Grandma, a story

Grandma had warm brown eyes. All the children who looked at them immediately felt protected and sheltered.

Grandma baked wonderful and pleasant-smelling cakes, and she was happy to give them to the children. Since she wanted them to be healthy, she sweetened them with honey or maple syrup, never white sugar.

Grandma told beautiful stories, all about children who found a fairytale house and then lived there happily ever after, without a care in the world.

Grandma always smelled sweet, like the cakes she baked. Everything about her smelled like this, her skin, her hair, her clothes. The kids loved that smell.

The children would easily find Grandma’s house. All the children spoke of that house as a place where you would be safe, forever, where no one would hit you, where everyone would be nice to you. Children would be drawn to the warm, sweet scent and follow it into the house. It seemed that the adults never noticed the smell, and ignored the pretty old house partially covered in ivy, because it was neither new nor modern.

It was always hot in Grandma’s house, because of the cakes she baked and the nice-smelling firewood Grandma used in the big oven.

The grandmother had long, sharp teeth that she sank into the necks of sleeping and satiated children and drank their blood. The kids wouldn’t mind because Grandma smelled so good and she was so warm and she always made sure they were comfortable and safe.

And they all lived happily ever after, the grandmother forever, the children a little younger than that.

This story was first published in Serbian, in various publications and in my short story collection, macji snovi. The English version appeared on Bibliophilic Blather, author Karen Wojcik Berner’s blog.