Meet Mr. Sanders
Here comes Pooh Bear back up from a morning spent sitting on the bank of a river. He had been thinking about how fireflies were not actually on fire nor did they spend time setting things on fire or putting fires out. This only led him to think of other things that flew. Owl flew. He did so very well at it. Christopher Robin’s kite flew, and if not held onto, it would fly off without any regard to the people below and never come back. Also, and this was very important bees flew. This made Pooh think of what bees flew to.
They flew to honey. Hunny made Pooh think of lunch. Lunch made Pooh think that he could use some right about then. Pooh was just about to stand home, thinking of the lunch that awaited him at home, but just as he started to he stopped.
He heard something. It sounded like a little hum of something soft ringing. Pooh who was still thinking mostly about his honey was certain this sound was a small cry of: “Help! Help!” Pooh Bear did not know any bells that made the sound of help before. So, he was certain that the sound was not from an object as objects didn’t usually go about speaking.
He tried to think of what sort of creature would make a tinkling sound and a sound of help. Perhaps because Pooh was a bear with very little brain or perhaps because he was still thinking about lunch, Pooh decided that the sound must be coming from a bee. He had never heard a hunny bee or queen bee say help before but they certainly had made a humming noise before. Although, bees typically made a buzzing sort of humming noise and this was making the helping sort. “It must be a helping bee,” Pooh decided.
Before Pooh continue thinking about the helping bee, he heard the cry, “Help! Help!” Again. Then, from around the tree, came a small streak of glitter, like a snow flake falling. After that it flew right passed Pooh’s nose still crying, “Help! Help!” Then, right on passed him until the glitter was floating above the river. After the glitter stopped, Pooh looked back at the tree certain that a thing moving that fast, must be moving that fast, away from something else. Pooh did not see anything, at first, but a moment later an orange Tigger sprang from around the tree and bound to the riverbank. He stopped.
“Tigger?” Pooh followed his friend to the river’s edge. “Why are you chasing that helping bee?”
Tigger looked at Pooh in a curious sort of way and then back towards the helping bee. He looked back at Pooh. “That is no bee.”
“Well no not an ordinary bee, but it is a helping bee. And if you stop chasing it, it might help me to some hunny,” Pooh replied. He smacked his lips together and looked hungrily towards the helping bee.
“A bee?” Tigger asked looking very unsure. He was silent for a moment, then said, “It doesn’t look like a bee.”
“Well not a hunny bee,” Pooh explained. “But helping bees they look like people and wear dresses. See?”
Tigger stared at the bee for quite some time. Then he said softly, “I see.” He looked towards Pooh saying rather grimly. “Tigger’s don’t like hunny and they certainly don’t like helping bees.”
“I know.” Pooh remembered that Tigger’s did not like hunny. He still felt very certain that there was nothing wrong with honey at all, but Tigger was firm about his dislike. Pooh was certain that if he had Tigger moving along that he would be able to talk to the helping bee and then he could have his hunny, but Pooh had never been very good at moving Tigger along. No one was particularly good at moving Tigger along though, not even Rabbit who was constantly trying to remove Tigger from his property.
“If,” Pooh began. “You like. I will take care of the helping bee, because I do like them.”
Tigger stood up straighter looking at the helping bee one last time. Then he nodded to Pooh. “Thanks Buddy-boy. I was on my way to Rabbit’s and now I am late.”
“Rabbit isn’t very fond of tardiness,” Pooh agreed. It never occurring to him that Rabbit probably was not expecting Tigger and his lack of presences was appreciated instead of missed. Pooh watched Tigger as he bound back up the bank of the river and around the same tree as he came.
After Tigger was a long time out of sight Pooh turned back to the bee. The bee was no longer flying over the river it was now flying near the end of Pooh’s nose. “Hello, bee,” Pooh said with a hint of mirth in his voice. This bee was obviously happy with Pooh’s assistance and ready to help Pooh to some hunny.
The bee, in a voice sounding very much like the tinkling of bells said, “I am not a bee.” The bee or the not-bee placed her hands on her hips.
She didn’t much look like a bee but instead looked more like a girl. Pooh had never met any girls, but Christopher Robin had told him that they look just like that. Only for some reason, Pooh thought that they would be bigger. He had just finished telling Tigger that this was an unusual sort of bee and now he was going to have to tell him that she was not in fact any sort of bee.
“I beg your pardon,” Pooh said to apologize. “If you are not a bee, then why were you saying, ‘Help! Help!’”
