Helga stretched her tight limbs. It had been a long time since she had felt so sore in the morning. If this was even morning. Stretching her legs out again, she wrapped them around the pair that she was pressed up against and rested her head on Arnold's bare shoulder. His chest gently rose and fell from his deep breaths and it wasn't long before she matched him.

Reaching over, she gently picked up Arnold's wrist to check the time. 10:30 am. What time had they gone to sleep?

A satisfied grin tugged upwards as she unconsciously played with the little hairs on his chest. Last night had been one of the most amazing nights of her life. Arnold had pleasured her thoroughly last night; she'd like to think she did the same for him. She had never felt more beautiful or more desired as she did when Arnold had held her in his arms. Nothing could bring her down from this euphoric high.

The mattress shifted as Arnold slowly woke. She stayed still, not entirely sure what to expect from him. Just because she was on Cloud Nine didn't mean he wouldn't have any regrets. Fear stabbed her in the gut and she froze, paralyzed from any possible negative reaction.

But when his hand came up and rested on the middle of her back, she relaxed, her heart beating quickly. "Morning." His eyes were still closed but a soft smile lit his face, squashing any fleeting uncertainty. His voice was thick from sleep and she thought it was one of the sexiest things she had ever heard.

"Morning." Taking a chance, she leaned up and lightly kissed the side of his mouth. His smile grew and he fractionally opened his eyes to look at her. "How'd you sleep?"

"Like an awesome."

She couldn't help the grin. "What's an awesome?"

"Me."

She laughed lightly at that and rested her head on his shoulder again as he lazily traced imaginary lines on her back. Her heart was doing flips in her chest, still not quite believing that this was happening.

"How about you? Sleep ok?"

Helga smiled. "Like an awesome."

His low, relaxed chuckle sent a shiver of delight throughout her body and the kiss he gave her on the top of her head caused an involuntary sigh to escape her lips. They remained silent, the tick of Arnold's watch the only sign of passing time. Helga closed her eyes, savoring the feeling of his coarse, small chest hairs scratching her cheek; the sound of his heartbeat under her ear; the feel of his breath on her forehead. She had pined for him for so long, buried her feeling deep down in a hidden box for almost as long, and then after a few short hours together alone, they were...well, what were they?

"What's going to happen now?"

"Well, I'd like to lay here for a little bit longer and then maybe go make some breakfast."

She smirked and turned to lay on her stomach, facing him. Her arms came up and crossed over his chest so that she could rest her chin on her forearm. "You know that's not what I meant."

His eyes were slightly open and he had a lazy, just-awoken grin. She couldn't help but smile wider at the child-like look that he could make sexy. "I suppose we have a few options. The first, and my least favorite, is pretend nothing happen and go back to how we were. The second, again another least favorite, accept it and still go back to how we used to be, although I don't see how that can happen." He kissed the tip of her nose and was rewarded with one of contagious grins. Once again, he started to trace lazy designs on her back. "Or, and this is my preference, we move on from whatever last year was, have a serious conversation or three, and see what happens from there."

Helga didn't respond and continued to stare at him. He noticed a few different emotions cross her face, but he wasn't able to identify them. It made him nervous. He stilled his hand and laid it flat on the middle of her back. "Am I way off base?"

Helga really didn't know what to think about it. Part of her wanted to yell at him for mocking her feelings, but another part rebutted that. Of course he wasn't. Arnold was a nice guy, but this last year had shown her a totally different side to him. A side that revealed independence and spine. A side that said he was not about to let people walk over him any more or force him to try and 'fix' things that so consumed his youth. "No," she said carefully, "it's exactly what I would want to do, too. I just don't know how to respond since it came from you and I've been waiting for it for years."

He relaxed against her again and kissed her forehead before tentatively pecking her lips. "Good. Let's start now."

"Now?" she leaned slightly, surprised.

"Yes," he replied, solemnly. "And we have to be completely honest with one another. Right?"

