peanut bitter

She squeezes the peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich until it bleeds, because that’s the way she does it, that’s the way she likes to do it, licking the drippings off her tiny, slender fingers. Her mother sits across from her, nursing her new baby brother with a bottle, grabbing a bite from a sandwich, here and there, while her father eats his, uninterrupted. She sips from an “organic apple” juice box not considering --- and why would she? – any juxtaposition. Mom and dad don’t get it, either, and probably never will. Grandma reaches across from another table and offers her a napkin and she’ll have none of it – or certainly not it, specifically. She is part of the New World, the one her parents don’t get and, even if they did, certainly wouldn’t acknowledge. Indeed, they’ll do their damnedest to keep her in their world for as long as they can, but she will break out, eventually, someday, and it will be painful, of course. If they are smart, they will understand her world or at least try to. If they aren’t, well, it will be their loss. Her name is Haley, and she is not alone. Neither are her parents, of course. Everyone’s on the merry-go-round. Everything is moving. And faster than any of them can imagine. Faster, indeed, than ever.