Out of all the things he could've asked of him. "Alright," Anthony responded after a moment. "what kind of story?"

"Erm..." he thought for a moment. "About when you were my age!"

Oh, god no. The time in his life that Anthony most despises talking and even thinking about. Alas, it seems that he'll have to tell a story or James will do something horrifying again or will just be sad, and he isn't sure which is worse than the other. So he tried to swallow the feelings bubbling up in his throat, get over it, and just tell a nice story for a nice kid.

"Uh, well," he started off. "not much exciting happened when I was a kid, but there was—you know what, why don't we just. Not talk about my childhood." Anthony laughed aloofly, but his expression and fidgeting with his hands betrayed his anxiety and unwillingness to talk.

James frowned: "Why not?" he wanted to know.

"Because there are some things I don't want to talk about." Anthony said, perhaps a little bit too defensively, considering that the person who asked the question was a child who had no ill intentions.

James looked confused. "Why not?" he asked again.

Never before has he wanted James to stop talking as much as he did now. "Because I don't want to talk about it." Anthony said, more forcefully than last time, looking down at his hands and picking absently at the skin around his fingernails.

"But why don't you want to talk about it?" James asked. If there was an obnoxious child of the year award, James would win it.

Anthony inhaled sharply. "Because I don't want to. Shut up about it." He said in a way more hostile than he thought it to be.

James was used to being told to shut up, so it made little impact on the boy. "That's not a reason though..." he pointed out in a sing-song voice.