The Lost Things Club

by J. S. Puller

  And TJ was on the floor in front of it.

  Well, sort of on the floor.

  We could see his legs, kicking and jerking, but the rest of him was inside the dryer.

  And he was screaming.

  The sound of his cries echoed through the room, off the cold, metal surfaces of the machines.

  I let go of Violet and Michelle, running over to where he was.

  There were eyes on us. As hard as they fought not to stare, they couldn’t help it. They didn’t understand why a kid would throw himself into a dryer.

  But I did.

  I knew where he was trying to go.

  I tried to block them all out.

  When I got to the dryers, I crouched down. TJ was screaming and screaming, and didn’t even know I was there until I reached around his waist, pulling him gently out of the dryer. He tried to jerk away from me, but I was stronger. I held him hard against my chest.

  He just kept screaming.

  His forehead was pink, a lump rising where he’d slammed his head. His face was slippery with sweat and tears, twisted into an unnatural shape, like a jack-o’-lantern at Halloween. He continued to shriek, even as I hugged him tight, feeling his heart beat against my skin. Violet and Michelle dropped down to the floor on either side of us, putting their hands on his shoulders. It didn’t help.

  I’m not sure he felt it.

  “Hedgehog,” I whispered, pressing my lips to his ear, giving him the lightest of kisses. “Hedgehog…”

  “No!” he screamed. He didn’t look at me or grab my arms or try to wipe my germs away. “No! No!”

  “Hey,” Michelle said. “TJ…”

  “It’s all right, TJ,” Violet told him.

  “It’s not all right!” He shook his head fiercely, his curls plastered to his skin with sweat. “It’s not all right!”

  With that, he let out another yowl.

  “What is it, buddy?” Michelle asked, desperately curling her fingers into his shoulder.

  “You can tell us,” Violet said.

  “The portal won’t let me in!” He thrashed, although I’m not sure what he was hoping to do, exactly. He couldn’t break away. And he couldn’t push me back. I guess he was too upset to hold still. Like his body would explode if he didn’t keep moving around. “I can’t get into the Land of Lost Things!”

  I looked into the gaping maw of the dryer and saw a light, oily smear against the back of the metal wall, shining in rainbow colors. Where TJ must have hit his forehead, diving headfirst into where he thought the portal was.

  My fingers brushed against his forehead. It throbbed under my fingers.

  “I have to go there!” he shouted. “I have to get to the Land of Lost Things!”

  “TJ,” Michelle said, “there’s no reason to get upset.”

  “Yeah,” Violet said. “It was only a game.”

  But all three of us knew it was more than a game. At least for TJ. We’d all known for some time.

  “No!” He practically snarled at her, turning so fast that I actually thought he was going to bite her hand. But Violet pulled away, falling back onto her palms, and TJ buried his face in my shoulder. “It’s not just a game! It’s not!”

  “But—”

  “No, Violet,” I said. “Don’t.”

  She shut her mouth.

  We were standing on the brink of the part of the story I’d been missing. The part we’d all been missing. For us, the Land of Lost Things was just fun. But it meant something else to TJ. Something real. Something important.

  Something worth leaving the world behind for.

  It was time to know what that was.

  TJ started screaming again. He threw his head back and wailed.

  Listen to kids. All the lists said that. Listen.

  I’d been listening.

  I just hadn’t bothered to ask the right questions.

  “Hedgehog,” I whispered, squeezing him tight. “Tell me why. Tell me why it’s so important to you. Why do you have to go to the Land of Lost Things?”

  “Because I lost something, and I have to get it back!”

  With that, he wrenched himself loose. I guess I was too confused to hang on. Like a wild animal, he crawled on his hands and knees back to the dryer, shoving himself into it. He didn’t hit his head this time. But we could hear him pounding his fists against the back of the dryer.

  “Let me in! Let me in!”

  “TJ!” Michelle shouted.

  Violet and I both grabbed him around the middle and pulled him out.

