Last year, it had barely snowed at all. All I'd wanted
was a snowday. Since it was my first winter, Omni was telling me everything
about this cold season I could ever want to know (and more). But one thing that
sounded great to me was the snowday. One day off of school, one day of unscheduled
fun - it seemed so unbelievably perfect.
So every night I would check the weather forecast
to see if we were expecting snow, and barely ever were we expecting little more
than an inch. So I almost gave up hope on the snowday, thinking it was just
some joke Omni had pulled on me. Especially when spring came around, and we
hadn't had a single day off school because of the snow.
So you can imagine my excitement when Omni hollered
up the stairs to me that morning.
"Po! You can stay in bed if you'd like, there's
no need to get up."
I glanced to my calendar. Wednesday. It wasn't
like we'd gotten the days of the week mixed up. But then, the answer came as
I looked out the window.
Before me was a massive blanket of whiteness,
and more was spiraling peacefully, yet fiercely, down from the equally as white
sky.
I squealed, pushed the cover off of me, and ran
down the hallway, Tika following behind me and Shadow at my heels.
When my two petpets and I entered the kitchen,
I could see Omni was as elated as I was--last year her school hadn't had any
snowdays either. Well-deserved, I thought, this snowday was.
"You don't want a little extra sleep, Po?" she
said, with an unconcealable grin. "No school today, after all." She laughed
and picked up Shadow, who was frowning while looking outside. From the little
we'd seen, he hated the snow and blamed Omni when it did snow, which wasn't
very often.
I grinned, then, grabbing a roll and heading
toward the closet where my scarf and hat were held, I called over my shoulder,
"I'll be back later!" Throwing on my winter adornments, I jumped out through
the front door and into a pile of fresh, white snow.
Picking my way through the snowdrifts, I came
upon the path to EverWild's house. It took a bit of memory and work to figure
out which way it went, but eventually I did end up at her front door. I didn't
bother knocking--I just shook of some snow and stumbled inside.
"Ev!" I called up, and Nova came out of the
kitchen with her eyebrows raised.
"Po? Up so early?"
I shivered. "Can I just have some hot chocolate,
please?"
She laughed and turned into the kitchen, then
came out a few moments later with a steamy mug. "You can wait in the kitchen,"
she said. "I'll got get Ev up."
"Uh, no, Nova, that'll be my pleasure." I put
down my mug then dashed upstairs to Ev's room. She looked still asleep at first
glance, but at closer inspection, I saw she was just turned over in bed, blankets
wrapped around her, but still awake.
Creeping slowly around her other side, I was
about to pounce on her when she turned groggily my way. "Po?"
"You got me!" I shouted, then flopped down on
a chair next to her bed. "It's a snowday. That means no school."
Her eyes widened. "Are you serious!?" she exclaimed,
sitting upright in bed, now entirely awake.
I nodded smugly. "Now come on, get up. We've
still got to go get Reggie and decide what we want to do today."
She hopped out of bed, then asked me leave for
a minute. I bounded downstairs again, and was finishing up my hot chocolate
when she came downstairs, also armed with a hat and scarf.
"Ready?" séhe asked, and I nodded fervently.
The minute we walked out the door, something
was different. The wind howled more fiercely, and now the snowflakes were driving
down at us sharply instead of floating downwards as they had seemed to do that
morning. I barely felt any warmth or comfort from the scarf around my neck,
or the hat on my head.
"Whoa," I said finally. "It's really cold."
Ev shook her head, as if that were obvious, and
we continued through her back yard. We'd managed the form a crude path a few
weeks before leading from her house to ReginaKoneko's, so somehow we were all
connected, and that made the 'Trio' as some called us, feel a little better
about not being able to get together nearly everyday.
But by the time we'd made it nearly half way
through the sparse forest that decorated the back of Ev's house, I stopped.
"Ev," I said evenly. "Something is definitely wrong."
I waited for an answer, but got nothing. Glancing
around, I discovered why.
I was alone.
For a moment, I thought I heard my name being
whipped through the wind - "Po!" But it was gone as soon as it had come.
My ears were being twisted by the wind, and I
turned to try to make my way back to Ev's house. But as soon as I turned, I
realized my mistake--I'd been walking with the wind before, and to get back
to Ev's would mean walking against the wind. I couldn't even try--as soon as
I'd turned on my heal, I'd met what felt like a million pounds of wind, pushing
me downward, as well as a mountain of snow falling down on me.
I lay there for a moment, feeling the snow plummet
down on me, barely detoured by the trees. The cold surrounded me, and even though
it felt like a thousand knives driving into me, I could barely tell myself to
get up.
But I did. It took some effort, but I did get
up. Except I didn't go the way I'd wanted to--this time, I went once again with
the wind, hoping to eventually stumble either into Ev, or end up at Reggie's.
As I look back now, I realize there wasn't much of a chance of me doing so,
but at the moment it felt like a good plan.
I turned my face down, and stepped forcefully
through the snow. There it came again: "Po!" But it was so mixed up with the
gusts of wind, I couldn't tell which way it was coming from.
This time, it was close to my ear. "Po, are you
alright?"
"Kas!" I exclaimed, and threw my tired, cold
paws around the fire Lupe's neck. I didn't want to let go, it gave me so much
comfort and relief to know I wasn't the only one out here.
"You can thank me later," he said with a grin.
"But now we have to find Ev."
I nodded, but kept a tight hold on him, knowing
how easy it was to be separated. This must be what Omni calls a blizzard, I
thought.
She was huddled by a tree, twisting her scarf
around her neck over and over again, when we came upon her. She didn't see us
at first--we could barely see her through the whipping snow, just her silhouette--but
when we finally stumbled into her vision she jumped up with surprised.
"Po! Kas!" She shouted over the din of wind.
"You don't know how happy I am to see you!"
It took nearly an hour, but we finally made it
back to the warmth of Ev's house. Nova was waiting, nervous, having had quite
a few phone calls back and forth from Omni, and both were nervous about mine,
Ev's, and, now, Kastro_'s safety.
She was happy to see us, and made us all each
a huge mug of hot chocolate, my second for that day. Kas explained the whole
thing to us, as well as he could--he'd called my house to see if we could hang
out that day, and Omni had informed him I was over at Ev's house. How she knew
that, I'll never know.
So he'd called Ev's, so see if we could all get
together that day, including Reggie, something the four of us hadn't done in
a while. But he'd reached Nova, saying we'd gone out into the snow just before
it had gotten really bad and that she couldn't see us anymore.
"So, being the Lupe I am," he concluded, boasting,
"I came out to save you. And you know the rest from there."
"Aw, we could have saved ourselves, you know,"
said Ev, rolling her eyes. "We didn't need your help."
We all laughed, and I glanced out the window.
Snow was still falling; it hadn't lessened since we'd come in, and I wondered
if it was possible to have two snowdays in a row...
It was possible--the next morning, when I
woke up, we had nearly two feet. Someone was shouting about how it was the most
snow Neopia had ever gotten! But Ev, Kas, and I had learned our lesson - at
midday, when the snow finally slowed, all four of us met at the new theatre,
watched a few movies, and just had a good time, like I'd imagined a snowday
would be.
So what if I've only had two snowdays? I think
I can safely say that they were the best two snowdays of my life.
The End | 
