Read Online Perfect Family by Pam Lewis - Free Book Online

most of the work. Mira was pretty worthless. She was too vain to be any help. She more hung on the raft than pushed, keeping her shoulders well out of the water so her gelled hair would stay dry and her polished black fingernails wouldn’t break.
    â€œGod forbid you should flatten your spikes,” Tinker said.
    â€œGod forbid you should lighten up,” Mira said.
    Pony’s first job was to keep a line of sight to the shore, the water, and some set of indicators she used to approximate where the anchor hook was. “Stop!” she called out, and they stopped while Pony peered down. Tinker thought she couldn’t see a thing in that dark water, but Pony had her ways. “Okay,” she said. She waved at the rest of the family on the shore—Mark and their father, Andrew and Isabel. Tinker wished she’d just hurry up. It was so cold. The anchor chain was coiled high in one corner. Pony pushed it over with her foot. She let it play out and then she slipped into the water and was gone. She had to find the eye down there and hook the chain to it. They waited. After perhaps a minute, she burst to the surface and everybody cheered.
    After the raft was secured, they swam to shore, and this was the part that rankled, even now, when it was so wrong of Tinker to think this way. It was the way her father wrapped a big towel around Pony as though she was the only one who’d done anything, as though noneof the rest of them were cold and wet and miserable from being in the water so long.
    Tinker checked her watch. She went into the kitchen to double-check the time on the stove clock. Ten past. The bus should have come by now. Why hadn’t she heard it? She felt alarm, the panicky vision of something terrible happening to Isabel. She went outside. Their house was set sideways to the road, so the front door opened onto the driveway. She was barefoot and had to step carefully along the drive to the point where she could see down to the bus stop. Down at the corner, the Vance kids were playing on their lawn. Isabel always came right home. It was the rule. No loitering.
    â€œIsabel?” she called. The kids stopped playing. “Is Isabel with you?” she shouted.
    One of the kids shook his head.
    â€œDid she get off the bus?”
    She was seized by terror. Those damn kids weren’t listening. She screamed louder. “Did Isabel get off the bus with you?”
    The same boy nodded and went back to playing.
    Now Tinker had to scream Isabel’s name at the top of her lungs. The neighbor across the street came to her door and looked out.
    â€œI’m here, Mama.” Isabel was suddenly, miraculously, on the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street, several houses up from theirs. Just standing calmly in her yellow dress, holding her book bag by one strap. Why hadn’t Tinker seen her? A car was parked close to where Isabel stood. A man was in it. He was looking out his window at Tinker, his face obscured by a baseball cap and sunglasses. She stared at him. He stared back for a fleeting second. She tried to put it together. Had Isabel been talking to him? Tinker charged toward the car. “Hey!” she said. “You!” The man rolled up his window. He took off at a high speed before she even thought to look at the license plate.
    â€œWho was that?” Tinker shouted at Isabel. She didn’t care who heard her. “Were you talking to him?”
    â€œNo,” Isabel said.
    â€œDid he do something?”
    Isabel’s eyes were huge. She was frightened, backing away from Tinker as if her mother might hit her, but Tinker had never hit her daughter, ever.
    â€œAnswer me!”
    â€œNo,” Isabel said again, petulance creeping in.
    â€œWho was he? What did he want?” Tinker was still shouting.
    â€œNothing,” Isabel said. Tinker had to take a breath. Calm down. A couple of neighbors had come out on their front lawns, drawn by the commotion. She