Chapter 1

It was cold outside. I was dressed simply, not enough to protect me from the evil New York weather. Even the car heater couldn't keep me from shivering a bit. I had a lot of time to think. This car was moving two miles per hour at the most, because of traffic, and the airport was quite far.

My older sister, Mercedes, looked back at me. "Hey, Jen, London's gonna be fun." I glared at her. Gee, Mer, thanks. Remind me of that little fact. You always know exactly the wrong thing to say.

"Was that supposed to make me feel better? You're lucky because he's not your father. Mom, why couldn't Marie go, too?" I asked, pouting slightly.

"Just because your sister is in remission, does not mean that her cancer can't come back, Jennifer. It's dangerous and Alexander wouldn't know what to do with her," my mother, Belle Jude Milan, said. My father was Alexander Gavin. He left right after Marie was diagnosed with leukemia at the age of two. I was four. Mercedes had a different dad. He's in Iraq. When he decided to join the army, mom divorced him. Guess she didn't take the news too well. He comes to visit once every two years. He's nice enough.

Well, my father decided he wanted to spend some "quality time" with his two daughters. Instead, it's just me going. Don't get me wrong; I've always wanted to go to England—Europe is beautiful. But, I never wanted to be stuck with him. This is going to be the worst winter break in the history of winter breaks. It's been a tradition, ever since 9/11, for us girls to go to Times Square to watch the ball drop on New Year's, but not this year.

"Mom, please don't start with that again. Listen, I promise to be good, for your sake."

"Thank you, sweetheart. Oh, and do not tell him about your tattoo under any circumstances!"

"Alright, mom, I wasn't planning to anyways, so don't worry." On my fifteenth birthday, my best friend, Josie, and I went to Pablo's Tattoo and Piercing Place, and I got a small white dove tattooed on the back of my neck. My mom almost killed me, but she's okay with it now, after being grounded for 3 months.

Josie Lynn McGomery. We've been best friends since we were five, I stole her ham sandwich and the rest is history. She and I are complete opposites. She is tall, 5'10 tall, while I'm about 10 inches shorter. Her grades were perfect, she was gorgeous, with her blonde curly hair and blue eyes, she was a perfect daughter, and she was popular. Being friends with her got me to be popular, too, but I didn't have the 'it' factor, whatever 'it' was. I was the normal one, everyone knew that. I always tried my best in school, and my grades were As and Bs—not all As. I bothered my mom way more than I should, and I wasn't gorgeous—far from it. Josie was superficial, yes, and kind of selfish, but she was sweet and I've known her forever. She was in England, too, with her aunt Lee, and she was only ten minutes away from my father's house. It was the only good thing in this whole trip of bullshit. She went every Christmas Break and summer vacation to stay with her aunt. Oh, I was so expecting the beast tour that girl had even given anyone in her freaking life.

The flight attendant on Flight 1425 to London, England from New York, New York escorted me to my seat. Window seat. It was a long flight, astraddle a 747's wing, banshee engines screaming, babies fussing, elderly seatmate complaining. Flying made me nauseous. I got nauseous when the screens showed movies that I'd seen three times before, seat belts signs denied pee breaks, and first class smelled like real food. Pretzels? For this ticket price?

My iPod blared music loudly. My neighbor looked towards me and then his gave traveled to the iTouch in my hands. He shook his head and turned towards his wife mumbling something I couldn't hear.

My eyes were drooping unwillingly. The attendant was offering us something to drink. I took nothing. Unavoidably, I fell asleep.

My eyes opened when there were only twenty minutes left of flying. I was exhausted and my neck was cramping from staying in an uncomfortable position when I slept. Great! Twenty more minutes until I have to see my father. I've been thinking to myself sarcastically a lot, lately. I opened the blinds from the window to see the sun barely shining through the thick glass. I popped my ears and looked down towards my yellow G-Shock, 6:03.

I leaned my head against the window and tried to spot anything underneath. Unfortunately, I was still met with white, fluffy clouds. I sighed. I hadn't realized how tired I really was before. I guess I was just nervous. My iPod, whose battery wasted completely was tucked away into my purse, along with a Vanity Fair magazine I had spotted in the pocket of the seat in front of me. I hadn't bothered to turn on my phone. My reception was crappy anyways.

