The Train of Lost Things
Page 1
ALSO BY AMMI-JOAN PAQUETTE
Princess Juniper of the Hourglass
Princess Juniper of the Anju
Princess Juniper of Torr
PHILOMEL BOOKS
an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014
Copyright © 2018 by Ammi-Joan Paquette.
Title page lettering by Jaime Zollars.
Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.
Philomel Books is a registered trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Paquette, Ammi-Joan, author.
Title: The train of lost things / Ammi-Joan Paquette.
Description: New York, NY : Philomel Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, [2018] |Summary: Marty goes in search of the mythical Train of Lost Things, hoping that by finding his heart’s possession he can save his father from cancer, but he discovers that, without a driver and conductor, the train is malfunctioning and only Marty and his new friends can fix it. | Identifiers: LCCN 2017014969 | ISBN 9781524739393 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781524739409 (ebook) | Subjects: | CYAC: Lost and found possessions—Fiction. | Fathers and sons—Fiction. | Railroad trains—Fiction. | Magic—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.P2119 Tr 2018 | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017014969
Edited by Jill Santopolo.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Version_1
For all those who have ever lost something irreplaceable,
and for Kim, whose jacket started it all
CONTENTS
Also by Ammi-Joan Paquette
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
1 The Jacket (Which Was the Start of It All)
2 The Ritual of Present Opening
3 When the Worst Day Comes in the Morning
4 The Train of Lost Things
5 Things You Hear in the Street at Night
6 How to Chase an Invisible Train
7 Take a Risk, See What Happens
8 And We’re Airborne!
9 The Movie in the Kite
10 Backstory Swap
11 The Worst Mess Is a Lost-Stuff Mess
12 The Third Trainhopper
13 What If Your Imagination Could Fill Your Stomach?
14 Star Spills Her Secrets (Some of Them)
15 Glowing Eyes in the Mist
16 Plot Twist When You Least Expect It
17 A Window on the Whole Wide World
18 The Tricks Finders Use
19 All Those Connections Add Up to . . . What?
20 The Answer Is Clear as Mist
21 Riding the Wind-Wave Home
22 Unspoken Thoughts and Secret Dreams
23 One Last Call in the Night
EPILOGUE
Acknowledgments
About the Author
1
THE JACKET (WHICH WAS THE START OF IT ALL)
The last time Marty Torphil saw his jacket, he was tucking it safely inside his mother’s suitcase. It had been one of those busy-rush mornings, with Mom dashing around the hotel room checking in drawers and under beds to make sure nothing was left behind. They had planned to stay through the long weekend—business meetings for Mom, rare unlimited screen time for Marty (he was dominating at Creature Smackdown)—but an urgent phone call had changed all that. Back home, Dad’s health had taken a sudden nosedive.
“You all packed up, Marty?” Mom asked distractedly. “Toothbrushes . . . passports . . . heels? Where are my good heels?”
“Uh-huh,” Marty said. His own bag was full, but even if it hadn’t been, Marty would have wanted the jacket in Mom’s suitcase. A place for everything, and everything in its place: Marty had read this somewhere once and had taken it as his personal motto. In this case, the jacket’s place was in the safest possible spot, and that’s where he put it.
Marty smoothed the dark blue denim and tucked the sleeves around carefully, protecting the twenty-six pins and patches fastened all over it. Each piece had been carefully chosen and each was set in just the right place. He didn’t want any of them to get messed up or fall off if things bumped around inside the bag.
“Okay. I think we’re ready,” Mom said, blowing out a puff of air that mussed her bangs. It left one wisp pointing straight up like a tiny exclamation mark on top of her head. Marty wanted to reach over and smooth it back into place. “The flight’s at ten, so we need to dash. You done with that jacket?”
“Almost.” Marty flattened his most precious possession and tucked it safely into its place in Mom’s bag. Then he put down the flap and Mom started the usual zip-and-squash routine to get her suitcase shut and to keep all the mountains of stuff inside from spilling out.
At long last they were off, bags in hand. Then it was taxi, walk, escalator, security line, planeplaneplaneplane, deplane, taxi—and finally they were turning onto their familiar tree-lined street. Sometime in the three days they’d been gone, the trees had whipped out their boldest, brightest colors. The fiery red and gold leaves flashed even in the dimming light.
As their brick house came into sight, Marty’s heartbeat quickened. Dad had seemed fine when they left, barely coughing at all, gorilla-thumping his chest to show how strong he felt and waving off Mom’s worries about traveling so far away. How could things have changed so fast?
It was getting dark out, but a yellow light glowed, stubbornly cheerful, from the window of the downstairs den. Marty wouldn’t call it the Sick Room. He wouldn’t.
A few minutes later, they burst through the front door in a bustle of bodies and bags and cold-snap fall air.
“It’s my two favorite people!” Dad’s voice calling from the den was a bit weaker than Marty remembered it, but warm and playful as always.
