The Babysitters Coven

by Kate M. Williams

  I scanned the room and noted that the bedside lamp had a thick metal base, so I could grab that if I needed it, and set the umbrella stand down right by the door. I crept in slowly, then dropped to my knees to peer under the bed. Nothing. So I tiptoed over to the closet.

  “Janis? It’s me,” I whispered, and the closet flew open. Janis came tumbling out and sat Andrew down before throwing her arms around me. It was obvious that she and Andrew had both been crying, and a freaked-out-looking dog was at their heels.

  At that moment, someone burst through the door behind us.

  Janis screamed. I held out my hand, and the lamp, the bedside table, the pillows, the duvet, and a pair of dress shoes all rose into the air above our heads, then began to launch themselves at the intruder like missiles.

  Fortunately, she had good reflexes.

  The next few seconds were chaos and barking as first Janis and then Andrew took in what had just happened, and Pig came running down the hall to check on the noise.

  Andrew started crying, and Janis looked panicked as she backed away, her head swiveling rapidly back and forth between Cassandra and me.

  “What the f…? Esme, wh-what was that?” she sputtered. “Did you see…? How…”

  I decided to deal with the scared-out-of-his-mind three-year-old first, and picked him up.

  “I’m sorry you had a nightmare,” I said softly, stroking his head and trying to smooth some of his hair back into place. “That must have been so scary. Everything’s okay now.” I carried him over to a corner of the room, and stood so that I could see everything. Cassandra grabbed Janis and pulled her over to us.

  “Stay with them,” she whispered, then turned and crept out the door.

  Janis was shaking and had tears streaming down her face. Still holding Andrew, I grabbed Janis’s hand and squeezed. “It’s okay,” I said. “Cassandra will—”

  I was interrupted by a loud crash and a scream from the other side of the house. Janis gasped, and Andrew cried harder. My nerves blinked like Christmas lights as I waited for what would come next, but it was pure silence, and each passing second of quiet made me even more convinced that something horrible had happened out there.

  Wordlessly I sat Andrew down and motioned for him and Janis to stay put, then crept out to the hallway and down the stairs. Cassandra was standing in the foyer, her hand on the knob of the open front door. The coatrack was lying on its side on the floor.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  She nodded, then pushed her hair out of her face and motioned at the coatrack. “It attacked me,” she said, “but I think I won.”

  In the kitchen, I sat Andrew down on the counter and poured out some cheddar bunnies, then put a sippy cup of milk in the microwave to warm it up a bit.

  “Hey, buddy,” Cassandra said, approaching him. “High five. You’re so brave! That nightmare is never coming back!” She held out her hand. Andrew considered it for a few seconds, and I breathed out in relief when he raised his palm and slapped Cassandra’s, a smile playing at the corner of his mouth. I took the milk out of the microwave, made sure it wasn’t too hot, snapped a lid on it, and then handed it to him.

  Cassandra seemed to have recovered, and I could see that with a little more experience, she could actually be a pretty good babysitter. She was entertaining Andrew by tossing cheddar bunnies into the air and deliberately missing them with her mouth so that they bounced off her forehead and cheeks. Pig was having a field day gobbling up any that hit the floor, and wasn’t letting Andrew’s dog get a single one. Andrew was laughing now, but Janis still hung in the doorway, a look of horror on her face.

  “Come on, Janis,” I said softly. “Let’s go talk.” I motioned for her to follow me into the living room, and when she didn’t move, I reached out and put a hand on her arm. She shook it off immediately, and when she looked at me, I could see she was mad. Like, rappers-beefing-on-Twitter levels of pissed.

  “You did that, Esme. I know you did. You made all that stuff float. And you know what’s going on here.” Her bare arms were covered in goose bumps, and she rubbed her hands briskly over them.

  “Here, let me get you a blanket,” I said, ignoring her accusation.

  “I don’t want a blanket,” she snapped. “I want you to tell me what just happened.”

  “Janis,” I said, “it’s a long story, and one that I don’t even really understand.”

  “You’re not denying it. You made all that stuff float up into the air. You threw it at Cassandra without even touching it.”

  I nodded slowly.

  “Why didn’t I call the cops? Or Andrew’s dad? It just seemed natural to call you. Something told me to do it, even though you’re just a babysitter like me. Why did I think of you, Esme? Do you have something to do with what was in this house?”

  My best friend was looking at me like she was scared of me, and I didn’t know how to make it better. Cassandra appeared in the doorway before I could think of what to say to Janis. “He’s asleep,” she said. “I had to use ypnos on him, but he shouldn’t remember much when he wakes up.”

  “Ypnos?” Janis asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “It’s like a spell to make someone fall asleep,” I said. “It’s totally safe.” Mentally I added “we hope” to the end of that sentence.

  “Spell?” She inched even farther away from me.

  Cassandra didn’t seem to notice, and came over and sat down right next to her.

  “Janis, tell us exactly what happened tonight,” she said.

  “It was just past bedtime,” Janis said, her voice hesitant. “And I got this feeling like I should go and check on him, which I never do—not after he goes to sleep.”

