***

Jolly Bear stood at the school’s playground. Without children, Jolly Bear thought to himself, playgrounds resembled dead wombs. Intertwining jungle gyms were the genetic model of a kidnapper. Rusted swings floated above shoe ruts like friendly nooses.

In one furry paw Jolly Bear held a plastic jug filled with lawnmower gasoline; he had taken it from a janitor’s shack behind the cafeteria.
He would deal with the dead womb first.

Jolly Bear had met the principal while working at the truck stop. Jolly Bear had just hugged a rival stuffed promotional bear, a pink one that went by the name of Lucy, at a local car wash that afternoon, and was still shaking when he returned to his job. The principal, who was passing through – weren’t they all – sensed something about Jolly Bear, and the two found themselves at a Happy Times Truck Stop Diner booth later that evening.

The principal was somewhat of a drifter, an itinerant principal actually, who liked to hire individuals to set his elementary schools on fire. The principal would videotape the event, then move on to another town soon after.

Would Jolly Bear be interested in such a project?

Yes, it would be right up Jolly Bear’s alley.

That was two weeks ago.

Now Jolly Bear heard laughter in a small building next to the playground.

Jolly Bear couldn’t believe his furry ears. The principal had promised that everyone would be gone.

Jolly Bear heard the laughter again.

The door to the classroom looked as if it had cut off from another building. Tumbleweeds whispered across its orange facade.

Jolly Bear jerked open the door. He was met by the stench of crayons and diapers. Misshapen watercolors in primary colors clung to the walls. A barred window in the back let in stale-looking sunbeams.
Jolly Bear immediately felt like taking an afternoon nap.

The reading corner had been covered with overlapping rug scraps, probably donated, Jolly Bear thought. On top of the scraps lay a small woman curled in a fetal position. She had long gray hair. She didn’t move.

“Hey, it’s me, Jolly Bear.” 

Someone stepped out of the darkness. A young boy in a soiled striped t-shirt. His brown eyes were wide. He swished blunt safety scissors in one hand.

“Are you a man or a bear?” The boy asked.

“I’m a Jolly Bear,” Jolly Bear replied. He spoke extra soft in an attempt to win the boy’s affection.

A voice from the ceiling interrupted Jolly Bear’s act.

“Principal Harris sent you.”

She hung in a corner, yanked tight against the ceiling tiles. A web of multi-colored yarn dangled from her naked body. Her perspiration drizzled the reading corner and the dead woman below her.

A hand quickly flung something at Jolly Bear, striking him in the foam snout. He rubbed it in his  paws. Mucus.

The ball of yarn jiggled with laughter.

“Come down and give Jolly Bear a hug,” Jolly Bear said, clenching and unclenching his front paws. “A hug from Jolly Bear makes everyone feel better.”

Warm dust entered through the doorway,  knocking over a row of glue bottles on the art table.

The young woman twisted her neck quickly, then unraveled from the ceiling, as if on invisible pulleys. 

“You…you can’t hurt us,” She moaned over the falling bottles.
Jolly Bear heard the child’s piercing scream just before he felt the scissors puncture his leg.

Jolly Bear tried to wrestle the weapon away, then give the boy a nice big hug, which is what all the children liked. But Jolly Bear’s overly-padded paws were meant for luring, not quick-grabbing.

Jolly Bear reached again for the boy, but his leg refused to operate the way it was supposed to. He stumbled backward on his padded paws.

The boy stood above him, silent now. Tufts of Jolly Bear’s chocolate brown fur had caught between the blades. The boy began cursing and tugging the fur out with sticky-looking fingers.

“Hug me, I beg of you,” Jolly Bear pleaded. He wished he had brought his revolver.

The boy had almost pulled all of the fur out. He began to laugh again. The naked woman stood next to the boy now, her moist hand on his shoulder. She frowned at Jolly Bear and slowly nodded her head. 

“Somebody, please,” Jolly Bear sobbed, “give Jolly Bear a hug.”

