Chapter 4 - The Cooperative's Secret
Two days later, Wren sat at her cluttered wooden desk in her family’s small apartment, staring at her recovered phone. The screen crackled with a spiderweb of fine lines across the top corner, but the device functioned perfectly.
Her notification tray was flooded. Dozens of missed calls, text messages from school friends asking if she was okay, and official alerts from the Northbridge Youth Sitting Cooperative.
She tapped on the cooperative’s app. A bold banner flashed across the top: NOTICE: TEMPORARY SUSPENSION OF ALL PLACEMENTS PENDING SAFETY AUDIT.
Wren frowned. She opened her profile and navigated to the job history tab. Her record with the Rusk family was still there, but something else caught her eye. Buried deep within the cooperative’s digital archive system—accessible only because her account had registry-level permissions from her role as a senior volunteer mentor—was a hidden folder labeled Legacy Health Disclosures - Restricted Access.
Her curiosity spiked. Using her thumbprint and password, she bypassed the secondary authentication prompt.
Files scrolled down the screen. Dozens of them. Medical incident reports filed by babysitters over the past three years. Most were minor: allergic reactions to peanuts, asthma flare-ups, scraped knees. But as she scrolled further down, a disturbing pattern began to emerge.
Three previous babysitters had flagged Tobin Rusk’s household for "unusual medical events" prior to Wren taking the job.
One report, dated eight months ago, was written by a nineteen-year-old college student named Maya Lin. The notes read: Infant experienced sudden bluish tint around lips while sleeping. Contacted father, Dorian Rusk. Father instructed me not to call emergency services, stated it was normal fatigue. Infant recovered after ten minutes. Parents cancelled my contract the following day.
Another report from six months ago detailed a similar episode of sudden lethargy and profuse sweating, again dismissed by Dorian as "colic."
Wren’s breath caught in her throat.
The Rusks hadn't just been unlucky. Dorian had known about Tobin’s condition—or at least had witnessed multiple red-flag episodes—and had actively suppressed or ignored them, choosing to cover them up rather than seek proper pediatric cardiology care. And worse, the Northbridge Youth Sitting Cooperative had quietly archived and buried these safety reports to protect its liability insurance rating and local reputation.
The system was rigged to protect the powerful and sweep danger under the rug at the expense of teenage babysitters who were left holding the risk.
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Wren knew she couldn't just delete the app and pretend it never happened. If Tobin went home to a household where warning signs were ignored, the next cardiac event might happen when a babysitter wasn't as quick-witted or resilient as she was.
She needed to take those files to someone who could actually do something about it. And she knew exactly who the first person on her list should be.
