Mary Kate

Mary Kate nails polished with chocolate, dark hair stiff with peanut butter gel, poses as a child. Her beloved "gwitter" dress and patent leather shoes clash with the jeans and and sneakers of her first-grade companions, yet she is first to climb the monkey bars, hurtle down the slide, dive into the ball pit. Her face proclaims "imp," "leprechaun." Freckles prance across the bridge of her nose like decors atop a creamy vanilla cupcake. But her winter-ocean eyes and uncertain smile belie these illusions as I hear her wrestle with an unforgiving world: Why do friends move away? Why did it rain on my birthday? Why can't we live with Daddy? But soon the playground beckons, and she is off, fighting for her childhood.