Broken Toys

by Jackson Lear

“Well, telling me at twenty would have been easier,” said Anthony. “Especially since I was crazy about you back then.”

  “I know.”

  “Which I still find odd. You and I had a thing for each other and we never went for it.”

  “I did move around a lot,” said Amanda.

  “And now? Where do you live?”

  Amanda rested her elbows on the kitchen counter and leaned forward. “If you tell me we have no chance, none whatsoever, and that you will never leave Gemma, I will go back to New York and do whatever I can to make sure we stay just friends. I won’t mention this day or conversation to anyone and I will suck it up and try to move on. But–”

  “Amanda?”

  “Please,” Amanda said, holding her hand up to interrupt Anthony. “Please? This is the scariest conversation I’ve ever had and it’s not going as I’d hoped, so I’m freaking out a little here. I have fourteen years worth of hopes and dreams riding on the next couple of minutes of my life, so ... if you want me in your life, to see me everyday when you wake up and when you go to sleep, if I’m the one you want to grow old with, then please tell me.”

  Anthony hung his head and wanted to groan at the floor. Whatever his nerves were saying, they were muddled by every long lost and nearly forgotten crush he ever had on Amanda. “I love my kids. I don’t know if I can put them through the misery of a divorce.”

  Amanda nodded slowly as the tears tumbled down the side of her cheeks. She slid off the side of the stool and couldn’t even look Anthony in the eye. “I come from divorced parents. Maybe I shouldn’t have crapped on them as frequently as I did. What if I move back to Luxford? I know my life isn’t exactly the dream ticket for either of us right now, but I can start somewhere.”

  “I’m glad you’re here.”

  “Yeah? Any chance there’s more?”

  “There’s more. It’s just …” He trailed off, his throat closing over as a thousand screams from Gemma started to overpower him.

  “I find it’s easier to start talking and then carry on like a crazy person,” said Amanda. “Hopefully the right words will fall out on their own.”

  “I love you, Amanda.” At that point his chest nearly did burst. He had hoped to say it for years and up until now he had always been able to keep a lid on it, but this was his subconscious speaking and he was barely aware of saying it. But the words came out and he certainly knew how good it felt to say. “You are my best friend and I have been in love with you for as long as I can remember. I do want to see you every time I go to sleep and wake up.”

  The tears were in full flow now. “God, I wish I wasn’t acting like such a girl right now.”

  “It’s nice to see.”

  “Eight year old me would never have expected to see me all these years later trying to convince you to, you know ...”

  “To leave my wife for you?”

  “Yeah.” Amanda looked up to Anthony and smiled a ‘thank you’. She held her arms out for a hug and Anthony came in, gripped her tightly, and they held each other silently for several minutes.

  “I love you,” Amanda whispered, and wished Anthony would say it back to her.

  “I ... am still married,” said Anthony.

  Amanda sniffed and pulled back. “I know. And I was too chicken shit to tell you before this all got complicated.”

  “No kidding. I mean I did just tell one of my oldest friends that I love her while my wife is the maid of honour and off on a hen weekend.” He looked over the kitchen and finally figured out what he wanted to do for the rest of the day. “Don’t go.”

  “I’m glad you said that, because walking back to Josh’s place feeling like this would be a bad idea.”

  Anthony then realised that Josh had hooked up with Brooke and still wasn’t home. “Do you want to help me make homemade ravioli and just hang out together?”

  “So we’re going to be playing husband and wife all day?” Amanda said, jokingly, and then she realised how that sounded. “Sorry. That probably disrespects Gemma quite a bit.”

  “As long as we keep our clothes on, I’m asking you to spend the day with me.”

  Amanda smiled and felt the feeling burst out of her. “I’d love to.”

  It took all the strength in the world to not go over and kiss her. He was sure the day might come when he would regret not taking the chance.

  Two hours later, while watching a Danish TV drama, Amanda fell asleep in Anthony’s arms. He gently kissed the top of her head.

