That day Fikri lost his locker key. He searched under the mattress, between the books, even in the uniform pocket that had been hanging there for two days. Nothing.
His roommates offered to help. They took the room apart corner by corner, until they forgot that the afternoon recitation was almost due. The key still did not turn up.
Near the evening prayer, a younger student knocked at the door. He handed over a small key he had found near the ablution area. “I saw your name on the tag,” he said briefly, and took his leave.
Fikri held that key for a long while. Not because his locker could finally be opened, but because it had just dawned on him: at a boarding school, what goes missing often comes back faster than the suspicion that has already settled in.