Goldilocks - Fairy Tale - Fiction by Cheryl Snell

Goldilocks 

I don’t remember why I refused to completely grow up. My reflection in the glass claims I did anyway, according to how I fill out this cat-suit. Every night I put it on and gather my rope and my tools, hoping to find an answer among other people’s belongings.

 

I have become disenchanted with my own. I close the door on the detritus of my childhood, the worn Beauty and her Beast, his fur now coming off in clumps, the cracked glass slipper, the other Beauty roused from her sleep by a prince who keeps asking, “You up?” with puckered lips. My new acquisitions─ the mirror with the suck-up answer, the naked Emperor still detached from reality, those seven quirky dwarfs ─ suit me better.

 

As I make my way deeper into the forest, at one with the dark, the dwarfs’ song─ Heigh-ho, Heigh-ho, It's off to work we go─ plays in my head. It’s a beautiful night. Did you know scientists say that Earth is a Goldilocks planet because it is set in a zone where the temperature feels just right? Not too hot, not too cold. Habitable. It’s a worthy goal, to be habitable. Sometimes I think we’ve lost the knack.

 

I keep my eyes on the single light burning in the house in the distance. I wonder if Hansel and his sister Gretel enjoyed any part of being abandoned to their forest.  Did they encounter magic trees or singing bones?  When they spied the witches’ gingerbread house, did they think they’d been saved?  The headlines might have trumpeted their plight in true crime style: homeless children bake witch in her own oven. Did Hansel resent Gretel for being the one to kill the witch? How can a little girl emasculate a boy who hasn’t hit puberty yet?

 

I digress. I’m at the edge of the forest and have reached my destination. This is the moment I find I’m at the edge of my capabilities. I climb up the side of my targeted house and rappel down from the roof into the living room, taking nothing for granted. By the time I stand upright amid the overstuffed couches and huge chairs, I have become a child again, all blonde curls and pink pinafore.

I like to live on the verge but it would be nice, when I’m on a job, to have a map with a big red x where the treasure is hidden. This is too much to hope for; and none of us do all that well when our instructions are either too easy or too hard.  Anyhow, I find the sweet spot of the situation pretty fast. I’m smarter than the average bear. 

I must climb on the high chair to see the goods on the table: three bowls of porridge in three different sized bowls, the words Papa, Mama, or Baby printed on them. I taste the cereal in the big bowl and burn my tongue. I jump up, take the pink between my fingers and plunge it into the middle bowl. It shocks me with cold. Just as I’m about to give up, I sample the porridge in the baby bowl. It’s just right, and I eat it all up. I smack my lips and then slip off the chair onto my black lycra-covered legs, somehow breaking it.

As satisfied as if I’ve eaten my fill, I curl up in each of the three beds in sequence, and finally nod off in the smallest. Like a madman who believes he’s seen universal truth, I’m dimly aware of the sound of police sirens in the distance. The people in my dream look out at me: Who’s been sleeping in my bed? they say.

Cheryl Snell's published books include poetry from Finishing Line Press, Pudding House Publications, and Moria Books; among others. She also has a series of novels called Bombay Trilogy (Writer's Lair Books).