What Not to Do If You Turn Invisible

by Ross Welford

  My invisible thumbprint might still open the gate, but I’d be seen on the security camera, and I don’t look like a regular student, not in this get-up.

  But – once again, if you’ll excuse my boasting – I’m ahead of the game. I pull a plastic bag from my jacket pocket. There’s a large rhododendron bush about ten metres along the high mesh fence, so big that there’s a space inside it for about two people, which is used by the older kids who want to smoke. The ground is littered with cigarette ends, but I don’t mind. It’s time to go naked, and I have other things to worry about.

  I quickly take off my clothes and cram them into the plastic bag, and shove the whole lot a bit further under the bush.

  Then I emerge.

  Naked and invisible.

  The walk here has actually made me bolder, I think. I’m not feeling as nervous as I was before.

  I head back towards the gate just before a van pulls up with TYNE CATERING written on the side. A moment later, there’s a metallic clank and the gate opens. It’s a simple matter to stroll in behind the van and there I am: in the school grounds.

  There’s nobody about outside. Everyone is in lessons.

  There’s a longish drive that leads up to the main entrance, and which goes round the back, basically encircling the school, which is a two-storey building with countless extensions and annexes, all built at different times and each with a plaque announcing which local councillor performed the opening ceremony.

  The most recent was the Performing Arts Block, which is over to the right, and that’s where I go now. This is where Whitley’s Got Talent will be starting in about an hour.

  The air is warm and sticky, and the sky is a glowering purply-grey. But so long as it doesn’t start raining, I’ll be fine.

  Because if it starts raining, the raindrops will hit my invisible skin and make me visible.

  Drip.

  Drip.

  Drip.

  I haven’t told you this before, because it hasn’t really rained yet. But I kind of knew that it would eventually and I would tell you when it came up.

  Well, it has come up, and so here goes.

  Getting rained on – like, really rained on – is just about the worst feeling I can have. I mean, since for ever, not just since being invisible.

  One of the reasons I haven’t mentioned it is so that you won’t think I’m crazy, even though I am. Just a bit, anyway.

  It’s not as though being rained on gives me panic attacks or anything. It’s not that.

  It’s that rain – heavy rain, not just a shower – makes me think of my mum. And it makes me sad. And I don’t want to be sad when I think of my mum. So that makes me scared. Does that make any sort of sense?

  I’m scared of the rain making me feel sad when I think of my mum.

  I think it’s because one of the very few memories I have of my mum is in the rain, and it’s not a good memory.

  It’s before the funeral memory I told you about. It’s probably my very earliest memory of all. I must have been about two and a half? Maybe even less. I’m walking, I know that, on a pavement somewhere. And Mum is walking too, gripping me by the wrist.

  It’s raining, like, really raining. There is lightning flashing around us, and people shouting, and Mum is soaking wet and shouting back at them, swearing, telling them to go away, only ruder. She is holding my wrist so hard that it’s hurting and that’s making me cry, and Mum is crying too.

  I think there must have been traffic, when I was there on the street with Mum, because the smell of rain and traffic fumes can sometimes bring back this memory, especially if it’s night-time, and …

  Well, that’s about it, really. I was upset, Mum was upset, and people were not being nice, and my wrist hurt. That’s all I can remember, and even then it’s sketchy.

  I was only little.

  So, when it starts raining, it immediately makes me feel sad.

  But now it also starts making me visible.

  I look down and there are droplets of water hanging in the air where my arms are, on my hands, making a sort of shimmery ghost-me.

  As the rain descends, so does the air temperature. It goes from warm and sticky to cold and wet, and I’m huddled against the wall of the Performing Arts Block, where there’s an overhanging roof, using my hands to brush off the rain as much as I can, and I’m feeling cold, shivery, scared and angry.

  Cold and shivery is obvious. The scaredness is the rain/Mum thing, which has made my breathing shallow and fast and my heart beat rapidly in my chest.

