Passing Through

a Hey Arnold fanfic by Pyrex Shards

pre-read by Lord Malachite

OoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooO

At some point after the age of twenty-five I fell in love with it. With all of it. The American desert.

I live in the Northwestern part of New Mexico, where I set up what remained of my life after I left Hillwood for good twenty years ago.

Perhaps it was the silence, letting me wrap myself inside of it like a blanket. Like it was telling me that it's okay to mourn a love never realized. Like, it's okay for me to step off of the stage, walk into the empty seats of an audience that left long ago, and just sit, contemplating about where I had stood on that stage acting as every actress is supposed to act on the outside, but dying on the inside due to lack of attention of the one actor who could possibly read the lines of my heart. He was the only one I would ever have let read that passionate script because, I felt, I knew deep within me, he was born for the lead role.

The last thing I saw before I walked off of the stage of Hillwood, and into the un-numbered seat aisles of the American west, was Arnold saying "I do." The question was "do you take Lila Sawyer to be your lawfully wedded wife?"

His answer burned through my heart like sulfuric acid. I fought hard to conceal the all consuming heat of my heart tearing itself up in agony at least until I could get outside of that damned church, where I stumbled through the parking lot towards my beat up ford fiesta, letting the word "nooooo" draw out from between my lips in a high pitch wine that I felt certain was the sound of my soul being snuffed out.

I never saw the priest make his pronouncement. I didn't see the kiss. Hillwood had nothing else left for me to offer. So while Arnold and Lila celebrated their blessed union over cake and white wine, I was at my little efficiency apartment packing the things most precious to me and using the rest of my savings to pay the lease termination damages.

I burned my locket, my pictures, the physical manifestations of a foolish fantasy.

Sometimes I still feel the tears from watching the pictures of my prince when he was little, as they shriveled up into nothing but black ash and released their texture into the smoke. But here in the desert, my eyes are dry like the air. This place prevents me from crying.

I let my bow fly out of my car window somewhere in the painted desert...

Here, in this little corner, away from the stage, where my car ran out of gas twenty years ago, souls pass through on their way to California to get famous, or Las Vegas to get rich. I watch them from my minimum wage post, an evening job at Windcatcher Cafe off of Highway Sixty-Four, near some little town called Shiprock. I've had one-night stands with some of them before so I know their fantasies, from the times that they whispered those stories into my ear as they made love to me, trying to entice me to come along with them. Perhaps they'll make it, they're not taking Interstate Forty, they're taking their time.

Then perhaps just like me they are unsure, but they're wandering through this place in abject awe at the beauty of it. The burning sun overhead heats me up during the day, melting away my stress and sorrow, precipitating it in beads of sweat that my do-rag collects for me to ring out later. I shortened my hair considerably to hasten the process, it felt good. At night it gets cold in my little travel trailer, and my body can cool off, cleansing me while I sleep, making me ready for a day born anew.

"Customer!" Susan Windcatcher sings harshly into the kitchen where I am washing out another coffee pot, a constant companion of mine. Susan, a beautiful woman of American Indian heritage, with jet black hair to match, was the one who picked me up off of the side of the road when my little compact car just couldn't work with the fumes of its empty gas tank anymore.

She saw me for what I was. A city girl who was desperate to escape into the audience section, away from the actors who crowded the stage. She took me in for a while, then took me to a bar, where she introduced me to tequila. At that time I told her my sob story while slurring every other sentence in an alcohol induced haze. She tells me it was the only time she had ever seen me cry. I never touched alcohol again.

But perhaps it was worth something. Susan saw me as some kindred spirit. She told me she had a beau named William once, but it was all for naught, and so she was determined to make it on her own, away from the attractiveness of the weaker sex, where she could be her own person, out here in the desert where the people we see most are just passing through.

She gave me a minimum wage job at her cafe, and a trailer she was trying to get rid of as a bonus. That was twenty years ago. She's still my companion, boss, and friend. I love her as a sister. She even helps me maintain my eyebrows in a ritual we call "re-femininazing Helga's eyebrow"

"Geraldine! Hurry your ass up!" I smile as I sit the washed coffee pot under the coffee maker, turn it on, and pick up an already full pot sitting on a warmer. Susan can be a nazi of a boss sometimes, but her willingness to be there for me and protect me makes up for her abrasiveness on the job. That and I can dish it right back as I spar with her verbally. I wouldn't have Susan Windcatcher any other way.

