hansel and gretel
i.
She likes his voice even better than his piano playing.
The armchair is conveniently symmetrical. The book is, too, though the individual words are not. Kozue loves symmetry above all else, so she sits in her half of the armchair and stares at her half of the book, unblinking, until her eyes go out of focus. Like this, the minute imperfections of specificity evaporate—the far half of the book is exactly like the half she's holding, and the half of herself she keeps at a distance is exactly like the half of herself she holds close—in fact, she can't remember which is which. She doesn't mind.
Miki reads—she can't, not blurring her eyes like this, and his voice sounds better anyway. She likes to think he has picked out this story especially, but she admits that this is probably not true. Miki always seems preoccupied when he reads, distracted, and she is sure he has already furrowed so deep into the newest imaginary world that he's utterly forgotten the real one, along with any comparisons he could have made. But that's all right—he can do the dreaming for both of them, and she can do the remembering, just like how they divide up the chores.
She does not talk or fidget when he reads, waits for him to finish, takes in his sentences solemnly, as if he is teaching her something. And isn't he, really? Aren't all children's tales supposed to have morals? But he changes the story; through his reading of it, Kozue divines the truth. She has already guessed why their parents and teachers like for them to read these fables—they hope she and her brother will take the quaint little surface lessons to heart. "Take care of your siblings." "Don't talk to strangers." Perhaps even something about the dangers of candy.
But Kozue's brother is too smart for them. He reads, and the real lessons, the important ones, are revealed; Kozue memorizes them, their warnings and admonitions. She hears them in his voice, and she knows she will never forget them.
The story tells her how to take care of him, and she is only too glad to learn.
ii.
Kozue scoffs at Hansel in the beginning. Really, a trail of breadcrumbs? Poor Gretel, she thinks, struggling to keep him safe when he is so unbrilliant, so common and mediocre and not like Miki at all. But then Kozue starts to understand about metaphors, and she falls in love with them, with their ability to bring disparate elements together, to make parallels elegant instead of clumsy, to infuse reality with some vestige of fantasy. How clever, how considerate the writers of books are, to create a language free of cumbersome literality, governed by beauty and subtlety alone!
She looks again at the breadcrumbs, examines them with metaphor's aid, and suddenly she does not find them silly anymore. Has not Miki himself used his genius in ways just so evanescent? And has not she, like Gretel, admired the beauty, the pathos of his creations, knowing all the while that they were without practicality?
Just so—people like Hansel, like Miki, dreamers, visionaries, must be protected from the world. They are all glass and satin, and in a reality where measurements are approximate, where things can be spilled or knocked over or ruined entirely, they cannot survive without help. Even if they excel at math, they are not good with variables; they admire the structure of a breadcrumb trail and never once consider the factor of the birds.
She says that to him once, says, "You don't consider all the factors."
"Factors?" he asks. "What factors do you mean?"
"People," Kozue says, "are imperfect. People don't act as they should. You treat them as if they did. It's a mistake, Miki."
"How can I get anywhere if I don't give them a chance? Besides, I don't think my estimates of people's natures are too far off, most of the time." He rests his cheek on his hand. "What if you're the one who's making a mistake? The most cynical response isn't always the right one."
"An overly conservative estimate is less dangerous than an overly generous one, even if they're both off by the same amount," she says.
He smiles. "But I'm not interested in wrong answers, Kozue."
"What happens when the world proves you wrong, then?"
"It won't," he says firmly. A child's argument.
But she cannot best him in games of metaphor, so she rests.
iii.
Then there comes something for which she could not possibly have been prepared.
Afterward, she cannot ask him why, cannot ask the reason for his betrayal, so she just concentrates on the fact of it, the objective statement. A cord was cut, a separation occurred, but one does not look for meaning in the placement of a lightning bolt, and Kozue, likewise, does not look for meaning in this.
But he must understand what it felt like. He must know the blasphemy of it, and above all he must never do it again.
Even he cannot weaken this new resolve, no matter how many times he comes to her, pleading. She always refuses, and his explanations are no good because she can accept no explanations. But she cannot tell him that, so she just says, "I won't," and turns away.
"You won't even tell me why?" he asks. He has not bothered to wash his face, and she can see the places where the tears have not yet dried.
"Remember," she says, "you were the one who turned away first."
"I didn't—"
"What excuse can you possibly have? I was all alone, and—you don't. You just don't do that, Miki. It ought to be impossible. We're twins; it ought to be impossible."