  The anger? That’s just me. I’m furious with myself for having taken such a stupid risk. What the hell was going through my head when I thought that this would be a good idea?

  I bet you thought, ‘That’s a crazy idea’ when you read it, didn’t you?

  Well, congratulations. You were right.

  I look down all around where I am standing and I think I have removed most of the rain from my skin. Except for …

  Oh. My. God. My head!

  My hair is soaking. I can feel it, but not see it. Carefully, I edge along the wall towards a window. It’s one of the windows into the performing studio, and there’s a dark blind pulled down behind it: it makes an almost-perfect mirror, and sure enough, when I stand in front of it, there’s a silvery, watery fuzz of my hair – faint, but nonetheless visible.

  It looks … weird. I peer closer, and my breath on the glass forms a cloudy patch.

  The only thing for me to do is to get my hair dry, and I’ll have to do that in the girls’ toilets where there’s a hand dryer.

  I need to act quick, I know that, but I can’t resist drawing my initials in the steam.

  E.L.

  And then I freeze. From behind me I hear someone speak.

  ‘Did you see that?’

  I daren’t turn, but I recognise the voice.

  I can see their reflections, standing about three metres away. It’s Aramynta Fell and Katie Pelling of the posse.

  ‘See what?’ Aramynta says.

  They’ve both stopped and are staring right at me. Right through me, I should say.

  ‘That.’ Aramynta points. ‘Them letters just … wrote themselves.’

  The steam patch is, thankfully, disappearing, and along with it the letters.

  ‘What are you on about?’ Katie says. ‘What letters?’

  ‘It was there, it … they … And what’s that?’ She is pointing right at my head now.

  Right at me.

  But Katie has lost interest. Barely glancing back, she’s walking off round the corner.

  ‘It’s a wall, Aramynta. They hold roofs up, you know? Come on, we’re going to be late.’

  Aramynta’s having nothing of it, and I’m terrified because she’s coming towards me. Slowly, hesitantly, with her hand out. And I know she’s going to touch my head.

  ‘Come on!’ shouts Katie.

  I could run? But then she’d follow – she’s got that determined, curious look on her face. Besides, my running route is blocked by Katie Pelling.

  Or I could do something else. Something that’ll stop her touching my head. I have no idea where this comes from, but I have only a second to act because her hand is just a few centimetres from my head.

  As I stick my tongue out, I utter the loudest, strangest throaty gargle I can.

  It’s like: klaaaaaaghhhhghghghgh!

  And then, for good measure, I lick her hand.

  It all happens at once, the gargle and the licking.

  It’s a combination of the two things, I think, that so utterly freaks her out.

  It takes a second for it to sink in and then Aramynta Fell does something that makes me feel almost sorry for her. She lets out a little, terrified scream and she just sinks to her knees.

  She is truly speechless with shock. I’m not sure it could be fright because she’s not even sure that there is anything there to be frightened of. She starts panting and sobbing and staring at her hand while backing away.

>   ‘Mynt! What the heck has got into you?’ says Katie, approaching her with concern.

  Aramynta has not taken her eyes off my hair since it happened, but now she does. I take my chance to dash round the corner towards the door, but I stop to hear what she says.

  ‘It … it … I mean … licked … eugh … it did. Agh!’

  Katie is suddenly all concerned. ‘Hey, babe. It’s OK. Come on. What’s wrong? Aw, look at you, you’re in a puddle …’

  I can hear them go back the way they came from, and I lean against the wall, breathing deeply and trying hard not to laugh.

  Only, I’m not at all sure that what has happened is funny.

  Satisfying, definitely.

  But funny?

  This invisibility business is more complicated than I thought.

  I have found myself the perfect spot in the wings of the small stage at the end of the school theatre.

  There’s a stack of chairs and a fake fireplace that was used in last year’s lower-school production of Oliver! If I squeeze between them, I’m out of the way, and would probably be invisible even if I wasn’t actually, you know, invisible.

