“One minute,” April called. She hadn’t moved from her sitting position against the wall.
Erin moved around the attic for a while, making things fly and float. Then she returned to the little room to admire herself in the mirror.
“I’m really invisible!” we heard her exclaim excitedly. “Just like in a movie or something!”
“Yeah. Great special effects!” I said.
“Three minutes,” April announced.
Erin continued to enjoy herself until about four minutes had passed. Then her voice suddenly changed. She started to sound doubtful, frightened.
“I — I don’t like this,” she said. “I feel kind of strange.”
April jumped to her feet and ran up to me. “Bring her back!” she demanded. “Hurry!”
I hesitated.
“Yes. Bring me back,” Erin said weakly.
“But you haven’t beaten my record!” Zack declared. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. Please. I don’t feel right.” Erin suddenly sounded far away.
I stepped up to the mirror and pulled the chain. The light clicked off.
We waited for Erin to return.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“Just … weird,” she replied. She was standing right next to me, but I still couldn’t see her.
It took nearly three minutes for Erin to reappear. Three very tense minutes.
When she shimmered back into view, she shook herself like a dog shaking water off after a bath. Then she grinned at us reassuringly. “I’m okay. It was really terrific. Except for the last few seconds.”
“You didn’t beat my record,” Zack reported happily. “You came so close. But you folded. Just like a girl.”
“Hey!” Erin gave Zack a hard shove. “Stop being such a jerk.”
“But you only had fifteen seconds to go, and you wimped out!” Zack told her.
“I don’t care,” Erin insisted, frowning angrily at him. “It was really neat. I’ll beat your record next time, Zack.”
“I’m going to be the winner,” Lefty announced. “I’m going to stay invisible for a whole day. Maybe two!”
“Whoa!” I cried. “That might be dangerous, Lefty.”
“It’s Max’s turn next,” Zack announced. “Unless you want to forfeit.”
“No way,” I said, glancing at Erin. Reluctantly, I stepped up to the mirror and took a deep breath. “Okay, Zack, say good-bye to your record,” I said, trying to sound calm and confident.
I didn’t really want to do it, I admitted to myself. But I didn’t want to look like a chicken in front of the others. For one thing, if I did wimp out, I knew that Lefty would only remind me of it twenty or thirty times a day for the rest of my life.
So I decided to go ahead and do it.
“One thing,” I said to Zack. “When I call out ‘ready,’ that means I want to come back. So when I say ‘ready,’ you pull the light chain as fast as you can — okay?”
“Gotcha,” Zack replied, his expression turning serious. “Don’t worry. I’ll bring you back instantly.” He snapped his fingers. “Like that. Remember, Max, you’ve got to beat five minutes.”
“Okay. Here goes,” I said, staring at my reflection in the mirror.
I suddenly had a bad feeling about this.
A real bad feeling.
But I reached up and pulled on the light anyway.
When the glaring light dimmed, I stared hard into the mirror.
The reflections were bright and clear. Against the back wall, I could see April, slumped on the floor, staring intently at her watch.
Lefty stood near the wall to the right, gaping at the spot where I had stood, a silly grin on his face. Zack stood next to him, his arms crossed over his chest, also staring into the mirror. Erin leaned against the wall to the left. Her eyes were on the light above the mirror frame.
And where was I?
Standing right in front of the mirror. Right in the center of it. Staring at their reflections. Staring at the spot where my reflection should be.
Only it wasn’t.
I felt perfectly normal.
Experimenting, I kicked the floor. My invisible sneakers made the usual scraping sound.
I grabbed my left arm with my right hand and squeezed it. It felt perfectly normal.
“Hi, everyone,” I said. I sounded the same as ever.
Only I was invisible.
I glanced up at the light, casting a yellow rectangle down onto the mirror. What was the light’s power? I wondered.
Did it do something to your molecules? Make them break apart somehow so you couldn’t be seen?