I wish something interesting happens in England. I want an adventure, and I really hope my father is not included. My wish was simple and selfish. I sat straight against my seat; the pilot had just stated we were landing.

It was a bumpy landing. Some girl up front screamed, and I rolled my eyes at how bitchy—how Regina George—it sounded.*

Baggage claim took forever. I stood there for fifteen minutes until I finally saw the bags come through. I picked up my one, large, orange suitcase, and I walked to where my dad was waiting for me.

He was tall; huge. I recognized him instantly. He had broad shoulders and my same dirty blonde hair and hazel eyes. Marie and Mer look like mom, brunettes with green eyes. I walked slowly to where he was standing and I hesitated before speaking.

"Alexander Gavin?"

He looked down towards me. "Jennifer? My God, Jen, is that really you? My, God you've gotten so big. Your mom raised you right?" He had a small accent.

"Yes, it's really me. And yes, she raised me right. Not that you would know, since you were never there." Oh, yeah. I can be a bitch.

He looked excessively uncomfortable.

"Um, yes, well, let's get to the house so you can meet Mildred." I didn't even bother asking who Mildred was. I really did not care about this man's life. The only way you could tell we were related was our looks, but that's it. We were nothing alike, I could tell already. He had a calm demeanor—the kind that you would see in people right before they're about to crack. I, on the other hand, had a spit-fire personality. You messed with me, I fucked you over (no, not like that, perverts).

The car was funny looking.

His house had two floors. It looked fancy, completely affordable to an engineer. He called 'Joey', his butler and he took my purse and suitcase to the guest bedroom. The living room was first and it was decorated tastefully, dark mahoganies and other shades of red and brown. The furniture looked expensive. The kitchen was next, and I noticed two people in it. Two girls to be exact.

"Mildred, Maggie? This is my daughter, Jennifer," my dad said. They both turned. They were most definitely sisters. They looked exactly alike. Same short, curly red hair and blue eyes framed by thick black glasses. Their noses were long and pointy and their features were very angular.

"HI, I'm Mildred," the taller one of the two said, "and this is my daughter, Magdalene." Daughter? Wow, so the plastic surgery did work. I shook her hand a tried a hand at a polite smile. The two of them looked like your typical selfish, back-stabbing slut faced ho-bags, but in reality, they were so much more than that. After dad left to finish something work related, the insults wouldn't stop. Really, what were they? Ten?

After about an hour, I really was pissed. My fist clenched and unclenched, until finally I turned around and punch one of them—I really didn't care which—right in the middle of their face. Before I could see their reaction, even though it would be funny, I ran through the front door and turned some random way. I ended up in a small park, a little forest off to the edge. I walked towards the swings. It was rusty, by I still sat. Fresh air always did me good.

"Jennifer?" I heard someone say behind me. I stood and turned around, seeing Josie standing there, smiling. I smiled widely, and went to hug her. She hugged back and started talking.

"When did you get here? How long have you been here? Why aren't you with your dad? What happened?"

"Whoa! Jo, one question at a time!" I giggled at her. "I got here about two hours ago. I met my stepmom, or future stepmom. Or maybe not. I kind of punched either her or her daughter."

"Your dad has a girlfriend and she has a daughter and you punched one of them?" Jo said, confirming what I had just told her. I just nodded. "…Why?"

"Women were probably PMS-ing. Really, those two scum-sucking road whores were the epitome of bitches everywhere."

Josie laughed, which caused me to laugh, too. She grabbed my wrist, and dragged me towards the little forest.

"Why are we going there?" I asked, suddenly cautious.

"Curiousness. I heard it was haunted. About a year ago, this girl went in. After a few hours, she didn't come out. It isn't exactly big, so a couple of people went inside to look inside. They found one of her sneakers, or something like that, but the rest of her was gone. I've always wanted to go inside. Besides, I have this feeling that we should go in there. Don't you?" Now that she mentioned it, I did feel a faint tugging in my chest, not of fear, but of excitement.

"Curiosity killed the car, Jo," I told her, quoting the famous adage.

