"They were both reported missing from work yesterday afternoon… It’s been hours since anyone has heard from them… Strange, they’ve never missed so much as a day of work in their lives… Trying to contact other family members… If anyone has any information… We really need them back in the lab doing research… Yes, we are going to investigate their home this morning… In other news…"

Maria sat with her eyes glued to the television set. The back of her mind was asleep – at peace, merely aware of the voices reporting the local news, not so much comprehending them. Her feet were still dirty. Mud slid onto the carpet in the shape of her tiny calves, her tiny footprints flowing from the foyer to the living room. Her parents always grabbed the mail from the mailman, since old-Mr.-Jeff often mixed up their address with the neighbor’s down the street. Maria had grabbed some envelopes from him earlier, though she nervously avoided eye contact and didn’t say “Hello.”

The envelopes sat next to her. She uncrossed her pale legs, twisting to push the envelopes around with her toes. The stale scent of coffee continued to permeate the air; Maria’s father bought the kind that filled the whole house with rich, caffeinated fumes. Her favorite books were tossed everywhere. Junie B. Jones was the only one left shut on the side table – a few American Girl and Goosebumps books were open on the ground around her. Red and blue Legos formed a circle around the books, since she hadn’t tidied up yet. Roscoe, the family mutt, sat next to the fireplace and occupied himself with a blue one. Roscoe was one of the quietest of all of the family pets they’d ever had; he never barked at a stranger strolling to the front door, nor did he whine from the depths of his cage at night. He was only ever roused by Maria’s parents’ fighting.

Last week, for example, the bills were too high and the voices were too loud, and Maria could practically poke at the tension in the air. Maria’s daddy slammed his fist on the kitchen table in frustration and her mother burst into tears as they rained insults on each other. Maria was told to go to her room, but she hadn’t understood what she could have done wrong to deserve such a punishment, so she tucked herself under the table until the screaming quieted down. As she lied down staring at the underbelly of the wooden table, Maria squeezed her favorite toy until her palms turned red. It was a tan, softly worn-down bunny. Her therapist, Dr. Dan, had given it to her on her half-birthday to help her cope with school.

School. Maria never wanted to go back. Of course she loved the learning bit; but according to her peers that was part of the problem. Maria always knew the right answers, always read the best library books, always did her own math problems. During recess, she sat under a little tree, shaded against the sun that would no doubt give her painful sunburns. Her friends would sometimes skip over to gossip with her or ask her to play tag. Most of the time, though, it was the back-stabbers, the name-callers, the miniature bullies that stopped by her tree.

Not popular enough… Not pretty enough… Not skinny enough…

Too quiet… Too weird… Too annoying…

And that was when the anger began to pile up. Day after day that’s where she sat, gulping up judgments as she did her chocolate milk before class. She tried fighting back the first few times it happened. After a while, she started to believe them, and her behavior changed.

When she came home, her parents always told her what to do and what to say. When she was tired of the rules, tired of the bullying, she cried and then got sent to the corner. After so long her parents got tired of it too and forced her to talk to a stranger in a strange room with a strange smell and a peculiar choice of paintings on the wall. That’s when Maria got the bunny.
Squeeze it when you are angry. You don’t have to behave badly to other people when you feel sad, just use the bunny.

Dr. Dan told Maria’s family she would be normal after a while. He told them she would stop lying and yelling, doing the opposite of what she’s told. That’s what bothered Maria the most. She was always supposed to do something a certain way for a certain amount of time and was never allowed to venture off on her own. She was a child after all, and children don’t know right from wrong. Children need to be indoctrinated with boundaries. When they don’t stay within the boundaries, it naturally follows that they should be punished.

So, when she was angry, when she wanted to jump out of the boundaries altogether, she squeezed the bunny.

Channel 2 was still rambling on about the weather. Sunny with a chance of rain. Maria peeled her innocent green eyes from the grainy screen, blinking to bring back some sort of moisture. The wind was mildly strong. Spring’s green grass struggled to hold its ground, and the world kept shifting shades as the clouds scrambled across the sun. Maria pushed the envelopes away and re-crossed her legs, suddenly noticing strings of bright blond hair in her eyes and tucking them behind her fragile pierced ears. She grew tired of boring TV stories and wondered what to do next. She thought briefly of playing catch with Roscoe, reading another book in her room, coloring a picture for her teacher, or checking outside again to see if Mr. Jeff had come by again with more mail he forgot to deliver. Her thoughts, however, descended into themselves once again when she heard the far-away engines approaching her home.

Her body grew rigid. As the engines got louder, Maria became increasingly concerned that someone would see. She searched for her bunny, but couldn’t find it. It had disappeared yesterday morning, before the coffee was brewed, even before her parents had had their first yelling match. Tears began to fall, and her pupils watched the TV unseeingly, her fingers tightening around the black thing.

The big men only knocked a few times before they stomped in. The dark blue front door was unlocked, so it wasn’t hard. She heard their footsteps. Then their voices, their questions, their gasps. One of them – he was mustached, with a vest proclaiming Police and purple half-moons settled beneath his eyes – stepped in between Maria and the television. He was asking her questions about what happened, was she okay, could she talk about last night. She got angry and squeezed the black thing harder, still wondering where her bunny could have gone. She decided to ask Dr. Dan for a replacement next week. The policeman finally gave up his interrogation and told Maria she had to come with him for a while. She only reacted in annoyance as he tugged the black bunny-substitute out of her hands.

Maria’s mind was somewhere else when they dropped the gun in a Ziploc and wheeled her parents out in a gurney.