No. That wasn’t a good theory. If your molecules broke up, you’d have to feel it. And you wouldn’t be able to kick the floor, or squeeze your arm, or talk.
So what did the light do? Did it cover you up somehow? Did the light form some kind of blanket? A covering that hid you from yourself and everyone else?
What a mystery!
I had the feeling I’d never be able to figure it out, never know the answer.
I turned my eyes away from the light. It was starting to hurt my eyes.
I closed my eyes, but the bright glare stayed with me. Two white circles that refused to dim.
“How do you feel, Max?” Erin’s voice broke into my thoughts.
“Okay, I guess,” I said. My voice sounded weird to me, kind of far away.
“Four minutes, thirty seconds,” April announced.
“The time went so fast,” I said.
At least, I thought I said it. I realized I couldn’t tell if I was saying the words or just thinking them.
The bright yellow light glowed even brighter.
I had the sudden feeling that it was pouring over me, surrounding me.
Pulling me.
“I — I feel weird,” I said.
No response.
Could they hear me?
The light folded over me. I felt myself begin to float.
It was a frightening feeling. As if I were losing control of my body.
“Ready!” I screamed. “Zack — ready! Can you hear me, Zack?”
It seemed to take Zack hours to reply. “Okay,” I heard him say. His voice sounded so tiny, so far away.
Miles and miles away.
“Ready!” I cried. “Ready!”
“Okay!” Again I heard Zack’s voice.
But the light was so bright, so blindingly bright. Waves of yellow light rolling over me. Ocean waves of light.
Sweeping me away with it.
“Pull the chain, Zack!” I screamed. At least, I think I was screaming.
The light was tugging me so hard, dragging me away, far, far away.
I knew I would float away. Float forever.
Unless Zack pulled the chain and brought me back.
“Pull it! Pull it! Please — pull it!”
“Okay.”
I saw Zack step up to the mirror.
He was blurred in shadows. He stepped through dark shadows, on the other side of the light.
So far away.
I felt so feather light.
I could see Zack in the shadows. He jumped up. He grabbed the lamp chain.
He pulled it down hard.
The light didn’t click off. It glowed even brighter.
And then I saw Zack’s face fill with horror.
He held up his hand. He was trying to show me something.
He had the chain in his hand.
“Max, the chain —” he stammered. “It broke off. I can’t turn off the light!”
Beyond the shimmering wall of yellow light, Zack’s outstretched hand came clearly into my view. The dark chain dangled from his hand like a dead snake.
“It broke off!” he was crying, sounding very alarmed.
I stared through the light at the chain, feeling myself hovering beside Zack, floating, fading.
Somewhere far in the distance, April was screaming. I couldn’t make out her words.
L
efty stood frozen in the center of the room. It seemed strange to see him standing so still. He was always moving, always bouncing, running, falling. But now he, too, stood staring at the chain.
The light shimmered brighter.
I saw sudden movement.
Someone was crossing the room. I struggled to focus.
It was Erin. She was dragging a large cardboard box across the floor. The scraping sound it made seemed so far away.
Feeling myself being pulled away, I struggled to watch her. She pulled the box next to the mirror. Then she climbed up onto it.
I saw her reaching up to the lamp. I saw her staring into the light.
I wanted to ask her what she was doing, but I was too far away. I was floating off. I felt so light, so feather light.
And as I floated, the yellow light spread over me. It covered me. Pulled me.
And then, with startling suddenness, it was gone.
And all was darkness.
“I did it!” Erin proclaimed.
I heard her explaining to the others. “There was a little bit of chain left up there. I pulled it and turned off the light.” Her eyes darted frantically around the room, searching for me. “Max — are you okay? Can you hear me?”
“Yeah. I’m okay,” I replied.
I felt better. Stronger. Closer.
I stepped up to the mirror and searched for my reflection.
“That was scary,” Lefty said behind me.
“I can feel myself coming back,” I told them.
