Oh what little time they had… Edd was writing in a notebook and walking at the same time, sometimes swerving a little off-course and almost bumping into the side of the hallway. Other kids walked past him, ignoring the seemingly blind sockhead. His reputation in the school had accumulated something infamous yet admired at the same time for having the best grades and awards, yet hanging out with the nefarious crowd. Kids knew, however, that when Edd was thinking, something big was happening in that complex, genius brain of his, so they tended to avoid him as much as possible as he made a beeline to the lunchroom.
The only kids who made it a point NOT to avoid him were the Kanker Sisters. Well, two of them, anyway.
"Heeey boyfriend," Marie stepped directly in front of his path, resulting in a crash that sent her back a few inches and Edd fell to the floor, dropping his notebook.
"What's this?" Lee grabbed the book and kicked the pen with her foot into her hand. "Love potion? Check it out, Marie! Our men are tryna make us fall in love wit'em. Ain't they precious?"
"Lemme see!" Marie yanked the notebook out of her sister's hand as a slightly disoriented Edd climbed to his feet.
"Ladies, please!" He begged, reaching for his notes, "That's personal property!"
"Hold your horses, pumpkinface," Marie ordered, turning her back to the boy and continuing to read.
Lee grabbed hold of his sweater, jerking him away from the blue-haired girl to glare down at him as she brought her fist closer to her face, "Where's Ed n' Eddy? I wanna give my man a Valentine."
"Um," Edd mumbled nervously, starting to sweat a little, "I believe he said he was going to skip lunch today."
"WHAT? I HATE when they do that! That's it, I'm tellin' a teacher."
"No, Lee!" Edd squeaked, grabbing onto her wrist to stop the girl.
She slowly turned, and beneath her thick bangs and heavy brow, even though her eyes were behind a shield of bulky red hair, Edd could feel the cold hatred emanating from the glare she gave him. Lee was frozen in place, fists clenched in warning as she waited for an excuse.
After gulping down his fear and lowering his shaking hand, Edd continued, "That is… I wouldn't mind giving him your valentine for you, Lee."
The redhead contemplated his offer, fingers resting on her chin as she stared off into space. If the wimpy one gave Eddy her valentine, he'd be more likely to actually take it, and maybe read it, but then again she wouldn't be there to *force* him to read it. However, even if she told anyone about Eddy skipping lunch (again) there still wasn't as good of a chance she'd be able to give him her valentine before the end of the day.
"Alright." She grabbed his hand and squeezed it tightly in her strong grip, "Ya got a deal! But-" She trailed off.
"Y-yes?"
"Here," she grunted, thrusting the large, perfumed heart into his chest. It was somewhat sticky for some reason so it just stuck there… "You gotta kiss him too or the deal's off."
That seemed to instantly break Marie's train of thought, and she dropped the notebook to the floor, "KISS?" She spun to face her sister, "Double Dee's not gonna kiss nobody else but me, Lee!"
"Can it, Marie! It don't count if it's another man!"
"I don't see how physical affection is necessary between me and…"
"It ain't!"
"It's part of the freaking poem, ya numbskulls!" Lee pointed out, peeling the valentine off of Edd's sweater and jabbing a finger at the end of the verse. Edd read aloud, squinting to read the… why, it was almost as illegible as Eddy's terrible handwriting.
"Eddy baby, you're so cute; too bad some kids think you're a fruit; but I like you, so I made dis; so much, in fact, I'd give ya a—" He paused at the unfinished sentence, and then a little smile appeared on Edd's lips, "Oh, "a kiss", correct? I get it. So, then I...err-! What am I saying? I can't do something like that!"
Lee frowned, "Fine then. I'll just tell a teach; Eddy can just get detention today."
"But," Edd paled a little, "the scam..." he choked on his words as Marie closed in on him.
"What scam?"
Words hardly discernable escaped Edd as flurries of excuses trailed through his brain. He wasn't sure who, exactly, Eddy was planning on scamming with this "love potion" scheme of his, but perhaps it was better off that nobody else knew at all.
However, if Eddy and Ed had detention after school for straying off of the school grounds, they wouldn't be able to pull the scam together before curfew…
"F-f-fine," He stammered, not fully comprehending the task he would commit to, he grabbed the valentine from Lee, "I'll… do it."
"Ugh!" Marie backed off a little, unable to believe that *her* man just agreed to do something so… so-…! "I can't believe you!"
"It's not a big deal," Edd convinced quietly, slowly picking up his notebook and retreating towards the lunchroom doors, "physical contact between two people; it's relatively harmless and virtually meaningless if you think about it, heheh. I'm sure Eddy wouldn't really care." They had kissed before, even, and it wasn't a big deal back then. It wouldn't be a big deal now… right?
"He's in denial." May was suddenly beside her two sisters, also watching Edd slink backwards into the cafeteria.
As Marie started to fume at the accusation, Lee smacked her blonde sister's shoulder, "Where ya been, May? They got lambchops on the line today; ya love lambchops don'tcha?"
Edd slowly chewed the odd-tasting meat that he'd gotten from the cafeteria as he sat alone at an empty table. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't eat in the lunchroom at all whenever his friends skipped Lunch period; he preferred sneaking into the library and waiting it out with his own bagged lunch. The only problem was, he hadn't taken his lunch today because his mother had made it for him… and she left a rather embarrassing note scribbled on the paper bag in an attempt to encourage him. …It was rather inappropriate anyway; he always made his own lunch. However, he assumed she was in such a good mood because she and Father were going to be out all night. Adults were strange.
No, he decided, his eyes resting on the sticky valentine that had stuck to the top of the table; Girls were strange.
