Free See No Color by Shannon Gibney Page B

jar. It was large and full of bright pink globs that were blinding even in the partial light.
    â€œUgh,” said Jason, wrinkling his nose.
    I turned it over in my palm. “It’s beets,” I said. “I guess they’re pickled.” I handed him the jar and he took it reluctantly.
    â€œWon’t catch me eating that anytime soon,” he said, placing it on the left side of the shelf. “Those things look disgusting.” He frowned and dusted off his hands.
    I shrugged and picked up another jar of chili sauce. “Taste is different than look.”
    Even with his back to me, I could feel him glaring. He had been surly lately. I mostly tried to stay out of his way because I knew we were both edgier and edgier with each game West High won. At that precise moment, we were exactly four games away from being the top-rated team when we entered the state tournament. While Jason had just heard that he had made the cut for the elite club team where we would play through the summer and fall, I was still waiting to hear. So, I really didn’t see what he had to be surly about at all. Everyone said that the elite club team was a direct pipeline to the best college ball, and if you had the gift and grit, hopefully something even better, like the draft.
    Jason took the chili sauce and shoved it to the right. The shelf sagged under the weight, but held. I grabbed a jar of green beans. There was nothing in the world as good as a freshly picked green bean, but if you couldn’t get that, one from a jar that Mom had packed would do just fine. I closed my eyes for a second, remembering the sharp crunch of the bean skin in my mouth.
    â€œYou know, we’re your real family,” Jason said.
    I turned the words over in my mind; I could not figure out what they meant. I turned to face him.
    â€œThose other people gave you up years ago. Mom and Dad wanted you, and that’s the end of it.” He took the jar of green beans from me, but his eyes were hard and held my gaze. “At least, that’s how I see it.”
    I hiccupped and desperately searched my mind for something to say and found nothing.
    Jason turned toward me, so that I had to step back. “I don’t know why you had to go and dig up those letters. You got Mom sad all the time, and Dad completely scattered.” He placed the beans in the center of the shelves.
    I broke away from his face, which was not the same face that had run cones and thrown long toss in practice with me for years, and looked down at my right hand. It was burnt deep brown by the May sun—my throwing hand. The part of me that knew how to think better than my brain most the time. The part of me that mattered most. That hand held no answer for this.
    â€œI wish you had never found them,” he said angrily.
    â€œWhy?” I said, finally finding my voice. “So you and Dad and Mom would feel better?”
    Jason stepped back, and I felt like I could breathe again. “Alex, this isn’t about anyone feeling better. It’s about reality. I’ve never seen you as black and neither has Mom or Dad or Kit, okay?”
    I had heard those same words come out of Mom and Dad’s mouths so many times before, but hearing it from Jason for the first time made my knees shake. For some reason, a tidal wave was building in my stomach and crashing in my ears. It felt like my body was on the verge of exploding in on itself, of disappearing under the weight of all that people didn’t think of me as. It was too much. I thrust my index finger in his face, and he looked scared of me, really scared, for the first time in years. It felt good to see him flinch. “You have no idea how I’m seen, got it?”
    Before I was conscious of what I was doing, my throwing hand swung at him, making contact with his jaw. I yelped in pain as I heard my knuckles crack against bone. He recovered quickly, grabbed my wrists, and ran me back against the