12Title: she walks in beauty
Pairing: Helga/Arnold
Rating: Teen
Summary: The sky is blue, water is wet, and Helga G. Pataki isn't pretty.
Warnings: Referenced child abuse (non-violent, off-screen), self-esteem issues, angst, emotional hurt/comfort, mild language.
Author's Note: Written for the Shortaki Week 2022 prompt: Vulnerable. Better late than never, right?
All my love to Betaruga for giving me the courage to post this. You're a treasure, darling.
she walks in beauty
Helga doesn't like to look at herself in the mirror. She can't avoid it, being a subject to society's expectations of propriety and all, but she takes care not to scrutinize herself more than she has to.
This makes her an anomaly, she knows. One of the many ways in which she's different from other girls. When Olga gifts her with a pocket mirror on her 13th birthday—and if there's a hint there, she refuses to take it—Helga feigns appreciation and promises to use it. And she does—once. She opens the ornate lid and peers at her reflection just long enough to feel her stomach twist, and then chucks it into her drawer and forgets about it.
Helga doesn't need some fancy mirror to know what she looks like. She's heard enough people talk about her appearance—always when they think she can't overhear, the cowards—to get the gist. She doesn't need a stupid peice of reflective glass to figure out what everyone else already knows.
She isn't pretty.
And that's fine, she tells herself when she catches glimpses of her appearance in shop windows, or takes too long to avert her gaze when she's brushing her teeth. Helga is smart, and tough, and creative, and that trumps being pretty any day. Who cares if guys never look twice at her? Who cares if they call her the "uglier sister" and pity her for not inheriting more of Miriam's genes?
Helga can crush any boy in sports, and pick locks with a hairpin, and maintain good grades without ever really trying. She knows how to cook, is a master at bowling, and can play poker with the best of them.
And isn't that so much better than being pretty?
She's sixteen when the love of her life asks her out.
Helga…doesn't see it coming. At all. Sure, she and Arnold get along a whole lot better than they used to (turns out that people like you a lot more when you don't bully them, go figure). And yeah, okay, so they hang out a lot too—Arnold always ignoring her protests and dragging her to random locales on weekends or after school. And okay, maybe they've even become friends of sorts. What else can you call two people who spend hours talking to each other on the phone each night?
And maybe she does catch him looking at her sometimes. More than sometimes. Actually, a lot. And always with that hooded gaze of his that Helga can't quite read but still makes her heart pound and stomach clench and shivers run down her spine and—
Anyways, it's unexpected.
At first, she misinterprets what he says completely. Who can blame her? "I really love you" can be interpreted in loads of ways. And Arnold is a nice guy. Sensitive, like a poet, or some other profession that attracts emotional types but doesn't involve writing (which he sucks at). It isn't the 90s anymore—guys are allowed to express their feelings without censure. So she orders her heart to calm the heck down, rolls her eyes at him for being a sap, and tells him she loves him, too. Y'know, as a friend.
She doesn't understand why he looks so frustrated and storms out. Never mind that they're at his place and he'll have to come back eventually. Which he does, red-faced and taciturn and looking everywhere but at her.
He says it again the next day and, well. Let's just say that declarations of love are a lot harder to misread when they're followed by toe-curling kisses and your sorta-best-friend gazing into your eyes and saying, "Get it now, Helga?"
Truthfully, she still doesn't get it (doesn't think she ever really will, because Arnold is wonderful and handsome and kind, and girls are always falling over him, and she's just plain, ugly ol' Helga—). But Helga is smart, and that means knowing when to not look a gift horse in the mouth. If Arnold is crazy enough to fall in love with someone like her, then she sure as hell isn't going to dissuade him.
Helga doesn't like looking at herself in the mirror, but in the days following their first kiss, she finds herself doing so increasingly often. Where she used to go out of her way to avoid the stupid things before, now she can't help but be drawn to them. Her eyes linger on every reflection of herself she sees.
It isn't vanity, because that would mean she has something to feel vain about.
And she doesn't. Not a single thing.
One evening after school, Helga finds herself freshly showered and standing in front of the full-length mirror in her bedroom. She tries to understand what Arnold could possibly see in her as she twists from one side to another before pressing her face so close to the glass her eyes cross.
