Rachel takes a seat.

"… Oh." Pause. "I thought you meant the girl's side."

"I do not," she says, and sips from her tea.

"I don't remember telling you anything about this."

"You didn't," she agrees.

Rachel looks at her expectantly.

Sip sip.

"So how do you know? Or should I ask – what do you know?"

"Thirteen years ago... maybe fourteen? It's a bit of a blur, I admit," she says. "Thirteen years ago, a single father came to me with his infant daughter. He had recently lost his wife, you see, and wasn't sure he was capable of raising a daughter alone. He had a bad past. A violent past. Perhaps he didn't feel he deserved this happiness in his life. He wept, you know. He sat where you're sitting and wept, while his infant daughter slept quietly in a port-a-crib... for a time. And then she cried out, and he was there in an instant. A father's instincts. I knew then he would be just fine, and told him as much."

"… And how've they been, in the meantime?"

"Oh, they've been fine. I expect you'll meet them soon."

"Do they live nearby?"

"Oh, no, they live in the City. I understand the little girl would loathe living here."

"I don't know that this so much explains how you know all this."

"I was getting there." Sip sip.

… Rachel also sips her tea.

"So that day," she continues, "when he looked in the crib... it's the strangest thing. The little baby had a teddy bear. Where did she get it from? He hadn't brought it with her. It wasn't a bear from my orphanage. She hadn't pulled it off a toy shelf. Where there was no bear, suddenly, a bear. I named it, you know. Little Penelope's 'Gregory the Bear.' They left that night together, to grow as a family. I wonder if she still has that bear, some days..."

"So you were already making bears, at this point?"

"Some, but not exclusively, and only as a hobby, you know?"

"– I think so?"

Sip. "Then I started getting dreams."

"Noticeably different?"

"Oh, yes. I'd barely remember them—but I'd talk. In my sleep. And I knew I had to make more of these bears, and give them to the children so they'd be loved, so they'd be loved so much their love would serve as a shield against all the terrible things out there."

"… I don't normally think much of – superstition."

She smiles at Rachel.

"I also don't think much of hearing voices." Sigh.