Collectible Items

The vines began growing back slowly, as they sang a song of what used to be. She followed them, and walked over to where she liked to pick the flowers. There weren’t many, but they were enough. It was a simple plan— pluck off a few blooms, and return to the gravelly road ahead.

Just a few feet away, he was so close in distance and yet the air on him so different in temperament. Sweat on his cheeks, swirling in a calculated dance of panic— each bead taking its turn before melting off his face, making room on the ballroom floor for the next dancer. Though it had been a long chain of weeks, he was still adjusting to his new home.

The peonies, though their bulbs felt like little clouds, grew large enough to bend the stems downward. Sad little flowers, she thought. But something beneath the bush flashed a light in the muted landscape, and caught her eye. A heart-shaped locket, abandoned and left by the peonies. A simple letter “A” on the front.

She looked around. She had heard about these, as news was circulating around town with wild stories from people finding these lockets. Rather than open it, she wore it on her neck and followed her path on the road. She could reach the makeshift town where they all arrived, and the communal hall where she would sleep, only through the gravelly road ahead.

And with that, he felt a jump in the air again, the movements rocking him back and forth until he could settle himself with ease.

—

The next morning at the market and all its whirrs and buzzing, one of the vendors ran up to her. “You found one of the lockets!” he exclaimed, containing himself only slightly.

“I did.”

“I recognize the ‘A.’ You should be careful walking around with that thing, you know these are collectible items. I can have it set for you, you know.”

“What’s with these things anyway?”

He looked around, then returning to her eyes, sobering his tone. “This is worth a lot of money,” he whispered. “It’ll help you get a spot on the ship to go buy food for the winter.”

She looked in his eyes, only seeing a dance of memories behind her. Food. That would be nice, wouldn’t it? Easier access to food, a spot on the ship. Food was something more readily available before what happened a few weeks ago. She had been doing okay so far, but knew the end would be near if she didn’t secure access to several weeks worth of food before the winter.

“How much will I get if I sell it?”

“You will have buyers. Not only will you get a spot on the ship, you may even get a few animals, too. But the first thing I’ll do for you is change the engraving to make it like the other updated lockets that were found. They are glass underneath the front plating. I’ll remove the plating to make the front of the locket see-through, without opening it. You cannot open it, it’ll lose its value right now if you do.”

“Well, you’re the best in town, I hear.”



“Thank you. I used to be a jeweler before all of this.” The vendor looked out past the market, sighing from one muted streetscape to another. She removed the locket from around her neck, handing it over to her new friend, who instructed her to come back in two days.

Meanwhile, the man who was sweating just yesterday near the peonies remained in a stunned fury. He was now crouching to the angled floor beneath him, unable to take the repetition of the loud noises in his new environs.

She came back, discreetly, dutifully as she was told.

“Are you ready?” asked the vendor.

She looked in his eyes, this time with intent. “Show me.”

The vendor went to his wooden drawer, pulling out the locket. It exhibited the exact change he specified he would do. He removed the gold plating and other engravings from the front, including the letter A, leaving behind the see-through window to the insides of this little locket.

She looked closer and screamed.

“What is that?! It’s moving!”

The vendor laughed. “So many people are wishing they could find these right now. Stop, don’t be afraid.”


Working through the hesitation, she looked closely again. She locked eyes with a little man sweating— beads of sweat dancing off his face, terrified.

“Why does this bug look like a little human?”

“That’s because he is.”

She snapped up, back to her gaze at the vendor. “You jest.”

“I’m not kidding. He’s one of the humans that used to be here. He is one of the few survivors from this area that were chosen to be shrunk and placed inside of these lockets. I guess you haven’t heard about this!” He paused. “As long as they’re in there, they will live forever. If they are released, they will die.” The vendor looked at her to make sure she understood. “Do not open the locket.”

She held up the locket, rubbing it with her fingers. The man inside looked up at her, unsure of what the long road ahead was going to look like.

“I’m ready to sell it. I can’t wear this.”

“As you wish.”

---

Several days later, she became a rich woman at the auction by the market. The buyer walked off, now housing several of the lockets. Adding a new nervous man to his collection, the lockets jingled and jangled together in his pocket, all see-through. The people inside, able to see each other… if the position of the locket allowed them so.

Doesn’t mean they were able to do anything else about it.

Except for the one who was originally in a locket labeled “L.”

You see, the woman inside “L” banged and banged at the glass covering each day until she couldn’t feel her fists. Her owner took amusement at this, but wasn’t annoyed; her tiny fists didn’t produce nearly the same amount as noise as he could.

The owner hung up his collection of lockets, some across from each other. He noticed the woman of “L” sometimes stared longingly at the man with sweat on his temples. They clamored at the glass, doing all kinds of hopeless things in a hopeless effort to get out, all while seemingly calling out to each other, as though they had some kind of past with some kind of love.

One of the nights he placed these two particular lockets across from each other again, and watched them, this time nestling them on the table.

He decided to open the locket of L.

She ran out in an excited fury, headed towards her lover in what the owner could only assume would be her futile attempt to free him. She did make a good effort, the owner could admit. As she lay on the ground within moments, the man with sweat on his temples looked on, losing the last remnants of what was.

“Get me out of here,” he mouthed through the glass at his owner, unable to take any more devastation. The woman of L remained on the floor in his view, and he only had so much room inside to turn around.

The owner looked on. “I’m a merciful man,” he nodded at the locket, convinced of his assessment. “You all can stay here with me.”

He had peonies out by the window at the end of the room. The man inside the locket could see them, only faintly, only impossibly in the distance.