She isn't attractive. She's always known it. It's just a natural fact of life: the sky is blue, water is wet, and Helga G. Pataki isn't pretty.
She's five foot eleven. She's seen washboards with more curves than she has. She's sixteen years old and her chest is still flat. Her skin tone is uneven, she has a large nose, and ugh, why are her lips so thin?
She has nice teeth, she supposes, as her reflection bares them. And she thinks her eyes are an interesting shade of blue. But her brows…she studies them with a grimace, then raises a finger to separate them into two.
I can work on some of it, she thinks, eyes lingering on her split ends and thick brows and dry skin, but the rest…
Helga sighs, turns her back to the mirror, and launches herself onto her bed.
For the first time in years she curses her shitty luck with the genetic lottery.
If only she looked more like her sister.
They're kissing languidly on Arnold's bed when he calls her pretty for the first time.
Helga freezes, his words echoing uncomfortably in her head before she forces them out. It's just pillowtalk, she reminds herself. Words of affirmation are one of Arnold's love languages. He's just caught up in the moment. Just being nice.
But then he says it again, following up with a kiss to her yet-to-be-plucked brow, and once more her body tenses with discomfort.
Unfortunately he notices this time, and draws further back to look at her face.
Helga bites her lip and averts her gaze.
"What's wrong?" Arnold asks immediately, voice pitched low with concern.
"Nothing." She forces herself to look at him and smile. From the way his eyes narrow, it probably looks as fake as it feels. "Just got a chill, is all."
"You're lying," he says flatly, pushing himself up so that he's longer lying on his side.
Reluctantly, Helga does the same. "Am not."
The look he gives her is unimpressed. "And now you're trying to distract me. It's not going to work. What's wrong?"
Helga crosses her legs and scowls at her socked feet. Notices, for the first time, just how unkempt they are—scattered with fading bruises and childhood scars, and fuzzy with fine hairs that aren't too noticeable but also doesn't mean they can't be felt. Her stomach sinks as the realization hits her. Arnold definitely must have felt her hairy legs when they were necking, and she won't ever know if he finds them disgusting or not because he's too damn nice.
It's like a dam breaking. Suddenly Helga is overcome with worries of what else about her he might not like but is too freaking kind to say. Her boyish figure? Her spotty skin? The weird mole she has on her nape? Maybe her nose?
It's like all the insecurities she's spent years pretending not to have hit her at once. Her chin trembles, and her eyes burn, and gods she wishes she were anywhere but here.
With her eyes closed she can't see him looking at her, but she can feel it, the heat of his gaze prickling her skin, and she has to bite her lip to keep from shouting at him to look away.
"Helga," he says, quiet and insistent, but Helga can't bring herself to open her eyes. Knows that her tear ducts will betray her if she does.
There's a sigh, soft enough that she can barely hear it, and then the creak of the mattress as Arnold shifts. Helga holds her breath, wondering what he'll do, but it's made clear when she feels her legs being rearranged and a warm body eats up the space. Arnold folds himself around her, jean-clad legs bracketing her hips and arms circling her neck. She's being engulfed. Utterly.
"Okay. I'm not looking at you anymore," Arnold murmurs in her ear, eliciting a shiver that momentarily distracts her from the chaos in her head. She stifles a gross sniffle and buries her face in the crook of his neck.
Time and time again he's amazed her with how well he knows her. Helga has always struggled with displaying vulnerability. The Pataki household is as cutthroat as the deep-sea, and her parents are sharks who grow hungry at the smell of blood in the water. The earliest lesson she learned was to never let herself bleed. Not if she didn't want them to start circling 'round her.
So she fashioned herself into a shark, too—one that could withstand anything and gave as good as it got. It was the only way to survive. Even if it meant shoving the girl she was so deep inside that Helga sometimes forgets the girl is still there at all.
Helga isn't sure when Arnold figured out that she equates vulnerability with weakness and struggles to show both. One day, he just seemed to know exactly what he needed to do to help her open up.
It's easier to bare herself when he isn't looking at her. When she can make herself small and pretend that the two of them are the only people who exist.
