I scoffed. “Okay, smarty-pants. Your turn. You take the quiz.”
Nico cocked an eyebrow at me, and right then and there, I felt my whole body melt into the seat. There was so much wrapped up in that single gesture. So many silent phrases. And I heard them all at once.
I like you.
I like hanging out with you.
You’re not like any other girl I’ve met.
Maybe it was all wishful thinking. Maybe his eyebrow raise was just an eyebrow raise. But I didn’t think so. And just like the personality quiz said, when I made my mind up about a person, the opinion tended to stick.
“Gladly,” Nico said, and clicked the back button to start the quiz over. “But it’s a pointless exercise. I already know what I’m going to get.”
I smirked. “And what is that?”
“ ‘The Champion,’ ” he said confidently.
“I don’t think that’s an option.”
“Okay, what about ‘The Best at Everything’?”
“And I suppose your strengths would be listed as ‘humble, modest, and realistic.’ ”
“See?” Nico said with a grin. “I told you I don’t have to take it.”
But he took it. And for the next few minutes, I leaned in and watched over his shoulder as he answered the twenty questions that would eventually tell me everything there was to know about Nico Wright.
I tried to pretend like I wasn’t committing every response he clicked to memory. I tried to pretend that I wasn’t fascinated by this rare inside peek into the mind of one of the most enigmatic boys in school.
Nico hit submit, and we both waited for the results to calculate.
“ ‘The Fixer,’ ” Nico read aloud, smiling. “I like the sound of that.”
I rolled my eyes. “Just read what it says.”
“Optimistic?” Nico read. “Check. Energetic. Check. Creative yet practical. Check, check. Great in a crisis?” He shot me a look. “Oh, I am amazing in a crisis.”
I chuckled. “I bet.”
“Relaxed?” Nico made a show of stretching out his legs and getting more comfortable in the incredibly uncomfortable ripped-up seats. “Check.”
“ ‘Spontaneous.’ ” I pointed to the screen. “What does that mean?”
“Well,” Nico said, clearing his throat importantly, “according to Webster’s dictionary, ‘spontaneous’ means . . .”
I slapped his arm. “I know what the definition is. I’m asking, is it true? Are you spontaneous?”
“Oh, you mean, like, do I just do things without warning?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
“Like do I just decide I want to, I don’t know, kiss someone and then just do it?”
Nico turned toward me and latched onto my gaze. The night was dark. The only light between us was the screen of my phone, lighting up Nico’s face from below. Like a precious work of art on display in a museum. I suddenly found it difficult to breathe. I swallowed hard and commanded myself not to look away. “Yeah,” I whispered.
But Nico did look away. And for a moment, I felt the sensation of falling. He cleared his throat again. “I guess I can be spontaneous.” He glanced back down at the phone, using his thumb to scroll through the page. He stopped, his brow furrowing again. “Uh-oh.”
“What?” I asked, leaning in to see what had stolen his attention away from me.
“It says here that Commissioners and Fixers don’t make very good matches.”
I tilted my head to read the screen and let out a dramatic sigh. “Well, I guess that does it,” I say with an air of finality.
“Yup,” Nico said, matching my tone flawlessly. He held out his hand for me to shake. “Nice knowing you?”
I shook it. “Nice knowing you, too.”
I turned to go. I knew it was a charade. But I wasn’t sure how far he was willing to take it. Or if he would really let me leave. I started to stand up.
“Although . . .” Nico’s voice stopped me, and I smiled into the darkness.
“Yes?” I asked, presuming innocence.
“How accurate are these personality quizzes?”
I lowered back into the seat and turned to him. “In my experience, they’re never foolproof.”
“It could be wrong about this.”
“It could,” I admitted.
“Should we chance it?” Nico asked, cocking his eyebrow once again.
If I could go back to that night—if I could hover like a ghost in the air—I would shout at myself. I would scream until I could be heard.
Don’t!
Don’t chance it!
It’s not worth it!
I would tell myself that the personality quiz was right about us. About Nico and me. About Commissioners and Fixers. They don’t mix. They don’t match. They only cause each other pain.
But even now, I know that I wouldn’t have listened.
Half an hour with Nico, and I was already too far gone to listen to reason. I was already smitten. Which explains why I went home later that night and reread the list of Fixer strengths over and over again, committing them to memory like the properties of a chemical compound. Like I would later be tested on the subject.
Optimistic.
Creative.
Spontaneous.
Great in a crisis.
So many things that I lacked. So many skills that, at the time, seemed to complement my own. I felt like his optimism was already rubbing off on me because I’d never felt more hopeful than on that night.
Too bad I didn’t keep reading. I would have gotten to the section about the Fixer’s weaknesses:
Insensitive.
Easily bored.
Secretive.
But I never even read those. I didn’t care about his weaknesses. In that moment, sitting in that VW Beetle, he didn’t have any. Neither of us did. We were just two personalities fitting perfectly together. We were two balls of pure possibility, colliding to create one perfect, infinite horizon.
Which is probably why I said, without any hesitation, “Maybe we should chance it.”
