The Lost Things Club

by J. S. Puller

None of the suggestions in the binder felt like what he really wanted.

  I knew what he wanted. He wanted to go to the Land of Lost Things. But how could I help TJ when the one thing he wanted was just impossible?

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The back room of the laundromat had become a sort of clubhouse. It was a sacred space for the members of the Lost Things Club to hang out, even when we weren’t making a new video. Michelle’s talent for finding lost things provided endless hours of entertainment. When Violet, TJ, and I arrived every morning, she’d have her latest finds from the evening washing shift. She would lay them out on the table. Some of them would be used for our puppets, who suffered wear and tear with each new video. But others would just leave us incredibly confused.

  “What is it?” Violet asked on Thursday morning, picking up an object Michelle had discovered wedged in the corner of one of the washing machines. Machine number fifteen, which always provided us with the most treasures. We were each sitting in one of the chairs around the table.

  Michelle in the squashy chair.

  TJ in the wooden chair with the cracked leather seat.

  Violet in the black plastic chair.

  And me in the folding chair.

  We hadn’t exactly, officially declared each seat as our own. But we all just sort of gravitated to them.

  Michelle’s latest find was about two inches long and made of glossy black plastic. It was shaped like a rectangle, with the corners slightly rounded. One side had a raised edge going all around the border. Like the lip of a bowl. On the other side, there were two prongs, slightly sticky, standing out from the otherwise smooth surface.

  “I’m not sure,” Michelle said, as Violet passed it over to her. She examined it a moment, then passed it to TJ.

  TJ flipped it over and over in his hands, then held it out to me. I realized a second too late that I was staring at him. A hard, intense look. After everything I’d read in the binder and book, I felt like I was seeing him in new ways. Searching him.

  Look for symptoms of trauma, all the articles and lists said.

  Was he shifting in his chair because he was anxious?

  Or because the cracked seat was poking him?

  How could you tell the difference?

  Was his shoulder hunched up because he was tense?

  Or was that what he looked like when he was relaxed?

  I didn’t know anymore.

  I was questioning everything.

  “Leah?” he asked, wrinkling his nose.

  “Nothing!” I blurted out. Before I realized he hadn’t asked me a question.

  I felt the three of them staring at me for a second.

  “Okay, then,” Violet said, raising both eyebrows.

  “Maybe it’s some kind of button?” Michelle said, gesturing to the piece of black plastic, sitting in the sweaty palm of TJ’s hand.

  “No,” I said, taking it from him. “No holes. I think it’s completely solid.” But I gripped both of the shorter ends and, on instinct, gave it a pull. To my surprise, it slid open.

  “Oh!” I said. “I know what it is!”

  “What?” Violet asked.

  “It’s a… I don’t know if there’s a word for it.”

  “That’s helpful.”

  “You stick it on your laptop, over the webcam,” I said. “And then you can slide it open when you need to use the camera, then shut it when you’re done so if a hacker turns on your camera, they won’t be able to see anything.”

  “How’d that end up in the washer?”

  “Must have been in someone’s pocket,” Michelle said.

  Violet shook her head. “I’ll never understand people. You check your pockets before you do laundry. Isn’t that obvious?”

  “Not to everyone.”

  Violet sighed. “People need to take better care of their stuff.”

  TJ nodded silently in agreement.

  There was a sudden knock on the door. TJ flinched.

  I wondered if he was reliving the noise of the bullets going off in the school.

  Like the car backfiring.

  Like the car door slamming shut.

  Aunt Lisa’s papers talked about that.

  “Who’s that?” Violet asked. “Is that your mother?”

  Michelle rolled her eyes. “My mama has a key. It’s her coin-op.”

  Violet scowled. “Can we just pretend I didn’t ask that?”

  “Nope,” Michelle said. “I’m going to remember it for the rest of my life.” She hopped up and trotted over to the door. After pulling it open a crack to peer outside, she pulled it open the rest of the way.

