Alice in Wonderland High by Rachel Shane Read Free Book Online Page A

mom in a prime spot below my bedroom window, long before my pathetic farming-lite failure. I had a better chance of growing boobs.
    â€œYou’re being too rigid with it, aligning everything in such neat rows.” Whitney patted the air in a line. “Plants don’t like that. They don’t like to be confined.”
    â€œAnd keep your mouth shut,” Kingston added, though the threat was unnecessary.
    â€œIgnore him,” Whitney told me. “He thinks he’s a girl and has the right to PMS.”
    Kingston kicked her seat hard and she let out an oof .
    â€œAnd just for that we’re listening to pop music on the way home.” Whitney fiddled with the dial until she found cheery singing on top of a catchy beat.
    â€œOh no. That punishes me, too!” Chess tried to turn the dial, but she slapped his hand away.
    I forced myself to push open the door.
    Chess rolled down his window. “You’re going to want to lie down. That green concoction? It sometimes causes dizziness.”
    â€œI thought you said—Should you be driving then?”
    â€œI’m a rebel.” He winked at me.
    I turned toward my house and released the smile I’d been harboring. I didn’t know what they were up to or what Chess had meant by doing things they couldn’t “brag about,” but I didn’t care. I just wanted to be part of it.

CHAPTER 5
    Once inside my room, I pressed myself against the height-measuring strip on my wall. Some girls obsessively weighed themselves. I’d been tracking my height since I started—or rather, halted—my growth spurt. I planted my feet flat, standing rigid like a soldier in a lineup. Instead of a one-handed salute to my officer, I lifted my right hand and held it level with my head.
    I marked my height, squeezed my eyes shut, and stepped away to see the result. One eye popped open.
    Four feet nine and three-quarter inches.
    I . . . shrank? How was that possible? The green liquid was making me hallucinate; that was the only plausible explanation. And in fact, I didn’t feel quite like myself. The giggles that were escaping my throat belonged to someone like Quinn, not me. I pressed my fingers to my temples and sank onto my bed. My eyes shifted to my French textbook, lying open, to my homework. I tugged it toward me and tried to concentrate on my lessons, translating the provided poem from English into French. Comment va le petit crocodile.
    I slammed the notebook shut. No, that wasn’t right at all. The word crocodile wasn’t even in the original English sentence. What was wrong with me? Had the green liquid turned me into someone else, someone not very bright? Like Quinn?
    That idea made about as much sense as Kingston wanting to turn back time by winding his watch. Whatever. I had to focus on my goal: finding a way into Whitney’s group by doing something to impress her.
    But what? I didn’t exactly have a year’s supply of paper lying around.
    The door slammed downstairs. My sister, Lorina. I wandered into the hallway, wobbling, and clutched the banister to keep my balance as I descended the stairs. My head felt light, as if it might float away from my neck at any moment. That drink was definitely strange. Might even win the award over Kingston for oddness.
    â€œAlice?” Lorina stuck her head into the living room. “I got petit fours on my way home.”
    Maybe food would help. Besides, I had a weakness for tiny desserts. Because as much as I hated to admit it, I adored anything that came in a small package. Like I shared some sort of solidarity with the travel-size toiletries sold in the neglected section of the drug store.
    Lorina gestured for me to follow her into the kitchen. She eased the lights to full blast, then lit a few candles so we could actually see each other. Ever since the nuclear-power plant had shut down a few years earlier, the ambience of most homes and buildings was permanently set