Hansel and Gretel
This is longer(4255 words), so read at your own risk. I wouldn’t mind if you stopped reading in the middle, but feedback would be helpful if you had any to give. Also WARNING: this contains mentions of drugs, violence, curse words, and more. If you are uncomfortable with the above listed topics, I would avoid reading this piece.
A man, with the last name of Miller, lived with his wife and two children in a run-down apartment. Between working at the dry cleaner and his job packing and unloading crates in the warehouse, he wasn’t home but a few hours to sleep and eat each evening. His wife, a tall, spindly woman with large green eyes accentuated by her nut-brown, hollow cheeks was more dear to him than anything including his children. Their apartment was situated amongst another two-hundred or so other run-down apartments in their apartment building in the center of Queens, NY. It was home to large population of not only other poverty stricken families, but also a large population of rats, drug dealers, and several homeless men and women who sat on the sidewalk in front of the apartments.
One year, a large amount of workers had been moving into the city in search of jobs. Their willingness to work for less money and to work longer shifts allowed them to find jobs. Mr. Miller, although a hardworking man, lost his job at the dry cleaner one day after getting in a fight with a customer when they wouldn’t pay, and they ended up rolling sleeves and spilling blood(some of which happened to stain a wedding dress and a few suits). He hung his head as he walked home, not eager to see the dissapointment of his children, and more importantly, his wife when he would have to tell them he’d been fired. The search for new jobs was unsuccesful, and after several weeks, their meager savings of money had been used. Food was hard to come by and soon he and his wife went hungry, so the children could eat. As more time passed, there wasn’t food enough even for the children.
After being fired, he had more time to spend at home. One night while he laid in bed sleepless due to his former sleep schedule, he rolled over to his wife who croaked, “Won’t you ever go to sleep on time again?”
He ignored her and proceded to ask about the pressing issue he’d been meaning to ask for days, “I ain’t gotta clue what we gonna do for food. I mean we don’ eat so the kids can, and now they ain’t even got food anymore.”
“You ain’t gotta clue? Well, imma tell you what we’re gonna do. Shit, I don’ know why we didn’t do this years ago,” she propped herself on her side, so they’d be face to face. “You gonna take them kids to work with you, and you gonna leave them in the park or somewhere where they ain’t never gonna be able to come back.”
He blinked at her but the darkness around them hid this one significant hesitation. Her words hung in the air as though caught in the cigar smoke flooding their room from the open window where their neighbor often smoked.
“We ain’t gonna abandon the kids,” he stated, “They not even old enough to work yet.” He thought some more and added, “The next time we’d see em’ ’ud be on a front of a newspaper titled: Two Children Found Dead in Central Park. Murder, rape, wild animals... they ain’t know halfa what they need to to stay alive.”
To this the wife suggested, “You know howta get you outta trouble. You teach ’em when as you walk. And they old enough to work. They just lazyass children.”
“They’re only 15. If I can’t get a job, they ain’t gonna be able to either. They gonna starve to death.” Thank God it’s summer he thought, already knowing he was eventually going to give in.
“Give ’em a bit of bread while you walk. Tell the two of ’em to save it for later. Someone’ll come pick um up before they starve. Them cops go ’round there sometimes and other people there all the time.”
With this he couldn’t argue, but he still had a bad feeling. “I still ain’t wanna leave them. I mean they’re our children...” He trailed off. His argument and the willpower to argue his wife’s decisions both growing weaker the longer he talked.
“But baby,” she hummed, “what about me?” She knew this was what would appeal to his emotions. “If we don’t send the children away, we’ll all starve. We’ll all die, and I’ll die first cause I’m so skinny.” She picked up his hand and ran it over her ribs then rested it on her hollowed cheek. Just as she had thought would happen, his moral obligations to his children were forgotten, and he conceded to her plan.
The following morning, he woke the children while his wife was still asleep, and in a moment of weakness and moral conciousness, told them of their mother’s plan. Shocked and appauled, they were filled with disgust for their mother. The father gave them a loaf of bread and ushered them through the front door. The dingy carpet bade them farewell and sparked an idea in young Gretel.