“Dad!” Marty yelled, dropping his bag and pushing through the heavy wooden door. Nurse Carla ruffled his hair as he blew by her, then she slipped out into the hall. She and Mom started talking in low voices.
“Scooter,” Dad said.
“Daaad,” said Marty, but he didn’t really mind. Funny how much can change in four months: You can go from hating your babyish nickname to thinking it’s the greatest word in the world. Swallowing hard, looking at his dad’s face, all dark circles and pointy edges and long shadows, Marty forced himself not to think about everything else that had changed in the last few months.
“Sit on down,” said Dad. He tried to make room, and his special hospital bed creaked on its metal frame.
Marty shook his head. “I’m good here,” he said, perching on the edge of the mattress. “What about you? Nurse Carla said you were—”
Dad flapped a hand weakly, like he was brushing away Nurse Carla and her false alarm. But Marty could see from the tightening of his lips and the tensing of his jaw how much even that small gesture cost him.
“There’ll be time
for my health update later,” Dad said. “Now I want to hear about your trip. Tell me everything.”
These were Marty’s favorite times: when Dad was well enough to sit up in bed, to talk and laugh and listen and pretty much do stuff like he’d always used to before he got sick. Just from his bed instead of his armchair. It was especially good tonight, when Marty had so much to catch him up on after their time away.
All too quick, though, their time was over. Dad’s shoulders started to droop, and Mom and Nurse Carla bustled in to get him settled for the night. Nurse Carla was gentle and efficient as always, but Mom moved like a robot stuck on half speed. Her eyes were ringed in red and her hair was a scruffy tangle.
Marty edged farther and farther toward the side of the room. Finally, he felt the bump of the doorpost behind him. Nurse Carla had cranked down the lifty top of Dad’s bed so he was lying flat, his eyes already closed. His hand clung to Mom’s while Nurse Carla fiddled with his medicine drip.
Squeezing his hands into fists, Marty turned and bolted from the room. He ran straight for Mom’s suitcase, which lay toppled over on its side in the entryway. He knelt in front of it. Then he froze. The zipper was half open. There was a tear in the tough fabric of the case. Marty yanked the bag open the rest of the way and grabbed for the corner where he’d left his most prized possession.
Where was his jacket?
Marty started to pull things out of the suitcase. He knew exactly where he’d put it. The jacket should have been right there—in that back corner—
But it wasn’t.
* * *
• • •
“Mom?” Marty said. He’d been sitting on the last step of the staircase, the one that stuck out round like a bottom lip and made a spot just big enough for sitting. He’d been there so long that his behind felt like a flat tire.
Mom jumped visibly. She reached out and flicked on the light switch. “What are you doing sitting here in the dark? I thought you went to bed ages ago.”
“I was waiting for you.” Marty struggled to keep his voice low. He couldn’t wake Dad. “I need to ask you—”
“Wait—what’s all this stuff all over the floor? Did you unpack your—wait—my suitcase? Right here? Marty, what’s going on?” Mom’s voice went from concerned to angry to super freaked out, all in one stretch, like maybe she thought Marty had lost his marbles right there in the entryway.
Not my marbles, Marty thought. My jacket. Which was so much worse. He swallowed, trying to make his voice sound normal. “My jean jacket. The one Dad got me for my birthday. I put it in your bag, remember? Back in the hotel?”
“Sure,” said Mom, already scrabbling at the clothes all over the floor. “You can’t just throw stuff around, though. Help me pick all this up. Are you feeling okay?”
“It’s not in there. I looked through the whole bag. And the zipper’s all messed up. Did you move my jacket somewhere else?” Marty stood up. His legs felt like they had swarms of ants running up and down them.
“I didn’t touch it, honey. Which bag did you put it in?”
“It was in this one. You saw me put it in.” Marty was getting desperate. This couldn’t be happening. He needed to be holding the jacket, needed to be wearing it right now. “I looked through all the bags. It’s not anywhere, Mom. It’s gone!”
Mom glanced up from where she squatted on the floor. In the dim hallway light she looked impossibly tired, like a display screen on its last bit of battery power. “Marty. It’s getting late. I’m sorry about your jacket, but I just don’t have the energy right now. Especially not with your dad and . . . everything. I’m sure we’ll find it, okay? Why don’t you go up to bed and we’ll figure this out tomorrow.”
Marty shook his head. He didn’t trust himself to say anything. Not now.
A place for everything. Everything in its place. But this time it wasn’t.
The jacket was gone.
2
THE RITUAL OF PRESENT OPENING
The jacket had come to Marty in the most ordinary of ways: On the night before his last birthday, Dad took him out for their traditional burger and milkshake. “Just us boys,” as he liked to say. Between slurps of thick, frosty chocolate and bites of meaty, cheesy goodness, Dad had slid a box across the table. It was one of those big Priority boxes that his mom kept a stack of in her office so she didn’t have to run to the post office every time she wanted to get something packed up to mail, which was super often. The box wasn’t wrapped or anything, and the front flaps were tucked under each other in this complicated way that made it stay shut without tape. Dad hated crafty stuff, but he’d clearly put this together on his own.