“What was his time?” Zack asked April.
April’s features were tight with worry. Sitting against the wall, she looked pale and uncomfortable. “Five forty-eight,” she told Zack. And then quickly added, “I really think this stupid competition is a big mistake.”
“You beat my record!” Zack groaned, turning to where he figured I was standing. “I don’t believe it! Almost six minutes!”
“I’m going for longer than that,” Lefty said, pushing past Zack and stepping up to the mirror.
“We have to fix the chain first,” Erin told him. “It’s too hard to keep climbing up on a box to pull that little piece of chain.”
“I felt pretty strange at the end,” I told them, still waiting to reappear. “The light grew brighter and brighter.”
“Did you feel like you were being pulled away?” Erin asked.
“Yeah,” I replied. “Like I was fading or something.”
“That’s how I started to feel,” Erin cried.
“This is just so dangerous,” April said, shaking her head.
I popped back.
My knees buckled and I almost fell to the floor. But I grabbed the mirror and held myself up. After a few seconds, my legs felt strong again. I took a few steps and regained my balance.
“What if we couldn’t turn off the light?” April demanded, climbing to her feet, brushing the dust off the back of her jeans with both hands. “What if the chain completely broke and the light stayed on? What then?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“You broke my record,” Zack said, making a disgusted face. “That means I have to have another turn.”
“No way!” Lefty shouted. “It’s my turn next!”
“None of you are listening to me!” April cried. “Answer my question. What if one of you is invisible and the light won’t go out?”
“That won’t happen,” Zack told her. He pulled a string from his pocket. “Here. I’m going to tie this tightly to the chain.” He climbed up onto the box and began to work. “Pull the string. The light goes out,” he told April. “No problem.”
“Which one of us is going to be first to get invisible and then go outside?” Erin asked.
“I want to go to school and terrorize Miss Hawkins,” Lefty said, snickering. Miss Hawkins is his social studies teacher. “She’s been terrorizing me ever since school started. Wouldn’t it be cool just to sneak up behind her and say, ‘Hi, Miss Hawkins’? And she’d turn around and there’d be no one there?”
“That’s the best you can do?” Erin scoffed. “Lefty, where’s your imagination? Don’t you want to make the chalk fly out of her hand, and the chalkboard erasers fly across the room, and the wastebasket spill everything out on her desk, and her yogurt fly into her face?”
“Yeah! That’s way cool!” Lefty exclaimed.
I laughed. It was a funny idea. The four of us could go around, completely invisible, doing whatever we wanted. We could wreck the whole school in ten minutes! Everyone would be screaming and running out the doors. What a goof!
“We can’t do it now,” Lefty said, interrupting my thoughts. “Because it’s my turn to beat the record.” He turned back to April, who was standing tensely by the door, pulling at a strand of her black hair, a worried frown on her face. “Ready to time me?”
“I guess,” she replied, sighing.
Lefty pushed me out of the way. He stepped in front of the mirror, stared at his reflection, and reached for the string.
“Lefty!” a voice shouted from behind us. “Lefty!”
Startled by the interruption, I uttered an alarmed cry. Lefty stepped back from the mirror.
“Lefty, tell your brother his friends have to leave! It’s dinnertime. Grammy and Poppy are here. They’re eager to see you!”
It was Mom, calling up from downstairs.
“Okay, Mom. We’ll be right down!” I shouted quickly. I didn’t want her to come up.
“But that’s not fair!” Lefty whined. “I didn’t get my turn.”
He stepped back up to the mirror and angrily grabbed for the string again.
“Put it down,” I told him sternly. “We have to go downstairs. Quick. We don’t want Mom or Dad coming up here and seeing the mirror, do we?”
“Okay, okay,” Lefty grumbled. “But next time, I get to go first.”
“And then me,” Zack said, heading toward the stairs. “I get a chance to beat your record, Max.”
