Chapter 4: Freak'n Friday

"Ak! Luffy! Stop throwing paint everywhere!" A random girl cried as her apron was suddenly splattered with red paint.

"Yeah! You might hit something valuab-AHHHH! IT'S IN MY HAIR!" Another girl quickly ran out the classroom door and headed towards the bathroom so she may clean her blonde curly hair, which had been splashed with blue paint.

Luffy and Usopp were in art class. Usopp loved art, so naturally he had decided to sign up for the class. Luffy just liked making messes. When they had first signed up for their extra curricular class, Luffy once again didn't want to be alone. First Zoro had refused to let him take Kendo. Luffy and weapons/listening/focusing did not go well together. Then Sanji said that he would not let his captain into his kitchen. It was the schools kitchen not Sanji's, but the cook had already decided to dominate the foods class. So alas, Usopp was stuck with his overenthusiastic captain in what should be a relaxing art class.

"Ow! He got paint in my eye!" Yelled another student as he ran blindly to the sink.

"AH! My new bag!" Exclaimed another girl.

"THAT'S IT!" Magenta-sensei shouted as she hurried up to Luffy. "OUT! RIGHT NOW!" She pointed to the door.

Luffy was shocked. He had no clue why this woman was yelling at him. As far as he saw it everyone was having fun. He had only spilled a little paint…it wasn't a big deal. Hm…she's probably just upset that she can't play too… Luffy held out the paint willingly to his aggravated teacher. "Do you want to play too?" He smiled at her when she stopped yelling to stare at him. I new that was the problem.

Magenta-sensei took a deep breath and said very slowly and calmly, "Hall. Now."

What a great idea! Luffy had been planning on going to visit Zoro soon, so this was a great opportunity. "Zoro!" Luffy cheered as he ran out the door.

"Why do I put up with him?" Magenta-sensei said to herself. Then with a big sigh, "Every Freak'n Friday…"

"AHA! I've done it! My masterpiece is finally complete!" Usopp held up a large painting of a blonde girl leaning on a windowsill looking out at something out of the picture that the observer couldn't see. He hadn't been affected by his captains 'fun time'.

"ICHI"

"HIE!"

"NI"

"HIE!"

"SAN"

"ZORO!"

"LUFFY!"

"HIE!"

Well, at least the rest of the class isn't affected by Luffy's entrance. Zoro thought with a sigh. The swordsman looked at his Kendo sensei who nodded and took over the counting for the class drills. Zoro then looked back to Luffy. His captain had somehow managed to cover himself with red and blue paint, somehow managing to leave his precious hat spotless. Most people that don't know Luffy by now would find his appearance odd. But, this was pretty much a typical Friday for Luffy. Fridays were the day that Luffy would get excited about the weekend and this Friday was an extra special Friday because tonight they had a game. Not just any game. A game against the Kiba Dragon's, who had the most notorious football team on the whole island. Zoro couldn't wait, and apparently Luffy couldn't either.

"Luffy, how many times do I have to tell you not to interrupt class when I'm teaching?" Zoro asked his captain patiently.

Luffy pouted, "Zoro doesn't want me here?" He thought that Zoro would be so happy to see him, but he guessed he was wrong…

Damn. "I…it's not that, it's just…" How do I say this so he'll understand? "Tell you what, you go sit down and you can watch us practice. Okay?" Taking the easy way out, Zoro just avoided answering Luffy's question. But it worked.

"Yeah! Okay!" Luffy ran over to sit on the ground in full view of Zoro.

Taking over counting for his sensei, Zoro returned his full attention to the classes form. He knew that Luffy wasn't going to stay for long. He never did, the straw-hat boy had the attention span of a bird.

Ten minutes later Zoro looked back over to the spot where Luffy had been sitting. As he had expected, his captain was nowhere to be found.

DING!

"Okay class, your pies are ready. Please take them out of the oven, make sure that you wear your oven-mitts and please don't burn yourselves."

"Hai, Cherry-sensei!" Sanji shouted enthusiastically. Sanji was so excited because today he was trying a new recipe. While on land he can use more ingredients then if he were on the ship, because things were fresher on land. Sanji pulled out his pie using the sides of his pink frilly apron as oven-mitts. Inhaling the sent of the freshly baked desert, the cook's heart fluttered with pride. "Mmmm, perfect."

"OWWW! HOT!" A cry of pain sounded behind Sanji.

