candy apples [rewriting]

four: babysitting and bankruptcy

“But you eat candy apples. Like, all the time.”

“Yeah, but those are apples. Its not like its cotton candy or anything.”

“Weird.” He rolls his eyes at me.

*    *    *

Once we leave the coffee shop we walk through town. We stop at the bookshop and I buy the new Rick Yancey book. We then stop at the record store and Drew buys the new Imagine Dragons album. The town is full with tourists visiting for the summer. Families with cameras around their necks. Elders with confused faces studying maps. Applegate, our town is one of the most popular tourist towns in the state. People come from all directions in Autumn, just to photograph the abundance brown leaves. Summer’s no better, with everyone wanting to go on holiday at Christmastime. Even trying to get a parking space in target is mission impossible.

“What are you doing later on?” Drew asks me while we meander through the busy main street.

“Not much. I told my neighbour  Chontelle that I’d babysit her 4 year old 6:30 tonight though.”

He turns to me. “Can I come along?”

“Sure. I don’t see why not. He’s pretty well behaved, for a 4 year old, that is. Way easier to deal with than Anna was.” I make a face. “Yikes. And his parents make him go to bed at seven anyway, so I only have to entertain him for the first half hour. The other three are just me just watching crap TV and making sure no one breaks in.”

*    *    *

“Fridge is all yours, nothing over PG on the tv until Jason’s in bed, umm…” The doorbell rings and Chontelle hurries over to answer it. Drew is standing at the door. He doesn’t get a chance to speak when Chontelle rushes towards me and talks through the sort of smile a schoolgirl gets before she bursts into a giggle fit. “Is this the boyfriend you told me about? What a looker-“ I blush bright red.

“I told you, he’s just a friend.”

“Whatever,” she laughs. “Just make sure Jason’s in bed by seven. Bye.”

She closes the door behind her and there is a remotely awkward silence between Drew and I that is hastily broken by Jason. “Farty poo bum!” He yells, running around the house, cackling like a demon.

“I Think,” I say to Drew. “That he needs to settle down a bit.”

We (meaning Drew) manage to force Jason to calm down and finally decide on mousetrap over monopoly junior. We spent ages trying to find what goes where and keep building a little past Jason’s bedtime.

At around half past seven we finish building the complex structure that is mousetrap and have a eureka moment when the singular marble successfully makes it out of the mouse trap. I glance at the clock for the first time in quite a while and almost spit out my cocoa to find that Jason should have been in bed long ago. Drew looks at me then at the clock. “Oopsie Daisy.” He says and then we realise that Jason can’t read a clock and will never know we kept him up later. Hopefully, his mother won’t find out either.