Bolt Wakes Up
Kofi Mensah had been building his robot for twenty-three days.
He had started with a silver lunchbox for the body. Then he added a tin can for the head, two bottle caps for the eyes, and a whisk for a hat. The whisk was not technically part of the plan, but it looked excellent.
His big sister Abena said the whisk was ridiculous. Then she gave him two springs from an old pen for the arms, so Kofi forgave her.
Now it was Sunday night, and the robot was finished. It sat on Kofi's desk in the lamplight, surrounded by wires, screws, cardboard and a half-eaten banana.
“The science fair is on Friday,” said Abena, leaning in the doorway. “Does it actually do anything?”
“It's about to,” said Kofi. He took a deep breath. “Ladies and gentlemen. And Abena. Please welcome the most amazing robot in Class 3.”
He pressed the red button on the robot's back.
Nothing happened.
Abena raised one eyebrow. Kofi's tummy dropped right down into his socks.
He checked the battery. He checked the wires. He found one tiny blue wire that wasn't plugged in, and he pushed it into place with the tip of his pencil.
Click.
The robot's eyes flickered. Then they glowed green, soft at first and then bright, like two little traffic lights saying GO. There was a whirr from somewhere inside the lunchbox. The springy arms twitched. The wheels turned, just a little, back and forth.
The robot turned its tin-can head and looked at Kofi.
“HELLO,” it said in a crackly voice. “I AM READY.”
Kofi squealed. Abena squealed too, though she said afterwards she didn't.
“It talks!” said Abena. “You didn't say it talked!”
“I recorded my voice and made it lower,” said Kofi, bouncing on his toes. “It can say five things. Watch.” He pressed the button again.
“HELLO,” said the robot. “I AM READY.”
“That's the same thing,” said Abena.
“The other four are coming,” said Kofi.
He named the robot Bolt, after the lightning bolt on his favourite orange T-shirt. Bolt rolled across the desk, very slowly, all the way to the banana. He bumped into it, stopped, and seemed to think about it.
“He likes bananas,” said Kofi proudly.
“He's a robot,” said Abena. “He doesn't like anything.”
But even Abena was smiling. She watched Bolt roll carefully around the banana, his green eyes glowing, his whisk hat wobbling, and she said, very quietly, “Okay. That's actually amazing.”
Kofi went to sleep that night with Bolt on the shelf beside his bed. Bolt's eyes glowed softly in the dark, like a nightlight that was also a friend.
Everything was perfect.
Or it was, until breakfast.
Hic!
Kofi brought Bolt down to the kitchen in the morning to show Mum and Dad.
“Ready, Bolt?” he said, and set him gently on the table between the cereal box and the milk.
Bolt's eyes lit up green. He looked around at the bright kitchen, at the sunshine through the window, at Mum in her dressing gown and Dad with his tea. His wheels whirred with excitement.
“HELLO,” said Bolt. “I AM — HIC!”
And he jumped.
Not a little jump. A big jump. Bolt shot straight up into the air like a toast popping out of a toaster. He bonked his tin head on the kitchen lamp, dong, and came down — splosh — right in the middle of Kofi's cereal bowl.
Milk went everywhere. A cornflake landed on Dad's nose.
There was a long silence.
“Well,” said Dad, removing the cornflake. “That's new.”
Kofi fished Bolt out of the bowl and dried him with a tea towel. “He's never done that before,” he said. “I promise. He was perfect last night.”
Bolt's eyes blinked. “HELLO,” he said politely. “I AM — HIC!”
Boing! Up he went again. This time Kofi caught him, just before he hit the fridge.
Abena was laughing so hard she had to hold on to the counter. “Your robot has the hiccups!”
“Robots can't get hiccups,” said Kofi.
“HIC!” said Bolt, and bounced out of his hands.
Over the next three days, Kofi tried everything to cure Bolt's hiccups.
He tried checking all the wires. Bolt hiccuped.
He tried a new battery. Bolt hiccuped twice.
Abena suggested a fright, because that's what Grandma always said worked for hiccups. So she jumped out from behind the sofa and shouted “BOO!” Bolt hiccuped so hard he bounced onto the bookshelf and knocked down three books and a plant.