  35

  McIntyre

  “So, what are we trading today?” James asked, looking over Daniel, Ian, and Warrick.

  Daniel stepped forward with a flash drive in his hand. “We’ve got videos.”

  “How many?”

  “Eight.”

  “Eight?” James asked, raising an eyebrow. “Are they any good?”

  “Some are,” said Daniel.

  James took the flash drive, shuffled over to the laptop sitting on the sofa, and had a look at what the boys were offering. “I see eight short videos.”

  “I edited all the crap out,” said Daniel. “There were hours of nothing happening.”

  James looked over the titles of each video. They were all a random mess of letters and numbers. “You haven’t named them?” James asked.

  Daniel stepped back in a moment of panic and realised then that he had forgotten something crucial. The boys all knew who were in the videos but James didn’t. “We decided it was best to keep them secret so that no one could find them easily. If my sister ever searched my computer for her name I don’t want her to find a video of herself.”

  James peered at Daniel and the boys suspiciously. “You fellas didn’t film yourselves whacking off, did you?”

  Ian and Warrick both shook their heads and mumbled a, “No.”

  James rolled his eyes at Daniel, who took a little too long to answer. “You better not have put that one on here.”

  “Only women,” said Daniel.

  James clicked on the first video and watched the opening few seconds. It was of a small bathroom. A woman came in and started unzipping her pants, then sat on the toilet, leaned forward, and relieved herself. “Who’s this?”

  Daniel stepped in closer and looked at the video. “That’s one of Ian’s.”

  Ian looked over. “She’s a friend of my mum’s.”

  “You can’t see much,” said James. “Kinda fucking disappointing, if you ask me. The rest better be better than this.”

  “They are,” said Ian, looking concerned.

  “Try the next one,” said Daniel.

  James clicked and saw a low level angle of a messy bedroom with several posters of boy bands in the back. A slim teenage girl came in, faced her closet, and began changing.

  “That’s Emily, my sister,” said Daniel.

  “How old is she?” James asked.

  “Sixteen,” said Daniel.

  “Good. You didn’t say, ‘and a half.’ Well done.”

  James watched for a few seconds and saw Emily completely strip, grab her bathrobe, and leave the room. The video jumped forward a few minutes to when she returned from the shower and proceeded to dry herself off before getting into her pyjamas.

  James nodded and gave his approval. He clicked on the next one. It was of Emily in the shower. “Did you film these on different days?”

  “Yes,” said Daniel.

  James glanced at the run time of the video and was surprised to see it go for twenty minutes. “Jesus, how long does she need in there?”

  “She says she’s always doing her hair, but ... you know ...”

  James smirked and clicked forward. Then he found what ‘you know’ meant. “So she plays with herself.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good effort,” James said. “I bet you three jerked off like crazy to this one.”

  The boys remained quiet, allowing James to sniff with a chuckle.

  “Yeah, yeah you three did. It’s all right. It’s what boys do
. You find a video of a pretty girl all naked when she’s enjoying herself and you get to enjoy her as well.”

  Two of the videos were of Warrick’s mum. James winced when he saw her in the shower. She was not the most attractive or slender of women. Then he laughed at it all, about how humiliating this would be if anyone ever saw her. She looked like she was in her mid-fifties.

  The final three belonged to Ian. Two of them were of his mum in her bedroom, getting changed. The third was of her showering and having a fake argument with herself while doing her hair. James peered carefully at her face and murmured to himself. “What’s her name again?”

  “Claire.”

  “Baxter?”

  “Yeah,” said Ian.

  James felt a devilish grin take over his soul. After all this time he finally got to see Claire Baxter naked. He closed the program and smiled at the boys. “You three did all right.” He got up, grimaced at his dodgy knee, and walked over to a chest of drawers by the wall. He pulled open the top drawer and started counting out a number of bullets. “You boys have a bag with you?”

  “I have my backpack,” said Daniel.