The not-bee relaxed dropping her hands from her hips. She pretended to sit; only there was no chair under her. “I was looking for a boy. He is supposed to be returning from Neverland, but you must understand that the new children are so much slower than he is. A bunch of slugs. Especially that wicked girl!”
“Was it you or another girl?” Pooh asked. He understood about Neverland and about the slugs but was not sure what she was meant about the girl.
The not-bee took offense to what Pooh said because she said something that he couldn’t quite understand and leaped out of her pretend chair to shake a fist at him. Then, at Pooh’s look of confusion, although he did not realize that he made such a look, she stopped shaking her fist. She took a step back in the air, instead of being right at the end of Pooh’s nose she was in front of Pooh. “Have you never seen a fairy?”
Pooh pondered this for a while before he determined that not only had he never seen a fairy he had never heard of a fairy either. So he asked. “How does one go about identifying a fairy if he happens to have seen one?”
This set the poor not-bee off, but this time she was said a lot that he could not understand. She was also flying around in mostly circles clearly upset. Pooh watched her as she continued to express her great surprise.
He waited until she stopped flying around and stopped saying things he could not understand. Then she returned to looking at him and saying things he could understand, which was, “I am a fairy.” And, “You live in a fairy world; one of them, there has to be a fairy here somewhere.”
"I know I have never met you before, so I don't think I have met a fairy before." Pooh did not deny that the Hundred Acre Woods was a fairy world because he knew it to be true. Before she said so he didn't know but now he did. After all this was not England nor was it France, or any of the countries; it was something beyond. Pooh understood what she had meant as soon as she said that this world was a fairy world. What he did not know was why, if this was a fairy world, there was no fairy. Expect there was one fairy that Pooh had met and it was convenient because she was there with him right now. “Perhaps you are the world’s fairy.”
“Absolutely not!” The fairy was adamant even stomping a foot in the air and folding her arms over she chest. “I am Tinkerbell and my fairy world is Neverland, as I said before.”
“Oh yes you did say something like that. You were on your way and then you lost something?” Pooh said, trying to think of what exactly she had been saying before she started saying things that Pooh did not understand.
“Oh, Peter!” Tinkerbell jumped in the air as though she had just remembered herself. “Peter is a boy. He’s about so high,” Tinkerbell flew up a little and measured to about the height of Christopher Robin. “I saw him come down here, but I did not see him come out. Have you seen him?”
“No, but the best person to ask about this sort of thing would be Christopher Robin, only he is not supposed to come by until much later. So the next best person to ask is Rabbit. He keeps track of the comings and goings of people here,” Pooh explained. He pointed up the bank and towards the tree that Tigger had disappeared behind. “Perhaps we should go there together, you can ask about your boy and I can see about lunch, seeing as you are not a helping bee, so you cannot help me to some hunny.”
Tinkerbell looked at Pooh curiously. “All right, but before we do, perhaps you should introduce yourself.”
“Oh yes, I had forgotten.” Pooh replied sheepishly. He introduced himself and then they started up the bank. They went on their way to Rabbit’s. As they went along the path Tinkerbell explained to Pooh about the other children and the window. Pooh listened carefully to the story because it a very good story and he thought he might like to retell it some time. As she told the story she kept getting more and more worked up about Wendy and the things she did. Pooh had never met a girl, but he had never realized how monstrous they were. He would have to ask Christopher Robin if the girls he had met were, so ugly as Tinkerbell described.
When they arrived at Rabbit’s he was standing at his gate and muttering to himself that Tigger needed to be more careful. Rabbit’s garden was in complete disarray. There was carrots littered every where and the bird bath was tipped over. The flowers were trampled into the mud. Pooh didn’t take any notice, because Pooh was not one to keep a garden so he was not one to no when one was messed up. He did notice that Rabbit’s hunny pots were scatter on the ground with their contents spilling all over the place. Upon seeing that he said, “Oh.”
“Pooh!!” Rabbit cried with such panic that Tinkerbell stopped talking and looked around in worry. Pooh knew that it was just Rabbit’s way to get spooked when someone came up while he was muttering to himself so he was not worried by his friend’s reaction. “You can’t come in.”
“Well, I was going to join you for lunch, but I see that it has been spoiled.” Pooh gestured to the hunny.
“I have another jar inside,” Rabbit said and then covered his mouth quickly.
Pooh peaked up and carefully opened Rabbit’s gate. He laughed when he said, “Oh good.”
“Pooh Bear!” Tinkerbell called following after him.
