The Invisible Enemy (5 page)

W
hat do we do now?” asked Alyssa.

“It’s a good thing we’re back late from the trip,” I said. “Most of the kids are gone, not to mention my mother.”

“Hello? Billie! Remember me? What are you going to do about me?”

I tried to stare at her. I wanted to shoot her a killer look like my mother’s.

“I’m over here, pinhead.”

I was glaring in the wrong direction.

“Could you just tell me the spell or whatever to make me reappear?”

“It’s not a spell, Alyssa.”

“What is it, then? What happens?”

“What’ll you give me to tell you?” Having an enemy was bringing out the worst in me. But, I admit, tormenting her came pretty easily. “I have information. You want information. Have you got any cash?”

“What? I’m supposed to pay you? Forget it, Billie,” she said. “I’m going to follow you around until you fix me back. You told the teacher I’m coming to your place. So I’m coming to your place. And I’m staying till this is over.”

“No way,” I said. “My mother is at my place!”

“Well, we can’t go to my place, Billie, because I won’t be there! Even
my
mother would notice that!”

“I’m not going anywhere with you, Alyssa. I’m sick of you. And I feel like an idiot, talking to myself in the middle of the street. You stole my backpack, and you stole my makeup kit. I
should have you arrested instead of talking to you. Plus, I’m freezing. So good-bye.”

I turned to walk away. I took two steps and heard my name called. But it wasn’t Alyssa.

“Allo, Billie!” Jean-Pierre had come around the corner behind us. He was wearing his adorable, crooked smile and no hat, as usual. How can a boy have such glossy, black curls while I have limp, brown straggles?

“Have you seen Hubert?” he asked. “I am waiting for Hubert.”

“No,” I said, “I have not seen Ooo-bear.”

As cold as I was, I felt sweat under my arms. I knew Alyssa was still nearby, but I didn’t know where, and it was giving me the heebie-jeebies.

“So,” I said, flapping a dumb little wave, “see you around.” I turned and tripped over Alyssa.

“Oof,” she said.

“Oof,” I quickly added, struggling not to fall over.

Jean-Pierre just smiled.

“Billie,” he said quietly. “Don’t go yet. I’m never alone with you, and I wanted to ask—”

Yikes!

“I was wondering—”

What? Wondering what? Oh, shoot, why did Alyssa have to be here?

“Would you maybe like to hang around? With me?”

“With you?” Was he asking me on a date?

“Oof!” I gasped again. “Don’t!” Alyssa had punched my shoulder.

“Oh, please, do not be embarrassed,” he said.

Embarrassed? I was flat out dying. Jean-Pierre was so not like a regular sixth-grader. Josh or David or Victor would never talk to a girl like this. They mumbled or teased. Jean-Pierre was—well, flirting! And Alyssa was listening!

“I know you are a bit shy,” he went on.

“Hah!” squawked Alyssa.

“Ah!” I covered, squeaking like a mouse.

Jean-Pierre looked a little disconcerted, but he kept going. “I like that. Shy and funny, not so pushy as Alyssa.”

My neck exploded in a rush of cold prickles. What was he saying? Oh, shut up, shut up, please!

“You are different,” he continued.

“Ow, stop that!” Another punch. Like it was my fault he had seen the real her in only five days.

“Stop?” said Jean-Pierre.

I pulled myself together.

“I don’t want to talk about anyone behind her back,” I said just as Hubert came around the corner of the building.

“Hubert! Oh, Hubert, thank goodness you’re here!”

“Allo, Hubert. We have been waiting for you.”

Hubert rocked from left foot to right. He silently quizzed me, his eyes darting back and forth and his eyebrows pushed up, asking where Alyssa was.

“Hubert,” I said, cocking my head in the direction of the last punch. “I’m going home, but I’ll call you later, okay? I have to talk to you.”

“I don’t know, Billie.” Hubert twisted his mouth the way he does when he’s nervous. “I’m going to be kind of busy.” He glanced at Jean-Pierre.

