Anthony Darrow was behind on a few things at the library. Not for any reason, they were just things that fell behind his daily and weekly duties, and even his monthly ones. They were supposed to be done fairly regularly, but he had so much else to do regularly that, somehow, he forgot to work these in.

Like cleaning out the lost and found.

There were many unclaimed items locked away in a safe upstairs, in a small cupboard. The valuable items went in the safe, the others were left on the three shelves above. The cupboard was not big, but then, it did not need to be. Except when he left it for so long.

The items that were in good condition and had been unclaimed for over a year were donated, while most of it was just thrown out. Everything had dates on it, when they were found. Most commonly there were sweaters and jackets, and other smaller articles of clothes that people just forgot and then never came back to get. Things like wallets and backpacks often found their home again before they ever made it to the closet because they could track down any names attached. It was kind of a fun little break from the norm for the other staff, to play detective for a moment and see if they could return a lost item to its owner.

He was pulling the oldest stuff from the shelves, sorting as he went. Once he had all the clothes sorted, he took a step back and sighed, patting dust off his jacket sleeve. He wondered how students could wear sweaters with so many holes in them, then thought they might have been in there so long the holes had been made after being lost. But no, that was silly.

It hadn't been that long, had it?

He opened the safe next, but there was not much in it. Valuables, whether monetary or sentimental, were also often claimed before too long. Things like phones and computers were usually labeled, and even when they weren't people came in looking for them.

The most common item in the safe was the flash drive. There had to be ten sitting in a little basket together, forgotten in the library computers by their owners. These he would just leave here, as he was never quite sure what to do with them. Sometimes the students that worked for the library would take them after the item had been there for too long, but even then the demand for them was low.

He frowned as he pulled out an item he had not seen in the safe after so long before. It had been there for over a year, at least, and it was some sort of game system. Small, with a cord wrapped around it. He remembered it had been found plugged in inside one of the study rooms. The last person who had checked the room out, however, had said it was not theirs so it was likely a student had slipped into the room to hide and relax without checking it out at the front counter. Which was fine, and not against any rules, usually checking out rooms was just for those who wanted to ensure they would have one. If one was open they were free to use until a reservation came in.

He sat down on the floor while he examined the item. He found a switch on the side to turn it on, but there was no power. The battery must have gone dead. He wondered if Nate might like it, and decided he'd take the thing home and see. It wasn't until he finished the rest of his sorting and left the dimly lit closet and entered the hall again that he noticed the game system was pink.

No. Nathan would not like that.

Tony sighed and took the items for donation to the processing room on the third floor, where book repairs and mail and other things like that were taken to be sorted and sent out. He greeted the other staff members there, then wandered downstairs with the game. He was told by one of the kids in the processing room that it was a Nintendo DS.

Dogby looked up at him as he approached the desk and he pat her on the head as he sat down, and then put the pink DS in his desk. He'd take it home that night and see if Kyndall or Harmony might like it. Because it was pink, after all.

(Word Count: 763)