As Nico and I wander the streets of downtown Brookings, we’re both silent. Neither one of us wants to speak first in fear of triggering the fight that we left hanging back in the restaurant.
Eventually, we stumble upon a small section of town that holds a collection of art galleries. One shop in particular grabs my attention. It’s called Mottainai: Treasures of the Lost and Found.
The storefront window is relatively bare, apart from something hanging from the ceiling by a long chain. When I step closer, I see that it’s actually a wind chime. And it’s made entirely of sea glass. A small shiver runs through me as I reach into my pocket and touch my own piece of sea glass, feeling its soft edges. I make a split-second decision and duck inside the shop.
Nico follows me, and we both freeze the moment we step through the door and take in the awe-inspiring sight in front of us.
We seem to be the only people here, but we are definitely not alone. Everywhere I turn, there’s a quirky-looking sculpture staring back at me. And, upon closer inspection, I soon realize that all the sculptures are made of the most unusual, seemingly random things. There’s a tiny duck whose face is constructed out of a light bulb and whose body is nothing more than a rusty old metal funnel with ornate keys attached to the sides as tucked-in wings.
Next to that is a robot with a metal olive oil tin box for a body, an upside-down paintbrush for a neck and head, and antique hot and cold faucet handles for arms. Beside him is an adorable kitten who sits on bent-fork legs, gazing at us through button-eyes attached to a face fashioned from an old alarm clock.
“What is this place?” I whisper, afraid to speak too loudly, in case the peculiar objects in here have ears.
“I don’t know,” Nico admits, gazing around the gallery in wonder.
And that’s really the only way to feel in here.
Wonderment.
“Look at this one,” Nico says, pointing to a t
able where a two-foot-tall figurine stands erect and proud. Its face is made out of a stripped tuna can, and its body looks like one of those old-fashioned sugar bowls that come with tea sets—two ornate curving handles protruding from the sides, making it look like the figure is standing with its hands on its hips. We both lean in to study the craftsmanship.
“Cute little guy,” Nico says, grinning.
“Um, that’s definitely a girl.”
“How can you tell?”
I point to the upside-down mini–Bundt cake pan fastened to the bottom of the sugar bowl, creating a billowing skirt to cover the sculpture’s candlestick legs. “It’s wearing a skirt.”
“It’s actually gender-fluid,” a voice says, causing both of us to startle and jerk upright. A man has suddenly emerged from a back room. His long white hair has been tied in a ponytail with little wisps flying out around the ears, reminding me of a West Highland white terrier after an open-window car ride. He wears a pair of shop goggles on his head.
“All of my sculptures are genderless.”
“Oh!” I smile at the man. “Hi. Is this your shop?”
“Yes, it is. I’m Wes Kapoor. Welcome to Mottainai.”
“Thank you,” I say. “We were just admiring your . . .” I search for the right word. “Art.”
Wes laughs a buoyant, infectious kind of laugh. “Thank you for calling it that. Most people don’t know what to make of it.”
“It is art, right?” I ask.
“It’s whatever you need it to be,” Wes says with a twinkle in his eye.
Nico points to a mouse whose face is constructed from a hollowed-out bell and whose ears are measuring spoons. “I think this one is my favorite.”
Wes smiles and approaches the creature. “Ah, yes. That’s Ziggy. Ziggy likes to watch over the shop. Every time I come out here, Ziggy is always facing a different direction.” Wes affectionately pats the mouse on the head, tweaking its electrical wire whiskers. “Sneaky little thing, Ziggy is.”
“So, you make all of this stuff out of . . .” Nico also seems to be struggling to find the right word.
Wes steps in to help. “Found objects. That’s what I call them, anyway. Most people call them trash. Junk. Garbage. Take your pick.”
I peer around the shop once again. “Everything in here is made from something someone threw away?” I ask in disbelief.
Wes flashes me a warm smile. “Exactly. I named the shop Mottainai, which is a Japanese term meaning ‘the sacredness of a material entity’ because everything, even this old pepper grinder”—he taps the long wooden body of a nearby dachshund sculpture—“has a story to tell.”
I bend down to examine the sculpture of a sad-looking turtle made almost entirely out of jewelry.
“The Buddhists believe that every object—regardless of whether it’s ‘alive’ or not”—Wes makes air quotes around the word “alive”—“has a soul. And I agree. So I take things that have been discarded, and I turn them into these creatures. That way, nice folks such as yourself can come into the shop and see the objects the way I see them.”
I turn and study another robot. This one has a face made from an old pair of opera glasses, a coffee-can body dressed in a pair of measuring-tape suspenders, and wrenches for arms.
It’s uncanny. You can’t really help but see something when you look into his eyes. Something almost human.
“Well, it’s pretty spectacular,” Nico says.
“Yes,” I echo dazedly, grateful that Nico has come up with the right word, because I’m not sure I could have. “Spectacular.”
Wes bows his head. “Thank you. That’s very kind.”
“Do you sell these sculptures?” Nico asks.
Wes shrugs. “Not really, no. I’m not in the business of selling. I own this building and rent out the stores to other shop owners. That brings me all the income I need. I create these just for the joy of bringing them to life.”
I smile at that. “So, where do you find all of this lost stuff?”
