The Better Business Bureau Receives a Complaint from the Baker

The witch took the first finger–the pinkie on Madelyn’s left hand–as a down-payment on the pregnancy. Madelyn thought that it wasn’t so expensive, given how long she and her husband had been trying, unsuccessfully, to have a baby, and also that there were still nine fingers left, and also that she was a rightie, so didn’t depend on her left hand for much. 

Madelyn hoped that she would be able to choose which finger the witch took next. She had a fondness for the index finger on her right hand, the one she used for accusations, or pointing the way for little girls in red hoods who got lost in the forest. She would prefer not to give up the ring finger on her left hand, the one with her husband’s ring on it. And she really didn’t know if she could give up her middle fingers at all, since they were so useful for shooting the bird at that wolf who thought he was so smart just because he wore women's pajamas, or the prince who constantly cut people off in traffic with his carriage, or even that creepy little cat in the Gucci boots. 

But if the cost of a baby was that she’d have to indicate with a nod, or wear her wedding band on a chain around her neck, then so be it. Madelyn really did hope that the witch left her with at least one middle finger, though.

At least the price was fair: one finger with the signature on the contract; one finger at the halfway mark when the danger of miscarrying was past; and one final finger upon delivery.

Madelyn couldn’t complain about the witch’s business practices. She was prompt and courteous, like all service people should be. She turned up on Madelyn’s doorstep halfway through the pregnancy to the day. How could you fault her? Her terms were clear. There was no Buyers Beware shit going on. The cost was three fingers for a baby. She came with her shears, snipped off the finger, and was gone again and out of Madelyn’s hair before she knew it, leaving Madelyn with a bloody towel wrapped around the finger stump and a complimentary bottle of milk of the poppy to take the edge off.

Still, there had been nothing in the contract about these swollen ankles and indigestion. Nothing about the sudden revulsion that swept her whenever her husband reached for her with his flour-dusted hands. Or the exhaustion, my god, the exhaustion. Madelyn couldn’t even get the baked goods into the front cases without needing to sit down and rest. Don’t even mention how she wasn’t allowed to have her usual cocktail after a busy day at the bakery, or go dancing with her girlfriends at the Goldilocks any longer. It became clearer and clearer to Madelyn how life was about to change. She wasn’t sure she was sure, anymore.

The labor was excruciating and long in the way that fairy tales have of expanding time and condensing hard work. The shitting and vomiting during the birth just confirmed for Madelyn that the whole ordeal sucked rocks. The pain, well, it extended the boundaries of even a violent children’s story and pushed well beyond into the real world. And then to be handed a squalling bloody bundle of baby, its face screwed up and ugly as sin–no, Madelyn knew what she must do.

When the witch came to collect her final payment, Madelyn was dressed and ready to go and so was the baby. She’d read the contract backwards and forwards. There was no specification about who did the choosing. When the witch took out her shears and approached Madelyn to take her last payment, Madelyn introduced the baby.

“In honor of our successful transaction,” Madelyn said, “I have named her Finger! I called her my little Fingerling.” She raised one eyebrow at the witch, who raised both eyebrows back in surprise, each of them communicating silently with one another the way that women, even in fairy tales, do. Madelyn knew that naming your kid “Finger” was a weirdness that would be acceptable in a world where people were named for their sleeping habits and hair color. The witch knew that she was dealing with a shrewd customer who understood that this turn of events was exactly the come-uppance shit that made a fairy tale become a favorite, so she put her shears away and accepted the baby Finger from Madelyn and went on her way.

Madelyn’s husband was furious when he found out that he now had no baby and an eight-fingered wife with a new understanding of freedom. He ranted and said he would report the witch to the Better Business Bureau. But that was not Madelyn’s problem anymore. She had a new pair of red shoes and a plan to go out dancing with her princess friends. She planned to dance the night away.