The Invisible Day Read online

  I stirred it a bit with my fingertip and patted some onto my nose. It was soft and thick, like crushed chalk or cocoa powder. I rubbed more on my cheeks and arms. It had the faint smell of stale toffee. I felt, not exactly a tingle, but a warming. For a moment, it made my skin gleam.

  Then, even though it’s impossible, I seemed to get fuzzy, like a photograph out of focus. And then, before my very own eyes, I began to disappear!

  It was the strangest feeling I’ve ever had, watching myself fade away to nothing. Even when I was gone, I could see. I mean, my eyes still worked so I could look in the mirror, but it was the toilet stalls I was looking at. The ugly green painted doors, the gray tiled walls, and the paper towel dispenser. I was just not there anymore!

  “This,” I said aloud, “is really weird.” I could talk and I could hear!

  “This is as weird as it can be.” My voice sounded hollow, but maybe it always sounds that way in the bathroom and had nothing to do with my body disappearing.

  I stared into the mirror. I tried to swallow. What was I supposed to do now? Walk into chorus practice and start singing? Go out and confess? “Uh, yeah, I found this bag and kept it for myself. I used the stuff inside and now, well, now I’m gone!” I imagined the look on my mother’s face. I decided to keep thinking.

  Maybe if I washed it off?

  It was a relief that I could grasp and turn the tap without visible fingers. I could feel the water splashing over my hands and face, but nothing happened. Except that now I had drippy hands and a wet face.

  Suddenly I heard voices outside the door. And a giggle that could only be Alyssa’s. I scooped up the powder and the other jars in half a second and nearly screamed when they vanished at my touch. I dropped them into my pack like burning matches. They reappeared instantly.

  The bathroom door swung open. Without thinking, I dove for cover in one of the toilet stalls, just as Alyssa burst in with Sarah right behind her.

  I had left my backpack on the floor beside the sink.

  5 • Telling Hubert

  I know she’s in here,” said Alyssa in her bossy way. “I saw her go in. Billie! Billie? Aha!” She had spotted my pack.

  “Her pack is here,” said Sarah helpfully. “So she must be, too.”

  I was an ice statue, cold with fear and as still as a toilet. I clenched my hands and closed my eyes, waiting for Alyssa to see my feet.

  Then I almost choked, trying to hold in a laugh. I was invisible!

  Alyssa poked her nose under the stall door, trying to catch me balancing on the toilet seat, but she looked right through me. I stuck out my tongue at her upside-down face.

  “She’s not here.” I could hear her disappointment. “How did she get out? Come on, Sarah, let’s get her in trouble. She’s late for chorus.”

  “She’s probably in chorus, Alyssa,” I heard Sarah grumble. “We’re the ones who are late.”

  Sarah is new this year. Her family just moved here from Wisconsin. Alyssa snatched her up instantly so she would have a slave-girl. So now nobody else really hangs out with her. Other than being friends with Alyssa, her only mistake is that she hasn’t realized yet that fifth-graders in New York City do not wear pink. She’ll catch on.

  “Maybe I won’t snitch just yet,” said Alyssa. “But I’m taking this hostage.”

  Her shiny boots clattered out the door, with Sarah trailing.

  I knew without looking that she had my backpack.

  I had to get Hubert right away. I glanced in the mirror to check that I still wasn’t there. I left the bathroom and tiptoed down the hall to the music room. There he was, in the alto section, gazing up at Mr. Belenky like a choirboy.

  Sarah’s head was bowed and Alyssa’s cheeks were bright pink so I knew they’d gotten the evil eye. Too bad I missed it. Lucky for me, Mr. Belenky would never stop a song to listen to Alyssa. He just glares if you’re late and usually glares at the parents, too, assuming it’s their fault. My pack was between Alyssa’s feet at the end of the second row.

  I realized I would have to think about my approach. It would be too easy to scare the wits out of Hubert. And this kind of thing just doesn’t happen every day.

  I retreated to the hallway. Under the bulletin board was a stack of flyers for the middle school play. I scribbled on the back of one of them.

  Hubert! Emergency!