Wes shrugs. “Everywhere and anywhere, really. Sidewalks, trash dumps, junkyards. Junkyards make me the saddest. So much waste. So many discarded souls, waiting for a second chance. I always wish I could adopt them all.”
“I love that.” I don’t even realize I’ve said that aloud until Nico turns to look at me, an inscrutable expression on his face. I clear my throat and refocus on Wes. “How do you know what to make out of each object?”
Wes flashes me another one of those twinkly smiles. “I don’t. The objects tell me what they want to be, and I listen.”
I can’t help the giddy grin that spreads over my face. The guy might be bonkers, but he also might be a genius. Maybe there’s a fine line.
I take another glance around the small shop, marveling at the way the eyes of Wes’s sculptures seem to be watching me. Each of them speaking a different language, sending a different message through the airwaves.
Then, as though someone turned on a giant spotlight, my eyes gravitate toward a tiny creature hidden behind one of the robots. All I can see are his beady little eyes poking out between the robot’s legs.
Without a word, I make my way toward the hidden sculpture. The invisible force pulling me toward it is so strong, I can’t fight it or even understand it. I just know I have to see what’s hiding back there.
I gently scoot the robot aside, revealing a beautiful steel butterfly that looks to be made entirely out of . . .
“Are those keys?” I ask no one in particular.
But somehow Wes is already there, as though he’s been watching me, waiting for me to find this very thing. “Yes. This is Kunjee. He’s made of lost keys.”
“Lost keys?” I repeat.
Wes nods. “They’re everywhere. You just have to keep your eyes out for them. When I find them, I like to hold them in my hand and imagine what secrets they might unlock.”
I turn back to the butterfly—Kunjee—and run my fingertips over its outstretched metal wings. The keys are all different sizes, shapes, and colors. Some look brand-new, maybe even freshly cut, while others are stained crimson with rust.
“It’s beautiful,” I say.
Wes slowly reaches toward the butterfly and picks it up. I like watching how reverently he handles it. As though it were a real butterfly with wings as delicate as paper. He brings the sculpture up to his face and looks it in the eye, exchanging inaudible words, then he nods and extends his hands to me.
Confused, I look from the sculpture up to him. “What?”
“She belongs to you now.”
“No,” I say, waving my hands. “I’m sorry. I don’t have enough money for—”
“Like I said,” Wes interrupts, “I’m not in the business of selling things, but I can tell when someone is meant to have something.”
“I-I-I couldn’t possibly take that.”
“You have to take him now,” Wes says. “He’s already found you.”
“Found me?”
“I hid Kunjee way back here so that only the right person would be led to her.”
I struggle to find words. “No. That’s not what . . . I mean, I was just curious.”
“Please,” Wes says, pushing the butterfly toward me again. “Take him.”
“But—” I begin to argue.
Wes cuts me off. “One of these keys will unlock what you’re looking for.”
I glance around the shop for help. This conversation is starting to make me uneasy. Nico is on the far other side of the room, bending down to examine the face of a Roman warrior made entirely from mismatched silverware.
I turn back to Wes. “I’m not looking for anything.” But the words come out cracked and broken.
Once again, Wes flashes that twinkly smile of his. “Well, I know that can’t be true.”
I give him a blank look, afraid to speak again for fear that my voice will fail me.
“You must be looking for something,” he explains. “Or you wouldn’t be here.”
For the n
ext thirty minutes, Nico and I drive around town, looking for somewhere to sleep for the night. Kunjee, the butterfly, is sitting on my lap. I can’t stop staring at all of those lost keys, wondering what they might have once unlocked. Wondering what Wes could have possibly meant by what he said.
Looking for something.
He said it with such authority. Such certainty. As though he’d known me my entire life.
“Look,” Nico says, pointing to a motel off the main road. “That place has a VACANCY sign.”
I yawn, the mention of a place to sleep already triggering my fatigue. “Great. Let’s pull over.”
Nico parks the Firebird in the front of the motel and kills the engine. I glance around the interior of the car for a safe place to store the statue, finally deciding on the center console. I lift the lid and am about to place the butterfly inside, when my gaze falls on the black cassette tape that I stashed in there at the beginning of our trip. I remember that loud, angry guitar. Nolan’s voice screaming from the speakers.
It’s only now, however, as I stare into the console that I notice the cassette tape has a white label on it. And on the label, someone has scribbled:
FE UNTITLED #3 7/17/10
I tilt my head, trying to make sense of the writing. “FE” obviously stands for Fear Epidemic, and that date—July 17, 2010—was during the period of time when Jackson was on tour with the band, but what does “Untitled #3” refer to?
“Are you coming?” Nico asks, and I glance up to see he’s already out of the car and is leaning back through the open door to talk to me.
You know what? It doesn’t matter. I don’t care. That band means nothing to me.
I return the tape to the console, gently set the butterfly statue on top of it, and close the lid.
Nico locks the car, and we walk toward the front entrance of the hotel. But for some reason, my attention is pulled back to the Firebird. There’s a question still gnawing at my mind. An itch I have to scratch.
The Geography of Lost Things Page 21