My Story Book

Red

                     William Peterson walked into the toy shop with his older sister Roxy and their mother, the bell tingling as the door opened. "Remember, just because this is a special occasion, doesn't mean we're going beyond the budget." Mrs Peterson reminded them. The children nodded.

                     Roxy looked around the dolls' section, while William scanned the entire store. He came to a halt when he spotted a brown teddy bear wearing a red patterned scarf. Its brown beady eyes looking down at him.

                     He stared at it for ages and picked it off the shelf. Roxy ran over to their mother showing her the toy cooking set she chose. Mrs Peterson looked at the price then nodded in approval, and the two began looking for William. Eventually finding him standing in front of the dozens of stuffed animals. Holding the soft, brown teddy bear.

                      "Hey baby, is that the one you want?" Mrs Peterson asked. William was unsure. There was nothing special in particular about this bear. And there were loads of cuter animals, like the multi-coloured llamas, or the penguin marshmallows. But William passed the teddy to his mother.

                     They made their payment and went home. Roxy opened up the cooking set and began playing restaurant with her Barbies and baby dolls. William shuffled on his bed, setting his new bear down next to his pillow, joining the other stuffed animals he had. Then he went over to Roxy and played restaurant with her.

                      While the house was asleep that night, the teddy bear blinked his eyes. In front of him was a sleeping William, his head turned away from the toys. "Hey, don't worry about the kid. Once they're asleep, they won't hear a thing we say. You can be as loud as you want till sunrise." said a small stuffed giraffe.

                      "Um... who are you?" the bear asked. The giraffe laughed. "I forgot you're a new toy here. I'm Wendy. These are Lincoln, Quilly, Flapjack, Hotcake, Spotty, Sir Floofsalot, Mickey, Ellie and Teddy." said the giraffe as she nodded towards a stuffed cat, porcupine, puppy, bird, leopard, fluffball, mouse, elephant and teddy bear. Teddy looked the new bear up and down.

                  "The kid give you a name yet?" he asked gruffly. "Uh, no." "Heh, he never does name us. We name ourselves. I'm Teddy. If you were the only bear, that's what we'd call you. But... you know. So you'll need another name." "What about Bob?" Quilly suggested in a high-pitched voice. Teddy shook his head.

                "No, he named all his tiny bird figures Bob already." Teddy then eyed the bear's scarf. "New kid, what do you think of Red?". Red smiled. "I like it.". "Well Red," Teddy said patting Red's shoulder, "Welcome home.".