She looked at me with raised eyebrows. "What? I never said no," I said, smiling at her, a giggle escaping.

Two hours later, we were lost. In the dark. In the middle of a stupid forest. Josie's death was closer than she thought.

"Shit, shit, shit! My dad's really going to kill me now," I said, biting my lower lip, something I always did when I was nervous.

"Relax! Your dad is not going to kill you. I'm sure we can find our way back in an hour or so." Her tone started out reassuring, but I could hear the panic rising.

We were fucking screwed. The pulling moved down to my stomach. Something was going to happen. I didn't know what, but something.

We kept wandering and after an "hour or so", I was exhausted.

"Jo, can we rest for a while? I am too tired." My feet were killing me. This forest sure seemed smaller from the park.

"For a little while, though. We still have to figure a way out." I agreed and sat down, leaning against a large tree and closed my eyes.

"Don't fall asleep." Josie sounded far away, although she had just taken a seat next to me.

I yawned. "I'm not. I'm just resting my eyes."

My yawn was contagious, it seemed. "Good."

When I heard Josie's slight snoring a few minutes later, sleep overtook me.

I woke up when I heard a roar. My heart was pounding hard against my skin and my breath was erratic. Just a dream, Jennifer. It was just a dream that you just don't remember. The roar seemed pretty real. When I finally got all of my senses back , I realized it was daytime, which was odd, considering the fact that I knew I hadn't slept that long.

I glanced at Josie and noticed she was fast asleep, as still as a brick.

"Jo. Josie, wake up. Come on, it's really late," I said.

"Of course it's late, Sherlock. It's still night time. Let me sleep," she mumbled groggily.

"Well, of course it's still night time, Sherlock. That's why the sun's up." My sarcastic comment made her eyes open wide. She squinted when her eyes met the sun's harsh rays.

"What the hell?" she said, and shifted her gaze to her white G-Shock.

"Jen, why is the sun up when it's only 5:30 in the morning?" Josie asked, her eyes wide and scared.

I took a look at my own watch and saw that it was, in fact, 5:30 am. However, it looked as if it were noon or one in the afternoon.

"Ok…That's…fucking weird," I said, not able to hold my sailor mouth. I glanced at my watch once more to check the time again.

"What is going on?" Josie growled in frustration.

"Yeah, Jo, ask me. Because, you know, obviously, I know what happened."

"Funny, Jen. Oh, I got it! What if we got transported into a different world?" Josie asked, smiling widely.

I hesitated to answer. "How…Alice in Wonderland, don't you think?" I asked. "However, this does not look like a Tim Burton movie set. I mean, I don't see Johnny Depp anywhere."

"Funny, again. Really, do you have a profession in sarcasm?" Josie still sounded extremely freaked out.

"I'm not too sure. You tell me."

"How about you tell me who you are?" I heard from behind me. I turned around, expecting to see the worst, but sighed in relief when I didn't see anything.

"Um, Jen, did you say something?" Jo asked, her voice an octave or two higher.

"No, I was kind of hoping you did." Josie shook her head.

"Hey! Down here!"

I turned once more and looked down. There was a beaver there.

"Aw! What a cutie," Josie said smiling, and reaching over slowly to pat it.

"Don't ever call me a 'cutie' ever again in your natural born life," the beaver said. …The beaver? Holy cow brains! A fucking beaver just talked! Oh, Jesus, I finally lost it.

As much as I felt like screaming my poor little lungs out, I didn't. My eyes widened and my mouth dropped slightly in shock.

"Jen," Josie said, "I think you were right. This is more like Wonderland, than anything."

"Well, Wonderland or not, we sure ain't in Kansas anymore," I said, gulping loudly.

"I don't know what you're bloody talking about, but you're in Narnia."

Tell me if you like it! This is the official first chapter of this story and I know what's going to happen in the next one. This takes place about 4 years after LWW, which you're going to find out later on. Alright, so THANK YOU to all who reviewed (yes, even your Charlene -.-) and thank you Kathryn for the amazing tips. Melanie, Juliet'lovestory, Noele, and TaylorOphelia—thank you guys too :) Your support is greatly appreciated.

Review please, and tell me your opinion.