Billy Sure Kid Entrepreneur and the Invisible Inventor

by Luke Sharpe

  “What? A way to make Kathy Jenkins call me back?” Manny replies. “Because I sure haven’t figured out how to make her do that.”

  “No, I have the idea for our next invention. INVISIBILITY!”

  “That’s great!” says Manny. “I love it! And today I have time to look into who is behind Definite Devices. After all, they sponsored Kathy Jenkins’s article.”

  I get to work trying to balance the key elements in what will be my invisibility formula. I have an idea of what the formula will need. When I was at Spy Academy earlier this year with Mom, I learned about HIDDEN INK—ink that’s completely undetectable until you hold it up to a light. Obviously I’ll want my invisibility formula to keep working under lights (and I’ll want it to turn more than just ink invisible), but it’s good to have as a base.

  As I set up my beakers and start playing around with various combinations of liquids, I hear Manny grumbling.

  “Well, I found an indie rock band call DEFINITE DEVICE, a political blog called DEFINITE DIVIDE, and a tool company selling DEFINITE DE-VICES that attach to your workbench,” Manny announces. “But not a clue about what a company called DEFINITE DEVICES has to do with that article.”

  As the afternoon wears on, I start having better luck than Manny, which is rare. After mixing, heating, and putting a thick syruplike concoction through a small blender, I end up with a bubbling, foaming potion. Staring at it, an idea strikes me.

  “Shampoo!” I cry.

  “Your hair looks fine,” says Manny.

  “INVISIBILITY SHAMPOO,” I explain. “That’s how I’ll make the invisibility invention work! You know, lather-rinse-repeat, all of that.”

  “Okay,” replies Manny, always happy to leave these kinds of inventing details to me.

  I tinker with the syrupy, foaming solution for a while longer. Then I’m ready for a test. I pour a sample into a small plastic bottle.

  “I’m heading home to test this,” I say. I grab Philo and we go back to my house.

  Lather-rinse-repeat-invisible. Lather-rinse-repeat-invisible, I say to myself over and over again. At least that’s what I hope it will say on the label when we release this product. It should make anyone who uses it invisible for an hour.

  At home I walk through the front door and Emily greets me.

  “How about a nice snack?” Super Nice Emily asks, flashing her big goofy smile. Scratch that. I forgot she’s not Super Nice Emily anymore, she’s ULTRA Super Nice Emily.

  “No, thanks, I have something I have to do,” I say. “Shower!”

  Emily glares at me, clearly disappointed I didn’t want her help.

  “Yeah, well, showers are something normal humans do everyday—” she stops herself, probably realizing that this little comment could end her deal with Dad. “Which you obviously are. SHOWER AWAY!”

  I rush upstairs, grab a pair of pajamas, and head into the bathroom with my little bottle of Invisibility Shampoo. I take a shower, washing my hair with the stuff. Lather-rinse-repeat . . . and . . .

  I rinse the shampoo off and look down.

  IT WORKS! I am completely invisible! I can’t see my legs or my feet or any of my body. I lift my hand up in front of my face. That’s invisible too!

  I get out of the shower and dry myself off, thrilled at my success. This is so easy to use. It was quick to make. It’s gonna be a huge hit!

  When I’m all dry, I slip into my favorite footie pajamas, ones with spaceships all over them.

  I step from the bathroom, heading toward my room. Meanwhile, Emily has just reached the top of the stairs.

  “AAAAAAH!” she shrieks, pointing at me.

  “What?!” I yell back, startled. “You can see me? You should not be able to see me! What good is an invisibility invention if you can see me?”

  “Well, I can’t see you,” Emily explains. “But I can see your footie pajamas. They’re walking by themselves. It’s really creepy!”

  I look down. Emily is right. I can see my footie pajamas. I just assumed that when I put on my pajamas they would turn invisible too.

  “Hold up. Billy, you invented invisibility. That’s like, mega huge!” Emily says. “Just don’t wear any clothes when you’re going to be invisible. No one can see you anyway.”

  I think about that for a moment. On one hand it makes sense. But on the other hand . . . “That could be tough in the winter. You know, the cold weather and all.”

