Fifi's home entertainment center wasn't the best ever. But seated on the living room floor looking up at the television from up close, it was almost like being at the movie theatre. At the conclusion of their contest, Arnie and Arnold got along curiously well. Arnie sat beside his cousin with an almost sympathetic look while Helga and Fifi sat together giggling. Harry passed tubs of popcorn around. Then Stumpy came around with some chilled Yahoo sodas. Helga and Fifi popped the lid tops and then clinked the edges of their bottles together in celebration of a new friendship.
"So what are we watching?" asked Helga.
"Alien Invaders Versus Tractor-Man, Three!" said Fifi. "Do you like sci-fi's?"
"Well, alien movies aren't exactly my favorite after I was mistaken for one, once," said Helga. "I have Arnold partly to thank for that!" said Helga scowling in his direction.
"Hey. I said I was sorry!" said Arnold looking up from his soda.
"I'll have to tell you all about that later!" promised Helga. "For now, tell me about Alien Invaders Versus Tractor-Man movies one and three! I've never seen any of them!" Helga kicked her heels as she waited for the pre-film commercials to pass.
"You've never seen any of them!" said Fifi. She hopped up and stopped the videotape. Then she switched it to a new one. "Movie marathon!" she sung as the first film in the series began to play.
It was nearly midnight when Fifi dropped Helga off in front of Arnie's farm house. The two girls had hit it off so well, Helga hugged the friendly girl back. Then she waved as Phoebe's wicked dopelganger drove away so reckless that Arnold was quite sure she hit a rabbit. He flinched.
Arnie had given his cousin a ride home, begrudgingly. But the girls had niched and there was nothing they could do about it. Girls would be girls.
"Whew!" said Helga stretching her arms out above her head in the moonlight. "The country is a blast! Thanks for inviting me, Arnie! Ya know, you're all right! And your friends are rocking awesome in their own weird little way."
"Thanks," Arnie said softly. "It's late. We should get to bed. Walk softly or you'll wake up Ma and Pa."
It was the longest stretch of words Helga had ever heard Arnie speak. She tiptoed in and found her cot in the kitchen by the stove. It was the most comfortable place in the farmhouse, considering. Poor Arnold had to sleep up in Arnie's room with his cousin snuffling and sniffing all night. But all lights went off in the farmhouse eventually.
The week following that first eventful day was not nearly so exciting as the first. Mostly, it was full of farm chores. Like collecting chicken eggs. And Helga discovered chickens did not like her any better than pigeons did. They played as many nasty tricks as they could so she would not find their eggs and put them in a little wicker basket. Arnold followed Arnie around the farm watching his cousin do farm work. But in afternoons, more often than not, they all washed up, then went over to Fifi's pig ranch to hang out. Once or twice, Arnie's pa drove them all into town. Time passed, and by some miracle, Helga's scheme in coming here instead of camp was not found out.
The morning light was streaming radiantly one day when Fifi paced slowly up to Helga. From yards away, Fifi could see the city girl lift the red flag attached to the side of a mailbox to the 'up' position. Helga was in the process of opening Arnie's mailbox to put a letter inside when Fifi approached.
"Whatcha doing?" said Fifi leaning over to see what Helga held in her hand. It was a photograph of Arnold and Arnie, with Helga standing between the two boys. One hand was on Arnie's shoulder while her back leg curved against Arnold's.
"Oh, just sending a little present to my friend, Lila," said Helga. Helga's eyes were shifty. She flipped the stiff photo print over to reveal a stamp, an address, and a postscript.
"You wish you were here," Fifi read with a smile. "Ooh. You're bad!"
"I know!" said Helga chuckling as she slammed the postbox shut.
"So what do you want to do today?" Helga asked Fifi. Fifi dwelt long in thought. "Well, we could go out and see crop circles!" Fifi declared. "Unless you're scared that is!" she challenged. Helga's wide unibrow twisted up at one side.
"Crop circles?" she asked. "What the heck are you talking about?"
"Well," said Fifi. "It's a well kept country secret that Farmer Jenkins five farms down the road has a space alien problem. He gets crop circles in his corn field every year! And it's caused by aliens!" Fifi pressed close to Helga. She stared deep into the blond-haired girl's eyes, waiting for her reaction.
"Ha!" Helga laughed. "Aliens! As if! Do you really believe in all that nonsense?" Helga pretended to brush imaginary dirt over her arm, then crossed her arms.
