The gray button spent the whole morning in the lost-and-found box.
It was quieter than the little wood chip. The wood chip had corners, and whenever it lay at the bottom of the box, it always looked like it might prick someone's hand. The gray button was rounder, with a shallow crack across it. It lay in the corner of the cardboard box like a closed eye. Kiyo looked at it three times that morning, and each time, he lowered his head afterward to check the buttons on his own clothes.
Naruto looked at it many times too.
Every time he looked, he asked, "Does nobody really want it?"
The third time Teacher Mizuno heard him ask, she finally set down her chalk. "Nobody claiming it doesn't mean nobody wants it."
Naruto froze. "Then why haven't they come to get it?"
"Maybe they haven't noticed yet."
"They lost it and don't know?"
Kiyo rubbed the shoelace on his forehead protector and said softly, "That's possible too. Sometimes my shoelaces come loose, and I don't notice until I've taken a few steps."
Naruto immediately looked at his feet. "Are they loose now?"
"No."
"Then why do you keep touching them?"
Kiyo pulled his hand back, his expression grave. "This is patrol duty."
Che sat beside him, drawing the two items in the lost-and-found box into his notebook. The wood chip was easy to draw, but the gray button was harder. A circle made it look too much like an eye, while adding the crack made it look like a wound. In the end, he drew a slightly uneven circle and wrote beside it: Gray button, East Corridor entrance, morning, unclaimed for now.
After writing the words "unclaimed for now," he paused.
The phrase was ordinary when used for an object. But