She nodded in agreement. Sudden worry flooded her. What kind of questions was he about to ask? Was she prepared to answer any?

"Good. First, is your favorite color pink?"

What? "Yes..."

He nodded, as if satisfied with that answer. "Have you ever done drugs?"

She smirked. "No, actually, I haven't."

He nodded again. "Did you really experiment with your roommate?"

Helga laughed at that and slapped his chest. Of course he'd ask that. "No, I didn't." She turned to lay on her back, resting her head on his shoulder. "We're friends, but neither of us would take it to that level."

"Hmm...that's a disappointment."

"You are such a pig."

"I'm such a guy."

She just grinned and rolled her eyes. "Hmm."

"How do you know how to pick locks?"

Helga frowned. "Who says I do? Are you trying to insinuate I break and enter, bucko?"

Arnold would have felt apprehensive if he didn't pick up on her playful tone. "The handcuffs, Buttercup."

"Oh. Oh!" Suddenly, her face turned bright red as the memory surfaced. "Um..."

Sensing her sudden uncomfortableness, he grinned and looked down at her as best as he could. "Completely honest, Helga."

"Well..." She cleared her throat and started to pick at her finger nails. "I... Oh, geeze, Football Head, I'm not going to say. It's too embarrassing. And you're not going to want to hear it, anyway."

"Oh, I seriously doubt that."

She laughed. "Oh, I seriously do."

"Helga..."

"Fine!" she huffed and crossed her arms over the blanket covering her chest. "A few years ago, I was dating this guy who liked to try things. I handcuffed him to the bed before he realized that he didn't know where he put the keys. They were cop cuffs, so it wasn't like he could just click a lever. I had to go online and figure out how to pop them open."

Arnold stayed silent, torn between being impressed and being jealous. Of course that was silly, though. He didn't even know the guy. "Remind me to not let myself be tied up by you any time soon."

She just covered her face with her hands. "Ugh, that is one of the most embarrassing things ever. I can't believe you made me say that."

He grinned and wrapped his arms around her, placing an encouraging kiss on the top of her head. "I got really drunk a few months ago and walked out of my dorm in just my boxers and holding an empty toilet paper roll and one of the video controllers."

Helga laughed at that in disbelief, lowering her hands. "You what?"

He just chuckled. "You heard it the first time."

"Nah, I really don't think I did," she grinned. "I could have sworn I heard you say you-"

"Yeah," he interrupted. "You did."

Helga laughed again. In the last ten hours, she and Arnold had some of the most satisfying sex that she had ever had, woken up without feeling any sort of awkwardness, shared intimately sensitive stories, and both ended up laughing over them.

She was in absolute bliss.

But the funny thing about bliss was that it was fleeting, lasting only for a short period of time. And, just like all bliss, it had to come to an end.

A knock at the door snapped them both fully awake. "Helga?"

Phoebe.

They both leapt out of bed, scrambling to find their clothes. Helga called out to her best friend as she slipped on her underwear, standing next to the door. "Phoebe, dammit! Where the hell have you been?"

Phoebe didn't answer her. "The door is jammed and Gerald is coming up with a drill. He'll be here any minute."

Helga forced her shirt over her head, moving back to the door. "What does he need a drill for?" she asked Phoebe, but looked over at Arnold. He shrugged and slipped into his pants.

"Well…we sort of broke the key in the door. It was the only way we could think of to keep you from coming out."

"You what!" Helga didn't know if she should have been infuriated over that or impressed.

"Arnold, are you alive in there?"

He grinned at Helga, running his fingers through his hair. It was such a simple act but such a turn on. He wrapped his arms around her and buried his nose into her hair, breathing in her scent. After a few moments, he turned his head to keep his words from muffling. "Yeah, Phoebe, but barely. Helga gave me a hard drilling yesterday."

Helga gasped and pushed him away from her. A deep crimson took over her face and she glared up at him, stunned yet secretly delighted at his innuendo.

