One day, as it happens from time to time, the trapdoor opens. An old lady comes up and steps into the dusty attic, holding something tenderly into her slightly shaking hands. She steps closer to a shelf next to a pile of boxes, placing the object she had been holding onto it, almost reluctantly so. She looks at the small, fragile but oh so pretty looking porcelain doll as if it would be the last time, before looking around the dark room that would only be lighted by the sunlight coming from the window. 

It’s only a minute later that she turns around and disappears, closing the trapdoor behind her. Just like this, she was gone, as if she had never been there in the first place. The only proof of her arrival being the doll she had left behind.

As things started to come back to life slowly and as several pairs of curious and empathic eyes set themselves onto the the pale and precious object, a lone tear slid down it's pale cheek.

Another one has been forgotten.

----

A week passed by, the old lady never came up too often, so the toys lived their lives normally with no fear of being caught in motion.

However, the doll that the lady had left hadn't moved an inch ever since she had been dropped. They didn’t ask questions, as the newly added toys usually had a hard time realising that it was over, that they had been abandoned here, and adjusting to their new environment. So they understood the state of mind the doll might have been in. If she needed time alone to think first, then so be it.

As all the other toys kept living their lives, talking, moving around the room, a small bear, with a beige slightly dusty fur watched in silence, sitting on a wooden box filled with old books that had been there for far longer than any of the toys there. The bear didn't say a word when it overheard a plastic baby doll and an elephant plush talk about the new porcelain arrivant. It heard them praising her fine clothes, her fair, seemingly flawless condition, her long and smooth looking hair… it would hear toys talking with admiration and envy mixed in their tones, wondering how exactly did a so beautiful object end up in here.

The little bear wouldn't say a thing. Instead it moved it's gaze towards the center of everyone’s attention and kept on observing. It watched as the doll was still unmoving, as she had been for the last week she had spent here. She looked so out of place, the bear thought. She was just too precious, too pretty, too unique, too delicate… What was she doing here? How did such a beautiful and well kept object end up in such a place? 

Shouldn't she be with other pretty things?

The bear could not understand. It had too many questions, too much wonder. It felt sad for the doll, remembering just how hard it had been when it was brought here. 

But the plush was so curious.

Another day went by and the doll still didn't move from her shelf. The little bear started to feel something else in the other toy’s discussions: something green, something was starting to change. And the bear didn't like it one bit.

‘Oh how i wish i had such a pretty white dress like hers.’

‘Why won't she move? It has been over a week now.’

‘Does she think she is better than us?’

‘Maybe she thinks she is too good to mix up with toys like us.’

‘Are we too unkept and dusty for the princess?’

The princess, the bear thought. A word it thought was a term of endearment, and in the doll’s case, of wonder and admiration, was starting to be used as a word of malice, envy and sarcasm.

What were those toys thinking? What was wrong with them? Why would they start saying such things when they were so admirative just a day before?

The bear did not like this change of behaviour at all, and it feared for the doll. They all had gone through a hard time when each of them arrived, being abandoned or forgotten is the worst feeling for any toy.

So why would they think of her differently?

Because she was pretty and well kept? That just didn't make sense.

The bear watched as the toys started to go and continue their own way, the chatting stopping, but their minds still filled with thoughts that seemed to grow more and more mean as time would pass.

This just wasn't fair, the dusty bear thought as it looked up to the doll’s shelf again. She was still sitting there, curled into a ball, her arms hugging her legs and her head resting on her knees.

She just seemed so sad, sad and alone. The mere sight of it hurted the little teddy bear’s stuffed chest more than it ever thought it would.

Without a word it got up from it's wooden box and stood, watching as the toys wouldn't even spare a glance in the doll’s direction. How could they all become so mean? Was it all only because of jealousy? 

The bear climbed down the box it had been sitting on and walked in the direction of the shelves, it's eyes never leaving the curled up form of the porcelain doll. The attic was spacious, stuffed with various objects, and the teddy bear was tiny. So it took several minutes of walking and moving around boxes and furnitures, but it reached it anyway. Nobody was paying attention yet. It then climbed the pile of boxes next to it, doing so as fast as it's little stuffed limbs would allow it to (which really wasn't much considering it couldn't grab anything easily). If it heard some toys wondering just what it was doing, the bear didn't pay them any mind and kept going.

