A gingerbread man lives in a gingerbread house. Is the house is made of flesh, or Is he made of house? He screams for he does not know. -- Anon Guest
[AN: I do recall a comic on this theme, so it is hard to not riff on that. No, it's not the one you referenced.]
Sugar, spice, everything nice, a modicum of flour. All the things that make a treat. Hands moulded them into shapes. Imagination gave them life. Well. Some of them were given life...
A hand reaches out to touch a wall. It feels like the skin of his mother. This is the way the world is. This is the way it always has been. Nevertheless, there are questions. Why everything is flat. Why there is only the pretty things on the outside. Why some things are sugar, and other things are gingerbread. How did it get there?
Call this child... Curly. They have been either blessed or cursed with a questing mind, it's difficult to tell which it is. The sort of mind that asks the interesting questions is also the kind of mind that won't stop at disturbing answers.
Why was clothing outlines and patterns? Why was clothing only on the front? Why was it all sugar and gelatin? Why were there fingerprints when nobody had fingers? What kind of fingers were the size of a person?
Curly was told not to worry about it. This was the way things were, and the way they would always be. Why bother unriddling the world when it did nobody any good? Nevertheless, Curly asked. Curly went looking.
There were essential elements to life as they knew it. Flour, eggs, milk, sugar, and ginger of course. Sugar and eggs made glaze, one of the essential elements for longevity. Though nobody explained why it was essential. Eggs available to Curly were made of gelatine and sugar. They were not... primal... eggs.
The most disturbing reality was the nature of houses. Curly kept looking into things, and looked far too far. The things that made their houses... were the same thing that made themselves.
Curly had known it since childhood, wondering why the wall of their home felt like the skin of their mother. The home was not alive. They were. Their mother was. Their friends and family were alive. The house was not.
Yet, the house was the same stuff that they were made of. Flat, like them. Gingerbread, like them. But... was it alive like them? How could they tell?
What was the essence of life?
Were they made of building material?
Were the houses made of flesh?
What kind of giant had made this insanity?
What sort of impossible alchemy had created this universe? Were there other elements outside of their ken? Where did gelatin come from? Why was it important?
Curly started spending days on end petting the walls. Trying to feel a living response. Asking questions that had no answers.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / Anterovium]
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