The missing cookie

The little girl knew that when she grew up she would marry a little old man and they would bake gingerbread boys and girls for the rest of her life.

She also knew that some of these sweet little cookies would jump the tray, run away from home and be eaten by sly old foxes, because that is what happened if you broke tradition.  You came to a bad end.

All of her little gingerbread men, except one, ran away and she kept waiting for that mean old fox to eat them, but he never showed up.  Instead one little boy became a printer and another became a musician and the others did all sorts of amazing things.

You can guess what happened to the one who never left home.

In the end the little old man ran away too and the little old woman discovered there was a whole world out there with a million wonderful things to do and most of the foxes were just nightmares in disguise.

She stopped baking cookies and telling them tales of terror and began writing stories of her own. And while no one lived happily ever after, the unknown gave their lives a richness and full flavored robustness they had never dreamed existed.