by Bill Myers
“Mom”——he glances around embarrassed——“ you can talk normal now. Your mouth is no longer buried in junk.”
“Yes, of course,” she cries as she once again throws her arms around him. “Oh, SuperSlob!”
After letting her do her mom thing another moment, he finally pries her off and asks, “What were you doing trying to come in here? You weren’t actually thinking of cleaning, were you?”
“Oh, no, Dear,” she says, “I know better than that.”
“Or making my bed?”
“I wouldn’t even know where to find it.”
“Then what were you risking your life coming in here for?”
“A SuperSlob fax just came in,” she says, producing a piece of grease-stained paper. “I was bringing it up to you.”
“Who’s it from?” our hero asks.
“The President.”
“Oh, no! Again?” Our hero sighs. He reaches for the paper and begins reading it through the globs of lima bean casserole, cold pizza, and fuzzy-green juice dripping from his hands. Immediately, he notices that every sentence is written in perfect handwriting. The staggering neatness sends a pain shooting through his brain. “What’s going on?” he cries. “I begged him never to send messages this tidy.”
“I know!” his mother exclaims. “Look how neat the letters are, how straight the margins are.”
The pain fills our hero’s brain. “Is there no end to his cruelty?” He gasps.
“And to top it off, I don’t see a single misspelled word!”
“Oh, Mom...you don’t suppose——”
Ta-Da-DAAAA
(He’s interrupted by the scary music that always plays when the bad guy is introduced.)
“I’m afraid you’re right, Dear,” his mom says. “It looks like the world is once again being attacked by——”
Ta-Da-DAAAA
(The real bad guys get two blasts of scary music.)
“...Neat Freak.”
As they stand in the room, a most amazing thing begins to happen. As if by magic, all of the clothes in Super-Slob’s room begin moving by themselves. Shirts mysteriously move toward hangers to be hung up. Pants begin folding themselves. Even the socks begin sorting themselves and, horror of horrors, actually turning themselves right side out.
What is going on? What sinister plan is Neat Freak pulling off this time? And more important, why is a sloppy person the hero of our story and a neat guy the villain? Does the writer really think he can get away with such mixed-up morality? Does he really think Mom or Dad or Grandma will actually buy you such a book? (Oh, never mind, guess they have.) And, suddenly, just when things are at their neatest——
“Lights out, loser.”
I glanced up to see my older brother Burt (or was it Brock? I can never keep those twins straight) sneering at me from my doorway. Burt (or was it Brock?) was always sneering at me— when he wasn’t ridiculing me, making fun of me, or damaging my emotional health in some other way. Ah, big brothers, what thoughtful, sensitive creatures.
And as the younger brother, my responsibility was to respond to him with equal compassion. “Who died and made you head Neanderthal?”
He scratched his head, obviously not understanding the word ‘Neanderthal.’ Hey, he’s only been in the eleventh grade two years. Finally he spoke. “Mom and Dad are already in bed. They’re headin’ out early tomorrow for their trip.”
“Meaning?” I asked, fearing the worst.
“Meaning me and Burt are in charge for the next three days.” He cranked up one of his more sinister grins. “Meaning you have to do whatever we say whenever we say it.”
Great, I thought, just great. What else could go wrong? Little did I realize when I turned out the light and went to sleep that something a lot wronger than this wrong was already working its wrongness.
Translation: Buckle in folks.
It’s going to get a lot worse.
As weird as it sounds, when I woke up the next morning I didn’t realize I’d turned invisible. (Unlike you, I didn’t have this book’s title to clue me in . . . though I bet you’re still wondering about the “intestine” stuff, aren’t you? Relax, we’ll get to it, we’ll get to it, unfortunately, we’ll get to it.)
Now, where was I? Oh, yeah. I really didn’t know I’d turned invisible until I was outside and heading for school. (Burt and Brock always treat me like I don’t exist, so being ignored by them was nothing unusual. And my little sister, Carrie, spends every waking hour hogging the bathroom mirror, so it’s not like I could catch my reflection or anything.) In fact, it wasn’t until I had joined Wall Street and Opera on the way to school that I even noticed there was a problem.
