Emily sat in her red Subaru afraid that when her wheels touched the curb it had torched their integrity. She looked down at her phone— that same background photo of her and mom posing at the bottom of some mountain they’d climbed long ago, looking back. Her mother’s younger face mocking her and laughing— pointing a finger and telling her: HE wasn’t going to text back. Why would he? She didn’t have an answer for the talking photo. She was utterly alone— sitting in her car and trying to understand how a boy she loved so much could be so fucking cruel.
Suddenly, her phone dinged, breaking her concentration and allowing a sliver of hope to move from her heart to her stomach. A slight flutter of excitement from within … telling her that not all hope was lost.
“Hey, sweetie. How late will you be out tonight? Dad’s making burgers; we’ll leave a few for when you get home. Love, mom.”
Emily felt embarrassed her mother sent text messages as if she was sending letters by carrier pigeon. Each one relenting yet nurturing, evoking guilt, she never thought of her parents at all. She had bigger fish to fry— money to be made and, of course, Robert Kingsly. The most beautiful boy she had ever met. Someone she couldn’t imagine would allow her to touch him.
But he did.
And now she waited.
On a curb outside of a family’s home that was her only source of income. Classic suburbia—a few miles up the street from the plant where the good jobs were. A plant where Emily’s own father worked and where she’d learned about the baby-sitting job. She’d been babysitting for the Buehler’s for almost a month— and they paid better than any job she’d ever had: fifty dollars an hour. Mr. and Mrs. Buehler loved staying out late into the night, racking up an exorbitant bill. This was good— it supported Emily’s increasing vice of smoking pot, which she procured from a seedy, fat, pimpled faced boy under the bleachers once a week for over a year. The boy gave her great deals … and Emily suspected he was trying to get in her pants— isn’t that what they all were trying to do? Or so she thought.
But our Emily had eyes only for one boy.
Robert Kingsly.
A name only suited for a king— with blue eyes and curly hair. Hair that she held onto when she allowed him inside.
Why won’t he text me back?
Because you gave him what he wanted, you dumb bitch.
She slapped the thought away and looked up to find Mrs. Buehler had opened the shade to wave her in. She’d been spotted, a shame … she’d have to wait for Clementine and Dorien to fall asleep before getting another chance to get her high. A high was desperately needed— she hadn’t smoked since her morning wake-and-bake ritual. Between four classes, running a mile, and being ignored by Robert Kingsly, it had been a rough day— the kind of day she longed to forget.
She stepped out of her car, grabbed her bag from the back seat, and headed inside.
“Emmy!” Clementine screamed when she entered the home.
Cute girl— blonde, pigtails her mother put some time into making. She ran up and hugged her thigh. It seemed strange to Emily, considering she had only been their babysitter for less than a month.
“Hey Clemmy,” Emily responded, holding her close to her chest, “Where’s your little sister?”
“She’s watching Lolly Polly in the wiving woom,” Clementine replied, then ran to join her sister in the playroom.
Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. Let the little shits watch TV, get the money, and re-up. Emily wasn’t fond of these thoughts … they plagued her mind daily.
Emily walked into the kitchen. Mrs. Bueller was cleaning two plastic plates, one looked as if a child had taken a bite of every piece of food on it, without consuming anything. The other was untouched.
“How are you, Emily?” Mrs. Bueller asked.
“Good.”
The mother didn’t look the girl in the eye. She rarely did, and Emily got the impression Mrs. Buehler didn’t like looking at younger women; girls she herself had once been, perhaps.
“Honey, let’s go, time to get the fuck out of here!” Mr. Bueller called.
It sounded like he was already sitting in the car in the garage.
“I’ll be right there, honey!” Mrs. Bueller replied.
Emily placed her bag and cell phone on the table. It hurt putting the phone down.
“Thank you, love, we don’t get any time to ourselves these days.”
“It’s no trouble, Mrs. Bueller. You go— I’ll tidy up.”
“You really are a godsend.”
Emily blushed, and Mrs. Bueller grabbed her purse and began down the hall. She turned before continuing.
“Emily.”
“Huh?”
“Please remember— only two hours of Lolly Polly.”
“Yes, Mrs. Bueller. I know.”
Mrs. Bueller grinned, showing some white, then walked out.
