Babysitting

You're alone in your room, ready to check the forum, and clearly a little scared. How was today's argument interpreted? Did the rumor already affect you?

Your heart filled with anxiety, you skim through the new threads, unfortunately, it doesn't take long to find one talking about you, most of those created today do. You choose one randomly and start reading:

[Man! This dude is the worst!]

[Did he ruin her stuff? Why?]

[Heard she didn't want to join his harem and they fought]

[The hell! He's that bad?]

[Already got two girls, and he clearly wants more!]

[Vera is too pure to accept a foursome]

[She's good looking tho]

[Vera go out with me please! I'll make you happy!]

[azdzadaadf]

[Dumbass!]

It goes on and you feel like you're wasting your time, you read other threads but they all say vaguely the same thing. You want to deny the accusation but you're not that dumb, if you do, everyone will know who you are, and it will make the rumors look even more believable. Instead of making things worse, you turn off your phone for the night.

"John! Come here please!" Your mom calls you from the living room. You join her and she's with Kana and a little boy.

"I have a meeting that'll last an hour or two. It would be great if you two could babysit timothy for a while. He's the son of a colleague and she didn't have anyone available to watch over him." Of course, you're not very pleased, but you can see that Kana is even less so. Your mom leaves and you find yourself watching over a little kid you don't even know. He looks at you:

"Are you brother and sister?"

"No" You respond, you wonder how he could even think you're related.

"You're married then." This time it's Kana that interjects.

"Of course not! We're way too young to be married!" Seems like the wrong thing to focus on but ok.

"Let's play hide and seek! Mister is the it!" He doesn't let you refuse as he's already running around. Kana looks at you with a slight smile and she starts leaving the room. You grab her arm to stop her from leaving.

"Mom said that we would watch over him, don't flee." She turns around.

"I don't want to spend the night watching a kid run around, I'll wash the dishes for a week."

"Nah, that won't work, mom does the dishes." You say that smugly, but after thinking about it you kinda feel like an asshole.

"Fine, what do you want?" You start thinking about what she could do for you, maybe she could cook you a meal again or play guitar for you...

"A kiss."

...

"I-I mea-"

"Sure. You take care of the kid for the night, ok?" Your heart only starts back when she's out of your sight.

You smile like an idiot, you weren't expecting her to say yes. And now you need to respect your part of the deal... You spend the rest of the night playing with Timothy.

When it's finally time to sleep, you pass next to Kana's room, but the lights are turned off, so you go to bed instead. You fall asleep easily while thinking about past your date.