“Everybody, stop talking about it,” I warned as we all clomped down the stairs. “Talk about something else. We don’t want them to overhear anything.”
“Can we come over tomorrow?” Erin asked. “We could start up the contest again.”
“I’m busy tomorrow,” April said.
“We can’t do it tomorrow,” I replied. “We’re visiting my cousins in Springfield.” I was sorry they’d reminded me. My cousins have this humongous sheepdog that likes to run through the mud and then jump on me and wipe its hairy paws all over my clothes. Not my idea of a good time.
“There’s no school on Wednesday,” Zack said. “Teachers’ meetings, I think. Maybe we could all come over on Wednesday.”
“Maybe,” I said.
We stepped into the hallway. Everyone stopped talking. I could see that my grandparents and parents were already sitting at the dining room table. Grammy and Poppy liked to eat promptly. If their dinner came one minute late, it made them real cranky for the rest of the day.
I ushered my friends out quickly, reminding them not to tell anyone about what we’d been doing. Zack asked again if Wednesday would be okay, and again I told him I wasn’t sure.
Getting invisible was really exciting, really thrilling. But it also made me nervous. I wasn’t sure I wanted to do it again so soon.
“Please!” Zack begged. He couldn’t wait to get invisible again and beat my record. He couldn’t stand it that he wasn’t the champ.
I closed the front door behind them and hurried to the dining room to greet my grandparents. They were already slurping their soup when I came in.
“Hi, Grammy. Hi, Poppy.” I walked around the table and gave them each a kiss on the cheek. Grammy smelled of oranges. Her cheek felt soft and mushy.
Grammy and Poppy are the names I gave them when I was a kid. It’s really embarrassing to call them that now, but I still do. I don’t have much choice. They even call each other Grammy and Poppy!
They look alike, almost like brother and sister. I guess that’s w
hat happens when you’ve been married a hundred years. They both have long, thin faces and short white hair. They both wear thick glasses with silver wire frames. They’re both really skinny. And they both have sad eyes and sad expressions.
I didn’t feel like sitting there at dinner and making small talk with them today. I was still really pumped about what we’d been doing all afternoon.
Being invisible was just so weird and exciting.
I wanted to be by myself and think about it. You know. Try to relive it, relive what it felt like.
A lot of times after I’ve done something really exciting or interesting, I like to go up to my room, lie down on my bed, and just think about it. Analyze it. Tear it apart.
Dad says I have a very scientific mind. I guess he’s right.
I walked over to my place at the table.
“You’re looking much shorter,” Poppy said, wiping his mouth with his cloth napkin. That was one of his standard jokes. He said it every time he saw me.
I forced a laugh and sat down.
“Your soup must be ice cold by now,” Grammy said, clicking her tongue. “Nothing I hate more than cold soup. I mean, what’s the point of having soup if it isn’t steaming hot?”
“It tastes okay,” I said, taking a spoonful.
“We had some delicious cold soup last summer,” Poppy said. He loved to contradict Grammy and start arguments with her. “Strawberry soup, remember? You wouldn’t want that hot, would you?”
“It wasn’t strawberry,” Grammy told him, frowning. “It wasn’t even soup. It was some kind of fancy yogurt.”
“No, it wasn’t,” Poppy insisted. “It was definitely cold soup.”
“You’re wrong, as usual,” Grammy snapped.
This could get ugly, I thought. “What kind of soup is this?” I asked, trying to stop their arguing.
“Chicken noodle,” Mom answered quickly. “Didn’t you recognize it?”
“Poppy and I had soup a few weeks ago that we couldn’t recognize,” my grandmother said, shaking her head. “I had to ask the waiter what it was. It didn’t look like what we’d ordered at all. Some kind of potato-leek soup, wasn’t it, Poppy?”
Poppy took a long time swallowing some noodles. “No. Tomato,” he answered.
“Where’s your brother?” Dad asked, staring at the empty chair next to me.