  On the other side was Aunt Lisa.

  Seeing her in the laundromat felt all wrong. Like when you changed the channels too fast and the shows you were seeing kind of blurred into one another. She just didn’t fit in. Didn’t belong in this world. Didn’t belong with the rest of the scenery.

  “Hello, all,” she said, with a brittle, forced smile that anyone could tell was, well, not fake, but not exactly coming from a happy place, either. “I’m TJ’s mother. Lisa Whitman-Cantor. I hope I’m not interrupting anything. I know you creative types have your process. I don’t want to get in the way of that.”

  “Nope,” Michelle said, stepping off to one side and raising one leg, balancing on the other. “Come on in.”

  Aunt Lisa breezed inside, carrying a tray covered in aluminum foil. “I thought you filmmakers might get a little hungry, so I brought you a snack.”

  Violet cleared a space on the table for Aunt Lisa to set down the tray, shoving aside a pile of mismatched socks. “This is a secret family recipe,” she said, taking off the foil to reveal a platter piled high with apple-cinnamon sticky buns.

  “They look amazing!” Michelle said.

  I could already feel my mouth watering. They were my absolute favorite. Aunt Lisa made them every Thanksgiving, when she came up to Deerwood Park with the family.

  They weren’t exactly a health food.

  Maybe she’d given up on that particular list.

  Couldn’t blame her. I still didn’t see how healthy food was supposed to get through to TJ.

  “Dig in, kids,” she said, smiling at us.

  “Thanks!” Violet said.

  “Yeah,” Michelle added. “Thank you so much.”

  TJ came around the table to take a sticky bun. His movements were hesitant, halting. Like he was afraid Aunt Lisa was going to grab him or something.

  “Thank you, Mommy.”

  It was the first time he’d spoken to her since their blowup in her room. My eyes cut over to Aunt Lisa. She very, very quickly dragged her hand across her eyes, turning just slightly so TJ couldn’t see.

  Fortunately, she had her waterproof mascara on today.

  We helped ourselves to the treats. They were just as buttery rich as I remembered, and I practically inhaled the first one before reaching for a second.

  Aunt Lisa once claimed that the recipe was the only thing her mom ever gave her.

  It seemed like a pretty great secret to receive.

  “Oh, these are soooooooo gooooooood,” Violet said.

  “You eat as many as you like,” Aunt Lisa said. “We need to put some meat on your bones. And, while I have you all here,” she continued, “there’s something I want to ask you. Something I hope you’ll consider.”

  “What?” Michelle asked.

  “Well, it’s about the crafts fair.”

  “Crafts fair?”

  “The Oak Lake crafts fair. It’s coming up this weekend.”

  “You’re on the planning committee for that, aren’t you?” Violet asked.

  It figured Violet would know.

  “Yes,” Aunt Lisa said. “And it seems we have an empty booth that needs filling. One of our artists had to cancel at the last minute. I was wondering if the four of you would be interested in using the booth.”

  Violet lofted both eyebrows. “We don’t really have any crafts to sell,” she said.
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  “Oh, I know, I know.” Aunt Lisa smiled at her. “I wasn’t thinking about you using the booth to sell. I was actually wondering if you’d like to use the booth to put on some puppet shows.”

  Michelle’s eyes lit up. “Really?”

  “Your Land of Lost Things videos are so popular,” Aunt Lisa said. “I thought we might take advantage of that a little bit. There will be a lot of kids coming to the fair with their parents. And I’m sure they’ll get bored, just walking through the rows. I think it would be fun for them to set up by your booth and watch some shows.”

  I noticed that she was careful not to use the word “stories.”

  It was “videos.”

  It was “shows.”

  She’d figured out that “stories” was… what had the binder said? A trigger word?

  Yes, that was it.

  A trigger word. A word that inspires someone to act a certain way. Or, in TJ’s case, react.

  It seemed like a cruel figure of speech to use, when talking about someone who had survived a school shooting.