“Hey, guys,” I called.
“Hey,” they answered without looking up. Wall Street was deep in conversation, and Opera was deep in, well, potato chip consumption. After all, it had been nearly twenty minutes since he’d eaten breakfast.
She continued their conversation. “I mean, I put it there on the dresser when I went to bed. When I woke up this morning, it’s like it had completely vanished.”
“Don’t, munch, munch, sweat it,” Opera said. “It’s just a penny.”
Wall Street turned to him in shock. “Just a penny? Just a penny!? Do you realize how many pennies make up a dollar?”
“Uh, crunch, er, munch, . . .” High finances have never been one of Opera’s strengths.
“Or how many dollars it takes to make a million?”
“Duh, burp, . . .” Okay, neither has math.
“Maybe you just misplaced it,” I offered. But I knew my mistake before I’d even finished the sentence. Wall Street misplacing money would be like the state of Florida miscounting presidential ballots. Okay, bad example. It would be like people actually liking Teletubbies. Okay, another bad example. It would be like—
“Don’t be stupid,” she said, turning to me. “When was the last time I ever misplaced—” Suddenly, she stopped. “Hey, where’d you go?”
I frowned. “What?”
“Wally?” She began looking all around, acting like she didn’t see me. “Wally, where are you?”
“I’m right here.”
Opera glanced up from his bag of chips. “Wally?” he called. “Wally?” Then, turning to Wall Street he said, “He was here a minute ago. I just heard him.”
“Guys,” I said. “What are you doing?”
They exchanged glances. Finally, Wall Street broke into a grin. “Okay, McDoogle . . .” She looked to the bushes behind me, then over to the nearby trees. “How are you pulling this off ?” she asked. “Loudspeakers, is that it? You got some sort of wireless microphone and PA system?”
“What are you talking about?” I asked.
“Wow,” Opera said, so impressed that he’d even stopped chewing. “You’re good. Real, burp, good.” (He stopped chewing but not burping.)
“Guys?” I said.
Still grinning, Wall Street stuck her hand out in my direction. Well, actually, not in my direction. More like in my
“OW!”
“That’s my eye!” I cried.
She immediately pulled back her hand. “Wally?”
“What?” I said, rubbing my eye with my hand. Well, it was supposed to be my hand. But as I looked I noticed I was busy rubbing my eye with thin air.
Thin air?! (Sorry, I’m shouting again.) But how was that possible?! Unfortunately, it wasn’t just my hand that was missing. I also noticed that the arm attached to my hand was gone. Come to think of it, so was my other hand and my other arm and my other . . . all of me!!
“Yikes!!” I cried. “What’s going on?!?”
But Wall Street just kept on grinning. “Oh, this is slick,” she said with a knowing nod. “Very, very slick.”
“Slick nothing!” I screamed. “This is impossible!”
Now Opera began to nod and grin. “He’s good, real good. But where are you really, Wally?” he asked, glancing around.
“I’m right here!” I shouted
.
“Right where?”
“Right here in front of you!”
“Yeah, right.” Wall Street snickered.
I don’t know what was worse—the fact that they couldn’t see me, or that they didn’t understand the seriousness of my problem.
“Guys, I’m right here!” I yelled. “Right here in front of you!” I waved my hand in front of their faces. They didn’t even blink. They just kept grinning broader and nodding bigger. “Guys,” I shouted, “something terrible has happened!!”
Broader grins and bigger nods.
I didn’t know what to do. In desperation, I reached out for Opera’s bag of chips. I lifted it from his hands so it looked like it was floating in midair.
Wall Street grinned, still looking around. “This is very, very cool, Wally. You have any idea how much money we could make selling your idea to magicians?”
“How are you doing it?” Opera asked. “With wires? Mirrors?”
“Guys!” I cried. “Something’s wrong with me. I can’t see myself!”
“Join the crowd.” Opera chuckled.
