Written By Shaun Blankenship

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"So, how'd your family dinner go?"

Ruth paused in her tracks. It was Arnold's idea to take a walk through the park in February. The jackets and gloves helped, but both of their faces were freezing from the cold. Arnold stopped to wait for Ruth, but she quickly started walking again and strode next to him. "It was good. My mother, she's… she's out there."

Arnold kicked a small pebble amongst the light slush on the path. "Can't be as bad as my Grandma is."

"Well, how's you Grandma?"

"She's pretty crazy." Arnold stared at his own feet, afraid to look at Ruth. Eye contact with some people always made him feel like staring for some reason, and staring always felt like he was a stalker. "She's not so much as she was a few years ago, but she's still out off the deep end."

"Yeah…" Ruth's voice trailed off as she watched the fog escape from her mouth. "Arnold…"

He immediately shifted his head from his shoes to Ruth's face. "Yeah?"

Ruth bit down on her lip. "This isn't going to work out."

The excitement in Arnold's face faded and he moved his head back at his high-tops. He exhaled a heavy sigh. "Yeah, I had a feeling about that."

"Yeah…" Ruth smiled down at the football-headed teen, but moved her lips downward when she realized he wasn't looking. "Look, it's that…"

"You know someone else." Arnold bitterly stared at Ruth's face. "You're seeing him, right? I'm just some little side project? Just because you're in college means you can just throw around people who you don't run into on a daily basis?"

"Arnold, it's not…"

"But it is!" Arnold's tone was now excessively harsh. So much, to the point, that now Ruth was looking at her shoes instead of Arnold. "Who was the guy who answered the door on Friday?"

She answered, yet she never took her eyes off of the slush; "That was him."

"You left me for that guy?" Arnold snapped his head away from her. "Ruth!"

As Arnold kept walking, Ruth stopped in protest. "Hey!" she yelled, grabbing Arnold's attention and causing him to spin around. "I did like you when I first met you, Arnold! When we talked to each other at the restaurant, I thought you were probably the most charming person I'd met in a while!"

"Oh, that's such a sad story." Arnold scornfully mocked the girl he had been walking with. "Because you're fickle means what? I should feel sympathy for you being with someone else?"

"I started thinking about it and… how am I ever going to get serious with you? You're still in high school! You're a waiter! Your family has tied your arms behind your back from leaving your house!"

Arnold squeezed his fists together. "Oh, so I'm scum because of my job? I'm scum because I care about my family?" Arnold moved towards her and shoved her on the shoulders. "Because I'm not some junkie who happens to go to the same college as you? Cry me a freakin' ocean if you want!"

"You're not what I'm looking for, Arnold." Ruth crossed her arms. "It's as simple as that."

"Yeah, I'm not the one you're looking for." Arnold stormed away from her. "You're gonna need someone who drives a cab."

With that, Arnold left. Ruth stood alone in the park, left with nothing but the scowls of those passing by. Most of them kept their comments to themselves; some mumbled under their breath nasty comments. Another teen couple walked by with a nasty frown on their face, as the boy reached down and threw a slush-ball in her face. Ruth slowly slipped the runny snow and ice off of her face and ran off screaming in the opposite direction of Arnold.

***

"So, Helga," started Robert's father. "How have you been?"

Ever since Friday, Robert had hardly been home. He did stop buy on Saturday to say hello to his parents and tell them he wasn't kidnapped, but after that he spent the night over at Rhonda's. He fell asleep on their couch; this time had nothing to do with him hurting his head. The swelling had gone down, but his scalp was still very tender if somebody touched it. Now, Helga was stuck between in the awkwardness of Robert's parents. "Um, I've been great. I have a job interview on Tuesday."

Robert's mother smiled a little too wide. "Well, that's wonderful. How's Robert doing?"

Helga shrugged in her chair as she took another bite of dinner. "He's doing good, I suppose," she said with her mouth somewhat full.

Robert's father pointed a fork in Helga's direction. "He's not, you know… doing… drugs, is he?"

Helga's face was very white and confused, but her mind was cracking up. Yeah, that'd be the day. "No, I'm absolutely sure of it."

The father shook his head. "Good. I should've known better."

His mother leaned in on the table in Helga's direction. "We just want to know from one of his friends. We thought you'd have a better view of his life since you seem to talk to him so much, being that you live in the room right next to him."

Helga's hair shifted as her forehead flattened and her ears lowered. "You two are involved in almost everything he does. How could you not be sure of how he lives?"

The father stuttered out, "W-W-Well, we are involved with his life deeply, but we just wanted to know. Just in case he's not telling us something."

"Isn't that a little… shady?"

Both parents froze with their forks sticking up off their plates in their hands. The mother decided to break the ice by letting out a small laugh. "Well, we can't go and change the past now, can we? Let's just all quit talking about it. Robert's okay."

The father nodded his head. "Yes, let's just eat in peace."

They all went back to their plates and started eating whatever dinner was again. It was some kind of noodle dish; that's all Helga could make out. It wasn't terrible though. Rob, you owe me for this one, bucko. She took another bite of the noodle concoction. You owe me big-time.

His father placed his fork at the side of his plate. "Is Robert part of a cult?"

Helga held her head down from her plate and moved her eyes up to meet him. "No. He is not part of a cult."

The man raised his hands in the air. "Just checking."

Helga dropped her fork down by her plate. "Um, I'm not that hungry anymore."

Her plate was still half full. Robert's mother gave that same warm smile she had been accustomed to already. "Well, scrape the rest of that in a container and put it in the fridge."

