Free Repossessed by A. M. Jenkins

tiny dotted line marked across the corner, and little words saying “Tear Here.” After tearing, I had to turn the packet upside down and squeeze to get the ketchup to come out.
    I found that if I squeezed too hard—or if the torn opening was too small—ketchup would spurt in unexpected directions. In this way I managed to get ketchup on my shirt, the tabletop, and Jason’s arm.
    â€œWatch it,” he complained.
    â€œSorry,” I said. I gripped the portion of my shirt that had ketchup on it, held it up, and licked it.
    â€œGross,” Jason said at the same moment that Shaun’s mom, horrified, said, “Shaun!”
    All right. No licking.
    I grabbed a napkin and scrubbed at the ketchup instead. What a waste.
    Shaun’s mom had a salad in a plastic tray. It looked crisp and appealing, all different shades of green, with a few curls of purple and orange. And a few small, red round things scattered here and there.
    She pulled out a larger version of a ketchup packet—this one had a man’s face on it—and tore easily across the tiny line. “Jason,” she said in a bright voice as she gently squeezed a white viscous substance from the packet onto her vegetables, “why don’t you call Cameron after dinner and see if he wants to come over?”
    Shaun’s mom had been fussing over Jason and his lack of friends for years. She used to take charge by having boys from his class over to play. They seldom reciprocated. None of the kids liked Jason enough to ask if he could visit them . A few parents insisted that their sons return the invitation, but these parents then complained of the way Jason wouldn’t look them in the eye, the way he tended to break toys, or the way he ate Fruit Roll-Ups and then absentmindedly dropped the empty wrappers wherever he stood.
    Now Jason was thirteen. He was too old for his mother to actively attempt to maneuver his social life. And she was champing at the bit to do so, you could tell by the way her voice took on an encouraging tone. “What do you think?” she urged Jason.
    I swirled a fry in ketchup, getting it nicely covered. The Cameron she spoke of was a boy Jason’s age who lived three houses down. I thought it would be a terrible mistake to call him. Cameron was a sower of pain. He ate kids like Jason for breakfast.
    Jason apparently agreed. “I don’t want to.”
    â€œWhy not?” Shaun’s mom dropped the packet into one of the empty bags. “He seems nice enough.”
    â€œHe threw erasers at me.”
    I watched Shaun’s mom stir the salad with her small plastic fork, flipping the lettuce around expertly. I’d squirted my ketchup into a puddle next to my fries, like Jason had, but now I wished I’d put it directly on them and mixed it up with a fork. That made sense.
    But there were no more plastic forks, alas. Only those with salad got forks.
    I continued dipping and eating.
    â€œThat was in third grade, Jason,” I heard Shaun’s mom say. “You should give him another chance.”
    Jason and I both knew that he should not give Cameron another chance. Cameron would refuse to come over, then mock him at school the next day for daring to ask.
    Of course, I couldn’t say any of this. And all Jason said was “I don’t want to” again.
    Shaun’s mom nodded, apparently engrossed in her mixing, but now her fork sent the lettuce leaping around her tray at an alarming rate.
    â€œWhat about Benny?” she tried.
    Benny lived a few blocks away. He cursed his parents to their faces, made hit lists, and looked up bombmaking on the Internet.
    Shaun’s mom would have had no way of knowing any of this. She would only see that Benny’s mother was president of the PTA and made him tuck his shirts in.
    â€œI don’t want to,” Jason said again. His standard noncommunicative line.
    Shaun’s mom sighed. She looked worried, I thought.