Jack James and the Tribe of the Teddy Bear Read Free

this stuff all the time.”
    “And you talk about the Seahawks all the time,” Jack caused half of the kids to crack up, including a little chuckle from Mrs. Adams.
    “Okay everyone,” she regained order. “Let’s calm down. Be polite and listen to Jack.”
    Twenty-five crestfallen students reluctantly settled into their antique wooden seats and the sound of creaking filled the room. Willow Elementary, in a bygone era, had once been the town’s high school. Hand built in the 1890s out of lumber logged directly from local foothills, the building had a feel of a well-worn shoe.
    Jack cleared his throat, considered the disappointed expressions, and decided to go off script.
    “You guys are into monsters, right?” a few kids perked up, mostly the boys. “Vampires, werewolves, boogie men, things that go bump in the night?”
    “Sure,” Dillon chattered at his normal, rapid pace. “But what does that have to do with those mirrors?”
    “Everything,” Jack stood close and beheld his likenesses. Three freckle-nosed kids with chin length, sandy hair returned the stare. “Imagine these aren’t really reflections. Imagine they’re windows into other dimensions,” he angled the mirrors, causing his images to double, triple, quadruple and so on until countless Jacks trailed into infinity. “Now imagine these dimensions go on forever. If there were endless universes, then that would prove the existence of monsters.”
    “Yeah, how?” Dillon leaned back in his chair, resting his head in his hands.
    “That’s a great question. I’m glad you asked,” he was warming up. “Just think about it. Who are these so-called monsters, and why are they so, well, monstrous? Take vampires, for instance. Blood sucking beings with supernatural strength. Dracula, the most famous of all vampires…”
    “Ahem!” Candice Rogers, the biggest Twilight fan in Willow Elementary, sneered and pointed at her Robert Pattinson T-shirt.
    Jack conceded. “Okay, second-most famous vampire. At any rate, allegedly Dracula was able to transform into a bat, or even dematerialize into mist. Werewolves are shapeshifters, too. Ghosts, demons, even Bigfoot and Queenie the Columbia River Dragon all have the same thing in common, which is this unearthly ability to change physical shape or vanish entirely.”
    “Queenie the River Dragon!” Dillon sat straight. “Oh, no you didn’t. You didn’t just mention Queenie, did you? Nobody believes in that stupid legend.”
    “One guy does,” added Dillon’s buddy Mike Miller, a big kid with a bowl haircut and gaps between his teeth. When he smiled, he resembled a demented version of Moe from the Three Stooges. “That crazy old Captain Kimbo believes it.”
    “Jack?” Dillon glared. “Are you really saying you believe in that stuff?”
    Both friends slapped their desks in amusement. A quick squint of scorn from the teacher made them lower it to a light snickering.
    “You may think they’re just stories,” Jack told them. “Legends passed down from generation to generation to explain the unexplainable. But I’m telling you it’s entirely possible these beings can and do exist. There are multiple dimensions, don’t you get it? Don’t you understand what this may mean?”
    “I know,” Dillon spoke up. “It means you’re a nutbar!”
    The students went wild again. Except Amelia, of course. She remained expressionless. Jack shook his head, imploring Mrs. Adams for support, but even she’d gotten caught in the whimsy of the moment. She made an attempt to conceal her grin. The temptation proved too great. Already in the grips of delirium, the sight of his sad face made her let loose an involuntary barrage of laughter.
    Right then, he wished more than ever his father had finished his interdimensional machine, the O/A. How cool would it have been to show those loudmouths just how wrong they were? While the tormentors pointed and ridiculed, he daydreamed about pushing a button on the device and,