Confessions of a High School Supermodel

Chapter 6

6

Saturday flew by and Maddie still didn’t call Ann Sterling.  She procrastinated all day, the same way she did when she had to study for an Algebra test, telling herself that Ms. Sterling’s office would be closed on weekends. 

Maddie shuffled around the whole day, staring at the telephone number on her desk, and finding extremely important things to do other than call, such as brush Honeydew’s fur, feed him kitty treats, and tie a pink satin bow around his neck.  Honeydew had liked everything except the bow; he growled his low, threatening meow when she did that. 

Now it was Saturday evening and her mom’s friend Ms. Blake had called her for a last-minute babysitting job.  Maddie was relieved to get out of the house, where she felt like the presence of the phone number had turned her bedroom into a jail cell.

Maddie occasionally babysat four-year-old Justin while his mom, who was divorced, went on dates.  Justin also happened to be the little brother of Sawyer Blake, who not only went to school with Maddie, he was Sundance’s boyfriend. 

Maddie had a crush on Sawyer the way you have a crush on someone you don’t know very well. The hope of them ever liking you back seems impossibly out of reach.  Maddie had never uttered a single word to Sawyer, yet he was the guy she found herself fantasizing about when she daydreamed about having a boyfriend. 

Maddie’s mom dropped her off in front of the Blakes’ house and Ms. Blake greeted her breathlessly at the front door. 

“Hey Maddie, thank goodness you’re a little early!  Justin hates it when I leave—he’s throwing a tantrum.” 

Maddie walked in and saw the little boy sitting on the floor pouting, tears streaming down his face.   Maddie immediately knelt down, picked up a toy truck, and began rolling it across the floor, making a cartoonish “vroom” noise with her mouth. 

Justin’s tears stopped almost instantly as his gaze fixed on Maddie and the truck.  He picked up a toy car himself and began imitating what Maddie was doing. 

“Thanks Maddie, you’re a lifesaver,” Ms. Blake gushed.

Maddie sat there on the floor playing with Justin while Ms. Blake scrambled to finish getting ready, slipping on earrings and spritzing on perfume. 

“Sawyer’s out with his friends,” she explained.  She paused briefly as she applied pink lipstick to her mouth.  “You know how it is, I wish Sawyer would take care of his little brother but he’s just so irresponsible.  I swear, every day I regret getting him that car for his sixteenth birthday.  He’s always out; he never wants to spend time with his family anymore.  He’s sleeping at Dean’s house right now.  He’ll be gone all night.”  She smiled at Maddie.  “I’m sure you never give your mom any trouble.”

Maddie acted disinterested but listened intently.  She was always curious about Sawyer, the way a person might be curious about the personal life of a celebrity.  She would never admit in a million years the amount of time she spent dissecting his Facebook page.  She always knew from his pictures what (or perhaps she should say who) he was doing. 

Sawyer and Sundance had been dating for a couple weeks now, and Maddie always saw them holding hands in between classes.  The couple had already moved onto the standard matching Facebook profile pictures, a black and white photo of the two of them with their arms wrapped around each other. Sundance commented on almost every one of Sawyer’s photos and statuses, whereas Maddie was too self-conscious to even “like” anything on his page. 

Being at Sawyer’s house was always somewhat of a thrill for her, even though she had never run into him while she was babysitting.  Maddie had actually tried peeking into Sawyer’s bedroom once before but she’d chickened out at the last second, afraid that Ms. Blake would come home or Justin would walk in right as she was about to do it.