Chapter two, up and ready to go. Thanks everyone for the reviews so far :)

Now, in the episode of the series where Arnold and Helga have rival papers, Sid gave Gerald a packet of pictures. one of the pictures is Helga practicing ballet, and she looks pretty happy with herself in the picture. I thought it'd be something she'd still keep doing, however secret.

I don't own Hey Arnold

"Your house, 6 0'clock sharp," Helga informed me, slapping a piece of paper on my desk. I blinked confused for a minute. It was only yesterday I had asked Helga for help on the subject of romance. I hadn't expected her to dive in so quickly, though I certainly wasn't going to complain.

"Why six?" I asked curiously, unfolding the piece of paper she had placed before me.

"'Cause I have ballet after school," she said bluntly, crossing her arms. I peered up in surprise, watching as she popped a bubble with the gum she was chewing. "You wanna make something out of it?" she growled menacingly. I shook my head quickly.

"Not at all," I replied quickly, keeping my comments to myself as I scanned over the piece of paper on my desk. It was a shopping list. I widened my eyes, scanning the contents. A large notepad, markers, a small composition book. "What's all of this for?" I asked, holding the list up. I gave her a confused look.

"If I'm going to teach you, I need supplies," she replied as if it was obvious. She popped her gum again. "Get them after school. I expect everything set up when I get there. You've got food, right? I'm always starved afterwards."

She was sitting on my desk now, chatting away. People were starting to stare as Helga popped her gum and chatted on about the exact details of what she ate on her pizza, and the best spot to get it from.

"Are you listening?" she called, snapping her fingers in my face. I shook my head to clear my thoughts, looking back up at her.

"What? Sorry," I stammered.

"I said that if you want to call and make the order later, I'll pick everything up on my way over, football head. "

"Oh, sure," I nodded in reply, scribbling down the toppings she was listing off again onto the shopping list. I was starting to wonder if this was such a good idea as she scribbled her phone number at the bottom of the list.

She had extremely neat handwriting, and she wrote her name under the number with a flourish. She popped the cap back on her purple pen before pushing herself off of my desk and plopping down in her own, her legs splayed in the aisle. Sighing deeply, I leaned forward on my elbows, covering my eyes. I desperately hoped I was making the right choice in asking Helga for help.

"What's the deal?" Gerald hissed from behind me, reaching forward to tap me on the shoulder. I turned around in my desk, shrugging. There was no way I was going to tell him Helga was going to give me romance advice on how to help Lila. He'd been at me these past two weeks to just let it go and move on. That was a lot easier said than done. Plus, after Lila and I got back together, I could explain the whole thing to him then and we'd laugh about it.

"What do you mean?" I asked in what I hoped was a casual manner. I was mid-move of placing my arm on his desk to lean on, but that seemed too casual, so I quickly jerked it back to my lap, laughing nervously.

He was silent for a minute, looking at me skeptically. "You know what I mean. Yesterday she's threatening to emasculate you, and today you guys are chatting over what pizza to order when you hang out after school. Don't tell me this is just a normal occurrence. I'm not crazy man. I'm not," he said, bringing his hands to his chest.

"She's helping me with some extra credit for Mr. Simmons," I lied through my teeth, trying not to let me eyes dart from his face.

He looked like he was starting to believe me a bit, and his posture started to relax. "Oh. I didn't know we had any extra credit. What is it?"

"Oh, it was just something I asked about yesterday when I stayed behind. Helga came in while I was here. Mr. Simmons was letting me do some more love poem stuff, ya know, because I didn't read mine aloud," I babbled, hoping my lie sounded convincing. I felt bad about it, but I didn't want him going to Mr. Simmons and asking about this so called extra credit.

Luckily, he nodded his head, now completely relaxed in his seat. "I was wondering what you guys had arranged. Okay then. That makes more sense to me. I was actually afraid you and Helga were starting to hang out. I mean seriously. Helga G. Pataki?" I heard his laughter mix with the harsh popping of Helga's gum. I had dodged a bomb this time.

I roamed the store, list in hand as I tried to figure out if any of Helga's stuff needed to be specific. How big did she want the big writing pad, and how many markers did she want? Could I just get a Sharpie, or was I better getting a box of markers. What was the smaller notepad for? Did I need markers for both?

I groaned, finally just grabbing up the large twelve pack marker set. She'd have plenty from that. I grabbed a composition book from nearby, then stared at all the notebooks. All of them were the same size, though at the end were wire racks filled with the large, wide-ruled paper that the teachers had often used in the younger grades. I figured those were the largest notebooks I could think of, so I managed to wrestle one out, taking all of my supplies to the cash register to check out.

