The Puzzle Master by Heather Spiva Read Free Book Online Page B

thing ever. No parents, now no uncle, and a sick aunt who can’t do a thing. Sheesh , she’d be an orphan .
    He shook his head. “Iris, that won’t happen to you. It just can’t. God doesn’t do that.”
    “God does all sorts of things, Marshall. Good and bad.”
    Her dead parents, he thought. She’d been through some really bad stuff. No wonder why she always looked so serious and sad. She was sad. But they couldn’t do puzzles thinking about sad stuff. They’d never get them finished.
    “You can’t worry about that stuff Iris,” he said, changing the tone. “My mom always says that if a door closes, then a window will open.”
    “Like you sneaking out of your house?”
    He smiled. She was hilarious for having a sad life. “Yeah, just like that.”
    “Okay. I won’t worry about it.” She smiled and picked up a box. “Here’s a five hundred piece one. It’s a picture of a lighthouse, Portland Head, Maine.” She tossed in onto the floor in front of him.
    “Good.” Marshall opened it up and dumped out the pieces. “First, we find all the edge pieces, and work on connecting those together. They form the perimeter, see, and once that’s started, the whole thing starts to take shape. After that, we sort ‘ em by color, and from there, work in sections. You’ll see,” he said patting the floor.
    She sat down and tucked her hair behind her ears. “Yeah, I think I already do.”

Chapter 5: The Truth about Iris
     
    After the first day of school and Marshall ’s run in with the “girlfriend issue” easing, the three amigos left him alone. Every now and then, they would see Iris and him walking together to class, and a whistle or two would follow. But because they ignored him, the teasing stopped.
    On Friday after school, Iris and Marshall went to Luke’s. They ate a snack, while Luke showed them a huge television someone had dropped off, and then they finished the first puzzle. It only took them an hour, and when they finished, they both stared at it. The lighthouse stared back at them, looking silent and beautiful.
    “Wouldn’t it be great if we could actually go inside the puzzle?” asked Iris. She was on her knees, peering into the picture. The lighthouse they’d assembled was grand, covered with white and red paint. The rocks below it glistened in the sun with the water running over them back to the sea. It looked like water easing down a dragon’s crusty spine.
    “Who says we can’t?” said Marshall, pleased she had an imagination.
    “Okay then, so we can.” Iris sat back onto her bottom and crossed her legs. “I’m the lighthouse keeper, and I live in this part of the house,” she said pointing to the picture, where the main house met the lighthouse.
    “And what about me?” asked Marshall, wondering how she was sucking him into this dream world.
    “Then we’re both lighthouse keepers, and we take turns on our shifts manning the light. The house part of it is huge, and we run through it at night playing hide and seek when we get a break from duty.”
    “As long as I get to hide first,” Marshall said. He took a drink of his chocolate milk. He crooked his head. “Bet that place saw some nasty ship wrecks over the years.”
    “That’s why there’s a lighthouse silly, so they don’t have shipwrecks.”
    “What if it’s a really foggy night and the captain can’t see the shore?”
    “They have sonar, and radar, and satellite stuff now,” Iris said, straight to the point. “I lived near one in the bay, Point Bonita Lighthouse. But, they don’t even have lighthouse keepers anymore, it’s like the towers are ghosts, vanishing castles. It’s kind of sad.”
    Marshall nodded. “But this lighthouse is still stuck in the past,” he said with a smile, “We’re keepers from back in time.”
    “Oh, right,” agreed Iris. “You know, I would have to get out there and rescue the captain,” she said, pointing to the boat in the water, precariously close to the craggy