Even so, it isn't easy. The words get caught in her throat, form a lump that she can neither swallow nor purge. It takes a long moment of just breathing in Arnold's familiar scent before she's calm enough to voice what's been plaguing her for days now.
"I don't like when you call me...pretty," she whispers into his hair, so quietly it barely registers as sound. Helga feels him shiver against her front, and she returns it.
"Can I ask why?"
A part of her doesn't want to answer. Already she feels like a gaping wound exposed to the air. But this is Arnold, her best friend, her boyfriend, and a much larger part wants to be honest with him. She trusts him enough not to throw salt in the wound. To not hurt her worse.
Trust him, a small voice urges. He hasn't left you to drown yet.
"Because I'm not." The words sound even more mortifying spoken aloud, but now that they've got a taste of what freedom feels like, they refuse to be corralled back. They spill from her, uncontrolled and unrefined.
"And look. I get that you're just trying to be nice. That's who you freaking are. I get that. I love that about you, even. But I don't need false platitudes, alright? So just…just don't. Please."
Once again, Helga finds herself wondering what the heck Arnold sees in her. She's a stinkin' mess. What kind of girl loses it over being called pretty by her boyfriend? A basket case, that's who.
She tries not to squirm with embarrassment as silence descends over them. Resists the urge to pop it like a bubble as she waits for Arnold to gather his thoughts. Normally she loves this about him; that he's always so thoughtful, so careful with his words. She's never been the patient type, but as with so many other things, Arnold has a way of bringing out aspects of herself she's never known to exist. With him—for him—Helga doesn't mind taking a slower approach to life.
It's only in moments like this, when she's poured out her soul and isn't sure how he'll respond, that the calm she normally feels around Arnold scatters into the typical frenetic energy that consumes her when he isn't around.
She needs to know what he's thinking as much as she dreads it.
She's coiled up so tight that when Arnold finally speaks, she startles against him.
"Okay, so there's a lot to unpack here," he starts, carefully.
"First thing is—geez, I don't even know how to say this without making myself look awful, but this is something I've been thinking about for a while now. Helga, I think you've, sorta, placed me on this pedestal? Which—yeah, okay, it's really great that you think so highly of me. But I think I need to disillusion you now 'cause if I don't, I'm definitely going to disappoint you in the future."
He takes a steadying breath. "I'm not perfect, y'know? You seem to think that I'm this—this—agh, I don't even know! But whatever it is, I'm not it. Helga, I'm not nearly as nice as you think I am. Shh—don't interrupt," he chides when Helga automatically tries to protest. "I'm serious, Helga. I'm not that nice. I have unkind thoughts about other people. I've said unkind things to other people. I'm nosy, and I tend to overstep boundaries, and I have a temper, and I'm not that nice."
He makes a sound of frustration. "And clearly I'm a bit of a pushover, which you seem to have already figured out since you think I say things I don't mean just to be nice. Which is actually pretty insulting? 'Cause okay, I might be a pushover, but I'm not spineless. And I don't lie to people just to make myself seem nice. "
"I didn't mean it like that," Helga insists. Her stomach is twisting itself into knots.
"I know you didn't mean it that way, but when you accuse me of lying to you for no other reason than—than wanting to be Mr. Nice Guy™, that's what it sounds like you're saying. Which brings me to my second point.
"Helga, when have I ever lied to you about anything?"
He pauses, clearly waiting for an answer, and Helga mutters, "You don't."
"Exactly. I've always been honest with you, haven't I? So why the heck would I stop now, just because we're dating? I don't say things I don't mean. So when I say you're pretty, Helga—I mean it."
A noise of disbelief escapes her. She can't help it. Just hearing him say it makes her chest tighten with discomfort.
Arnold is right. She knows he isn't the type to fabricate the truth for the sake of others. In fact, one of the things she's always admired about him is how brutally honest he tends to be. It's one of the reasons she trusts him so much—he doesn't lie to her. Doesn't sugarcoat things or tell her what he thinks she wants to hear. Has never been afraid to tell her the ugly truth, even if it stings.
Helga knows this. But the words still ring in her ears like a lie.
She can't bring herself to accept them.
And because Arnold knows her so well, he leans back and cups her cheek with his palm. Waits until she reluctantly drags her gaze up to meet his.
