She took in the yard. It looked like it had come straight out of a magazine, all of it, even the two girls in the pool, because they were young, suntanned, and happy. “Is Taylor your only child?” she asked.

“Oh gosh no,” said Brooke. Her expression said, What a question! Who would have only one child? Her voice said, “She’s my baby.”

“I see,” said Sherri, waiting.

“Alton is going to be a sophomore, and Ceci is going into eighth grade. Ceci went to Salisbury Beach with a friend, and Alton, well, who knows. Once they go into high school, you never see them again.” She waved her hand in the air like a magician, whisking her eldest child away.

High school was only three years away for Katie. The thought of never seeing Katie again in a mere three years filled Sherri with a brutal sort of rage and terror. She was not going to let that happen, she had only Katie left in the world. She looked at the pool. There was a diving board and a winding slide. Lined up on the side like soldiers awaiting orders were a series of brightly colored pool floats, not the cheap kind you have to blow up. These were made of thick, expensive foam. They looked like they were floating even when they were on the ground. The pool house had an indoor/outdoor bar with six stools, and Sherri could see an outdoor shower attached to one side of it. This outdoor shower was nicer than the indoor shower in hers and Katie’s current accommodations.

What she couldn’t see were the heads of two girls. The panic came over her in a flash and she jumped up from the chair and ran to the edge of the pool. The tile was dark gray, so you couldn’t make out what was under the surface.

“We’re having a contest,” said Taylor calmly, and Sherri saw that she had failed to notice Taylor sitting on the edge of the deep end of the pool, holding a phone. “To see who can stay under the longest. I’m timing her. I already lost.”

Now Sherri felt foolish. Obviously the girls were okay. And yet. Shouldn’t Katie have surfaced by now? Instead of abating, the terrible panic picked up strength and force. “Katie!” Sherri cried. A distant part of her noted the way her voice went up at the end in a kind of ridiculous shriek. Katie’s head broke the surface and she gasped for air. “Katie, I’m here!” said Sherri.

Katie was laughing. She was laughing, and Sherri thought she was dead. Sherri had been about to jump in the water after her.

“Two fifty-one,” said Taylor admiringly. “That’s the pool record.”

“Yessss,” said Katie, treading water with one hand, fist pumping with the other. “What was the old record?”

“Two twenty-nine,” said Taylor.