"You remember the plan, right, dear?" A lady's voice said through the phone. "Yeah, yeah, I know. 1:00, I come over to watch your son until you come back home." A brown haired boy on the other end said. "Yes, Charlie, of course! And we'll be paying you accordingly too.” Charlie smiled. “Sweet. I’ll be there in a bit.” He hung up and began to make his way down to the front door. “Be careful, Charlie! Text when you get there!” His mom called from the other room. “Yeah, I know! See you later.” Charlie’s relationship with his mom wasn’t very close. She usually just let him do what he wanted which wasn’t very responsible, but that just meant the boy had to learn to fend for himself. Still, he kind of felt like he was alone in the world outside of his friends at school.
Charlie Lawrence was your standard highschool teen. 5’6”, short brown hair in a lazy style, decently thick muscles but nothing too major. Just a boy who had meat on his bones so he wasn’t unable to lift something heavy. Had friends, but wasn’t too social. He was sixteen and had recently earned his license, but in order to help pay for his car, he took up odd jobs around town. One of them being babysitting. It was summer vacation, so there was a lot of time to gather the funds.
The other day, he agreed to help the Michaels, a young couple, look after their eight year old son Brady while they were away on an important business trip. They were relieved when he told them he could work the whole week, even longer if they run into something and need to stay longer.
Grabbing his jacket and a backpack full of necessities, Charlie ran out and got into his car, driving off into the next neighborhood over to where he’ll be staying for a while. When he arrived, he walked up to the porch and rang the doorbell. He noticed a car already started up.
A rather pretty blonde woman, about in her late twenties, opened the door to greet him. She was fully dressed in formal business wear. “Hi, I’m glad you’re here! Thank you so much for taking up the job, you’re a life saver.” She let him in. “Yeah, it’s no problem, ma’am. Where’s the…kid…” Charlie was in awe when he stepped inside.
The house looked pretty normal on the outside, but on the inside, it seemed like they were pretty well off. Nice furniture, hardwood flooring, a roaring fireplace in the living room, the kitchen was pretty well built with cabinets and an island. It was pretty cozy. A family’s dream, probably. ‘Heh, not bad. A guy could get used to this.’ He thought to himself. “He’s upstairs. Brady, Charlie’s here!”
“Yeah, I’m coming!” A high pitched boy’s voice responded. He heard light yet loud footsteps and a boy about a head and a half shorter at 4’0” came running down the stairs. He ran up to Charlie and looked up at him. “Man, I was expecting a cute girl or something.” He pouted. He was wearing your standard t-shirt and shorts combo typical of most boys and no footwear due to preferring not to in the house, with short, somewhat curly blonde hair and grayish blue eyes. Nothing out of the ordinary in terms of body build with a face rounded with baby fat, he was rather cute to most who’d look at him. “Yeah, well, my name’s gender neutral. Tough luck, dude.” The older boy ruffled the kid's hair, making Brady wanna swat his hands away. “H-Hey! Quit it!” Mrs. Michaels laughed at the exchange. “I think you two might just get along nicely! Now, Brady's bedtime’s at 9, so at least remember that. You can use me and my husband’s bedroom to sleep in. If you run into any trouble, call me and I’ll help you with advice. I’ll try and see if I can come home early if it’s really an emergency.” Charlie nodded and Brady's mother gave him a kiss on the forehead. “Be good, ok? Don’t give Charlie a hard time.” She said. “Mmhm.” Brady hugged her and she headed out to the car where his dad was in the passenger seat waiting.
After hearing the car roll out and off into the distance, Charlie took it upon himself to take a closer look around, wandering into the large living room after taking his jacket off and putting his bag down. “So…what do you usually do when your parents are off on their little excursions, huh?” Brady followed him. “Ehh, not much. I just kinda do whatever.” He shrugged. He didn’t sound too enthusiastic, awkwardly sitting on the couch and waiting for Charlie to do something.
Looking around the room, Charlie saw various family photos on the mantle above the fireplace, feeling it’s warmth as he got closer. Why they had it going in the summer is anyone’s guess, probably to make it look nice. It was a bunch of sweet pictures of the family going places, doing various activities like going to amusement parks and fishing trips, but what really caught his eye was the other stuff on the mantle, that being the unusual knickknacks between and behind the photos. All these old yet beautiful looking artifacts and ornate jewelry and whatnot.
“Woah…” Charlie muttered to himself. “What're you lookin’ at?” Brady asked. “Just the weird stuff on the fireplace. Not the, uhh, pictures, I mean like, the other stuff.” Charlie gestured to the other things. “Oh. Those are some ancient junk my parents brought back from their trips or whatever. They travel a lot, so they find stuff and bring it home.” The kid watched Charlie grab a statue next to a picture of Brady and his parents at one of his little league football games. It was a cute looking idol of a bear holding a shooting star.