  Before class, go to boys’ bathroom.

  2nd floor. Billie.

  I hadn’t really noticed before how bathrooms were the only place where a kid can be alone. I chose that one because it’s a single, with a lock on the main door.

  I folded the note twice and put it on the upper shelf of Hubert’s cubbie, where I knew he would find it soon, wrapped around his stash of banana gum.

  Crouched next to the sink in the bathroom, I got a little stiff. Maybe it was only a few minutes, but it felt like hours. I was trying not to worry about my predicament. It could even be fun, eavesdropping and going places where maybe I shouldn’t be.

  Mostly, I just kept hoping that no one would come in to use the toilet or that other weird piece of plumbing. Finally, I heard Hubert’s triple knock, and I triple-knocked back. He opened the door and looked astounded at the empty room.

  “Hubert,” I whispered, “it’s okay; come in; I’m invisible.”

  He was not reassured. His face slid into a pudding of worry, and I could almost feel his hand sweating on the doorknob.

  “Hubert, I promise, it’s okay. Please come in before anyone sees you standing there like a dodo-bird. I need your help.”

  He stepped in automatically and closed the door behind him.

  “Where are you?” Hubert’s eyes were roaming around the room.

  “I’m over here, you idiot! Look at me!” I grabbed his hand and he gasped, but I had his attention in more or less the right direction.

  “Uh, does your mother know about this?”

  “What do you think?”

  “You’re in trouble, Billie. Plus, you’re in the boys’ bathroom.”

  “Duh.”

  We were quiet for a minute.

  “Lucky for you, Ms. McPhee is sick today. We have a substitute, with purple frames on her glasses. Talk about ugly!” He wiped his face. Enough chitchat.

  “What happened?” He perched on the toilet. “This is really creepy, Billie.”

  “I was trying to tell you before chorus. I found a little bag in Central Park and inside were all these little jars full of cream and powder and stuff and I didn’t realize they were magic and …”I couldn’t even show him! “I can’t even show you because Alyssa stole my backpack with all the stuff inside. You have to help me get it back.”

  “From Alyssa?”

  “Yeah, from Alyssa. Maybe you could be invisible with me!”

  He perked up immediately.

  “But we have to get my pack. And we have to swipe the attendance sheet when it goes down to the office and check off our names. It’s so cool that McPhee is sick. The sub won’t know my mother.”

  Hubert’s head started to shake back and forth in double time.

  “I don’t think so, Billie. This is maybe not such a good idea.”

  “Hubert, it’s our big chance. We can go outside and see the world and the world can’t see us. Hubert, come on!”

  “Billie, you’re dreaming. You—”

  There was a knock on the door. We froze.

  6 • Walking Tall

  Hubert? This is Ms. Maloney.” It was a perky voice. “Are you okay?”

  “The substitute,” hissed Hubert.

  I poked him.

  “Uh, yes, ma’am,” he stuttered.

  “Well, then. Get a move on. You should be preparing for the math quiz.”

  “Flush the toilet,” I whispered. He flushed the toilet.

  “Turn on the taps.” He turned on the taps.

  “What are you going to do, Billie?” He was really washing his hands.

  I knew what I was going to do.

  He r
eached for the paper towel. I had to keep dodging him.

  “I’m going to go out, Hubert. Outside, by myself. Just for a little while. I’ll meet you back here in an hour. And you have to get my pack from Alyssa. That’s your mission. And cover for me.”

  There was another knock.

  “I’ll be okay,” I whispered. “You better go.” I watched him walk down the hall behind the substitute. He kept looking back. He even lifted his fingers in a goofy little wave. I tore off a piece of paper towel and let it float to the floor so he’d know I was there.

  Ms. Shephard, our door dragon, was sitting in her cubicle in the front hall, with her glasses shoved up on her forehead. She always wears some junky piece of collage jewelry that her kid made.

  The pink attendance sheets were in a stack on the ledge right in front of her. I waved my hand in her face. She didn’t flinch.