"Criminey Susan! Don't get your panties caught in your butt, okay?!" I yell back as I walk towards the door that leads to the front of the Cafe. I push the swivel door open effortlessly and there's Susan standing not ten feet away, leaning back on the countertop with her arms folded.

"Our client wants coffee." Susan states with a smirk across her unwrinkled brown face, it compliments her high cheekbones well. She's also well spoken.

"Yes mother." I say back, while holding the coffee pot up, extending my middle finger where she can see it.

"Very funny."

"I think so too. Princess Windcatcher." To which Susan laughs at me in a friendly way and walks into the kitchen.

Now that Susan is in the kitchen and I'm alone out here, at fifteen 'till midnight, there's an amazing silence that descends upon me, like the silence of the nighttime desert air is leaking in. For some people that lack of activity is depressing, I find it soothing.

I take a moment to revel in the comfort, take in a breath, and then look around to spot the customer who would be passing through at midnight on a Saturday night. Probably a trucker. They're always truckers. He's sitting near the door. Typically the travelers that come through here sit facing the direction they're headed. Which means that our west facing seats have permanent butt grooves, while the east facing seats are near pristine.

But this man, sitting where I can only see the back of his familiar looking head, is facing east. I walk around the counter, and then stop cold as I realize, I know that head. That football shaped head. I know that faded, but still blonde hair. I know the aura around Arnold. It's imprinted on my soul.

The sands of this desert never claimed Arnold away from that most precious part of my heart. I only allowed the desert to let me forget, to bury Arnold amid its sands where I could dig him up when I dreamed, and then sink back amidst the mesas when I woke up.

The coffee pot shakes in my hand. "Arnold." I form the word in my mouth silently, surprised that my lips can still form those two syllables to his name. I hadn't said it in years, not counting those dreams I know I have where I call his name out in pleasure.

I close my eyes and still my passions. It would not work well for me if Arnold were to turn around and question why I'm standing here looking haunted. I open my eyes and step forward, one step after another. I approach and take more of his presence in. His handsome shoulders, his unruly hair like tufts of prairie grass. I can see the strands waving a little from the ceiling fan overhead. I will not swoon, I'm denying myself that.

I approach the table and reach down for his coffee cup to turn it right side up. He doesn't look up, instead he's writing something on a notepad. I realize, he's writing poetry.

"Since when did you write poetry, Football Head?" I blurt out.

Damnit! What have I done? I want this encounter to be simple. I want him to look at me, comment about how I look familiar. I want to recite odd poetic comments to him, give him a message that he will receive but never understand, wherein I tell him how much I was hurting when I left Hillwood, but how much the desert healed my wounds, and that I am happy here, I think. I want to ask him why he is facing east, what is it that the east has to offer him that the west cannot. As I stare at his barren hands I want to ask him why he doesn't have a wedding ring anymore.

Arnold looks up at me in shock. "How do you know that nickname? I haven't heard that in years." He peers into my eyes, but, absent of any recognition, I can only see curiosity in those green, but tired, pools of his soul.

"Sorry. Bad day." I respond in an excuse. "You're not the first victim."

Finally he arches an eyebrow. "You, look familiar. Do I know you?" His voice is so low now, spiced with age. It rumbles through my heart. I realize I'm forgetting about my love of this place, this desert. I'm looking at the actor of the main play to my life; one that has been on hold for two long decades.

I smile at him. "A lot of people ask me if I know them. Are you sure you haven't passed through here before? I've been here a long time."

"This highway is new to me." He responds. "Did you grow up in Hillwood by any chance?

"Hillwood? Where's that?" I lie.

"In Washington state, Near Seattle. Do you want to sit down?"

I nod. "Well, shift's over in an hour. You may be the last soul I have to listen to tonight. Why not?" I shrug, and sit down. I want so much to sit beside him, to lean into him, but instead I sit facing him, through not across, but against the window, where I can lean into the corner between the seat and the wall, facing him.

