On a shelf with lots of other toys in a big department store sat a small brown bear.

His name was **Corduroy. **

He had bright eyes, a green Corduroy“>corduroy jumpsuit, and a warm friendly face that saw all the world from his shelf each and every day. People hurried beneath him — shopping, laughing, hurrying, bag-laden — and Corduroy observed them all in quiet patience and quiet hope.

Because he was waiting.

He knew without knowing what he was waiting for. One day someone would come, and  the  little Bear would know.

—

One day a small girl named **Lisa** paused beneath his shelf and looked up at him.

She had friendly eyes and a smiling face and she looked at him as though she had already decided to love him.

**“Oh Mama,”** she said, tugging on her mother’s hand. **“I want that bear. I’ve always wanted a bear just like that.”**

The woman looked up at the bear. She looked at her purse. Then she said some of the saddest words in any language.

**“Not today, sweetheart. He’s too expensive. And besides,”** she added gently, glancing at the bear again, **“he’s missing a button on his overalls.”**

Lisa peered closely at Corduroy. He really was missing a button on one strap of his green jumpsuit. There had been one there. But now it was gone, leaving a threadbare strap that hung a little askew.

Her mother tugged on her hand, and together they stepped away into the crowd.

Corduroy watched them depart.

—

Later that night after the store had closed and the lights had dimmed and the last customer had left, He stared for the first time at his missing overalls button.

He stared at it for a minute. And then decided. He climbed down off his shelf — which was tricky, let me tell you, for a little bear who had never climbed before anything — and went in search of his button.

The department store was cavernous and unfamiliar and ber kept tripping over his own feet at night because he couldn’t see very well. There were shadows everywhere and strange smells. The littlie bear padded through the sleeping furniture department, eyes wide. Past couches and recliners and even bigger beds than the one he slept on at the store. Everything was enormous and ornate. It was also pitch-black, which made him nervous.

He climbed atop one mattress and bounced a few times to test it.

It felt wonderful.

He bounced for a long time.

Finally — when he’d gotten his fill of bouncing  little bear  searched for his button on the mattress strap and tugged.

It wasn’t his button.

Also, a night watchman had spotted him and relocated him back to his shelf.

Poor Bear still did not have his button.

But somewhere between the furniture department and his shelf Corduroy wandered through long rooms of sofas and chairs and chests, rooms kept artificially dark by large plastic windows and walked past sleeping animals and dolls curled up in beds — he saw it.

Everything.

A house. Home.

A family.

—

Lisa came back the next morning.

She came alone, or mostly alone. There was a small purse in her hands and her chin was up like only small children with their hearts set on something can get it up.

“My name’s Lisa,” she announced to Corduroy when she reached his shelf. **“I live kitty-corner across from here!”**

Lisa clambered up next to Corduroy.

Her house was small and narrow but cozy, she explained. Lisa showed Corduroy where she slept; he could sleep with her!

But first, she wanted to pick out a button for Corduroy’s overalls.

Up and down the bed siezed, tossing pillows and teddy bears aside in her enthusiasm until finally —

“Yes!” She shouted, holding aloft a large green button with a smile.

It wasn’t quite Corduroy’s color.

But Lisa insisted, hammer and needle in hand, until Corduroy had a new button on his shirt. He loved it. He really did.

“I’m gonna tie my hair back, now,” Lisa told him earnestly as she began gathering up toys that weren’t Corduroy into her purse. “Then we can go.”

Corduroy was nearly sick with excitement.

Not because he was going to Lisa’s house. Not because he would finally have a home.

But because Lisa had tucked something tight into the corner of her purse that scratched against the cloth when she walked:

A button!

He had a button!

One of many different colors, to be sure. One that might not even match his shirt.

But a BUTTON NONELESS!!! !

Soon they were outside and Lisa was leading the way, dragging Corduroy off by his wrist and pulling him toward Lisa’s home.

Across the street!

You see, Lisa lived kitty-corner from the department store.

Corduroy didn’t know what kitty-corner was.

But he would soon.

He would soon see everything.

—

Lisa’s house was everything Corduroy imagined and more, as he bounded into the room from her excited grip and took in his new surroundings.