“Oh,” Pooh remembered himself. He stopped on the way into Rabbit’s home. “Rabbit this is Tinkerbell. She’s a fairy.”
Rabbit looked to where Pooh gestured. He leaned closer to Tinkerbell and looked at her carefully. “A fairy?”
“Yes. Tinkerbell, this is Rabbit. He’s a Rabbit.” Pooh said, then satisfied with his explanation he started again to Rabbit’s door.
“Pleasure.” Tinkerbell said from behind Rabbit. “Pooh here was telling me that you would know if a boy had been around here lately.”
“A real fairy?!” Rabbit’s voice raised an octave and then he was through his front door before Pooh could reach it. Pooh followed him inside. Rabbit was looking through his bookshelf muttering again, but this time it sounded much more excited and a lot less frustrated.
Pooh helped himself to the kitchen and into Rabbit’s cupboard where he kept the hunny. Well where he usually kept the hunny. “Um, Rabbit you said you had hunny?”
“Yes, yes. It’s under the sink.” Rabbit muffled voice said.
“Oh thank you.” Pooh went to the sink. It was an unusual place to keep hunny, but Rabbit had kept his hunny in unusual places before. Rabbit had said before that he kept them in unusual places so that he had some left after Pooh came to visit. This Pooh took to mean that the hunny was left for him, if he happened to visit Rabbit for lunch two days in a row. Pooh found the jar of hunny and took it to Rabbit’s table. Then he sat down to eat.
“Ah ha! A Fairy.” Rabbit exclaimed. He placed the book on the table next to Pooh’s hunny jar and pointed. “Do you see? Do you see?”
Pooh looked at where Rabbit was pointed. There were a lot of words there, and Pooh didn’t know many of them. There was also a drawing of a fairy, only not exactly like Tinkerbell, this one was more the boy sort, because this fairy had boy sort of clothes. Pooh looked at Rabbit. “I see.”
“Exactly! This is it!” Rabbit exclaimed.
Before Pooh could ask what was it, since he was sure the part that was it, was the part that he could not read. Tinkerbell joined them at the table. Rabbit exclaimed again and then picked up an old, mostly empty jelly jar, and caught Tinkerbell inside closing the lid tight.
“Oh!” Tinkerbell exclaimed. She tried to push on the lid. “Help! Help!” She said again, only this time it was more muffled then when Pooh had heard it before at the river. She couldn’t push the lid off and after a minute of trying she started to shake her fist at Rabbit and say things that Pooh didn’t know again.
“Rabbit, I don’t think Tinkerbell likes that.” Pooh said around a bite of hunny.
“Don’t talk with your mouth full.” Rabbit scolded. He picked up the jar carefully and looked at Tinkerbell closely. “Christopher Robin is going to be so pleased.”
Pooh licked all the hunny from his paw and then looked at Rabbit. “She doesn’t like that.”
“What?” Rabbit looked up at Pooh. He looked surprised like he hadn’t realized that Pooh was in his house eating lunch. Then he recomposed himself and said: “I thought you said you see.”
“I did see, but I didn’t read.” Pooh explained not being embarrassed about that in the least.
Rabbit sighed. “Right you can’t read. I will tell you what it says.” Rabbit put the jelly jar on the table above the book. Tinkerbell was inside and she had stopped speaking. She was now trying to get the jelly that dripped on her wings off her wings. She was also now at the bottom of the jar knee deep in the jelly.
“It says: ‘when the baby first, um…laughed, that it broke up and went skipping away and that’s how fairies first came.’” Rabbit pointed at the book but he didn’t point to a particular word when he read it. That was what Christopher Robin did and when he did that Pooh could see which words were the words he said, but Rabbit didn’t do that. So Pooh couldn’t tell exactly which words said that. “Then it says in this part that: ‘there should be a fairy for every boy and girl.’ Well now do you see?”
Pooh looked at the book again and then at Rabbit. Then he looked at the book. He thought that what the book said was very interesting, but he didn’t understand exactly why Rabbit had put Tinkerbell in the jar. After a moment Rabbit sighed again. “She is Christopher Robin’s fairy Pooh. Don’t you see now?”
“The book says that?” Pooh asked. He had a funny feeling about this. He was not quite why.
“Well, no, but have you ever seen a fairy? No. This is the first fairy we have seen and so this one must be Christopher Robins. Don’t you see boys are supposed to have a fairy of their own,” Rabbit explained. He was talking very fast and he seemed very excited about the fact that Tinkerbell was Christopher Robin’s fairy.
