This is my first ever Hey Arnold! fic. Arnold has turned into my latest obsession, so now I have a whole plan of writinga long 4 part story. First would be, of course, Jungle Movie, with Arnold and companie being ten. Second part is this one-shot. Third part "The patakis" which centers only in Helga and the fourth part would be Arnold and Helga's reunion. But, well, starting, and because I'm lazy and probably never going to write any of that, "Saying goodbye" a.k.a Arnold and Helga break up and Helga angts.
Disclaimer: I'm not certain that HA! belongs to Graig Bartlett, but it certainly doesn't belong to me.
Saying goodbye
It's a rainy day in Hilwood. There are clouds in the sky that almost cover the sun, the streets are empty and the air is silent, or at least it is if one chooses to ignore the constant 'drip-drop' of the water collapsing against the floor constantly. There are no children out there, and this means my friends are inside doors. It is the third year in the twenty first century –2003– and it is November the second. A nasty, rainy November. As I said, everyone is indoors, safe inside their houses.
Such is my case, me being Helga G. Pataki. I am not alone, for my parents are there too, but I might as well be. My parents are down, in the first floor. If the music weren't so loud, I'd be able to hear the also very loud TV, where Big Bob is watching a football match. In the kitchen, Myriam has passed out over the table, after drinking one too many smoothies.
Me? I'm locked in my room. I'm listening Beethoven because, sometimes, the guy just fits my mood. I'm sitting in my bed, hands on my head, staring at the closed doors of my closet.
I sometimes wonder just how many girls in the world have a secret compartment in their closets. Then, I wonder just how many girls in the world have an altar to their life-long crush in it. How many of those girls have been crushing in same said crush for ten years? And how many of those girls are thirteen? I don't fancy myself very special, mind you, but I honestly doubt there's someone else in the world as mentally insane as me.
And it's not, as you may think, that I don't enjoy what some may call my 'uniqueness', but (somehow, there always seems to be a 'but'), one thing is being in love, and quite another is to be completely obsessed. And I guess I'm dangerously drifting to the second – and that's just not to say I'm completely obsessed, mind you –, specially because there's been four whole months since Arnold left me to live in South America, with his parents.
I can still remember every single word he said to me that day – the day we broke up for the very last time.
"Helga, we need to talk," he said.
And, you must know, Helga G. Pataki may talk about herself in third person, but she is not stupid. And is a well known urban fact, even for girls my age, exactly what those four words (plus my name) mean when said to a girlfriend.
"You're about to break up with me," I stated.
Had Arnold not known me like he did – for almost ten years – he would have thought I did not care. But, the fact remains, he did know me, and he could see the walls building around me, like a shell, a shell that I'd swear was visible to his beautiful green eyes.
"No – well – yes," he stumbled through the words, nervous –once again – for breaking up with me, and it was almost as if it was the very first tome – once again. I almost smiled. I would have, too, had he not been about to break my heart – once again –, "but it's not for the usual reasons."
"You mean it's not because we have made a battlefield of the floor we are standing on again?" I asked, my voice filled with the venom that has became my shield for everything Arnold-related, like always.
"Yeah, we haven't done that for a while, have we?" he asked fondly, and it was almost as if he were talking about the last time we played baseball or the last time it rained.
"Almost three weeks," I grunted, pointing out the facts, "but we were on non-speaking terms for two of those."
"And snogging out like crazy the other one. Don't make us look like such a disaster, Helga," argued Arnold, almost begged. I was not in the mood for begging, "I still love you."
I smiled sadly. A 'but' was what followed now. I knew it. There always seemed to be a 'but' with him. 'But you can be really rude sometimes'. 'But you should try and control yourself'. 'But you should be more considerate of others'. 'But that was no reason to shout like that'. 'But you are not as freakin' perfect as I want you to be…' 'But, but, but' Our life was a whole bunch of 'but's and I hated it. Hated it.
And I really tried not to cry, and not to be angry, but it's not as if, as he likes to point out, I could really control my emotions. I mean, honestly, who cans? Only him and his stupid perfect-ness persona!
Stupid football head. I was crying – and trying my best not to – again. I wasn't trying to make us look as a disaster, – honestly, why would I? – but the fact was, we were a disaster, with all eight words in caps. We were always arguing, always hurting each other like it really did matter, as if we weren't two kids playing at love – some kind of stupid game we were both crap at and we were both failing miserably just in trying since we were ten.