A sudden drilling noise started and she stepped away from the door as if it would fall down onto her, hoping that Phoebe hadn't heard him. Moments later, she was slapping Gerald on his arm.

"That's for putting me into handcuffs and that's for locking me up in here with a stupid football head and that's for being a jerk!" Her hits were light and Gerald could immediately tell that that she wasn't serious. It was kind of hard to take anyone seriously who was grinning while attempting to hit him.

Of course, it wasn't like he and Phoebe had come by at some point last night to let them out, only to hear laughter from inside the room. And Phoebe, being Phoebe, never would have suggested to let them stay in there a bit longer. And Gerald, being Gerald, wouldn't have distracted his girlfriend for the rest of the evening, preventing her from coming back until the next day.

"Hey, don't take this out on me, Pataki. It's Phoebe's fault. She's the one who came up with the idea."

Her friend blushed when Helga gave her a stunned look. "And proud of it. It seemed to work. Neither of you are hurt and I dare say that you acting pretty relaxed, too. I trust you both slept well?"

"Yeah, sure, Pheebs. And way to go, Gerald-o. You broke your door." Helga tried not to let her blush reach her face again and quickly changed the topic. It didn't get lost on Phoebe.

Gerald shrugged and walked to the kitchen, wondering what food was left over. "Good thing I'm not really staying here, otherwise it'd be a bitch." He picked up a package of string cheese, peeled off the package and bit into the goodness that was mozzarella. Feeling eyes on him, he looked up to see both Arnold and Helga giving him a strange look. "Wut?"

"What do you mean, 'not really staying here?'" Arnold asked, not quite sure if he had heard correctly, even though Helga was giving him the same confused look.

Realization dawned on Gerald, laughing, walked over to the armoire and opened it, revealing no suitcase, clothes, or any personal belongings. "Don't tell me you guys didn't figure this out earlier."

Helga lost count on how many times she had been taken by surprise in the last 24 hours. She turned to Arnold, silently asking how they could have overlooked something so obvious. "You mean you guys planned this? As in, put some thought into it? Not spur of the moment?"

"Of course we did," piped in Phoebe. "We've been thinking about it for months. It took us a while to really hone down on the little things, and we literally lucked out on this place, but in the end it all came out perfectly."

"But…all that food in the kitchen!" Helga protested.

Phoebe smiled at her. "I know you like to eat. I wanted to break you, not starve you."

Helga laughed, thoroughly impressed by her best friend's ingenuity. "If that had come from anyone else, Phoebe…"

"I know, I know."

"Hey!" Gerald shouted suddenly from the kitchen, holding up the handcuffs. "These aren't broken!"

Helga rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest. "Doi, you freak. I have a talent getting out of uncomfortable situations. What was the deal with those, anyway? I mean, it's not like we could have gotten out of this room. Were those really necessary?"

Gerald grinned. "No, but I couldn't help about this one episode of Doug that I remembered, where Doug and Patti got handcuffed together, and the only way that they could get out of it was by holding hands so the handcuffs could slip off, like a Chinese finger trap."

Helga scoffed at him, shooting him an annoyed look. "That's a stupid reason."

"But it worked, didn't it?"

Helga and Arnold shared a smile as he reached out for her, gently taking her hand into his and pulled her to him. "Yeah, I'd say so." Helga's smile grew into a grin as he leaned down and softly kissed her.

Phoebe's eyes widened in shock before gleefully hurrying over to her boyfriend, holding out her hand with a hushed giggle. "I believe I won this wager."

Gerald, stunned in astonishment, looked down at the petite and wonderful woman in front of him. She had really done it. She not only successfully got Arnold and Helga to stop fighting, but also got them to release that palpable sexual tension they had been holding inside for years. In one night. Without actually having to say a word to either of them. Smiling affectionately at her, he reached into his pocket for a wallet.

It was going to be a long life with her and he couldn't wait.