Emily stepped into the playroom— an area filled with a magnificent number of toys, like stepping into an amusement park. A rainbow ball pit where a large, stuffed unicorn was drowning. Three slides, a trampoline and an indoor jungle gym Emily could tell were rarely used. Two bean bags— one red, one blue— sat on a watermelon carpet in the center of the room. Directly in front of the carpet loomed a seventy-five-inch television mounted on the wall, towering over the little girls who hadn’t yet learned how to tie their shoes.
There she was: Lolly Polly, in all her red-and-pink-robed glory. Her hair, the color of rubies and inferno. Clementine and Dorien sat mesmerized beneath their goddess, looking up and never blinking.
They never blinked.
“Hey girls,” Emily called out to them.
Neither could be bothered.
“Oh my, what special children you are! Today we will talk about the colors of the rainbow and how they make us feel! And to help me do that, we will bring out my sister!”
“Boo!” Clementine yelled at the screen, and Dorien pulled her shirt up over her face so she couldn’t see.
Emily watched briefly with amusement.
“Well, that’s not very nice, but you’re right— sissy isn’t allowed out for another fifty-five minutes. So, we will have to find something else to do while we wait.”
“Hurray!” the sisters chanted in unison.
Buzz.
Buzz.
Emily’s pulse quickened. She rushed to the kitchen to grab her phone.
“Hey Emily, sorry about not responding to your texts. And for ignoring you during lunch. I think you’re a really cool girl, but I’m not looking for anything serious right now. We can still hook up if you’re into it, but that’s really all I want. Also, please don’t tell anyone about us... I don’t want Sarah to know.”
Emily gritted her teeth and balled her hand into a fist. Tears stung her eyes, and she would have screamed if the kids weren’t one room over. She threw her phone across the room; something that at the time seemed like the winning option.
Emily looked at her book bag— the kids were occupied with Lolly Polly—she would let her watch them for a little while.
She sat on a cushioned couch in the backyard. Her eyes poured warm rain onto Robert’s hood she had stolen. She clutched it in her hands and wiped her face with it. She grabbed her bowl, packed the last remnants of her stash into it, lit the cherry and inhaled deeply. A warm buzz in her chest greeted her, and the voice that had been maliciously chopping at the inside of her brain calmed, mellowed, became a pal she could bear to live with until she fell back down from the sky to rejoin the sober world.
She lay on her back, using Robert’s sweatshirt as a pillow while counting the stars until her eyes became too heavy and she—
The sky was darker when she opened her eyes; a million twinkles over the dark canvas telling her she was as little as she felt. Her head hurt and she didn’t know how long she had slept. She looked over at the sliding glass door that led to the backyard.
It was slightly ajar.
There was a large handprint plastered on the other side of the glass— a slightly green mark left behind. A shiver ran through Emily, and her stomach dropped when she realized what must have happened.
She stood, and all the blood in her body rushed to her head. She wanted to sit back down, but the children were inside. They were alone, probably worried that their babysitter was missing— or sleeping in the backyard.
When Emily stepped inside the house, a wall of frigid air struck her face, and she wanted to walk back outside, grab Robert’s sweatshirt and put it on. The halls were pitch black. She held her phone in front of her, but it only illuminated a few steps ahead.
She heard the laughter of small children.
Clementine.
Dorien.
But there were more voices.
The high-pitched cackle of a grown woman … Was she snarling? Perhaps the snarl of a beast Emily had unintentionally allowed into their home.
Emily rushed into the living room.
A single silhouette stood in front of the television.
“Clementine?” Emily called out the little girl’s name and stepped closer. “Is everything okay?”
“Welcome Emily! How was your nap?”
Emily’s skeleton jerked out of her skin as she looked around the room. At first, she thought it was Mrs. Bueller’s voice, her tone signifying that she had been caught and was on the verge of being fired. But when she looked, no one was there.
“Yoo hoo, right here, love, right here.”
Clementine didn’t move. Emily stepped next to her and peered into the television screen as if it was a window.
“Much better, much, much, better. So, as I was saying, how was your nap?”
Emily was frozen in place. Lolly Polly was speaking directly to her. She rubbed her eyes. Perhaps if she did it a few more times she would wake up, look at the stars, and realize that she was just dreaming. Hell, maybe she dreamt the whole thing— maybe Robert didn’t tell her he didn’t want to be with her.
