• They weren’t poets or dreamers, this isn’t a story about great thinkers, nor is it about heroes or monsters, no; this is a story of toys, two small toys sitting by one another in a toyshop. He was a small bear, she was a little penguin and they sat by each other, side by side with stitched on faces and button eyes.
    One day she was moved, to sit among different toys, angels and rabbits, but they sneered at her and tore at her, and as she came back to her teddy bear with only one eye on her face, she looked at him, at his silent stitched face and said, “Hold me. I’m broken.”
    He said not a word, but held her tight and as she slept he slowly pulled out a needle and a bit of black thread and with care and love unsowed his eye, and stitched it to her face.
    She awoke in the morning, and kissed his head and went off again to play with other toys. She did not come back that night, or the night after that, but he waited without a word. On the third day she crawled up onto the shelf, button eyes wet from tears, her new friends had taken her legs. She pulled herself close to him, snuggling into his belly and with a sob uttered, “Hold me. I’m broken.”
    He said not a word, but held her tight and as she slept he slowly pulled out a needle and a bit of black thread and with care and love unsowed his legs, cut his soft cotton fur into flippers and stitched them to her body.
    She kissed him before she left, to explore the toyshop again, and he waited without a word, and looked with his one eye to her return and for days and days he waited until she came back sobbing with only one arm, and as she sobbed he stretched out his arms before she could even say, “Hold me. I’m broken.”
    And he said not a word, but he held her tighter than he had ever held her before, and after he had rocked her to sleep, her breath coming smooth and silent, he pulled out a sharp needle and a coil of black thread and slowly undid the strings which held him together and cutting his soft, precious skin made a flipper, which he sowed to her little body.
    She woke in the morning with a smile on her lips, and she kissed him and held him tight and left him to search the toyshop, and he waited. The sun went down upon his wasted little body, on his fluff now scattered and soiled. His face no longer nicely stitched but ragged with fray, his button eye now drenched in tears. But he said not a word as he waited for her, not a word, but waited on.
    And she did come back, her little body strong and fair and beautiful, this time with no tears in her eyes. And she looked. She looked on her little friend, and he looked back without a word and the tears ran down her face. She walked over to him and wrapped her arms around him, and wept like a child.
    He didn’t say a word. He held her tight. No needle and thread. Just a tear, a small fragile tear with a small fragile shatter, and as she held him tight they whispered together.
    “Hold me. I am broken.”