“No, I’m serious!” I shouted. “I’m . . . I’m . . .”
“What are you going to tell us now?” Wall Street smirked. “That you’re invisible?”
I looked back at my hands . . . or at least where my hands were supposed to be. But there was nothing. Just thin air . . . thin air and the bag of floating chips. “Yes,” I cried. “Yes, yes! I don’t know how it happened, but somehow, I’ve turned invisible!”
This set off another ripple of chuckles as they continued looking around, trying to figure out how I was doing the trick.
“Look!” I said, reaching into the bag and pulling out a handful of chips. “Look! Could wires do this?”
Suddenly, there was a handful of chips floating in the air. And, ever so slowly, Wall Street’s and Opera’s smiles began to fade.
“Can mirrors do this?” I demanded, cramming the chips into my mouth and starting to chew.
If they’d stopped smiling before, they stopped blinking now. Instead, they just stood and stared, their jaws dropping to the ground. But I wasn’t done with my little demonstration.
“Or how ’bout this!” I shouted. With a big gulp I swallowed the mouthful of chips I’d been chewing.
Now they were no longer smiling, blinking . . . or breathing. And for good reason. I followed their stares down to my stomach and
“AUGHHH!”
shouted my head off (if I had a head to shout off ). Because there, hanging in midair, in the middle of where I was supposed to be, floated the chewed-up chips. That’s right. None of me was visible, not my clothes, not my body, not my stomach . . . only the food that had just now entered my stomach.
EEEEwwww. . . . Talk about gross. It was worse than dissecting frogs in science class, creepier than watching open-heart surgery on TV, more disgusting than trying to eat my sister’s meat loaf (well, maybe not that bad, but close). In a flash, all three of us moved into action, each doing what we did best . . .
—Wall Street whipped off her coat and wrapped it around me so no one would see the floating lesson on potato chip digestion (either that or so no one would steal the idea before she could sell it).
—Opera reached out and yanked his bag of Chippy Chipper chips from my hands (the poor guy only had another four bags to get him through the rest of the day).
—And me, well, I don’t remember all the details, but I do kinda remember closing my eyes, rocking back and forth a little, and finally passing out onto the sidewalk—not exactly dead, but not waking up for a while, either.
Chapter 3
Opera, the Good Luck Charm
“Hey, Dorkoid,” a burly eighth-grade football player shouted at Opera. “Where’s my water?”
“Coming!” Opera yelled. He raced onto the practice field with a bottle of water for the big bruiser.
“Hey, Wingnut!” another player shouted. “Grab me a towel!”
“Right away!” Opera yelled. He dashed to the sidelines to get a towel, then ran back onto the field with it.
I leaned over to Wall Street and whispered, “Why do we have to meet here? We’ll never get anything accomplished.”
She answered, “Coach Kilroy won’t pass Opera in PE unless he does extra credit by helping the football team after school.”
“I know that,” I said. “But why do we have to meet now?”
“Hey, Jerkface!” a third bruiser yelled.
“Coming,” Opera called.
Wall Street turned to where she thought I was standing and whispered, “The sooner we get going on my plan, the sooner we’ll start making money.”
Ah, yes, making money. No wonder she told me to keep quiet all day at school. No wonder she told me to just let the teachers mark me absent. She needed the time to figure out how to make a buck off my problem. Good ol’Wall Street.
gurgle . . .gurgle .. . gurgle .. .
“What’s that?” she whispered.
“My stomach,” I moaned, putting my hands where my stomach should be. But, of course, there was no stomach to be seen . . . come to think of it, there were no hands, either. “I haven’t eaten anything since those chips this morning and I’m starved.”
“Sorry, Wally,” she sympathized. “But you saw what happens when you eat solid food.”
“Yeah.” I nodded. “Gross city.”
gurgle . . .gurgle .. . gurgle .. .
Opera ran up to us, huffing and puffing. “Okay,” he gasped. “I think I’ve got a minute. Let’s go over what we know.”
