I dropped to the floor and held one guy up. “This can be Mac, and this can be his lover, Pryce.” I conveniently left the woman out. But this was my fantasy.
“Which one can I be?” Donny asked, sitting beside me.
I looked at the figures, then handed him one. “You’re Mac. He’s in charge of the mission.”
“Cool. What’s the mission?”
I shrugged. “I dunno. We have to rescue someone.”
“How about that teddy?” He pointed to a bear sticking out of another bin.
“Perfect. Let’s go.” This was the strangest party I’d ever been to, but if it meant playing with Donny for hours, I was in.
After a while, more people came up the elevator. A few were shy littles who colored at the table, and a couple sat and watched cartoons. A few grabbed some toys, but they acted like they were all in cliques and didn’t want to make friends. I watched them doing their things, feeling like school all over again. Elementary and high school had been hard. I didn’t even finish high school. I’d been the loner, the one who got picked on. I’d started playing with my brother’s crappy, worn-out guitar to keep busy. We couldn’t afford lessons, so I listened to the radio and tried to mimic what I heard. That was still how I played, mostly. I wasn’t great at writing the actual music. If I were working on a song, I’d record it and let someone else transcribe it. Wolf was actually really good at it, but Joe often did it for me, too. Music was what sustained me through those hard years, but I didn’t have any music now. Only Donny.
“Want to try and make friends?” he asked.
Did I? “I want to have fun.”
“Haven’t we been having fun?”
I nodded vigorously. “Yes. I want to keep having fun.”
“Okay.” He started making up a new story for our adventurers, but I kept looking around the room. A few men walked around,not playing with things, but talking to the littles. Almost like they were at the pound, looking for a pet.
“Look.” I tugged Donny’s sleeve. “What’re they doing?”
His eyes got big. “They’re daddies looking for a boy.”
“Thought so.”
“What’s wrong?” He understood my moods so well, I swear he fucking read my mind sometimes.
I huffed. “I don’t like the way they’re looking at everyone. Like…”
Donny scowled. “Right. Like they want to eat someone.”
“Mmm…something like that.” They were like predators, and I was ready to tell them to fuck off if they came over to talk to me. But one lingered by the door. He had his arms crossed over his broad chest and wore a fire-engine red mask. When he moved, I saw a harness over his white shirt, which was tucked into a pair of jeans. A pair of big black shit-kickers finished off his outfit. The best part though, was that he didn’t look like the others. He wasn’t stalking the room at all. In fact, he looked like he was ready to run out of there. I bumped my shoulder into Donny’s. “Look at him.”
“Oh. Let’s go talk to him.” I wasn’t sure about that, but Donny jumped up and ran over with me trailing in his wake. “Hi. I’m Donny. This is Kay.” He shoved me forward.
“Hi, guys.” His voice was deep and rough. “I’m Saxon.”
“Nice to meet you, Daddy Saxon. We were playing over there. Want to come over?”
“Sure.” He followed us back to the corner where we were playing, but I didn’t want to play anymore.
I held my action figure in my lap and tried to sneak looks at this daddy while Donny played.
“Are you shy?” Saxon asked.
Donny answered for me, “He’s feeling self-conscious now. He gets that way. He’s really sweet, though. He’s my best friend.”
“I think you’re both really sweet.” Saxon’s smile was nice. He had great teeth and dark eyes that twinkled.
“Come on, Kay, play with me.” Donny tried to tug me over, but I wasn’t having it.
“No.”
