did."
"What?" Arnold questioned. "What are you talking about?"
The stability of her legs stumbled below her, either from the number of stairs or the sensation of fear from finally freeing herself from her fibs. "I was the one who started the fight at the sleepover. I threw a wine bottle at Rhonda. That is why the whole fight began in the first place, and I wouldn't have even ended up in the hospital if it had not been for that."
Before sucking in another sudden sip of air, Helga closed her eyes. "I could have hurt Rhonda. I deserved what happened to me."
"They just tried to stop the fight. Yes, they hurt me, but I deserve it. They kept trying to push me, asking me questions about you. But instead of accepting how I felt about you, I got angry. I always get angry, and now people are getting hurt. Yes, this time it was me, but next time, it could be Rhonda, Lila, or even Phoebe."
"We were lucky that it was just me that was hurt." Helga's sanity crumbled unto the ground below her, and the shakes of her sobs shook the concrete around her.
"We were lucky that it was just you?" Arnold grabbed Helga's shoulders and started to shake her. "Are you fucking kidding me?"
"What? What?" Helga discovered that the shaking was from Arnold's arms, attempting to gain her attention.
"You seriously believe that you deserved what happened to you? That you were lucky to be the one that was hurt? You can't blame yourself for that, Helga! You just can't."
Arnold dropped to his own knees, ignoring the soreness from the journey of seconds ago.
"You do this all the time. You blame yourself, and you internalize all this anger and pain. It's not healthy, it's not okay. I won't allow you to do this!"
Helga's body flopped like a fish out of the sea of her own irises as Arnold continued to shake her into reality.
"You made a mistake. It would help if you hadn't thrown the wine bottle. Someone could have gotten hurt. But you did not deserve what happened to you. NO ONE deserves what happened to you."
"You… You don't hate me? You should hate me for what I did." Helga decided, attempting to dig herself further into her safety of herself.
"Hate you?" Arnold smiled softly. "How could I hate you?"
"How could I hate the one person who woke me to the fucking chaos that is around us? You've awakened me in the last week, Helga. You might have woken up from a coma from being hit on the head with a wine bottle, but I woke up after seeing you. You woke me up to a life of possibilities."
He shifted for a moment, digging into his jacket pocket to find a napkin that he stored there previously in the evening. Although crumpled and probably used, he gently absorbed the wetness of Helga's skin.
"I could never hate you for that."
"Arnold…" Helga gulped and glued her eyes together again to allow him to finish his task. He grabbed her hands once he completed before he saw an opportunity as she opened her eyes and prepared to close the gap between the two blondes.
He was going to kiss Helga G. Pataki. Not a drunken makeout, not for a school play, not for an animated movie. He was going to kiss her for the first time.
As he leaned in, the buzz of a cell phone overtook the silence that the dark rooftop brought. Arnold groaned and backed away quickly.
"One second." Arnold, obviously bothered, checked the screen to read who was calling. "Wait a minute."
"Who is it?" Helga asked.
"It's Phoebe. Why is she calling me? I guess she is checking on us. I should answer." Arnold pressed the little green call button that had the word answer.
"Hey, Phoebe. What's going on?"
"Arnold! You answered. Are you with Helga?"
"Yes, I'm with Helga. We are okay. What's wrong? You seem upset." Arnold questioned further.
"We can't find Gerald. He's gone."
"Gone? Gone where?"
"We think Rhonda has him."
