letters to sam • sgc

iv

College was hard. It was a lot of studying and a lot of cramming and a lot of testing and a lot of crying.

But nothing could compare to how difficult it was to babysit Claire Grundon. She was only six, and I loved kids, but my God was she spoiled. I didn't even know what to do with her. What do five year olds even like doing? Playing dolls? Claire didn't.

Claire liked breaking things. Actually, Claire loved breaking things. When I first started babysitting her, I used to jokingly threaten to lock her in the laundry room. And just last week, she reached her new longest time out in there of three hours.

She was a brat. She could be fun, but when it was time for bed or time to quit playing, I'd be on the verge of pulling out my hair. Or hers.

Ma gave me her old phone book, two inches thick with hundreds of phone numbers in it, for Claire to rip the pages out of. She said she'd get tired and bored of it after ten minutes, and I could have some peace.

Claire and I had sat down in the living room with it, and I watched with rapidly deflating confidence as she tore that book to shreds. The entire thing, absolutely decimated, in twenty minutes, tops.

This time, ma had saved all of her eggshells from baking (there were a lot), and I sat on the Grundon's porch and watched Claire stomp them all to smithereens on a plastic bag I had laid out in the driveway. She was taking running jumps from twenty feet away, she was kicking them, she was doing the stanky leg on them, they were getting violated.

She was allowed to destroy things once a week, when I came over. And only things I said she was allowed to destroy. We always had a real good time.

I watch as Sunny walks up the driveway, fear evident in her expression, though she masked it pretty well. She waves to Claire, but it was pointless.

"What is happening?" she whispered to me out of the side of her mouth, taking a seat beside me on the edge of the stoop.

"Beats me," I shrug.

"This is what you babysit?"

"Hey, she can be fun."

"How?"

"I like to close my eyes and pretend I'm on the Titanic."

She scoffs.

"What are you doing here?" I nudge her shoulder lightly.

"Just wanted to talk about some stuff," she says quietly, resting her chin in her hand.

"Like what?" I ask, tossing an eggshell in Claire's direction. Ma gave me extra, in case Claire ran out of the other ones too quickly. I watch as she gently rolls it onto the bag with her foot before crushing it to death.

"The wedding, you know," she shrugs. She's being vague.

"If you wanna talk about it, you're gonna have to talk about it," I say, bumping her shoulder. "'M'not telepathic, you know."

She sighs. "Yeah, I know."

I give her some time.

"Okay, well, I went in your room-"

"Sunny!"

"I was trying to find you! Anyway, I just happened to read the letter from your boyfriend-"

"Sunny!"

"You should invite him out for my wedding!"

"Sunny."

She was grinning at me and batting her eyelashes. "Please," she begs, dragging the 'a' out. "He seems really sweet."