When it reached the top, the plush let itself fall on top of the last box with a soft huff, allowing itself a very short rest. It then sat up and shook its head from side to side to get rid of the additional dust that got stuck into it's messy fur, opening its eyes to the sight of the attic it had grew familiar with. Seen from above, it seemed a little smaller than it was. From up there, almost the entirety of the attic could be seen, aside from the areas light couldn't reach. The bear also noticed that only a couple of curious toys were paying attention to his whereabouts, the rest not even bothering to throw a glance at it's direction, not noticing that it was gone from it's usual spot.

The teddy bear didn't mind, it figured that if their attention wasn't up there, it meant that it wasn't on the newcomer , so the bear saw it as a relief. It was tired of their mean and envious comments.

Its gaze turned soon towards the shelves it was trying to reach so badly, and onto the oh so beautiful doll it had only seen from afar until now.

She seemed so small, so fragile…

There was just so many things the bear wanted to know. So many questions it wanted to ask.

But more importantly, it wanted to protect the oh so fragile looking doll at all times. 

It felt a urge to stay by her side and take care of her as much as she could, no matter what it took. The doll didn't seem to notice the stuffed animal and stayed unfazed and unmoving. And what a sad sight was it, the bear thought. 

What do i need to do to make your sadness go away?

The bear stuffed it's chest with all the courage it could gather and stood up with one goal in mind: making the porcelain beauty smile.

The top of the box pile was, thankfully, almost right against the side of the shelf so it wasn't too hard to climb onto it. The plush's paws were leaving their print in the layer of dust that was on the shelf, and it was sure her fur would be fully dusty very soon. It attempted to get rid of what was sticking to its front paws, but as it flew around, some of it fell onto its nose which made it let out a sneeze. And the bear thanked all the gods it knew for it wasn't loud enough for the doll to be aware of its presence near her. She hadn't moved from her position.

"What are you doing up here?" A soft voice was heard. 

Ah, so it had, in fact, been loud enough. The bear scolded itself in it's mind for being too noisy.

The doll's voice was soft, almost unnoticeable, but so unbelievably sweet. And if the bear had a heart it was sure it would have missed a beat or two. The stuffed toy was so affected that it almost forgot to give a proper answer to the doll. 

"I'm came here to check up on you" it timidly said.

The doll's head rose from her knees and she looked at the bear for the first time, revealing her finely painted features.

The bear realised that the doll was even more beautiful from up close. And it decided that it had never seen anything more beautiful in it's whole life.

She was smaller too.

"May i ask why you would do such thing?"

"Because i wanted to." The bear was filled with newly found determination. It didn't detach it's gaze from the small doll even once (even if it had wanted to, it wouldn't have been able to, really. The doll really was beautiful).

The doll stayed silent for a little while, observing the stuffed animal without any actual emotion showing. Maybe the bear would have been scared if it had been another toy, but it felt safe somehow. This short amount of time allowed the bear to take note of the many things it wouldn't have been able to notice if it hadn't gotten closer to the porcelain doll. The most endearing thing being the small mole that had been drawn next to her eyebrow. By seeing just how pretty the small beauty's dress was, the bear would have been lying if it had said that it hadn't felt the tiniest bit of insecurity when it realised just how dirty and plain its fur was in comparison.

But it was all forgotten when it saw the doll's small lips curl up in the softest smile the bear had ever seen.

"My name is Irene."

Even her name is pretty, the stuffed animal thought. It took longer than it should have for the bear to snap out of the trance the doll's smile had caused.

"My… my owner used to call me Seulgi." The answer came out slurred and a little awkward, an almost forgotten memory of a young boy cuddling the plush playing in the back of the bear's head. This didn't matter now. Remembering it used to hurt, but the bear had learned to cherish  it. What mattered was the present, and the beautiful, beautiful toy whose smile seemed to get wider, reaching her eyes for the first time in a while.

"Well… it is nice to meet you, Seulgi" the bear couldn't help but find the way its name sounded in the doll's soft tone endearing. And it hoped that their newly formed friendship would last for a long, long time.