Helga walked behind her peers as they flooded out of the classroom in a frenzy of adolescent elation. The last class on a Friday afternoon always led to these mass breaks for freedom leaving the halls crowded and alive with premature enthusiasm. Her mind spun lazily as she lifted her feet consciously trying to tread a straight path. She had thought the effects of the alcohol would have worn off before the days end, but she still felt a good pull from the drink. As students grazed by she observed their demeanor with slurred judgmental thoughts and occasional bouts of paranoia when teachers' heads would bob through the sea of students.
She finally found solace in the girl's restroom where she locked herself in a stall and sat on a cold toilet seat to collect herself. She pulled the familiar pink detention slip from her pocket watching it blur from focus and visually swim. She had nearly forgotten the incident from her first period class. She hung her head over the note as if in prayer, clutching the paper in her hands. Something like regret suggested itself to her in this moment's daze. But she pulled herself upward, leveraging her weight with the stall door. After a five minute sulking she opened the stall, hoping hallway traffic had eased.
She emerged into the hall whilst mindlessly attempting to find her cell-phone in her disheveled backpack. As usual it was lost in a torrent of papers, pens, books and candy wrappers. Her hands grasped fruitlessly and she felt a familiar frustration boil up from her throat into a gnashing growl. She conceded her attempts and made for the closest bench just outside the hall doors. She reached aggressively through her things, quickly spying her pink plastic phone.
She read the time on the face, and exhaled lightly. She still had fifteen minutes to get to detention. In relief, she rest her head against the wall and enjoyed her inebriated state despite her better judgment. There was simply nothing that could be done about her situation at this point, and knowing this gave her an odd sense of comfort. Her heart felt lighter for the thought, but she worked to bury it. Her best hope was to play off her symptoms well, and though she had no real proof of her ability to act, she somehow sensed she had the gift. After all, she had been so successful so many times in fooling others. And what else is an actor, but a professional liar?
She opened her eyes stepping off the pedestal inside her mind that had been plugging a false sense of competence, and got her things together. She stood heavily as if her bag were weighted with barbells and heaved it onto her back like a hated chore. She stood still for a moment, trying to gauge her sense of equilibrium.
"What are you still doing here?"
Helga stiffened and turned abruptly, frightened by the thrown voice, "Huh?"
Over her shoulder she saw Arnold standing behind her, holding one black strap from his dark gray bag of books. Her mind felt as if half-melted beholding his perfect cornflower hair under the bright lit autumn sky. She felt both guilt and paranoia float in her chest and she bit her tongue as incentive just to form her next coherent sentences.
"- Uh, I'm...going to detention. You of all people should know, doi."
Arnold's eyebrows fell with the subtlest edge of hostility as he responded, "I didn't think you would bother showing up."
Helga shrugged, being made uncomfortable by the acidity behind his words. She joked a little more honestly than she might have had it not been for the alcohol, "Of course I'd show up. It's all the peace and quiet I can't get at home." She laughed whilst second-guessing her choice of self-disclosure.
Arnold ignored the diversion, "I can't believe I have detention. I had plans with my friends and now I'm stuck here at school with you."
Helga inwardly winced at the blow to her ego, unintentional as it had been. Biting her tongue as she had learned recently was unfortunately necessary, she spoke in a softer voice she rarely used that carried a sense of sincerity," I usually don't get caught. Uh, I owe you one...or two, I guess since I said I owed you one for lending me the assignment in the first place, uh, sorry." She crossed her arms.
Arnold was grateful for Helga's small steps toward maturity. It relieved and stunned him at the same time. Feeling unable to maintain his frustration, he acquiesced a smile, "Well, at least I'll be able to get my homework out of the way."
Helga smiled uneasily as they made their way back into the main building together.
Arnold opened the door with Helga trailing behind, both immediately analyzing the malaise of student faces. Arnold stood stalk stiff, taking in the room as fully as he could at a glance. He recognized a kid in the second row, though his hood was up as a lazy attempt at hiding his headphones. He was carving into his desk with a pen and had a focused expression on his face.
Helga grabbed Arnold's wrist and pulled him toward the back row. He whispered pleadingly, "Helga?"
Helga returned, "Trust me. The back row is where you wanna be in detention." But Arnold had his doubts.
The room sat in a half-silence filled with the distant sounds of pencils drawing, erasures erasing, gum smacking, and off rhythm finger tapping. Arnold made for his backpack and pulled out his textbooks and binder, preparing to work the time away. Helga pulled out a single sheet, bent and unfolded, and began to draw.
The two sat in silence as they worked. Helga felt a wave of anxiety hit her from the extended silence, and she washed it down with a small sip from her vodka filled water bottle. As she fitted the bottle into her belongings she could have sworn she felt a pair of eyes watching her do it. Either Arnold had been watching, or she was paranoid.
Suddenly, A fat kid with greasy brown hair, and an over-washed green shirt let out a rank, sputtering fart. Two boys on the left side of the room bust up laughing, one covering his mouth in his sleeve and the other laughing into his desk. Arnold rolled his eyes, and Helga laughed.
The teacher rose from his seat in a surprisingly quick manner, and pointed at the two boys, "Hey, that's enough!"
The abrupt outburst from the teacher caused a second group of girls to laugh, and the laughter spread until their teacher barked, spitting as he yelled, "I SAID SHUT THE HELL UP!"
The room stiffened in fear and an eerie silence fell in the room. An Asian kid in the back row in a black-shirt coughed, and a whisper about spicy tuna made a few students giggle, and slowly but surely the room returned to its original state of half-silence.
Helga wrote on a corner of her own paper, tore the wedge off, and passed it to Arnold.
'I think that fat kid was just scarred for life.'
Arnold wrote simply, 'probably.'
He then tapped his pen on the desk, and remembered a curiosity that had just visited him moment's ago. He added to the note, asking boldly, 'uh, is your water bottle filled with alcohol? It smells.'
He passed it her way. She read and then cringed. There wasn't much use denying it, but that only left the choice of how to word oneself in reply. She chose brevity and humor to aid her response, 'yezzz :)'
Arnold worried for Helga, but chose not to voice it. He wasn't sure telling her to be careful and all that would really have as much an effect if it were on paper- if he told her at all. He tried not to think about it too much, though. It was her life, not his. Plus, she was never the most receptive person to criticism.
The rest of the period was wasted in daydreams and homework. Helga drew a picture of the teacher in a straightjacket, yelling at the class. Arnold finished his history assignment and began his math homework. After sixty minutes the teacher stood up and ushered them out in a slow, shuffling heard filled with chatter.
Arnold yawned and stretched his arms over his head, while Helga hurriedly packed, anxious to start the weekend. By the time Helga had packed her things carelessly into her bag Arnold had just started fitting his binder into his. Helga swung a gray strap over her shoulder and heaved herself upward.
"I guess it's the old dusty trail for me." Helga spoke absent-mindedly.
She seemed competent, but Arnold still felt that guilty twinge of worry for her well-being. He offered somewhat begrudgingly, "Hey, do you want me to walk you home?"
Helga's chest froze and she turned her head over her shoulders stiffly to reply, "If you want to..."
Arnold smiled and put his things away again while Helga rested her hands on her hips. They left the building and were greeted by a cool breeze and the dimming of the daylight sky that held the sun, smoldering red-orange just above the horizon. Autumn leaves whisked by them in the blustering winds, and they clutched themselves for warmth as they set forward.