Kylie heard them, and her heart began to beat to the tune of “All Around the Mulberry Bush.” Footsteps. Voices. Getting Closer.

“…the Greymont case?” An unfamiliar voice said. Young, alert.

“Oh, that? Closed it yesterday. You’ll never guess it: the butler did it!” Both voices laughed. Kylie laughed, silently, too. She laughed easier now, as odd as that might sound.

“Let’s see…let’s see…Item 3-8-4.”

Kylie’s heart sank. She was Item 312. They weren’t here for her. Until she felt a sharp kick to her box, and the unfamiliar voice.

“What’s this thing? Been here a while.”

“What’s…wait, no! Don’t touch…” Officer Brook’s familiar voice shouted, but it was too late. The chime sounds of a music box melody filled her box.

Ohmygod!ohmygod!ohmygod! Kylie thought. It was happening again, finally! She had to rein in her excited mind, though. Focus. Get right to the point. No playing aro—

The box popped and Kylie rushed on springs back into the world of evidence lock-up. Wheee! She barely even saw the two police officers in the room with her, and couldn’t remember what she wanted to say to them while she swayed on her spring.

The new officer, a younger man, gawked at her, while the older one, Officer Brooks, groaned.

“Why’d you have to open it, Hank?” He said. “Now it’s gonna yap.”

Yap? Kylie thought. Oh, right! She focused, locking her eyes on Officer Brooks. Or, did as best she could while bouncing to and fro. “Officer Brooks! Officer Brooks! Look, I figured it out: the box is magic.”

But Brooks seemed thoroughly unimpressed, and didn’t reply. It was the younger one, Hank, that talked next.

“What the hell?”

Kylie turned, sort of, to the officer, and smiled sweetly. She had a habit of being kind to people. She didn’t really like it. “Hi! I’m Kylie-stuck-in-this-Box. I’d shake your hand, but…” she trailed off and looked at her oversized mitten hand.

“We have a talking toy in evidence?”

“I’m not a toy!” Kylie said indignantly. “I’m a person, stuck in this box—”

“Oh, jeez. Here we go with this,” Brooks said, rubbing the bridge of his nose. Kylie shot him the meanest look she could muster. Which, wasn’t much. But it was the thought that counted.

“I go, or went, to NGCU Grant. You know, the theater school. We were staging a play, and the director found this great prop to go with it. And he asked if I wanted to do it, and I wanted to do it, and so we did it…not like that…”

“Anyway, we were doing a run through dress rehearsal when this guy!...” Kylie swung her mitten in the general direction of Brooks, which triggered her springs, which triggered her rotating wildly, but she continued talking despite the lack of control she had. “…burst in and confiscated like half the show, including me! So I get stuck here. I guess there’s this whole investigation about my director allegedly stealing props and money from a community theater—”

“Not allegedly. He did it.” Brooks said.

“Then why am I still stuck in here? When all the other props have been returned?”

“Because the box did not come from the community theater, it did not come from the school, we cannot confirm provenance of the box, and your friend Mark has skipped town. But since he’s looking at real jail time, he couldn’t claim you, either.”

Kylie frowned, thinking. It was hard. “But why am I still stuck in here? There’s a latch, just down there…press it and I’ll be released.” She said that last not to Brooks, but to Hank, looking him in his eyes, begging him with big eyes and a sad face. And it almost worked, as the younger officer began to lean in, before Brooks yanked him back.

“What are you, stupid? We don’t go releasing magic, talking toys!”

Hank looked a bit confused, “uh, why not?”

“Yeah, why not! What’s the worst that could happen?” Kylie chimed in.

Brooks turned on her, “I don’t know the worst thing, but I can think of more than a few reasons it would be a bad idea. You could be some kind of poltergeist, and instead of haunting that box, you get to haunt this police station. Or we release you to cause mayhem and mischief all over the city. Or, whoever releases you swaps places with you, and then it’s Hank stuck in that box. The fact is, we don’t know who, or what you are, and we aren’t going to do anything you say.”

Kylie rolled her eyes. “I’m a theater kid stuck in a box. Could you please just let me out?”

“Then, how come we can’t find any record of Kylie Ramirez at the school? Or that there’s no mention of you in the script? Or that that box is too small to fit any person inside? Or that you’ve gone for how long without food and water just fine?”

“I told you! Magic!”

Officer Brooks sighed. “Which gets us back to poltergeists, curses, and other nonsense.”

Kylie looked back to Hank, putting on her begging face again. All she needed was to keep the idea in his mind. Plant the seed. Maybe she could get out of here. But Brooks wasn’t having any of it. “That’s it! Enough outside time.”

“Wait, what?” Kylie said as Brooks put his hands on her head and pushed her down, and down, and down further, back into the box. She kept one eye looking at Hank the whole way down, silently pleading with him. All the way until the box lid clicked shut.

“That’s why we don’t go playing with random things in evidence lockup.” Brooks said.

Footsteps, leaving. Kylie’s heart ached to the beat of “All Around the Mulberry Bush.”

“Poor girl. What’s going to happen to her?” Hank asked.

“It. Since it has no one to claim it, and it’s not needed for any ongoing cases, at the end of the month, it’s getting sold at auction. Then it’ll be someone else’s problem.”