  The phone rang. Ms. Shephard turned toward the switchboard, and I gently thumbed the top corners of the pages, looking for Ms. McPhee’s class. Just as the swivel chair swung back, I found the right page and slid it to the ground. The paper had to lie on the floor so that I could see it to find my name. I stood up to swipe a pencil and crouched down again. I made a tiny check, just like the ones Ms. Maloney had done. When the phone rang again, I put the page back. Easy as pie.

  I put my fingers into my ears, stuck out my tongue at Ms. Shephard, and wiggled like Jane doing a belly dance. No reaction.

  Oh, boy, this was going to be fun!

  As soon as I stepped outside the school, though, I took a big breath. It was the first time in my life that I had been on the street all by myself. Not exactly by myself, of course. I guess if those half million other people could have seen me, they wouldn’t have bumped into me so much.

  I concentrated on walking tall with my shoulders back. That’s what my mother says is the best way to seem confident. I realized that no one could see me, but I kept on doing it anyway, just to fool myself.

  I went along Bleecker Street because it was the most familiar. I had walked this block on the way to school with Jane and my mom, and it had been just regular. The deli, the funeral parlor, the Japanese restaurant never open till noon, the watch repair, the bagel shop: just regular.

  Now it seemed about to explode with adventure, as if all the doorways might burst open together and let a stampede of clowns tumble into the street. Or a flock of giant larks might perch on the water towers and douse the air with a joyous song. It seemed possible.

  I was just walking along, but it seemed like a dramatic adventure.

  I was suddenly starving. My breakfast bagel was a long time ago. I stopped outside a fruit market called City Eden. I had a dollar bill and three nickels in my pocket, but I figured that money magically appearing and my voice coming out of thin air could only cause trouble. I would just have to steal.

  I slipped into the store right behind a man with an orange beard and his little boy. The kid was smaller than Jane.

  “Daddy! Daddy! Daddy! I want, I want Sunshine crackers, I said, Daddy, I want Sunshine crackers, Daddy, Daddy, I want Sunshine crackers!”

  “Ben, please use your regular voice. I don’t understand when you whine.”

  This brat was the perfect cover, even if I hadn’t been invisible. He was so noisy that the clerk stared at him in disgust. She didn’t notice the sudden gap in the row of bananas or the bag of Doritos that I scooped from the rack right under her elbow.

  Out on the street again, my neck was warm with triumph. I started to think about the wide range of possibilities for an invisible thief. F A O Schwarz! Barnes & Noble! The candy department of Dean & Deluca! I could have anything I wanted!

  I ate the banana and tossed the peel toward the wire garbage basket on the corner. Swish. Only Ben saw the miracle.

  “Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, a flying banana peel, Daddy, look, I seed, I seed a banana …”

  “Ben, slow down. If you talk in your regular voice, I might…”

  I walked in the opposite direction, toward SoHo. I ate my tortilla chips with what my mom calls gusto. I would have whistled, but my mouth was full. At Houston Street I stopped with a lurch.

  I know it sounds goofy, but I had never crossed such a big street alone.

  “This is a tricky corner,” said a man next to me. I looked down to see if the spell had worn off. It hadn’t.

  “Too many cars making the right-hand turn.”

  I glanced around, wondering who he was talking to.

  “Would you guide me across?” Oh, duh, I thought. He was holding a white cane! I realized that, because he was blind, his hearing was extra sensitive. He knew I was there when nobody else did.

  “Hello!” he said sharply. “Would you guide me across the street?”

  “Of course, sir,” I piped up, “certainly, sir!” I brushed the Dorito dust off my fingers and put my hand under his arm. When the light changed, we stepped into the road. The drivers waiting to turn saw a blind man tapping his way through traffic. We crossed the street safely.

  “Thank you; I’m fine from here,” he said when we got to the other side. A hot-dog vendor looked sideways at him as he waved his cane at me and marched off.

  7 • Magic Movie Moments

  There were ten huge silver trucks parked on Prince Street, a sure sign that a movie was being made. The sidewalk was crisscrossed with black, snaky cords. Blazing white lights shone down on the Vesuvio Bakery. Tony de Angelo, the real-life baker, was hovering off to one side.