  And apparently, everyone developed different trigger words. None of the articles suggested that “stories” would be one. But we’d seen firsthand how TJ reacted.

  Aunt Lisa knew that. Didn’t she?

  “That could be a lot of fun!” Michelle said.

  Violet nodded. “And we could film a promo for the crafts fair today.”

  “Yeah!”

  “That would be wonderful,” Aunt Lisa said.

  “Well, I’m down for it,” Michelle said.

  “Me too,” Violet replied.

  I raised my hand. “Me three.”

  We all turned to look at TJ.

  And immediately felt a sense of disappointment.

  TJ was frowning. In fact, he was downright scowling. His eyes flicked back and forth, among the three of us. “I don’t know,” he said, hunching his shoulder.

  “Why not?” Violet asked.

  “There will be a lot of people.”

  “So?”

  “Remember our charter, TJ?” Michelle said. “We need to spread the word to as many people as we can.”

  “But this isn’t on video. This is in front of people.” He set down his sticky bun, appetite suddenly gone.

  “You don’t need to be shy, TJ.”

  “Yeah,” Violet said. “We’ll be hidden from sight. That’s how puppet shows work.”

  Violet and Michelle were so excited. And TJ just wasn’t buying it.

  “We can build a barrier,” I said, trying to find a way to make it work for everyone. “Something that has ‘Land of Lost Things’ on the front.” I swept my arm through the air, trying to make him see it. “You’ll be hiding behind it the whole time.”

  TJ looked at me, his expression softening a little bit. “No one will see us?”

  “No,” I said. “Only the puppets.”

  He nodded. Just slightly.

  I was doing better with this empathy thing. I’d picked up on his fear and found a way to soothe it.

  “Well,” Violet said, clapping her hands together. “There’s an easy way to settle this. We are part of a club, after all.”

  “What’s that?” Michelle asked.

  “We put it to a simple vote. All those in favor of performing at the Oak Lake crafts fair, raise your hand.”

  Violet’s hand went up.

  Michelle’s shot up, too.

  I raised my hand cautiously.

  And as we watched, TJ very, very slowly raised his hand.

  “Okay,” Violet said. “That settles it. It’s unanimous. The motion passes.”

  “So you’ll do it?” Aunt Lisa asked.

  “We’ll do it.”

  “Oh! Wonderful!” She reached out, touching each of us one by one on top of the head. “Thank you, kids. Thank you all so much. You have no idea how much this means to me.”

  But I thought I had some sense of it.

  I could still hear the echoes of her cries.

  I hadn’t forgotten.

  “You all will be the hit of the crafts fair, I know it.”

  “Thanks, Aunt Lisa,” I said.

  “Anything you need. Anything at all. You just name it and I’ll arrange it for you. Just say the word.”

  “We’ll need something to build the barrier,” I said.

  “Maybe a cardboard box,” Michelle said. “That’s kind of like a lost thing.”

  “I can get you one,” Aunt Lisa said.

  Michelle turned to Violet and TJ. “We can decorate it with markers and beads.”

  “And socks,” Violet added.

  “Of course!”

  “Those are our trademark items.”

  “We’ll have to find a whole bunch of them that don’t match.”

  Violet nodded to the pile she’d shoved to the floor. “Right.”

  The two of them were off and going, coming up with creative ways to decorate the barrier.

  A barrier that would protect TJ from people.

  I looked at Aunt Lisa, with tears in her eyes.

  I looked at TJ, standing on the sidelines as Michelle and Violet brainstormed one idea after the next.

  And I couldn’t help it. I shuddered.

  Something about this whole situation had me worried. Like we were on the verge of something truly terrible, something I couldn’t avoid because I couldn’t see it yet.

  I couldn’t deny what I was feeling. Not anymore.

  I was afraid.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  I didn’t want to let my fear stop me—especially since I didn’t know what was causing it—so I threw myself into the project.

  Both of my projects.

  Thursday afternoon and all of Friday, we worked on the puppet show, coming up with everything we could possibly need. Most important, the story.

