The Babysitter Murders - By Janet Ruth Young Page 0,6

up Dani’s travel time.

Alex appears inside the screen door.

“Sorry, guy,” Dani says.

“Mom’s mad, but not a lot mad.”

As she enters he backs up, talking the whole time. “Do you want to see my new e-Pet? It’s a horse named Louie.”

“Sorry!” Dani yells upstairs.

“It’s okay!” Mrs. Alex yells back. From the sound of things, Mrs. Alex is talking to the hospital, putting on her heels, and styling her hair all at once. “Glad to know you made it, that’s all.”

Of course I made it. When have I ever not made it? Dani thinks.

Dani hates letting people down, especially Alex and Mrs. Alex.

Alex is so cute and heartbreaking. Alex’s father left when Alex was only four. Dani tries to be extra fun so Alex won’t miss his dad. She should have told Shelley she was pressed for time, but that would have meant letting Shelley down. Whenever Dani gets too busy, someone in her life gets cheated, and today it’s Alex.

But there will be compensation. Because he sometimes asks T H E B A B Y S I T T E R M U R D E R S

about her matches, Dani used some of her babysitting money to buy him a junior racket, a really good one with the same features as hers but only twenty-one inches long. She wants to give him lessons once a week when school’s out. Maybe when Alex gets to Hawthorne High he’ll be captain of the boys’ team.

“I’ll go calm your mother down,” she tells Alex.

“There you are!” Mrs. Alex says. She wears a lab coat but snaz-zes things up with silver hoop earrings and pink lipstick.

“Anything new with the kiddo?” Dani asks.

Mrs. Alex is a nurse practitioner, which she says is as good as a doctor. She’s distracted most of the time, but in many ways she’s easier to talk to than Dani’s mom. She has a philosophy that Dani can get behind. She’s been through some rough times, but she believes that no matter what, you have to place a high value on yourself. She was in love with Alex’s father at the beginning, and tells exciting stories about meeting him on a sailboat and him getting five passengers through a thunderstorm. She thought he owned the sailboat, but friends told her later he didn’t. Then followed a year-by-year landslide of her admiration, and eventually she realized that he was not good enough for her, and she asked him to leave. Now she only mentions him when she has to, not using his name (Patrick) or the phrase “my ex-husband” but the phrase “Alex’s father.” That makes it seem like Patrick is someone in Alex’s life but not Mrs. Alex’s—a friend of Alex whom Alex had once introduced her to. Alex talks about Patrick when his mom isn’t around. He tells stories about feats of heroism, like flying a helicopter through the middle of an iceberg. Maybe all those 21

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adventures spring from the sailboat story, and Alex carries in his genes the infatuation Mrs. Alex first felt when meeting Patrick.

Dani thinks of Alex’s version as Tarzan Daddy.

What can she do with Alex for the next eight hours to com-pensate for his losing his adventurous father? And will there be anything for her to eat when she gives Alex his supper? Mrs. Alex keeps promising she’ll stock up on food for Dani, but she usually forgets. Often there’s been nothing for Alex, either, and Dani walks him the six blocks to McDonald’s.

Mrs. Alex jingles her keys. “Nothing really new. He still has a slight ear infection. I’ll be home after eleven.”

How does that feel, bitch?

Dani has a picture of herself getting the junior racket from Alex’s room and whacking the side of Mrs. Alex’s head. Mrs. Alex’s eyes roll up. She sways for a minute before hitting the ground.

Not Mrs. Alex. Not Mrs. Alex. I would never hit or hurt her. I would complain about her, sure, but I would never hit or hurt her. I wouldn’t call her the B word either. I basically like Mrs. Alex. I don’t know why I would even think that.

While having all these thoughts, Dani listens to Mrs. Alex talk.

She tries to focus on her employer’s instructions. She touches her own lips to make sure she hasn’t spoken while Mrs. Alex is speaking. That she hasn’t said the B word. The picture of Mrs. Alex going down was so real that Dani goes to Alex’s room to check that the racket is still where she