Sanji didn't even bother turning around to see who had been hurt. "Careful Luffy, it's still hot…"

Luffy scowled at the pie that burned him. Stupid hot pie… He then looked at his chef and slumped slowly over to him leaving the other student's pie safe for the moment. "Sanji" Luffy whined, "I'm hungry"

"Yeah I figured. There's a sandwich on the counter over there that I made for your snack. Fell free." Sanji nodded his head in the direction of said counter. He wiped his hands on his apron before starting another cooking project. "Cherry-sansei! I'm going to make you a special drink!" The cook once again shouted over his shoulder.

"Hai Sanji-kun." Cherry-sensei replied. She was used to Sanji making pretty much whatever he wanted in this class. If she gave him a new recipe he was ready and willing to try it out, otherwise he did whatever he wanted. She didn't really care. It was obvious that he was a great cook, even better then her, so she was happy to try his food and maybe learn a little from his cooking.

I have the best chef. Luffy thought happily to his sandwich as he took a bite. He finished his snack and made sure to lick the crumbs of his fingers before looking around for some other tasty treat. He turned to look at Sanji just in time to see the chef hand his teacher a red drink. The drink looked really good and Luffy was taken aback that his chef had made a drink for this woman and not for his captain. Luffy pouted, "Sanji"

"Here." Sanji handed Luffy a matching drink. The cook would have to be pretty dense to not know that his captain would whine until he too received a drink as well. The blond had been sailing with Luffy long enough to know his eating habits and his food preferences. Which was pretty much any time and anything.

"Yay!" Luffy cheered as he accepted the drink.

Sanji stared at his captain as he slurped on his drink. Sanji sighed, "Luffy, go wash off, your tracking multicolored footprints everywhere."

RING!

"Finally!" Nami exclaimed exasperated. She grabbed her school bag and quickly ran out the door. That class had been hell, plain and simple. It was full of the class rejects; the students that the principle did not want to represent his school. It was just…hell.

Nami covered her mouth as she ran through the corridor trying not to inhale dust on her way to meet her friends.

"Alu! Over here!" Usopp cried at the top of his lungs while waving his hands in the air to make sure that she saw him in the…small spread out group of students that were heading for the front doors on their way home.

Nami smiled at her friend and gave a little wave. "Hey."

"How was class?" Usopp asked when Nami had reached them.

"Ug." That pretty much summed it up.

"That good huh?" Sanji smiled sympathetically at Nami. He then looked at his watch. "Man, I got to go to practice. I'll see you guys later at the game." He turned and headed for the locker room.

"What practice?" Nami asked Usopp.

Usopp shrugged. "Soccer, he has early practice today because of the football game."

"Oh. Cool." Nami nodded, trying to act like the cool boy that she was.

Zoro rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Come on Luffy." He grabbed Luffy's hand and dragged him away.

"Okay! By Alu! See you at the game!" Luffy waved with his free hand.

"What was that about?" Nami pondered. Then she noticed the peddles of water that trailed after Luffy. She raised an eyebrow, "he fall in the toilet or something?"

Usopp shrugged and started walking to the front doors with Nami. "Zoro and Sanji…have a respect-hate relationship. And as for Zoro and Luffy…I'll tell you later." He smirked at Nami in an all-knowing way.

"So…what's with this game tonight?" Nami asked Usopp as they passed through the doors into freedom.

Usopp jumped up and clapped his hands in excitement. "OH! We're playing the Kiba Dragons. They're undefeated, but they're never played against us before." He puffed out his chest at his greatness. "Apparently our team used to suck, everyone quit and this year Zoro took over and recruited. Now we're undefeated. It's going to be great, you should come."

Nami nodded her head, "I'll try my best. What time does it start?" In truth, Nami was exhausted. This was the first day of school after those five long days of near death drifting after the chase…Nami just wanted to go to sleep.

Usopp thought for a moment, he always had to get to the game early. "Six…yeah six. Oh! But you might want to come early because the seats are going to fill up fast."

Nami nodded showing that she understood. "M'kay, like I said I'll try to make it. I'll have to talk to my brother about it first."

"Okay, yeah no problem." Usopp shrugged. The sniper knew what it felt like to have young ones to look after. Back in his hometown he had been responsible for three little boys, though they were his crewmates, and it was his job as captain to look after them. Then there was Luffy. Usopp knew that he was only about a month older than his captain, but he was still older. Usopp's mind drifted away from reality to the time when he had single handedly defeated the East Blues Jumbo Shrimp. He smiled to himself. Good times, good times…

"-way." Usopp heard the end of Nami's sentence, which brought him plummeting back to the reality of being stuck on this island.

"What?" Usopp asked, shaking his head a little to clear it of his daydream.