“Pluck off peices of bread as you go, so we can find our way back,” she whispered to her brother.
“I ain’t gonna do that,” he hissed back, “I’m hungry and I wanna eat my food not drop it on the ground.”
“Think about it this way moron, if you don’t wanna starve in the park, I advise you make a trail to follow.”
“Fine.”
As they walked, Hansel dropped small pieces of bread. They fell between people’s feet and under people’s feet, getting ground into the concrete. As the sun began to set, rats scurried accross the sidewalk, collecting the pieces of bread along with the other morsels on the roads and walkways. Near Central Park, they ran out of bread, and could not see the path behind them either. They stopped, and their father said farewell to the children, leaving them with nothing but their clothes and each other.
As he walked home, he was overcome with an awful ache. Guilt pressed in on him with each step that brought him closer to home without the children. He knew he had done a terrible thing. So, nearing the middle of his journey home, he made up his mind to head back to the children. He shoved through the crowd, pushing toward the edge of the sidewalk closest to the road where there were less people. His feet moved faster now with worry that the children may not be there when he returned. As he speed-walked in the near dark, a rat ran over the sidewalk and across his path. He managed to step on it’s tail, and the beast shrieked and bit his other ankle. He yelled and lunged off of the sidewalk, getting crushed by a stoned New York City taxi driver.
Meanwhile, the children, in Central park still, were led by the more practical Gretel as Hansel trailed behind complaining.
“I told you it was a bad idea. We ain’t never gonna find our way home in the dark.”
She ignored her twin brother’s grumbling as best as she could so as not to slap him across the face.
“I frikin told you so, and you wouldn’t listen.”
The park was new to both of the two children, but before it grew too dark to see, Gretel had watched people come and go from several specific directions which she supposed to be exits.
“I’m hungry now.”
Gretel was also hungry, but him saying so did not help her mood.
“You’re a fucking idiot you know.”
She turned around with a snap. And Hansel cried out. The boy bounced back, hands already up in fists. Gretel lunged toward her brother, driving her shoulder into him. He grunted and stumbled back a few steps, regained his balance, and took a step forward swinging his fists at her. They hit her jaw and shoulder, pulled back, and were ready to hit her again. He paused when she put her arms over her head and face.
“Geez, man. Sorry.”
“You ain’t sorry. You meant whatchu said. I know it,” she mewled.
“C’mon, Gretel, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. Promise.”
“I’m an idiot. ’N I got us lost here. No food, no water, no place to sleep. Shit, Hansel. We gonna die here.” Her shoulders started to shake and she leaned into her brother.
Not one for affection, he simply patted her head. This time he took the lead, taking only left turns. In Gretel’s misery, she didn’t realize they were making loop de loops through the park, which saved Hansel from yet another scolding. Gretel’s absence from the lead was peaceful, and Hansel blundered ahead inatentive to his sister who was unusually quiet. When he decided to take a break to tie his shoe, a quick scan of the surrounding area told him she was no longer following him.
Gretel had stopped lamenting and decided to let her brother waste their time by making a horrendous amount of left turns and stops to tie his shoes. She had slowed down, each step making her sleepier than the last until she stopped at a bench to rest. She figured her brother would realize no one was following him and stop to take a break with her, but she overestimated him because to her minor suprise, he kept walking. Not that that bothered her enough to do anything about it with her sleep craved mind.
She had fallen asleep, head lolled over the edge of the bench but woke, half-asleep, to someone picking her up. Believing her brother had come back afterall, she rested her head on their shoulder and continued to sleep. The man carrying her, however, was not her brother, and was not bringing her to safety.