“Yes, call!” said Jean-Pierre. “I’ll be there, too! I’m sleeping over tonight.” He smiled. “It’s
good to have girls phone a pajama party, eh, Hubert?”

Hubert looked at me, and I realized we were both blushing.

“Party?” I said.

“Just us,” said Hubert quickly.

Then, as I stood there wishing I was ten miles away, Jean-Pierre’s hair faded and vanished. Alyssa was touching his hair! He clearly felt nothing, and his tan face kept grinning at us.

“Aaay!” yelped Hubert. “Don’t!” I screamed. It wasn’t funny this time.

Alyssa let go. Jean-Pierre looked normal again, but completely confused.

“I have to go,” I said, backing away. “I have to go home right now. I’m late.” I didn’t trust Alyssa for one more second. I wanted to run. I wanted to run till I fell down floppy like an old stuffed bear.

I did run, and pretty fast, too. Down Mac-Dougal Street to Houston, across at the light, and along Houston to Thompson Street.

“Billie! Wait up!” Alyssa’s voice came from quite a ways behind me.

I ducked down Thompson and kept jogging as far as the M&O Grocery at Prince Street. The cold pinched my nose, and my breath came out in little frosty puffs.

Curiosity stopped me short. I could see my breath. I turned around. It was cold enough to see my breath. Could I see Alyssa’s breath, too?

Lots of people were hurrying past on Prince Street, some with shopping bags, some with dogs. I stood there, panting from my run and squinting, trying to see if Alyssa’s breath would announce her arrival.

“Thanks for waiting,” she blurted sarcastically into my ear. I jerked toward the sound.

“Say that again.”

“Say what?”

Wow! Sure enough. A tiny cloud of steam hovered in the air for a moment.

“Wow,” I said. “I can see your breath. I didn’t notice before because I wasn’t looking in the right place, but—”

“Big fat deal,” said Alyssa, shooting more
hot air into icy puffs. “What are you running away for, Billie? I told you, I’m going to follow you until you give me the cure. I’m coming to your place whether you like it or not.”

I
t took my dog, Harry, about three seconds to figure out that something was wrong. From the moment Harry heard my key in the lock, he started to jump as if he had springs on the bottom of his paws. I teased him with my mitten as we came in the door.
Boing, lick, boing, lick lick, boing.
Same greeting as every day.

But then he tilted his nose and his feet stopped dead. His little body was quivering slightly and he started to bark; quick, yappy barks, as if he’d spotted a cat and wanted to pounce.

“Uh-oh,” I said. “Harry’s too smart. And he’s not too good at keeping secrets.”

“What’s bugging Harry?” called my mother
from the kitchen area. “Make him shush, will you?”

I picked him up and folded his face into the crook of my arm.

“Stay right behind me,” I whispered to Alyssa. “And if you touch anything, I will tell Harry to chew off your hand!”

“Hi, Mom!” I said as I passed the kitchen and headed for the space I share with my sister, Jane. I held my breath. Alyssa was completely unreliable. I could feel her brewing behind me like a sandstorm.

“Hey! Where’s my kiss?”

Aw, Mom! My mother kissed me and patted my hair.

“How was the trip, honeybun?”

I could hear Alyssa choke back a snicker. She was seeing a different side of Stone-Face Stoner, that’s for sure.

“The bus was late coming back.” I just wanted to get to my room.

“But how was the trip?” She was putting away plates from the dish rack, not listening too closely.

“Really interesting.” If I said “really boring,” I’d get a lecture about how an intelligent person is never bored. And what if I told her the truth—that my Evil Worst Enemy had stolen my Secret Invisibility Powder and was now stalking me on home territory? “Gosh, honey-bun, I’ve always loved your imagination. Why don’t you write a story about it?” Oh, sure.

