It was Sunday evening and Rowan was confused. She was sitting at the dining table, looking down at Christian's homework. He had asked her for homework help, and she assumed that it was something easy like Math or History homework—but no.
This was his Religion homework, and the paper required him to fill in the blank of bible verses. Rowan had never read a lick of the Bible. Her Dad raised her agnostic, so she had no idea how she was going to help him.
He had filled in the first three verses, but he was apparently stuck on the last three.
"Can't you just look it up in your bible?" Rowan asked him.
He shook his head. "That's cheating."
Rowan sighed. She had no idea how she was going to be of help.
"I'm sorry buddy, I'm not sure how to do this," She told him.
"Why not?" He asked. "I thought grownups knew everything."
"Well, I was never taught this because I'm agnostic, do you know what that means?"
Christian shook his head.
"That means that I do believe that a god exists, I just don't claim that that is true. I don't follow everything that the Bible says, I usually rely on my morals to make decisions. I believe that there is a higher power watching out for me, I'm just not sure what that higher power is. Does that make sense?"
Christian looked a bit confused, but he nodded anyway.
"You look confused," Rowan pointed out.
"I'm not," Christian told her. "It's just that my Dad told us that any other religion is wrong, and if you're not Catholic then you're just...dumb."
Rowan rolled her eyes. "Well, that's not so nice of your Dad." She said. "You want to know what my Dad told me? He told me that you don't have to believe in other people's religions or lack of religions, but it's best that we are respectful of them. You wouldn't want someone to say that your religion makes you dumb, right?"
Christian shook his head no.
"Right, so we won't call anyone else's religion dumb," Rowan said.
"Okay," Christian said. "So that means that you won't be able to help me with my homework...because you never learned this?"
"That's right!" Rowan told him.
"Then how am I gonna finish my work?"
"Let's call your mom and see if she's available to help," Rowan suggested, which Christian agreed to.
Rowan unlocked her phone, FaceTiming Georgia who picked up after the third ring.
"Hey Rowan, what's up?" Georgia asked. Her phone was set on something so she wouldn't have to hold her phone for Rowan to see her, the woman walking around her hotel room in some PJs.
"Christian needs some help with his homework," Rowan told her, surprised that she wasn't out somewhere considering it was the last day of her vacation.
"What homework?" Georgia asked, walking over and bringing the phone to her face.
"Religion," Rowan replied.
"Go ahead and give him the phone, I'll help him," Georgia told her. "It's not like I'm doing anything anyways..."
Rowan handed Christian her phone, walking to where Ollie had fallen asleep on the couch. She picked the boy up, carrying him to his room to put him in his bed before walking back downstairs. She watched TV while listening to Georgia instructing Christian on how to do his work. The way that she was patient with him—not getting mad at him when he got something wrong—was extremely attractive. Not only was Georgia a good mom, but she was a good teacher too.
YOU ARE READING
The Babysitter
RomanceRowan Barlowe hated her job. It wasn't the people-it was the pay, and there was no way that she'd be able to save up for college while only being paid $12 an hour, as she had other expenses that she needed to spend her money on. In crashed Georgia...
