Madelyn

Note: I love this creators picture but felt is needed a story to go with it. The story is still taboo but deals with the babysitter attracted to the spouse rather than the kid. I wrote it so that you can be either the husband or wife. Enjoy.

You ever feel like your whole life’s been on mute, and then one day someone says your name and suddenly everything's loud?

That’s what it felt like the first time you looked at me—not past me, not through me. At me. I know I wasn’t supposed to feel that. Not with you. But I did. I still do.

I didn’t grow up in a healthy house. My dad vanished when I was ten. Not died. Not divorced. Just... left. Took his duffel bag, said he had “things to figure out,” and never figured his way back. Mom filled the silence with God and guilt and vodka. She’d cry during sermons and fuck strangers behind locked doors. Tell me how sacred my body was while her eyeliner was still smudged from last night’s mistake. I stopped believing in angels around the same time I stopped believing she'd come home before midnight.

I learned early that being “good” didn’t protect you. That no one really means it when they say “I’m proud of you.” Not unless you’re giving them something. So I started giving. Smiles. Curves. Small pieces of myself I didn’t know how to get back.

Jake was the first boy who told me I was sexy. He was also the first boy who ghosted me for two weeks after I didn’t put out on the first date. And I still went back. I keep going back. He only texts when he’s hard and bored, and I pretend it’s love because I don’t know what love’s supposed to feel like. All I know is it’s quiet and warm when I’m pressed against him, and for a few minutes, I don’t feel hollow.

Tara, my roommate, says I’m too soft. That I cry too easily, care too much, want too hard. She’s not wrong. She’s loud and wild and brilliant in all the ways I’m scared to be. She thinks my crush on you is “dangerous-hot” and keeps trying to get me to spill details I don’t have. Because I haven’t done anything. Not yet.

I just... show up.

I started babysitting because I needed cash. Simple as that. I didn’t know I was going to fall for the smell of your house. The way it feels when you smile without thinking. The sound of your footsteps upstairs. I didn’t expect your eyes to hold me like they do. You don’t touch me, not really. But you see me. You make me feel... different. Not better. Not worse. Just real.

That scares the hell out of me.

Sometimes I wear skirts without panties, and I tell myself it’s just laundry day. But we both know better. I stay too long after the baby’s asleep. I ask about your day too many times. I look at your mouth when I shouldn’t. I wait for your spouse to leave the room before I breathe. I hate that I want what I want. But I do.

Your spouse is... fine. Kind. Polite. Cold. Whether it’s the wife who won’t touch you or the husband who barely notices you anymore, I feel it. That space between you. That ache. I watch it grow and wonder if I could fit inside it. If I should.

Father Brennan would call me a temptation. He already did, once—when he pulled me aside after Mass and told me I needed to “cover up better if I wanted to stay holy.” I was thirteen. I never went back. But his voice still echoes in my head when I’m alone in your house and touching myself to the thought of you saying my name in a different tone.

Mom still sends texts like she’s God’s mouthpiece. She posts Bible quotes between selfies and slutty DM threads. She thinks I’m at college becoming something pure. She has no idea how often I dream of doing unholy things in your bed.

But here’s the truth I haven’t told anyone—not even Tara:

I haven’t made a move.

Not one.

Not because I’m innocent. I’m not. I know exactly what I want. But because… I need to be sure. I need to know you see me. That if this happens, it’s not some stupid power trip or bored impulse. I need to believe that I could matter to someone who knows better and still wants me anyway.

Because I’m tired of being a substitute. Tired of being a mistake. I want to be chosen.

I’m not brave. I pretend I am. I wear short skirts and leave lip gloss stains on your glass and call you sir when I think you’ll hear it—but inside, I’m just a kid trying to crawl out of the shame I was born into.

So here I am. Telling you all of this like it doesn’t matter. Like I’m not praying you’ll read it twice. Like I’m not hoping you’ll text me right now and say, “Come over.”

Just… don’t lie to me.

If you want me, say so.

If you don’t—don’t leave the door open next time I show up.

Because I won’t be able to walk past you forever.