  If I lean out a bit I can see part of the audience who are filing in, noisy and excited. I’m almost nervous just from being onstage and although I know – like, really know – that no one can see me, it’s still a very peculiar feeling.

  The way Whitley’s Got Talent works is like this.

  Twenty acts, two from each class in the lower school, are each given a three-minute slot. With introductions and changeovers and the prizes at the end, the show lasts two hours.

  They don’t do judges’ comments or anything like that – not this year anyway. The first year of the show, before I was at the school, they tried that, but the judges – who were other kids – were trying to be too funny and cruel. Two acts left the stage in tears. Last year they switched to teachers being the judges, but they were too kind and said that all of the acts were excellent, even the ones that weren’t, and the audience started booing the judges.

  So this year it’s a committee of three students and three teachers, voting in secret and not making comments.

  Mr Parker is in charge of introducing the acts. Today he has a bow tie on, and he skips up the steps to a cheer and applause, and at least one wolf whistle, which he acknowledges with a mock curtsy, which gets a laugh.

  (Honestly, Mr Parker should just do the whole show. He’d win easily.)

  ‘Thank you, thank you. A little bit of decorum, please, as we ready ourselves for a veritable cornucopia of entertainment! Indeed, we have comedians, crrrrooners, contortionists and terpsichorean tunesmiths – kindly desist with the giggling, Mr Knight, and look it up if you’re finding that my choice of vocabulary obfuscates my lucidity!’

  Half the time, I can only guess at his meaning but I love listening to him.

  He goes on like this for a bit longer, then gets to the first act.

  ‘Please put your hands together rrrrapidly and rrrrepeatedly for Class 7E’s mistress of melody – Miss Delancey Nkolo!’

  Delancey is in the year below me, and she’s good.

  The lights go down and then up again as she comes onstage, and everybody cheers. Two boys from Year Eight are doing the lighting, and Delancey sings a Beyoncé song, complete with all the vocal swoops and trills and everything.

  She finishes to a huge round of applause, and I’m thinking, Poor Boydy.

  After two more acts – Finbar Tuley playing a really tricky piano piece, and two girls from Miss Gowling’s class doing weird, sort-of-yoga moves to music – it’s Boydy’s turn.

  Mr Parker introduces him.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, you’ve heard of Eric Clapton, you’ve heard of Jimi Hendrix – well, those of you with any taste in music have … Settle down, settle down. Now it’s time to hear of Boyd. Class 8A’s axeman of excellence, a guitarist of gargantuan greatness. Give it up for … Elliot Boyd!’

  Wow. That’s some introduction. As Boydy makes his way to the stage, I can tell he’s nervous – and who wouldn’t be after a build-up like that?

  He starts to tune his guitar. Ding-ding-ding. Ding-ding-ding … dong.

  Oh no.

  (Tip to guitar performers: tune your instrument before you go on.)

  Boydy does a few try-out chords, and then more tuning. Someone gives a sarcastic cheer.

  Come on, Boydy, get on with it, I’m thinking.

  A murmuring is starting in the audience.

  He’s losing them, and I know I have to act now. Coming out from behind the fireplace, I take a deep breath and prepare to do the scariest thing I have ever done in my life.

  Have you ever had a dream where you are naked in public?

  It’s not exactly unusual. Apparently ‘being naked in public’ is the most common bad dream people have. It sits ahead of falling, flying, being chased and being unprepared for an exam.

  In my recurring bad dream, I’m at school, although not this school – my primary school. I’m in the playground and, looking down, I realise to my complete horror that I am completely naked. Not a stitch on, and the funny thing is that nobody seems to have noticed. If I carry on walking, and dodging into doorways, people just ignore me. I don’t have far to go until I get to the cloakrooms, where there will be some clothes on a hook that I can put on. But even though I am walking in the right direction, the cloakroom gets no closer, while I am becoming more and more certain that people will notice that I have nothing on. The embarrassment builds into a real fear that everyone will turn and look, and I eventually wake up. I know the dream so well that sometimes I tell myself, in my dream, ‘Oh, Ethel, it’s just that silly dream again. Why don’t you wake up?’ And I do.