  “And, there would be another problem if you had no clothes on,” Emily says.

  “What’s that?” I ask.

  “I can see your face and hands now,” Emily points out.

  I lift up my hand. I can see it clearly. I look in the mirror. There’s my head. “This formula was supposed to last an hour! I can’t believe it wore off already!”

  “So, obviously, if you are having trouble controlling exactly how long the invisibility lasts, it could get tricky if you have no clothes on.”

  “Yeah,” I say, pretty deflated. “We don’t want everyone running around in their birthday suits. Maybe I need to shower with my clothes on? But then I’d be stuck wearing wet clothes.”

  Hmmm . . . back to the DRAWING BOARD, I guess. I’ll have to tackle the refinements to my formula tomorrow at the office.

  I turn to head into my bedroom when a thick rope made of colored strands all woven together comes zooming down the hallway. It floats by itself in midair.

  “That’s Philo’s favorite dog toy!” I say. “But where’s Philo?”

  Emily and I look at each other, both having the same thought at the same moment.

  I race to the bathroom and discover that the bottle of Invisibility Shampoo has been knocked over. A little puddle of the stuff spreads out on the floor.

  “Philo must have rolled around in the spilled shampoo,” I say. “You know how he loves to roll around in anything sticky or goopy.”

  I step from the bathroom and see a large bone bouncing past me in midair. Then the bone floats down the stairs.

  Not knowing what else to do, Emily and I follow the bone down the stairs. It floats right into the living room where Mom and Dad are sitting. Dad is on his tablet. Mom is reading a magazine, happily cut off from her work for a few minutes.

  “What’s going on, Billy?” she asks, her head turning to follow the floating bone.

  “Invisibility Shampoo,” I explain.

  “Makes sense,” Mom says. “It was either that or a ghost, but you never know with your inventions.”

  At that moment, Philo reappears, completely visible now, in the living room. He happily chomps at the bone in his mouth.

  “Well, yeah, but it obviously needs some more work,” I say, patting Philo on the head. Then I head back upstairs. Now to perfect the invisibility formula. . . .

  Lather, Rinse . . . and Repeat

  THE NEXT MORNING at school, I receive the same treatment I’ve gotten for the last few days. Kids look away from me, turn and walk in the opposite direction from me, or shoot me nasty looks.

  But today, none of it bothers me—at least not as much. Maybe I’m just getting used to it, but really, I think it’s because I’m now working on a new invention. I’m always at my HAPPIEST when I’m plugging away on a new idea!

  I spend the whole day thinking about the Invisibility Shampoo. Then I grab Philo and head over to the office, where I find Manny looking concerned.

  “Operation Sure Fix is off to a slow start. I still haven’t heard back from Kathy Jenkins,” he explains. “I’m starting to think that she wanted to spread lies about Sure Things, Inc.”

  “It does seem that way, huh?” I say.

  “It does,” Manny agrees. “And it just doesn’t make sense. First Kathy Jenkins loves Sure Things, Inc. Then we become more successful, and now she doesn’t? Something happened . . . I’m willing to bet this has something to do with Definite Devices.”

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “Definite Devices sponsored Kathy’s articles, so I think they paid her to write l
ies about us. Now we just have to figure it out—who and what is DEFINITE DEVICES? They’ve sure done a good job keeping themselves invisible. I can’t find a thing about them.”

  Manny is right, but I don’t know what to say about Definite Devices now.

  “Speaking of invisible . . .” I say, changing the subject.

  “Oh, yeah, how’d the shampoo work?” Manny asks.

  I fill Manny in on the half-successful trial run. “I think Philo liked it best of all.”

  “URRRRRRR,” Philo moans at the mention of his name. He’s sitting upright in his doggy bed, ears standing straight up. I know this pose. He’s on high alert. Just because I mentioned his name? That’s weird. Usually he’ll only go full-on high alert if another person enters the room. But after a few seconds he lies back down in his bed.

  “Well, here’s some good news,” Manny says.

  I come over and look at his screen.

  “This is our marketing plan for the hovercraft toy,” he begins. “It’ll be in every major toy chain by the end of the year! And the app is already available for smartphones. You can fly a virtual hovercraft on your phone, but once the actual item becomes available, the app will transition into a great MARKETING TOOL to help sell the toy.”

