Member-only story
Gingerbread Baby
Sugar and spice to make something quite nice.
Henry Mackie grew old with the knowledge that his better years would probably be leaving him behind.
When he was thirty-nine, his wife Melissa died in a tragic accident. Henry still couldn’t ride a train after all these years. Every time he heard that blaring horn at a railroad crossing, some part of him would freeze up. It got to the point that he had to find ways to avoid the streets where it was common to see train cars amble by every day.
It might not have been such a lonely life if Henry actually opened his heart up to others — but such sentimentalities evaded him. He tried to convince himself he was just a colder person, much better off aloof than beloved, even though his remaining family tried to bring out the humor in him as much as they could. But some people just weren’t meant to move on and thrive — or that was how Henry saw it.
Until he met Beth Greer at his brother’s home one snowy December afternoon.
By then, it had been ten years since Melissa’s death. Henry still kept a wallet-sized photo of her at all times on his person; sometimes, he would just take out the smiling photograph and memorize that face which should have had the chance to age and wrinkle beside him. Often, when he was alone, he would just take out the…