  Every week, it seems, there is another movie or TV show being shot in our neighborhood. It’s partly because of our unusual buildings. They are covered with stone decorations, like chunky old birthday cakes. The roof lines and window frames are covered with angels and lions and curlicues, all made of stone. You can always recognize tourists in New York, my mom says, because they walk along gaping upward. Well, I live here and I think it’s cool, too.

  The bakery is what my mom calls quaint. It looks about a hundred years old, with cracking green paint and a window lined with paper, full of fancy breads.

  Right now there were four husky men trying to aim a spotlight through the window at just the right angle. There was an actor standing inside, dressed like a storybook baker, with a white hat and floury apron. I guess he was waiting to be lit at just the right angle. Tony wears velour shirts and dark trousers and definitely no hat.

  The angle of the light was pronounced satisfactory.

  “Clear the set! We’re ready for Miss Clare.” The call went out from one assistant to another, down a row of people wearing black clothes and headphones.

  I was thinking, Miss Clare? Could this be the luckiest day of my life? Am I about to see Dana Clare close up? Dana Clare is my favorite actress. She’s only fifteen, and she has already made two movies. One was Romeo and Juliet, and the other one was a really funny story about a girl who gets lost up a chimney into space.

  Sure enough, Dana Clare stepped out of her trailer and came striding over to the bakery door. She was dressed in regular jeans and a jacket, but I could tell she was wearing movie makeup. She and the director had a little powwow with their heads close together, and then she nodded and said, “Okay, Steven.” He stepped back beside the big camera that was mounted on a complicated apparatus with wheels.

  “Quiet on the set. Thank you. Rolling camera. And action …” Dana fumbled in her jacket pocket for a scrap of paper. Then she looked at the bakery and back down to the paper, comparing. She crumpled the paper into a ball and tossed it behind her onto the road. Litterbug. Then she reached for the brass handle on the bakery door.

  “Cut!” called the director. “That was fine, Dana. Let’s do it again for good luck. Could someone put the paper back?”

  An assistant jumped forward with a fresh scrap and scooped up the other one from the street.

  “Uh, Steven,” said Dana. “Shouldn’t there be something on the paper? I mean, it’s blank.”

  “Sure, Dana, write anything you want.” The same ass
istant gave her a pencil. She scribbled for a moment and then handed it back.

  “Quiet on the set, please.”

  That was my cue. I decided I was going to be in the movie with Dana Clare. I leapt the curb and was at her side in one silent motion.

  Just as the boss said “Action!” I turned and waved at the camera. Dana’s fingers fiddled with her pocket while I grinned and did a dance of happiness. I was maybe eight inches away from her. In fact, my flapping hands made her hair shift a little, like there was a breeze. She glanced up to see where it came from. She looked at the bakery. She looked at me. She looked at the paper. She crumpled the paper and this time let it drop out of her hand onto the sidewalk beside her shoe. She reached for the bakery door.

  “Cut. Print. Beautiful moment of confusion, Dana. Ten-minute break.”

  I waited until everyone was moving before I picked up the paper. I watched Dana Clare saunter back to her trailer. My heart was doing somersaults. I tried to peek in the window, but the blinds were pulled down so I could only see her shadow moving across the light.

  I nearly got crushed by the lighting guys as they maneuvered the equipment to set up the shot inside the bakery. I decided to keep moving. As I strolled along the block, I uncurled the ball of paper. I had to lay it down on the sidewalk so that I could see it to read. It said: Vesuvio Bakery. Dana Clare.

  I smoothed it out and held it flat between my palms. I put it carefully into my back pocket without creasing the edges. Then I did a cartwheel, right in the middle of Prince Street. And then I danced four blocks before I stopped for breath at the corner of Broadway.

  8 • Candy Land

  Dean & Deluca was right across the street.

  Dean & Deluca is the fanciest food store in the world. They have 234 different kinds of cheeses from 106 different countries. I know because I asked one time. We usually just buy cream cheese to go on bagels and sometimes a couple of stinky ones if my mother is having a party. I don’t know who really needs 234 kinds of cheese, but they have them—just in case.