He set down the… whatever it was, and decided to check the radar. After a quick glance around the cafeteria, Edd pulled the small metal object out of his pocket, slipping over the button that turned it on, and suddenly heard a flurry of high-pitched beeps singing through the small speaker. He jumped in place and looked around, suddenly face-to-face with Eddy.
"E-E-Eddy!" He squeaked, shrinking back as he stuffed the remote in his pocket, "I thought you were skipping lunch today!"
His friend stood there in silent observance, his eyes flickering down to the pocket where Edd had stuffed something, where there was a plethora of strange beeping noises that sounded like they were coming out of his butt. In the still moment of awkwardness, Edd carefully reached in and flipped the switch again, turning the device off and silencing the beeps… Raising an eyebrow, Eddy was about to ask about it when Ed plopped down between them and started feasting on Edd's food. Edd was pretty insistent on changing the subject as he greeted Ed and asked him politely why he was eating his portion of nourishment for the afternoon, while Eddy persisted to know what was going on just now.
"Why's yer butt beeping?" He asked, plopping down next to Ed as he stared at Edd disbelievingly. "More pigeons?"
Edd started to sweat… if Eddy hadn't figured it out by now, how long would it take before he would? Best to think of something to prevent such a thing now before it was too late… "Er, well," he said, his back straightening as he thought of an excuse, "It's really quite unstable, you see; as a new invention there's… really no telling what it will-"
"Oh!" Suddenly Edd felt himself come to a halt as he was interrupted by Ed, who had apparently stopped eating and was admiring the shoddy red heart plastered onto the table, "You got another valentine, Double Dee! Can I read it?"
But just as Ed was about to turn it over, Edd made a noise of protest and fumbled to grab at his hand. "N-no Ed, that's not necessary, I'll just-" As a desperate attempt, Edd ripped the valentine off of the table and held it to his chest, where the glue stuck to his vest quite noticeably. He awkwardly glanced downward before peeling it off and shoving it into his rucksack, all the while getting strange glances from his friends.
"Aw… C'mon Double Dee-"
"I wanna read it!" Eddy jumped at the chance, snatching at Edd's bag as the thinner boy heaved it away from his grasp with the most worried expression on his face.
"You can't!" he sputtered, clinging the bag to his chest as if his life depended on it, "It's not yours!"
Eddy's excited grin faltered, his fingers still twitching as he anticipated ripping open that bag and seeing what was inside. Edd could tell that he was disappointed and even a smidge confused at why he was putting up such a fight. "This morning you were throwin' 'em at me but now I can't see this ONE? What's up with that?"
"Th-this…" Edd felt himself warm up, hoping to dear god he wasn't blushing. "This is a special one, if you must know. Um! Actually," he glanced over to the door, nervously looking for an easy way out of this confrontation, "I must take leave. There's a class on the other side of the-"
"You can't go now, Double Dee!" Ed clasped onto Edd's waist, holding him against his will near the table and he clung to the boy from his own seat, "We wanna see the valentine!"
"Yeah, hold 'im Ed!" Eddy climbed onto the seat and then jumped onto Ed's back as he grabbed at the bag Edd was holding onto for dear life. "I gotta know what all the fuss is about!"
"G-gentlemen!" Edd shrieked, trying to shimmy out of Ed's grasp as he felt his bag being grabbed at by Eddy, "This is HIGHLY inappropriate! N-No Eddy! It's confidential! Private! PERSONAL!"
"Yeah right!" Eddy growled, fisting through the open material as he reached around inside for the valentine, "What's so great about this chick? Who is it! GAH!"
Suddenly Eddy fell to the top of the table, falling butt-first into a heap of potato salad as he held his finger in pain. It was red, swollen and throbbing, blood rushing to where he had been pricked at the fingertip. Edd could only assume he'd met his match with a loose pen or something as he smirked and clutched his bag closer, the contents now safe from anyone else's eyes but his own. "Serves you right, Eddy… Eddy?"
He gingerly swallowed and joined Ed in looking over Eddy's crippled form, who hadn't even noticed he'd stained his pants as he sucked on the end of his finger, looking up angrily at his friend as his eyes glassed over. Edd frowned, knowing that sometimes the tiniest prick could mean a lot of pain, and suddenly he felt like a jerk for thinking his best friend deserved it. "Are you alright?"
"I just wanted to see, Double Dee," he said quietly, innocently enough to make Ed glare at their sock-headed friend.
"Well, you- I…" Edd stumbled with his words, shying away from Ed as he sat down at the table, looking over the swelling as Eddy took it out of his mouth with a quivering lip. He winced and slowly looked down, opening his bag to reach for his emergency kit. "I have some first aid in my-"
"AHHA!" Eddy suddenly lurched forward and snatched the first glimpse of red he saw, pulling the valentine out of the bag and earning a shocked, protesting shriek from his friend in the process, "Yer sucha sap, Double Dee!" Eddy slid along the table, away from Edd, skidding along a trail of potato salad as he chuckled deviously and waved it at him.
Edd, completely flustered, scrambled to his feet and climbed onto the table without thinking, crawling after his friend and reaching for the valentine. He started to slip over the mayonnaise and chunks of potato that had been squashed all over the surface, catching himself before swinging his frail little arms to grab the red heart, blubbering angrily at his friend for taking advantage of him, "OH YOU! How dare you deceive me in such a manner! You're nothing but a egomaniacal, perfidious-"
"Boyfriend!"
Suddenly the three looked towards the exit of the lunchroom where the Kankers stood, arms folded and devious expressions etched all over their faces, Lee looking particularly irked that she had been lied to...
Author note: The potato-salad and library thing are kinda a shout-out to my favoritest person ever.