  “Hmm. It’s not ideal, but it’ll do. Next time bring a small plastic bag or the like, something that you would put a sandwich in. Otherwise the bullets will roll around the bottom of your backpack and they’ll get lost.” James dumped a handful of bullets into his drawer and slid the rest into a small box. “Here you boys go. There were some decent videos in there so you’ll get three bullets per video. Divide them up as you like. Let’s keep them coming. The knickers as well. The more videos the better, okay?”

  Daniel beamed when he took the box of bullets and glanced over them to make sure he had twenty four in there. “Yes. Thank you, James.”

  “No problem. You boys going to fire them off today?”

  “Probably.”

  “Well, go easy. Save some for tomorrow. You don’t want to fire everything off at once. You want to enjoy it. Take your time.”

  The boys grinned and left, giving James a chance to return to the young Emily and the older Claire. After all these years, after everything he had gone through, he was finally able to see her pussy.

  36

  Ian

  Ian heard his mum laughing on the phone, then he groaned when he heard her next question.

  “Great, so you’ll come over tonight?” Claire asked. “Perfect.”

  Ian felt another night of him looking after Tom and Sarah again. Just what he needed. Maybe he should introduce them to his zombie apocalypse game. It would blow Tom’s mind away. Then he could see if the kid was man enough to play. Sarah would probably sit in the back of Ian’s dark bedroom, listening to the foreboding music and gunshots fire randomly as another zombie met its doom. She would slowly descend into tears. Then with any luck Ian wouldn’t have to hang around babies anymore and he could sit at the grown ups table.

  “Great, I’ll see you then,” Claire said. She hung up the phone and turned to Ian. “So, I’m having a gathering tonight, as you may have heard. Tom and Sarah will be over.”

  Ian tried to not roll his eyes, but the zombie apocalypse had just climbed to his number one source of entertainment for that evening. Unless ... “Daniel invited me over tonight,” Ian said, quickly.

  “Oh,” said Claire, looking stumped for a moment. “When did this happen?”

  “He just sent me a message.” It wasn’t true, but even if Daniel was busy Ian was sure he could go over to Warrick’s. Or, hell, he could spend the night wandering around town. It would certainly be better than what his mum had in mind.

  “Well, if you must. It probably won’t be your thing anyway. Anthony and Gemma are coming over. So are Josh and Hannah.”

  Ian nodded automatically, knowing those four rounded off the usual suspects.

  “Amanda as well,” said Claire, staring off to the ceiling.

  Ian’s heart fluttered at the sound of that. Amanda. Bathroom Amanda. He might actually have a second chance at filming her. And not just her, but Gemma and Hannah as well. Neither of them were fat and probably looked okay naked, but until then Ian had never really considered seeing either of them without their clothes on.

  Of course, if he hid the camera in the bathroom then he would also end up filming Josh and Anthony. He didn’t really want to see that. It also increased the risk of getting caught, especially with Tom and Sarah nosing around. Unless he was able to keep Tom and Sarah occupied and limit them to the upstairs bathroom, then he might earn enough bullets from James to make Daniel and Warrick bow down in jealousy.

  “They’re coming over with their outfits for the wedding,” said Claire.

  Bam!

  Ian’s devious mind hit pay dirt. They were going to get dressed. And undressed. But where? And even if they just got undressed then all he would get is their underwear. No, the toilet cam was still the best. Then he could see their whole bush and that was worth a lot more than just underwear. Unless ... unless he got both. He would need a second camera. He knew there was no way the women would get undressed in the lounge, not in front of the guys. He had to figure out where all of this undressing would take place.

  “I’m not going to this wedding, am I?” Ian asked.

  “No, I’m afraid Lucy has made it clear that no one under sixteen will be attending. And she’s made it especially clear to everyone with babies. She’s called everyone with children and has spoken to them repeatedly that if they can’t find a babysitter then it’s best for them to stay at home.”

  “When are they coming over?” Ian asked.