"I wish it could be like that," he says, and he is sincere.
"What about the story?" she asks. "What about the story you read me? 'Hansel and Gretel?' Remember? We were supposed to be like that. They stayed together forever, and we were supposed to—"
Retorts do not pass easily from Miki's mouth, but then, after the times they have had this conversation can no longer be counted, he makes this time the last. "You can't live life like it's a fairytale! Even Hansel and Gretel had other people to consider."
She doesn't understand. "Other people?"
He sighs. "There's another story, Kozue. She—Gretel—takes care of her brother as long as he needs her, but eventually she marries a king. She gets married, and she's happy, all right? She can't be his guardian forever."
What is this? What is this?
"And what's more," he says, "we can't always be together either. Not all the time. It's impossible, Kozue."
She forces him out of the room. She slams the door. She throws herself on the bed, hides her face, clutches fistfuls of fabric and kicks at the mattress.
You ask the adults why writing shows up backwards in a mirror, and they explain about right and left—not right and wrong, that's another discussion—about how if a real person stood opposite you your right hand would be opposite his left. But a reflection isn't a real person, so it can be perfect, an image of smooth and unbroken symmetry.
You can't separate a reflection from its original. Therefore, the fairytale is wrong.
Small and trembling, curled atop the covers, she forces the two thoughts against one another until they connect, until her battered brain calls them logic.
iv.
The evil stepmother is not worth mentioning.
v.
—Then, the gingerbread house.
The white buildings, hospital-clean and just so impersonal, do not fool Kozue for a minute. It's the smell she heeds, for the hallways reek of it, the unmistakable ginger-tinged scent. Sitting silent at her desk, she thinks of spun-sugar windows framed in licorice, roofs tiled with marzipan, candy-cane banisters.
But she has no stomach for sweets; she hungers for one thing only, strains with—eyes are useless—nose and ears and teeth—
—the witch.
She finally finds her, but it's roses, not gingerbread. Kozue had thought roses could be trusted—roses once grew in their garden—but the girl does not fool her. She hungers for silver, thirsts for fire, dreams of herself, witchbane, wielding such weapons.
But the witch has a different game, this time, a game of deeper subterfuge. A game of roses, not of gingerbread. And her brother can only hold out so long, can thrust his purity and naïveté before him like chicken bones to keep the witch from knowing him. But her gaze is sharp—even Kozue is sometimes pierced by it—and he will fall, he will fall like a trophy at her feet if Kozue does not do something. She will devour him, if Kozue does not do something.
But this game is strange to her. She could endure hunger, labor, heat, frost, blood, even fear, if it was for Miki's sake. But these rules are whimsical and deadly. There is sense in their nonsense, just like in the old nursery rhymes, but Kozue cannot decipher it. She does make progress, over time—there is much about power, more about pain, and the space between the two is shrinking rapidly—but it never seems like enough.
And the witch has a brother too, a spider-brother with long limbs and a smile stitched from secrets. She can use him, perhaps, or else he can use her. He, she thinks, also believes that the bond between siblings should be unbreakable.
At last, when the warring scents of roses and gingerbread have turned her head and she is drowning in her own metaphors, she tells Miki, "You'll have to give up something."
"I don't understand," he says.
"Your feelings," she says, "or else your purity. Withdraw, or harden yourself so that she cannot break you. There is no other way, Miki; you cannot have them both."
"Who will break me?" he asks, in lieu of an answer.
Kozue narrows her eyes. "You know. The witch. Always the witch."
"I wish you wouldn't call her that, Kozue." He rests his hands on his thighs. "I think if I'm going to worry about anyone, I ought to worry about my next fencing opponents."
She allows herself a small huff of disdain. "They're of no consequence. Why concern yourself with them?"
"They're the ones I have to fight," he says.
"No," and the smile is a sad shadow on her lips. "No, Miki; you have to fight your own heart."
His smile is surer, taking confidence from its ironical twist. "But that's a fight I must always lose. My heart is the most important part of me."
"Yes," she agrees. "So harden it, or lose it."
He turns pensive, staring off and away from her. "I wouldn't mind losing it, if it's to her," he says.
Kozue is not so sure she likes metaphors after all.
vi.
Kozue is certain of only one thing: she must protect Miki, because he is hers. There will be more witches after this one—perhaps there will always be witches—and it is her job to know them. She must—she will know them, no matter what guises they appear in, no matter what games they play or how impossible the rules are. She will know them, and she will feed every last one to the fire.
That's what a good sister does.