This had gone one for days when a pair of children came by. The pair consisted of an older boy, perhaps thirteen, and a younger girl, his sister, six years old.

They asked her the predictable questions. “What are you doing?”

“My part in bringing about world peace.”

The little girl said, “Why are you out here all alone?”

Karen looked into the child’s eyes. “Because no one has bothered to join me.”

The girl’s eyes grew sad. “You must be lonely.”

“Everyone is lonely. People don’t care. That’s why I’m here.”

Then, the little girl did a miraculous thing. She wrapped her short little arms around Karen’s waist. The young woman was caught off-guard. She let the tension out of her shoulders, dropped her sign, and wrapped her arms around the little girl.

The boy then said. “I brought her here to show you. You sure no one cares?” He then pulled out of his backpack two signs much like her own, and a trio of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. “Now. We have a world to bring peace to.”