hadn’t really struggled for much. The forest kept them safe, well fed and simple. They hadn’t known worry, haste, or the fear of losing something great before.
Within a few months of working steadily every day, they became very different animals than when they started. Then… one day…
‘Miss Owl! Miss Owl! Come down! I got it! I finally got it!’
‘It’s morning bear, I’m tired and I just went to sleep. What do you want?’
‘I found out the last one. Today is the last one!’ the bear said with, quite possibly, the most enthusiasm ever seen in a bear. He jumped up and down frantically while hugging himself. The realization of what the bear was talking about slowly dawned on the owl. When the fact appeared clearly before her, she jumped to her feet, out of the tree, and as she was heading towards the ground she felt a tremendous wave of joy passing through each and every one of her feathers.
‘Are you sure, Bear? It is the last one?!’
‘The last one, Miss Owl! I want us to go write it down now before I forget it.’
‘Let’s go, Bear!’ And off they scurried towards the clearing, feeling like all the months of hard work and learning had been worth it. Finally, after all the years spent not knowing what made humans laugh or cry, what made them shine and talk and leave their homes, they would finally understand. They would finally know why humans were not just happy with living in the forest and had to go off and build cities. Huge things that looked and hummed like giant bees but were missing the wings, and were multi-colored.
They reached the clearing. Bear quickly grabbed a stick and drew a shape on the ground. It looked like a mountain tilted to the ground.
‘They call it “zee”, Miss Owl, and it’s used in words like zebra and crazee.’
‘Zee… what a strange sound. Sounds a bit like a bee but like a really high-pitched bee, like a bee kicked in the shins.’
‘Yes, it does! I thought of just about the same thing. Now, Miss Owl. Do you know what I’ve got here, behind my back?’
‘Yes, I do, Bear.’
‘What? How?’
‘You’re not holding it straight and it’s showing.’
‘Oh, pardon me.’
‘Now… do you know what I’m holding here behind my back?’
‘Yes I do, Bear, I’ve already seen it!’
‘Oh… well. Good enough. Here it is!’ the bear said gloriously and pulled out the book. ‘Let’s reeeaaaad it!’
They looked at it as if it were a sacred object. They laid it on a large flat boulder, in the middle of the clearing. The bear slowly opened the cover of the book and turned the first, white page.
‘Mas… Mas… Mas… what is that, Miss Owl?’
‘A T, Bear.’
‘Mast… er… ing… t… t… t… Mast… er… ing t…’
‘The, Bear, the.’
‘Mast… er… ing… THE… arrr… arrr… arrrt… o o o o offf frrrrren…ch.’
‘Oh, my Lord, vive la France!’
‘C… c… c-o-o…’
‘Coo, Bear, coo.’
‘Coo…king.’
‘Mast-er-ing the arrr-t of frr-en-ch coo-king.’
‘Bear, I think you got that last word wrong.’
‘No, Miss Owl, look there on the ground, that’s a g all the way, and that’s a K and an I.’
‘Bear… do you know what cooking is?’
‘No, Miss Owl! What is it?! Is it a princess? Is it a castle?! Is it a pony?’
‘No, Bear. It’s… something completely different.’
‘You seem sad, Miss Owl. What is it?’
‘Nothing, Bear, it’s just that… this is not a story book.’
‘Yes it is! What else are books for?’
‘Well, it’s not. It’s a… cooking book. Cooking is when humans make food for themselves.’
‘Oh… so no story?!’
‘Actually… I’m afraid not. No story, Bear. I’m sorry. I’m very, very sorry.’
‘It’s ok, Miss Owl. You didn’t know. At least now Krinkle will understand why you didn’t read her the story.’
‘I can’t believe that all this time that child was looking at pictures of food.’
‘Food is good, Miss Owl. Krinkle is a good girl. She taught us how to read.’
‘Yes, Bear, she did. And so did you. Without you I would have never found out that this is a cook book.’
‘What do we do now, Miss Owl?’
‘Well, Bear. I don’t know.’
‘I want to read a story, Miss Owl.’
‘So do I, Bear.’
‘Why don’t we write a story that we can read together, Miss Owl?’
‘What do you mean, Bear?!’
‘Well, you know a story. You know a story that you told to Krinkle. Why don’t you write it?’
‘Well, I… never thought about that. I suppose I could. You know, Bear, you’re pretty smart for an animal with bad grammar.’