  “Nice,” I say. I don’t know much about marketing, but I’m always impressed by how good at this stuff Manny is.

  “And here is the plan for some other hovercraft-related merchandise,” he continues. “Let’s see, we’ve got a hovercraft-shaped lunchbox, a hovercraft-shaped key chain, a poster that’s shaped like the hovercraft . . . oh, and look at this one, a waffle maker shaped like the hovercraft.”

  “People want hovercraft-shaped waffles?” I ask.

  “Take a look at the advance order numbers and decide for yourself.”

  I scroll down Manny’s spreadsheet.

  “Wow!” I nearly yell in disbelief. “Manny, you’re a genius!”

  I get back to my workbench and start again with the ingredients for the Invisibility Shampoo. But this time I change the amounts, heat them up in a different order, and combine them more slowly.

  A short while later, I’m ready to test the new version.

  “Rather than waiting until I go home again tonight, I’m going to test it right here,” I tell Manny.

  “How’re you gonna do that?” he asks.

  “In the sink,” I say. “I figure that if I shampoo my hair with my clothes on, my whole body and all my clothes should disappear.”

  Many nods and goes back to his spreadsheet.

  I bring a small dish of my new Invisibility Shampoo over to a sink in the corner of the garage. Manny’s dad put this sink in when he built the garage, figuring that he’d be using the garage as his workshop. Little did he know that Sure Things, Inc. would come along and change all those plans! Now we mostly use the sink when we wash our hands after eating pizza from the custom pizza-maker.

  I turn on the faucet and wait for the water to get warm. Then I stick my head under the running water. It feels KIND OF SILLY—I’ve had my head stuck under sinks when I’ve gotten haircuts, but no one told me how hard it is to do yourself! I get water all over my neck and down my shirt. This must be what Emily felt like after washing the car.

  When my hair is good and wet, I pour some of the shampoo onto it, scrubbing. Thick white foamy bubbles form. I work it all through my hair, deciding that I should let the shampoo sit in my hair for a little bit before washing it out.

  I stand up and the white soapy suds drip down onto my shirt.

  Philo looks up at my white foamy hair and tilts his head in confusion.

  “It’s okay, boy. It’s just me.”

  Then suddenly Philo stands up, steps from his bed, and stares at an empty corner of the office. He starts growling!

  “GRRRRR . . . GRRRRRR . . .”

  “What is wrong with you, Philo?” I ask.

  “RUFF . . . RUFF!!”

  Now he’s barking at nothing.

  “Philo, be quiet! There’s nothing there!”

  But he continues to stare into the corner and growl menacingly . . . or at least what passes as menacingly for Philo.

  I wait a few more minutes, then go back to the sink. I stick my head under the running water and rinse out all the shampoo.

  Manny looks over at me and his eyes open wide. I know him well enough to see that he is trying to hold back a giggle.

  Meanwhile, Philo takes one look at me, whimpers, then turns back to barking at the empty corner.

  “What?” I ask. “Didn’t it work?”

  Before Manny can say anything, I look at my hands. I can plainly see both of them. I glance down. My soaking wet shirt is also visible.

  “So it didn’t work at all!”

  “Well, I wouldn’t say that, exactly.” Manny replies, giggling. “Take a look in the mirror.”

  I go over to a mirror hanging on the wall. Peering at my reflection, I step back in shock. The only thing that has turned invisible is my HAIR!

  “Oh great!” I moan. “I can see my scalp!”

  “Think of it as a preview of what you might look like when you’re bald,” Manny says, unable to hold back another round of uncontrollable giggling. “On the bright side, I think you’ve figured out next year’s Halloween costume.”

  “Yeah, yeah, very funny. Looks like I’m back to the drawing board yet again.”

  So, sitting back at my workbench, with my bald head, I go back to work. It’s obvious that shampoo is not going to work as an invisibility delivery system. I need something that can spray all over my body and clothes . . . WAIT A MINUTE. That’s it.

  “I think I have it, Manny,” I say.