We live in a kind of house called a loft, which is like an apartment except it’s mostly one big room with only a couple of half walls and doors. This is especially inconvenient when a person wants privacy or if a person has something to hide, which usually means the same thing.

Jane was on the bottom bunk, dressing her doll, Nonnie. The top bunk is mine.

“You share a room?” said Alyssa, at a normal volume.

Jane’s eyebrows pulled together. This is what I mean by no privacy. If I was going to keep Alyssa hidden, I needed a miracle. Because Alyssa was too full of herself to be quiet. And Jane’s wily brain sticks to secrets like Velcro.
Harry squirmed out of my arms and started barking again.

“Oh, shut up!” said Alyssa.

Jane looked at me with an alert shine on her face. “You did another trick, didn’t you, Billie? You vanished someone like you did with Harry.”

Her eyes flitted right and left of me and settled where Harry was sniffing, at what must have been Alyssa’s feet.

“Who’s there?” Jane commanded in a stern voice. She groped forward like she was playing blindman’s bluff. I heard Alyssa step back, her heel grinding a Playmobil doctor. Harry scampered away in alarm, whining a little.

I grabbed Jane’s wrists and looked her straight in the eye. I was torn between admiring her cleverness and wincing from the horrible pliers of panic that pinched my skull whenever the Blabbermouth bumped into news.

“Jane,” I said. “Janey-Jane-Jane. How about this: We’re going to play a game. Let’s pretend we have a visitor from, ah, the Forest of … Twinkenteenies, and she’s a powerful sorcerer and—”

“And she’s invisible!” cried Jane. Harry barked, almost like applause.

“Yeah. She’s invisible. Her name is Toady-Breath and—”

That got me a kick behind the knee.

“And she’s invisible because she’s here on a Secret Adventure, and her very life will be threatened by Dark Powers if we reveal her whereabouts.”

“And then what?”

“Oh, um, well, we better be nice to her, don’t you think? We better serve her some fairy food. Will you go get her a snack?”

“Yes, yes! I’ll get the food! I’ll get Oreos! Fairy Frog Sorcerers love Oreos!”

She zoomed to the kitchen to find a snack. Harry bounded after her, nipping at her sneakers and barking joyful yaps.

“I’m not here to play some dumb fairy game with your kid sister, Billie. I’m really tired of all this. You’ve had your bad, little joke. Would you just do your stupid magic tricks or whatever? So I can reappear and go home?”

Go home? I suddenly saw a movie fast-forwarding
in my imagination. Invisible Alyssa telling her mother why she wasn’t there. Mother thinking she was hearing voices. Alyssa grabbing mother and shaking her to prove her story. Mother disappearing. Father tearing at his tufts of hair and calling the cops. Flock of cops arriving, dragging me off to jail wearing handcuffs.

“Go home?” I murmured.

Clearly, Alyssa could not go home in this condition. The full reality of our predicament washed over me. I was stuck with my invisible enemy.

W
hat were you supposed to be doing after school today?” I asked Alyssa. “Won’t your mother be wondering where you are?”

“I usually go home on the school bus. My mother gets home from the office around six.”

“You just hang out alone?”

“Yeah, you know, I have a snack, watch TV,
tell her I’m doing homework. Oh!” She sounded dismayed for a second. “I’m supposed to check in or they dock my allowance. I should phone now. Where’s your phone?”

“Jane!” I called. “Bring the phone, would you? I need to call somebody about homework.”

“You should get a phone in your room,” said Alyssa.

“No kidding,” I said.

Jane came in with a plate of cookies and graham crackers in her hands and the remote telephone receiver tucked under her chin.

“Mom’s pouring lemonade,” she said as she unloaded. “I’ll go get it. I told her three glasses, for a game.” She winked and ran back to the kitchen.

I held the phone in the air. “You better do this fast. Jane’ll be back in two minutes.”

Alyssa snatched the phone away into thin air. A moment later it reappeared on the floor.

“You’ll have to dial,” she said. “I can’t see the numbers while I’m holding the phone.”

