Another Story from Children and Household Tales by the Brothers Grimm
(Featuring Karen Carpenter)
By David Macpherson


Richard and Karen Carpenter were again lost in the deep woods. Richard turned himself around in a circle. "The breadcrumbs," he said. "The breadcrumbs are gone."

Karen looked about as well, but her eyes moved up to the sky instead of the ground where they should have been."It was the birds, Richard. They are hungry too."

Richard looked down to his feet, "I see no birds. I think you ate the crumbs. You eat all the time."

Karen Carpenter smiled and sang apologetically, "Why do birds suddenly appear, every time you are near."

Richard said, "Those last notes were flat. You need to do better." He walked forward and Karen silently concurred with his direction.

By the morning, they found a house made of gingerbread. They ate the awnings. They bit into the window shutters. Richard said, "Best be careful, don't make a pig of yourself."

The witch opened the kitchen door and waved them in with a pan of fresh baked brioche. "Here my dears, warm your stomachs upon this."

Richard plowed in on the hot bread. Karen Carpenter raised her hand and said, "I guess I shouldn't." She found herself eating with facility, none the less.

They both fell asleep after breakfast. They woke up locked in giant bird cages. The witch approached them with a tray heavy with raisin cakes. "I will free you my dears, but you need to eat."

So they did. They ate the raisin cakes, the prune danishes, the cinnamon rolls. Richard Carpenter became round, all his edges disappeared. Karen Carpenter became thinner, more skeletal with every day of eating. Most nights she sang. "Rainy days and Mondays always bring me down."

On the first day of snow the witch said that it was time for harvest. She opened up the cage that held Richard and trussed him with twine. He was tossed into the still cold oven. She lit the wood under the oven and stoked the flame with long slow breaths.

Karen sat in her bird cage and asked, "And what of me. When shall I be cooked and eaten."

The witch stopped her ministrations. "You? I don't think ever. But you may continue to sing where you are. Your voice pleases the very ear of the sky."

The witch went back to blowing on the flame. Karen Carpenter walked through the space between the bars. She took a paring knife from the butcher block, walked behind the witch and ran the knife across her throat. Karen opened the oven door and pulled her brother out onto the floor. She looked down long enough to see he was still breathing. She laid her palm on his scorched cheek and sang a few notes of an unknown aire. She walked into the oven and ignited like straw.

By the time Richard Carpenter ran to the oven all he found was ashes.


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David is a writer living in Central Massachusetts with his wife Heather and son George.