Chapter 4

The soft raps of computer keyboard clicks, emanating from the fingers of the school secretaries, interrupted the eery silence characteristic of the schools main office. The office was a large room, with light blue painted walls and a drop ceiling with fluorescent lighting. A large counter was situated directly to the left of the double doors leading to the hallway, behind which sat the school administrator. Behind her, two secretaries sat at their desks, typing at what seemed to be a mile a minute.

Further back in the office, a series of leather office chairs (much like those in the waiting room of a medical office) were situated in a small hallway of sorts; this hallway served as an access point to the offices of the school disciplinarian, guidance counselor, assistant principal, and the principal himself.

Three of the chairs were currently occupied by Ed, Rolf and Double Dee. The three boys had been ordered into the schools main office around twenty minutes ago, and were awaiting their turn at receiving disciplinary action from the school administration. Eddy, being the first chosen the first to receive his proverbial sentence, had already been ordered into the principals office for his lecture.

Double Dee, still in his Hawaiian get up, sat with his feet planted on the ground. The extremely nervous boy continuously chewed on his nails, an action which he typically loathed but could not control due to his anxiety. The principals office was most definitely not the intelligent adolescents "happy place", being a boy who had dedicated his life to upholding rules and maintaining educational integrity.

In contrast to Double Dee's uncontrollable nervousness Ed and Rolf, sitting two chairs down from their friend, seemed to be in high spirits. Rolf remained dressed in his Elvis attire, but had removed his large sunglasses, allowing the oafish Ed boy to wear them instead. Still in a musical mood, Ed had removed an old comb from his pocket, and had created a makeshift musical instrument by wrapping a piece of tissue around it. As he played a simple rhythm, he and Rolf swayed back and forth in their chairs, playing a favorite folk game of Rolfs country of origin; a game introduced to the Eds during a scam involving returning Rolf to a false representation of his old country: That's My Horse.

As the boys danced, they initiated a call-and-response pattern of sorts. Each boy took turns saying "that's my horse" after which they playfully struck each other with ever increasing force, giggling as they did so. Typical of the game, the violence seemed to escalate at an exponential level; the boys began grabbing objects within the vicinity , such as staplers and potted plants, and proceeded to smash them over the head of the opposing boy in a cartoonish manner, laughing dopily as they did so.

Double Dee appeared to grow even more distressed with every iteration of the equestrian refrain. Eventually, the intelligent Ed boy had reached his limit, and proceeded to turn towards his friends.

"Enough!" said Double Dee in a relatively stern manner, "Cease and desist your foolishness immediately!"

Double Dees outburst caused Ed and Rolf to freeze in place where they were, staring at the boy with wide eyes. Ed had cradled one of the schools steel filing cabinets over his head as if he were a statue, with Rolf grasping another one of the office chairs as a counter weapon. Both boys appeared as if they were a canvas painting, awaiting Double Dee's inevitable lecture.

"Do you two have any amount of shame whatsoever?" asked Double Dee, "Do you not realize the implications of our situation? In all of the fourteen years I have lived, I have never been sent to the principals office for a disciplinary reason, and I cannot think of a more terrible manner in which to spend our last day of school."

"Oh come on Double Dee," said Ed, "It's not so bad, look we get free candy!"

At that point, Ed reached towards a small table located adjacent to their chairs, on which the office kept a small bowl of complimentary candy for visitors. Ed proceeded to remove and shove an entire a handful of the small, red and white colored mints into his mouth, causing his cheeks to puff out to a noticeable size.

"Not too Shabby!" said Ed as he picked the bowel up off of the table, holding it out towards his friends, "Try some Double Dee!"

Double Dee stared toward his friend in a dumbfounded manner.

"This is inhuman." said Double Dee in a quiet yet distressed manner, sweating bullets as he did so, "How can you possibly worry about candy when in a few short minutes all of our permanent records will be forever marked with an indication of a serious disciplinary infraction!"

Double Dee glanced up towards the clock, which registered 11:45 a.m.; fifteen minutes until the scheduled early dismissal typical of the last day of school at Peach Creek High.

"It's almost time for dismissal, and Eddy is still in the confines of the principals office." said Double Dee, "If the scope of his discipline warrants three hours of deliberation, who knows what the administration has in store for us?"