  He clutched the lip of the dryer, clinging on until his fingers turned white, trying to pull himself back. It took Michelle’s help for the three of us to get him out, breaking a few of his nails as he clutched at the dryer.

  “Let me go!” he said. “I have to go there! I have to!”

  “You can’t, TJ,” Violet said.

  “I can!”

  “No, Hedgehog,” I said. I smoothed down his hair, rocking him back and forth against my arm. “No…”

  TJ looked up to Michelle. Michelle, who he always turned to first. Michelle, who had created a whole world for him. Michelle, who told the story with such passion that it had to be true. His rainy-day eyes stared into hers. Between the tears, he silently begged her. Please.

  Please.

  Michelle bit her lips together. And just barely shook her head.

  No.

  No, he couldn’t go.

  No, it wasn’t real.

  TJ tossed his head back and howled.

  Michelle crawled over and threw her arms around the both of us. And Violet was there in the next second. We huddled in a tight cluster on the floor.

  And we let TJ scream.

  It was what he wanted.

  Or maybe what he needed.

  I wasn’t sure.

  But it went on and on and on.

  One of the regular customers of the laundromat, a handsome guy with longish hair, tried to move closer. “Do you need—”

  “It’s fine,” Violet said, with the same ferocity she used to scare drivers away from her parking spot.

  Holding up his hands, the regular quickly backed away. “Should I get Ms. Green?” he asked.

  “No,” Michelle said.

  I guess she figured having her mom around would only make things more complicated than they already were.

  Adults couldn’t help TJ.

  Only we could.

  There were others still watching, scared and uncertain. Violet glared around the room, daring any of them to approach.

  Not a single one did.

  TJ kept screaming. Until he suddenly couldn’t scream anymore. He grabbed his throat with both hands and started gagging. Coughing. Choking.

  “TJ!” I shouted. “No, TJ. No!”

  “Breathe!” Michelle said.

  “In and out.” Violet took a deep breath and let it out. She ran her hand up and down the front of her chest, doing it again and again.

  He watched her, his face turning nearly purple until he took a deep breath. And then another. And another. He was breathing again, but then he started to cry. He sobbed. And with his tears, I felt some of my own building up. But it didn’t last long. He grew quiet and still. And in a matter of minutes or hours, he’d cried himself dry.

  The last of his tears landed on the Formica floor of the laundromat.

  And TJ fell asleep in our arms.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  He slept.

  But he didn’t really rest.

  His eyelashes fluttered against his cheeks. His eyes shifted from one side to another. And he kept making… noises.

  We carried him into the back room. The unofficial clubhouse for the Lost Things Club. I sent off a text to Aunt Lisa, telling her that TJ was fine and we were going to calm him down. She wanted to know where we were right away, but I didn’t answer. It was selfish of me. Wrong. I knew that. But all the same, there was an instinct whispering in my ears, telling me that Aunt Lisa wasn’t going to help th
e situation.

  Not yet, anyway.

  He didn’t need an adult hovering over him.

  He needed the Lost Things Club.

  I insisted on keeping TJ with me, on my lap. Michelle and Violet came and went. Michelle left to tell her mom what had happened, before one of the customers could. She returned with sandwiches and water. Violet fetched her sun-warmed blanket from the puppet stage to wrap up TJ. We didn’t really talk. But we were there for one another. And there for TJ.

  After a while, he started to fuss even more.

  At first, it was just fitful dreaming sounds. He moaned softly. Let out little sobs. Little grunts.

  Trouble sleeping. That was a symptom of trauma.

  But slowly he woke up, his eyelashes sticking together a little bit with sweat and tears and eye goop.

  “Hi, Hedgehog,” I said, running my hand through his curls.

  “Where are we?” he asked drowsily, blinking.

  “The clubhouse,” Michelle said.

  “You were sleeping for a while,” Violet added.