"Helga, I think you're beautiful."
Ever seen asphalt in the wake of an earthquake? That's how Helga feels—like she's being cracked open and torn apart, broken pieces of herself scattered everywhere.
Shut up, she wants to tell him. Just shut the hell up. But her voice won't work. All she can do is stare into Arnold's heartfelt eyes and shake.
"I love your face. Love how expressive it is. Love how no one else can ever tell what you're thinking, but around me you're an open book. Like you just can't help it." He looks at her with such wonder that it takes everything Helga has not to drop her gaze.
"I love your cheekbones, and how ridiculously long your lashes are, and gosh, your nose. It's adorable." Arnold pokes it, and it scrunches under his touch. He grins at her. "Especially when it crinkles like that." His finger then glides over her brow. "And you have no idea how much I adore the little furrow you get between your brows when you're annoyed at me. You'd kill me if you knew how often I purposefully bug you just to see it."
Helga feels the corner of her mouth twitch without her permission, and she doesn't know if he feels it or sees it, only that he's aware. His grin broadens, and he raises his free hand to cup her other cheek so that her face is secure between his palms. So she can't escape him when she inevitably becomes overwhelmed and her fight or flight instinct kicks in.
Holding her in place as well as anchoring her.
"I love the little mole you have at the back of your neck. I love your thick hair. I love how long you are—your legs, and your fingers, and your cute toes. Love this mouth of yours. These lips." Without closing his eyes or waiting for her to close hers, he leans in and presses a feathery kiss against them once, and then twice. Lingers for a moment before pulling away. "Love kissing you. Love watching you laugh. Love hearing you talk."
A calloused thumb strokes the underside of her eye. "And then there are your eyes. I don't think you realize just what they do to me. I think—I think I fell in love with your eyes first. I could search the entire world and I'd never find anyone with eyes as striking as yours. Never find anyone who looks at me the way you do."
He kisses her again, sweet and reverent. It tastes like salt. "You are so beautiful, Helga. I love you so much. And I'll keep telling you it for however long it takes you to finally believe it. And longer, because you deserve to hear it. Deserve to know how crazy I am about you."
It takes Helga a long moment to realize she's crying. It doesn't register even when the room blurs around her, or her face feels damp, or her nose starts to sting. She can't even hear the hiccoughing gasps that are being punched from her, so loud is her heartbeat in her ears. It isn't until Arnold whispers that she can cry, that he's got her, that he'll always have her, that she becomes aware that the sweeping sensation she feels under her lashes is him brushing away her tears, and the world is tilting because she's gasping for air.
Helga doesn't cry often, but when she does, it tends to be muted. Dry, so her family won't notice. Quiet, so they won't hear. But now, in the safety of Arnold's arms, with her chest cracked open from the impact of his words and touch—the dam bursts. She sobs in a way she can't remember doing since she was a child, too young to know that crying just made things worse.
She tucks her face into the juncture of Arnold's shoulder and cries, cries, cries. Loud and ugly. Not once is she shushed, or shouted at to be quiet, or treated like a noisy toy that might finally go silent if it's shaken hard enough to break.
She loses track of time as Arnold rocks her, murmuring words of reassurance in her ear. What feels like an eternity passes before her tears dry up. She's been wrung out; there's nothing left to give.
She sits, heavy yet hollow, trembling yet inert, and thinks of the innocent little girl who she'd long ago traded for the steel heart of a shark.
Thinks, for the first time in a long time, that maybe more of that girl survived than she thought.
Thinks, for the first time in her life, that it may not be such a bad thing.
Not with Arnold there to keep her safe.
"I love you," Helga rasps some semblance of time later. The words hover in the air, suspended. There's more to say, so much more that the back of her throat itches with it, but her head is stuffed with cotton and talking hurts and for the time being, it will have to be enough.
She says again, "I just really, really love you."
Arnold's grip tightens as he nuzzles his cheek against hers. Says in a shuddering voice that makes Helga think he's been crying too, "I know. And I really, really, love you, too."