  Cassandra nodded.

  “His door was open an inch or so, and I was pretty sure that I’d closed it on my way out, so I went into the room, and I was standing there looking at him. Then out of the corner of my eye, I saw something move down the hallway.”

  “Did you get a good look at it?”

  Janis nodded.

  “What did it look like?”

  “Voldemort.”

  Cassandra blinked. “Voldemort?”

  Janis nodded, deadly serious.

  “Voldemort broke into this house and tried to kidnap Andrew?” Cassandra asked, and I could detect a note of incredulity in her voice.

  Janis could too, and it pissed her off. “No,” she said. “Someone dressed like Voldemort broke into this house and tried to kidnap Andrew. They were wearing a costume.” She huffed. “It’d be easy to get. There’s a Halloween store on practically every corner right now.”

  “That’s so impractical. Why would a kidnapper dress like Voldemort?” Cassandra asked.

  “Are you serious?” Janis said, looking at her like she had a subzero IQ. “It’s perfect. Think about it—if a kid tells their parents that Voldemort broke into their room, the parents are going to laugh it off. They’ll think it’s just a case of overactive imagination.”

  “Oh my God,” I said, feeling like I’d been shocked as it came together. “David Bowie!”

  Janis glared at me like I was trying to change the subject.

  “No! I know what you’re talking about,” I said. “I was babysitting for Kaitlyn, and she said a not-nice man came into her room. The way she described him, he looked just like the Goblin King. I didn’t believe her.”

  Janis pointed a finger at me. “See! Exactly! I wouldn’t have believed Andrew if I hadn’t seen it myself.”

  “Why didn’t you tell anybody?” Janis asked me, and I knew she meant “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  I looked down and picked a piece of lint off my knee. “I don’t know,” I said. “I thought it made me look bad. Like I was a babysitter who didn’t know how to deal with a little nightmare.” They were both staring at me. “And,” I continued, fig
uring I might as well lay it all out there, “I was scared. Like, really scared.”

  Janis nodded. “It freaked me out. I didn’t look back. I just picked him up, then went and hid in his dad’s closet. That was when I called Esme.” Janis looked over at me.

  “Should we call someone now?” I offered.

  “Like who?” Cassandra asked.

  “Like the cops, or Andrew’s dad?”

  “No way,” Cassandra said, shaking her head. “They wouldn’t believe us, and we don’t have any evidence. They’d ask too many questions, and I don’t want to be questioned by a bunch of old men.”

  I looked back at Janis, and to my surprise, she was nodding in agreement with Cassandra. “I don’t want to drag this out,” she said. “All I really want to do is go home.”

  The thing was, Janis couldn’t go home, at least not until Andrew’s dad returned, so we settled on the next best thing. We didn’t want Janis to get in trouble for having friends over, but she understandably didn’t want to be left by herself, so Cassandra and I crossed the street to watch the house until Andrew’s dad got back. Pig sat between us on high alert. I had a feeling that, after tonight, Janis really was going to kick babysitting to the curb. The cookie-cake job might have required an apron, but at least there was no worry that someone was going to come in and try to kidnap the cookies.

  We sat there for a little over an hour before Mr. Reynolds pulled up and went inside. When Janis came out of the house and started to walk to her car, I stood to meet her.

  “Esme,” Cassandra said, standing up next to me, “before you go, there’s one thing I wanted to ask you. You’re not falling for my brother, are you? I know you guys text and hang out.”

  The question caught me off guard, because in the excitement of the night, I’d somehow completely forgotten about Dion.

  “I don’t know,” I answered truthfully. Janis’s car beeped as she unlocked it.

  “I don’t care,” Cassandra said. “Honestly. You wouldn’t be the first of my friends to like my brother. Just be careful. I love him more than anyone else, but he can be a real jerk.”

  My mouth fell open in shock when I heard this. But before I could ask her to clarify, she was already crossing the street.

  * * *

  —

  Janis gave us rides home, her mouth set in a grim line and her hands at ten and two as she drove four miles below the speed limit. No one talked except Cassandra, who gave Janis succinct directions about where to turn. When she got out of the car, I moved into the front seat. Janis started driving toward my house, and I figured now was as good a time as any to address the mastodon in the car.

  “Janis—” I started, and she exploded.

  “What the actual hell, Esme?” She took one hand off the wheel and pressed it to her forehead. “This was the scariest night of my life. There was something in that house, and it wanted to hurt me, or hurt Andrew, and then you show up and you can move things with your mind? And your new BFF Cassandra Heaven knows all about it, but I don’t?”

  “I’m sorry. I was going to tell you,” I said. Though, as soon as I said it, I realized it was a lie. Before Cassandra, I hadn’t even thought about telling Janis, or anyone else, about what I could do.

  “How long have you known about this?”

  I sighed. “I guess I started to suspect that something weird was going on a while ago. But know for certain? Like, maybe a week? A little more? It’s all brand-new to me too.”

  “Why does Cassandra know? Is that why you wanted her in the babysitting club so bad?”

