Author's Note: Got a lil headcanon here that I just couldn't shake. All foreign language translations done via Google Translate so forgive me if they're wrong.

Shout out to Hazelbaum for her help with names and games!

Love you!

Enjoy!

Double Dee tapped his hands on Ed's shoulders to the beat of the music coming out of the speaker of the phone in his pocket as the taller Ed drove them on his bicycle from the high school to the cul-de-sac.

The ride was only about ten minutes and Double Dee had walked that morning while Ed had come in earlier for an early morning rugby practice and took his bike as a means to warm up before hitting the field.

But because they both stayed after school; Double Dee with a National Honor Society meeting and a personal tutoring session for a couple of freshmen, and Ed with another rugby practice, Ed could give his smart friend a ride home.

Edd would ride on the bike's rear pog's and hold on to Ed's shoulders as they would talk about school, make plans to study and have fun and just enjoy each other's company in the few minutes they could get together before the responsibilities of home beckoned.

When they pulled into the cul-de-sac, a car followed behind them and turned into Kevin's driveway as Ed turned into Double Dee's.

Edd's mother glanced up from where she was watering the rose bushes that nestled beneath the living room window and gave them a shake of her head as Ed slid into the drive way and her son hopped off the bike.

"Hey, Dr V!," Ed called to her with a toothy grin and Marion waved at him with her water hose.

"Hello, Ed," she smiled as her son gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Tell your mother thank you again for her help with the hospital's new mother retreat last weekend for me, would you please?"

"Will do, Doc! Later, Dee!"

Edd barely waved goodbye because he was a bit too busy staring at Kevin who had only given him a quick head nod and smirk before unloading his mom's car.

"Did Kevin and Nazz finally have a baby?"

"What?!," he gasped, as his mother's question tore him from his thoughts of why Kevin was holding a baby carrier in one strong arm along with a baby bag on his shoulder, as well as his backpack and baseball practice duffle.

"Look, I know I'm not home often," the pediatrician sighed, "and that means I'm typically out of the whole neighborhood gossip loop, but he's carrying a baby into his house! So I was wondering…"

"No," Edd sighed, still a bit confused himself. "They're really only friends. She's dating Josh Thomas, actually."

"Yo, Sockhead!"

Edd and his mother's eyes were drawn away from the house across the street to the jalopy in front of their house.

Eddy was waving a gift bag at them and when Edd walked up, he said, "Listen, I can't make Kev's party because I gotta work, but give that to him for me, will ya?"

"Eddy," Edd whined as he took the gift bag and Eddy rolled his eyes.

"I know, I know! But I gotta!"

"Ok," Edd pouted and Eddy gave him a look.

"I promise –"

"To break another promise," Edd interrupted, a ticked off look in his eyes.

"Dude, not everyone has rich doctors and lawyers for parents," Eddy retorted. "Some of us have to work for a living."

"I have a job, too, Eddy," Edd snipped and Eddy groaned.

Their scamming days ceased the summer between sixth and seventh grade. But they weren't old enough to really work back then.

Edd got back on his paper route while Ed went to back to working on Rolf's farm that fall with Eddy being the odd one out.

His friends gladly shared in the joys of their labor with him, but it wasn't until he got his own job working at the local Wendy's when they were all 15 during freshman year, that that whole honest pay for an honest day's work hit home for the smol Ed. Now they were all 17 and he was the store's head assistant manager. But this also meant that he missed out on parties, game and movie nights with his friends, study sessions, and general shenanigans with his friends and neighbors because of work.

And no employee discount could really make up for it in Edd's mind, but these are the breaks.

"I know, but I can't get out of it. Just give that to him for me, ok, Double Dee? Please?"

Edd looked into pleading grey eyes and sighed, but he did pitch a bit of a hissy fit as he did so; full on stomping his feet and whining on the front curb of his house, but Eddy rolled his eyes and then rolled away tossing his thanks and IOUs out the window as he went.

"What was that about?," Marion asked as Edd walked back up the drive way to the open garage she was standing in.

"Eddy's missing the party Saturday because he has to work, so I gotta give this to Kevin for him," Edd sighed as he waved the gift bag in front of her and she gave him an empathetic look.

"Well, that was nice of him to give him something."

Edd just shrugged.

"I gotta go study," he said quietly as he walked into the house.

Kevin bounced his baby cousin on his knee as he waited for his mom to get home.

"¡Ojitos!," she cooed as she pulled her pudgy brown hands from her face.

"¡Ojitos!," he cooed back as he gave her Eskimo kisses and she giggled as she hid her face again.

They played the game for a couple of minutes more before he heard a tiny rumble.

