Chapter Three

Eddy lay in bed for hours that morning, unable to sleep in the intruding daylight, but afraid to get up and confront his parents. But while they would usually have berated him for wasting half the day hours ago, today they left him alone. At one o' clock in the afternoon, when he could stand it no longer, he finally crept to the bathroom and got ready, and tried to creep back to his room to use that door to leave.

"Eddy?" his mother called as he was about to open his bedroom door. He turned slowly. "Good morning Eddy. Or good afternoon. You slept late."

"Yeah, I…"

"Would you like some pancakes?"

Eddy did a double take. Pancakes? Last night his parents had been in the throes of a major fury, now they were offering to make him pancakes?

"Or how about if we skip the pancakes and I make you some lunch? Or we could go to McDonalds if you want."

"Er, some lunch would be fine," he answered.

He followed her to the kitchen, and sat down as she busied herself making some food and some strained conversation, in which he was uncomfortably aware that she was concentrating very hard on what to say next, and that the normality of her questioning; what did he plan to do today; how were his friends doing, was simply a thinly veiled excuse to keep them both distracted.

Finally she sat down opposite him and placed down a BLT sandwich; his favourite.

"Thanks Mom," he said, somewhat confused.

As he took his first huge bite, his mother took a deep breath. "Now Eddy," she said. "I want you to know about Arnie. I know we might have seemed a little rash and unreasonable last night, but some of the things Arnie said that he'd done… aren't really right. They're unfair, and they're unnatural, and we don't want him to be a bad influence on you. We know you look up to him and we don't want to spoil it for you. We're not mad at you, Eddy. We know you were just trying to do the right thing by bringing him back, and we're very proud of you. We just want to do what's best for you."

Eddy stared, his eyes agape. "But… how could you do that to Arnie? He's my brother. He's your son."

"Don't forget how he left us all without telling anyone. You remember how you worried as much as anyone. After he put us all through that, he might still be our son, but he's not quite the son that you are."

Eddy sat in silence, finishing his sandwich in small bites. His mother, afraid of the silence, produced a five dollar bill from her purse with a shaking hand. "Here," she said, pushing it across the table. "I'm sure you just want to go out and play. Why don't you go to the candy store or something?"

He took it, and mumbled a quiet "Thanks Mom," then ran outside.

Outside he found Edd leaning on a fence, apparently bored senseless. Ed was nowhere to be seen. "Hi Eddy!" he called as Eddy came out.

"Hey Double D," replied Eddy. "Where's Ed?"

"He's grounded; his Mom caught him sneaking back in. He triggered the sleepwalker alarms," answered Edd.

"What about you?"

"Oh," said Edd, apparently caught slightly off-guard by the question. "Mother and Father don't know. I was careful." He leaned back against the fence. "What about you Eddy? Was your mother angry?"

"Y'know, I thought she was gonna murder me this morning," answered Eddy, "but she made me a sandwich and gave me five bucks."

"Wow!" grinned Edd, his eyes going wide under his omnipresent black beanie. "You should sneak out more often Eddy."

"Yeah, I'll go out and look for some other siblings I didn't know I had." He smiled. Despite the strangeness of the conversation with his mother, this few minutes with Edd made everything feel right and normal again.

"Oh dear," said Edd looking down the street. "Speaking of siblings…"

"EDDY! Where's the pictures you promised us!?"

Sarah stood directly in front of Eddy, hands on her hips, in a classic image of defiance. Jimmy stood slightly behind in a feeble mockery of the stance.

"Oh, er, I- I couldn't get them. I won't be able to get them. Here, have your money back." Eddy pushed the money, and a fair amount of sweat, quickly into Sarah's hand. "Come on Double D, let's go do something."

He walked away, Edd hesitantly following.

"Eddy, wait!" called Jimmy. Eddy turned back. "I only gave you one eighty-five; this is a five dollar bill." He held the money out in his palm as Sarah gave him a look of 'what did you do that for?'

"Oh right," said Eddy, fumbling in his pocket for Jimmy's change, which he found and replaced for the five dollars. "Thanks squirt."

Eddy walked away. Edd hurried up to him. "Eddy, are you sure you're alright?" he asked.

"Sure thing Double D, why wouldn't I be?" replied Eddy.

"Well, a voluntary refund is hardly in character-"

"It's a fanfiction, you can't expect it to be perfect."

"Eddy, even the laziest author wouldn't make that mistake-"

"Double D look, I'm fine, okay!" snapped Eddy. "I even got five bucks out of it." He took a breath. "Come on; let's go to the candy store."

They walked to the candy store in uncomfortable silence, with Eddy trying again to catch some more of Edd's happy sense of normality, but there was none coming. Rather than spend the whole five dollars, Eddy bought fifty cents worth of jawbreakers for himself, the same for Edd and another fifty cents worth for Ed, which they decided to lock away in the junkyard until Ed could come out again, since neither trusted the other not to eat them. This aroused further concern from Edd as to Eddy's wellbeing, but Eddy shrugged them off, and eventually the sugar went to their heads and they were smiling and messing around again as normal.

"And we could fly between there and there-"

"Pssst!"

