Janine collected lost things.
Not stamps or coins—actual lost things. A glove dropped on the bus, a single earring found on the sidewalk, a note crumpled in the gutter. Her apartment was a museum of the misplaced.
Each item came with a story she imagined: the glove belonged to a woman rushing to catch a train; the earring fell during a breakup; the note was a confession someone couldn’t send.
One night, she found a polaroid tucked in a park bench. A child smiling, gap-toothed, holding a balloon. On the back: Come home soon.
It didn’t feel lost. It felt left.
Janine stared at it for hours. This one wasn’t hers to imagine.
The next day, she returned to the park and pinned the photo to a nearby tree, weighted with a rock so it wouldn’t blow away.
It was gone by morning.
She didn’t mind.
Sometimes, she realized, the point wasn’t to keep what’s lost.
It was to help it be found.