“Right,” Wall Street said. She reached into her pocket and pulled out something between her fingers.
“What’s that?” Opera asked.
“My missing penny,” she said. “I went home during lunch and grabbed it off my dresser.”
Opera squinted. “I don’t see anything.”
“Exactly. Just like Wally, it’s invisible.” She took his hand and shoved the invisible penny into it.
“Hey, that’s neat,” he said, feeling and touching something none of us could see. “Very neat.”
“So . . . ,” Wall Street lowered her voice so she couldn’t be heard. “First of all, we know that whatever happened to my penny is what happened to Wally.”
I nodded. “We both got hit by that OOPS beam.”
“Check. And so did your clothes, which is why we can’t see them.”
“Check.”
“But why did OOPS make them invisible?” Opera asked, still feeling the penny. “I mean, we didn’t type ‘invisible’ or anything on the computer.”
“That’s just it,” Wall Street said. “We typed nothing on that computer, so . . . ,” She let the phrase hang in the air until one of us finally got it.
“So . . . ,” Opera shouted in understanding, “Wally became nothing!”
“Shhh . . .” Wall Street motioned for him to keep it down.
“Wonderful,” I groaned, “I’m a nothing.”
“Actually, you’re something,” she corrected as my stomach gurgled some more.
“Yeah,” I moaned, “invisible intestines.”
“No”—she shook her head—“you’re all there. It’s just that to everyone you appear to be nothing.”
“That’s supposed to make me feel better?”
“But why didn’t it happen right away?” Opera asked. “I mean, why did it take him all night to get this way?”
“I’m not sure,” Wall Street said. “Unless it takes longer to realign atoms to make you look like you’re nothing.”
“Hey, Opera, ol’ buddy.” We looked up to see Jerry Bingham calling from the field. He’s the team’s quarterback and a nice guy (even if he is a superjock). “When you’re done with your friend, you want to grab me a drink?”
“Oh, sure,” Opera shouted, starting toward the cooler.
“No hurry,” Jerry called. “Just when you get the chance.”
Opera nodded.
Wall Street contin
ued her thinking. “So, the next question we have to ask ourselves is . . .”
“How to get me back to normal?” I asked.
“Not just yet,” she answered. “I was figuring we should make some money off you first.”
“Of course,” I groaned. “What was I thinking?”
“Just for a little while,” she said. “We don’t know how long this will last, and we might as well take advantage of the situation while we can.”
“Why am I not surprised?” I sighed.
“But how?” Opera asked.
“That’s what I’ve been figuring,” she said. “And I think I’ve got something. You know the old deserted house just down the street?”
“The Crider place?” I asked.
“Yeah. Well, what we do is start spreading rumors that the place is haunted. Then we start charging people admission to come see.” She looked in the direction where she thought I stood. “And then you can start moving chairs and stuff and make them think the place really is haunted.”
“Cool. . . .” Opera grinned.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Isn’t that kinda like, you know, cheating or something?”
“Who will know? And if that OOPS beam wears off and you start getting visible again, we’ll just tell them that the ghost moved out. But we gotta hurry. I can make up the fliers tonight, print them tomorrow, and we can start charging admission as early as tomorrow night.”
“After the big game,” Opera said.
“Sure.” Wall Street nodded. “In fact, we can pass out the fliers during the game.”
“Guys . . . ,” I said. “I don’t know if this is such a good idea. It’s really not that honest and—”
“Hey, Idiot Boy,” another bruiser shouted from the field. “Where’s that water?!”
“Sorry,” Opera said. He ran to the cooler, grabbed a couple of water bottles, then dashed out onto the field with them. His first stop was Jerry Bingham.
“Thanks, pal.” Jerry grinned, grabbing the water and guzzling it down.
“Why are you always so nice to him?” the first bruiser complained.
“Hey, it’s nice to be nice,” Jerry said. “Besides” —he reached over and tousled Opera’s hair— “rubbing this guy’s head brings me good luck. Ain’t that right, Opera?” He gave Opera a wink.