Abalyn
Member
BBW, fairy tale, WG – To find solace from nightmares years past, a young woman returns to the forest. Awaiting her is a very special house made of very special materials.
I.
When Gretel returned, ten years later, the house was exactly as she’d left it. Somehow the witch must have cast a spell that prevented its falling to the elements—its sugar windowpanes had not melted in the rain, leaves and moss had not coated its gumdrop shingles, the gingerbread walls had not worn away. The only traces left to show that anyone had been there at all were the few tooth marks on the corner near the front door, where all that time ago she and her brother had taken a few tentative nibbles before the house’s owner had discovered them.
Hansel lived a few miles away now, in a nearby village, married and with a child on the way. He was rail-thin again, wiry, as his sister was—he’d worked hard to remove all traces of their captivity after they escaped. As far as Gretel could tell, her brother was happy.
For years, she’d tried to tell herself she was too. That their misadventure had been frightening, but as it faded into memory was no more than a bad dream. But all too often she’d find herself staring into space in the middle of the day, feeling the heat of oven flames against her face, the cold leathery touch of a withered hand clutching at her wrist and pulling her toward it. In the decade since she’d kicked the witch into her own fire, she’d not known a single day when she’d truly been able to remove herself from the visions.
Hansel, she supposed, had had an easier go of it. Of course, he’d had to live with the awful foreknowledge that once he was plump enough he would be cooked and devoured, but it had never been anything more than that to him—abstraction, a concept rather than a reality. He’d never felt his skin begin to burn as it drew close to the furnace, had not filled his nostrils with the horrible sweet smell of cooking flesh after shoving someone inside.
As she stared at the house, Gretel couldn’t help but feel a little silly at the terror that had gripped her all these years. It was so tiny now. Still a house made of candy, mind, but when she was little that front door had seemed to tower over her head like the gate to a palace. Now, it was . . . just a front door, though one that seemed to be made of solid chocolate rather than her own home’s wooden entry.
Slowly, she pushed the door open, absently wiping her fingers against her skirts afterward to ensure no softened chocolate dirtied them. Her shoes clacked faintly against the floorboards—slabs of peppermint, shining as though newly cleaned. The gingerbread walls were laced with fine spirals of color—spun sugar spidering along the baked surface, shining faintly with the same iridescence as the windowpanes. The furniture was exactly as Gretel remembered—cookies formed the shapes of chairs and tables, with generous dollops of icing layered on top for padding. Embedded in the floor at the far side of the room was a spigot, one that Gretel knew connected to a well dug on the premises. Were she to use it, the liquid that would come pouring out would be not water but milk, ice cold and frothy.
Only two things within the house were not edible. The bars across one corner, which had held Hansel captive; and the oven, standing in the center of the house’s back wall. Both were iron, and unlike the rest of the dwelling both showed their age. Rust was speckled across their surfaces, corroding, eating away.
In a way, the rust and Gretel shared the same purpose.
Slowly, calmly, without taking her eyes from the pitted oven, Gretel let her supplies slide from her back to the peppermint floor. She hadn’t brought much: a bedroll, an axe, some extra clothes, and a tin cup. Bending down, she reached for the latter, felt its cool surface beneath her fingers, then strode across the room and placed a hand against the spigot. For a moment, it would not yield to her touch; then she pressed harder against it, and with a faint groan it opened up.
From deep in the earth, the milk bubbled up, as if it had been waiting all these years to come forth. With a great glopping spurt, it flowed into the cup, and Gretel quickly had to cut the stream off before it overflowed. Exhaling quietly, she looked at the cup clutched within her thin, graceful fingers and noticed that it trembled slightly, risking a spill; her hand was shaking.
With a deep inhalation, she steadied herself, calmed her nerves. The tremor weakened till it was barely perceptible.
Before it could begin again, Gretel brought the cup to her lips and drank.
The milk was so cold it was a shock, her teeth crying out as though they’d been hit by a ball of ice. But it was good, oh so good, rich and creamy and fortifying, and Gretel drained the cup in one long swallow. She could feel the dregs of the liquid coating her throat, lingering there. The rest settled in her stomach, a dim, somehow comforting presence.
Slowly, willing herself not to whip around, she turned and looked at the oven.
Nothing had moved. No door had fallen open. No sound emerged.
Returning to the pile of items she’d let fall to the floor, Gretel picked up the axe. Its weight was vaguely ridiculous in her grip, her slender wrists and wispy fingers comically small compared to the stout oaken shaft the iron was mounted to. But its weight lifted easily enough in her grip. She raised it, and admired the sunlight glinting off the metal, tinted pink by the sugar panes through which it streamed.
Relishing the weight in her grip, Gretel hefted the axe in both hands, then turned and brought it down against the front door.
There was no satisfying crack, the chocolate far too soft and pliable for that, but the blow splintered the door nonetheless. Chunks of chocolate big as Gretel’s hand went flying, scattering across the gleaming peppermint floor. One came to rest at her feet, a particularly sizable rock of candy. It looked to be the size of both her fists.
