Short Story 27 : The Children’s Playhouse

The Children’s Playhouse

                                      - T ABRAHAM

    By the time the spring descended and the autumn was peeping out the teddy bears were becoming dusty in their appearance. It was a pleasant Sunday morning when a few customers came inside to buy a teddy bear. The two other teddy bears who were with Liddy were one black teddy bear and a white teddy bear.

(SOURCE: AI GENERATED IMAGE)

    ‘Papa, I want that black colour teddy bear. It would perfectly fit inside my playhouse. I want it papa. Please…’, said a little girl who came to buy a teddy bear with her father. The man looked at the teddy bear for a while but dragged his daughter out of the shop and they went straight into the supermarket to buy the day’s grocery. ‘Please papa…’, cried the little girl but her father forced her into the car and they went home.
    Liddy was excited by the idea of being a teddy bear living inside a playhouse and started off with her story about a playhouse, ‘There was once a playhouse maintained by the royal family for their little prince. It was made out of wood with only a tiny door and one small window. This little prince had many plastic toys and one teddy bear.
    The little prince disliked the teddy bear and always used it as a punching bag to vent out his anger. This little boy had a notion that only girls like to play with teddy bears and he considers himself to be a strong man who only likes cars and boyish toys. The queen always takes care of the teddy bear by dusting it every day and would take it to her bedroom during the monsoon to avoid it from getting wet.
    One day the little prince was angry with the king and the queen and went hiding inside the playhouse. The playhouse was not in a good condition after the rains, which was there the previous night. It was in a condition where no one could tell when it would collapse and being inside the playhouse was not a very good idea.
    The teddy bear was inside the playhouse but the little prince threw it away. But the teddy bear fell down near the door of the playhouse. It was already getting darker and the queen was worried about her son. The king and the queen knew that their son was inside the playhouse. Suddenly it started to rain heavily and there was a crash sound heard from the garden. The king and the queen knew that the playhouse might have collapsed and they rushed to see it.
    Suddenly they remembered about the little prince and they were panicking and took away all the pieces of wood with which the playhouse was made. There they found their son lying with minor injuries with the teddy laid over him. The teddy bear which was there inside the playhouse was used by the little prince as a cover to protect himself from the wooden planks which had suddenly collapsed due to the rain. Since the wooden planks used were quite lightweighted and harmless he did not have any serious injury. The teddy bear was made with good quality stuffing and it had withstood the crash and protected the little prince. From then on the little prince’s favourite toy was this teddy bear which had protected him from injuries’.
    Then the man who came to the shop with her daughter, came all alone by himself to the shop once again. He asked one of the employees of the store to pack the black teddy bear inside a little box and wrap it with a gift wrapper. Liddy felt happy for this teddy bear as he is going to live with a family which has a playhouse.