"Hey Arnold," Nadine greeted me from her perch behind the register. I forgot she worked here after school some days.

"Hey," I replied cheerfully, fishing out my money as she read my total.

"What's all this for?" she asked curiously as she finished sliding my markers into a bag.

I froze for a moment, quickly blurting out, "Some stuff for the boarding house."

She nodded and we said our goodbyes before I rushed outside. I couldn't think of a day where I'd lied more than I had today. It was nerve wracking!

I pushed open the door, calling out a greeting to my grandparents, where ever they might be in the house. I could faintly hear grandpa griping, "Pookie! Where did you find a taxidermy tiger?!"

I just shook my head, grinning as I made my way up to my room. I deposited the supplies on my desk, shrugging out of my over shirt and depositing it on the couch. I wasn't sure if I needed to clean up my room any. I mean, it was never really dirty. I just had some clothes scattered around and a few bits of crumpled up paper on the floor near my desk. Oh a whim, I quickly took my photo of Lila and myself and shoved in in the drawer on the desk. I didn't want to have to hear Helga pick her apart later. I really wasn't sure what to do, so I moved around my room sporadically. I played one of my computer games, worked a little on my science assignment, tried to nap, and then settled for watching TV until Helga arrived. I almost forgot I was supposed to order pizza, so I had to go find where I'd tossed the list.

I almost jumped out of my skin when a loud banging came from downstairs about thirty minutes later. I tripped on my way down the stairs, but I managed to catch myself and stick the landing when I got downstairs. Grandpa was just opening the door, the words "We don't want any" just leaving his lips by the time I skidded up beside him.

"She's here for me grandpa," I blurted quickly, taking her wrist and pulling her up the stairs behind me. She didn't say anything until I whirled her into my room, closing the door.

"Nice to see you too," she said sarcastically, plopping down on my couch. She was balancing the pizza box in the crook of her arm, a two liter in her hand. She put the box on the couch and popped it open, a grin on her face as she pulled out a slice of dripping pizza. Just watching her made me realize how hungry I actually was. It was for both of us, wasn't it?

I walked over, hesitantly. "Can I?" My stomach let out a large grumble as I winced.

She smirked, raising an eyebrow. "I'm sorry, you thought we were ordering for two now, did you?"

I was about to protest when she started to laugh, turning the box to face me. "Go on, don't get your panties in a twist football head, I was only joking."

"Thanks," I said gratefully, sitting down on the other end of the couch and getting a slice of the pizza. It was actually really good, though I hadn't recalled ever ordering from the place before. I'd had to look the number up.

"You get my supplies?" she asked, catching some cheese that had managed to stick to her chin.

I nodded, mouth full as I pointed to the desk. She grabbed another piece of pizza, ripping off a chunk before walking over the desk. She rubbed the grease off her fingers on her jeans, setting stuff up. Lila never ate like that. If we had pizza, she wanted it on a plate and with a fork. She never ate more than once slice, and she certainly didn't like to drink it with soda.

"Just drink from the bottle," Helga mumbled around a mouth full of pizza, seemingly reading my mind. I obliged without any complaint.

She pushed my desk chair to the middle of the room so it was facing the sofa. She popped open one of the markers and scribbled onto the large pad of paper that she had propped up into the chair. "Lesson one," she read along as she wrote. "Know your girl." She underlined it before turning to look at me, waving the marker.

"Any thoughts?"

"I thought this was a romance emotional type thing," I asked, confused. "I already know her."

"But there's a difference in knowing her and knowing her," Helga explained. "Knowing specific things about the girl leads you into knowing which way she would like to be wooed."

I just nodded. "Um, okay. What's that mean?"

"Okay, for example," she said gesturing to herself. "I like food and wrestling."

"Everyone already knows that-"

"But," she interrupted me, glaring as she continued to scribble what she was saying on the paper, "Those are the obvious things about me. Stuff anyone already knows. If someone were to want to get my attention, they'd have to show they paid enough attention to me to pick up on smaller details. The smaller details have the biggest impact." She made a show of underlining her last statement. "Got that?"

"Got it. Small details, bigger impact," I nodded, trying to dredge up the small details of things Lila liked.

"Now I also like poetry, ballet, and….and stuffed animals," she muttered a bit sheepishly. "And if you tell anyone, I'll shove your head in a toilet"! she threatened in her normal gruff tone. I nodded, eyes wide. Understood. "Now you can pick something from both groups to get her attention. Or two from one. It's just always better to pick two things to go on rather than one. So, let's say, you took me out for a carb loaded dinner and chose poetry as the topic of choice. It shows attention on both levels. Girls like to know you pay attention to the less obvious things."

