Chapter 1 - THE GIRL WITH THE BABYSITTING BAG
My father shoved the duffel bag into my chest hard enough to force me backward onto the porch.
“If you won’t raise our kids for free,” Richard Reed shouted, “you’re useless in this house.”
I was seventeen years old.
The four children he called “our kids” were my younger siblings. I had been feeding them, bathing them, helping with homework and staying awake through fevers since I was twelve.
The first thing my mother said when I told her I had been hired by Grant’s Hardware was not congratulations.
It was:
“And who is going to watch the children now?”
I explained that the job was only four evenings each week. I could still help before school, on weekends and whenever they had an emergency.
My father laughed.
“A real man puts his family first. You don’t get to become selfish after everything we’ve given you.”
What they had given me was a bedroom barely large enough for a twin bed, food I cooked myself and responsibility for four children I had never chosen to raise.
When I reminded him that I needed money for college because he had repeatedly said tuition would be my problem, he walked upstairs and packed my clothes into a black duffel bag while I was still arguing.
At two in the morning, he opened the front door and ordered me to leave.
My mother removed the spare key from my palm.
“We’ll tell everyone you abandoned your brothers and sisters,” she said. “Let’s see how proud you are when the family knows what kind of person you really are.”
That was when I realized they had already prepared the story.
“You planned this before I ever mentioned the job.”
My father slammed the door in my face.
The deadbolt turned.
Then the porch light went dark.
I started down the steps with the duffel strap cutting into my shoulder. I had made it halfway to the sidewalk when a blonde teenage girl approached carrying a canvas babysitting tote.
She stopped when she saw me.
Behind me, the front door opened again.
My mother’s face drained of color.
My father reached toward the door as if he could close it before the girl spoke.
“Mrs. Reed?” she said uneasily. “You told me Evan wouldn’t know you hired me three weeks ago.”
No one moved.
The girl looked from my parents to the bag on my shoulder.
“I thought he was moving away after graduation.”
My father’s expression changed.
“Kayla, go home.”
“But you said tonight was my first overnight.”
I looked at my mother.
The job had not caused them to throw me out.
May you like
They had already replaced me.
They had only been waiting for an excuse that could be blamed on me.
