BooksBarbecue
Back The Copycat Save as PDF
Chapters (68)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Chapter One
  7. Three
  8. Four
  9. Five
  10. Six
  11. Chapter Two
  12. Seven
  13. Eight
  14. Nine
  15. Chapter Three
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Chapter Four
  19. Twelve
  20. Thirteen
  21. Fourteen
  22. Chapter Five
  23. Fifteen
  24. Sixteen
  25. Chapter Six
  26. Seventeen
  27. Eighteen
  28. Nineteen
  29. Chapter Seven
  30. Twenty
  31. Twenty-One
  32. Twenty-Two
  33. Chapter Eight
  34. Twenty-Three
  35. Twenty-Four
  36. Twenty-Five
  37. Chapter Nine
  38. Twenty-Six
  39. Twenty-Seven
  40. Chapter Ten
  41. Twenty-Eight
  42. Twenty-Nine
  43. Thirty
  44. Thirty-One
  45. Chapter Eleven
  46. Thirty-Two
  47. Thirty-Three
  48. Thirty-Four
  49. Thirty-Five
  50. Chapter Twelve
  51. Thirty-Six
  52. Thirty-Seven
  53. Thirty-Eight
  54. Chapter Thirteen
  55. Thirty-Nine
  56. Forty
  57. Forty-One
  58. Forty-Two
  59. Chapter Fourteen
  60. Forty-Three
  61. Forty-Four
  62. Forty-Five
  63. Forty-Six
  64. Forty-Seven
  65. Chapter Fifteen
  66. The Following Summer
  67. About the Author
  68. About the Publisher

She pulled out her notebook and drafted a new category: Ali’s Rules for the Sloane Family Feud. She jotted down three points. A quick review told her they were a to-do list, not rules, so she drew a line through the heading and gave it a new title: Ali’s Plan to End the Sloane Family Feud. Satisfied, she closed the notebook, packed up her things, and headed for the exit. She’d follow interstellar boy and girl and find Alfie.

When she reached the cafeteria door, she paused. Was she ready to meet Alfie? Nope, at least not out of the blue like this. But how could she meet him in a natural way? Then she smiled. She’d use new school rule number eight: Join a club to meet people. She was about to learn how to debate.

ALI’S PLAN TO END THE SLOANE FAMILY FEUD

  1. Find out what started it.
  2. Meet Alfie Sloane.
  3. To be continued.

Four

Ali might not be ready to meet Alfie yet, but she did want to see him. She scanned every face she passed in the hallway for the rest of the day. But she was out of luck: no one looked like they could be her cousin. Based on the photograph, she imagined Alfie as a mirror image of herself—short, with dark frizzy hair and pale gray eyes like Digger’s that reminded you of tarnished silver. She was pleased to see interstellar boy and girl in her science class; it was like they connected her to Alfie. Had they found him at lunch? Based on the grumpy expression on interstellar girl’s face and the happy one on interstellar boy’s, she guessed yes. When the dismissal bell rang, she bolted, anxious to get home and tell Gigi and Digger about Alfie.

Unlike previous days, the fog hadn’t burned off. Some of it floated past her like wispy magic carpets, while fatter tufts settled into the trees. Its frigid tendrils wrapped her in a foggy coat, but she was too excited about her news to mind the cold. Half a block ahead, she spied the same boy she’d seen on the way to school. He still swung his knapsack and, like her, was surrounded by the creeping mist.

Digger was asleep when she arrived, stretched out on the Oriental carpet in front of the fireplace in the parlor. Except he wasn’t Digger; he was Digger’s favorite thing to change into: a black collie-Labrador retriever mix. Ali knew she was the only kid to arrive home from school to find her father’s tail wagging from a happy dream. She didn’t mind that he spent so much time as a dog. In fact, sometimes she preferred Digger the dog to the real Digger, because he was always cheerful when he was a dog.