Mira sat at the wheel of the sweltering car, mime-driving. From the handbook, she now knew where every control was, from the hazard lights to the wiper, and in theory could back the car out of the driveway without running anyone over. In theory, she could zoom off, if only Rosie would tell her where she’d hidden the keys. She’d drive to San Francisco, then on to Portland and across the border to be a fugitive in Canada, where she’d trade in the Camry for a hybrid and live amongst the multiethnic street punks of British Columbia.

In the rearview mirror, she glimpsed a man in a hooded sweater standing on the porch of the darkened house across the street, the Ireland house, peering through its windows. He was nobody she recognized and from where she was, it was hard to describe him beyond adult male, darkly Caucasian. The lack of details frustrated her: she made a ritual of memorizing faces in case she was ever invited to point someone out in a lineup. At dusk, everything and everyone looked as hazy as a gas station surveillance tape.

The man looked at his watch, rapped on the door, rang the bell several times, waited for a response and got none. That solitary Kate woman clearly wasn’t in. Her car wasn’t in the driveway and none of the house lights were even on. The man walked down the front steps and disappeared around the side of the house. He was probably one of those hoodie burglars! Mira kept a close watch through the rearview mirror, expecting him to reappear at any second with a sack of jewelry or a flat-screen TV. Then she’d bust him.

Her foot pumped the accelerator anxiously, and in her mind she plotted out the quickest route to the phone and what she would say to the cops. Where were those stupid police choppers now that she needed them?

RAT-a-tat! Knuckles on the passenger window.

It was him! Her mind went blank, her amazing improv abilities lost to panic. He started walking over to the driver’s side, her side. She shut her door and locked it.

“Hi there?” the man said. He sounded muffled on the other side of the glass. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

She said nothing and just stared at his face, which seemed so ordinary that it defied description. Brownish hair. Gray hoodie. The big arms of somebody who owned a gym membership. He knocked on her window again, more softly this time.

“Do you speak English?”

She nodded, keenly insulted.

“Mind rolling down your window? I want to talk to you.”

She thought it over. He looked harmless enough, and besides, if he tried anything, she could sound the horn and her mother or Rosie would come running. She lowered the window. He casually reached in, unlocked her door and pulled it open. Now he saw her legs; she saw his.