The Babysitter Murders - By Janet Ruth Young Page 0,7

left it. She touches her mouth again and rubs her hands. Then she follows Mrs. Alex downstairs.

When Dani sees the TV she remembers that murder in Dorchester. She had forgotten about it since Saturday. She remem-22

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bers that she thought about Alex being murdered. She pictured him on a stretcher, under a blanket. It was awful. It was upsetting. It wasn’t real and it didn’t happen. She made herself stop thinking about it.

Then they played some more and she felt better. They ate chicken and she did her homework. After she put him to bed she checked him once an hour and he was fine. But now the pictures come back, although she tries to push them aside. She doesn’t understand why they’re back again, since she thought she dealt with them last time.

Now Dani imagines Alex lying on his bedroom floor with a kitchen knife beside his body. All the stuff that’s usually inside is showing.

She talks extra loud to drive the thought away.

“Have a good night at work!” she tells Mrs. Alex, putting her hand on Alex’s shoulder.

This is bad, Dani thinks. I feel terrible and I just got here. I keep having to push thoughts out of my mind.

Mrs. Alex stops in the doorway. “What about you? How was school? How’s the boy? ”

“He has no idea. It’s painful. You know.”

“Louie’s a boy,” Alex says. “Do you want to see him?”

Dani has tons of homework, but she pities Alex for the usual reasons, so she sits with him at the computer. She puts her arm around Alex but she feels funny touching him, because even though she hasn’t said or done anything wrong, she’s ashamed.

She’s ashamed of her imagination and her thoughts. She wants more than anything to relax and stop working her mind so hard and be normal. Mrs. Alex will be gone for eight hours tonight.

Will I be having these thoughts the whole time I’m here? Dani wonders.

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Dani and Shelley warm up for their match with Monsignor

Deagle High School.

“Oh my God, is she cute,” Shelley says when they collect the balls.

“She is cute,” Dani agrees. Since the coming-out, the word she with no antecedent always means Meghan Dimmock. Dani is giving Shelley a free pass on talking about Meghan. A lifetime of crushes has backed up inside her, after all. It will take weeks of talking before she catches up with the straight people.

Dani hopes more of her fellow Schooners arrive early so she and Shelley can practice on the same side of the net. Lately she’s been missing a lot of shots that come down the center line. Their coach hinted at making Dani and Shelley co-captains next year, but that chance could evaporate. Wouldn’t it be weird if Shelley was captain by herself? Or worse, if she co-captained with another player? Dani would be jealous.

“You don’t think she’s dumb, do you?” Shelley asks. “Because I can’t honestly like a dumb person. I can think they’re hot, sure, but they can’t be my first real girlfriend. I can only admire them from a distance.”

“I don’t know, Shel. Are you reading her correctly? Is it that she’s dumb? Or does she just not pay attention to other people?”

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“That’s because she’s concentrating. She’s so into her music that she blocks everything else out.”

“Maybe. And, you know, there are different forms of intelligence. Musical intelligence, for one.” Dani never lies outright. She doesn’t say Meghan has musical intelligence, only that it is a form.

“Have you heard of kinesthetic intelligence?” Shelley asks.

“It’s like coordination. It’s the intelligence that makes you not hit into the net just because Gordon Abt walked by.”

“I’m not looking at him.” She isn’t. But every day she remembers what color shirt he’s wearing so her eyes can scan for that color. And sometimes she likes thinking about him without talking about him. Not talking makes her feelings compress and intensify, like the grain of sand that forms a pearl in an oyster, or the piece of coal that gets pressed into a diamond, and every precious and semiprecious cliché ever written. She sees a plum-colored shirt hesitate by the fence, but she stares down the center line at Shelley until the color moves on. He’ll probably admire her dedication to improving her game.

Another reason not to talk