Gently, Gretel lowered the axe back to the floor, then placed one hand on either side of the shard of door. Despite its size, it weighed next to nothing in her grasp as she raised it up. She turned it from side to side, watching the sugar-pink sunlight play across its surface.
Then she raised it to her mouth and tore off as big a chunk as she could manage.
The texture was somehow chalky and soft at once, yielding to her teeth without resistance but with enough solidity that it was still a firm presence within her mouth. The flavor, too, was a paradox, almost cloyingly sweet notes on top but with a sharp bitterness of cocoa underneath. Gretel rolled it around her mouth, letting it melt into stickiness, and then swallowed.
And there it was. Her first bite. A beginning.
The ending, she knew, looking at the peppermint beneath her feet and the gingerbread on all sides and the cinnamon rafters up above, would be a long time in coming.
Best to get on with it, then, she thought, and took another bite. And another. And another.
* * *
Several hours later, Gretel lay moaning on her bedroll, one hand pressed fast against her stomach. The chocolate, so airy to hold, lay in her belly dense and heavy. Her fingers were sticky with the stuff, her lips as well, and her stomach roiled with the cups of milk she’d drunk down to try to quell the thirst the door had brought.
And the door still stood, nearly as solid as it had been when she’d arrived. The divot she’d carved out with the axe stood out against the rest, a hollow carved into the chocolate, but it could be driven into the door a hundred times over and still the candy would not be gone. Thinking of how much she had left to do—and that was only the door, the house was enormous by comparison—Gretel felt her distended stomach lurch, and a muddy belch slipped past her lips.
This was a stupid idea. A child’s dream, one that she could work at for months and not achieve. And at the end, what would she have to show for it? She’d already beaten the witch—burned her into nothing, watched her smoke rise upward from the gingerbread chimney. What purpose did this serve?
Grunting, Gretel raised her head to stare at the oven, the descending sun lighting it dimly through the sugar windows. For a moment, she swore she could see something hovering at its edges—curls of smoke, calling out for something to burn.
With sudden defiance, she tried to loose another belch, but her stomach hitched, and instead a strained hiccup emerged. She tried to hold the next one down, but her body would not be ignored, and another spasming hiccup slid sharply from her.
Collapsing back onto the bedroll, Gretel snorted an almost-laugh, and hiccupped again, and let her fingers trace their way across her tightly packed belly.
Eventually, she fell asleep.
Consumption and Catharsis
by Abalyn
by Abalyn
I.
When Gretel returned, ten years later, the house was exactly as she’d left it. Somehow the witch must have cast a spell that prevented its falling to the elements—its sugar windowpanes had not melted in the rain, leaves and moss had not coated its gumdrop shingles, the gingerbread walls had not worn away. The only traces left to show that anyone had been there at all were the few tooth marks on the corner near the front door, where all that time ago she and her brother had taken a few tentative nibbles before the house’s owner had discovered them.
Hansel lived a few miles away now, in a nearby village, married and with a child on the way. He was rail-thin again, wiry, as his sister was—he’d worked hard to remove all traces of their captivity after they escaped. As far as Gretel could tell, her brother was happy.
For years, she’d tried to tell herself she was too. That their misadventure had been frightening, but as it faded into memory was no more than a bad dream. But all too often she’d find herself staring into space in the middle of the day, feeling the heat of oven flames against her face, the cold leathery touch of a withered hand clutching at her wrist and pulling her toward it. In the decade since she’d kicked the witch into her own fire, she’d not known a single day when she’d truly been able to remove herself from the visions.
Hansel, she supposed, had had an easier go of it. Of course, he’d had to live with the awful foreknowledge that once he was plump enough he would be cooked and devoured, but it had never been anything more than that to him—abstraction, a concept rather than a reality. He’d never felt his skin begin to burn as it drew close to the furnace, had not filled his nostrils with the horrible sweet smell of cooking flesh after shoving someone inside.
As she stared at the house, Gretel couldn’t help but feel a little silly at the terror that had gripped her all these years. It was so tiny now. Still a house made of candy, mind, but when she was little that front door had seemed to tower over her head like the gate to a palace. Now, it was . . . just a front door, though one that seemed to be made of solid chocolate rather than her own home’s wooden entry.
Slowly, she pushed the door open, absently wiping her fingers against her skirts afterward to ensure no softened chocolate dirtied them. Her shoes clacked faintly against the floorboards—slabs of peppermint, shining as though newly cleaned. The gingerbread walls were laced with fine spirals of color—spun sugar spidering along the baked surface, shining faintly with the same iridescence as the windowpanes. The furniture was exactly as Gretel remembered—cookies formed the shapes of chairs and tables, with generous dollops of icing layered on top for padding. Embedded in the floor at the far side of the room was a spigot, one that Gretel knew connected to a well dug on the premises. Were she to use it, the liquid that would come pouring out would be not water but milk, ice cold and frothy.