"Cut it out, geek-bait," I snapped, " it's not as if I don't know what's coming know. Go on! You love me, but?"
And I know he wanted o shout at me, tell me I was wrong and there were no buts this time, but they were, there was always a but for him, there was always something wrong with us.
"But I'm leaving with my parents," answered Arnold slowly, " I'm moving to San Lorenzo."
He stared at me, without saying a thing. The anger disappeared and was replaced by shock and then by hurt and then by something akin to desperation. He stopped looking aimlessly at me in that moment, and he hugged me. I was crying, and it was not the silent kind of crying his mom cried when they found each other, or the desperate kind of crying Olga had cried when I changed her grades. It was not the whole whining shouts kind of crying that Kimberly cried when she was little. It was another kind of crying, the kind of crying that does not show in the movies, because if has little of poetic and is completely heart breaking. It was the type of crying someone cries when he feels as if his soul is being ripped out in pieces.
Even if it isn't.
I cried in his arms for what seemed hours, and I was surprised to discover he was crying too. And I hugged him back, still sobbing helplessly because if he left, then my world seemed to be slowly falling apart. It took several moments for me – and him too, apparently – to bring my act back together, and even then, I was sobbing when I tried to talk again.
"I… I thought your parents loved Hilwood," I accused, as if he had been lying, as if what was happening was somehow his fault, " I thought you loved Hilwood… I-I-I… I thought you lo…," I stopped myself and a couple of seconds became endless before I continued, "When? When are you leaving… us?"
"At the end of seventh year, I think," he answered, cleaning his tears.
Had I seen he was crying again, I would have been softer. Tried to console him or something. But I hadn't, and my mind was now working as fast as it could work, too busy to notice him. We were in June. Seventh year ended in July, and that left us with only one more month. It was insane! Why would they decide to leave so suddenly? What was so urgent that needed to be attended so immediately? But, looking at Arnold, I realized it was no sudden as he made it seem. They had been discussing these for some time. It wasn't sudden, It was just that I hadn't been aware of it.
Hadn't I – and Arnold and Gerald – rescued Miles and Stella from a hidden village in the middle of nowhere? Hadn't I found the way to give them their memories back and hadn't I made sure that they came back? I'd think, that after so many troubles, the least they could do to thank me was to stay here, in Hilwood, so I could keep seeing Arnold, keep finding a way to go on…
And yet…
Wasn't it better for me if he left? Seeing as how messy were things between us… ours had to be the stormiest relationship in the story of relationships… and we were just thirteen. I could not –can not– imagine going on like we were for another year, much more less for the rest of my life. And even though I loved him – Oh, how I love him! – and even though he was the reason I woke up every morning and even though he was my little ray of sunshine and the last thought on my head before I went to sleep… even so, he'd leave.
"Will you come back?"
He looked at me, uncertain. He looked as he already knew the answer.
"I… I don't think so, Helga," he answered, truthfully, " I guess for college, but even then, not to Hilwood".
"So…" I was trying desperately not to break down in tears again, "This is it. We're breaking up," my heart broke a little more, "for good"
With this, Arnold looked up again, and I knew that, once more, he wanted to argue with me. But there was no point, and he knew it. It was for good. Even if I loved him, and even if I knew he kind of loved me too, we had not, in three whole years of relationship, done nothing but hurt each other. And, okay, so there were some good times too. Sometimes we kissed, and it was pure bliss. And sometimes we went to the movies, and to the park, and laughed together all day, and just… sometimes, we got along perfectly fine. But it never seemed to last.
Sooner or later, he'd say something to piss me off, or I'd argue with Gerald and he'd get involved, or he'd stop caring of what I thought, or I'd stop caring of what he thought. Then I'd do something he just wouldn't approve of, or something, anything, really, would happen, and it'd ruin everything once again.
"Yeah…" he mumbled finally, failing for once to look for the bright side and hurt by the truth, "for good."
And that's why there's some pathethic music by Beethoven or Wagner in the CD player, changing for a sad love song, then a rock one, then whatever. Sometimes it was because of the lyrics, and sometimes just the music notes, but something in the music fed my deep desire to cry. And I did, silently, for I did not want Bob or Myriam to notice.
Not that they'd even care.
Yeah, that's all... I know.
Thanks for reading. A review would be nice, but you're not obligued to leave one.
Lilamedusa