Gingerbread Houses

By Hannah Redding

It was quiet in the warm, candy house. Dinner had finished some forty five minutes before and my gingerbread mother stayed behind to sweep up our crumbs. Mama always got our crumbs. She swept them up when our dog died, running wild and loose in front of an oncoming truck. Mama swept up my crumbs when I cried for the first boy I loved. Sometimes I’d lay in my bed at night, the bed she made for me in the mornings, and wonder who swept up behind Mama. Gingerbread is still a cookie, no matter how tough and resilient.

Gingerbread is not as sweet as sugar cookies. Gingerbread has a bite and kick, like an angry horse. Mama bit when I broke her own mother’s vase into a thousand sugary pieces. Mama kicked when I lied to her and snuck out of our gingerbread house. Just because I knew why she was upset, doesn’t mean it didn’t make me sort of shamefully mad. Mad that I was caught. Ashamed that I made more crumbs for Mama.

Gingerbread is hard. I never saw my Mama cry even when I thought she must’ve needed to, so bad. It probably settled in her throat like the hot milk she gave me to send to me to sleep. One night I crept past her bedroom on my way up the stairs and saw her back turned, shoulders shaking, quietly weeping for a reason I didn’t know. That night was the first time I laid in my bed that she had made for me that morning, and wished Mama would pass the broom to me. I wanted so badly to help sweep up her crumbs.

As I grew up, I realized why Mama wouldn’t let me hold her broom. I went to college and had to help sweep my roommates’ crumbs when she came home from a long night with a lot of people. When I graduated college, I saw my gingerbread Mama smile so big I thought she’d break. When I met my husband, we passed the broom back and forth. Not like Pop did for Mama. Pop worked so hard for us he wasn’t home to drop any crumbs. When I had my first daughter I knew that all I wanted for her was goodness and sweetness. I wanted to give her the perfect candy house and hot milk to sleep. I wanted her to have no idea that she dropped any crumbs. I wanted her to believe she was perfect, as much as I believed it.

And I realized why Mama wouldn’t let me hold her broom. I tucked my girl into the bed I had made that morning, laid down my broom, and sat on my bed to call my gingerbread Mama.

Hannah Redding is a senior.