"Well, if aliens aren't real, then you shouldn't have any problem if we go see the crop circles!" declared Fifi. Helga considered it.
"Well, alright," she said with a shrug before shaking her head. "But I'm telling you, aliens aren't real!"
"We'll see!" said Fifi with a smile.
Harry and Stumpy were already waiting at Fifi's house. The wavy, black-haired girl in slim, blue plaid top, short blue jean shorts, and army boots twisted her hips jauntily. All of her friends had been gathered, and now it was time for a grand outing. Fifi smiled in victory.
"Let's go!" she said swinging aboard her ATV. Helga put on a helmet and climbed on board. Fifi reved it into high speed.
"Wow," said Arnold, descending from Arnie's ATV. "Helga and Fifi sure are getting along great!"
"Yup," said Arnie. He blinked one eye, then the other in his odd way. Arnold set his helmet down and wandered away into the cornfield they had come to see.
"So where are the aliens?" Helga scoffed. Arms folded, she looked all around her.
"Hiding," Fifi tossed lightly. "But look! They have left their sign in the corn! See where all of this is flattened? It's a symbol!" Fifi gestured all around them. In places, the sunny green rows of corn remained standing, a vivid jungle. But in the others, the newly crushed stalked lay along the ground.
"I told you she wasn't smart," Arnie said. He snorted loudly. Arnold stared backwards towards Arnie. For once, he had to agree with his cousin. Arnold walked out into the damaged corn field, his hands waving on either side as he walked. Arnold walked up to Helga as she stared all around her.
"Hey," said Arnold standing beside Helga. His eyes flickered along the ground in awkwardness for a moment. Then he pointed into a narrow row carved out in the cornfield, as thin as an indoor hallway. "Look? Do you wanna explore down there?" Helga stopped her staring all around to gaze back towards him.
"Sure thing, Arnoldo," Helga answered with a soft smile. Together, they walked out into the thin trek between softly rippling sheaths of corn. The grove grew narrow and Arnold and Helga were forced to walk shoulder to shoulder to stay side by side.
"Well, that's the end of it!" said Helga, squaring her feet as she faced off the end of the narrow trail. "Nothin'. And NO space aliens!" She whipped round to look back towards Arnold. But just then, a peculiar breathing sound began to be heard.
"Koff-ha, koff-ha!"
A wheezing sound came from behind Helga and her eyes grew as round as teacup saucers. Helga put a hand up to her lips and bit her nails. But then, the wheezing sound grew nearer! When it was almost over her shoulder, she narrowed her eyes. Eyebrows dark with rage and lips downturned into a scowl, Helga whipped her fist out behind her shoulder and was satisfied by a very familiar, "crack!"
"BRAINY?!" Helga and Arnold both shouted at Brainy as they stood over the boy with glasses. "What are you doing here?" Weakly, Brainy sat up and put his cracked glasses back on his nose.
"Uh. Something," Brainy mumbled.
"Oh, well!" said Helga. "Do you need a ride back to town?"
"Uh, yeah!" said Brainy. Fifi's relatives arranged a ride back into town for Brainy, although no one knew how or why the boy had gotten there.
"Well," said Fifi when she had returned to her friends. "How about we all camp here and have a bonfire? Then we can all keep a lookout for aliens! I brought some hotdogs and marshmallows!" Fifi pulled a small cooler from the floor of her ATV and opened it. Everything they needed for a cookout was inside.
"I'm game," said Helga catching a Yahoo soda as it was tossed to her. Although no one was terribly enthused about spending the night out in the open cornfield, the weather was priceless. The boys reluctantly agreed.
After several trips back and forth in preparation, Fifi set up an ample campsite. With no mountains between the field and sky, the sun vanished quickly. Arnold lay out on his bedroll, feeling the earth cool beneath him. He kept his hands cupped behind his head as Helga, too, stared up at the blossoming night sky.
"It's so.. Different," said Arnold. "Look at all those stars! I don't think I've ever seen so many in my life!"
"Yeah," said Helga. "Yeah, it is different, Football-Head!" Arnold crooked his brow, then exhaled slowly, at peace.
"Well, at least one thing hasn't changed," Arnold said. "I never would have expected that name to follow me all the way out here!"