Out of habit I take the red do-rag off of my head and brush my fingers through my hair. I have a pretty low cut, almost a buzz cut, but for some reason I feel my old pigtails weigh my head down like phantom limbs. Arnold smiles at me, as I sigh in relaxation. He doesn't know that I'm trying not to stare, I'm trying to bring up my old acts, my old shell.

I'm trying to protect myself from him again, but why. Why here?

"So where'ya headed?" I ask.

"Well, I'm heading east." Arnold puts the pen in his hand down on top of his notebook, and reaches for his coffee. He grips the mug with a few fingers, then lifts it up to blow across the surface. "I'm Arnold, by the way."

"Geraldine." I reply. I look down to his ring finger again. I can't even see any indentation from a wedding ring. I wonder how long he's been without it, but I cannot ask him. "Are you going to a city, or farm, or something?"

"Albuquerque." He replies after a sip of coffee. Not enough information, but fair enough.

I eye him suspiciously. "Why didn't you just take I-Forty from Flagstaff?"

"Have you ever seen the painted desert?"

I nod at him. "It's a beautiful place."

"Well. This may sound goofy, but it had some sort of effect on me. I was on the interstate until I hit New Mexico. I was looking at the map, something in my mind said take highway four-ninety-one to Shiprock, and so I'm here."

"That is a bit goofy, Arnold." I look at the prose sitting on top of the paper on his notebook. "But from what it looks like you're trying to get some inspiration too. This is a good place for it. But it's better during the day. You're missing the mountains."

"I am?"

"Stop in Farmington for the night. In the morning you'll see what I mean." I grin at him as he smiles back.

He nods. "I think I'll take that advice."

I can feel the conversation start to die. The desert brought him to me, so I'm going to indulge this time I have with him. "So do you want anything?"

Arnold shakes his head. "Just coffee is fine."

What do I do now? All the old pains come back and threaten tears to well up in my eyes, but I fight them down. I want to cry for Arnold to realize who I am. But I won't let him know who I am. I won't let him see me like this. I ran away from Hillwood. I flipped that city off while I did so. I burned that bridge. Why has my beloved barren badlands thrust this irresistible creature, this soul of my dreams, back into my life?

"I'm looking for someone." Arnold sighs, he looks up at me. Perhaps he sees me as someone he can open up to. Oh, I can only hope.

"Who?" I whisper.

"There was this girl I knew, a long time ago. Her name was Helga. Helga G. Pataki. I haven't seen her in ages. On the day I got married, she just disappeared. I didn't even realize she was gone until a month later when her best friend mentioned her absence."

Phoebe. Oh how could I forget Phoebe? In my haste to leave I cut that rope too, except I was the only one who knew I had cut it. Phoebe didn't feel the slack until later. She must have been worried sick. But that was years ago. She's probably gotten over it. Right? I want so much to ask Arnold about Phoebe now.

But I cannot... Not now...

Arnold continues. "The only thing we got was a note that she wrote to her parents, that she was heading east, and to stay away, to not go looking for her under any circumstances. She just cut all her ties with us and disappeared."

"Do you have any other clues?"

He shakes his head. "None. I barely remember what Helga looks like absent a yearbook photo. I doubt she's wearing pigtails or her pink bow anymore." I catch a gleam in his eye as he reaches for his pockets. "Perhaps. Perhaps you've seen her? Darn. I think I left the picture in my car."

He goes to get up but I quickly stop him. "That, won't be necessary." I smile sadly at the puzzled middle-aged face of the man I still love with all my heart. I don't want him to look at me and then realize I'm the same woman in an old yellowing yearbook photo. I don't want the pain of recognition. Not now. "I can tell you right now, this is a small town, I don't know of any Patakis in this area. You have a better chance in Albuquerque."

Arnold frowns, and then sits back in the seat.

"Why are you trying to find this girl?"

Arnold swallows. "My wife, she, died, two months ago. Breast cancer."

"I'm sorry to hear that." Lila. Dead. I always had ill feelings towards Lila Sawyer-Shortman, but could never wish death upon her. At once, I can see the look in Arnold's face. It's the grief of a man in mourning, one who never cries except when alone. Arnold really loved Lila. Arnold the Orphan. Arnold the widower.

"She told me on her deathbed that she wanted me to find Helga Pataki, to give her a message."

