BIG BEAR AND THE BOY (Fantasy)

BIG BEAR AND THE BOY  (FANTASY)

It hadn't been a good day for hitch-hiking.  The road was in country and traffic was light.  Now it was getting late.  He was not a country boy -- he'd just been dropped off here.  The driver wouldn't let him out where he wanted to be.

He wasn't only hitch-hiking when he started down the road.  He was an experienced guy so he knew what the possibilities were.  Maybe he might make a little money if the driver liked him.  Or the other end of the gamble was that the driver might hurt him, even kill him.  In a way his whole life had been that bet.  He felt it was out of his hands.  So when the big red pickup pulled over and waited, he ran to get there, slipping off his backpack so he could climb in quickly.  That's what he always did.

First he ran up on the driver's side to make sure the driver wasn't a highway patrol in disguise, but was rocked by what he saw.  The pickup was driven by a bear, a big black bear.  "Hop in!" the bear said, smiling genially which exposed his teeth.  

The momentum was upon him.  He tried not to think as he ran around the back (NEVER run around the front!) and climbed in.  He pretended he'd just had a headjump.  To be fair, it had happened before when he was into drugs.  Never any longer was he surprised by what his brain did.  Being a sophisticated kid, he explained to people that he was a postmodern thinker, a bit surreal and a bit political. These ideas went over big if he were in a university town.

The sun was almost down so it was kinda dark in the cab.  There was something on the seat beside the bear.  "Careful where you sling that backpack," said the bear.  "That's my son beside you.  His mom had to be somewhere else so I'm taking care of him."  The boy was startled, but the bear said, "Sure, I'm a male bear and it's not a usual thing, but -- you know -- things are different these days.  Species roles, gender roles -- all that stuff."  The backpack went on the floor.

The little bear was about the size of one-year-old child.  He looked up at the boy with bright eyes and his clever little nose went to sniffing.  Nostrils pumping, he waved his little snout around, then settled like the needle of a compass on the boy's shirt pocket.  "It's a chocolate bar," explained the boy.  "Is it okay to give it to him?"

"Why don't you split it with him and then he won't eat as much?  He'll be pleased to eat it with you."  The little bear made whines and whuffles to show agreement.

"He doesn't talk?"

"Not yet."

The cub ate his candy, sighed with satisfaction and climbed into the boy's arms.  It only took a few minutes for the boy to understand how to make a cradle of his arms.  It was oddly comforting.  In fact, something like a blush went through his whole body as the cub tumbled into sleep.

"So . . ." ventured the big bear, leaning his hairy left elbow out the window into the warm night where the trees were sighing with their new leaves.  "Are you running away?"  A handful of late-to-settle birds sped past on their slipstream.

"That was long ago.  I've been taking care of myself for a long time."  The big bear saw that the ragged boy was underweight, but -- since he was a bear -- he didn't mind that the boy smelled unwashed.  The boy remembered the only way he knew to make money so he said.  "Want to have a little fun?"

The bear shook his head.  "Don't come on to me, kid.  I've been where you are."  There was a curve in the road and he turned the steering wheel with his big paws.  "Remember that you're holding my baby."

The boy went stiff.  "You have no idea where I've been.  You don't know what it's like."  Suddenly, the boy felt as though he were the one who was a cub, but not held by anyone, only cold and bruised.

The pickup met and passed a car and in the headlights the bear could see the glitter of the boy's eyes, not quite weeping.  He shook his shaggy head.  "I did the usual forbidden things that people with no standards pay money to do to you.  Then I fell into a carnival and thought I had it pretty good.  I'd dance and make obscene gestures and everyone laughed.  Then one day came the iron collar and the chain."

The boy didn't know what to say.  "I've heard of dancing bears."

"They made me fight a panda."

"Well . . . pandas are . . .  well, at least it was a bear."

"But it wasn't.  I was just a little bear then and the panda was a big man in a costume who had one of those shocker things and he hurt me."

They rode in silence for quite a while.  There was very little traffic and they were going along a valley highway so they could see the lights of houses nestled in the hills.

The big bear shook his head hard.  "I longed for a home where I could be safe.  I didn't need much -- a cave."

"But you escaped!  How did you escape??"

"It was a fire and we were close to a lake and I swam across it.  When I climbed out much later, everything had changed."

After some moments of silence, the boy kissed the top of the cub's head.  It was all too real to him.  Tears rolled down his face.  The cub woke up enough to lick them off.

The big bear smiled.  "You better come home with me tonight, son.  Everything can change."