"You'll never stop being a Football-Head!" said Helga. She sat up with a grin and punched Arnold softly on his shoulder. But then her smile vanished as she looked around.
"Say, Arnold? Where did the others go?" Arnold sat up in a blink.
"I don't know," Arnold said looking all around him. Just then, they heard a crunch in the corn. Two, glowing hands reached out from behind the cornstalks.
"Arnold!" Helga squeaked. "Run!" Helga leapt to her feet and ran down the open circle in the field of corn to its other side. But two more pairs of glowing hands reached out from the corn. Then two figures wrapped in sheets stumbled out. One figure lifted its head to reveal a green face and two enormous, black, soul-less eyes!
"AAAAHHHEEEEIIIGGGHHHH!" came Helga's high-pitched scream from behind Arnold. His ear was falling off, but the boy had more pressing concerns. Like running. He and Helga both scuttled back in the direction they had come and found themselves pressed in on three sides by glowing aliens before Arnold snatched Helga's hand and they both plowed off it the corn. They were just small enough to snake through the rows without running over every plant.
"Look!" said Arnold. Up ahead was a farm house. It was Farmer Jenkin's no doubt, and both Arnold and Helga pounded on his door. But no one answered.
"AAAAHHHEEEEIIIGGGHHHH!" Helga screamed again as four figures stumbled out of the corn field and lurched towards them. Arnold's hair stood on end. Then the figures suddenly stopped their advance.
"Relax!" said Fifi pulling off her mask. "It's just us! You should have seen the look on your faces! It was so funny!" She held her stomach in painful laughter.
"Very funny, Fifi!" said Helga glaring. She stalked up to Fifi and snatched the mask out of her hand, then glared at it, too, with a touch of curiosity.
"Where'd you get the paint?" asked Arnold walking closer. Fifi dusted some off.
"It's powder!" she explained. Stumpy snicked.
"We sure had ya fooled!" the country boy said.
"Yeah!" said Harry. "You were so scared I thought you were gonna run home and and call your mommy!"
"Not likely," Arnold said, his hands on his hips as he looked at Helga. She returned his look with a sympathetic, knowing expression. There was no way Harry knew Arnold's parents had been missing for years.
"Well," said Arnold stretching out the mask after Helga had handed it off to him. "You've had your fun! Now can we all go home? Back to the farm house, anyway?"
"What? Are you still creeped out?" said Fifi with a wicked smile.
"More like tired," said Arnold, his eyes narrowed and annoyed.
"We won't bother you anymore," said Fifi. "We promise!"
"Right," said Arnold. His voice was disbelieving, but he followed after the others as they returned to their campsite in the middle of the clearing.
"Helga," said Arnold long after the event. "We've been here three weeks. Don't you think we should, uh, both go home early just in case? We don't want your parents to find out you've been here all summer! What if your camp lets out early? Or your parents call the administrators about the bus? A hundred, million things could happen!" Arnold rationalized. But Helga waved a hand at him.
"Oh, Arnold! Don't worry! If it makes you feel better, we'll leave! But I want to go to the barn dance in the middle of the week first! It sounds exciting!" Helga fastened a necklace around her neck by its clasp and admired herself in a mirror in Arnie's living room.
"Right. Well. Great," said Arnold. "I'll talk to Arnie's parents about it."
"It's settled then," said Helga admiring herself in the mirror still from multiple angles. "We'll buy bus tickets for the day after the party!"
The barn dance Arnie had promised was going to be great thing. The children were all going to be there, but mainly the grownups- all the farmers from the region- would be showing up eat and drink and listen to live music. Harry's family barn was painted with a fresh coat of brick-red paint for the occasion. Arnold and Helga helped Harry paint. They both wore old overalls to try to keep their clothes from getting dirty, but Helga defied the effort to stay clean. When Arnold wasn't wary, she leaned down from her ladder and brushed him on the nose with her paintbrush.
"Gotcha, Football-Head!" she said in glee as Arnold felt rather than saw the paint on his nose. But after that, they managed to get the barn done. The three stood in front of their painting work, proudly.
"My Aunt from the city is getting married here," said Harry surprising the two of them. "Right before the dance! Do you want to come?"
"Sure," said Arnold, as polite as ever. "But what do I wear? I didn't pack a suit!"
"Just dress clean!" said Harry. "No paint."