***

A strip mall parking lot shone dully in the darkness.

Jolly Bear found himself propped up against a small mechanical blue horse that you insert quarters into.

His leg throbbed.

Jolly Bear looked around. He had worked in strip malls like this. Sometimes shoppers and employees would pose with him for pictures; other times he would hand out free day passes to a local amusement park. Eventually, people became bored, and told him well, they better get back to whatever they were doing. It was probably the loneliest part of being Jolly Bear. It was what probably led Jolly Bear to start taking jobs like this.

Jolly Bear didn’t  know how he had made it out. Maybe it was a sign for him to step back. The principal would have to satisfy himself with old tapes of elementary schools.

Jolly Bear’s stomach growled. He noticed a trash can nearby. He limped over and pulled off its cover. Among the soda cups and candy wrappers were the remnants of something pink. Cotton candy?

He grabbed a handful and stuffed it through his mouth hole. It tasted fresh.

In the far corner of the strip mall parking lot, a compact car entered off the street, scraping the cement incline.

Jolly Bear stiffened. He stumbled to one of the few doors in the strip mall that wasn’t boarded up.

He tested the door. It was unlocked.

Jolly Bear entered Cloth World.

He crawled inside a circular rack of hanging polyester. He stopped in the middle of the rack and turned around. He couldn’t see a thing except for the sliver of light that silhouetted the front door.

Jolly Bear crouched inside the rack. Dry smell of old cloth, his DNA. His legs began to bleed again.

Jolly Bear forced himself to think pleasant thoughts. Perhaps the cloth around him would be built into a cute and lovable animal costume like Jolly Bear’s.

The bell on Cloth World’s front door jingled.

Jolly Bear peered through the polyester. The teacher’s aide was dressed, yet her clothes already looked damp with perspiration. Pieces of yarn still stuck to her hair. The boy stood next to her. He held his scissors tightly with one hand, and the young woman’s sweating hand in the other. He stared directly at Jolly Bear’s rack.
Jolly Bear had to lure them both within hugging range, a yard or two at least. He  usually brought a small toy for these situations.
He should have brought his revolver. 

Jolly Bear shifted his weight, and heard a slight cracking sound. Below him was a warped piece of tile with the edges sticking up. Jolly Bear grabbed a corner of it and began to peel it off.

Safety scissors squeaked back and forth.

Jolly Bear wasn’t going to go out like this. Principal Harris had made promises of better paying jobs if this went well.

He had to get back to the school.

With a final tug, Jolly Bear lifted the tile. It made a cracking sound. The back of the tile revealed black tar glue and scratch marks.

A dark hole stared back.

Jolly Bear looked up again through the cloth rack, and saw the child, directly in front of him.

The hole probably led to Cloth World’s basement. Escape. Maybe it even led to redemption.

Jolly Bear heard a splash.  He looked down.

A single faded pink ear. Pink like cotton candy.

“Lucy?”

The pink furry hand grabbed Jolly Bear by the neck. He could not twist himself from its grip. He considered himself a strong stuffed bear. He pulled until a rotted pink fur shoulder ejected itself above the floor. Scraps of dusty pink fur and felt.

“Lucy?”

Lucy. His friend at the car wash.

Jolly Bear collapsed against the tile, straining against the grip.

Lucy rasped in his ear.

“I’m in heaven, Jolly Bear.”

Jolly Bear hammered with a fist at Lucy’s wrist. Yet the hand continued to drag him toward the hole. More costumes floated in dank water fifty feet below Cloth World’s floor. He thought he could make them out, old co-workers and acquaintances, bobbing together in clots of fur. Harold. Christopher. Janet.

He had hugged them all.

Jolly Bear heard the child speak from miles away.

“He’s stopped moving, mommy.”

Jolly Bear fell into the hole.

The strip mall grew quiet. The woman and the child returned to their car. They drove onto an onramp and the highway, in the direction of the truck stop.

The fire at the elementary school raged.