"The Curious Case of Wally Bear"

Wally Bear: Origins - Part II

That night, the factory owner couldn’t sleep. His wife didn’t share his problem. On the other side of the bed, she snored like a freight train. Therefore, her husband had no trouble sneaking out of bed and down the stairs.

Opening his briefcase, the factory owner took out what had been troubling him all night. The teddy bear blankly stared back at him, looking quite unkempt, with torn fur, loose stuffing, and the absence of a nose.

Time to get to work, he thought. Minutes later, he had everything he needed laid across the kitchen counter: scissors, thread, pillow, and his pajama bottoms. He leaned in to begin but thought better of it. He closed the kitchen drapes, imagining how strange this scene would look to his neighbors.

Unfortunately, the man was right. Next door, Mrs. Fields pondered every possible explanation for her neighbor’s behavior: nervous breakdown, midlife crisis, compulsive teddy bear kidnapper. Luckily, what she saw would never leave her lips, for no one would believe her.

When the factory owner was done, he stood back and admired his work. Down from his pillow made up the bear’s stuffing. The man’s pajama bottoms were now pajama shorts; the fabric was used for the bear’s patches. The teddy bear also had a nose. It was a button taken off of the man’s pajama top. The once shoddy bear was now an impressive work.

The next morning, the factory owner went to the fertilizer plant where his son-in-law worked to deliver the teddy bear for his grandson. As he walked by an open vat of unrefined mineral compounds, the wrapped box containing the bear slipped out from under his arm and fell into the vat.

The factory owner realized the bear was missing but there was no trace of its whereabouts. After searching, he finally went home, and, due to his lack of sleep, thought the teddy bear had been a dream.

Meanwhile, the box sunk deeper and deeper into the vat. The chemical compounds soon filled the box and seeped through the bear’s thin fur. Suddenly, the bear’s lifeless body became alive. The factory owner’s creation had entered the vat an ordinary stuffed toy and soon exited an extraordinary stuffed bear.