I can still see her, though I haven’t seen her in years. Small enough to fit in my backpack, her fur once white and caramel but faded by time and love. Her nose was stitched black, and one of her ears was thinner where I’d rubbed it between my fingers at night–mainly to calm myself from the monsters under the bed. I named her Lola. I don’t remember why. It just felt right. She was mine, and I was hers.

The memory of losing her isn’t sharp. It’s like watching an old film reel that’s been cut in the middle and put together in the wrong order. There are moments I can see clearly — bright balloons, the sound of children playing, a table covered with paper plates, the cake in the center — and then a blank. Somewhere in that blank, Lola disappeared from me.

It was at Emily’s birthday party, in her backyard. I must have been seven or eight. I remember the sun coming through to us in stripes through the trees. There were bubbles floating everywhere, catching the light, and I chased them with one hand while holding Lola tight in the other.

Someone shouted my name, and when I turned, a bubble burst on Lola’s face. Tiny droplets sparkled on her fur. I laughed, wiped her off, and ran toward the others. That’s the last thing I remember clearly — her damp in my hand.

After that, everything becomes fractured. I remember sitting cross-legged during the games, clapping when Emily blew out the candles, then reaching into my lap and finding only air. My hand searched for her automatically, as it always did when I felt nervous. But this time– nothing.

I told Emily’s mom. She said, “We’ll find her, sweetheart.” She smiled, calm, as if she had some grown-up confidence that everything lost can be found if you just look properly. We searched the backyard first, turning over picnic rugs, peering under chairs. I checked behind the plastic slide, under the snack table, inside the toy chest where the party favors were kept. Lola was nowhere.

At first, I was certain she’d turn up. “She always comes back to me,” I told myself. Toys have a particular way of hiding. They slip between couch cushions, fall under car seats, crawl behind beds. They come back when they’re ready. They know where they’re needed.

But as the sun lowered and the guests began to leave, that certainty turned into panic. I remember standing near the window, watching the morning sunlight turn orange, clutching a paper cup. It was the first time the world felt huge — the kind of huge that makes you small enough to lose anything, even yourself.

I asked Delta if she’d seen her. She shook her head. “No,” she said too quickly, the way children do when they’ve been asked something they don’t want to answer. Behind her, I saw a glimpse of white and brown through her open bedroom door — but it could have been any toy. There were dozens scattered around, gifts she’d just unwrapped. Still, the image stuck in my mind like a burr.

Later that night, at home, I cried so hard I gave myself hiccups. Mom tried to soothe me with promises: “Maybe someone picked her up by mistake. We’ll ask around.” She even called Emily’s mom, who said they’d check the yard in the morning. But I knew — with that strange certainty children have — that Lola wasn’t coming back.

For days afterward, I carried around the feeling of loss like a bruise. She wasn’t just a toy; she was my best friend. She’d been there through every long car ride, every night when the house went too dark and too quiet. I’d whispered secrets into her fur, breathed in her worn cotton smell, used her as a shield against whatever lurked under the bed.

Without her, the nights were terrifying.

In the weeks and months after the party, I kept looking for her. Every time I went to another girl’s house for a playdate, I’d quietly scan their rooms — toy chests, shelves, the corners of beds piled with stuffed animals. I told myself I was just curious, but really I was searching. Searching for Lola. Sometimes I’d spot a flash of brown and white and my heart would jolt, only for it to be something else — a different dog, a different story.

I never got to go back to Emily’s house after that day, but I always wondered. I’d picture Lola sitting on Emily’s bed, surrounded by her other toys, maybe not even remembered anymore. Maybe Emily had loved her too — or maybe she’d forgotten her completely. Even as the months turned to years, a part of me always wondered where Lola was.

Sometimes, I think of confronting Emily about it now, as adults. “Hey, do you remember that toy dog I lost at your birthday party?” I’d ask, laughing casually, as if it were nothing. But what would that even do? We’d both only remember fragments, and the truth would be unreliable. Memory is like that — it reshapes itself around what you need it to be.

Once, a few years ago, I was in a thrift store and saw a stuffed spaniel on a shelf. For a moment, I froze. The same coloring, the same lopsided ears. My hands trembled when I picked it up. Of course, it wasn’t her — the fur smelled of dust, the tag was different — but I still felt a sudden rush of tenderness, like seeing an old friend years after you’ve parted.

I didn’t buy it. I set it back on the shelf for another little girl who needed it more than me, but I still smoothed its fur before I left. On the drive home, I cried — not just for Lola, but for everything she represented. It was a tangle of feelings: guilt that I hadn’t looked harder, wonder about where she ended up, and a deep, aching wish to return to the kind of childhood where losing a stuffed animal could be the worst thing in the world.

Sometimes I still imagine her sitting somewhere — maybe in a forgotten box in someone’s attic, maybe in Emily’s childhood room — waiting patiently, the way she always did. I hope, wherever she ended up, she was loved.