Snow Day

Alex Jefferson wakes early on Monday and listens anxiously as the radio announcer reads a long list of school closures. When Campbell County finally appears on the list, he celebrates the unexpected holiday. Fresh snow covers Odyssey, and his friends are already outside waiting to play. Before Alex can join them, however, his mother gives him an important errand: he must carry a dozen warm chocolate-chip and macadamia-nut cookies to his grandmother.

Alex sets out with the cookies protected inside his mother's famous golden tin and a paper bag. He soon finds Cal beside a snowman built with an assortment of vegetables. Cal asks for the paper bag to use as a hat, then recognizes the golden tin and begs for a cookie. Alex refuses because the entire batch belongs to Grandma.

A snowball suddenly strikes Cal, and another destroys the snowman. Alex and Cal race to a snow fort where Nathaniel and Mandy are waiting. Nathaniel helped design the fort, while Mandy has decorated it with calico curtains. The friends soon discover that their unseen attackers are throwing the same wet snowballs that destroyed the snowman.

Their enemy reveals himself as Rodney Rathbone, leader of the Bones of Wrath. Cal's glimpse of the golden tin has alerted Rodney to the valuable cookies, and Rodney demands that Alex surrender them. He promises that everyone will be hurt only a little if Alex cooperates. Though frightened and outnumbered, Alex remembers the promise he made to his mother and refuses.

Declaring himself captain, Alex organizes his friends into a defensive force. Mandy and Alex throw snowballs while Cal and Nathaniel supply the ammunition. Their resistance slows the Bones, but the fort's supplies quickly dwindle. When Rodney threatens a final charge, Alex invents a desperate escape plan.

The four friends exchange coats and hats, pull up their hoods, and race away in different directions. Mandy wears Alex's clothes, Nathaniel heads toward his own house, and Alex runs south with Cal. The disguise confuses Rodney long enough for them to escape, although Alex is horrified to discover that he has ended up in Mandy's Powderpuff Pamela collector's jacket.

Alex and Cal resume their journey through the quiet, snow-covered neighborhood. Their relief ends when Rodney and the Bones spring an ambush near the park. The boys protect themselves with a metal garbage-can lid, which Alex treats as a mighty shield against the barrage. When the Bones close in, Alex and Cal run toward Harper Street. Grandma's house lies only half a mile away, but Rodney is gaining.

Their quickest route is down Gumpers Hill, a dangerously steep course that ends at Gumpers Creek. A boy at the top refuses to lend them his racing sled unless Alex pays him with two cookies. Alex will not break open Grandma's gift, so he turns the garbage-can lid into a snow saucer instead. He and Cal launch themselves down the hill just as Rodney takes the racing sled and follows.

The makeshift saucer has no steering and no brakes. Cal tries using his boots and then his hands, losing a boot and his gloves in the process. With the frozen creek directly ahead, the boys leap clear. The lid tumbles onward, and Rodney's stolen sled crashes into the creek. When Alex and Cal hear him calling, they go back to see whether he needs help, despite suspecting a trick.

Rodney uses their concern to surprise them and seize the cookie tin. His triumph disappears when he discovers the macadamia nuts, because he is allergic to them. In disgust, he scatters the cookies across the snow. Alex counts only nine on the ground and realizes that three must remain hidden inside the tin. Even one surviving cookie would be worth delivering, so he takes the container and continues toward Grandma's house.

Rodney follows, angry that the boys have escaped with anything at all. Alex trips at a curb, Cal falls over him, and Rodney closes in. Mandy and Nathaniel arrive at exactly the right moment and pelt the bully with snowballs. While Rodney is distracted, Alex and Cal make their final sprint. With all four friends helping one another, they reach Grandma's front door ahead of him.

Inside the warm house, Grandma serves homemade hot chocolate with large marshmallows. Alex apologetically opens the tin and discovers that the rough journey has reduced the three remaining cookies to crumbs. Grandma is not disappointed. She declares that the crumbs will make a perfect topping for her famous apple crisp and invites everyone into the kitchen to help prepare it.

Alex's exhausting mission ends with his promise fulfilled. He has persevered through temptation, fear, ambushes, a dangerous hill, and the destruction of nearly every cookie. Surrounded by his friends and the smell of Grandma's apple crisp, he tastes a well-earned victory.