Saturday Morning, Intercepted

Silent as a ghost

No – soft like a cat about to pounce

Sleek like Iron Man

I come down the stairs

One step at a time

The entire house is asleep

I’m the only one awake

And the world is mine

Passing through the kitchen

I stealthily steal an apple from my mom’s chipped ceramic bowl

Over at the pantry I pull down the box of Gorilla Munch

A cereal bowl, a teaspoon, the milk

Ugh, I’m not sure how to carry all this

Morning cartoons are just on the other side of that door

A creak issues from my parent’s bedroom

I hear my mother shuffle over to her robes and slippers

My father says something inaudible in his low, mumbling way

Panicked, I drop my arm full of Saturday morning booty and make a run for the TV

Where my mother, darn her, intercepts my reach for the remote like a bald eagle, talons extended

Intercepted, I’m left heaving and panting on the side

While she, that woman, walks back to the kitchen, head shaking, muttering something about “Books, books, books!”