‘Thank you, Miss Owl.’
‘You want to start writing the story now?’
‘Why not? I have my stick!’
‘Good. Let’s get to it, then.’
‘Once upon a time, in a castle far-far away, there lived a beautiful princess. So beautiful she was that when she was born…’
THE BUBBLE BOY AND HIS FLYING MACHINE
PPart I
Once upon a time, in a small town perched on each of three small hills overlooking a river valley, there lived Doodle… also called the Bubble Boy. The townsfolk had given him this name because he had the extraordinary ability to make giant bubbles of soap in his tiny laboratory at the top of Reinmar hill. Once he made a bubble so large, it was bigger than his entire home. It swelled up and pushed out through the open windows and the chimney, causing the house to look like a sweater covering a child who had outgrown it.
Doodle dreamed of one day flying off to the moon in one of his bubbles. He knew it was impossible because the bubbles blew up when they reached a certain height, but he still hoped that o he would figure out a way to make it happen. Until one sunny day in August, an old, gray man walked through the door.
‘Are you Doodle, the Bubble Boy?’
‘Yes,’ Doodle said while pouring a jar of blue soap pellets into a small tub. ‘What can I help you with? I do birthdays, but I don’t like the circus, and they told me my bubbles aren’t sturdy enough to be in the movies.’
‘No, that’s not what I have come to talk to you about. See, I am an inventor. And I want to build a flying machine that stays in the air using… bubbles.’
‘Wow! I’d love to do that! But my bubbles always blow up after a while. I’m afraid the machine would crash mighty fast.’
‘But what if we found a way to keep the bubble from bursting?’ the inventor asked.
‘You could. But you’d have to keep adding soap and water all the time!’
‘Well, there’s plenty of water in the clouds, isn’t there? And we could just take soap with us, as fuel. Every vessel runs on some form of fuel.’
‘But Mister, even if you did have soap and water all the time, what about the wind and cloud and storms? Soap bubbles aren’t cut out for that!’
‘Aren’t they? Have you ever flown in a balloon, Doodle?’
‘Once, when I was little. My mum and dad took me. It was really great! That’s when I decided I wanted my own balloon. But then I realized that if I make soap bubbles instead, I can have as many balloons as I want!’
‘You’re right there. Soap bubbles fly when they’re filled with hot air. Just like…?’
‘Hot air balloons.’
‘Precisely. Now, I made some calculations and it seems to me that if you managed to make a bubble with walls thick and flexible enough, it would handle storms much better than regular balloons. A soap bubble can change its shape so easily that you can’t tear it. You can only pop it. But if you add enough soap and water, any hole would be covered instantly. It just patches itself up.’
‘That’s a good point, Mister. But if you
know all that, what do you need me for?’
‘Well, Doodle, I can make the machine that blows the bubbles and holds the passengers and has tanks for water and soap. But I can’t tell what ingredients I need for the bubbles, or how to mix them.’
‘Oh, I can do that. That’s all I do all day long.’
‘Perfect! So we have a deal, then? We’ll build a flying machine together?’
‘Yes! Yes we do! You know Mister… I’ve been waiting for someone to ask me that all my life!’
THE BUBBLE BOY AND HIS FLYING MACHINE
PPart II
Doodle and the inventor began work on their plan immediately. Soon enough, the laboratory was filled with sketches and blueprints of flying machines. Doodle had quickly found the recipe for the perfect bubble; after all, he had been working on it all his life. The challenge, however, was to keep the bubble connected to the machine. A hot air balloon has strings tying it to the basket. But how were they supposed to tie-up a ball of liquid?
Doodle thought and thought, but he could not come up with a solution. The inventor seemed oblivious to this issue. He worked on designing the perfect lightweight tanks and a pressurized capsule to keep them safe and warm, instead of a traditional basket.
One early morning Doodle was sitting on the steps of his laboratory, stroking his pet sloth. He’d found Hewey on his doorstep when he was only a pup and he took him in and cared for him. Because everyone thought Doodle was a bit off his noodle, Hewey was his only true friend.
‘What do I do, boy? I know that this problem has a solution, I can feel it inside me. I just can’t get it out of me so I don’t know what it is yet. I can’t connect the dots.’
Hewey didn’t take Doodle’s grave concern to heart. He was more preoccupied with trying to move his bed from the shade into the sunlight so he could take a warm and comfortable nap. At