Robert and the Goblin Tree

Where's My Stuff!?

It was the third day in the new house, and Robert had been relieved of chores and allowed to entertain himself. Mother had gone to university to attend an orientation for guest lecturers, and Father was working on a project for a client back in the states.

Robert had brought three small shoe boxes with him from home, and each was filled with particular set of favorite treasures. He was taken with particular shapes and textures and liked taking the items out of each box, studying them, arranging them, and then returning them to their respective boxes. Two of the boxes safely stowed in armoire, Robert had the contents from the first box on the bed in front of him.

He gasped, "Oh no! Where is it?!"

A flat, metal heart, once part of a larger set of jewelry owned by one of Robert's older sister, was missing. He picked up the box. Looked around the box. Nothing.

"Where is it!?"

He pulled the other boxes out of the armoire and checked them, just to be certain, but of course it was not there.

"It's gone!"

He went through the contents of each box carefully and found that a circle long discarded from one of his other sister's toys and a metal mint box were also missing. The worst loss, however, was the plastic green soldier, a remembrance of his brother.

Robert put the items back in their boxes and scowled at the armoire. It had two doors that swung out, tall enough to hang shirts and pants in, and two drawers below. He got down on his knees and felt along the bottom of the armoire.

"Nothing in there."

He retrieved his flashlight and looked around in the first drawer.

At that moment, there was a knock at the door and Father walked in.

"Robert," he said. "Did you take my flash drive?"

"Flash drive?" Robert repeated, brows furrowed as he considered what Father was asking for.

"Yes, the little black stick I put in my computer."

Understanding flashed in Robert's eyes. "I don't have it." And he returned to studying the drawer.

Father turned to leave but noticed Robert.

"What are you doing?"

"It's gone!"

"What gone?"

"The green soldier is gone. It's not in the box."

"Well, maybe you left it at home in Alaska."

"No." Robert said. "It was in the box and now it is not."

"Well it has to be around here somewhere. Like my flash drive. Good thing I already copied the files." And Father left the room.

"School starts next week and all you have done since we got here is hang out in the house. Go outside!" Mother insisted on the fourth day.

The yard, or garden as he was informed it was called in that part of the world, was about an acre around the house. The shrubs and flower beds had been neglected and grew in wild abandon, but Robert and Father had cut the grass just the day before. A large tree grew in the back right corner, and a tire hung by a thick rope from a stout and sturdy branch. The yard was not fenced but the historically tended if currently neglected lawn meet an abrupt end, immediately transitioning into moss, bracken grass, and eventually into thin, sagging trees. Robert climbed on the tire and stood as he swayed back and forth, studying the change.

He dismounted from the tire and wandered into the dismal forest. Among the trees, he thought he saw small trails crisscrossed among the undergrowth, and tiny footprints in the dirt, but the number of toes was wrong: sometimes three but mostly seven.

Going back to where the garden ceased to be garden, Robert noticed a row of evenly spaced stones. Each stone was clear and white, more oblong than round, flat on top and roughly the same size. He straddled the line, one foot in the garden, the other in the mossy grass and bobbed back and forth as he walked along the line back toward the tire swing.

He stopped. Just left of his right foot was a stone the same color and size as the others, but this one looked like a key. Robert crouched down and looked at it closer. He reached out and brushed his right-hand pointy finger across the smooth top. It was cold to the touch. He flattened his hand and ran the fleshy part of right-hand fingers across the top. The stone was supple, smooth, and cool. He rummaged around the rock and broke it free from the grass and dirt. For several minutes he crouched there, studying the rock in his right hand. He turned it over several times and brushed the dirt off, always amazed as the texture and feel of the stone.

Mother called from the doorway: "Come get cleaned up for dinner!"

Robert stood up, took one more look, and then slipped the stone into his pocked before heading into the house.

The next afternoon was raining, so Robert was not ushered outside for his "free time." He was allowed to retire to his room and rummage through his boxes. Robert had added the key-shaped stone to his primary box, and the first thing he did that afternoon was go to that box.

"It's gone!" Robert yelled. "Mom! Mom! It's gone!"

"What's gone?" Mother asked, almost out of breath from slight panic at Robert's outcry.

"My rock! It's gone!"

Mother stared at Robert in stunned silence.

"Your rock?" she finally managed.

"Yes! I found it in the garden. It's gone! Someone took it."

"Well it must be important," Mother answered, stunned at the volume of Robert's reply. "All I can say is look around the house. Did you have it elsewhere in the house and forget about it?" she suggested.

"Where is it?!" Robert insisted.

"I don't know! Where did you have it?"

"Where is it!?" Robert stopped short of stomping his foot, knowing that would only get him in trouble.

"Look around!" mother insisted. "Look under things, around things. Don't sit there and ask me. I don't know. Pretend it's one of your video games and you have to find it."

So Robert spent the remainder of his free time searching through the house, tapping on walls, opening cabinets, and inspecting wainscoting. It wasn't entirely in vain. One of the bedrooms had a loose floor board, and Robert found a stash of empty thread spools and decorative buttons. In the laundry room, in a hole behind the clothes hamper, he found his father's zip drive, three paperclips, and one of his mother's hair combs. (He returned both the drive and the hair combs to their proper owners.) But after almost two hours of diligent searching, he found little else and no sign of any of his stuff, including his new rock.