"Ya hungry, Rosie?," he asked as he looked down to see if he could see her peeking out at him from in between her fingers.

"¡Ojitos!," she said loudly, determined to continue the fun game with her big cousin.

"Let's get you something to eat," he chuckled as he sat on her on the floor, plopped down next her, and dug some toddler cookies out of her diaper bag.

*buzz buzz*

"¡Telephono!," Rosie squealed as she and Kevin looked around for his phone.

He found it in his backpack and saw that it was a text from his mom.

Ma: Me y Mari están en nuestro camino. ¿Llega a Rosie de guardería?

Mi Calabaza: Si estamous en casa ahora

Ma: Ok alimentar al bebé y saque el pollo y carne

Mi Calabaza: Tacos?

Ma: ¡Tacos por mi bebé!

"Yes!," Kevin grinned as he gave a small fist pump to himself, swooped his cousin up, and slid into the kitchen to pull out what his mother would need for dinner.

"Odio esto, Kev," Marisol sighed and Kevin hoisted Rosie on one hip as he surveyed the open checkout lanes at Peach Creek's Save A Lot.

"C'mere," he said quietly as he eased the full cart into Edd's line and waited.

"Hey, you!," he said cheerfully as the older man in front of them pushed his cart away and Edd looked at him in shock and some anger before slapping his customer service smile on his face.

"Hello, Kevin. How can I help you this evening?" he asked politely as Marisol started to unload the cart's basket.

"Not me, silly," Kevin grinned before cocking his head at Marisol. "My cousin."

The initial anger in Edd's eyes quickly evaporated and was replaced by confusion as Marisol pulled a large pink coupon book and her EBT card out of the diaper bag he had seen Kevin carry into his house earlier that day and handed them to Kevin.

"She's got food stamps and WIC and –"

"And TANF," Marisol said softly as she pulled a box of diapers and wipes from under the cart and placed them behind a box that held what Edd knew to be the amount of formula most moms in the state got on their WIC vouchers every month.

"And I was hoping…" Kevin said as he trailed off and gave Edd a shrug.

"Ok, first things first," Edd said as he turned to Marisol, "put your food up front and we'll get that done first because it's the fastest thing to deal with. Then we'll do each voucher one at a time and then the cash stuff. You know it all rings up separately on its own, right?"

"Y-Yeah," Marisol nodded as she stepped away to organize her things.

"And what's this little one's name?," he asked as he turned back to Kevin and Rosie hid her face in Kevin's shoulder.

And that's when Edd noticed that the child in Kevin's arms, his cousin, and the redhead himself all shared the same shy grin.

The slight tan that Kevin always carried with him, which grew even darker in the spring, summer, and early fall months was only about two shades lighter than the natural skin tone of the young woman standing next to him.

And the hazel in their eyes could only come from one place.

Genetics.

Edd was way too relived for his own damn good to tell his mother that Kevin hadn't had a baby that he was hiding away from everyone.

He was only helping out his family.

Edd knew that his mother was from Puerto Rico from their very brief, passing introduction at Kevin's birthday part, but he didn't know how close the rest of the family was, til just now.

"This is Rosie," Kevin chuckled as the little girl squealed her protests at Kevin trying to pull her back up to greet the smart Ed.

"¡No!"

"Sé amable y mira tus modales, Rosanna," Marisol said firmly and Rosie sat up and pouted.

"Hi," she huffed as she looked down at her hands.

"Hola," Edd grinned and Kevin's breath hitched a bit.

The little girl looked at Edd curiously before grinning and saying, "¡Hola!," back as she waved her pudgy hand at him.

"¿Cómo estás?"

"Meh," she said, her tone and shrug mimicking the one of the tall boy holding her close.

"I get it," he grinned and Marisol heaved a huge sigh.

"I think I'm ready."

"Bags?," he asked as he rang up a can of green beans.

"Gimme!"

He shot a shaken look at the loud child and her mother just handed over the canvas bags to her as if this were their norm so she could hand them to Edd.

"Ayudé," she grinned to Kevin who only chuckled again as he walked to the end of the checkout stand, pulling the grocery cart behind him as he did so.

Once he placed Rosie back in the front seat of the cart, he gave Edd a quick whistle.

Without even taking his eyes off the work in front of him, he tossed the bags to Kevin, who bagged up the groceries as Edd and Marisol worked together to get everything scanned up properly.

But Marisol was getting jittery as a young man wearing a Peach Creek High letterman jacket and holding a carton of eggs sighed loudly behind her.

Edd ignored him, but made sure to take a quick glance at him to see what he was working with.

