The Invisible Day (5 page)

Charley picked Australia. Nina picked Greenland. Hubert picked Bali. He said later he didn’t have a second choice ready. Bali is the name of a place his mother says she’d like to run away to sometimes, and it just popped into his head.

I
was so mad I left the room. I trailed down the stairs to the library, punching the wall along the way.

Even though she couldn’t help me, I sort of wanted to be near my mother. I sat in the corner next to the window, with my feet scrunched up under me. I wanted to strangle
Alyssa. How can someone always be so mean?

My mother was browsing in the picture book section. She was wearing the blue plaid shirt that I like. Better than her striped one, anyway.

After a couple of minutes, I heard the giggles and whispers of the kindergarten kids. It was Jane’s class coming for Reading Time. My mother was going to read them a story.

It took a few minutes to get everyone settled on the green mat. I could only see my mother’s back. Jane was curled up next to her. The other kids were all watching with complete attention. They call her Ms. Stoner, and they think that everything she says is true and smart. No wonder she likes this job so much.

She held up the book to show them the first picture. It was
Millions of Cats
. I used to love that book. It’s almost like poetry, the way “hundreds and thousands and millions of cats” gets repeated in a chant. I loved the way my mother’s voice sounded saying it over and over. I closed my eyes and listened. I could
remember snuggling up to her, just like Jane. Lying on the navy corduroy couch at home, begging her to read it again.

What if I don’t come back? What if I really don’t? The thought entered my head and stayed there, gnawing. I wanted to run over and hug my mother. I wanted to put my head in her lap and let her stroke my hair. I silently apologized for every rude thing I’d ever said to her.

And what if I do come back? I wouldn’t be able to tell her what happened. It would be a secret from her forever. My mother wouldn’t really see all of me from then on. My life would be more and more away from her as I got older. And what about her? Do I ever see her? Or is she invisible because she’s just my mom? I was feeling dizzy from all this thinking. I admit, my eyes got hot and my nose was stinging, I was trying so hard not to cry.

I put my palms flat across my eyes and breathed slowly. I suppose if I waited long
enough, the powder would wear off, but how long would it be? There must be a solution. I would go and get Hubert. Together we would find a cure! I would get the antidote for my condition. Like an explorer in the jungle with a snakebite.

I opened my eyes and caught my breath. Alyssa was leaning against the table. She slammed down a stack of books about China. She pulled out a chair with a scraping sound, dropping my backpack, as well as her own, onto the floor between us. She sat next to me with a thump.

My mother turned around and shot her a warning glare. Alyssa made a snooty face behind her back. I had to sit on my hands so I wouldn’t smack her. Then she flipped open the top-most book and started to write on her notepad. She looked back and forth between her page and the book and kept steadily writing. It took only a minute to figure out that
she was copying, word for word, everything in the book. I could tell she wasn’t even reading the words. She probably didn’t know what she’d just written.

Suddenly I was determined to get revenge.

I couldn’t wait to tell Hubert, but I was trapped by Alyssa and her pile of books. I sat
there, as quietly as I could, trying to come up with a plan. This was one bad guy I intended to catch!

The bell rang in the distance of stairs and corridors. My mother ushered the little kids into the hallway. Jane held on for an extra minute, but my mother managed to peel her arms away and send her off with the others.

Hubert poked his nose around the corner. He was coming to look for me. I tried to think how I could let him know I was there. He saw my pack at the same moment that he saw Alyssa. She looked at him with disdain.

“Excuse me, Bertie,” she sneered. “I just have to reshelve these books on China.” She stood up and pushed past him. I quickly leaned over and poked his shoulder.

“Aah!” he cried.

“What?” Alyssa stopped to stare at him.

“You did a very bad thing,” said Hubert. He was showing me he could stand up for himself.

“You did a very bad thing,” mimicked
Alyssa. “Ooooh. You scare me. What are you going to do to me, Bertie? Blow a bubble in my face?” She fake-laughed over to the card file.

My mother chose that moment to come around the stacks.

“Alyssa Morgan, I’ve had enough of your noise today. Hubert, is everything all right?”

“Sure.” His eyes skipped around the library, wanting to warn me, but my mother had spotted my backpack.

“Isn’t that Billie’s?” she asked, picking it up. It couldn’t be anyone else’s. Not with a huge STONER in liquid-gold marker on the back pocket and twelve keychains hanging from the zipper.

“Uh, yeah.”

“Hey,” interrupted Alyssa. “I was looking after that for Billie.” She stepped closer and reached past Hubert for it.

“I haven’t seen anything of Billie today,” said my mother in that jolly voice she uses when she thinks she’s missing something. She
was still holding on to the backpack. My key-chain collection jingled slightly.

“I haven’t seen much of her myself,” said Hubert. I wanted to kick him. “But I’ll take her pack, Ms. Stoner. I’ll be seeing her any minute.”

“You haven’t seen her,” said Alyssa to my mother, “because she’s not here. She hasn’t been here all day.”

I
didn’t wait to see what my mother’s face looked like. I was out the door before my next breath.

“Hey, Alyssa!” I called from the hallway, “Sarah’s looking for you.”

I popped my head back in.

“There she is now,” said my mother. Alyssa’s story was too unlikely to consider. “Shouting
again. Hubert, when you catch up to her, please tell her I’d like to see her.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Alyssa was shocked to hear my voice, and she started directly toward me to investigate. Hubert tried to follow, armed with a new sense of bravery.

