Read Online 100 Sideways Miles by Andrew Smith - Free Book Online

residents there would have to drive through the creek, which became impassable during heavy rainfall. Frequently, the people on the west bank would have to leave their cars along the shoulder of the highway and try to wade across the raging creek just to get to their homes.
    During a couple of the worst seasons, Dad and Mom actually took in what they called West Bank refugees who could not get to their homes. My mom and dad fed the stranded neighbors and allowed them to sleep in our house.
    There were no bridges here. I think people in the canyon pretty much gave up on the idea of civil engineering.
    â€œWell, it really stinks here. If we’re going to look at the second brightest moon in one hundred years, we should probably move away from dead things,” I said.
    â€¢Â â€¢Â â€¢
    â€œA century is about sixty billion miles,” I said.
    Julia Bishop was sixteen years old. Her skin was dark and smooth, and she had the most perfectly curved slender legs. I tried to devise some strategy that might allow me to casually touch them, just like Julia had touched my arm.
    The thought made my atoms feel very alive and aroused, not nearly like the fourteen-billion-year-old sourpusses I was used to.
    I was certain I’d never feel anything as flawless as Julia Bishop’s skin.
    But I was too afraid.
    We sat on the ground with our knees bent, at the edge of Julia’s yard. From our spot in a clearing between some dried Lydia brooms and spiny mesquite brush, we watched the moon as it rose higher into the sky above the canyon rim.
    â€œOh,” Julia said, “I can’t even imagine what sixty billion anythings would look like.”
    I thought about it.
    â€œNeither can I,” I said.
    Cade and Monica sat away from us, drinking. Cade had his arm around Monica, and occasionally I could hear the wet sounds of their kissing. I didn’t really get their relationship at all. Cade was athletic, smart, energetic, and high maintenance; Monica was quiet, brooding, and dissatisfied. Monica’s wardrobe came in one color: black. And she only listened to bands like the Smiths and the Cure. As far as I could tell, Cade and Monica had only one thing in common.
    It was a miracle they were still conscious, too. And they fully intended to have Julia drive us to Blake Grunwald’s party, where they would certainly drink more alcohol.
    That’s what kids do.
    â€œNot many people change schools in May,” I said. “Where did you come from?”
    Julia smiled. She was startlingly beautiful. I looked directly into her eyes and saw tiny moons floating in them.
    Twenty miles.
    Twenty miles.
    Then she said, “I came from up there.”
    Julia Bishop nodded toward the moon and stars.
    I said, “Oh, yeah. Well, you know, I guess we all did.”
    â€œNo.” Julia said, “I mean I came through a Lazarus Door, just like you.”
    â€œOh,” I said. It was a groan, actually.
    Lazarus Doors.
    This is the truth: In the book my father wrote, The Lazarus Door , the tiny, atom-size particles the angel-aliens came through to arrive at the endless orgy and dinner table of Planet Earth were called Lazarus Doors.
    â€œYou read that book too?” I said.
    â€œHasn’t everyone?” Julia asked.
    Cade Hernandez, now animated and enthusiastic, said, “I never read books. Sorry, Finner.”
    Then he burped and laughed.
    Monica Fassbinder said, “What book?”
    Here is another truth: My father once said to me that sometimes the smallest thing—a Lazarus Door–size idea—can force an entire book to squeeze out through it.
    Poof!
    I believed this.
    My father told me the inspiration for his book came from the scar on my back.

    Imagine that.
    Once they got here, the incomers from Dad’s novel decided to surgically remove their wings, in order to blend in better with human beings.
    Human beings were not very smart. We never have been, to be honest.
    One