Lost and Found in France
LOST AND FOUND IN FRANCE – April 2, 2025 – Saint-Malo, France
“Without pain, how can we know joy?” – John Greene
Joining the spring break trip to France was not Vale Ogilvy’s idea. Her mom found out about the trip through Vale’s high school French teacher and signed her up. If her schedule was entirely up to her, Vale would have preferred spending spring break doing nothing in particular. She would have laid around, watching movies and reading a couple of books she heard about on TikTok. She did not want to think about anything affiliated with school. Spring break was supposed to liberate her from all that.
Vale knew that the France trip was her mom’s unsubtle way of forcing her out of the house where she could make real human friends. It was an extreme way to encourage socializing and usually her mom was too helicoptery to tolerate an entire ocean separating her from her daughter. And of course, she constantly reminded Vale how much the flights cost.
“It was your idea, not mine,” Vale finally said to her mother. “How about you go and I’ll stay home?” That kind of reply did not help either one of them feel better about the trip.
The spring break travel group turned out to include twenty-eight people. Eight of them were adults, including the French teacher and parents who could afford to tag along. The other twenty were teenagers taking some level of French between 9th and 12th grade. Vale recognized some of the kids. They all seemed to belong to one of three cliques formed before the trip started. No one bothered including Vale.
For the first two days they toured Paris, Vale followed subserviently at the back of the pack. She shared a hotel room with a girl named Bethany, but they were rarely alone and barely spoke. Vale watched jealously as the others took pictures and giggled over sculptures and people they passed on the street. She longed to be included in the inside jokes and conversations but was not brash enough to insert herself into any of the three teen groups. And her fellow students were self-absorbed enough not to notice anyone staring from outside. Vale left Paris without attempting a word of French to any of the locals. She kept her eyes open but her mouth shut.
On the third day, the tour boarded a bus for a long trip to Normandy and the Atlantic coast. Vale sat alone reading a book between catnaps as they crossed farmland and forests of the French countryside. They reached the seaside town of Saint-Malo by early afternoon. The French teacher raved about the fortified walls surrounding the city and how it was home to real pirates.
“All the pirates are gone. It’s mostly full of tourists now. Look how cute it is with all the flowers blooming. It’s very safe, so you can explore on your own for a few hours and we’ll meet for dinner at a restaurant near the entrance at 6:00. Go see the cathedral and the famous beach.”
The three teenage cliques walked in three different directions. The adults hung loosely together. Vale was left on her own. Unnoticed, she wandered the town’s narrow cobblestone streets that felt like canyons lined with ancient, multi-storied buildings. She stared through shop windows and bought a Nutella crepe at one of the many cafes. Then she climbed the stairs leading up the protective wall encircling the city. At the top of the wall, a wide stone path allowed her to walk the entire perimeter with views of the city on one side and the ocean on the other.
Vale reached a point where she had a good view of a beach directly under the wall and she spotted some of her schoolmates trudging across the sand to a nearby rocky island the size of two football fields. The tide was out, leaving a connecting footpath. The island was intriguing, but Vale did not want to look like she was trying to tag along with the group, so she waited until they disappeared before making her own way down a staircase and toward the island pathway. Her shoes got wet in the soggy sand before she reached the bottom of a craggy hill covered in yellow wildflowers.
The climb up the hill took three minutes. Vale paused at a rock shelf surrounded by grass and more of the blooming wildflowers. The spot looked so pretty that she sat down and pulled her phone from her small cross-body bag for a photo. She snapped shots of the walled city and spun around for views of the ocean. She removed her bag for a selfie and then took turns staring at the water, seagulls, and two dozen people trapsing around the island.
After a quiet half-hour, Vale decided it was time to return to the city. She stood up and took a first step back to the pathway she had followed up the hill. Something made her turn back, where she saw her bag still lying in the grass. Inside were 200 Euros, a bank card, and the driver’s license her mom had insisted she get. She grabbed the bag, which she was not used to wearing, and draped it back around her neck and shoulder. She breathed a sigh of relief and imagined all the trouble losing the bag would have created. Her mom would have never let her forget it and forbidden her from ever leaving home again.
Vale hurried back up the city wall, took one last long look at the island, and then walked toward the city entrance. She arrived at the restaurant early and did not mention the dropped bag to anyone. She spent the dinner listening from the outskirts while the others recounted discoveries in the city. For the rest of the trip, she kept her bag wrapped around her. She returned home safely with some nice picture and videos.
When her mom asked about the best thing that happened on the trip, Vale replied, “I almost forgot my bag in Saint-Malo. Lucky for me, I didn’t.”
Now we will revisit this mostly uninteresting story, returning to the exact moment when Vale stands up on the island, looking toward Saint-Malo. In a slightly altered scenario, nothing inside her made her glance back at the ground and spot her bag on the grass. She continued walking down the hill, across the wet sand and into the city. She took a familiar path back to the designated meeting point and waited patiently for the others to arrive for dinner.