Two days later, Arnold and Helga followed a crowd of some forty-some grownups to an arbor set outside the barn on a green, grassy lawn. The sun was bright overhead. Arnold had worn had red plaid shirt without the blue sweatshirt on top to match Stumpy, Harry, and Arnie with their own plaids of varied colors. So astonishingly, he seemed to fit in. Helga wore her pink thin strap dress for the occasion and a pretty necklace of gold besides her usual ribbon. Most of the people attending wore boots. Some of these boots were cowboy-style, while others the expensive utility boots of the construction industry. Only the bride and groom wore shoes meant for walking indoors.
"Hooray!" said the crowd as the couple agreed to their vows. As the bride prepared to throw her bouquet, Arnold looked toward Helga with a grin.
"I bet you'll faint again," he said.
"Ha!" Helga scoffed. "I won't!" There was little chance the bouquet would fall her way anyway. They were at the back of a sizeable crowd. But the bride tossed her bouquet high up in the air and a sudden wind gusted it much farther than expected. Helga paled as it dropped straight down into her arms. She fainted.
"Caught ya again!" said Arnold with a wide smirk. "See? I told you so!"
"I didn't faint!" Helga protested. "I slipped!"
"Right," said Arnold pulling the flower bouquet free from her hand and setting it down on folding steel chair. "Let's go get something to eat!"
The music for the barn dance started up just as the sun went down behind the flat horizon. It was a country band. Arnie danced a weird little shuffle and Fifi bounced up and down beside her boyfriend Stumpy as he swayed. For a time, the grownups had the children clear the floor as the band led a formal dance with much looping of arms and spinning in lines, circles, or boxes. Arnold stared at the choreography.
"Eugene would love to be here," said Arnold. Helga absorbed the comment. Fifi floated up to Arnold and Helga along with the others, wearing a blue, breezy gown.
"So, Arnold!" Fifi fluttered. "How do you like the music?" Arnold shrugged.
"It's okay, I guess," said the boy.
"Shucks," said Stumpy. "That's cause you're a city boy! You just plain don't appreciate country music!" Arnold gave a sigh. Then he reached into the pocket of his red plaid shirt.
"I appreciate country music just fine!" he said pulling out the paper cover torn from a cd case. He offered it to Stumpy.
"A cd cover for Mr. Hyunh? Sure, I remember that singer! He sure was fine. You'all must be a big fan of his or somethin'!"
"Ahem!" said Arnold coughing into his curled fist before he tucked it behind him. "Read the back cover."
"Mr. Hyunh," Stumpy read with his thick southern drawl. "Country singer! Agents and Professional Country Music Sales Representatives, Gerald Johanssen and Arnold Shortman," Stumpy finished reading. "Willikers!" Helga smiled coyly beside Arnold.
"Finally got one up on your cousin, after all, huh?" she said as Arnold gave back a sly smile.
"Maybe," Arnold admitted quietly.
The barn dance was a lot of fun after all, and it was their final goodbye to their new friends. Helga didn't know if she'd ever see Fifi again but she promised to write. Then, the next day, Arnold and Helga boarded the bus headed back toward Hillwood. They both thanked Arnie and waved goodbye. The country boy waved back with a final sniff. Then Arnold saw a familiar figure standing on the sidewalk. It was Brainy, wearing a red sweater.
"Oh, hi Brainy," Arnold said as Brainy took a seat in the aisle across from them. He was still a number of seats away, so Arnold spoke quietly to Helga.
"I still don't understand how Brainy ended up in that field of corn," Arnold speculated.
"Me, either!" answered Helga. "But there are still a lot of things I don't understand about that boy!"
The two of them ignored Brainy as they rode the bus for hours more. At long last, the bus rolled into the station at Hillwood and Arnold and Helga carefully carried their suitcases down the flight of bus steps. Brainy walked away down the street ahead of them into the distance. The minute he disappeared from view, Arnold and Helga were startled to see Brainy walking TOWARDS them down the sidewalk with an ice cream cone in his hand and wearing a GREEN sweater instead of a red one. Helga's eyes bugged wide.
"Uh, Arnold?" said Helga biting the nails of one hand. Maybe Fifi wasn't so crazy after all! Maybe aliens were real! "What is Brainy doing HERE?!" she trilled out. But Arnold's hair was standing on end and he shook his head.
"I don't want to know!" the boy said. "I REALLY don't want to know!" The end.