I feel haunted all of the sudden. A message from a dead woman, whom I last saw two decades ago exchanging vows with the love of my life, stealing him away from me. "What was…what was the message? I'm sorry I don't mean to pry, but..." I smile and wring my hands together. "Perhaps if Helga somehow…wanders through here and breaks down on her way to lord knows where, I can tell her for you."

"Oookaaay." Arnold looks me in the eyes suspiciously, but all I can do is give him a curious stare, to show sincerity. "Lila wanted me to tell Helga that, she's sorry for what happened, but she couldn't wait any longer for Helga's indecisiveness. She said that Helga would understand what that meant. The other thing she wanted me to say was 'take care of him.' But I have no idea who, he, is."

Lila wants me to take care of Arnold. Do I have the right to claim the widower? Would he have me? I look at him again, I can see Lila in his eyes. That image hurts so very much, but, I guess, not as much as it hurts the soul who has that image burned into his eyes. He's still longing for Lila to return to him even though she cannot. Perhaps Lila didn't anticipate Arnold finding me so fast after she passed on. Oh, and that apology... Typical Lila. But...

"So, I'm trying to find Helga out of the dying wish of my late wife and give her a message that only she'll understand. And all the evidence I have is a note that she was heading east, and a high school photograph." Arnold laughs. "I'm sorry. It's a crazy story. I'm sure you get a lot of crazies through here at night."

I laugh. "Actually. This is refreshing. The usual people I get this time of night are greasy truckers with raging libidos who try to slap my ass when I turn away, not a widower on an impossible journey." Arnold smiles back at me, and I realize I'm doing for him what I did when his grandparents died, or when he had that lousy thanksgiving, or when his future wife dumped on him in the fourth grade. I'm being his pillar again, more so now than when he got word that his parents remains had been found.

Have I always been cursed to be the protectress of his soul, but at a distance? "I notice that you don't have your wedding ring on. That's an odd way to express your viduity." I must keep up my illusion.

"My wife requested that she be buried with my ring. I don't know why."

It's so easy Arnoldo! Lila's giving you to me, but you cannot be mine, not when Lila's soul is still swimming in your eyes. "So. You have no idea where this Helga G. Pataki is, you know she's east of Hillwood, so you're just going to search all over God's green continental United States in search of her."

"Well, Canada too, and perhaps Mexico."

"Okay. But, how will you ever find her like that?" I smile sadly. He's already found me, but he's so dense. That's part of why I love him.

"Perhaps, I just saw this as an opportunity to pack up and see the country, to pass through places like this and write my poetry. I've been moderately successful with writing it, and my publisher agreed that I should look for inspiration in other places. Perhaps someday I'll even find Helga, in a place like this. We'll talk and chat about old times. Perhaps."

"You miss your wife."

"Lila wanted to come with me. We were going to see the states together." I hear his voice crack slightly and tears well up in his eyes. "I know this sounds strange, but that voice in my head that told me to come up here, it sounded like Lila, like she's guiding me around somehow."

I pause for a second. "That's very poetic. You must be a good poet."

"I guess I am." He laughs a little, wiping a tear from an eye with his thumb. "Lila thought so. My publisher thinks so."

I bring my legs up to rest my head on my knees as the desert silence descends upon us again, only accented by the sound of a refrigerator compressor turning on with a low creaking sound. "I used to be a poet once." I break the silence. "In school, actually. Then I went on this, crazy chautauqua, and wound up here getting acquainted with the salt of the earth. Do you know what I've found?"

"What is that?"

I sigh. "I discovered that sometimes you just have to stop at a place, to take a breather. No matter how long that takes you to stop. Me? My car broke down and that horrible, but compassionate and caring boss of mine, took me in and gave me a job. I may spend my entire life here with my life on permanent pause. But this desert has been comforting to me. And every now and then, someone stops by to tell me that there is always a chance for me to rejoin the play."

"Well?"

"What?"

Arnold grins at me. "Have you ever considered it?"

I arch an eyebrow at him. "With you?" I smile and shake my head. "No. I have yet to consider it. Though you're the first person to not try and ask me after my clothes are on the floor beside my bed. There is still much that this desert has left for me. Everyday I feel born again, and I kind of like that right now." Away from the hurt and the pain. "Perhaps I'll go back sometime."

