Alice Next Door Read Online Free PDF

could think of was Miss O’Herlihy, and telling the teacher was too sad for words. So I didn’t tell anyone.
    Melissa had sprained her arm on Saturday, and everyone was fussing over her so much that shedidn’t get a chance to tease me about the petition. Fingers crossed, I thought, with any luck she’ll forget about it altogether.
    *  *  *
    And so a few weeks went by, boring, just like before. As usual, Alice e-mailed me every few days. I wanted to send her a message every day but Mum wouldn’t let me. She said that would make me seem desperate. I was desperate of course, but I couldn’t tell Mum that. She’d only have started one of those serious talks I hated. And I couldn’t sneak a message without Mum knowing because she won’t tell me the password for the computer. She thinks the Internet is a dangerous place for kids. When she said that, Dad said the world is a dangerous place anyway and why not just lock me up in an ivory tower altogether and be done with it. Then Mum gave Dad one of her not-in-front-of-the-children looks and that was the end of that.
    Alice and I took turns to phone each other onSaturdays. I never had much to say. Alice always had lots. She was making friends. She mentioned Janine a few times. Even though I was glad for Alice, I couldn’t help feeling a bit jealous too. Sometimes she mentioned her secret plan, but I pretended not to be interested, even though I was dying with curiosity.
    Then, just before Halloween, I got the e-mail I was waiting for.
    Dear Meg,
    The best news ever ever ever!!!!!! I’m coming home at Halloween. Jamie can’t come because he has a soccer match (yippee!) so it will be just me and Dad. I’ll be coming down on the train. And I can see you every day. It’ll be fantastic. Mum says I can stay for three days. She said it would be unsettling to stay for longerthan that … I didn’t argue too much, because of THE PLAN. I can’t say any more in case anyone else reads this. Does your mum read your messages? Mine doesn’t, but that’s only because she still can’t work the computer. (Let’s hope she never learns.) Anyway, I’ll e-mail you again soon, and I’ll see you in sixteen days. I can’t wait.
    Al xxxxxx
    Those sixteen days were very long. It felt more like sixteen hundred days. Every night I crossed off another day on the calendar over my desk in my bedroom. Mum said that wouldn’t make them go any faster, and she was right, but I continued anyway. I hadn’t anything else to do.
    At last it was the Friday of mid-term. I was so happy, I felt like shouting and screaming anddancing out of school. (Of course I didn’t do it. Melissa and her buddies would never ever let me forget something like that.) Even so, I found myself giving an odd little skip every now and then as I walked home.
    When I got home I changed out of my uniform , and hung it in the wardrobe, shoving it right to the back. After all, I wouldn’t be wearing it again for ten more wonderful, happy, Melissa-free days. I put on my best jeans and the top Mum bought me on the day Alice had left. Then I sat in my room and waited. I tried to read my new Jacqueline Wilson book, but I couldn’t concentrate . I was reading the words and turning the pages, but I had no idea what was happening in the story.
    It was a long wait. It was nearly six o’clock before I heard Alice’s dad’s car stopping outside. I ran out to the front door. Alice was just getting out of the car. I hadn’t seen her for five whole weeks. She looked just the same. She had a newdenim jacket, and great new jeans.
    ‘Meg!’ she shouted, when she saw me, and she ran over to me. We even hugged.
    Her dad smiled. ‘Oh, hello, Megan. I see you two are glad to see each other. Would you like to come inside with Alice for a while?’
    I knew Mum would give out to me later for ‘invading their privacy’, but I didn’t care.
    ‘I’d love to thanks,’ I said. Alice put her arm around me and we went inside.
    It was funny