Like many people in college, I found myself broke at the expense of alcohol, take-out food and plan B. I decided to look for a job. I applied at a few places, but my resume was weak. A fired waitress whose only other jobs included working on a farm and working for my parents wasn’t going to get me far. The other applicants would trample me. I settled for a job as a babysitter.
My experience babysitting/being held hostage by a seven-year-old:
I get her off the after school bus at 4pm. As we walk the five blocks to her house, she informs me that I have a stupid diarrhea face. I agree with her. “Yes, I do have a stupid diarrhea face.” She shoves me and punches me the entire way to her apartment screaming all the way, “GIVE ME YOUR MONEY. OPEN YOUR WALLET. I WANT CANDY.” I reply, “Yeah I have some money Take it. Go buy candy.” She comes back with cookies and lolly pops and soda from a store near her building.
She makes me take the stairs 8 floors instead of taking the elevator. Every ten steps or so she picks her nose and wipes her boogers on my arm. We get to the door, and as I go to unlock it, she slams me into the wall, kicking my shins and laughing diabolically. After she takes my phone and slams it into my teeth I ask her to stop. I try to talk to her like a she’s a real person. “Come on, don’t do that. That’s not what normal people do. You can’t just go around kicking people.” She doesn’t stop. As she jumps up and down on my feet, I silently tell the wall that I’m going to fucking kill myself. She must be sugar high.
We get inside and I make her dinner. She is mad at me because her mom forgot to buy her orange juice. “It’s not my fault! Have some lemonade,” I plead. She screams “NO.” Five minutes later she demands that I bring her two lemonades and a colorful straw for each. I deliver the drinks. She’s sitting in a large suede armchair and watching South Park. She asks me, “How do people have sex.” I tell her I’ve never heard of the word sex.
I am instructed to cook her a nutritious 3 course meal. As I sauté chicken, she cries out in a bloodcurdling scream. It sounds like she’s being raped by a horse. I run to her and ask what’s wrong. She acts like she doesn’t know what I’m talking about. “I wasn’t screaming,” she giggles. This continues for half an hour.
She yells my name and I can tell from the distance of her voice, she’s left the arm chair. I’m scared. She’s in the bathroom and has taken the biggest shit I’ve ever seen. “WIPE ME,” she demands. I shrink back and try to hide within myself. I have never wiped anyone. There are no gloves around. She is seven. I can tell from the look of the shit that I’ll be wiping her for days. Completely lost, I ask her how many times I should wipe her. “38 TIMES,” she yells. ”Absolutely not,” I think. I wipe her three times. The sensation of rubbing toilet paper on someone else’s bare ass makes me dry heave. I lean over to the sink and start spitting. I wipe once more and tell her she’s clean even though there’s still shit all over her. She runs back to catch the end of South Park or Taxi Cab Confessions or whatever she’s watching.
She makes me go to the park with her after dinner and tells me to sit on the swing. It’s almost dark. I obey. She jumps onto me so that we’re face to face, and straddles my lower half. She begins to swing us. This looks horribly wrong. I soon realize that being suspended in air, crotch to crotch with a seven-year-old, might seem suspicious to onlookers. All of the other parents are staring. I tell her we should leave the park because her mother will be arriving home soon. Twenty minutes later than usual, the mother arrives. I make polite conversation with her. She tells me she doesn’t have the money for me today and apologizes. I don’t care. I just want to leave.
On my way home I realize that I wiped someone’s ass for free today. I begin to cry. I don’t stop for a very long time.
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