Plot Lois is sick and thinks it's still Sunday and tells the boys that their punishment is not over yet, so the boys decide to stay home from school but then they realize there is nothing to do. Hal goes to a car dealership to try and buy a red porsche which he can't decide to buy or not.
Summary Malcolm, Reese and Dewey are excited that it's Monday for a reason. It was the end of their two month long punishment for giving away the bike to Francis' dead beat vandal friends, Richie, Justin and Circus. Hal tells the boys that before they leave school, they walk in to the room and tell Lois to feel better because she's been sick for the last few days. However, he leaves and they attempt to tell her, but she thinks it's still Sunday and the boys stay home. However, soon enough they get bored, but are scared to go outside because they don't want to be busted for truancy.
On his way to work, Hal gets distracted by a Porsche dealership. He walks in just to look at the car, and gets pounced upon by a salesman who convinces him to look at a brochure. Then the salesman convinces Hal to take the car for a test-drive. He introduces him to the financing guy and the trade-in guy. Finally, he gets Hal to initial a price and works up a whole contract and payment plan.
At the house, Francis calls home and tells the boys that he's worried that Lois will find out about a letter from a college in Southern Alabama involving a prank he did when he drove a back hoe into a swimming pool. The boys agree to hide the letter for a while and he does them a favor by telling them about an owner from the arcade store who doesn't busts truants. Francis also mentions that there's money in the one of the drawers and Lois won't know as long as they take between five and seven dollars. The boys attempt to raid the drawers but a sick Lois catches them and mentions that she hid it in the back of the closet. The boys then forget about the arcade and decides to get to the truth out by asking Lois how she knew about Dewey's bike not really being stolen. She finally tells them that Francis told her everything and it was how she knew the boys were lying.
At the Porche Dealership, the salesman tries to convince Hal to sign on the dotted line, but by this time Hal is freaking out and also not feeling very well. Hal fears he's come down with Lois's flu and breaks for the door, but the saleman cuts him off and convinces him to stick his head in the Porsche one more time and smell the leather and look at the console. Hal stick his head in the Porsche and throws up in it. The salesman has to drive a very ill Hal home.
At the house, Reese is outraged by Francis and wants to give the letter to Lois so she can bust him for what he's done. Malcolm isn't so sure and wants to get his side of the story first. Sure enough Francis calls again and it's confirmed that he did rat his brothers out. Malcolm is furious and tells him that he will give Lois the letter in retaliation to what he did to them. Soon after the boys discuss it amongst themselves wheter or not to give Lois the letter and later decides not to, but pretend they are to scare him. Once again Francis calls home, but he has an ace up his sleeves. Sure enough, his dead beat friends, Richie, Justin and Circus shows up to find the letter. Malcolm hides it in the VCR and tells Reese. Francis tells Richie to watch Reese's eyes, and of course Reese entirely gives away where the letter is hidden. Francis's friends ride off on their bikes triumphant with the letter. Then Malcolm tells Reese that that was a fake letter, and he knew Francis wouldn't give up until his friends had the letter, and that Reese would give it away, so he told Reese where the fake letter was and actually gave the real letter to Dewey, which is the last thing anyone would expect. Dewey proudly announces that he hid it under mom's pillow. Malcolm freaks out as a sick Lois awakens in her room shocked while reading the letter.
In the bedroom, she's furious with what Francis has done to the college's swimming pool. Reese tries to distract her by thinking it's a dream, but she doesn't buy it and tells him to shut up. Malcolm reminds Lois to rest up because she's sick, but she tells him that she's too angry to be sick. She tells them that Francis has really outdone himself this time and will send him away to a work farm in Arizona. She later leaves to throw up in the bathroom. Malcolm calls Franics to apologize about what happened and that he, Reese and Dewey had no intentions of showing the letter to Lois and it was accidental. He understands and tells them that he's sorry for ratting them out, but she was pressuring him to tell her the truth if he wanted to come home for the summer. Now his younger brothers feel really awful, and try to think of a way to save Francis's hide. Malcolm decides if they get into a whole lot of trouble, their mother will be so busy being mad at them that she won't remember to be mad at Francis. They take all their parents' prized possessions up onto the roof of the house and put them in a wheeled cart. They roll the cart off the roof into the driveway... just as the salesman is pulling up to the house in the Porsche with their very sick father. Mission accomplished.
It's night time, and the boys are still up on the roof. Lois is standing outside in her bathrobe drinking a cup of tea and telling them to come down. They say they'll come down when she tells them what she's going to do. She says she'll tell them what she's going to do when they come down. It's a stand-off.
An offbeat, laugh track-lacking sitcom about a bizarrely dysfunctional family, the center of which is Malcolm, the middle of the two brothers who still live at home. His eldest (and favorite) sibling, Francis, boards at military school because his parents believe it will reform him and keep him out of trouble. Malcolm often has a hard time coping with his family life, but he has more troubles to contend with when he starts receiving special treatment at school after being diagnosed as an intellectually advanced genius. Malcolm in the Middle follows a dysfunctional family in an anonymous location. The family is headed by super-stressed supermom Lois, and eccentric child-at-heart Hal. The eldest son, Francis, once a wild youth, now lives on a ranch with his wife, Piama. Next in line is dimwitted ne'r-do-well Reece. Second youngest emerging genius and evil mind in the making Dewey, and baby Jamie, already a troublemaker, is the youngest. Smack in the middle is Malcolm, a moody certified genius who seems to be the only hope his family has. Since his discovery at the age of eleven, Malcolm has been his own worst enemy - though he'll tell you that his family is his worst enemy.
