Falling for the Babysitter

Chapter 1

1

Remy

The trash smells disgusting. “God, did something crawl in there and die?” my friend Clara says beside me as I wheel the trashcan out to the curb. She’s stayed over for horror movie night, a monthly tradition we’ve held since we were twelve.

I hold my breath, face scrunched up tight. “Yeah, whatever that thing was my mom tried to feed us last night.”

“What was that?” Clara says.

“Tofu.”

“Is that some kind of bird, because if it is, it should be hunted until it’s extinct.”

I laugh. Poor Clara. Her family is strictly meat and potatoes. She never even saw a Brussel sprout until we met. She thought it was the cutest little baby cabbage until she actually tried it. Now she calls them devil warts.

“It’s made from soy beans, I think.”

off the cement as the day warms up. The sky, with its layers of vibrant orange and

with a hiss that startles me at first before I realize what made that sound. We have to sprint across the lawn in bare feet to get to the newspaper before it’s ruined. No

water droplets when I hear the deep rumble of a pickup truck. I watch as it pulls into Sam’s—my neighbor’s—driveway. But my neighbor drives a Toyota Prius, so I know it’s not

to exit the vehicle. Then Deacon steps out of the driver’s side

my god,” I say, standing

neighbor’s house. “Holy shit,

is. Don’t stare!” I grab her by the

talking,”

“We are talking.”

I can stare without being obvious I’m staring,” I say as I watch him over her

grumbles. “Fine. But hurry

own the house, then sold it to Sam after he married. I remember sitting in my old tree house, watching as he loaded his boxes into the U-Haul, half tempted to go next door and put each box back in the house so he couldn’t leave. That was a couple years ago. I haven’t seen him since.

little more mature, maybe, and thicker with muscle than I remember. Clearly that confident swagger never went

the truck. I squint to see better. Is that the top of a car seat I see in the back

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