  But both nights, after everyone had gone to bed, I slipped into the cabinet to read Aunt Lisa’s binder. I was slowly working my way through her book Psychological Trauma and Recovery. It was a struggle. There were just so many words I didn’t know. I tried to look up the terms on my phone, but each new word led to another round of links that I had to click, which pulled me further and further away from the book. Around and around I went. With nothing to show for it.

  Except a growing sense of dread that I couldn’t explain.

  And my newfound empathy, I guess.

  Saturday and the Oak Lake crafts fair came almost as soon as Aunt Lisa’s sticky buns were gone. Nicole texted me that morning:

  Break a leg!

  And a few minutes later, she texted again:

  That’s theatre talk for “good luck with your show!”

  Frank Street was closed off with police barriers. And collapsible tables were lined up down the middle of the road, skirted with blue-and-white plastic tablecloths, decorated with red stars. They were back-to-back, with artists spreading out their work. Handmade jewelry. Glossy black-and-white photographs of cats and trees. Wooden block puzzles. Oil paintings of Paris and Vienna. Tie-dyed scarves. One booth had beautiful, old books, hollowed out and their pages glued together, hiding velvet-lined secret compartments. Open them up, expecting a story, and instead you’d get a surprise. Another booth housed a cartoonist, who sat customers on a stool and drew caricatures of them, exaggerating their teeth and foreheads and ears.

  And it wasn’t just art you could buy and hang on your wall.

  Near the tracks, a little stage was set up. A local band, called Holly and the Millennials, was jamming out, playing covers of famous Dina and the Starlights songs.

  You can sit under the bleachers

  Or you can charge the field

  But when I feel old doubts return

  I grab my sword and my shield

  In for a penny

  In for a pound

  You can’t really lose

  What was meant to be found

  There was a cleared-out area in front of the stage, where kids were dancing and twirling around, making themse
lves dizzy with excitement.

  Someone was blowing bubbles.

  Someone even brought Hula-Hoops.

  Beyond the stage, there were clusters of food stands. Fresh-squeezed lemonade. Cheddar- and caramel-coated popcorn. Kosher hot dogs with celery salt. A wide assortment of fancy cheesecakes. Tamales in corn husks. And, much to Aunt Lisa’s delight, a stand selling individual slices of deep-dish pizza, oozing with gooey cheese and spicy sausage patties.

  Most of the shops on the street were buzzing, their doors propped open to invite in the breeze and all the visitors who’d come from all over Chicago. They flew banners of green canvas, declaring their love for the Oak Lake neighborhood:

  WELCOME TO OUR HOOD!

  Take a break in Oak Lake!

  ALL ARE WELCOME!

  It made a lot of sense why Aunt Lisa loved this place so much.

  Even the weather was cooperating today. It was summery, but with big, fat clouds. Warm enough that the water vendors were selling out of water bottles. But not so hot that the street was beginning to smell like sweat.

  Mostly, it just smelled like sunblock.

  Aunt Lisa set up the Lost Things Club’s puppet stage at the very front of the fair, far enough away from the music that the audience would be able to hear us. I came up with the design for our stage myself. A cardboard box, built out of several cardboard boxes so it was big enough to hold three people. It was open on the sides, but the low front and the high back were closed off, creating a rectangular window for the puppets. When Michelle, Violet, and TJ crouched beneath the window, they could raise their arms and the puppets would appear, without any hint of the humans holding them up.

  On the front of the box, we spelled out the name of our video series:

  The Land of Lost Things

  There were beads and buttons lining the letters. And then circling them was a rope of mismatched socks, tied together, heel to toe. We’d covered the cardboard with black construction paper, and dotted the background with tufts of lint, which looked like there were so many stars. Violet draped her patchwork quilt over the top of the whole thing.

  It looked like a beautifully wrapped present.

  Already, kids had started slowing down when they passed us, like they expected the gift to open itself.