diff --git a/presto-common/src/main/java/com/facebook/presto/common/block/VariableWidthBlockEncoding.java b/presto-common/src/main/java/com/facebook/presto/common/block/VariableWidthBlockEncoding.java
index 04411e1caa49a..fff137eb2de68 100644
--- a/presto-common/src/main/java/com/facebook/presto/common/block/VariableWidthBlockEncoding.java
+++ b/presto-common/src/main/java/com/facebook/presto/common/block/VariableWidthBlockEncoding.java
@@ -68,7 +68,8 @@ public Block readBlock(BlockEncodingSerde blockEncodingSerde, SliceInput sliceIn
         boolean[] valueIsNull = decodeNullBits(sliceInput, positionCount).orElse(null);
 
         int blockSize = sliceInput.readInt();
-        Slice slice = sliceInput.readSlice(blockSize);
+        Slice slice = Slices.allocate(blockSize);
+        sliceInput.readBytes(slice);
 
         return new VariableWidthBlock(0, positionCount, slice, offsets, valueIsNull);
     }