“Pooh, I have a boy,” Tinkerbell explained her voice was muffled by the jar. So that was why it took Pooh a moment before he remembered why he had a funny feeling before.
“Actually Rabbit, this fairy is looking for a boy…”
“For Christopher Robin no doubt. Do not worry Tinkerbell we will get you to Christopher Robin this afternoon.”
“I think she said his name was Peter or was it Wend…”
“Definitely not!” Tinkerbell cried before Pooh could finish.
“Then it was Peter.” Pooh looked at Rabbit. “That’s why we came to visit you. Do you know if there has been a boy around? A boy named Peter. He flies.” Pooh remembered that part of the story.
Rabbit looked at Pooh with a curious expression. “Pooh, are you saying that this fairy, told you this?”
“Yes.” Pooh looked at Rabbit back but he was not as curious. He just wanted to help this conversation along then he could get back to eating without the fear of talking with his mouth full. “She’s been telling you this too.”
“I don’t hear anything but bells,” Rabbit replied in a very disappointed tone.
“I hear the bells tinkling too, but that’s just how she speaks.” Pooh explained. He really didn’t know the mechanics of it, but Kanga always spoke in such a high toned voice and Piglet was always stuttering so he didn’t know how this was any different.
“Very well.” Rabbit said lifting the jar and removing the lid. Then he helped Tinkerbell out. “Tell her I’m sorry.”
“I heard him.” Tinkerbell said shucking the jelly in her shoe off onto Rabbit’s book. So Pooh said nothing and he finished his hunny.
2
After lunch, Rabbit, Pooh and Tinkerbell went back to Rabbit’s garden and Pooh explained to Rabbit as Tinkerbell explained to Pooh, again about what she was doing there, and what Peter looked like. Rabbit said that he had not see a boy like that, but he would ask his relations, because he had so many of them and if Peter was around one of them would have seen him. So Rabbit went off to talk to his relations saying that he would meet them by the river shortly.
Tinkerbell was using the river to remove the sticky remains of the jelly. Pooh sat and thought.
Rabbit had told him that every boy had a fairy, so Christopher Robin must have a fairy too; only none of them had ever seen a fairy before that day. Tinkerbell was not Christopher Robin’s fairy, but a boy name Peter’s. So it had to be a different fairy that was Christopher Robin’s. This was a fairy world, like Tinkerbell had stated, and she had also been surprised to find that even though it was a fairy world that there was no fairy. So, want did that all mean. Pooh sat down on the ground and thought about this for some time.
He was distracted when a brood of cygnet followed their father into the river. One of the baby swans stopped at the edge and sat by Tinklebell. They were talking, but Pooh was too far to hear what they were saying. A few minutes passed before Tinkerbell came back around and said to Pooh.
“Tinkerbell, I think I need to ask you something. About boys and fairies.”
“I think you do, too.” Tinkerbell agreed. She sat down on a wild flower and looked at Pooh softly.
“Do boys have boy fairies and girls have girl fairies?” Pooh began because he thought this would help him decide what sort of question he needed to ask.
“Usually, but not always, most fairy worlds have more than one fairy you know?” Tinkerbell explained. “That is why this place is so peculiar. Not one single fairy, yet you have a boy that visits quite often. The swan told me.”
Pooh nodded. “That would be Christopher Robin. He comes often.”
“Well, every child may have a fairy, but mostly they do not meet. There is a story that a long time ago that there was no fairy worlds and no ordinary world. They were all just one world. But then, the first child said: ‘I don’t believe in fairies’ and meant it. Then, the world’s started to split apart. So now there is one ordinary world and many fairy worlds, but not many people or fairies travel to and fro like I do or like Christopher Robin does. Even Peter would be no good at it if I was not around to help him.”
“Does he get lost often?” Pooh asked.
“Oh no, that’s not what I meant by help. You see Neverland can only be reached if one flies and if one knows how to get there. I know how to do both. Peter often forgets one or the other. So I have to make sure he doesn’t. I just say Peter don’t you remember you can fly or Peter don’t you remember where to go. Then he remembers, if he doesn’t remember as soon as he sees me.” Tinkerbell explained.
“So maybe Christopher Robin’s fairy is like your Peter?” Pooh asked.
“No, I doubt that. I believe that this fairy is probably around, because if a fairy forgot where his home was then he would just make a new home and the old home would just be ordinary, which this is not.” Tinkerbell was very good at explaining things Pooh realized and he knew now exactly what he needed to do. Tinkerbell smiled.
