Invisible Inkling

I Figured I’d Come for Lunch

Monday, I walk into the lunchroom alone. “Wolowitz! You want to sit with us?” Chin calls, as she heads off with the girls.

I shake my head. “Maybe tomorrow.”

I don’t want to sit with them because even though Locke, Linderman, and Daley are fairly nice, I don’t know how today is going to be.

Is Gillicut going to come and demand his sprinkles, like before?

Or something worse?

Whatever he’s going to do, I don’t want him to do it in front of those girls.

I pick an empty table in a corner and open my lunch box. My back is to the wall, so I can see Gillicut when he approaches. I take out my yogurt and begin to mix it to the perfect purple color.

Blueberry yogurt. Blueberry yogurt.

Is he coming over? I glance up, but I don’t see him.

I will myself to stay calm.

Blueberry yogurt. Blueberry yogurt.

He’s hurt you before, and you’ve survived, I think.

Blueberry yogurt. Blueberry yogurt.

I look up to see Gillicut—and he’s walking with his tray to the other side of the lunchroom. Way far away from me. He sits down with a kid called Joo and opens his milk.

He sees me looking at him.

We lock eyes.

He looks down.

And then I realize:

Gillicut’s not taking my sprinkles.

He is not coming over at all.

Not today, and not tomorrow.

Because Gillicut is scared of me now.

Scared.

Of me.

He thinks I bit him. And biting—it’s scary. And kinda weird. Much more violent than the twist-pinching and kicking and stuff that he’s been doing to me.

It doesn’t matter that it wasn’t really me.

He’s afraid.

My shoulders relax. The room looks brighter.

The future shines.

As I take a bite of yogurt, I hear a thump and feel Inkling’s furry body scrambling from the chair next to me onto the table.

“You’re here!” I say. My face bursts into a grin. “I thought you went to Land o’ Pumpkins. We said good-bye.”

“Well, I figured I’d come for lunch,” he answers.

“Did you miss your train upstate? Will you be able to get another?”

“I was on my way to the station,” says Inkling, “and I got to thinking you might need my help with Gillicut today.”

“You paid the Hetsnickle on pizza Friday,” I say. “You know you don’t owe me anymore.”

“Nah. See, pizza Friday wasn’t the Hetsnickle.” Inkling snorts. “I realized that this morning. All I did was bite a nine-year-old on the ankle.”

“So?”

“In the Mexican swamplands, where I come from, that would be nothing but a warm-up to a day of combat.”

“But—”

“I still owe you, Wolowitz. Dropping on Gillicut was nothing compared to what you did for me when that rootbeer attacked,” says Inkling. “Or when people mauled me at the Health Goddess. Or even just when your dad sat on me. What you do for me all the time, actually.”

“Does this mean—” I am scared to say it, almost. “Does this mean you aren’t leaving?”

Inkling leans against me. “Bandapat code of honor. I can’t leave until that Hetsnickle is well and fully paid. Plus, now that you’ve got a job, I think my squash worries are over.”

I realize: He doesn’t owe me.

He wants to stay.

He wants to be here, with me, more than he wants a whole patch full of pumpkins. More than he wants the Halloween Pumpkin-Carving Extravaganza.

“What’s for lunch?” Inkling asks.

I look.

My yogurt, a ham sandwich, dried apricots, Cheddar Bunnies, and water. A large yellow apple and a Tupperware of rainbow sprinkles.

All for me to eat in peace.

I open the container and push the sprinkles toward Inkling. “Have some.”

The Tupperware lifts, and a small avalanche of sprinkles pours into Inkling’s mouth. Then they go invisible. “Thanks,” he says, chewing. “Don’t mind if I do.”

A thing about Inkling is, he hogs whatever food he gets.

A thing about Inkling is, he shows up when you need him.

A thing about me is, I have an invisible friend.

And that means—

Anything could happen next.