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Unexpected Turns: The Painted Bear


Why her mother kept her in the room Kasia never knew. She assumed that all little girls were kept in their rooms. As far as she was concerned, her room was her world. Her world had four walls and a door. It had a window, a bed and a floor. It had toys and books and clothes. And in one corner a toilet. That was all. There was a small amount of world outside, which showed through the window, but it was crowded with leaves, and it was cold, and wet sometimes, and hot and windy at others. She had to be protected from it. That's what her mother said. She was not allowed to go outside, into the other world where the trees grew. That was only for grown ups. Besides, she didn't want to go outside. It was a horrible place, that outside world. There was no room to move in it. She always believed her mother.

Kasia closed her eyes and slept for a while. There was nothing else to do. When she woke she was hungry. She hoped that the next meal would come soon. She lay sleepily, with her back against a wall, and flipped through the pages of a book she already knew off by heart.

It was a book about bears. They were painted bears. Red, yellow, bright orange. Each bear had a name, and they all smiled, or danced, or held things. They looked like humans dressed up. Kasia often wondered if bears like this really existed. She was scared of them, if they were real but not scared of them if they were just pictures in a book.

One of the bears was a panda. It was black and white and it sat in a room, with its back against a wall, and read a book. "Primrose the panda reads a book" said the caption. Kasia often paused when she got to this page. What was the panda reading about? Why did it read books at all? Where was its mother? Was Primrose living in a room too, just like Kasia?

It was then, at that moment, as Kasia admired the panda, that she thought she might like to have a bear of her own. And she imagined one, just the same as Primrose. Her bear would be bigger than her, with large black eye-patches. Her bear would be friendly, and fat and full of fun. And as she saw her own bear coming to life in her mind, she smiled inside. It was a smile that burst like a hot flower in her heart, warming her whole body.

"Painted bear," she called, "Where are you hiding?"

"I'm over here!"

"Under the bed? Come out!"

"You have to find me!"


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