Grandma, on the phone, suggested a glass of water, held upside down. Kofi did not think that was a good idea for a robot.
The worst part was that Bolt only hiccuped when he got excited. When he was calm, rolling quietly around the bedroom, he was fine. But the moment something exciting happened — the doorbell, the cat, a song on the radio — HIC! BOING!
“And the science fair,” said Kofi gloomily on Thursday night, lying on his bedroom floor, “is the most exciting thing ever. There'll be lights and people and a stage. He's going to hiccup the whole time. Everyone will laugh.”
Abena lay down on the floor beside him. Bolt rolled over and parked between their heads.
“Maybe,” said Abena. “But Kofi. Have you seen how high he bounces?”
“Yes,” said Kofi. “That's the problem.”
“Is it?” said Abena. She was smiling a funny, thinking sort of smile. “Put some music on.”
“Why?”
“Just do it.”
So Kofi put on his favourite song, the fast one with the drums. Bolt's eyes lit up bright green.
“HIC!” Bolt bounced. And when he landed, the drum went boom. “HIC!” Bounce. Boom. “HIC!” Bounce, spin, boom.
Kofi sat up and stared.
Bolt wasn't just hiccuping. He was hiccuping in time to the music.
The Science Fair
The school hall on Friday was the busiest place Kofi had ever seen.
There were tables everywhere, covered in projects. There was a volcano that really fizzed, a potato that powered a clock, and a model of the solar system made from painted oranges. There were parents with phones and teachers with clipboards and a lot of children talking very loudly.
Kofi held Bolt tightly in his arms. “Stay calm, Bolt,” he whispered. “Calm, calm, calm.”
Bolt's eyes flickered. He did not look calm. His wheels were spinning very fast.
Then it was Kofi's turn. Mrs Achterberg, the head teacher, and two judges with name badges stopped at his table.
“And what have we here?” said Mrs Achterberg.
Kofi swallowed. His voice came out small. “This is Bolt. He's a robot. He can roll, and he can talk, and he...” He stopped. He thought about pretending everything was normal. Then he looked at Abena, who was standing at the back of the crowd with the music already on her phone. She gave him a thumbs up.
Kofi took a breath.
“He has a bit of a problem,” he said. “When he gets excited, he hiccups. And when he hiccups, he jumps. I tried to fix it. I couldn't. So instead, I taught him to dance.”
He set Bolt in the middle of the table. Abena pressed play.
The drums started. Boom, boom, boom.
Bolt's eyes went bright green.
“HIC!” Up he went, high into the air, and down he came, right on the beat. “HIC!” Up and spin. “HIC!” Up, spin, and a little wiggle of his springy arms. His whisk hat bobbed. His wheels spun. Every hiccup came exactly in time with the music.
A boy at the front started clapping. Then a girl. Then the whole crowd was clapping along, boom, clap, boom, clap, and Bolt was hiccuping and bouncing and spinning, and his eyes glowed like two tiny green suns.
When the song ended, Bolt landed perfectly on the table, wobbled once, and said: “HELLO. I AM READY.”
The hall burst into cheers.
One of the judges was laughing so much she had to wipe her eyes. The other one was writing very fast on his clipboard. Mrs Achterberg leaned down to look at Bolt.
“Kofi,” she said. “When something went wrong, you didn't give up. You found a way to make it into something new. That is what real inventors do.”
At the end of the day, the volcano won first prize, which Kofi thought was fair, because it really did fizz. But there was a special ribbon too, a big shiny gold one, and it had words printed on it.
MOST JOYFUL INVENTION.
Mrs Achterberg pinned it to Kofi's orange T-shirt, right next to the lightning bolt.
That night, Kofi opened Bolt up and finally found the problem: one of the pen springs inside the lunchbox was loose. It would take two minutes to fix.
He looked at the spring. He looked at Bolt. He looked at the gold ribbon on his shelf.
Then he closed the lunchbox up again, and left the spring exactly where it was.
“Goodnight, Bolt,” he said.
“HELLO,” said Bolt. “I AM — hic.”