“Hubert?” My mother handed him my backpack. “And Hubert? It’s not right to chew gum in school. It’s distracting for the other students.”

“Sorry,” he mumbled. He took his gum out and wrapped it in a piece of paper. She smiled at him and went back to her desk.

I was waiting by the door.

“Come to the phone booth,” I muttered as we watched Alyssa’s rear end wobble up the stairs. “It is time for desperate measures.”

The public telephone is in an old closet opposite the front door in the main hall.

“Come in quick,” I hissed, trying to drag him in beside me without Ms. Shephard craning
her neck to notice. He closed the door. We were a snug fit.

“Hubert! You were brilliant. You kept your cool and you saved the day!” I was feeling kind of fond of him. “And thank you for getting my backpack! Now give it to me. We have to find the person who belongs to the little bag.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I want to reappear. I’m going to phone the number that was in the bag. Jody Greengard. Maybe there’s a cure.”

“Good idea, Billie. Why didn’t you think of that earlier?”

“Oh, shoot, if I’m holding it, it disappears. You’re going to have to dig it out, Hubert. See? Being invisible has its disadvantages. I think I better come back.”

“I have to admit, I miss your freckles.”

I tried to punch him, but we were so crowded, I cracked my knuckles against the wall instead.

He pulled out the satin bag. He opened the
zipper and it didn’t even stick. He poked at the pots and tubes.

“Well, they don’t look too thrilling. Which one did you use, Billie?”

I nudged the compact.

“What do you think this one does?” He picked out the biggest pot and started to unscrew the lid.

“Hubert! Don’t! We have no idea what could happen! What if it’s shrinking cream or it makes hair grow all over your hands?”

He put it back with great care. He slid his fingers around inside until he found the cards. The number for Jody Greengard was on the membership card to Dr. Dingo’s Science Club.

“Okay, Billie, just phone.”

“I need a quarter.”

He sighed a sigh of enormous suffering, but he stuck a quarter in the slot.

I dialed. The phone rang twice and got picked up with a clatter at the other end.

“Hello?” The person was whispering.

“Hello?” I said back. “Is this Jody Greengard?”

“Who’s calling?”

“Urn, I have something that I think is yours. I found a bag in the park.”

“You found it! That’s so cool!” She stopped whispering, and suddenly I could tell she was a teenager. “When can I get it?”

“Well, there’s a problem,” I said. “I’m invisible.”

The silence on the other end was complete. I thought the line was cut.

“Hello?” I said.

Hubert was poking me.

“Who is it?” he whispered. “Is it a wizard or something?”

I stepped on his foot. The telephone is the one place where everyone is invisible. I could be talking to anyone, a girl with green hair or a brain surgeon.

“Hello? Did you hear me? I’m invisible and I want to get uninvisible. I mean, I want to reappear.”

“Wow,” said Jody. “It works! I never tried it on a person before! This is totally cool. I’ve got
to see you. I mean, you’ve got to come here immediately. I have a broken ankle and I can’t go anywhere so you’ll have to come here. I was whispering in case you were my teacher. I wanted to sound like I’m in pain. I must examine you. I broke my ankle when I was looking for my bag. How long have you been invisible? Oh, thank you for finding the bag. When can you come?”

I was thinking, when can you stop talking?

“The thing is,” I said, ignoring Hubert’s pokes. “The thing I’m wondering is, can you make me come back? Do you have a cure for the powder?”

“How old are you?”

“Nearly eleven.”

“So you’re ten. Wow. I made my dog disappear and come back, and about a hundred bugs, but I didn’t know if it would work on people.”

My heart took a dive. I could feel it flopping around in my stomach.

“Look,” I said, summoning my bravery, “if I come to your house now, can you help me?”

“I hope so,” she said, without a lot of conviction. “Yeah, but you better come as soon as you can, before my mother gets home from work. She will kill, I mean KILL me if she finds out that the powder works and I’m a genius.”

“Is the address the same as on this membership card?”

“Uh-huh.”

“I’m on my way.” I hung up and turned to Hubert. I’m glad he couldn’t see me because I was about to cry. My nose was stinging again.

W
ell?” said Hubert.

I took a deep breath.

“We have to go uptown, Hubert. This girl, Jody, she’s a teenager and she invented this
stuff and she thinks she might be able to help but we have to go. Right now.”

“I can’t go, Billie. That’s hooky. Why do I have to go?”

“Hubert, do you seriously think I’m going uptown by myself?”

That got him.

He opened the door to the telephone closet and closed it again quickly. We both should have been in class at this time of day. Ms. Shephard would be sure to say something. She might even be efficient enough to accompany Hubert back to the room. We had to think of a way to get out of the school without her seeing us. Seeing him.

I stepped into the hall, leaving Hubert hidden. I crab-walked past Ms. Shephard with my eyes crossed and my head lolling to one side. I went along to the empty music room and slipped inside. Then I started to laugh like a lunatic and slammed the door five times in a row. Ms. Shephard was out of her seat in no
time. I walked right past her as she went to find the culprit.

Hubert and I were out the front door like professional cat burglars.

I held Hubert’s hand while we walked to the subway. I never would have done that on a normal day, but somehow today it was okay.