Invisible Inkling

I can’t believe this is happening. I have a rush of questions. “Are you hurt? Did Rootbeer bite you? Do you need a Band-Aid?”

And: “Why can’t I see you? What kind of creature are you?”

And: “You’re a boy, right? You sound like a boy.”

And: “Are there lots of your kind all over Brooklyn and we just don’t know it? How do you make yourself invisible?”

The creature ignores everything. “Let me tell you this,” he says. “I owe you, big-time. You saved my life.”

“Can you appear and disappear? What do you look like? Are you bleeding? Are you even real?”

“Of course I’m real,” the creature snaps. “We’re having a conversation, aren’t we?”

“Yes, but—”

“No buts. I’m here. I’m real. Get used to it. What’s your name?”

“Wolowitz. I mean, my first name is Hank, but I’d rather you call me Wolowitz.

“Wolowitz! I’m Inkling.”

Wow.

I am having a conversation with an invisible animal. A normal conversation, just like I’d have with a human.

I wish Wainscotting was here for this.

“Is Inkling your first name or your last?” I ask.

“It’s my name,” he says. “Lots of people have just one name.”

“Only pop stars.”

Inkling changes the subject. “What you did for me just now, Wolowitz? Fantastic. A heroic rescue. I am in your debt.”

“It wasn’t much,” I say. “Anyone would have done it.”

“Are you kidding? It was life or death with that—what did you call it?”

“Rootbeer,” I say.

“It was life or death with that rootbeer,” says Inkling. “I’m in your debt until I can return the favor. We bandapats have a code of honor.”

“Is that what you are?” I reach out. My hand connects with soft fur, though I still can’t see anything. I run my palm gently along Inkling’s back. “You’re a bandapat?”

“A little-known mammal native only to the Peruvian Woods of Mystery,” Inkling explains. “We are extremely cute but naturally invisible, which helps our species survive in the fearsome woods among predators and other scary stuff.”

“And you speak English?”

“Of course,” he says. “And Yiddish. And Mandarin. All bandapats do. Only there aren’t very many of us. We are endangered. I am the only one in Brooklyn. Possibly even in North America.”

“But why did you come here?” I ask. “I mean, with dogs and all that, I don’t imagine it’s very safe for you.”

“Bandapats eat squash,” Inkling explains. “We can eat almost anything, actually, but we need the squash because we need lots of vitamin A. What’s more, it’s really, really yummy.”

“Squash?”

“We prefer pumpkin, but we like butternut, too. Or acorn. Most any kind that’s not zucchini,” says Inkling.

“Back to why you came here.”

“Oh. Where I come from, among the Ukrainian glaciers—”

I interrupt: “I thought you said Peruvian Woods of Mystery.”

Inkling ignores me. “—there developed a shortage. All the squash growing among the glaciers was harvested by humans to cook into pies and serve with turkey.” He sighs.

“The last of my kind began to waste away for want of it. There were so few of us, so few—and finally, there was only me.”

Even though he’s for-serious lying—hello? there are no squash growing in glacier ice—I like his stories. He probably has an overbusy imagination, too. Plus, I feel a wave of sadness for Inkling.

He’s all alone, in a world that can’t even see him.

There’s nobody like him for miles, even continents, around.

“Why come to Brooklyn for squash?” I ask. “I mean, we have squash, you can get it in the stores, but it’s not, like, the squash capital of the planet or anything.”

“Ahh,” says Inkling, sounding excited. “There may be more squash elsewhere on the planet, but here in Brooklyn, you have bigger squash.”

“We do?”

“The biggest! I was looking for it when the rootbeer attacked me. Here in Brooklyn, you have the big round pumpkin.”

“You mean my family’s shop?”

The springs of the bed creak, and the pillow squishes up and down. I think Inkling is jumping. “Your family owns the big round pumpkin?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, this is news. Good, good news. You can’t imagine, Wolowitz, how far I traveled with that small bit of newspaper, that bit with the ad showing the pumpkin. Giving the address where I could find it. It was in an old issue of the New York Times food section that somebody threw out. Just luck that I read it, but as soon as I did, I felt like the pumpkin was calling me. I had a purpose. A destiny!”

He must be leaning forward, as I can feel his warm bandapat breath on my face.

“I am starved for squash. Haven’t had it in months. I came miles and miles and miles to get here. I camped out in people’s hatchbacks, on trains, planes, underneath seats in cross-country buses. I slept on park benches and underneath cars. All to get to that big round pumpkin—but when I got here, I couldn’t find it.”

“I saw you in the shop,” I say. “I saw you eat that waffle cone, and I think I grabbed you by accident under the kitchen sink.”

“That was you?” Inkling chuckles. “Sorry, I didn’t recognize you. All humans kind of look alike to me, honestly.”

“That’s okay.”