Prompt: The first snow of the year ends up... different than expected, or the celebration for it does.

This story may or may not have been influenced by the fact that I was listening to Tobymac's Light Of Christmas album while I wrote it. Modern Au. And Oh, yeah, amazing Youtuber Mark Rober does have a website where you can build things like a snowball machine gun, instructions are free. I wonder what my brothers would think if I did build one…

The first snow of the year was always celebrated by a humongous winter block party on the street where the Jovesons lived. Everyone was invited, no matter where you lived. Most everyone brought some kind of dish, from Mrs. Weaver's famous Crockpot Chilli to Gort's more than average gingerbread. Someone always brought something unexpected, like Jupiter Goodson's abundance of saucer sleds, enough for everyone, children and adults alike. One year, Victor Blackstar found a good fifteen snow-block makers in the Blackstar's basement, which resulted in the strangest, most competitive igloo building contest anyone had ever seen.

But the strangest year anyone could remember was the year Iantha showed up with a snowball machine gun.

The party was going strangely smoothly. A large table was set with everyone's edible contributions, Tobymac's Christmas This Year was blasting from speakers Maya Shanks had produced out of seemingly nowhere, and Emma had teamed up with Winslow to string dozens of glowing lanterns. The first snowball came when Smalls stepped out the back door into the yard, carrying a box of stringlights Glen had insisted he hang. It hit him squarely in the back of the head, sending him tumbling forward off of the deck stairs, and dribbled into his shirt.

"Whit!" He stood up, brushing snow from his face. His brother popped his head out of the upstairs window, scowling.

"Does it look even remotely like I did that?"

Smalls shook his head. "Sorry." He turned in the direction of the Garden gate, where the cold projectile had come from. When he opened it, however, the only people there were Mr. and Mrs. Weaver, who he could never imagine throwing a snowball at anyone. He put the snowball out of his mind, and went back to hanging lights.

When he stepped back inside to change his boots, which Jacks Longtreader had accidentally drenched with a pitcher of water, his mother called,

"Where's Iantha?"

"I didn't know she was here," Smalls replied, tugging on a pair of woolen socks, and retrieving a pair of snow boots, which technically belonged to Whit out of the closet.

"She parked outside twenty minutes ago," Replied Glen, pulling a steaming tray of dinner rolls from the oven. "Go find her, will you? I think Heyward was looking for her." Smalls nodded, and tramped back outside. If Heyward couldn't find Iantha, Smalls didn't know who could. They had been dating for nearly a year, and while Iantha was a bit aloof, constantly losing her glasses and spending most of her time singing, she seemed to bond with Heyward in a way she hadn't with anyone in her family. When Smalls rounded the corner of the house, another snowball hit him, this time in the stomach. Now he was determined to find the culprit, he sprinted in the direction it had come from, which happened to be Iantha's blindingly green Mini-Van, which she had temporarily deemed "The Grinch." Someone had drawn 'Merry Christmas' on the back windshield, and Smalls recognized Jupiter's neat handwriting. He skidded around the corner of the car, and found Iantha crouched on the ground, aiming what looked like a leaf blower at him.

"Don't move." Her voice was a playful growl, edged with a laugh.

"What is that thing?" Smalls examined the leaf blower further, and noticed a tube of ready snowballs attached to the end.

"It's a snowball machine gun," Iantha grinned. "Heyward helped me build it off Mark Rober's website over break."

"What?" Smalls gawked. Iantha was known for plenty of things in her family, but building science–ish things was not one of them.

"Anyway," Iantha continued. "You'd better run. I'll give you five second's head start." With a start, Smalls realized she meant to berate him again, and he turned and bolted for the garden gate, weaving around the vehicles of various partygoers, and bursting into the yard with such a noise that everyone stopped what they were doing and stared at him. Smalls schreeched to a halt, and went very, very red. But the sound of Iantha entering behind him snapped his brain back into overdrive, and he dashed for the old swingset, which no one except Jacks had used for years, taking shelter behind the rockwall. The rest of the yard obscured from his vision, he grinned as he heard the buzz of the snowball gun, and then very soon after, shouts, and numerous crunches that sounded like people diving into the snow to avoid being hit. He peered around his shield for just a moment, and a snowball smacked him in the face. His "Ouch" was stifled by a mouthful of cold snow, and he wiped snow off his face for the second time in not even an hour. Everyone expected for something unexpected to happen, each year without fail. But not even Kyle could have dreamed this up.

I don't like this, but I kind of ran out of time.