I Kissed Shara Wheeler: Chapters 15–19

by Casey McQuiston
High school senior Chloe Green has been working hard to become the valedictorian of Willowgrove Christian Academy, so when her main competition, Shara Wheeler, suddenly disappears, she is determined to find her and prove that the honor has been fairly earned.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Chapters 1–3, Chapters 4–9, Chapters 10–14, Chapters 15–19, Chapters 20–25
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. herald
    foreshadow or presage
    She’s throwing back the last can from her emergency espresso stash when she hears the heralding clangs of Georgia’s water bottle against the nearby lockers.
  2. flounce
    walk in an emphatic or exaggerated way
    They don’t talk for the rest of class, and when the bell rings for lunch, Georgia flounces out with Ash, and Chloe stomps off toward the gym.
  3. precariously
    in a manner affording no ease or reassurance
    Up in Rory’s live oak tree, Jake and April are splitting a party-size cardboard tray of nachos, which is balanced so precariously on the bough between them that Chloe makes a point not to stand under it.
  4. consolidate
    bring together into a single whole or system
    Willowgrove likes to consolidate AP exams and senior finals into the same week of early May, so next week is going to be hell, even if the finals for her AP classes are all perfunctory take-home exams that double as reviews for the real tests.
  5. perfunctory
    as a formality only
    Willowgrove likes to consolidate AP exams and senior finals into the same week of early May, so next week is going to be hell, even if the finals for her AP classes are all perfunctory take-home exams that double as reviews for the real tests.
  6. ornate
    marked by complexity and richness of detail
    It’s a necklace, with a thin, ornate charm: a diamond-studded crucifix.
  7. buff
    polish and make shiny
    She watched Shara hesitate briefly, biting one of her buffed pink nails with shiny white teeth before she swept her hair over one shoulder and unclasped the chain at the nape of her neck.
  8. underscore
    draw a line or lines underneath to call attention to
    They underscore the last three words, setting them apart for emphasis.
  9. squat
    having a low center of gravity; built low to the ground
    Wooden piers separate twenty individual slips, wrapping in a U shape around a squat boathouse that’s closed for the night.
  10. infernal
    characteristic of or resembling Hell
    Now, waiting under the moon in the fifteenth slip, Shara looks like she tumbled right out of Chloe’s memory. Mostly because, for some infernal reason, she’s still wearing her prom dress.
  11. bodice
    part of a dress above the waist
    The hem of her dress is gray with dirt, and when she turns to face Chloe again, Chloe sees popped stitches at the juncture of the bodice and the skirt.
  12. monotony
    the quality of wearisome constancy and lack of variety
    “It does get boring in here.”
    “You know how else you could break the monotony of living on a boat?”
  13. baron
    a very wealthy or powerful businessman
    You wasted a whole month of my life on your demented scavenger hunt that wasn’t even going anywhere, while you’ve been luxuriating on a yacht like an oil baron—
  14. impassive
    having or revealing little emotion or sensibility
    She looks up at Chloe, face impassive.
  15. fraught
    filled with or attended with
    Chloe is definitely not attending Smith and Rory’s emotionally fraught MarioKart session tonight.
  16. afghan
    a blanket knitted or crocheted in strips or squares
    Chloe remembers the smell of...cinnamon air freshener, the hand-knit green and orange afghan on the armchair where her grandma would sit and watch tiny Chloe read Redwall during her few childhood trips to Alabama.
  17. conservative
    having social or political views favoring the right wing
    Her grandma was mostly conservative, but a dogged commitment to Southern hospitality meant she was kind to everyone if they were her neighbor or her company.
  18. iteration
    the act or process of doing or saying again
    She knows for a fact that her mom put a blue streak in her hair with bleach and Kool-Aid and told three friends from woodshop that she liked girls, and that, when the secret got out, the Willowgrove rumor factory stamped out a hundred iterations like candy bars.
  19. clavicle
    bone linking the scapula and sternum
    She’s wearing a baggy old T-shirt with a hole in the collar, tugged over on one side so that her collarbone pokes out. Again with the clavicles.
  20. legacy
    an applicant with a relative who attended the same school
    As far back as I can remember, everybody told me I was pretty, I was perfect, I was a legacy, so I decided to be that, because it made my parents like me better and it made me feel safe.
  21. askew
    turned or twisted to one side
    He looks absolutely awful. Hair askew, shirt buttoned wrong, dark circles under his eyes, all in all like a man who had a terrible weekend and is now having a terrible Monday.
  22. heady
    marked by defiant disregard for danger or consequences
    It’s bright, heady expectation, like she knew it was only a matter of time until this happened.
  23. indignant
    angered at something unjust or wrong
    And then she storms off.
    That’s new. Not the running away part—that’s Shara’s thing—but the indignant way she looked at Chloe before she did it, like Chloe had betrayed her, somehow.
  24. polymer
    a naturally occurring or synthetic compound
    A dozen lockers down, Ash is cramming their art kit—basically a fishing tackle box of polymer clay and googly eyes—into their locker.
  25. despot
    a cruel and oppressive dictator
    Enlightened despot? Probably how Shara sees herself but no. Would be really helpful if European history were less horrifying.
  26. sacrament
    a formal religious ceremony conferring a specific grace
    “The Institutes of Christian Religion,” Shara asks.
    “Written by John Calvin, 1536. Says the Bible is the only source of Christian doctrine and that there are only two sacraments: baptism and communion.”
  27. defenestration
    the act of throwing someone or something out of a window
    “Defenestration of Prague.”
    “1618,” Chloe says. “Protestants threw a bunch of Catholic officials out of a castle window in Bohemia. Started the Thirty Years War.”
  28. waif
    a person, especially a young woman, who is extremely thin
    She’s a waif flouncing around Dracula’s candlelit manor with her neck out, sighing, “Ohhhh noooo, look at my poor exposed and vulnerable arteries, wouldn’t it be absolutely tragic if someone were to come along and slurp them?”
  29. heathen
    a person who does not acknowledge your god
    Her mama is already singing “Papa Don’t Preach” under her breath. Chloe unclasps the necklace and gathers the chain in her hand. “See? Still the heathen you raised.”
  30. feral
    wild and menacing
    Chloe recoils, choking it out onto the grass—the cardstock slices the corner of her mouth, which is perfect, really, what is Shara if not a papercut in the mouth corner of Chloe’s existence—and with a feral sort of yowl, she bites Shara’s finger.
Created on Mon Apr 10 11:31:20 EDT 2023 (updated Thu Jun 01 14:25:21 EDT 2023)

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