  I agree: other people’s dreams are usually very boring. I wouldn’t normally tell anyone about a dream, because I find myself getting bored stiff when other people tell me theirs. But this one is important because when I emerge from the wings of the school stage that is exactly how I feel.

  I am naked as the day I was born, with one major difference: nobody can see me.

  A strange feeling? You bet.

  I am onstage, in front of the whole school, with no clothes on.

  For a moment or two, I just stand there, rigid with fear.

  I’m expecting at any minute to hear someone shout:

  ‘Look! There’s Ethel Leatherhead with no clothes on!’

  But they don’t.

  Instead, Boydy continues to stumble his way through a guitar piece, and it’s awful. People are starting to giggle.

  I come up behind Boydy and lean in close.

  ‘It’s me, Ethel.’

  He gasps and jerks his head round, causing him to miss another note.

  The audience are openly laughing now, and I hear the first ‘boo’, even though mocking the performers is strictly not allowed.

  Then Boydy just stops altogether.

  I reach forward and gently take the guitar from him.

  ‘Let go. It’ll be fine. You’ll see.’ I’m whispering so that the microphone doesn’t pick it up.

  With his left hand, he releases his grip on the guitar’s neck, and I slowly lift it a bit higher.

  The audience falls silent, and then I hear a small gasp, which builds.

  Into his ear I say, ‘Now pretend you’re making it fly.’

  I’ll give him this: he’s good. He gets it straight away, and moves his hands in mysterious gestures, as I make the guitar sway from side to side and pick up the tune where Boydy left off.

  I can’t actually do much playing while I’m moving the guitar around – I’m not that good. But I do manage to pull off some near-accurate chords and stuff in between more elaborate twists and turns of the instrument, and the audience are loving it!

  Boydy fixes a grin on his face and turns his head a little towards me, saying through his grin, ‘Ethel, are you, erm … Are you naked?’

  ‘Shh. Yes. I am, obviously. Don’t even think about it.’


  He keeps his fixed smile. ‘I wasn’t. Honest. Until now.’

  ‘Shut up.’

  ‘Got it.’

  A ripple of applause starts, and then a cheer as I lift the guitar higher. I’m laughing inside as I imagine what the audience is seeing: it must look truly magical!

  Boydy is grinning like mad, and waving his arms around as if he’s conducting the guitar’s movements as we go from one side of the stage to the other, and I’m feeling so confident that I tell him, ‘Follow me!’

  There’s an aisle up the centre of the seating, which leads to the rear doors of the theatre. With Boydy following and waving his arms, and me strumming the guitar as best I can, I go down the steps at the front of the stage and up the aisle.

  I know: it’s a massive risk. But I’ve led a pretty risk-free life so far, and I think I have a bit of catching up to do.

  I think it’s the thrill that gives me the confidence. The thrill of doing something so outrageous yet being completely unseen.

  At any time, someone could reach out and touch me, but they’re all so awestruck that no one does. They just watch, open-mouthed, as Boydy – grinning like a madman – conducts his floating guitar down the centre aisle, through the audience, surfing a wave of amazement.

  People are shaking their heads in astonishment, their mouths agape, eyes shining, just loving it, and loving him, and I just want this to go on for ever.

  Someone please tell me: why is it that when I’m enjoying myself the most, there’s a little voice in the back of my head telling me that it’s all going to go wrong? It means I can never lose myself ‘in the moment’, however much that’s supposed to be a good thing to do.

  Instead, I always come back to what Gram would say at such a time:

  ‘Pride, Ethel, comes before a fall.’

  It’s not meant literally, obviously, but I should have seen it coming.

  Or should I? I don’t know: how could anyone?

  I suppose it’s just Jesmond and Jarrow Knight; wherever they are, you have to be on your guard, and I do spot them, halfway to the back, sitting on the edge of the aisle.