  “Sleeping?” We watched as the memories returned to him. The howling. The bump on his head. The back of the dryer, solid and unforgiving under his fists. His little face crumpled up, but he had no tears left to cry.

  “It’s okay,” I said, cupping his cheek in my hand. It was hot and clammy. “It’s going to be okay.”

  “No,” he said. “It’s not going to be okay.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because… because…” He made a few dry, hacking noises. “Because if the Land of Lost Things isn’t real, then…”

  “Sh, sh, sh.” I kissed his forehead. “Easy does it.”

  “If the Land of Lost Things isn’t real—”

  “Then what?” Violet asked. “It doesn’t matter.”

  But it did matter. I could feel his urgency, his need. It mattered to him very, very much.

  He looked up at me. “Then I can’t go there. I can’t go there and rescue Jeremiah.”

  What?

  I looked up at the other two. Michelle’s forehead was scrunched up. But Violet’s eyes slowly started to widen.

  “Jeremiah,” she said.

  “Who?” I asked.

  “TJ,” Violet said, scooting closer on her hands and knees. “Do you mean Jeremiah Jamison?”

  He nodded.

  “Who is that?” I looked back and forth between the two of them.

  Michelle clapped a hand over her mouth.

  “Jeremiah Jamison,” Violet said, “was the boy we lost at Chancelor. During the…”

  During the shooting.

  We’d known all along that it was something about the shooting that was troubling TJ.

  Why hadn’t I thought to ask what actually happened?

  Violet had told me a boy had died.

  But that boy hadn’t been TJ.

  So I’d forgotten all about it. All about him. He was nothing to me. Just a sad fact to file away.

  But TJ hadn’t forgotten.

  I looked down at TJ. “What does the Land of Lost Things have to do with Jeremiah Jamison?”

  “He’s there,” TJ said. “Like Morgan used to be. He’s lost. And I have to go find him. I have to bring him back.”

  Aunt Lisa’s binder had said something about that. It had warned not to use words like “lost.”

  Seemed like someone had used it anyway: We lost Jeremiah. That’s what someone had told TJ.

  Maybe even a lot of someones.

  And TJ didn’t understand. “Lost” didn’t mean lost. It meant that Jeremiah wasn’t coming back. It meant there was nothing TJ could do.

  But why had TJ put that responsibility on himself? He said that he had lost Jeremiah.

  “Why?” I asked. “Why do you think you have to bring him back?”

  “Because it’s my fault.”

  I looked to Violet again, but she had nothing for me. She shook her head.

  Michelle squeezed her eyes shut.

  I looked back at TJ. “TJ, why would you say that?”

  He snuffled a little, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand. “We got in a fight,” he said. “He was wearing new gym shoes, and I told him they were ugly, so he said I was just jealous. I wasn’t jealous, though. They really were ugly. And I kept saying that, but he wouldn’t listen to me, so I pushed him.”

  “You pushed him?”

  He nodded. “And Mr. Hiler saw it, so he called us to the front of the room. And I said it was all Jeremiah’s fault, but he said it was all my fault. And Mr. Hiler said that since I was the one who pushed him, I had to go to the principal’s office.”

  Just like Violet said.

  TJ was in the principal’s office at the time of the shooting.

  “And…” TJ’s eyes were getting watery again. Apparently, he still had a few tears left, after all.

  “And?” I asked him.

  “And Mr. Hiler made Jeremiah sit in the front of the class. By the door.”

  The pieces fell into place, locking with a sickening sound.

  It must have been the place Jeremiah was sitting when the shooting happened. When he got killed.

  While TJ was far away, in the safe nest of the principal’s office.

  “Oh, TJ,” I whispered. I took his face in my hands again, pulling it close, so I could rest my forehead against his.

  “It’s all my fault,” TJ said. “He’s lost because of me. I was mean, and now he’s lost and that isn’t fair. But then Michelle told me about the Land of Lost Things. Lost things can be found again. I know it. Jeremiah can come h-home.”

  “This isn’t the same kind of lost.”