The furniture was smaller here but still comfortable. The walls were cozy and the towels on the bathroom rack were wonderfully soft.

“Oh Corduroy,” Lisa sighed happily as she sat on her bed, swinging her feet, **“I’ve wanted a stuffed animal to hug forever!”**

As it turned out, Lisa loved stuffed animals. She pulled Corduroy close and buried her face in his fuzzy brown fur.

“Will you be my friend, Corduroy?” she asked.

She patted his head.

“Yes!” She cried. Hopping off her bed, she stuffed Corduroy in her purse so he could keep all her other stuffed animals company while she ran to the store and grabbed her mom.

Back at the department store Lisa approached the counter with Corduroy still safely tucked away in her purse.

“Could I please please please buy this bear?” She asked brightly.

“I’m sorry, sweetie,” the clerk told her. “We don’t sell him.”

“But I love him,” Lisa cried, tears welling in her eyes. “Please?”

“It’s just that,” he hesitated. “Our policy.”

“No!” Lisa yelled, pulling Corduroy from her purse. “You don’t understand. He’s PERFECT.”

Lisa held out Corduroy for the clerk to see, with his makeshift button and everything.

“What’s wrong with him?” She cried.

He blinked at Corduroy’s oversized green button.

“What do you mean,” he said, baffled, **“what’s wrong with him? You…**

“Why don’t YOU want him?” Lisa sobbed.

—

The man looked Corduroy over from head to paw.

He scratched his head. Then smiled.

“Well…” he began.

Lisa took a deep breath and braced herself.

“You,” said the man. He pointed at Corduroy. “Are perfect.”

She counted them slowly at the bottom of his shelf, pursing her lips with concentration.

Finally she looked up at Corduroy.

“I have been saving my money,” she told him solemnly. “And I have enough.”

She counted out the money herself at the counter, dropping coins into the till one by one until it was finally Corduroy’s turn to leave the store. Lisa cradled him in her arms, his bright button eyes peering out over her shoulder to watch the sidewalk as they walked.

Lisa’s house was small and cozy, with toys scattered about and clothes hanging everywhere just because they were in constant use. Lisa took Corduroy straight to her bedroom and showed him her view from the window, her bookshelf, her small chair in the corner and, finally, her bed with its patchwork quilt made up of dozens of mismatched colors.

Corduroy stared around the room, taking everything in with his shiny black eyes.

Lisa climbed onto her bed and opened her mother’s sewing box. Pulling out a needle and some thread, she popped the tip of her tongue into her mouth to concentrate and sewed him up a brand-new button on the strap of his green jumpsuit.

Standing him back up on her bed to admire her handiwork, she smiled down at him.

“There,” she announced. She patted his ear.

Corduroy gazed down at his new button. It was perfect. Better than perfect; it had been sewn onto him by someone who cared enough that he would have one.

Lisa hugged him tightly.

“I like you just the way you are,” she whispered into his fur. “But I thought you might like to have your button.”

She was right. He did.

Corduroy had never been hugged before. He had sat on that shelf for what felt like years watching people hurry past him on their way to somewhere else. He had sat there through sunny days and dark nights but nobody had ever held him like this, like he belonged somewhere.

He imagined what it would feel like to have a friend.

He decided that he must feel it now.

“You know,” Lisa sighed happily, falling backward onto her pillow with Corduroy in her arms. “I have always wanted a friend just like you.”

And Corduroy thought about sitting on that shelf in the big store, lonely and uncomfortable. He thought about dark nights and lost buttons and mattresses that bounced too much. He thought about kids and dogs and never getting to come home.

But most of all he thought about Lisa sitting on her bedroom floor at the bottom of his shelf with her piggy bank in one hand and her mind made up.

“I think,” Corduroy pondered, thinking the way that only bears can think — lovingly, and wordlessly, with their whole heart —

“I have wanted a friend just like you too.”

THE END.

*Someday you’ll be laughing*
*about the time you spent waiting*
*fur something you’ve already got. *

Goodnight, little one. 🌙

If you want to read more like this, click here: The Giving Tree