***

"Arnold, you sound irritated. Is this a bad time?"

The football-headed boy collapsed on his bed face down. Through a pillow, he mumbled back to the phone, "This is a very bad time, Gerald. A very bad time."

"Well, what's wrong? Why aren't you with Ruth tonight."

He tried as hard as he could, but Arnold's eyelids could not close any tighter. He rolled himself on his back and put the phone close to his mouth. "It's over, Gerald."

The phone was silent for a while. Only the sound of their breathing kept any silence away. After twelve of the longest seconds in the world, Gerald finally answered back to his long-time friend, "I'm sorry, Arnold."

"No, you're not." Arnold sighed heavily, hoping maybe he'd exhale any breath left in his body and somehow collapse his lungs. "You told me in the beginning that I shouldn't go out with her. You said… I can't remember, but it was just flat-out 'no'."

"No, you have it messed up." Arnold scooted his body inside of his bed to get comfortable, if possible, as he listened to his friend explain. "I told you that you probably don't really like her anymore; that's it's more just a payback to yourself. Who broke up with who?"

"She broke up with me. She cheated on me for some slob with a beer gut."

"Then I guess I was wrong. In the end, it was her problem and not yours. It isn't your fault, Arnold. It's her's." Another long pause happened between the two. "Maybe you two weren't meant to go out in the first place."

"Oh, JEEZ, Gerald!" Arnold sat up, grabbed the alarm clock off of his shelf and threw it across the room, shattering the glass of the face about the room. "I'm sick of this, Gerald! I'm so sick and it's just incredibly stupid that every time I tell you, you always say, 'You weren't meant to'. I'm not 'meant' to do anything, Gerald!" Arnold gripped at his forehead and squeezed whatever was in-between his fingers. If only it was loose enough, he'd be able to rip it off. "I've had it, Gerald! Right now, I feel terrible, and the last thing I need to hear is that somehow, no matter what, I've been destined to feel terrible!"

The voice on the other end spoke very easily, like a cop talking down a jumper. "Okay, calm down, Arnold. That's not what I really meant this time. What I meant was…"

"I don't care what you meant, Gerald, I want to stop talking about this!" He collapsed once more back on his bed, letting a few tears escape the corners of his eyes. "I just want to stop."

"Okay, Arnold." Gerald tried his best to calm him down. "Okay, Arnold. Are you gonna be alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"Do you need me to come over? Maybe bring over a few friends? Do you wanna skip school tomorrow?"

Arnold stared up at the roof of his ceiling. "No, I don't think I should."

"Well, I could skip school. I'm sure you have some kind of good reason to 'stay home'. Are you sure you don't need me over there?"

"Yeah, I'm gonna be alright." Arnold sighed. "Thanks for calling, Gerald."

"You don't have to thank me, I was…" Before he could say '-going to do it anyway', the voice thought before he spoke. "It's okay, Arnold, as long as you're okay."

"Well, I'm fine."

"What was that crashing sound earlier?"

"A clock."

"Another one?"

"Yeah-huh."

A low chuckle was heard over the phone. "When are you ever going to run out of those things, man?"

Arnold shrugged, starting to smile himself. "I don't know…"

"Make sure you put a new one up, Arnold, before you go to bed tonight. You need to wake up tomorrow."

"Yeah, I will. I gotta go, Gerald."

"Okay." Their voices were silenced, trying to find some way to end the phone call. "So, um… see ya, Arnold."

"See ya, Gerald." Arnold clicked the cordless phone off, and sprawled his arms out on the bed.

***

Helga rested on her back upon the bed she currently occupied at Robert's house. This wasn't her home, and she wasn't about to call it her home. Yet, for some reason she was starting to worry about where Robert was as if he was family. He hadn't returned yet. The clock had just struck ten-thirty, and he still was out with Rhonda. What is taking him? It's a school night.

Like magic, the sound of the door in the living room swinging open traveled to Helga's ears. A low laughing and talking emerged, and after a minute or two the door shut itself. Footsteps in the hall carried, and then a knock came on Helga's door. "You awake?" the voice whispered.

"Come on in, Robber." Heh… I like that one.

The door gently cracked opened and the boy pushed his head through the space created. "Hi, Helga."

"Hey, Bobbo, how was your weekend get-away with the princess?"

He sighed and hung his head down at the floor. "It was okay, I guess. I had fun."

"Well, you know what that means." Helga turned her head from the ceiling to Robert. "So where are you taking me and when?"

"I owe you an apology."

Helga glared confusingly. "For what?"

"Helga…"

"No really, I'm not being sarcastic." She sat up in the bed and pulled away her blanket, revealing she was still fully dressed. "You went out and had yourself a good time, why do you owe anything to me? You should be happy? Smile, boy!"

Robert laughed. "Yeah, but then again you were stuck here with my parents."

She looked around the room for a minute as she thought. "Good point. Okay, apology accepted."

"Yeah." Robert smiled and sighed.

Helga tapped her fingers on the soft bed. "So… you two going out again?"

"I think so." The boy moved his left foot in one place back and forth on the carpet. "I'll have to see at school tomorrow."

"Well, let's just cross our fingers and hope for the best then." She smiled at her friend. "Are you happy?"

"I think I am."

"Good, then. I'm really tired, Rob, and I need to get some rest." She turned her back. "Can you turn the light off on your way out please?"

"Oh, yeah, sure." Robert backed off to the light switch and flipped it off. "Good-night, Helga."

"Good-night, Rob."