Hansel heard a sound like feet to his left, and followed it blindly through the dark. under a streetlight near the edge of the park, he could make out the shape of the man, and the fact that he was carrying something. Either a sudden burst of intelligence, or maybe a small amount of pity from God was granted to him at this moment and told him to continue to follow this man. Out of the park and down a dimly-lit back alleyway, the man trudged and Hansel followed. He followed this man through a few more back alleys, through a door hanging by a single hinge, and down a set of stone stairs.
The man turned on a light in the corner, put Gretel down. The couch on which she was set looked as if had never been cleaned. There were stains of all colors, and reaked even from where Hansel stood, nose scrunched and gagging slightly. The whole room smelled like marijuana and an indescribable choking scent that was the main cause of Hansel’s gagging.
Gretel was still asleep when the man came back and tied her hands together. The movement of her hands ad the light woke Gretel up, and this time she was more awake. Her eyes grew wide, as she soaked in her surroundings, and gagged as the smell caught up to her. With a quick sweep around the room, she noticed Hansel, but didn’t know why he wasn’t tied as well.
Communication in general between Hansel and Gretel had never been great, so their nonverbal communication was not a step in the right direction. What is going on? Gretel asked through wide eyes and a slightly open mouth. This place stinks like dog shit, marijuana, and a sex-ravaged beast’s bed. Hansel tried to say by putting two fingers to his lips as though smoking, a squidged nose, and a puckered mouth. This was not translated well by Gretel who was now confused as to why all her brother was thinking of was smoking. With a slight tilt of her head and creased eyebrows, she asked What are you talking about? Translated by Hansel as: What? He rolled his eyes, pointed at the man who entered the room again through a door opposite the couch, made a kissy face, and pretend gagged, which wasn’t hard to do considering the smell of the room.
Gretel hadn’t noticed the man earlier because she was still waking up, but now her eyes grew once again, and she shrank away from the man, scooting further from him on the couch. He was watching her as he sat down too close to her. She turned her head away, disgust etched in every part of her face. She was now facing Hansel again, and the man looked to where she had her head turned. He stood up quickly. With a flick of his wrist behind his back, he had a knife out in front of him, and Hansel could see the handle of a shotgun in his waistband.
The man inched closer holding out the blade chest height toward Hansel. Hansel put his hands up. “I ain’t got nothin on me,” he mumbled.
“What’s that kid?” The man growled. His teeth, or at least the few left, were yellowed and chipped. Even from four feet away, his breath caught in Hansel’s nose and sat there rotting.
“I ain’t got nothin on me,” Hansel repeated.
“Well then there ain’t gonna be no trouble then is there?” the man hissed through the seven visible teeth.
He grabbed Hansel’s arm and pulled him into the room adjacent to the one the man had previously been in. The grimy walls let in no light except through a barred basement window, the small, yellowed kind that only small animals can fit through. Hansel was tossed in and the door was shut and locked behind him. The man could be heard from the other room only by the low, raspy sound of his speech. Gretel’s high-pitched voice was the same way, only a blur of sound. Hansel knew whatever was being said was not good.
Later, Gretel was thrown inside the room as well, and landed on her hands and knees as Handel had earlier. Hansel was sitting against the floor and had been trying to get the mouse that lived in a hole in the wall to trust him. He looked up as the door clicked open, the mouse scurried away. The raspy voice from the other side chuckled then footsteps could be heard walking away.
“What did he do to you?” Hansel whispered
“Nothing yet,” Gretel answered to her feet. Gretel started to cry, and Hansel looked back at the mousehole wishing for his quiet old company back.
“Well, we gotta find a way to get out of here then,” he suggested lamely.
* * *
Across the city, Mrs. Miller paced through the small apartment fretting over her husband’s absence.
“Oh god, baby. Where are you? You were supposed to be home hours and hours ago.”
“Maybe he was kept late at work.”
“What a shithead. He probably abandoned me for the children.”
“I thought he loved me more than those two sewer rats.”
“To hell with him. I’ll get myself a new man.”
“But what if he comes home and finds me cheating?!”
“Ain’t never gonna forgive me for that.”