  “Uh-huh,” he says without turning around to look at me. I’m guessing that at this point he can’t look at my bald head without cracking up, and he doesn’t want to make me feel any worse than I already do.

  “Forget shampoo,” I say. “I’m going to work on an INVISIBILITY SPRAY. It will be quicker and easier, plus you can spray yourself and your clothes all over without getting soaking wet!”

  Just as I say that, there’s a noise behind me. I spin around and see Manny’s cat, Watson, rolling around. Watson doesn’t come much to the garage, so I’m not used to him being here, although he and Philo get along well (more like they ignore each other). Still, the noise sounded like someone gasping . . . oh well. There’s no one else but Watson there, so it must have been him.

  Help Wanted

  I GET BACK to my bench to work on the Invisibility Spray. I have got to figure out how to make this invisibility formula work the way I want it to work. The future of Sure Things, Inc.—not to mention my REPUTATION—is at stake!

  Manny continues to plug away on his marketing plans.

  “You know what I could really go for now?” Manny asks.

  “An invisibility invention that actually works?” I reply.

  “Well, sure, but I have no doubt you’ll get there, Billy,” Manny says. “But I could totally go for a QUESADILLA. Mmm, all that cheese.”

  “I know what you mean,” I say, although I think if Manny wants something cheesy, he should just help himself to some pizza from the office’s pizza machine. Don’t get me wrong—quesadillas taste delicious. I’m just not sure Manny is about to leave the office, go to a Mexican restaurant, and order one while Operation Sure Fix is in full investigation mode.

  I look down at my Invisibility Spray formula, testing different kinds of heat and ways to mix it. When it’s less goopy than the shampoo, and thinner, like vegetable oil, I decide it’s ready.

  Time to test it!

  Here goes . . .

  I put the formula in a spray bottle, squeeze the handle, and spritz the top of my workbench with it.

  I wait . . . and wait . . . and wait some more.

  But NOTHING HAPPENS. My workbench is still visible.

  After three more tweaks with no success, I realize that it’s getting late, and I need to go home.

  “I’m not
having too much luck here, Manny,” I say. “Which means it’s time to sleep-invent! With any luck I’ll have something useful in the morning.”

  Okay, okay, I know sleep-inventing sounds weird, but it’s what I do. Whenever I’m close to cracking the code on an invention, but can’t quite get it when I’m awake, I go to sleep with a pen under my pillow and wake up to fully rendered blueprints.

  “Have a good night,” Manny says. “And by the way, thanks, Billy. I didn’t even hear you leave and come back.”

  “What are you talking about?” I ask. “I’ve been here working away the whole time.”

  “I’m talking about this!” Manny says. “This EXTRA-DELICIOUS, EXTRA-CHEESY quesadilla!”

  I turn around and see Manny holding up a quesadilla, which he has just taken a big bite out of.

  Okay, now I’m really confused and a little creeped out.

  “Um, Manny, I didn’t get you that quesadilla,” I say.

  “Hmm. . . .” Manny replies, unfazed as usual. “Maybe one of my parents brought it in and I didn’t notice.”

  “That makes sense. Or maybe Ultra Super Nice Emily got it and snuck it in here. Anyway, enjoy. I’m outta here. Wish me luck sleep-inventing tonight.”

  “Grood luurck,” Manny says through a mouthful of quesadilla.

  A short while later Philo and I arrive at home. Once again, Emily is right there at the door to greet me. I’m starting to feel like I have a butler.

  “How was your day, DEAREST BROTHER?” asks Emily, handing me yet another plate of double-chocolate chip cookies.

  The cookies are great. Emily . . . well, like I said, all this niceness is getting to be a little much.

  “Okay,” I say. “Although I’m still having a little trouble nailing down my latest invention.”

  “Well, I’m sure it will all work out,” she says, flashing that weird smile she seems to have perfected.

  I look over Emily’s shoulder into the kitchen and spot Mom. She rolls her eyes in sympathy. Obviously Emily overdoing the nice thing weirds her out as much as it does me.

  “What do you think of this one, Billy?” Dad says, carrying a large painting in from the living room. “I just finished it. It should be the final piece for my show.”