Charlie turned to him. “Did they tell you what this is?” Brady’s eyes lit up at the sight of that one. “Oh, that thing! Mom and Dad told me it was called the Ursa Major. They said it could grant wishes.” The teen sat down on the couch with him to take a closer look. The bear itself was made of a smooth wood, while the star had a sparkly light blue crystal look to it, almost as if it actually came from a star. “Looks really cool, right?” Brady was enamored by the star. “Yeah…” Charlie turned it over and saw writing on the back.
“To the one who holds me, say what you wish, for it might become real.”
Raising an eyebrow, Charlie just scoffed. “Pfft, yeah, right. It’s probably nothing but some pretty looking figure.” Brady gave a sad look. “It’s true, though! I mean, I tried it the day after we got it.” He sat back on the couch, kicking his feet. “I didn’t think it would actually work, but…I wished Mom would let me do a sport since she didn’t want me doing one until I got a little older. Later that day, Mom told me she decided to trust me and now I get to be on a football team!” The boy got excited talking about it.
Charlie looked skeptical. “Really?” Brady nodded. “I mean…it might just be lucky, but I think I believe in it now.” The teen handed the statue to him. “Well, if you’re sure about that, little dude, then show me. Make a wish and let’s see what happens.” After a minute of thinking, the kid shook his head. “…Mmm, nah. I think I’ll let you make a wish.” Charlie was hesitant. He didn’t want to end up making a wish, only for nothing to happen and feeling embarrassed about it. The kid might never let him live it down. But then again…he didn’t seem like that kind of person. “Nah, man, I can’t.” He said awkwardly. “C’mon, Charlie! I wanna see you do it.” Brady was insistent. “Why?” he asked. “’Cause I already made one. I wanna let you have a turn.” The kid leaned forward eagerly.
It seemed like he had no choice, so Charlie decided to go with something a little personal, if the sports wish was granted. “…Well…you know how I’m supposed to look after you?” He asked. “Yeah, why?” The blonde boy was curious. “Well, uhm…I didn’t really have anything like that growing up. Dad left when I was little, and Mom's not really much of a Mom. I-I mean, she IS, but…y’know.” The teen stopped himself. “Wait, what am I saying? You don’t know. You’re like, five.” Brady narrowed his eyebrows. “Nuh-uh! I’m eight!” Charlie got snarky. “Same diff. Anyway, my point still stands. You probably wouldn’t understand.”
Brady continued to lean forward to look up at him. “I think I know what you mean. Mom and Dad work a lot, but they started making time for me after I made that wish. Before that, they weren’t around much.” He lazily tilted his head. “You’re not the first babysitter I’ve had, y’know.” At that point, Charlie began to feel sad. His mother wasn’t super close with him, but at least she was around. Either way, they did share something in common. “…Guess you do.” He continued. “Sometimes I wish someone would take care of me too.”
When he realized what he just blurted out, Charlie immediately grew flustered. “Not like ‘take care of’ as in like—I mean, someone who’d look out for me, y’know? I didn’t have anyone like that. Someone who like…” he just sighed. “Loves me, or whatever.” They didn’t notice it, but when Charlie made his wish, the star the bear was holding sparkled a little, almost glowing.
“Yeah, I get what you mean.” Brady wanted to laugh and tease him a little, but something inside him made him stop. Instead, he kind of wanted to make Charlie feel better. “…Well…maybe I could look out for you.” He blurted out. The teen scoffed at him, the two of them getting up from the couch. He put the bear back on the mantle. “Yeah, right. Who’s the babysitter here?” Brady put his fists to his hips in a kind of superhero pose. “I’m serious! We’re stuck here together until my parents get back, so let’s look out for each other!” Charlie laughed, ruffling his hair again. “Tch, whatever you say, weirdo.” Brady laughed in return. “Hey! That’s mean!” He wanted to look grumpy, but he couldn’t help but smile. The kid just met him, but for some reason, he already felt a friendship forming.
“Alright, what do you wanna do first? We got all afternoon.” Charlie crossed his arms. “Oh! You wanna play some football? We can go out in the backyard!” Brady asked excitedly. “Eghh…I’m not really one for…” The teen looked down at him. The face he was making looked too cute to say no to. Besides, part of this job was keeping him happy. If this would keep him busy, then why not? “…Fine. Go get the ball.” The kid started turning around for the stairs. “Cool! C’mon, I’ll show you my room. My sports stuff's in there.” With that, the two headed up the stairs to the hallway.
While they were gone, though, the bear's star continued to glow faintly again before fading.