Only two things within the house were not edible. The bars across one corner, which had held Hansel captive; and the oven, standing in the center of the house’s back wall. Both were iron, and unlike the rest of the dwelling both showed their age. Rust was speckled across their surfaces, corroding, eating away.
In a way, the rust and Gretel shared the same purpose.
Slowly, calmly, without taking her eyes from the pitted oven, Gretel let her supplies slide from her back to the peppermint floor. She hadn’t brought much: a bedroll, an axe, some extra clothes, and a tin cup. Bending down, she reached for the latter, felt its cool surface beneath her fingers, then strode across the room and placed a hand against the spigot. For a moment, it would not yield to her touch; then she pressed harder against it, and with a faint groan it opened up.
From deep in the earth, the milk bubbled up, as if it had been waiting all these years to come forth. With a great glopping spurt, it flowed into the cup, and Gretel quickly had to cut the stream off before it overflowed. Exhaling quietly, she looked at the cup clutched within her thin, graceful fingers and noticed that it trembled slightly, risking a spill; her hand was shaking.
With a deep inhalation, she steadied herself, calmed her nerves. The tremor weakened till it was barely perceptible.
Before it could begin again, Gretel brought the cup to her lips and drank.
The milk was so cold it was a shock, her teeth crying out as though they’d been hit by a ball of ice. But it was good, oh so good, rich and creamy and fortifying, and Gretel drained the cup in one long swallow. She could feel the dregs of the liquid coating her throat, lingering there. The rest settled in her stomach, a dim, somehow comforting presence.
Slowly, willing herself not to whip around, she turned and looked at the oven.
Nothing had moved. No door had fallen open. No sound emerged.
Returning to the pile of items she’d let fall to the floor, Gretel picked up the axe. Its weight was vaguely ridiculous in her grip, her slender wrists and wispy fingers comically small compared to the stout oaken shaft the iron was mounted to. But its weight lifted easily enough in her grip. She raised it, and admired the sunlight glinting off the metal, tinted pink by the sugar panes through which it streamed.
Relishing the weight in her grip, Gretel hefted the axe in both hands, then turned and brought it down against the front door.
There was no satisfying crack, the chocolate far too soft and pliable for that, but the blow splintered the door nonetheless. Chunks of chocolate big as Gretel’s hand went flying, scattering across the gleaming peppermint floor. One came to rest at her feet, a particularly sizable rock of candy. It looked to be the size of both her fists.
Gently, Gretel lowered the axe back to the floor, then placed one hand on either side of the shard of door. Despite its size, it weighed next to nothing in her grasp as she raised it up. She turned it from side to side, watching the sugar-pink sunlight play across its surface.
Then she raised it to her mouth and tore off as big a chunk as she could manage.
The texture was somehow chalky and soft at once, yielding to her teeth without resistance but with enough solidity that it was still a firm presence within her mouth. The flavor, too, was a paradox, almost cloyingly sweet notes on top but with a sharp bitterness of cocoa underneath. Gretel rolled it around her mouth, letting it melt into stickiness, and then swallowed.
And there it was. Her first bite. A beginning.
The ending, she knew, looking at the peppermint beneath her feet and the gingerbread on all sides and the cinnamon rafters up above, would be a long time in coming.
Best to get on with it, then, she thought, and took another bite. And another. And another.
* * *
Several hours later, Gretel lay moaning on her bedroll, one hand pressed fast against her stomach. The chocolate, so airy to hold, lay in her belly dense and heavy. Her fingers were sticky with the stuff, her lips as well, and her stomach roiled with the cups of milk she’d drunk down to try to quell the thirst the door had brought.
And the door still stood, nearly as solid as it had been when she’d arrived. The divot she’d carved out with the axe stood out against the rest, a hollow carved into the chocolate, but it could be driven into the door a hundred times over and still the candy would not be gone. Thinking of how much she had left to do—and that was only the door, the house was enormous by comparison—Gretel felt her distended stomach lurch, and a muddy belch slipped past her lips.
This was a stupid idea. A child’s dream, one that she could work at for months and not achieve. And at the end, what would she have to show for it? She’d already beaten the witch—burned her into nothing, watched her smoke rise upward from the gingerbread chimney. What purpose did this serve?
Grunting, Gretel raised her head to stare at the oven, the descending sun lighting it dimly through the sugar windows. For a moment, she swore she could see something hovering at its edges—curls of smoke, calling out for something to burn.
With sudden defiance, she tried to loose another belch, but her stomach hitched, and instead a strained hiccup emerged. She tried to hold the next one down, but her body would not be ignored, and another spasming hiccup slid sharply from her.
Collapsing back onto the bedroll, Gretel snorted an almost-laugh, and hiccupped again, and let her fingers trace their way across her tightly packed belly.
Eventually, she fell asleep.