  “Janis, it’s not that at all. She didn’t even know until after she’d joined the babysitting club. She’s not even a good babysitter!” Normally this was the kind of news that would have piqued Janis’s interest, but she didn’t bite. “I didn’t tell her,” I continued. “She figured it out. Before I did, even. The stuff that happened in driver’s ed, it was because of these weird powers. I didn’t tell you, but it was why I dropped gym too. Stuff happened. With balls. Bad ball stuff.” I was babbling, so I tried to get to the point. “I couldn’t control them, and Cassandra helped me. She gets it because she has powers, too.”

  “She’s a Carrie?” Janis asked.

  “No, she’s more of a Drew Barrymore than a Sissy Spacek.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Sorry,” I said. “I mean, she’s only a pyrokinetic.”

  “Ha,” Janis said. “Only.”

  “Well, Carrie was both, because she—”

  “I’ve seen the movie,” Janis snapped.

  “Are you mad?” I asked.

  We were at a stoplight, and when the light turned green, Janis just sat there, the car idling at the intersection. “What would I be mad about? It’s just really…”

  “Weird?” I finished.

  She nodded.

  “Are you freaked out?” I asked.

  “Honestly, yeah.” The light turned red, and she finally went. “I mean, I know you better than I know anybody else, but the stuff you just did, I thought that only existed in books and movies.”

  I nodded, even though I didn’t want to end up covered in pig blood, and didn’t want Janis to think that I was like Carrie.

  “Tonight, whatever was in that house,” she said, “you’re connected to it, aren’t you?”

  I hadn’t wanted to think about that, but as soon as she said it, I was pretty sure Janis was right.

  “Esme,” she said as she finally pulled up to my house, “what is going on with you?”

  “I don’t know yet,” I said, “but I have a feeling I’m about to find out.”

  * * *

  —

  I had so much to think about. What Janis had said, and who she had seen. What the hell was I, and what did it mean? It sounded like a bad country song (as if there were any other kind), but when I crawled into bed, all I could think about was Dion. Especially what Cassandra had said about him, and what he’d said about her. Every time I saw them together, they acted like the chummiest of chums. Every time I saw them apart, it didn’t seem like they liked each other all that much.

  I knew I wasn’t her first friend to fall for him. Anyone who was around Dion for any amount of time would probably fall for him. But she’d called him a jerk. “A real jerk” had been her exact words, and that was a not a phrase I would have associated with Dion. Nor was it something I would have expected to come out of Cassandra’s mouth when talking about him. I wasn’t quite sure what to make of her warning. I mean, it wasn’t like I hung out with Dion 24/7, but I’d never seen anything even remotely dickish from him.

  When he had talked to me about Cassandra, he’d just seemed tired, and maybe a little sad even. I always got a protective vibe from him, even though Cassandra didn’t exactly seem like someone who needed protection. But what did I know? I was an only child, so I didn’t expect to understand what went on between siblings, especially when they’d been through so much together.

  I texted Janis, hoping to close the night with some semblance of normality.

  2morrow’s look?

  I had to wait several minutes for a reply.

  Thankful to be alive.

  I could tell from the period that she was still mad.

  * * *

  —

  I woke up the next morning to another text from Janis.

  the McAllisters want someone to babysit on Halloween. last minute, but can u take it?

  I stared at the text for a minute, not knowing how to respond. Janis and I always hung out on Halloween, even if that just meant sitting on her couch in costume and watching scary movies. We always coordinated our costumes too. We were Cher and Dionne once, which was awesome, if a little obvious, and last year, we were the twins from The Shining. We should have won the costume contest at school, except the judges were a b
unch of football players, and they gave first place to a couple of girls who’d dressed as…Baby One More Time Britney. The patriarchy is nothing if not predictable.

  But now, if Janis was asking me if I wanted to babysit on Halloween, that meant…

  U don’t want to hang out?

  yeah, no offense, but after last night, i want to avoid everything spooky for a while

  that’s cool, I get it. u don’t want the job?

  I think i want to avoid babysitting too

  I didn’t know what words would properly express how sorry I was. About everything, and not just what had happened the night before. Finally I just said I’d take the job and told her I’d see her at school.

  I wasn’t surprised that Janis didn’t want to babysit anymore. People evolved. They moved on. You weren’t going to like the same stuff at seventeen that you did at twelve. But maybe, just maybe, we could have eked it out until the end of high school if a creep in a costume hadn’t tried to kidnap her babysitting charge. And if Janis hadn’t seen me chuck a bedroom set through the air using nothing but my mind.

  When I saw her before first period, I couldn’t help but notice how subdued her outfit was. Forest-green skinny jeans and an oversized silver sweater, with leopard-print motorcycle boots, a black leather backpack, and bags under her eyes.

  “Here,” she said, holding something out to me. “You should have this.”

  I looked down. It was the burner phone. “But, Janis,” I said, not taking it from her, “you’ve always been in charge of the phone. You know I’m crap at managing the schedule.”

  “I know,” she said, not denying it. “But like I said, I think I’m done with babysitting. I’m not up for it anymore.”