She worked evening shifts at a local diner though, so she had to quit her frantic pacing and get ready for the day’s work. On her way to work, she stopped to glance, like she usually did, at the front page of the New York Daily News in the newspaper stand, so she wouldn’t have to buy the copy. Today, she glanced it over, continued walking, and backsteped back to the stand. The title screamed: MAN KILLED BY TAXI DRIVER. Underneath, a picture of Mr. Miller on a stretcher was printed in faded color. The text under the picture and title read: African American man leaped into traffic right before a taxi driver under the influence of drugs and alcohol was caught speeding and crashed into him. The man was killed minutes after he was hit with several broken ribs, a broken neck, and punctured lungs. When he was killed, he was supposedly going back to his apartment: 7th St. 17th Ave. Apt. 124, Queens, NY (as written in his wallet). The man’s name was Mr. Miller and the case isn’t still being investigated as the driver has suffered injuries from the crash and is currently in the hospital...
Her hands flew to her heart, and she stood frozen and unbreathing. That was her address. A sob caught in her throat and she wailed.
* * *
Back in the basement room, Hansel sat with his back against the wall while Gretel stood at the door listening like she had the past four days for any sound of the man talking or coming to the door. Hansel sat uselessly against the wall opposite the door, playing with the mouse who he’d named Jamal Paul, PJ for short.
“Ain’t he the cutest little mouse?”
Gretel shushed his from where she stood at the door. She was trying to listen to a conversation the man was seemingly having either to himself or to the phone because there was only one audible voice and that was his own.
“He got brown and white spots ’n everything.” Hansel rubbed it’s belly with his finger.
Gretel turned around with her finger to her lips and shushed him again. With her ear back against the door, she could pick out only a few of the words. Only when Hansel wasn’t talking to her from the inside of the room that is.
“Jamal, my sister ain’t never let me talk much. How are you so quiet, PJ?” The mouse was sitting on Hansel’s front hoodie pocket now tugging at the material with it’s teeth.
“I’m tryna listen, pea brain,” she hissed back at him. The conversation on the phone was unusually long. She kept catching the words: “pick her up” “Yup. In a few weeks” “she’s too skinny now” “I know but men ain’t like them only bones” “fine, fine. Not too much, I know” “yes, she’s fine” “to hell with ‘im” “you’ll make good money with her” “You better fuckin’ believe it” “I ain’t seen many so young and pretty” “found ’er in the park” “yup”. From what she gathered, she could only guess she was being sold to someone else in a few weeks, but only when she was less starved.
She heard the clunking of footsteps then and hurried to sit next to Hansel. The mouse jumped up and scurried away, just as the door opened. A plate of food was slid in and the gruff voice commanded, “Eat! I better not find any left, you hear!”
“Ain’t gotta tell me twice,” Hansel muttered, already at the plate and eating. Gretel sat against the wall. Until they had a way to get out, she was not going to eat more than a tiny morsel each day. Starving herself was the only way to keep them here until they could escape.
The month passed and she grew skinnier instead of plumper which only made tha man angrier. Hansel on the other hand, was well fed and glowing, a prized pig at the fair. Gretel was taken from this room and locked in a room separate from Hansel’s. As much as Hansel disliked Gretel’s constant scolding and mothering, he hated to be separated from her and devised his own plan to be reunited with his sister.
When next the man came to the door and opened it, Hansel ripped it all the way open, noting how careless the man had gotten. The gun was on a table Hansel could see behind the man, and the knife was not in the man’s hand. Hansel punched the man and pushed him over. Stepping on his nose gave Hansel a satisfying crack, and blood began to flow from the unconcious man’s nose. He searched through the man’s pockets retrieving the knife and a set of keys on which he was surprised to find a mickey mouse keychain. The shotgun from the table was slipped into his pocket and he began his search for Gretel.