"Silence Ed Boy!" said Rolf as he suddenly dashed toward his brainy friend with an expression of distress, placing his hand over Double Dees mouth as he stared towards the door to the principals office, "The small fry Ed boy is set to emerge!"

Double Dee trained his eyes towards the semi transparent glass adorning the door to the principals office. The silhouette of Eddy's square shaped head, complete with his three long hairs cast its shadow through the large pane, growing in size as the boy approached the door. Within seconds, the door knob began to turn, eventually emitting an audible click as the door unlatched.

"Oh dear," said Double Dee in a nervous intonation as he observed the door open in a slow manner.

To the black haired boys surprise, Eddy exited in quite the casual manner; he remained dressed in his red Hawaiian shirt, with a pair of black shorts, sunglasses, and flip flops completing his tropical look. As he emerged the office, the small boy turned around, pointing both of his fingers towards the interior as if they were pistols.

"Later Mr. B!" said Eddy in an exuberant manner as he calmly closed the door to the office.

The boys watched in awe as Eddy began to confidentially strut down the hall towards the main office exit, breaking the silence with another declaration.

"C'mon boys, let's andale!" said Eddy, "Tabbs taking the girls to the mall after school, so let's synch up with Big Chin and get our summer vacation rolling."

"Now wait just a minute Eddy," said Double Dee, "Ed, Rolf, and I have still yet to reprimanded for our misdeeds, and I cannot risk even more..."

"Relax mop top, you guys are off the hook!" said Eddy.

"Of the hook?" asked Double Dee, "But how?"

"Just a little bit of something Lee likes to call 'collective bargaining'", said Eddy, "These modern teachers are the biggest suckers for sob stories. A little bit of the Eddy magic was all it took to conjure up an excuse for my actions. I told them I act out because I'm bored with school, and that I feel like it doesn't give me the time I need to express myself 'artistically'. I also them I was the one who convinced you guys to go through with it, so you shouldn't be punished...he totally bought it!"

Eddy laughed heavily at which point Rolf suddenly rushed towards the small boy. He proceeded to lift his arm into the air, and began to rub his armpit, much to Eddy's discomfort.

"Thank you Ed boy!" yelled Rolf, "Rolf is forever in your debt for not only assisting Rolf in courting his Sweet Babushka, but also helping Rolf avoid the school hammer of discipline!"

"Eddy!" yelled Ed as he ran up to his friend, embracing him in a tight bear hug, "You are the best friend a guy can have. Now the principal won't call my mom, and she won't tell my dad, and I won't be grounded."

"While I'm most certainly not a fan of cheating the system, so to speak," said Double Dee, "I suppose in this case I should offer thanks to you for coming forward and alleviating us of our disciplinary action."

"Whoah there boys," said Eddy as he gently pushed his friends away, "We ain't out of the woods yet, there's one small price to pay if we don't want a mark on our permanent record."

"A small price?" asked Double Dee, "Do I dare ask what that price may be?"

"Well you guys have to participate so why not?" said Eddy as he adopted an expression of annoyance, "The principal said he'd forget about the incident, provided we work some kind of community service project over the next two weeks. Blomgrens got it lined up for us, alls we have to do is show up at school like usual. What a jip."

"No work for Ed!" yelled Ed. He quickly switched to a mediocre singing voice for his next line "Summer is for fishing, and for lounging around..."

"Please Ed, wrong cartoon" said Double Dee in a quiet manner, at which point he turned back towards Eddy, "I for one think that this is a wonderful opportunity that should be thought of as a blessing rather than a curse! Just imagine all of he wonderful thinks you can do to help others less fortunate than yourself, and inspire those to pay it forward to others."

"Yeah whatever," said Eddy as he glanced into a wall mounted mirror, flexing his muscles as he did so "We'll think about it later. Right now, it's time for me to go home, relax, and get ready to show off these awesome guns at Lindsay's pool party tomorrow."

Eddy turned away from the mirror, and continued his casual stroll down the hallway, waving his hand as if to signal his friends to follow him.

"C'mon boys," said Eddy, "Summer awaits!"

The boys proceeded to follow their friend down the hall and out the door, on their way to the start of a brand new summer.