He was Marc James and the school's top point guard who had a tendency to like to repeat his history and geography courses.

And he was one of the thorns in the student resource center's tutoring side as he hardly ever made any of his tutoring sessions unless the whole team went or the coach sat in on his individual sessions.

Considering that he was talking to the young woman in front of him and she would respond back in a very thick Central American accent, he knew Marc was good for some stupid quip about immigrants and he hoped he was prepared to teach him a lesson on the subject and geography.

When she swiped her EBT card after her WIC vouchers were rung in, he scoffed as he said, "Another illegal immigrant taking all of our benefits, huh?"

Edd shot him a hard glare as Kevin turned from where he was playing ¡Ojitos! with Rosie and the hazel in his green eyes went orange with rage.

"Kinda hard to be an immigrant when you're a citizen, eh muchacho?," Marisol quipped as she threw him a side glance that Edd had seen many times growing up on Kevin's face.

She knew her thick accent gave her away, but Puerto Rico is an American territory, making her just as much a citizen as anyone else in the store that night, but she also knew that most didn't care. They just saw brown skin and heard an accent not like their own and thought it was all wrong.

"Where you from?," the young man snipped as he damn near slammed the eggs on the convory belt.

"Cherry Hill. Where you from?"

The cold look she gave him damn near made Edd's skin crawl as the young black man in front of her could only trace his roots to one continent, but he knew her implication all the same.

"Here and ain't nobody from America talk like you," he snipped.

"You need to get out more, Marc," Edd sighed as he handed Marisol her receipt . "And probably pay attention in geography class."

Kevin's loud laugh echoed around the front of the store as he and Marisol made their way out and Rosie waved and said adios to everyone she could see.

Edd didn't even look at the EBT card the young man swiped after Kevin left, but as he handed Marc his receipt, he said, "I expect to see you at my next study session for the basketball team later this week."

"Whatever," Marc scoffed again as he stormed out of the store.

"Hey."

"Hey," Edd sighed into the phone before faceplanting into his bed.

"I need a favor. And I wanted to ask you earlier but I had to run Mari and Rosie back home."

"¿Qué pàsa?," Edd said as he rolled over to his back and stared at the planetary mobile Kevin gave him for his birthday.

"Heh," Kevin chuckled and Edd's ears burned. "Um, you got the study guide for Washington's class, yet?"

"Yeah, why?," Edd said curiously.

He knew Kevin wasn't one to sneak notes of their shared classes as they figured out over the years that teachers wouldn't teach the class the exact same way each time, so any notes Edd would take would be damn near useless for Kevin's own class and they took notes so differently that it was hard to figure out what each was trying to keep in mind for tests and what he would toss away, only to pull out of his ass years later as some sort of random trivia point. And Kevin's class was known to be rowdy, thus making the teacher scramble to figure out ways to keep his rambunctious students on task.

"Can I get a copy of it?"

"Why?," Edd asked worriedly. "Aren't you gonna be here for class Thursday?"

"No," Kevin sighed. "Gotta go to court for a family thing."

"Well," Edd said as he sat up and went to dig his AP History folder out of his messenger bag. "I'm gonna have to black out my notes, but I can scan it in an email for you."

"Of course you took notes on it already," Kevin scoffed and Edd laughed.

"The test is next week, Kevin."

"Meh."

"So you taught her that?"

"Of course I did!," Kevin snickered. "I'm all she's got so I get to teach her things!"

"What about her parents?!," Edd protested as he pulled the study guide out and a handful of index cards to cover his notes so Kevin could take his own.

"Mari? Eh, she's alright," Kevin said teasingly before his voice grew dark. "But we don't talk about her shit bag dad."

Edd had heard that dark tone in many instances over the years, and lately it had grown on him, but he knew when to soothe it and when to let it go by now.

This time he let it vamos itself into the ether.

"So noted."

"Ya got my notes, though?," Kevin asked, the apprehension in his voice making Edd a pout a bit as he hurried to cover his notes and get the study guide to the jock across the street.

"Check your email in five."

"Thanks, Babe."

"No problemo, mi corazon."

"Oh, my god," Kevin snickered. "You're such a dork."

"Annnnd?"

His answer was soft, barely a whisper.

"But you're my dork and I love you."

"That's what I thought," Edd thought to himself with a sly grin, but he only said, "I love you, too. Breakfast?"

"Ma masion," Kevin yawned but the slight Spanish lilt in his voice made Edd giggle and he felt the redhead's eye roll through the phone.

"Entonces te veré en tu casa mañana."

"Kay," Kevin said softly. "Love you."

"Love you, too."

"Night."

"Goodnight, Baby."