“Oh, cripes. What’s the number?”

I dialed for her and handed it back.

“Hello? Extension number four-five-seven, please. Hello, Tina? This is Alyssa. Uh, fine, thanks. Is my mom there?”

“Who’s Tina?” I whispered.

“My mother’s secretary.”

The seconds ticked by. I heard Jane giggle in the kitchen and ice rattling out of its tray.

“Oh, hi, Mom? I’m calling because I didn’t go home on the bus today. I was invited to have a sleep-over.”

“What!” I spluttered. “You were not!”

“By Billie Stoner,” Alyssa continued, her voice as cool as cool.

I waved my hands where I thought her face must be, shaking my head back and forth. Alyssa sleep over at my house? No way!

“Uh-huh. Billie Stoner. Ms. Stoner’s daughter. Well, I know I don’t usually like … but … well, yeah, I know I told you she was …” Alyssa’s voice dropped to a mumble.

Embarrassment hovered over us. I wondered what terrible things she’d said about me to her mother. Probably the same kind of things I’d said about her to mine.

“I’ll borrow pajamas.” Her voice was normal again. “So, it’s okay?

“Oh, let me ask.” Alyssa poked me, and my sweatshirt flickered for an instant. “When should I be picked up?”

“Now,” I said, knowing it was hopeless.

“Get real. When? When is it going to wear off?”

“Tell her you’ll call her,’” I whispered.

My heart sagged like a water balloon ready to pop. I was going to have to help her. I’d have to call Jody. I’d have to find all the ingredients for the potion. The talcum powder, the different fungi … The dog biscuits we have. I would need Hubert for the gum juice. Why did it have to be so complicated? I was going to have to—

“Mom? Can I call you again in the morning? We might do our homework.”

Of course she didn’t have to know I was going to help her. She deserved to suffer for as long as possible….

“Yes, I promise. Yes, yes, I will. Okay, g’bye. Mom.” The phone flew through the air and landed on Jane’s bed.

“I did
not
invite you to stay here tonight,” I said.

“Do you have any better ideas, you lamebrain?” Somehow Alyssa managed to sneer even without a face.

“You’re the last person I want as a guest, Alyssa.”

“Billie!” Jane was standing there, holding a teetering tray with three glasses. “It’s Alyssa? The Frog Fairy is Alyssa? I thought you hated Alyssa!”

“Jane!”

“I’m not deaf, you brat, only invisible,” said Alyssa.

“But how come she gets to be invisible, and I never do? I want to! When’s my turn?”

“Oh, shut up!” yelled Alyssa.

“You shut up, Alyssa!” I said.

“I’m telling Mommy!” cried Jane.

I snatched the tray of drinks from her hands before we had a disaster. I put the tray on my desk and pulled Jane onto her bed, landing with the phone under my spine. Harry was on top of us in a second, yelping with delight.

“Janey,” I whispered. “I know it doesn’t seem fair, but being invisible isn’t always a good thing. No one hugs you if they can’t see you. People say rude things about you even if you’re standing right there.”

“I didn’t mean to.”

“I know, I know, I’m not mad at you. Actually, I’m mad at Alyssa for getting this way. But here’s the thing. If Mom finds out, I’ll be in so much trouble I’ll be crying for a week.”

“You will?”

She sounded intrigued instead of sympathetic. I tried to think fast. I knew it would be much safer to have Jane as a partner on this.

“If you can keep this secret,” I promised, “I will give you such a big reward you won’t believe it.”

“What will you give me?”

“It’ll be a surprise.”

“Do I get the present tomorrow?”

“When tomorrow comes and we still have a secret, we’ll talk about delivery.”

I took a deep breath before I allowed myself
to say the next part out loud. “Plus, think of this: We get to have a sleep-over party, and Mom doesn’t even know!”

“Mom doesn’t even know what?” said my mother, suddenly arriving at the side of the bed.