Arnold finishes off his coffee and looks back at me. "Well. Thank you for hearing me out. I must get going."

I nod at him. "Thank you for not trying to slap my ass."

To which he laughs a little. "I'm not a trucker, I'm a poet."

"Poets have the dirtiest mind's, Arnoldo." When I say his name like that, he looks at me again, as if he recognizes something in my voice.

"Are you sure we don't know each other. I could swear up and down. Could you possibly be related to a Pataki?"

I wince. He's getting too close. It's getting too late. I must push him away. He's not ready for this. I'm not ready for this. "I'm pretty certain I don't know anyone with that last name. I'm sorry. My last name is Windcatcher. The lady you saw earlier is my step-sister. I'm adopted."

He takes one last look at my face before he pulls a five dollar bill out of his wallet, and places it on the table. "I really must get going." He stands up and walks towards the door, I memorize every step that he takes towards the door, every motion that every muscle in his body makes. I fight to keep that passion in my heart down. It still hurts too much. Lila is still there. He turns around and looks at me. "It was nice meeting you, Geraldine. Perhaps we'll see each other again?"

"If you wanna pass through, I'll be here." I smile.

He's out the door. Then I hear a car start, pull out towards the open highway, and, he's gone.

I scoot over in the seat and look at the coffee cup that just a few moments ago his lips were touching. I reach for it and drag the saucer across the table towards me. I look down in the cup and see a few drops of coffee remaining. I lift up the cup, look around to assure that I'm alone, and put my lips to it, letting those last precious drops of coffee, mingled with his own essence, meet my tongue.

The desert may cleanse my soul, but Arnold never left. He's still there, though now he's no longer an actor in a play, like me he's just sitting in the empty seats, just passing through. I sit the cup down and, and reach for the coffee pot. I pour a full glass of coffee, and lift it up to my lips again. I realize I can smell nicotine. Arnold must smoke now, not that I blame him after all that he went through in his life, all that loss.

Then I realize I am not alone. My companion, my spiritual sister, Susan, sits down in Arnold's old spot, across from me. I know she knows who's lips have graced this coffee cup. She knows it will disappear from the cafe. She also probably has a good idea who that wonderful man was who just graced us with his presence.

I sit the coffee cup down and look at her. "He's on a chautauqua. I cannot have him. Not now. Perhaps not ever."

"If I recall, you were on a spiritual journey yourself Helga. Then you ended up here. If there's one thing I know, this is not a place to end such a journey. This is just a place to stop and rest. Perhaps you should have gone with him because you're still on one yourself."

I close my eyes. "His is a journey of a man in mourning, Susan. I cannot, I will not go with him."

"Suit yourself. You're always welcome here, no matter what you decide. You've been passing through for twenty years." She places her hand over mine and squeezes it reassuringly, then stands up and walks away into the kitchen again.

I look outside at the night, at the orange glow cast on to our dirt parking lot, at the asphalt of highway Sixty-Four, and beyond that the blackness of my beloved desert. Tomorrow I will be born new. I will spend the day replacing the worn belts in my car. I will wonder if I should have taken Arnold up on that offer, then I will laugh sadly as I realize I could simply drive back to Hillwood. No, I will not do that.

I lift the coffee cup up to my lips, look around, and swoon as I sink into the seat, thoughts of Arnold's lips drinking from this blessed coffee cup washing through my mind. And I realize, I never left the play. I'm just not in the scenes right now. When Arnold's chautauqua, his spiritual journey, has ended, and the desert tells me I can go. Perhaps Arnold will have me. Perhaps I'll have him.

Perhaps I am ready to pass this place by...

End.

OoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooO

Author's Corner

I'm kind of milking the entire North American desert thing for all its worth. As you may or may not recall I used it before in BonBon Je T'Aime. The same area even. This will be the last one for a while, I promise. I will not make it all cliché on everyone. It's just that I've driven through the area described, and it had a deep influence on my creativity. It is a very inspiring place, though a bit bare, but that's what a desert is. As far as I know there is no such cafe in the area of Shiprock named Windcatcher. Don't go asking around for it. :)

Consider this my 4th of July gift to all my fellow US readers. To everyone else around the world reading this, I wish you lots freedom.

Please review, and I shall reply.