Honey Pie / Fiction

"So Masakichi got his paws full of honey—way more honey than he could eat by himself—and he put it in a pail, and do-o-own the mountain he went, all the way to the town, to sell his honey. Masakichi was the all-time No. 1 honey bear.”
“Do bears have pails?” Sala asked.
“Masakichi just happened to have one,” Junpei explained. “He found it lying by the road, and he figured it would come in handy sometime.”
“And it did.”
“It really did. So Masakichi went to the town and found a spot for himself in the square. He put up a sign: ‘Deeelicious Honey. All Natural. One Cup Ґ200.’ “
“Can bears count money?”
“Absolutely. Masakichi lived with people when he was just a cub, and they taught him how to talk and how to count money. Masakichi was a very special bear. And so the other bears, who weren’t so special, tended to shun him.”
“Shun him?”
“Yeah, they’d go, like, ‘Hey, what’s with this guy, acting so special?’ and keep away from him. Especially Tonkichi, the tough guy. He really hated Masakichi.”
“Poor Masakichi!”
“Yeah, really. Meanwhile, the people would say, ‘O.K., he knows how to count, and he can talk and all, but when you get right down to it he’s just a bear.’ So Masakichi didn’t really belong to either world – the bear world or the people world.”

Продолжение читайте в журнале English4U №12 (декабрь 2010) на который можно подписаться или купить здесь.