So right away, this box sparked Marty’s curiosity.
Marty was good at making connections, and here is what he could tell straight off.
Dad had packed this box himself, without Mom’s help.
Dad was giving it to him tonight instead of at his birthday party tomorrow.
Therefore, the present—well, it had to be a present, right?—was something extra special. Secret, maybe even. Something for only the two of them.
Shoving his milkshake out of the way, Marty grabbed the box in both his hands. He almost yanked it right open, but just in time he remembered their present-opening ritual.
If ever a present needed to follow the ritual, this one did.
Catching Dad’s eye with a big grin, Marty hefted the box up in both hands. The box was wide but not very tall, and bigger around than his head. It was also pretty light.
“Heavier than a boiled egg,” he said. The rule was you had to say the first thing you thought of that fit. “Lighter than a laptop.”
“Boiled egg?” Dad laughed. “You try and find something lighter than that.”
Marty laughed, too. He shook the box. “No rattle.” He shook it again. “A little wiggling around in there . . . a hamster, maybe?”
Dad laughed again, then he coughed. The cough triggered a bigger cough, and Marty frowned. Dad waved a hand as if to say, I’m fine. But he coughed for like a whole minute, which was not normal.
He’d been doing that more lately.
“Mom would tell you to wear a sweater when you sit in the air-conditioning,” Marty said when Dad finally got his breath back. He was still holding the box up and hadn’t even realized his arms were starting to cramp. He lowered the present to the table.
“Sweater, schmetter.” Dad straightened up. His face was back to its normal color. “Get on with your gift, mister.”
Marty did. He grabbed the flaps in both hands and yanked them apart. The inside of the box was stuffed with crumpled . . . tissues? He looked up at Dad, whose face was bright with held-in laughter.
“Don’t give me that look,” Dad panted. “They’re not used tissues. I needed something”—he coughed again, but only once—“to keep it from sliding around in there.”
Marty shook his head. Dads. Then he turned the box upside down on the table. Crumpled tissue blew everywhere. Even if they weren’t used tissues, it was still kind of gross to have inside a present. All that disappeared, though, when the clouds of fluff parted to show a bundle of cloth. Jeans?
“A jacket,” Marty said, pulling it out. “You got me a jean jacket.”
“Ah!” said Dad, lifting one finger up in front of him. “It looks like a regular jean jacket. Doesn’t it? But mark my words, Scooter, this is far more. This is a whole thing. A me-and-you thing. Here’s how it works.” With that, Dad fished in his shirt pocket and pulled out something little and round and crayon-bright. It was a metallic button the size of Marty’s thumb, and it showed a picture of a fat, juicy burger on the fluffiest of buns. On the back of the button was a pin. “See?” said Dad. “This is our first collectible. Stick it on anywhere you like, Scooter.”
Marty’s eyes widened as he took the pin and pushed it right through the front of the
jacket, below the collar. Then he put the jacket on over his T-shirt. He turned to check out his reflection in the diner window. He thought he looked ready to go on some kind of a magical quest, like the jacket was a superhero’s cloak that came with its own secret powers.
“Well?” Dad said.
“I love it,” said Marty. “Seriously. It’s the best. And we’ll get more of these things?” He stroked the pin with a fingernail.
“Tons of ’em,” said Dad. “One for each memory we never want to forget. See? That’s how you capture today and keep it forever.”
* * *
• • •
That was a little over four months ago, and a week hadn’t passed since then without Marty adding one or two pins to the jacket, each of them linked to a particular Dad-ish activity or thing they had done together. A trip to the circus. Bumper cars. Sunday-morning pancakes. The buttons weren’t that easy to find—especially not specific pictures like that—but Marty was a champion finder. He got some great ones online, and then he found this dusty old store downtown that Mom took him to sometimes, where they had a crazy selection. He’d bring each new pin back and sit on Dad’s bed while they talked about the event it was linked to—reminiscing, Dad called it—and decided the best spot to pin it on. He’d even gotten a big patch in the shape of a dog that Dad helped him iron on to the jacket’s back. That was the only collectible that wasn’t linked to something specific—Marty just liked the dopey look on the dog’s face. It gave him that good feeling in the pit of his stomach.
These days, he needed to catch that good feeling wherever he could.
Because the jacket was about the only good thing that had happened in the last four months. They’d had Marty’s birthday party the day after the present, and it had been the best. Then the next day, Mom and Dad had sat him down together and had the Sickness Talk: Dad had cancer. The bad kind. The kind that took your body—your whole life, actually—and turned it inside out and upside down.