Winning Read Online Free PDF Page B

well.”
    â€œYes, but how?” I prod. “Do you have a fever? An upset stomach?”
    â€œI have a daughter who asks too many questions,” she spits back. “Please, just leave me alone.”
    â€œBut, it’s Thursday ,” I protest.
    â€œSo what? There’ll be another one next week.”
    Natalie rips open the package from the pharmacy. She wrestles with the amber-colored plastic bottle but in her current state of inebriation can’t seem to work out the childproof cap.
    â€œHere, let me,” I say. I take the bottle from her, open it, and shake a few blue pills into the palm of my hand. “One or two?”
    â€œThree,” she replies without hesitation.
    â€œThree?”
    â€œI haven’t had any today. And I haven’t slept more than a couple hours at a time in a week.”
    I hand over the pills. Natalie takes them with one last gulp of bourbon, slams the glass down, and stands. It takes her a second to find her balance, a problem she tries to mask by smoothing her pencil skirt. How she’s maintained such shapely calves in her current state of decay is beyond me.
    She walks over to me and lifts my chin with one hand. “Your mouth is naked,” she says. “Very lazy of you.”
    I knew I should have taken a few extra minutes to fix what Matt’s kiss ruined. You never know when Natalie’s going to turn back on. “Sorry,” I mumble.
    â€œI’m going to bed,” she informs me. “Oh, and you may want to rethink your usual Lean Cuisine for dinner. Those things are full of sodium and your face is looking puffy.”
    And with that, my once-beautiful pageant queen mother saunters off into the night.

SEVEN
Alexandra
    I decide to skip dinner altogether. Instead, I head to the basement and run five miles on the treadmill. It takes about fifteen minutes for the endorphins to kick in, but once they do, they set my brain on fire. I’ve always loved to run; that’s one thing my father and I had in common. When I was younger, we used to head over to Banning Park and race each other around the paved trails.
    But then the running trend hit Spencer, Indiana, and even Frick, that miserable frump, became a Couch to 5K convert. That’s when I took my running indoors. Now I do my miles in the basement instead of out in the open air. It’s not nearly as satisfying, but it saves me from having to make small talk with all of the sneakered sheep in this town.
    After a cold shower—great for the hair and skin—I settle in at the kitchen table with my laptop and check email. My in-box is clogged with the usual noise, including another request from Sloane Fahey to run lines together this weekend. It’s the third time she’s asked, and the third time I’ve hit delete withoutresponding. Ever since Mrs. Mays named her my understudy for Evita , Sloane has operated under the delusion that she can make demands of me. Clearly, she’s learned nothing since sophomore year.
    I put that little wannabe in her place once, and I can do it again. Only this time, I won’t be as kind.
    There’s also a message from Liz Brookover, the director of the Hoffman County Library, looking for a student to take over a story time program in the children’s room. I couldn’t care less about reading to a bunch of sticky, screaming toddlers. But what does interest me is the part about Brookover wanting to expand the program to the branch over on Williams Street—a small, run-down library that doesn’t even have a children’s collection.
    Craig and I were recently discussing the possibility of me changing my platform from the dangers of texting while driving to something with a little more heart. And just like that, I know exactly what my new platform will be: providing underprivileged youth with access to books. That shit is pageant gold .
    I dash off a quick application and send it to Brookover, along with a