I Baked This House for You

I found a toy of yours.

I was cleaning for once, brushing under that old wicker sofa I hate—the one with the cushions I stole from a farmer’s porch back when I had nothing. I was sweeping under it when I found your little gingerbread house, barely the size of my fist, still covered in that rot-slowing glue. There was a hole in its roof, and the front door jiggled inside, but it was fine otherwise. I picked it up, stared at it for a while, then I sat down on those old, stolen cushions.

I sat there while the sun rose and the sun fell.

I sat there while crickets chirped, owls hooted and rats scampered across my bowed wood floor.

The moon came up. Stars twinkled and twirled. All while I just sat there.

When birds sang, and light bloomed over the forest canopy, I finally stood and brought your little house to the kitchen nook. I shoved all my loose spices, herbs, spoons, frog legs, swamp scales, all that stuff onto the floor so that your toy was the only thing on that countertop. Then I pointed at it, said, don’t you go anywhere, and left the cottage for the shed out back.

It’d been a cold spring since winter left. The kind of spring that still makes your ear tips red and keeps all the critters tucked away. The backyard was a mess, and I tried not to look at the rusty tools, the caved-in stable, the dried up well, or the oven still clogged with ash and bones.

I pulled the shed’s termite-riddled doors open. From the outside it wasn’t bigger than a privy, but inside it stretched for miles and miles. I snapped my fingers, and torches hissed with green light down a long throat that kept on going.

As I trudged through that endless dark, I passed by relics of bygone years: old rings from old marriages, brooms all spent and splintered. There were dusty land deeds signed by kings, bones of pets, paintings of lovers, ancient coins and letters penned by long dead friends. I was a painter once, back before my fingers curled, some even said a fine one. I passed by landscapes of evening Alps with the sun poking over snowy caps. I passed by Spanish ponds where geese skimmed across glassy water. My favorite series was what I called "Ghosts of Carthage" where I’d spent the better part of a lifetime painting the ruins of a city I once loved. As I plodded along, I remembered that this place was more mausoleum than shed, and so when I say each step was a year, I mean it.

The wand was in the back of the shed. By then my shoes had worn down to toothpicks, and I kicked myself for never saving any boots. It wasn’t a relief to see that wand, not at all. I hated the thing. Hated how I felt relieved when I put it back there all that time ago. Hated that catharsis when I walked away from it, thinking that I gave it up, that I beat this urge. Hell no. No more. You were the last, I swore you’d be, but if nothing else all I have is time. And sometimes time is all it takes. 

I carefully plucked the little thing from its case and blew the cobwebs off. It was a little bent, a little splintered, but it’d work all the same. When I turned and started back through that long dark, I ignored my blistering feet and aching bones. I just held the wand and looked ahead, smiling all the way and hating how it felt in my hands again.

Bees rattled out of a nest as I closed the shed’s door. Sunlight shimmered through thick green leaves. Critters scampered through weeds, and as I walked over ant hills blood soaked the grass.

I knew something had died when I got inside the cottage—some rat in a wall or a sparrow in the chimney. The stench made my eyelids twitch as I shuffled to a hearth and lit it with a wand flick. I held my hands over the warmth. Felt the chill leave. Felt my toes again. I shook the last shiver from me, then turned to the kitchen. Your gingerbread house was still there.

On a shelf above the kitchen basin I tapped my fingers along a row of books. I pulled out a red tome and thumbed through its parchment, stopping at a colorful page. Your favorite page.

I lifted the splintered wand and pointed at your little house. I didn’t hesitate. I’d longed for this, in fact, though I’d never admit it. I twirled my wrist clockwise keeping the wand fixed on that little open door. I whispered the words scribbled on that colorful page, sang them at times, shouted them at others. My head throbbed. My stomach clenched. But then I sniffed the air and found the stench of death was gone, traded for fresh bread. I opened my eyes to a cottage filled with color.

Bile climbed up my throat as I bounced on the balls of my bloody feet. The bowed wood was now gingerbread. The window panes were a thin sheet of sugar. The ceiling rafters crisscrossed in a purple licorice, and the doorknobs twinkled with sweet crystal. I twisted one, pulled on it so a glob of slime covered my hand. I pressed the slime into my mouth, let it rest on my tongue. I chewed slow. Gumdrops were your favorite.

I hobbled outside and smiled at a cottage that now sang with color. I closed my eyes and thought of you, thought of others, thought of everyone I still might savor. And as I stood there, cradled by a perfume of pies, cakes and scones, I knew I felt you next to me, your little hand in mine like it was so long ago, back when I baked this house for you.