Nami pointed down the dirt that they had apparently reached while Usopp was off in space. "I have to go this way."

"Oh." Usopp frowned, and pointed the opposite direction, which lead to the docks. "I'm that way." He was planning on getting some work done on Merry before the game started.

"Oh, okay. Well I'll see you later then." There was no point in saying 'see you tonight' because even if Nami did end up attending the event, it was more then likely that Usopp would not see her. There would just be too many people and Usopp would be focused on the game. "Bye." Nami gave a small wave and headed down the road heading to the Elementary School.

Usopp continued on his normal path home from school. He had to stop off at the house to exchange his school bag for his supply bag; he also hoped to grab a quick bite to eat. Speaking of eating…hadn't Luffy and Zoro gone on ahead of him? "Oh, crap!" Usopp shot off like a bullet, hoping to make it to the house in time before Luffy ate all their food again. Honestly, Zoro let their captain get away with anything.

CRASH! BOOM! SPLAT! "HAHAHAHAHA!" Luffy laughed with joy as he sat in a pile of rubble. As soon as the rubber boy had arrived home with his first mate, he had slingshot himself and Zoro through the door. As usual they had flown into the far wall down the hall, breaking down the new wallboards that Usopp had put up the day before. Luffy loved to stretch. If he hadn't been able to stretch at home and on the Merry Go, then he didn't know what he would do.

Zoro, however, did not share in his captain's happiness as he pulled himself off the ground and dusted off his uniform. "Dammit…" The swordsman ran his hands through hair while offering his other hand to Luffy.

Luffy accepted it and pulled himself up. He smiled at Zoro and quickly brushed of his uniform before running back down the hall heading to the kitchen. "That was fun! I'm hungry!" As Luffy ran, he stripped off his uniform and picked up his usual red shirt and blue shorts that he had left in the hall the night before.

Zoro sighed when he heard crashes from Luffy rummaging through their kitchen. He really didn't care if Luffy ate all the food again. It wasn't like they couldn't get more. He took off his jacket and threw it into his room before heading to the bathroom. "Luffy, I'm taking a shower! We'll go work on Merry after I get out!" Zoro shouted to his captain.

"Mmfh!" Was Luffy's reply of 'okay'. He had found himself a jar of peanut butter and some bread. All he needed now was some meat… "Meat, meat, meat…" Luffy chanted to himself through his mouthful of peanut buttery goodness, as he stretched his hand over to the fridge and opened to door.

Just as Luffy was about to grab the lunchmeat that was sitting on the top shelf the front door slammed open. "Hands off the food!" Usopp stood in the doorway panting. He was pointing at Luffy knowingly.

Luffy just smiled at his funny friend before swallowing the lunchmeat that he had grabbed within the few seconds of the door being opened. "Usopp!" He grabbed his sharpshooter's arm and pulled him into the kitchen.

Usopp let out a scream as he flew ten feet from the doorway, past Luffy and into the door of the refrigerator. Since the door had previously been open by the rubber boy, Usopp's arms and legs happily missed hitting anything, while the rest of his body slammed against the side of the door. "Mmf." Usopp let out a little groan as he slid to the floor. CRACK! The unlucky door broke off its hinges and landed on the long-nosed boy.

"Ah!" Luffy cried. "The door! What will we do now?" He grabbed the door and tried to shove it back on the fridge, only to have it fall on Usopp again. Man, Sanji's going to be mad…I'm still hungry. "Time to go!" Luffy cheered and ran out the front door.

"Wait…help." Usopp whined as he squirmed out from underneath the assaulting door. He got up and wiped his bleeding nose. He hadn't been surprised that Luffy had left; Sanji would punish him later no matter where he went. There wasn't anything to do at the house, so Luffy got bored and decided to leave. It was normal. Usopp walked to his room and stretched out his sore muscles before changing and grabbing his bag. He then returned to the kitchen to see if Luffy had gotten out of control with the food. Opening up the cabinets, he only found empty boxes and wrappers. With a sigh, Usopp went over to his enemy fridge and peered inside. The fridge was pretty much empty except for a jar of pickles. Usopp shrugged and pulled out the jar. "Good enough." He pulled the remaining pickles out of their jar and walked out of the house munching on the crunchy snacks.

"Ah! That felt great!" Zoro announced as he walked out of the steaming bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist. He stretched his arms over his head to pop his shoulders and looked around for anyone who might be jealous of him getting the shower first. Zoro didn't see anyone, and he couldn't hear any movement within the house. "Luffy?" No answer. "Hm, he must have gone on ahead of me. Well, I guess I could get some sleep before tonight's game." And so he did.