The Invisible Enemy Read Online Free Page A

one prizesneak! I glared at Alyssa, but she was earnestly chipping away at her purple nail polish.
    I returned to my seat and quickly unzipped the pack. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it would all be there. It’s not as though anything
looked
valuable. My lunch, my binder, my calculator, my library book.
    No makeup bag. No orange-mesh-with-black-zipper-container-of-Vanishing-Powder makeup bag. She thought she was just taking a pretty cool bag. She didn’t know what she really had. Oh, please let me get it back before she found out.
    I stood up to go get it from her. The bus started to move. I sat down. What did I think she would do? Say, “Oh, silly me. Here it is,” and hand it to me wrapped with a bow?
    What should I do? What
could
I do? Tell Mr. Donaldson that my magic Vanishing Powder was missing? March up the aisle and punch her in the nose? Oh, sure. What a dumb mess this was. I so hated Alyssa.
    I clenched and unclenched my fists, silently mouthing my tirade at her.
    Michele looked at me sideways.
    “Are you okay?”
    “No,” I blurted. “I’m crazy mad about something, and I don’t know how to fix it.” I could hear my own voice tremble.
    “Oh,” was all she said, turning back to the view outside the window.
    Get a plan, I told myself, get a plan. As soon as we get there, I’m going to—And then I stopped, baffled. My brain was empty of all ideas. I couldn’t figure out what to do.
    I stood up again and sat down. My jean pockets were bunched up, stuffed with latex gloves from the library. I transferred them to my backpack. I took my jacket off, but then I felt cold and pulled it on again.
    Alyssa turned around and sneaked a peak at me. I gave her the all-powerful Stoner Stone-Face Glare, and she dropped her eyes first. Hah. My brain started to work again.
    By the time we got to the parking lot outside the Cloisters, I grabbed my chance.
    I stepped between Alyssa and Megan. “Giveme back my makeup kit,” I commanded. “Just hand it over now, and I won’t expose you for the thief that you are.”
    “You’ve already got your moldy backpack,” she said, “though why you’d want it, I’m sure I don’t—”
    “You know what I’m talking about, you snake,” I said. I realized it was a mistake to confront her with Megan there. It just made her show off.
    “Get out of my way.” She tried to brush past me and continue up the path.
    “Don’t walk away from me.” I stood my ground.
    She pretended to trip and stomped on my foot.
    “Ow! You rat!” I screamed, maybe a teeny bit louder than it hurt.
    “It was an accident!” she cried as Mr. Donaldson strode over.
    “Girls!” he huffed. “Your behavior is unacceptable.”
    “But—” I said.
    “But—” she said.
    “No
buts!
” He made us walk beside him while he started his lecture.
    “The Cloisters is a museum that opened in 1938. It incorporates actual cloisters and chapels dating back to the twelfth century and imported here from Europe. A cloister is a place of seclusion within a convent or monastery. It might be a walkway or courtyard where one goes to reflect. As you will see, the ancient stone architecture and the tapestries and medieval artifacts inside give a real feeling of another time altogether.”
    We trooped up the wide steps to the entrance, with the stone ramparts looming above us. I pretended for a moment that we were knights returning to our castle after a crusade or a jousting tournament. There would be a goat roasting on the fire in the main hall and troubadours ready to tell us a tale. Except there weren’t any Middle Ages in New York City and Alyssa was the only dragon around here deserving a lance through the heart.
    I thought about pushing her down the icystairway and ripping open her bag. I could see her nose dripping with mud from my boots and her silver jacket soaked in slush. I saw her being carted to the dungeons by knights and left to hang by her wrists from chains in the ceiling, her face squidged up as she