The Keeper of Lost Things

by Ruth Hogan

She had been dead for forty years, but she was still his life, and her death had given him his purpose. It had made Anthony Peardew the Keeper of Lost Things.

Laura called it consorting with the Truth Fairy and found it as gratifying as listening to her favorite record with a deep scratch in it.

Her grandmother had once told her that one could blame ugliness on one’s genes and ignorance on one’s education, but there was absolutely no excuse whatsoever for being dull.

Just then, in among the dust and dirt at her feet, the glint of gold and glass caught her eye. She stooped down, rescued the small, round object from the gutter, and slipped it safely into her pocket.

But gradually, imperceptibly, infinitesimally she let him be. She let him make a life without her. The trace that lingered, and still remained to this day, was the scent of roses in places where it could not be.

A life still scarred and cracked and misshapen but worth living nonetheless. A life with patches of blue sky amid the gray, like the patch of sky he now held in his hand.

The only promise that Therese had ever asked of him, and he had failed her. And so he had started to gather the things that other people lost. It was his only chance for atonement.

But he could not regret his life without Therese. He would a thousand times rather have spent it with her, but to give up when she died would have been the

greatest wrong;

She was able to feel the pain and joy of others and give them value.

Contrary to the impression that she often gave, she wasn’t a mere spectator of other people’s lives; she had to engage.

Her capacity to care was instinctive. It was her greatest asset and her g...

She had made a different life, grown a new skin, but somewhere there was a hidden patch, still red and tigh...

Laura often felt that she should have been a Catholic. She did guilt so well.

“In this world, Daisy, we are tiny. We can’t always win and we can’t always be happy. But the one thing that we can always do is try.

Laura was disappointed in herself, but she was determined to try to change.

I’m nineteen and I’m dancing drome.”

“If you never get sadness, how do you know what happy is like?” she asked.

“And by the way, everybody dies.”

He was her North, her South, her East, her West, Her working week and Sunday vest, She was his moon and stars and favorite song, They thought that love would last forever: they weren’t wrong.

“O Fortuna”