  “Seven o’clock.”

  Ian nodded and wandered back to his bedroom. Ten seconds later he was on his computer typing away to Daniel.

  ‘Gold mine! My house, tonight!’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘4Fs. They’re trying on wedding outfits.’

  Ian waited for an immediate reply but it didn’t come. After ten seconds he refreshed the program, but still there was no response. He waited a minute. Then two minutes. He started to sweat, fearing that Daniel’s computer had just been intercepted and their message had been read. He cursed himself for making it so obvious and knew he had to be more careful next time.

  Five whole minutes went by before Daniel responded. ‘Just asked. Mum says ok. What time?’

  Ian leaned back against his chair in relief. ‘They’re coming at 7.’

  37

  Anthony

  At seven o’clock Anthony and Gemma pulled into Claire’s driveway. Tom and Sarah had just been dropped off at Anthony’s parents for a couple of hours. Gemma insisted it wasn’t necessary, that Claire wouldn’t mind having them over, but the kids would be bored within half an hour and at least this would keep them out of their hair for half the evening. Secretly, Anthony didn’t want Tom and Sarah in the same place as Amanda and Gemma in case they saw emotions flare out of control and hear things Anthony didn’t want them to hear.

  Claire greeted them at the door. “Hey! Just the two of you?”

  Anthony nodded. “Just the two of us.”

  “Well, come in. Everyone else is here.”

  Anthony stepped inside and waved to the familiar crowd gathered in the lounge. “It’s like you people are the only ones I ever see.”

  “That’s because we are so great you don’t need anyone else,” said Hannah, raising a glass of wine.

  Anthony glanced over everyone and finally landed on Amanda. He nodded politely, turned, and assessed the various looks from his friends. What seemed painfully obvious was that it was no longer a secret between just himself and Amanda. Josh had certainly played a hand in the set up and he might know more of Amanda’s plans than even Anthony did. Claire may have also been informed. All it would take was one slip of the tongue before everyone revealed everything and lives would be ruined. Destroyed. Gone. With no hope of recovery. Gemma was the only one he was convinced remained in the dark.

  Amanda had always been a wild card. If she went for it, tonight, then
there was nothing that would help him.

  She looked radiant, though. Claire, Gemma, and Hannah were all wearing jeans, but Amanda wore a maroon silk skirt and a teal shirt. She had on a gold necklace that drew attention to her chest. Anthony noticed her nails were buffed and polished as though she had spent the afternoon having a manicure.

  Josh stood up and caught Anthony’s attention. “Drink?”

  “Sure, but I’ll get it,” said Anthony. “Can I get something for anyone else?”

  There was a chorus of orders, but the only person he saw was Amanda nodding at him and saying nothing.

  Anthony went to the kitchen and tried to hide there. He felt a groan coming along that probably wasn’t going to leave him all night. He gently rested his forehead against a cupboard door and counted to ten. He got to eight when Claire came around the corner and startled him.

  “Hey, everything okay?”

  “Yeah, fine,” said Anthony, automatically.

  “Did I scare you?”

  “Nope. Just drifted into space a little.”

  “Well, just as long as we don’t make it too rambunctious tonight. Ian and a friend of his are upstairs, but apparently there’s world domination to be had and we probably won’t see them.”

  “Oh yeah? Too shy of the adult folk?” Anthony asked.

  “Apparently we are dumb,” said Claire. “We speak to them as though they are seven when in fact they are thirteen and want to believe they are eighteen.”

  “Should we hide the booze?”

  “If they start drinking I’m sure we’ll figure it out when their heads are pointing down the toilet.”

  They were interrupted when, lo and behold, Ian wandered into the kitchen with his head pointed at his phone. He didn’t take his eyes off the screen and used his peripheral vision to open up the fridge, pull out some orange juice, pour himself a glass, put the juice back in the fridge, and wander away again.

  When Ian was gone Anthony allowed himself to grin. “He wasn’t reading.”