Beautiful Lies Read Online Free PDF Page A

seems to cheer him. He adds, as though I care, “After Paul McCartney’s first wife.” Charlie loves the Beatles.
    “Jeff, wait. She’s worried about her sister. Rachel,” my aunt says, scooting over on the wide sofa, making room for me. “Come here.”
    I shake my head. “No. You need to call the police.”
    “The police?” She stares at me. “She’s been gone less than an hour. Sweetie, come on. What are the police going to do? Alice is eighteen.” But my aunt can see how upset I am. “Jeff?” she asks. “What do you think? Should we go look for her?”
    My uncle is eating a handful of Charlie’s popcorn now, chewing while he speaks. “If Alice can figure out how to turn back the odometer on my sports car, then I’m sure she can take care of herself for an evening.”
    I’m almost crying. “Uncle Jeff, this isn’t funny. Please listen. I know something happened.”
    Charlie blinks at me. “How do you know, Rachel?”
    “I know because … because I just
do.
I can feel it. It’s like one second she was there, and then she was gone. I mean
gone.
Please,” I beg, “call the police. Tell them she’s missing. Say we can’t find her. They’ll know what to do. They can put out a bulletin, or search the fair, or—”
    “Rachel, your sister has a criminal record. Honey, the police won’t look for her yet. You need to calm down.” My aunt’s gaze flickers back to the Muppets.
    Ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-dum,
my heart thumps. I’m sweating. “If you won’t call the police, then I will.”
    “What?” She seems alarmed by the idea. “Rachel, please don’t do that. Think about this for a minute. Alice disappears. It’s what she
does.
” My aunt has little patience for behavior that is anything besides orderly and whatever she considers “normal.” Her own mother—my grandma—is certifiably crazy, which made for a miserable childhood for my aunt and mother; my grandma had a hard time functioning from day to day, and she’s had more than a few stints in institutions, even when her daughters were young. My mom got over it eventually, but Aunt Sharon never has.
    “Alice didn’t run away this time.” I can’t explain to them how I know, though. They wouldn’t understand any of it. Even
I
don’t understand it, not completely. All I know is that I can’t feel her anymore. Our connection has been replaced by a messy sense of dread that fills my whole body, seeping into the space around me.
    My aunt and uncle exchange a look, communicating with their eyes, the way people who have been married for a long time can do.
    “Okay, Rach,” my uncle finally says, “if Alice doesn’t come home tonight, we’ll call the police in the morning. In the meantime, why don’t you get in touch with a few of your friends? See if any of them ran into her.”
    “Fine.” My voice trembles. My fingertips are numb. “I’m going upstairs.”

    In our room on the third floor, I sit cross-legged on my bed, staring at my phone for a long time, willing it to ring. Willing it to be her, calling to say she’s all right.
    Alone in the room, I look around, trying to take some comfort in the familiar surroundings. My sister’s bed, against the back wall of the house, is unmade as usual. Heaps of our clothing litter the floor. An easel sits beside the front window, holding a work in progress. It’s a charcoal drawing of Robin, started weeks ago, abandoned when the relationship got messy. The walls are covered with sketches. Some of them are random objects—books and buildings and household things, studies from long hours spent after school in the art room. Lots of them are of Charlie, who is an excellent model. A few others depict a smiling young girl with a small gap between her top front teeth. I don’t know her name or whoshe is, but there must be at least a dozen sketches of her in our room alone. In the lower-right corner of every drawing, so small you could barely see them, are the initials A.E.F. A talent for art