Eddy looked around. He could just see his brother's obscured figure hiding behind a corner. Eddy and Edd came over.

"Eddy, were you okay after last night? Double D?"

"We were fine. Eddy even landed five dollars," answered Edd.

"Really?" asked Arnie.

"Yeah. It was really strange. She was being so nice to me," replied Eddy.

"You mean she's not normally?" asked his brother.

"Well, yeah, I mean… she's a mom," said Eddy.

"If you have any problems with her, or with Dad, Eddy, you know you can come away with me. I don't exactly have a concrete home right now, but if you think my open-air hole-in-the-ground accommodation's any better than at home, you're welcome to stay," Arnie offered.

"Thanks bro," said Eddy, quite taken aback.

"Hey, tell you what!" grinned Arnie, the same grin that dominated Eddy's face when he had thought of a particularly devious scam. "My girlfriend Christine's just opened a new club sort of thing, and I'm doing some of the entertainments. If you want, tonight, but don't tell Christine, I could have the back door left open for you."

"Arnie, that'd be brilliant!" Eddy exclaimed. "Wouldn't it Double D?"

"Couldn't Christine get into a lot of trouble if we were caught?"

"Aw, come on sockhead, it wouldn't be the first time I've talked you into something dangerous," cajoled Eddy.

"Well that's true," admitted Edd.

"Great!" said Arnie, his smile spreading. "Invite your friends. As many as you want." He saw the same smile spreading across Eddy's face. "And don't charge them; it's a favour," he added.

"I wasn't gonna!"

"I know you Eddy, your mind's only on one thing, and not the same thing my mind's always on," Arnie teased. "Look, sorry to run, but I don't want to be seen just now. I don't know how all the kids are going to react."

"Arnie… I'm sorry."

"Don't worry about it Eddy," said Arnie. "See, that's why I hadn't come back yet. I was scared. Scared of that. I mean, Mom and Dad aren't exactly alternative, are they. But I would have done the same if I were you. I was a bastard."

"But at least you're back," said Eddy.

"Yeah, for a whole five minutes," laughed Arnie. "And speaking of which, I really have to go again. Things to be, people to do."

"Alright," pouted Eddy. "See you tonight."

"Bye Eddy. Bye Double D."

Arnie ran off in the direction of the trailer park.

"You're really going to sneak out two nights in a row?" asked Edd.

"You said I should do it more often," reasoned Eddy. "Come on, let's go invite the kids."

They invited Rolf, Nazz, Jonny and, reluctantly, Kevin, and shoved a note through Ed's window, as he was too afraid of his mother's reaction to actually speak to them, but decided against inviting Sarah and Jimmy, thinking it probably wasn't too good an idea to invite ten-year-olds to clubs.

"Eleven pm sharp, by the lane," Eddy told them, before heading home to decide what to wear that night.

Before he said goodbye to Edd, though, a twang in his head that had been bugging him finally came out. "Double D, I keep thinking," he said. "I keep thinking we should ask May and Marie."

"The Kankers!?" choked Edd. "But Eddy… the Kankers!? They scare me."

"But they found him, didn't they," argued Eddy. "They tried to do something without trying to do something creepy to us for once, and they led us to my brother. If it wasn't for them, we wouldn't even be going to this club."

"I guess you're right, but I'm not going to ask them with you. I draw the line at the Kanker sisters," insisted Edd.

"Nope," argued Eddy. "You're coming, sockhead." And he grabbed Edd's arm and they were away."

Despite his assurance, Eddy too felt a wave of panic and nausea as he looked at the Kankers' trailer door.

"We could always turn back Eddy," whispered Edd.

"No," said Eddy, confidently moving forward. "I'm going to ask them." He strode forward and knocked on the trailer door.

There was a sound of movement from inside, and a moment later the door opened, with Marie behind it, leaning on the door, with her usual flirty smile in place of the evil one she had worn the day before.

"Hi sugar dumplin'," she grinned, leering at the both of them. "Come to ask me out?"

"Um, yeah, actually," stammered Eddy.

Marie's face dropped into the oddest expression of disbelief ever, and it was all Eddy could do to stop himself laughing. "Really?"

"Yeah," replied Eddy. "You and May. To this club, Christine's, in town. My brother's performing there. He said he'd leave the back door open."

"Oh Eddy…"

"It wouldn't just be us," garbled Eddy. "There's Ed, and all the kids from the cul-de-sac. Except Sarah and Jimmy, so don't tell them."

"Thank you!" She spun round and shouted up the stairs. "Hey May! We're going out tonight!"

"Whoa, you're loud," gasped Eddy. "Won't your mom mind you going?"

"No she won't mind," maintained Marie, with, Eddy noticed and Edd saw plainly, a slight hint of defensiveness. "She won't mind at all."

"Wow," said Eddy. "You have a great mom."

"Yeah. Great," said Marie.

"So err, we'll see you at eleven by the lane," said Eddy, changing the subject before Marie got upset and pounded someone.

Marie smiled again. "Thanks Eddy."

She closed the door to the trailer and Eddy returned to Edd, who was still a safe few feet from the trailer.

"See sockhead," he said. "I don't know what you were afraid of."