Fudge

The house smells sweet, sticky, chocolaty. Mom is making fudge like she does every Christmas. She will cut it into thick squares; sometimes with walnuts, sometimes without, sometimes layered chocolate and peanut butter, sometimes only peanut butter. I like it plain. Only chocolate. No nuts. She puts it into a fancy candy jar. Cut glass. It looks sparkly like diamonds. The top is pretty heavy and when you sneak into it, you have to hold it really tight; one hand on top holding the knob, the other guiding the side so it closes without a sound. Mom hears everything and will not like us being in her fudge without asking. Craig is the real sneak. He loves mom's fudge. I think he even likes the nuts. He is good at taking fudge from the noisy candy jar, but Mom notices when he takes just one too many, so he has to be careful. One of our tricks is to take out a few pieces and slice just a little off each piece and then put them back in jar. Mom doesn't notice our thievery then. A lot of times she puts scotch tape all over the lid to keep Craig out. He can still get in without her noticing. That is how much Craig loves mom's fudge. Come to think of it, he does the same thing at Halloween with the orange pumpkins with the little green stems. He just loves candy.