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Ivan had only the very faintest idea of how he had come into the world. He remembered that the world had formed from darkness into a haze, and that he could gradually feel himself becoming bigger and bigger, his insides slowly rising as material filled in, giving his wooden frame substance when previously there was none. He remembered little needles filing in and out of his skin like so many fussy little workers, pulling him together. After awhile, silence was permeated by sound, sound garbled and strange, as if someone were trying to speak underwater, their words exploding into bubbles. But soon enough, he had been able to distinguish voices out of the haze, and the voices had made words:

"It's about bloody time we got a new one—Erik's old one is falling apart at the pieces, hardly no good for scaring away no birds," grumbled somebody. There were mutterings of agreement.

"Give 'im a big nose," said another voice, this one soft and breathy in comparison to the other rough, rather hoarse one. "A colossal one." Ivan felt something pressed against his blank face. "That big enough, then?"

"No, make it larger!" insisted a new voice, lilting and fast. "You know what they say about big noses…." Gales of merriment swept around the scarecrow, and he heard the rougher and lower voices chuckle nervously. The object pressed against Ivan's face was replaced, and soon enough needles were driving in again, anchoring the appendage to his skin. Then, someone removed the buttons that had been placed over his face and said, "I don't really think green's REALLY his color….I say we give 'im some big purple eyes. That'll scare the boots off any neighbors who try sneakin' into the fields late at night." There were murmurings of agreement, and darkness slowly began to turn into light as one eye, and then the other was sewn into Ivan's rough flesh.

The haze turned into blurred colors, shapes, and finally, figures gathered around him, looking at him. Ivan stared. He stared because he could do nothing else as they continued stuffing straw into his torso, tying the bale of hay so that Ivan's chest would not fall to pieces. Soon enough, they began dressing him, though people were still poking at his face.

"Eyes…nose….do we give him a pipe to smoke?" Someone with a dark waterfall of straw coming out of her head asked, her eyes disappearing for the briefest of seconds before reappearing again. Ivan was stunned.

"No, too much trouble; give him a mouth," advised a person who looked remarkably similar to the dark-haired girl, and someone reached for Ivan's cloth face, something sharp and gleaming clutched in his hand. He felt someone tear into the space below his nose, making a wide line.

"Make it more crooked!" a very small somebody suggested, with thick brows and yellow hair. "Big and scary!"

"How's this then?" The knife went up and down just a little inside of Ivan, and the child clapped his hands. People pulled up a pair of old trousers over Ivan's legs, and buttoned a threadbare shirt over his large chest and broad shoulders. A man with a straw hat had looked Ivan up and down, clucking appreciatively.

"Crows've been so bad these past few years, it'd be good if we could get maybe a few more of these fellows," he commented thoughtfully as three people pulled the motionless Ivan to his feet, pulling very large old boots over the straw husks. "But he certainly looks much scarier than the ones you lasses have made in the past," he said cheerfully, the girls in the crowd groaning and clucking reproachfully. He held up his hands, the corners of his mouth turning up. "Now, now…not to say that they haven't been good, but they're too darn cute. The three last scarecrows weren't nearly as scary as this here fellow—why, that little one got pecked to pieces!" Ivan just looked at him, still saying nothing.

Everyone seemed finished with Ivan now that he had been born, though it looked like several boys were getting ready to take Ivan wherever it was they wanted him to be. But it had been the farmer's little girl who had given Ivan his heart, timidly stepping forward amongst her siblings to tuck inside the straw of his breast a tiny pincushion of sorts, a misshapen and clumsily put-together heart. "Make sure he has this," she chirped as the youth began to laugh. "He won't be able to love what he does unless he has one."

A person with short hair and a brusque voice said, "C'mon now, Katyusha, don't be stupid—he's a stupid scarecrow, for god's sake. He'll stand out there whether he likes it or not, and he won't care either way, seeing how he's straw…."

"I think he has a point, Katyusha. Not much point, though it's a nice thought."

The girl blinked, the corners of her mouth turning down, and Ivan decided immediately that he did not like the look on her at all. "But Papa, aren't you the one who says that we should put our hearts into everything we do? How can the scarecrow do that if he doesn't have a heart?"

Jeers and giggles turned to coos and blessings of the little one's heart. The man with the straw hat's eyes twinkled, and he scooped up the white-haired little girl and gave her a kiss as some boys carefully carried Ivan out, though one of them accidentally whacked his face against the door.

They carried him out deep into a sea of swaying green and yellow stalks, and planted the pole Ivan's frame rested upon into the dark ground, which smelled earthy and of leaves. Then, the boys wandered away, and Ivan was alone.

For the longest time, he just idly observed the stalks around him, and vaguely wondered what sort of purpose he had being there, now that he had form. His attention crawled to the dark skyline above him, and immediately the scarecrow had been spellbound.

So many specks of twinkling light, like the gleam of brightness in the old farmer's eyes as he looked upon his daughter with a expression that was soft like some of the voices Ivan had heard, like Katyusha's sweet one. Ivan tried and tried and tried to move, but he remained firmly motionless, even as he longed to pluck out one of the many dots in the heavens and plant some in his own button eyes. How would it feel to have them there?

Ivan was so deep in thought, he didn't hear the plodding of little footsteps coming from behind him. He was quite startled when little Katyusha popped out of the darkness before him, smiling slightly.

"I brought you this," she offered shyly, standing on tiptoe and raising up a row of pink cloth towards him. Ivan said nothing. Katyusha began hopping up and down, trying to drape it around his neck. As she was nowhere near tall enough, she just settled for tossing up one end of the pink scarf around Ivan's neck and awkwardly circling the scarecrow like she would a maypole, wrapping the cloth around his shoulders.

"It's old, but I made it myself and it should keep you warm tonight," she said proudly, shivering slightly in the cool night air. "And no one did give you a name, did they? Well, I think I might as well will. I have a little cow named Bessie," she added, folding her arms behind her back and rocking back and forth, admiring the night sky. Ivan looked at her. "If it were a male cow, I would've liked to name him Ivan. Ivan is a good name. Your name will be Ivan from now on."

"Katyusha!" someone called out faintly from the distance. "Katyusha, blast it, you're going to catch cold if the wolves don't catch you first! Now get inside!" With a strangled yelp and a fearful glance around herself, Katyusha took off running towards the house, briefly turning her head to call out, "Good night, Ivan, good night!"

The scarecrow watched her go, feeling a strange sense of emptiness in his chest, as if he had somehow lost some of his body's straw. He saw that he had lost none and was very confused. He wished Katyusha would come back and talk to him, though he doubted it would happen.

'I have a name,' he thought, marveling silently. 'My name is Ivan.'

But what did it mean he should do, exactly? What was expected of him? When would he be able to be like Katyusha and run in cool grass with bare feet? When would he be able to talk to Katyusha and thank her for the colossally long scarf, which was now fluttering in the breeze behind himself?

Later on, Ivan understood that the scarf was to be his first gift. It would not be his last.