They Found the Gingerbread House

The tip came from an anonymous call. Female voice. Young. Trembling.

— It’s just north of the woods. Before the stream. You’ll see.

Nothing more.

I went alone. My editor thought it was a hoax. A myth. But I grew up on stories like this. I know the strange hum of a truth warped by too many mouths.

I saw it at dawn. A ruin. At first glance.

But as I got closer, I saw the remains: collapsed walls made of melted sugar, licorice beams charred at the edges, candy-glass window shards nestled in moss. The caved-in roof exhaled the scent of burnt caramel and moldy secrets.

All around: a heavy, muffled silence. The kind found in houses long locked away.

I turned on my recorder.

Bones. Small. Human.

Baby teeth. Doll fragments. A blend of sweetness and horror. A table still set. On one plate: a bitten chunk of gingerbread, blackened with time but strangely intact.

I took photos. Collected samples. But nothing wanted to leave with me. Everything I packed became sticky. Blurred. As if the house was calling it back.

As if it were chewing on my evidence.

There was a voice.

Barely there. Like an old child. A breath more than a sound. It said things like:

— still sleeping.

— You came alone?

— Weren’t you hungry?

I couldn’t find the source.

I ran. Slipped. Fell on rotting candy. Skin crawling. As if my own body had shifted texture.

I lost my phone in the escape. But not my notebook. That stayed with me.

When I got back, I showed my photos. On screen, they were all ruined. Overexposed. Too dark. Blurry. As if taken by a child who had tried to bite the lens.

The samples? Gone. Just a thick, brown liquid at the bottom of my bag. It smelled like fermented sugar.

But I have my notebook. My words. I remember.

And sometimes, at night, I see it again. Not in dreams. No. When I go for a glass of water. When the fridge light catches on something that floats a little too well.

Something with a melted sugar eye.

And I hear:

— I never forgot the taste of your voice.