"But how would I have known those things about you if you hadn't told me?" I inquired curiously. "I mean, I never would have even guessed-!"

"Wrong!" she yelled, throwing on of the markers at me. I flinched, shielding myself. Maybe I shouldn't have got the twelve pack. "You would know, if you paid attention." She quickly turned around and wrote ATTENTION in big letters on the paper, underling it as well. "Attention is key. So here's your composition book."

I managed to catch it as she pelted it at me. I fished the marker from where it had tried to burrow into the cushions beside me. I waited for further instruction. After making sure I was ready, she continued, "So, what's the most obvious thing your girl likes. Something anyone would notice about her."

I tapped the marker on my chin, thinking. "Horseback riding and Italian food," I finally piped up, scribbling in my book. "Okay, got it."

"Good," Helga nodded, coming to get another slice of pizza from the box. She was actually really tiny, where was she putting it all away? "Now, smaller details. What have you noticed about her that she doesn't make so obvious. What's a few things she may be a bit shy to show?"

I chewed on the marker some more, feeling self-conscious as Helga stared at me over her pizza. I scribbled down a few words, feeling like I was trying to pass a really hard exam.

"Read."

"Okay, um… she likes cheesy romance movies, flower gardens, and baking. At least I think she likes baking."

"I wouldn't use 'cheesy' when you talk to her about the movie," she instructed, so I quickly scribbled out cheesy on my paper. "So, from the info you've got here, how would you go about starting a conversation? Begin." She said this all very bluntly, heaving the two liter up to her mouth. She motioned for me to start.

"Oh, okay. Um. Hi," I began, giving a false wave to the imaginary Lila I created in front of me. This felt really awkward. I didn't like romance movies and I didn't know how to cook. "You want to go Horseback riding and eat some Italian food?"

I heard Helga snort from beside me before exploding into a full blown fit of giggles.

"What?" I demanded, my cheeks burning.

"That was smooth, Arnoldo," she joked, shaking her head. "If you wanted that approach to work, you should have started with 'Hey Baby.'"

"That bad?"

"Try something a little less forward."

"Okay. There's a new movie coming out this weekend," I fumbled. This didn't sound romantic. "Maybe you'd like to go with me? There's this great Italian restaurant nearby if you want to stop for some dinner before?" My imaginary Lila smiled at me. I should have considered she might have liked that more than a baseball game.

"Better," Helga praised. "Now you know the flipside of this is to know things she dislikes, and not push them on her. Do you know her dislikes?"

I screwed my face up, leaning back on the couch. That was hard. Lila acted like she liked everything we did. "I can't think of any," I admitted.

"Come on," she prodded, looking at me incredulously. "No one likes everything. Some people don't outright say they don't like something, but it's in their face. You ever mention something and have her face twitch or something? People have the giveaway signals."

I rubbed the back of my neck, feeling sheepish as I looked back on it. There was the time that new game had come out, and Gerald and I wanted to go to the midnight release. I thought she'd like to play, so I'd got her her own copy. She'd gushed about how she'd liked it, but casually turned down every offer for us to play together. The corners of her mouth had twitched. "So maybe I can think of a few things."

"So progress here. The rest of this lesson will be to expand on her likes and dislikes, which we'll list. We'll plan you some conversation strategies around this, and start implementation. After implementation tomorrow, we'll move onto lesson two on Wednesday at 6."

"So soon?" I blurted, nervously. This was moving fast.

"You've got to build up a solid foundation with this girl before you go in for the more serious stuff. She'll want to get to know you as well. If you want a date soon, then you need to start soon."

I nodded, swallowing loudly. "O..okay. Why Wednesday?"

"I've got auditions tomorrow night, she explained, fiddling with her shirt.

"Auditions?" I asked, curious.

"For a show. We do four shows a year as our recitals. I'll take longer, and it's tiring." She continued to fidget.

"How long have you been doing ballet?" I continued, curious. "How come you never tell anyone?"

"Cause it's not anyone's business!" she snapped, trying to close the subject.

"One more question, I promise. When's the show? I'd like to come!" I said honestly, pushing myself form the couch and going to my wall calendar.

"Really?" she asked, looking surprised and skeptical all at once. "I mean, you don't have to. My parents don't even come. I don't expect anyone to come for me."

"I will, I promise," I assured her, getting a pen to write down the date.

"It's…it's the Saturday after the banquet," she informed me, coming over to point out the weekend on the calendar. I quickly scribbled it in. "Now enough on that. Back to work on lesson one."