  “TJ,” Michelle said, speaking through the hand over her mouth. “TJ, I am so, so sorry.” She turned to me, her eyes big and frightened. “I never meant for him to—”

  “I know,” I cut her off.

  Michelle didn’t have a cruel bone in her body. It wasn’t her fault.

  “He was sad,” she said. “I thought the stories were cheering him up again. I used to tell stories about the Land of Lost Things to my little brother all the time. I missed telling them. I missed being a big sister. I was just trying to help. I was lonely. That’s all it was.”

  “You have nothing to apologize for,” I told her.

  “I think I do. I thought I was making him better, but I was just—”

  “You were doing what you thought was right,” Violet said. “What you thought would help.”

  Just like me.

  I’d wanted to help, too.

  We all had good intentions. There wasn’t a bad guy here.

  “I didn’t see what was right in front of me,” Michelle said.

  “None of us did.”

  TJ turned his face to them. “What are you saying? What do you mean?”

  “Hedgehog,” I said. “I know this is going to be hard for you to believe, but you have to listen to me very carefully.”

  “What?”

  I took a deep breath. “What happened to Jeremiah was terrible but it wasn’t your fault.”

  “It was!”

  “No!” I gave him a squeeze. “It wasn’t your fault. Okay? You didn’t bring a gun into the school. You didn’t pull a trigger. You didn’t take anyone’s life.”

  There. I’d said it.

  Jeremiah was dead.

  TJ couldn’t bring him back home.

  It was the truth, and I felt awful.

  We could see TJ slowly beginning to understand. He was a smart kid. He knew what dead meant. “But then…”

  “What?”

  “But then I’m even worse!” TJ’s lower lip trembled. “If it hadn’t been for me, he wouldn’t have been sitting in front.”

  “And someone else would have been,” I said. Which was another terrible thing to say to a little kid. But that didn’t make it any less true. “What happened to Jeremiah, what could have happened to any other kid, that’s on the person who did this. That’s on the person who chose to take his anger out
with a gun, instead of with stories.”

  “But I want to fix it.”

  “There isn’t anyone on this planet who doesn’t want to fix it, TJ,” I said. “But you can’t undo the past. You can only live in the present.”

  “And try to fix the future,” Violet added.

  “How am I supposed to do that?”

  “You tell the story.” It was Michelle who said it. In her soft, soothing voice.

  TJ shuddered. “No more stories,” he said.

  “Yes, more stories,” she replied. “That’s how people listen to things. That’s how people learn to feel. It’s the language of the human race. Look at how you got people to pay attention to you, just with a talking hedgehog. Everyone wants to hear stories.”

  “This isn’t a happy story,” TJ said. “It’s not good.”

  “Stories don’t have to be happy to be good,” she said. “You tell your story. People are going to listen. And maybe, just maybe, they’ll change something because of it. Or change themselves.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t have to know now, TJ,” I said. “It’s okay not to know.”

  He gave me a wary look. “But?”

  I smiled. At least, I think I did. I couldn’t feel it. “You know me so well.” I sighed. “But. I think, if nothing else, you should probably tell your story to two particular people.”

  “Mommy and Daddy?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  His eyes drooped. “Oh.”

  “TJ, they’re worried about you. They need to know what’s going on in here.” I tapped the side of his head with my fingertips. “And they want to help you feel better in here.” I touched his chest. “But they can’t do that if they don’t know the whole story.”

  “She’s right,” Violet said.

  Michelle nodded. “Yeah. Remember what we said before? That’s how a story gains power. From being told.”

  That felt long ago.

  Our adventure had started out so innocently.

  But innocence had also been lost to the Land of Lost Things.

  Another tear slid down the side of TJ’s face.

  I was a little surprised it was only one tear.

  After that, there were no more.

  He rubbed his eyes with the backs of his hands, sitting up straight on my lap. Violet started to smooth down his hair. And Michelle reached out her hand, offering him something.