When Vale walked into the restaurant and chose a seat at the end of a table, she watched her female traveling companions reach for the cross-body bags they all wore. A few girls removed them before sitting down, others slid their bags so they were closer to their stomachs than their waists. Vale instinctively reached for her bag, but it was gone.
“My bag’s gone,” she said, quietly at first. Panic instantly gripped her and she repeated much louder, “My bag’s gone! It’s got all my money!”
One of the adults at the next table asked in a concerned voice, “When did you last have it?”
“I know I had it in town. I used money to buy a crepe. I’m pretty sure I had it around me after that.”
“Did you take it off anywhere else? Did you maybe go to the bathroom?”
“No. I really didn’t stop anywhere else, except maybe the island.” Vale suddenly remembered taking the pictures and slipping off the bag. “The island! It’s gotta be there! I’ve gotta run and check.”
Vale’s French teacher stood and asked, “Is anyone willing to go with her?”
Bethany, Vale’s hotel roommate, immediately popped up. “I’ll go!”
“Send us a WhatsApp message as soon as you find out anything,” the French teacher called.
Vale and Bethany rushed out the restaurant door and up a street that cut through the middle of the town. The dose of dread-induced adrenaline coursing through Vale made her legs pump hard. “My mom’s going to kill me!” she shouted between labored breaths.
“It’ll be okay!” Bethany shouted back reassuringly. “You remember where you took it off, right?”
“I think so. But what if someone found it? They’ll take the money for sure.”
“Maybe not.”
“My mom’s gonna freak out. I’m never gonna hear the end of it. Should I call her?”
“How about waiting to call until after we look around? Let’s see if we find it first.”
Vale tired as they reached the wall and then the beach, but Bethany was a strong runner and continued shouting encouraging words. They jogged across the still-open path to the island and looked up at the looming hill. Vale cursed at herself under her breath and kept repeating, “Why was I so stupid?”
“Shall we start climbing, or do you want to take a little break first?” Bethany asked.
Vale leaned over and rubbed the ache on one side of her ribs. After nearly a minute, she raised up and said, “Okay, let’s go.”
The island was mostly abandoned because the impending tide was about to cut it off from the city. An older man wearing a dark scarf, jacket, and backpack was descending the hill and temporarily blocked their path. Rather than ignore him and let him pass, Vale felt compelled to ask him a question in broken French. “Did you see a bag on top of the hill?”
To Vale’s surprise, the man pulled off his backpack and fished out a bag that looked just like hers. She instantly beamed with excitement, “That’s mine!” she said in English, before repeating the phrase in French.
“How do I know it is yours?” the man asked in French.
“My name is on my driver’s license. Vale Ogilvy.” She recited her address for good measure.
The man smiled, dug through the bag until he found the license, and then seemed satisfied. “Then I shall give it to you instead of the police.”
“Oh, thank you! Thank you!” Vale grabbed the bag to find all of her money still inside. In a mixture of French and English she continued to thank the man for being honest and for saving her from being killed by her mom.
“I hope you enjoy your visit,” the Frenchman said graciously in return.
When the man walked away and she was left with Bethany, Vale said in ecstatic relief, “This is the best think that’s ever happened to me. I’m so lucky. Thanks for running with me. If you didn’t, we might have missed him.”
“No problem,” Bethany replied. “I’m just happy it worked out. I told you it would. I’ll send the group a message saying you found it.”
The girls strolled back to the restaurant instead of jogging. On the way, they talked about their moms and other members of their family. Both had annoying little brothers. Bethany revealed she was used to running because she had been on the school’s cross-country team. But she was less into running now and not sure what she liked instead.
They reached the restaurant and Vale held her bag triumphantly over her head as she walked in. Everyone in the group clapped and cheered. They peppered Vale with a dozen questions, which she happily began to answer.
“How about you tell your story in French?” her teacher suggested.
Vale did not hesitate because she was in such a happy mood. She struggled through some of the words but kept a bright smile on her face. Her audience nodded and laughed and was genuinely happy with the outcome. The room they were in seemed to brighten by several shades.
Bethany insisted that the chairs at her table be rearranged so Vale could sit next to her. Together, they retold the bag-finding story in greater detail to the five other teenagers around them. Words spilled from Vale’s mouth. Joy drowned any anxiety she might have felt less than an hour earlier and she remained the center of attention the rest of the evening.
She did not sit alone for the rest of the trip. She learned all the things she had in common with Bethany and her friends. They talked about favorite shows and music and teachers they could not stand. The bus ride through the Loire valley and back to Paris was filled with nonstop chatter. By the time they flew home, Vale had firm plans to hang out with three new people.
“So, what was the best thing that happened to you on the trip?” Vale’s mom asked her.
“I lost my bag.”
“Your suitcase?”
“No, the bag I carried with me. The one with my money.”
“But you’re wearing it right now.”
“I know. I found it. It’s a cool story. Terrible at first, but it all worked out in the end.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“It happened so fast. You didn’t need to worry. And I should tell you, I’m going over to Bethany’s tomorrow.”
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