ketchup

"I've got an idea..." Sarah muttered, tapping her fingernail on the glass of my bedroom window in time with her thoughts. She jumped off the blue gingham-checked windowseat, her bright Strawberry Shortcake red hair now gleaming in the sun, like the idea had lit her up from the inside out. 

"Let's camp out, over there across the lake!"

"But it's freezing out-- it's February!" Mary moaned. Looking out the window up towards the grey sky and naked branches, I started to agree with her.

"But it's supposed to be warmer today and tomorrow. The high is 65! We'll be fine. Come on, it'll be fun!" Now Sarah was pacing, working up her plan, and Mary and I, looking at each other from across the couch, agreed without words there was no point in arguing with her now.

*

Down in the garage, Mary watching very carefully for spiders, we pulled out the old green canvas tent my brothers had used in boy scouts. They had long ago outgrown scouting-- "that's for babies," I could hear my baby brother's mocking voice now. But we still had the tent, and it was in pretty good shape.

"How many does this thing sleep?" Sarah groaned under the weight of it. 

"About 4, probably 5 max," I said. 

"Oh, good, we can invite Lauren then. And we'll need food, lots of food. And some way to make a fire. And hangers for marshmallows, and we need to get some beer too..." she rambled while Mary and I loaded the tent in my little red car to drive it across the levy. 

* 

Mary's phone rang in the hot dog section.

"Hello? Hey. Oh, really... Where? Yeah, I know. Really? Awesome. Yeah, yeah count us in. See you at 7."

"What was that?" Sarah asked, looking at Mary like she had just killed her favorite rabbit.

"Jason just invited us to a party, out at Mark's farm. He's going to meet us at CVS at 7 and we'll follow him out there. He's got beer. It's going to be killer." Mary always had her ears open for a party, especially one where Jason was involved.

"Oh, cool, we'll steal some of his beer and then come back to camp out," Sarah said absentmindedly. 

"Well, we could stay for a little while couldn't we? I mean we could hang out for an hour or two... we'd still have time to cook," Mary fretted while looking down at Sarah who was elbow deep in bags of marshmallows.

"Yeah, an hour will be ok. But no more than that! We have to build a fire too, and after all that we'll be starving... and you'll be half-drunk." Sarah said, looking sideways at Mary while jerking the biggest bag off the back of the shelf.

"Will not!"

*

"I think we forgot the ketchup!" Mary yelled while digging through the three plastic bags of groceries in the backseat. 

"We have to go back!" Sarah yelled, sitting up straight in her tan leather driver's seat and eyeing the turn lane like she was going to make a Batman-like U turn right here.

"We don't have time now. It's almost 5 and we've got to get ready." I said, always the diligent one.

"But you don't have any at your house. Oh, I know-- you two go in and get some packets here." And instead of the Batman-like U turn, she did a Batman-like swerve across two lanes of traffic into the McDonald's parking lot.

"Ketchup is hardly worth killing us over," I grumbled as I got out of the car and walked towards the door.

I held the greasy silver and glass door open for Mary, and she, being only 5 foot 1, performed her favorite trick of walking under my arm. We walked up to the deserted counter.

"Excuse me?" Mary said to the tall woman behind the counter.

"welcome to mcdonalds can I take yo order supersize is only fifty cent more" she spewed at us like she'd said it a thousand times in her life and was getting tired of it.

"Can we have some ketchup please?"

"Ketchup? You wanna order somethin'?"

"No, just ketchup," Mary said very politely, and the woman, without bending down or taking her eyes from Mary's face, reached under the counter, pulled out several packets, and threw them on the counter towards us.

Mary, red-faced, grabbed up the packets, and we ran for the door. Again trying not to actually touch it, I opened the door for her. There was a young man, maybe in his mid-twenties-- too old to be looking at me-- standing right behind me. His brown hair hung in his eyes so I could hardly see his face, but he was smiling at us. He had observed the entire conversation at the counter.

"You want a napkin to go with that ketchup?" he asked, holding a single clean white paper napkin out to me.

"Umm, no..." I stammered and we ran for the car without looking back.

*

"I can't believe this is happening," I exhaled as I watched Jason and his friends pull dry, dead branches and out of the woods and make a pile in front of our newly erected tent. "Who invited them?"

"Well, you know it wasn't going to happen any other way. I mean it's not like we were going to do all this work. And once Sarah gets an idea..." Mary trailed off, smiling at her own thoughts as she cracked open another beer.

"But I know my parents can see us. You see that light over there? That's their bedroom!" I pointed across the lake to a light in the not-far-enough distance. "They could be here in less that five minutes, and the only way out is the levy. It's not like the boys could hide their truck in the woods."

"Don't worry, none of this is your fault. I'll cover for you."

"FIRE!!!!" bellowed one of the guys, a guttural howl, like he had never before seen it and was amazed at himself for creating it.

Everyone pulled up a stump or a log or whatever they could and sat around the fire. One or two more beers in, people started pairing off, some departing into the woods, others into the tent. Lauren and I were left with a guy named Paul, all alone around the dying embers.

"It's cold... I'm going to the car," I mumbled, glad that the night was ending.

"Me too," said Lauren sleepily, grabbing her blanket and following me.

"Ahem. Can I come too?" Paul said weakly.

"Sure, you can have the backseat. Some camp-out, huh, Lauren," I said, plopping into my driver's seat and reclining it as far as it would go.

"Yep." 

Yep, I thought, a night I won't forget anytime soon.