Nothing has been fixed. As incredible as Arnold is, even he can't tighten all the loose screws inside of her through force of will alone (though gods, does she love him for trying). She wishes it were that easy. Wishes she can just accept what he says as the truth. But a handful of words, however wonderful (and too good to be true), can't erase a lifetime of believing otherwise. A drop of soap can't remove over a decade of accumulated grime.
But it means something. It means a lot. And Helga's willing to put the work in, no matter how rough it gets or long it takes, because she wants to believe him. Wants to look at her reflection and see what he does. Wants to be the beautiful woman he describes.
(Wants it for herself, too.)
And while she still can't associate herself with any of the descriptors he's used, still can't even think of herself as prettylovelybeautiful without mentally shying away, she's looking forward to the day she can.
Arnold is the only person she knows who's as stubborn and steadfast as she is. With the two of them determined to see this through, well…
It's only a matter of time.
Arnold finds the mirror Olga had given her while he's rummaging through her drawers for a calculator.
"Oh, wow, this is nice."
Helga looks up from her calculus worksheet to find Arnold tilting the old thing under the ceiling lights. Even from several feet away she can see the gemstones catch on the light and shine.
"I forgot I had that," she muses, setting aside her homework as Arnold climbs onto the bed next to her—mirror in one hand, calculator in the other. "Olga gave it to me for my thirteenth birthday. There was a hint there, I think. Which I obviously ignored."
She ignores the noise of discontent Arnold makes. He hates when she makes self-deprecating jokes about her appearance, but considering that just a few months ago she couldn't even bring herself to think about her appearance at all (or at least, not without stressing herself out), Helga views it as progress.
It doesn't hurt that Arnold gets all offended on her behalf—
("No one is allowed to talk about my girlfriend that way," he'd snapped at her, once, after she'd tried on a dress and jokingly compared herself to a troll, "not even you.")
—which Helga is selfish enough to enjoy. Sue her.
She takes the compact mirror from him and studies the ornate lid. Brushes away the memory of opening it for the first time—thirteen and bitter, held together by nothing but stubbornness and spite—as she pops open the lid and peers into the small circle of glass.
She waits for the discomfort to hit, but it never comes. She doesn't feel much at all, if she's being honest. She looks like she always does—perhaps a little more tired than usual (thanks to a certain someone who refused to hang up the phone last night so she could sleep), but it's the same ol' face looking back at her.
Average. Maybe a bit nice. Just a little.
The bed creaks from under her, and she pulls the mirror further back to watch as Arnold drops his chin onto her shoulder.
"Hey, beautiful."
The Helga in the mirror rolls her eyes, and her companion grins.
"Ugh, stop with the cheese already," she complains with a scrunch of her (cute, a voice that sounds distinctly like Arnold whispers in the back of her head) nose.
"Never," he says, teasing yet serious, a threat and a promise rolled into one.
They fall into silence, staring at the picture they make. Her gaze falls on Arnold's face, and she feels a familiar tug on her heart, like it's straining to be closer to him. Nevermind that he's draped over her and there isn't an inch of space between them.
It will never be enough.
"I don't tell you this enough, but you're beautiful too," she says quietly, unwilling to stir the curtain of silence surrounding them. She watches as his gorgeous eyes widen before falling shut, and a beaming smile spreads across his face, just a touch shy. After a moment he opens them again and spears her with a look so full of love that her breath catches. He doesn't say the words, but she sees it in the warmth of his eyes and the softness of his grin. Feels it in the tightness of his arms around her, and in the press of his thumb on her wrist, tracing infinity symbols over her pulse.
Knows it in the way their chests rise and fall together, their hearts beating in sync.
Helga takes it all in and thinks: we're beautiful.
She turns and kisses Arnold. Snaps the mirror shut and lets it fall from her fingers as the the pressure deepens. A gasp, and then she's on her back, her hands tangling in his hair. They break to breathe, chests heaving, lips bruised and wet, and Arnold's eyes are hungry as he gazes down at Helga and—
She's never felt more beautiful.
fin
Author's Note: Hey, you. I just wanted to remind you that you're beautiful, inside and out. You're a one-in-a-kind rare artifact—in a world of billions there's only one of you. So please treat yourself with kindness, and cherish yourself the way you deserve. You are so worthy of respect and love.
Thanks for reading, lovelies. :')