Snap.
Snap.
“Listen here you little stoney slut— that’s not it one bit. And you ain’t sleepin. Let’s all stay in the present, we’re learning about rainbows today, remember?”
Lolly Polly’s fingers sounded like they were behind the TV rather than inside of it.
Something shrieked behind Lolly Polly, and Lolly smiled.
Emily couldn’t stop shaking. Her lips shuttered, and she felt a warm trickle down her leg until it began to soak her sock and shoe.
“Oh, poor little girl. There is nothing to be afraid of— you’re a little too old for us!”
Lolly Polly howled with glee, as if something tickled her from within. Yet the colors of her clothes had somehow faded.
The little girls joined her— Emily could see Clementine, but Dorien had yet to be revealed.
“Now, as I was saying: We were learning about rainbows today, and we are missing two of the colors, isn’t that right, Clemmy?”
“Yes, Lolly Polly,” Clementine replied.
“Good girl. The first color is Green.”
The shrieking from the screen wasn’t that at all. It was wheezing— a breathing that Emily didn’t know could be concocted by the living. And Lolly Polly was right— her sister was somehow green, with slippery verdant skin in some places, and dark green fur in others. Her bangs covered her eyes, but somehow— call it intuition— Emily knew exactly who she was looking at.
“Clementine, what two primary colors make green?”
“Blue and yellow!”
“You really are our star pupil, gold smiley face, my girl, gold smiley face!”
“Hurray!” Clementine jumped up and down, giggled, and clapped her hands.
“Now what’s the last color we are missing?” Lolly Polly spoke, but Emily couldn’t focus on anything except the green beast dragging a sack filled with something to the front of the screen.
“Red! We are missing red!” Clementine yelled.
Lolly Polly’s sister held the sack over her shoulder like Santa, and the bag was not only moving— it was also moaning.
“Where’s Dorien?” Emily finally found the strength to ask the question she’d been dreading … it was her fault, after all.
“Show us red, sissy!”
The contents of the bag were dumped onto the ground.
A little girl squirmed in the dirt.
Her skin was missing; her crimson inner shell had been exposed to the lens. Emily began to cry when she realized Dorien was blinking.
“And that’s it! Those are all the colors of the rainbow!”
“Hurray!” Clementine yelled.
“And now it’s your turn Clemmy! It’s your turn to join your sister on this side. Sissy!”
Lolly Polly pointed at the green monster, and the monster began moving closer to the window. Its putrid face sniffed the screen, as if testing its infrastructure, and then the beast’s two furry green arms began to penetrate the portal and reached for the littler of the girls. Its face pressed through, and Emily realized that its eyes were yellow, and its teeth matched them. Something was hanging from the green creature's serrated jawline.
Skin.
Little girl skin.
The tastiest.
Clementine reached out her arms to embrace her new mother. But suddenly, a light illuminated the room from above, and a woman began screaming behind Emily and Clementine as the monster’s green arms reached through.
Mr. Bueller. He charged forward, slapped the green fur away from his daughter, and while he fought the beast, Mrs. Bueller shut off the television, and the room fell silent. “Jesus fucking Christ!” Mr. Bueller panted, out of breath, holding onto his only remaining daughter. He looked at Emily with distaste. “What did you do?!”
Emily looked down at the floor. She didn’t know what to say.
Mrs. Buehler put her hand on Emily’s shoulder, “You forgot?” she asked.
Emily shook her head.
“You know they can’t watch for more than two hours,” Mr. Bueller said.
Emily nodded. It was all she could do.
Bueller held her stomach, and Emily finally noticed that another life was growing within her boss.
“Hmm, Dorien?” She asked Emily.
Emily shook her head.
“Well, that’s not good. We really need to make sure we are limiting their screen time, Emily. We won’t be paying you for tonight.”
Emily didn’t respond.
“You go home and think about what you’ve done.”
Emily started to cry and looked up at Mrs. Bueller.
“But why?”
“Why what, sweetie?”
“Why let them watch at all?”
Mrs. Bueller grabbed her remaining daughter and held her close. She kissed her on the forehead and gave her husband a warm grin.
“Because love, parents need time for themselves as well. You will understand when you’re a mommy.”
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