"Do it! I double dare you. Stick your tongue on the pole."

Stop! Let's backtrack a bit. I'm Alex, and I'm not just your average 9 year old. I just got adopted by my new parents, the Washingtons. Before that, I was just a poor orphan in the Caribbean. I love to write, I love hanging out with my friends- you get the picture. But there's so many things that I haven't done, so just wait! I still have to explain what's going on to you. It all started when school got canceled for a snow day- my very first!

I woke up this morning at 7:30 to find snow falling outside my window. I was awestruck by the small flakes gliding from the clouds down to the ground. I panicked, thinking that I was late for school, but Mrs. Washington heard me coming down the stairs and yelled, "Snow day, Alex!" from the laundry room. I grabbed a doughnut for breakfast and immediately went to go wake up my friends.

My first stop was Aaron, who lived right next door to me. He was already awake and writing.

"Morning, Aaron! What are you writing?"

"Just my speech for class president. Why are you still wearing your pajamas? Did you just wake up or something?"

"The better question is, why are you not? It's a snow day! Wait a second, how early did you wake up?"

"Six o' clock. Why, is that a problem?"

"No, but how do you even wake up AT SIX O' CLOCK?! Are you crazy? Anyways, do you want to play outside with me? I was about to get John, and Lafayette, and Hercules..."

"Maybe later. I need to finish writing this speech."

"Please, Aaron? Who knows how many snow days we'll have this year, this might be our only one! And this is my first snow day! Besides, that speech isn't due until-"

I kept on talking and talking until Aaron interrupted me with a very loud and definitive "fiiiiiiine."

The next stop was Johnny. Going through his house to wake him up was a pain, especially because we had to try not to wake up his five younger siblings. I'm not exactly a quiet person, but I somehow managed to wake up only one of them. When Johnny saw us, he immediately knew why we were there and went with us.

After Johnny was Lafayette and Hercules, or just Laf and Herc to us. Laf was eating a croissant and Herc was watching cartoons. In the end, they both agreed to come outside (even though Herc hadn't finished his episode of Pokémon yet).

The last ones we had to wake up were Angelica, Eliza, and Peggy. This was one we were going to have to tag-team. Herc ended up getting screamed at by Angie, Johnny and I got bear hugged by Eliza, and Laf was found screaming from Peggy's room after being caught in all fifteen of the booby traps that were set up in there. But after we finally managed to untangle Laf, we all went outside and started to build a snowman.

But as we were rolling a snowball for the head of the snowman, three figures stood around our snowman and kicked it over until it was a small lump of snow. All of us ran over, but I was the first to yell, "Hey! What do you think you're doing?"

A familiar voice then shot back, "You mean what have I already done?"

I knew this voice. It was the voice of my sworn enemy, Thomas. He, for lack of a better term, was a real jerk. He was always trying to get ahead of me in everything, even if that meant taking the route of a staged "accident." And standing behind him were his accomplices, James and Charlie. James isn't actually that bad, in my opinion. He's just easily influenced. But Thomas and Charlie are the same- always trying to win at the cost of others.

They started to tease me just for trying to stand up for my friends. I'm noticeably shorter than everyone else I know, so that only added fuel to the fire. But when Thomas took a low blow and started making fun of where I was from.

"You take that back right now!"

"Or what? Might want to watch what you say, midget."

At this point, I was about ready to scream when Eliza, shy, quiet Eliza, tells us, "Stop."

Everyone was surprised. Eliza wasn't the most courageous of us, and she wasn't one to get in on an awkward situation. Amazingly, Thomas listened to her, so I decided to do the same.

But that didn't stop Thomas from saying, "I have a deal for you."

I was interested. If he would stop, then I would pay anything within reason.

"If you go and stick your tongue on that flagpole, then I'll make you guys three complete snowmen and I'll owe Alex a cup of hot chocolate."

I was hesitant. This seemed like too easy of a deal for Thomas.

"Do it! I double dare you. Stick your tongue on the pole."

I told him that I was fine with that, and we shook on it. However, not everyone was for the deal we made. Aaron was warning me of all of the possible medical problems it could cause, Eliza had me in a hug and would not let me go, and Johnny, Laf, and Herc were pleading with me not to do it. Peggy had no idea what was going on because she was too busy spying on James "for his file information," whatever that meant. Angelica looked like she was ready to drop kick someone into the snow any minute. But despite all of this, I still walked over and prepared myself.

Well, I was stupid enough to do it. I actually stuck my tongue on a pole. And everyone else's reactions? That was what made it... interesting. Peggy stuck her tongue on the pole too (although I can't really blame her, she's only four.) Aaron was lecturing me about all of the other things that were going to go wrong now that I was stupid enough to take the deal, while Eliza panicked and called the police. Laf ran to my house to go get Mr. Washington. Charlie had fled the scene already, but Angie and Thomas were having a staredown a couple feet a ways from me. Herc was already starting a fight chant, and James looked like he'd rather be anywhere in the world but there. Johnny was trying to pull Peggy and me off of the flagpole at the same time, which ultimately failed.

Guess who got there first? The police! But not before Angie slapped Thomas across the face. And eventually, Peggy and I got our tongues freed from the pole. But we couldn't talk right for two weeks. And guess who got in trouble, even though we're all Mr. Washington's students? I was also grounded for two weeks afterward, even though Thomas started it.

But did we get our three snowmen? The answer to that is no. Thomas's parents did send a box of hot chocolate though. Maybe my first snow day didn't end like I wanted it to, but it was definitely a fun story to tell!