Her soft brown hair fell in lovely, loose, natural curves all around her neck.Her soft brown hair fell in lovely, loose, natural curves all around her neck. And she was very tall for 14 - almost as tall as my wife. If I did not know better, I would have bet she was 19 or 20. She was dressed in a knee-length T-shirt with a picture of a teenage mutant ninje turtle on it, and that combined with the roughouse play she was engaging in with her brother were the only indications that this was a kid. Pete made the kids stand still and he introduced them to me. I had seen Jeff playing around the complex, but had never met him or even seen Kelli. "Hi," he said, looking away. "Hi," Kelli said, looking me right in the eye. Her expression had a kind of boldness to it, but she still looked terribly innocent. I held that gaze for an uncomfortable moment, then looked up to see that Pete and Judith had already started heading for the door. "You kids be good - mind Mr. Freeman," Judith said, not looking. Pete followed her out the door without a word. They told me nothing about who to call if there was a problem, or any of the stuff I'd thought one would tell a sitter. Pretty neglectfull parents, I thought. The kids showed it. For the first hour things were rocky. These two just would not calm down. They wrestled, tumbled, and ran over most of the house, and I felt weird telling them to `settle down' and things like that. It made me feel like my father, and hence rather old. I began to see why the place was such a mess. I decided to retire to the TV room and hoped the kids would get tired soon. I was watching some nudie flick on the Playboy channel, and things got reasonably quiet for a while. Then all of a sudden I head a loud *bang* followed by crying. I ran into the kitchen and saw Jeff lying next to the undersink cabinet. I felt my heart jump when I saw the blood running down his face. Kelli was standing next to him, looking too innocent and doing nothing to help him. |