Writetober 2019

October 5-Build

One quiet winter night it snowed long and heavy. The next morning found people wading from their apartments into more than two feet of fine white powder. Slowly, people made their way to the large building in the center of their compound. Shivering friends gathered in the building's kitchen, where there soon were a coffee maker bubbling and an oven humming to life with a batch of cinnamon rolls inside.

The tallest of the friends, John, checked his phone again before announcing, "That settles it. Aurora's car won't start, and her car is blocking Randal's. We've officially got ourselves a snow day."

There were a few cheers from the younger and more whimsical members of the group.

"You know, unless someone calls in for tech support," John added, but no one was really listening.

"So...what do you guys do on snow days?" The youngest friend asked from inside his multiple layers of clothes. This was his first winter with the group.

Another friend, this one bundled in a puffy blue-green coat, Ugg boots, and grey scarf and hat answered, "Usually we stay indoors, watch movies, and make hot cocoa." She shrugged.

A third friend, this one nearly as bundled as the youngest, said through chattering teeth, "I'll let the dogs enjoy themselves until they get bored or start to get frostbite. Then we'll hibernate until tomorrow."

"You guys are boring," The youngest decided, shaking his head in disgust. "Don't you ever have snowball fights? Build snow forts or snowmen armies?"

"Not really," The one guy not in a coat—only a sweater over a few layers—answered. Checking the coffee and looking away disappointed, he added, "John would cheat anyway."

"I would not!"

"No, pretty sure Will's right in this instance," A late arrival said as she shrugged off her leather jacket.

"Hey!"

"I mean, there's an easy way to settle this...," The woman in the puffy coat said, glancing between her friends.

"Snowball fight, free for all. No powers," Will said triumphantly.

John narrowed his eyes as he looked between his friends. He was about to protest the trap when a timer went off. "After breakfast."

Everyone readily agreed to that.

A half hour later found the friends outside, scattering. The youngest grabbed one of his more reluctant friends by the wrist and pulled her around the side of the building. "Come on! We're building a fort."

"Isn't this teaming?" The lady asked. Really, she'd wanted to sneak away to curl up in bed with her dogs again.

"They never said anything about teaming," Her young friend said with a conspiratorial wink.

The lady rolled her eyes and pulled her black scarf higher on her face. "Alright, fine. We build a snow fort. Then we destroy the others." Then I go back to bed, She added silently.