The basement house was small, so it didn’t take long to find Gretel locked in the kitchen. Tied to a chair, she sat in the room, a delicious smell of cookies mingling with the putrid stench of the rest of the house creating a confusion of smells, not unlike when you spray febreeze in a bathroom after shitting he thought to himself. The knife was slow at cutting through the plastic ropes and gave enough time for the unconcious man to become concious again and to stagger into the kitchen, holding his face.
“Fuck,” Hansel whispered and sawed at the plastic faster. One rope left and he’d be done. He looked up again and the man was right next to him. The rope was almost cut when Hansel saw a burst of colors and felt a pop in his ear. Hansel stumbled and fell over, and the man proceeded to step on his face as Hansel had earlier done to the man.
Gretel pulled at the ropes tied behind her back attatched to the chair. The man sneered at her and walked slowly over. The blood from his nose was smeared over his face like war paint, some even in his eye, dying it red.
Gretel stood suddenly and swung around. There was a splintering crunch, and he was on the floor again. Gretel’s hands were attatched only to a small piece of chair now. She picked up the knife and sliced through the last of the rope, wringing her hands out. The man was not unconcious though, and stood, unbalanced and shaking with anger. Gretel backed away, the oven at her back. He charged at her. She sidestepped, opened the door, and he crashed headfirst into the oven where several trays of golden cookies were sent cascading to the floor.
There was a shrieking emanating from the oven where she held the door as far shut as she could. Minutes passed before a roasting meat smell mingled with the baking cookie and other smells. The shrieking turned to moans which grew steadily quieter until they turned to nothing. Hansel sat up, hands over his dripping nose, and peered at his sister holding the oven closed with legs sticking out of it. He always knew she was scary, but he never knew she would bake someone alive. He added a mental note to stay on her good side as much as possible.
They were suddenly reminded of the possibility of freedom, when they caught a glimpse of light from the semi-larger-but-still-grimy kitchen window above the sink. Gretel gathered some of the food she found in the pantry and refridgerator and bagged some of the cookies as well. Hansel went back to the room he’d been locked in and gathered the mouse into his pocket after taking the gun out and placing it at his waistband as the man had done before. Gretel, after assaulting the kitchen pantry dug through the other rooms and found a large pile of money which she hid under her shirt. They met at the door and were out on the streets again as fast as possible.
* * *
Their mother, had not fared well from the news of the passing of her husband and had had a heart attack after she read the paper.
* * *
The children, back on the streets, had never been happier, but their joy was short-lived as they didn’t know where they would go before dark. They wandered the streets and eventually came upon a newspaper fluttering in the breeze. Hansel picked it up and began reading as he walked, stuttering through the words using the small amount of reading practice he’d had from school.
“Maaan killed by tax-I dr-ih-ver,” he sounded out. “Hey, that looks an awful lot like pa, ain’t it?” He pointed to the picture and showed it to Gretel.
“Shit, that don’t just look like him, it is him!” she gasped. She took the newspaper from him, handing him the bag of food instead. She read bits and pieces out loud while she skimmed the page. “leaped into traffic... under the influence of drugs and alcohol... punctured lungs... the man’s name was Mr. Miller...” She sighed and looked over to study Hansel’s reaction. When none came, she turned her attention back to the paper.
“It’s got our address here!” she hollered. Immediately, she set out to find their location and get them back home before dark. As soon as she found the street signs, they were off. Their feet grew sore, but the fear of being out at night again kept them going, and they made it into the neighborhood they knew well. Their apartment was locked, but the door was easily kicked in.
They soon found out about their mother’s death, but celebrated, much to the surprise of their neighbor who gave them this news. Gretel got a job as a waitress, and with the money they stole from the man in the basement, Hansel was able to go back to school, and continue on to college. Gretel quit her job as a waitress when he went to college, left the apartment, and was accepted into a community college in the middle of the country far from any large city. Each lived happily ever after...
Until, that is, Gretel couldn’t live with the guilt of cooking someone alive and was found by her roomate dead in their oven. And Hansel became a vetrinarian specifically for rodents, but contracted a respritory illness from one of the mice and died soon after. So maybe neither lived very happily ever after after-all.