Before Pooh could declare his new knowledge, Rabbit met them at the river like he had said. He sat down in the grass next to Pooh. He was out of breath so both of Pooh and Tinkerbell waited for him. Then Rabbit stated: “Pan was here, but he was dispelled out of the Hundred Arce Woods, around the time you came to my house Pooh. He was sent off by Owl who said that he had a lovely conversation with the boy until Owl began to tell him a story about an adventure he had in some place called Wild Woods. Apparently, the boy thought it sounded like a great place to visit and flew straight up towards the sky and straight on…until morning.”
“That’s what Owl said?” Pooh asked since Rabbit couldn’t hear what Tinkerbell was saying, and Pooh couldn’t really understand what she was saying at that moment either. All he knew was now, she was really angry and flying in circles.
“That’s what my cousin said who saw the whole thing and heard Peter say, ‘until morning,’ so he thought it was worth repeating. And so did I,” Rabbit replied as he watched Tinkerbell. “I can understand that.” Rabbit blushed. “You better not talk to Owl. He won’t tell you the direction. He’ll just keep talking. You better just go on. Straight on to morning like I said.”
Pooh frowned unsure why Rabbit could understand that but he could not, but what he could understand Rabbit could not. Tinkerbell waved at them as she flew just the way Rabbit said, or at least that’s what Pooh thought. He wasn’t very good at directions himself.
Rabbit smiled when she was too far away to see and then stood up. “Well I feel good about helping, but I better get back to my garden.”
“Bye Rabbit.” Pooh said having forgotten all about his talk with Tinkerbell before Rabbit arrived.
3
Pooh continued to forget for the rest of the day and then he only remembered as he was relaying the adventure to Christopher Robin. Then he said, “Oh.” “Oh?” Christopher Robin looked up from his place laying among the tall grass in the meadow. He had a large straw hat on today and some overalls. He had brought Pooh a hat too and Pooh was wearing his, but it kept getting in his eyes and Pooh had to pull it up over his ears. He didn’t say that he didn’t like it because Christopher Robin had said that it was to help keep the light out of his eyes. “Is that how the story ends.”
“Well, I told you the end already, at first, but then you said I should start at the beginning so I went back.” Pooh explained.
“Right.” Christopher Robin continued to look at Pooh. “So what was the oh.”
“The oh, was that I remembered I had forgot something important after Tinkerbell left.” Pooh explained.
“I thought you might.” Christopher Robin replied. He sat up and this made Pooh happy because he could look at Christopher Robin better. “What was it?”
“You have a fairy too Christopher Robin and he somewhere here, right in this Hundred Arce Woods. Only none of us have ever seen him, so he must be stuck some place,” Pooh explained.
Christopher Robin smiled at Pooh. “You’re a good bear Pooh,” Christopher Robin said, “But he is not stuck.”
Upon hearing that he was a good bear Pooh was very happy so he was a little confused about the other thing that Christopher Robin had said. When he realized that Christopher Robin was talking about his fairy Pooh asked, “Do you know where he is?”
“Yes.” Christopher Robin stood up and he helped Pooh up. Then he took Pooh by the hand and lead Pooh all the way through the meadow then past the river and back to Pooh’s house. Pooh looked at his house and then he looked at Christopher Robin. “He lives here.”
“Here?” Pooh asked, because he was certain that he would have seen a fairy before yesterday if the fairy lived here with him.
Christopher Robin walked to Pooh’s door and then had to reach up, but not too high, but higher than Pooh’s door but under the sign above Pooh’s door that said: Mr. Sanders. Christopher Robin tapped his finger on the spot. It was not but a second that the spot Christopher Robin touched was opened up. It was just like a little door, and now that Pooh was looking, he could see that it was a little door, like his own door only little.
Then out of the door, a fairy came, Pooh knew what fairies looked like now. This looked just like the sort. The fairy looked like a boy only smaller with wings, but he was a more grown up sort of boy than Christopher Robin, but not as big as an adult. He wasn’t dress like Tinkerbell. He was dressed more like Christopher Robin. He wore shorts like Christopher Robin wore when he wanted to go wading in the river and he wore a long sleeved shirt but the sleeves were rolled up. He also wore a green cap.
“Come out.” Christopher Robin said then he stepped back. He turned to Pooh. “Pooh bear. I want you to meet James Thomas Sanders. James, this is Winnie-the-Pooh.”
